116 | “Closing Without Conflict: Doug Wyatt’s Playbook for Technicians Who Hate ‘Sales’ (Live at Service World Expo 2025)

This episode is from service world at 20, 25 that we recorded with Doug Wyatt from synergy learning systems. Honestly, this is a pretty cool interview. Doug's a pro man. I don't know what else to say. I mean, he's a, he's a, he's a great dude, but he's a pro and, um, he actually, roped me into doing some role playing during the interview. That was just, it was out of the park. was so good. Um, so check it out, enjoy the episode and thanks for coming in and hanging out.

Great to be here Justin. Yeah. I followed your career for a really long time. It's great to be here on your show.

Yeah, it's really cool. And as you can see, if you're watching this on YouTube, you can see behind us, Doug's got an amazing setup. This is a really cool booth. And so what we're to talk about a little bit today is about how Doug can help, how he helps contractors. Because truthfully, you've thousands of, tens of thousands of contractors over the years. And we just wanted to kind of talk a little bit about what it is and how you do it and how you make their lives just that much better.

that. Thanks for having me on. really appreciate it. I listen, the contractor has a special part, special place in my heart. And in order to share what we do, I think I need to back up a little bit. I grew up in a small town in southwest Missouri, a little town called Nixa. And there, you know, we learned core values like honesty, character, integrity. Got up before the sun came up. We went to bed working after the sun went down. And there were a couple of things I took out of that small town. And that was that you should never have to lie, or steal in order to make

your way in this world, right? Here at Synergy Learning Systems, we talk about something called the grandmother rule, and that is if you wouldn't recommend it to your very own grandmother, your very own family member that you love and adore, we certainly shouldn't recommend it to our customer. And so we start there, and I say, you know, a lot of times the biggest thing that I see as a challenge for us in the trades is that we've grown up repeating a mantra to ourselves that we don't like school, we don't want to study, we don't want to go to class, and we really don't want to do those things if it has to do with being in the business of

or sales. And so coming from that small town in the country, I didn't like sales either. In fact, I hated salespeople. My father hated salespeople. And so as I got into the trades about 20 years ago, I realized that that was a piece that was really missing for a lot of us, not all of us, but for a lot of us to say, how can I effectively influence customers to choose me based on my value, based on my integrity, without having to be that sleazy, slimy salesperson, heart-closing people, selling them things they don't need, over-traveling

charging them, and I'm not talking about charging a fair, decent, premium price, because that's the only way we can grow a great company. But that's what we're all about here. It's bringing a new flavor and a new system to the business of sales and influence to help us grow our business from the call center, the time the phone rings, to the field, and everywhere in between.

Well, and you know, it's funny you say that the slimy sales guy, because how many technicians do you get in front of and they're like, I'm a technician, I'm not a sales guy. And you think, well no, that's what you are. And you'll probably agree with this, you we talk about the sales process with people and it's like, well, if you only give them one option, you've actually given them no option. Like it's a yes or no. So I think that's really good that you guys kinda highlight how do you sell without

being salesy.

Yeah, absolutely right. I'll say this, I'm glad that you said the options because one of the things that if you study the idea of psychology and the psychology of sales and influence, customers need to be able to say no. Right. And if you haven't provided any options, it's either yes or no.

Right? 50-50 shot. That's all you got.

The other thing is I think there's so many things that we can do in the trades to increase the amount of comfort, the amount of servitude that we provide to our customers. And if we're providing options based on what we would buy, that's not necessarily what's best for our customer. You talk about options, Justin, I always think a lot of us have a good, better, best. And a lot of times, the folks that hate sales and the ones that just want to be a great technician, a lot of times we eliminate the option of the highest, most premium solution because we think, well, we wouldn't pay for that or it's overpriced.

The challenge is that what if that person would have chose that even if it meant that they had to go and get a financing arrangement put in place, but because maybe it had eczema or maybe that they had some type of lung capacity challenge or they've had cancer or they've had a skin challenge, any of those things, right? And a lot of times I see us offering basic stuff because that's what we would put into our place or that's what they've always had.

think for technicians, it's so difficult for them to think about, like they're not their customer. You know what mean? Like they're not the customer. there's often times where they're like intimidated by even presenting that high option, because they're like, well, I wouldn't pay for that. Well, of course you wouldn't. You're a technician, right? Like you're not going to have somebody come out and do your own tune up. You're going to do it yourself. So I think that's pretty cool that your program kind of walks them through that in a very, I'm going to say eloquent.

I appreciate that. You we've developed seven foundations of effective communication. What I find is a lot of times when we shun away from sales, we also shun away from being an effective communicator. A big part of our program is also the mindset because if we walk into a home and we think that we're going to make a recommendation, even if we give three options, and we think that that customer, that homeowner is just going to accept us without some type of pushback, that's where the mindset comes into play. I like to say that I believe our homeowners have a

a fiduciary responsibility to say no, want to get the most for the least. So even if they believe everything that you've shared, if they like everything that you have, even in your premium option, they still have a responsibility to get the most for the least. They want the most for their dollar. So even if they've chosen you as the premier contractor in their area, if they love you as the technician, they still have a responsibility to ask you for a discount, to say, you know, just let me think about that or let me do a little more research and call you next week.

challenge to your viewing audience. If we don't work to master, and I mean absolutely master those things, Justin, you know, you've been on the contractor side, you've been incredibly successful. If we market our business properly, if we set up all of our operations, if we answer those phones, if we dispatch those vans, if we knock on those doors, we enter those entryways, we diagnose those systems, we have all the tools, we have all the inventory and we can fix them, and then we get down to the end. If we don't have a specific way that we ask for the order, and then a way that our

is geared and programmed to say their responsibility is to say no so that they don't wake up in the middle of the night with buyer's remorse. I want my customers to have the opportunity to say no. But if we're not prepared for when they say no, what are we going to say next and how do we keep the conversation going to work them through that part where they're having this pushback and saying, gosh, know, I think I could get that cheaper somewhere else. We're never going to have the type of success we could have. And I'm not saying that we don't have a lot of people successful.

I'm saying you're never going to build the business you could have, have the profits that you could have, if we don't focus on those last few steps. We've got to have the marketing, we've got to have the operations, we've got to have the technical skills. We've got to work on becoming masters of effective communication to help people through that consternation that they feel when they feel like they should be able to get it cheaper.

Well, customers, when I think about cheaper, right, and you talk to technicians and they go in the house and they get the pushback of price, right? Sure. And it's like, they're not contractors. They have no idea what the price should be. Right. But so many techs just shut down. Yeah. They hear no and it's like, my gosh. Yeah. Like, what do you do? So for anybody who's listening or watching, and maybe it's an owner on the truck, give us a tip to help them

sell the next job. What is a quick tip to help them overcome one hurdle?

Okay, one of the things I like to say is the one that trips up most of our clients and as you mentioned I've trained a thousand companies and 7,000 tradesmen. One of the number one things that I see people get tripped up on is the objection or the area of concern of I've got to think about it. Yeah. That is, it's like the easiest thing for one of our homeowners to say because they know what are you going to say? You're going to tell me I can't think about it? It's my home, it's my money. Right. And so what happens is we hear that and we go, yeah, I want to be respectful of this person so I have to let them think about it. I'll you a quick little technique.

and this is less than a 60 second role play. But it starts with a mindset. See, if we're an effective communicator and we've been doing a great job of discovery, serving that customer like our very own family or very own grandmother all along the way, when we get down to the end, the homeowner is supposed to say no. And sometimes no sounds like, let me think about it, because they want you to give them a discount, they're going to shop around, get three bids, whatever it is, they're going to ask you for a cheaper price. So here's what I say. There's only three things, Justin, that a person could think about. There's only three.

You could put these other things into these categories, but think of three umbrellas. Number one, when we get down to the end and we ask for the order, and that homeowner says they got to think about it, it's because they either have additional questions. Maybe we haven't been as thorough as we possibly could have been, and that customer actually has some questions about what we've recommended. The second thing is, what we have recommended, they don't have any questions about it, but they're not quite sure that's the correct product or service for them in their situation.

So we've either got additional questions or it's not the right recommendation. There's only one other thing. The third thing is the price. So let's just say this. Let's say that you're in the home. The homeowner has chosen you. They say, man, this guy is trustworthy. I like his company. I've read his reviews. He looks great. He talks the part. He sounds very educated. I love his recommendations. He's been so thorough. I have no questions. He wants you now. I want you as my contractor.

What I don't want to do is pay full price. Because I have a fiduciary responsibility to get the most for the least. So even if I want you and I want what you're going to do and I know how many questions, I just want you to do it for a little bit less. Okay? So here's what we do. We get down to the inn and the homeowner says, okay. In fact, just tell me you got a thing about it, Justin.

You know, Doug, I appreciate you coming in and showing me this, but I gotta think about it,

first thing I'm gonna do is I'm gonna do a little what we call rare listening. I'm gonna breathe life into your objection instead of dismissing you and your concerns because that's what high pressure salespeople do and none of us like that feels like we're on a used car lot. I'm gonna I'm gonna either do a little repeat I'm gonna acknowledge the emotion that I assume you must be feeling if you're not ready to move forward and you need to think yeah I'm gonna rephrase what you said or I'm gonna relate to you but what I'm not gonna do is say I understand because I don't understand. That's one of the worst things we can ever say to a homeowner that's concerned about

spending their money on a contractor and they didn't want to spend usually their money on what we have. So here's what do. Say it me one more time and then I'll go through it. Tell me you got a thing about it.

Doug, appreciate it and all the time you spent here, but I really got to think about it, man.

It sounds like this is a big decision for you Justin. You have a few concerns. You're just not ready to move forward and it's something that you're to need to take a little time and maybe sleep on for a little bit. that right? You know, while I can't imagine what it's like for you and your house, I feel like I can at least relate.

That's, yeah.

You know, most of the time in similar situations, when our customers have shared with us that they're not quite ready to move forward, they need to do a little additional thinking, they've shared with us that it's one of three things. Either they have some additional questions, or maybe what we've recommended here today isn't the exact perfect product or service for them and their family, or number three, it just comes down to the investment. Justin, let me ask you.

Which one is it for you? Do you have additional questions?

I think it was more than what I was planning to spend.

Okay, so no really questions. You feel like I've been pretty thorough. You understand what we're gonna be doing here today. You feel like the product and service that we've recommended is a right fit for you and your family? I do. It just comes down to the price. You know, often these things do require a little bit more of an investment than what we were thinking. Let me ask you this, Justin. How much too much is it?

I don't really know that I have a number. just, didn't think it was going to be so much.

Here's where we are think about this if I come back and ask him a question and number one we were doing a role play We didn't even know what when I was you know offering you right we didn't let the price out Let's just say that this recommendation was fifteen thousand dollars Okay So now if we have that number and I come back and I say so this entire project is going to be a fifteen thousand dollar investment That is sounds like it's a lot more money than what you were expecting How much too much is it you weren't thinking about fifteen how much were you thinking before I arrived here today?

Well, last time I got my AC replaced, was half of that.

Half. So significantly more. I you're talking about what $7,500? Yeah. So about $7,500 too much. I want to ask the audience, what would it be like?

If every single time from this point forward for the rest of your company's history, every single service call, every single sales lead, if your team had the ability and the training to be able to move somebody from, got to think about it, to the price objection, because we have a hundred ways and we should have been building our value against this price objection all along the way. So I just want if you rewind the tape and watch what just happened, you told me you need to think about it. I said, do you have additional questions? Is it not the right recommendation or is it about the price? Now you've told me it's 7,500 too much.

Now I have a tangible thing that I can work with. Now, there's a lot of other techniques there we could use. We could say, okay, let's dollarize the value, let's reduce to the ridiculous. That would sound like this. So 7,500, that was a while back that you had something similar done with a different company. How long ago was that, Justin? Ten years ago you had the system replaced.

It was probably 10 years ago.

Do think that my company, my warranties, my guarantees, the people that we hire, the way we serve our community, the drug testing, the background checks, the 500 five-star reviews that you shared with me that you had read, do you think all of that might be worth $7.50 a week, the cost of a sub sandwich for lunch one day?

I just want to say that was well played, sir.

So here's, when you ask me what's one thing, guys, that's just two of hundreds of things that we can share. But here's my point, Justin. I think there's a three-headed monster in our industry. For us to run a successful contracting business, like both you and I have done, and many of our viewers are currently doing,

We've got to make sure that we focus on how do we set up our business. That's all the operations. That's the trucks, the facility, the computers, the people, that's ops. And then we got to make sure, and marketing. And then we got to make that phone ring. But then we have to be able to do the work. We have have tech.

Delivery.

Technical experts, otherwise we have recalls. We're to get a business. We're going to get sued. We're going to all this liability. But we've got to do the technical work. And you know what? The scary thing is, Justin, that's where I see many of us stop working on mastery. We work to master operations. We get the right CRM. We hire the marketing companies. We get the uniforms. We do the wraps. We do everything. And then we hire the people. We do all the training. We get Nate certified. We do all these things. We do the repairs properly. We inventory our vans. We set up supply house relationships. And then we go out there and we run these calls. And we get down to the end. And you know what happens?

everything about everything about our company is perfect. And then we get down to the end and the homeowner says, okay, let me think about it.

I haven't ever done this before. did this 10 years ago. Your price is too high. Somebody else will do it cheaper. And we're stuck. And what do we do? We have people all over the country, thousands and thousands of us saying, OK, I'll email you. And then we get ghosted. My challenge to the viewing audience today is, whether you're the business owner, whether you're running a big operation somewhere in between, or you're the man in the truck, we have to focus on that third head, which is, how do we effectively communicate while lowering sales resistance, still getting five-star reviews, even if we don't land the job? Because we're not going to win them all.

I'm only after about 60 to 70 percent of the marketplace that's going to invest in premium value when shared what that value is and why they should choose us. We can't be in a race to the bottom. But if we get to the end and we or our team is getting tripped up by bids, brands, stalls, and price, I got to talk to the spouse, let me think, sleep, pray, let me talk to three other guys and it's first time I've ever done it or I did it 10 years ago and it was half as much, you're never, and I mean this, it's not that you won't have some success, you will

never have the success that you could have had if you would have worked to master that third entity, that third hit, which is effective communication, closing without conflict. How do we keep the conversation going? Walk out of those homes with 60 to 70 % of the business that will actually be able to see our value and invest in that value with a great company.

Isn't it interesting how terrified most technicians are of basic communication? Like just asking the question, like, what's the most important thing in making this? You know, just the basic, just like you did. mean, you just mastered to where I'm now ready to give you my extra $7.50 a week because you took that number and just, you made it ever so.

We've got to put it into perspective. By the way, when I talked about mindset just a little bit ago and I shared that with us in the audience, when I think about that, we as a human race, we don't like conflict. Now some of us might agree if we have an ex-wife, but other than that, most of us don't like conflict. Our technicians, sometimes, I'll tell you, I've trained 7,000 of them, they'll come up to me because they're not working for me, they're working for somebody else, they're in a training event, and they will literally share with me they hate their job. And I say, what do you hate about their job?

It's not the tools, it's not the work. They're not afraid of hard work. They're not afraid of getting up early, not afraid of working on the weekend.

What they despise about their job is being asked to go in there and close business, sell, and they hate rejection. We all hate rejection. We hate conflict. So what we did, this goes back to where we started this interview on this podcast, Justin, my country upbringing was to say, I don't want to pressure people. I don't want to create conflict, right? I've been in enough fights in my life growing up in the country. So what I want to do is I want to lower that resistance. I want to make people feel seen and heard and understood. I want to give them psychological air.

Let them breathe in like this person's actually listening to me, cares about me. If our technicians had a system and a process, and this is what happened at my company.

when they felt they had a system and a process that they didn't have to be the high pressure, pushy salesperson that was going to constantly get rejected or even thrown out of homes, right? One star reviews, then they have to face the company and how'd you get us a one star review? If we could create a way, like think if you had a magic wand and you could create a way in your call center, in your field staff, your techs, your comfort advisors, everybody and with one another, your leadership team to effectively communicate, to continue to keep sales resistance and conflict low,

We would all enjoy our lives better. You'd be a better parent to your teenagers. Your teenagers would communicate better with us. That's what we work on.

We're anywhere. This is what I like to say. Our programs are designed not just for the trades, for anybody in the human race that would like to have a more effective experience and communication style with other human beings where we could even agree to disagree. Right. Walk out of a home with as friends. Maybe maybe our price is too high. Yeah. For that putt for that customer. That's OK. We're not going to win them all. What I would rather do, by the way, Justin, is I would rather have fewer customers at more profit.

Love the one you're with. I'd rather have the people that would value the service and the people and the things, the great links that we've gone to in order to serve them in that way and then say, you know, it's a lot more than I thought or a little bit more than I thought. But now that I understand, I see yours the only option for me to choose for my contracting project.

So this was a master class put on by Doug. This was great. And you gotta check it out. This is the guy that people call when they wanna increase their sales. And the programs you have, and we've looked at some of them earlier today, are incredible. The time, the skill, the mastery you've put into it is super impressive.

I appreciate that. know, it's been a labor of love. absolutely love what I do. I, you when I got into the trades 20 years ago, I realized the trades didn't need another person to focus on the technical mastery. Right. They didn't need another person to help them with their operations and their inventory and their CRM and their marketing. Those are everywhere. What I found is what we in the trades need is somebody that has went out for 30 years to master. How do you communicate while keeping sales resistance down and then give the mindset to our people on the phones and in the

field that I can have these conversations and in the end we're going to win more than we lose but I'm not going to upset or piss off a single person along the way. And if a person in our business feels like I don't have to go into battle every day arguing with people, hard closing them, selling them things they don't need, you know what? They'll work harder to master that and they'll actually do it. And that's how I grew my two contracting businesses. Focus on those things. By the way, I'll say this, we're probably running out of time. Leverage activities, the Pareto Principle.

Right? Pareto has a principle, the 80-20 rule. If you haven't read this, I challenge you study this principle and test your own company right now.

80 % of your results right now, if you think about it, are probably generated by 20 % of your activity and 80 % of your revenue is generated by 20 % of your people. And then we're going to flip it on the other side. 80 % of your problems and your challenges are created by 20 % of your people. You're thinking about who they are right now. So you're thinking about that you're number one person and they're generating all the revenue. like, man, have I just had another Joey, right? And then you got this guy over here and you're like, man, Billy causes all these problems. He's never on time, his shirt's untalked, he doesn't serve customers well, never gets a five-star review. He does get ones occasionally.

20 % of our activities, in my estimation, if you've been working to master your operations, your marketing, all of those things to manage your business effectively, right? If you've worked to master your technical expertise so you can do the jobs better than your competitors, the next thing, the big rock, my recommendation is, we gotta start working to be effective communicators, close business without conflict, serve others better. That's the way I think the magic elixir is in our business.

That's fantastic. Doug, so how do people get in touch with you and find out more about some of the amazing programs you have?

Great question. Thank you for asking that. know, at Synergy Learning Systems, our URL is .net. It's not .com. So SynergyLearningSystems.net, if your audience would go to that website, go to the Contact Us page, as a gift for you having us on the show here today, Justin, I'd like to give away Foundation 3. We have seven foundations. Foundation 3 is 42 micro learning segments. It's six hours of training, and that's the program that we call the Wordsmith.

The Wordsmith is going to help our teams, both on the phones and the field and our leadership team, start to communicate more effectively with the words that we choose, Foundation 3. If you fill that out, there's a drop down there that you will see that we were on Justin D's podcast, and select that, and then we'll give that to you for free. It's all virtual. No shipping, nothing. Just, it's yours for joining us here today.

fantastic. Well thank you for coming and hanging out. And if you guys look in the back you can see this cool booth and if you look right here there's a QR code. Yeah. If you're on YouTube, if you're listening to the podcast obviously you can't see it but that means just go to go to YouTube and check it out. There's a free giveaway. Tell us a little bit about

You know the QR code that that's free giveaway if you can see it I don't know if you can see it on there But it's a $40,000 training package that we're giving away before the end of the year And so I encourage you hit that QR code You can also find it choose an email if that QR code doesn't work and we'll let you get in it that grand prize giveaway The reason that adds up to $40,000 is Justin. don't believe in quick fixes Yeah, if we think that we're gonna be able to go to a three-day training event and listen I'm a guy that does three-day training events

But I've never had the long-term consistent success from a three days. There's very few people that take all of that content and actually implement it. So what we did here at Synergy is we said, how do we solve the challenge of implementation? So what we designed is a 52-week path to mastery. And everything works perfectly together, from our call center to our field staff running on-demand service calls to our sales team selling the bigger projects, our installers, our leadership team. We handle it all. We create Synergy sessions for your team to keep this process moving forward for 52 weeks.

So, yeah, we do live events, but my true passion is how do we help solve these challenges over the course of an entire year, work towards mastery on small micro learning chunks. So that package, not only in 40,000 altogether, includes the full virtual program for all the departments. It also includes live ongoing coaching with me. We do role plays for everybody in our program. We're in six countries. People log in and role play every week with me. I coach them on the role plays and what they're working on in our process. do leadership training.

and then there's private stuff that we do just for those owners in that big package. So it's a heck of a package. I'm gonna be working my tail off for free on that. But as a marketer, listen, I think the more people that we get to toe into the program, like even that seven foundations and foundation three, my hope is that we add so much value that people say, look at our results that we got from a sliver. What can we do with the whole package?

Yeah, know, contractors are always looking for that silver bullet, that magic pill. And I think the 52-week program is a perfect opportunity to say this, The magic bullet is implementation. information's great, but if it's not applied, it doesn't be unique.

Is there any way I can take the mic and interview you for one second before you leave? Yeah, absolutely. You're a man who ran an incredibly successful business. You're still running multiple successful businesses. Now you've launched this podcast. I saw you last year on the main stage here at Service World as a key noter last year with your wife, Kristin. What would you say is one of the biggest differences between you and all of the men and women you've worked with around the country? What was it that helped you achieve that level of success?

Huh, that's a good question. I think probably two things. One, my wife is amazing and she is smart, way smarter than I am. And so that always helped because I could focus on the operation and the selling side of the business. The other thing is I very early on figured out that I'm not the smartest guy in the room and I didn't need to be the smartest guy in the room. So I always went and hired people that are way smarter than I am. And then, you know, I just kind of get to do my thing.

It's kind of like the E-Myth, right? If we're trying to wear all the hats and be the smartest person.

It's yeah, it's no good.

Good. Yeah, I can agree with that. One of the things that I've done is I have a focus on recruitment. Yeah. How do we get A players or really hungry B players that are wanting to become an A? I'll say this, in my organizations, I look at it and I go, I say every single day, every single word that comes out of your mouth, the time you arrive, the time you go home, the way you communicate with dispatch or the field, you're either a part of the problem or you're a part of the solution. There is no in-between. Every action that you take, you're a part of the problem or a part of the solution.

And so it's not that we won't make mistakes, we're all human, right? And so what I say is, when we find people that choose to be consistently a part of the problem, we have three options. It's like when we have cancer, right? And I'm not gonna say anybody on our podcast here today is a cancer, your people are, but you can behave like one. And so I say when you find a cancer, you have three options. One, you cut it out.

Two, you cure it, that's bringing them in, having the meetings, working to grow, right? And number three is you allow it to stay. You allow a cancer to stay, it's going to metastasize. It's gonna spread, it's gonna affect the good cells, and it's going to kill you over time. It might kill your profit, maybe you stay in business, but with cancers within your organization, it's gonna kill you one way the other. So I say, that can't be an option. We either have to get it out, or we have to cure it, but we cannot allow it to stay.

So three options.

My of A players is keep those guys around.

Yeah, you keep the Cs or the Ds, your A's aren't gonna wanna be there. I want A players that say, that guy fits with us, she fits with us. I want him or her to say, that B player isn't where we are, but my gosh, look at that work ethic.

Willingness, willingness,

I don't expect perfection. We would do these intense role plays every single week and then one full day every single month. I never expected absolute perfection. I speak in terms of E words a lot in our training, E's, expectation, I have very high expectations, effort, enthusiasm, energy. We're working towards excellence, Energy, enthusiasm. Here's the thing, if there's anybody in my organization that doesn't bring effort, you're a part of the problem. You bring effort, bring enthusiasm,

working towards excellence, I can tolerate that. I can encourage that. You can come into my roleplay sessions and not be perfect, but next week you better be better. I'm gonna be better than I was yesterday and tomorrow I'm gonna be better than I was today, right?

That is it. Man, appreciate you coming and hanging out. But all the information on how to get in touch with Doug, the programs, the giveaway, all that stuff will be in the show notes. call Doug, man. He's the guy. So thank you guys for coming and hanging out. Appreciate it,

Thank you for having me on.