A Personal Journey: From Call Center Agent to Owner.

DIY for Business Podcast. Fantastic sales techniques that are easy. Full Episode-79 with Richard Blank. Every week this DIY For Business show is to help the entrepreneurs of the world navigate through all the decisions that need to be made to start and grow a company. Our hosts, Russ and Greg, weave through the maze of hurdles that start-up and young companies are dealing with every day. Whether you are interested in the marketing, financial, HR, legal, or any other side of business, our hosts will discuss their thoughts and interview guests to provide insights. You might even have a few laughs along the way. DIY For Business offers guidance and support to entrepreneurs as they navigate the oftendaunting process of starting and growing a company. Our hosts, Russ and Greg, are here to help start-up and established companies overcome the numerous hurdles they face every day. Richard Blank owns a call center in Costa Rica and he shares some fantastic sales techniques that work for his team and can also work for all people to improve their communication skills. If he can teach a team of phone sales professionals how to sell in a new language, he can help all of us become more effective at listening and carrying on purposeful conversations. He also gets into when the timing is right for your organization to use a call center versus hiring phone sales people. Great conversation that needs to be heard in December 2022. Russ Catanach is an entrepreneur, marketer, and audio producer. He has produced countless hours of audio, consulted hundreds of companies, and founded a thriving entertainment and event production company. Russ started his career behind the scenes and behind the microphone of major market radio stations working with PBS, Clear Channel, and CBS. He currently hosts and produces three successful podcasts that highlight his audio production skills, sense of humor, and business intelligence. For the last 13 years, he has consulted small and medium-sized businesses throughout Northern California while developing database-driven marketing automation systems. As founder and CEO of Fog City Entertainment, Inc., he led a team that produced over 300 events annually for clients, including The Clorox Company, Major League Baseball, Yahoo, Google, and several major hotel groups. He has been on stage with acts including Penn & Teller, in the studio with Ryan Seacrest, and has interviewed hundreds of guests for broadcast and podcast. In addition to his professional background, he won second place in a stand-up comedy competition, won awards for acting and technical theater production, and is a trained improviser. Greg Louie has been a business owner and radio personality for over three decades. Greg has founded and managed five companies that include a marketing company for the service, auto, and medical industries. He also started a chain of golf retail shops building custom-fit golf clubs, an international golf radio show, and a marketing consulting firm in the technology space, which led to a media company. Greg has had success in growing his companies to expand both nationally and with his radio show international. Greg’s experience as a radio personality combined with running two marketing businesses and a chain of retail locations has provided the perfect path to currently partnering in creating Sellory Media, producers of DIY for Business, and The Safe Bet podcasts. We understand that entrepreneurship can be a challenging journey, and that’s why we strive to bring you not only informative content, but also some humor and levity along the way. So, tune in and join us on this exciting adventure as we explore the world of business together. A Personal Journey: From Call Center Agent to Owner If you can get past your parents' guilt, you can live anywhere. So I decided to make up my mind and stay. And the next thing you know, here we are 22 years later. I learned the business from the inside and out. I didn't start C-level. I learned everything within a call center and I sat with the proletariat. I was in the cubicles, making the phone calls, seeing the good and the bad, breaking bread. And so I skipped a step. https://youtu.be/LxQRoMcYJk0 https://youtube.com/shorts/KdJ-g-Nj0QQ Richard Blank has the largest collection of restored American Pinball machines and antique Rockola Jukeboxes in Central America making gamification a strong part of CCC culture.Richard Blank is the Chief Executive Officer for Costa Rica’s Call Center since 2008. Mr. Richard Blank holds a bachelors degree in Communication and Spanish from the University of Arizona and a certificate of language proficiency from the University of Sevilla, Spain. A Keynote speaker for Philadelphia's Abington High School 68th National Honors Society induction ceremony. In addition, entered into the 2023 Hall of Fame for Business along side other famous alumni. Paying it forward to Abington Senior High School is very important to Mr. Blank. As such, he endows a scholarship each year for students that plan on majoring in a world language at the university level. https://costaricascallcenter.com/en/outbound-bpo-campaigns/ #GregLouie #RussCatanach #DIYforBusinessPodcast #RichardBlank #CostaRica #CallCenter #Outsourcing #Telemarketing #BPO #Sales #Entrepreneur #B2B #Business #Podcast #Gamification #CEO #smallbusinesschronicles #successfulquitterspodcast #Saranunezbee Greg Louie, Russ Catanach, DIY for Business Podcast, Richard Blank,Costa Rica's Call Center, Outsourcing, Telemarketing, BPO, Nearshore, Sales, Entrepreneur, B2B, Business,Podcast,Gamification,Leadership,Marketing, Radio, Guest, Money, education, trainer, Creative Hiring Practices But if you're showing up telling me stories, I can tell you another thing. When they're filling out their resumes and they're putting in all of their bells and whistles and telling me all these adjectives on why I should hire them, I ask them to turn that piece of paper all over and write me a couple of paragraphs of a coming of age story. Tell me a time you beat up a bully or you saved a kitten out of a tree. Can you think outside the box compared to your memorized 20-minute interview? And can I also get a gem out of this? Yeah, you like storytellers. Somebody can riff off a story and keep you entertained. That's a talent that can really take place. The Power of Communication: Lessons from Helen Keller And for me, and just like you, Greg, you're mentioning, you see tell signs, you see it. Me, I think the purest form of communication is verbal because congruence is when audio matches the visual and usually it's inconsistent. And so let's think about, and you're talking about learning sign language and one of the greatest communicators, the master communicator of all time was Helen Keller. And there's a Helen Keller Institute here for blind and deaf children. Now, The late Helen Keller lost her sight and her hearing. We on the phone, we were taking away our taste, touch, and smell. The scientists say that your senses should be expanded when they're taken away. And so once again, Helen Keller mastered so many mediums of communication and all of the presidents like Eisenhower and Kennedy wanted to meet her and she was a phenomenal. And so with all due respect to this master communicator, I wanted to take advantage of this special superpower. We talked about active listening. It should be there. Phonetic Micro-Expression Reading Well, for me, there's phonetic micro-expression reading. Okay, this is sight on scene. And phonetics is broken down into four sections. You have your tone, rate, pitch, and duration. And let's just for argument's sake, look at 30-second to two-minute intervals as our communication here. Your tone of voice should always be consistent. I believe it always should be confident and empathetic. People talk about mirror imaging technique. Well, I wouldn't match someone's tone of voice if it were negative. So let's just keep it as a doctor, a lawyer, or someone that's a confident parent that you believe in. That's the sort of tone you want to give. It's very reassuring. The Dual Nature of Skills And just like fire, you could use it to cook your meals and to give light and life. But it can also burn somebody Festive Celebrations in Costa Rica So what are you going to do to celebrate? In Costa Rica, we have many activities here in December. First is I love the Festival de la Luz, which is our own like Macy's Day parade where they have all the floats and all the events that go down Main Street. And then another event that they have is called El Tope, where they have hundreds of beautiful horses with all the vaqueros and vaqueros and grand heroes that they come out and they walk down main street as well. Tips for Overcoming Language Barriers That's an excellent, excellent question. Soft skills and composure, and I believe a certain amount of rhetoric and extreme active listening and engagement can reduce any sort of stress somebody has. But I can give you some quick tips right off the bat. First is, since English is their second language, they might have an issue with vowels, and that's fine, A-E-I-O-U, I-A-E-O-U. So I asked them to write out the words phonetically. Still got to learn how to spell it. But if you can write yourself a cheat sheet and explain it properly so there's no strong accent there, that could reduce any sort of stuff. Ethical Stance in Call Center Operations I don't do sports books, casinos, stocks, pharmacies, or sweepstakes. We're in a very conservative Catholic country. So it's not that I can't fill the need of any sort of client, but it's really about the agent. They need to choose to make these calls. And so when you hear these horror stories, it's because people choose to make those calls. There's a thousand ways to earn a living. And if you're talented, you could do it the right way