161: Sell with Authority – Interview with guest expert Mike Saunders

Positioning Authority Coach at Marketing Huddle

Authority Positioning Coach Mike Saunders talks with Bill Ringle on My Quest for the Best about marketing hurdles, learning from failure, and the phenomenon of creating “Done for You” assets.

>>>Visit MyQuestforTheBest.com for complete show notes and more expert advice and inspiring stories to propel your small business. My Quest for the Best is a top-rated small business podcast with over 300 episodes of thought-provoking and insightful interviews with today’s top thought leaders and business experts. Host Bill Ringle’s mission with this show is to provide the strategies, insights, and resources that will unlock the growth potential of your business through these powerful conversations.

Interview Insights

Key points that you’ll learn from this interview:

• Why strong companies don’t eliminate marketing completely when times get tough.
• How having authority assets distinguishes you from your competitors
• The importance of regular “marketing huddles.”
• The biggest takeaway from failure.
• What it means to have Authority Positioning.

Read the Show Notes from this Episode

• 1:12 How the 2008 economic crisis was the impetus for Saunders to get his MBA in Marketing, and eventually form his marketing firm Marketing Huddle.
• 2:00 [On keeping the marketing budget in tough times] – “They would keep that momentum going knowing that their competitors were cutting back and they would gain that market share.”
• 2:05 “For the last 9 years I’ve focused on helping small business owners, entrepreneurs, consultants with their marketing with some real cutting edge marketing strategy.”
• 2:30 How Authority Positioning will grant you the distance you need between you and your competitors.
• 3:19 [On the term Huddle] – “A lot of times in business consulting you’ll see them recommend ‘Do a daily huddle, do a weekly huddle, get your team to come together to talk about what’s working, what’s not.”
• 5:05 [On Daymond John] – “He wants to see the people who have failed so he can learn from the failures.”
• 5:13 “Most of the time you hear that phrase, you win or you…and people are like ‘yeah yeah yeah, lose, win or you lose!’ No, you win or your learn.”
• 5:40 “If it doesn’t turn out the way you want it, take those lessons, move on to the next iteration of that plan and move on to build from that.”
• 6:40 You have to be wired to be an entrepreneur, otherwise you’ll run for the hills at the first setback.
• 7:20 “You need to have the strategy before the tactics because if you just start throwing tactics out there without a strategy then you’re really going in multiple directions.”
• 7:40 Points out the importance of Steven Covey’s phrase, “Begin with the end in mind.”
• 8:16 [The biggest takeaway] – “Maybe there was a small level of success, well let’s just do it again but do it a tiny bit better, or a little bit longer, or align with the right strategic alliances.”
• 8:55 “I don’t think anyone starts a business and has this consistent trajectory upward, there’s going to be those ups and downs.”
• 9:41 “The problem came where I was trying to be too many things to too many types of people, and I was never an expert in one specific thing.”
• 10:16 [On Writing Authority Selling] – “Everybody’s doing good content on social media, good content on a blog post, but not many people are out there writing a book.”
• 11:43 How writing his first book on business social media led him to find more opportunities.
• 11:57 “It was at that point I realized that if I had just given a two minute elevator speech about how people should do social media differently, it would’ve gone in one ear and out the other.”
• 13:32 [On being an influencer] – “We don’t have superstar celebrity movie star status, but guess what we do have. We have a message and we have some expertise that we are really good at in what we do for our customers and our clients.”
• 14:05 “A marketing consultant does a lot of things, but an authority positioning coach, now that’s interesting, how can that help me?”
• 14:30 “We all are selling, but when you can sell from the position of expertise and authority, your ideas will land that much better.”
• 15:50 “Having a position of authority helps you to sell or promote your business and your ideas from a whole different mindset than your competitors.”
• 17:21 How a graphic designer used Saunder’s Authority Positioning Model to differentiate himself. “I helped him become an Amazon bestselling author without writing a word.”
• 18:41 The importance of having long term authority positioning assets.
• 19:26 “Your prospects are googling your name and your brand, because maybe they were introduced to your name by a friend.”
• 21:59 “The ‘done for you’ model is so viable because people these days want something done for them, handed to them, and quickly without a lot of hassle.”
• 23:40 “There’s a disconnect between your head and your hands.”
• 25:16 [On establishing authority positioning] – “You gotta start small.”
• 27:00 5 Question Round
• 30:55 “Building your authority is your number 1 priority.”

Expert Bio

As the Authority Positioning Coach, I help entrepreneurs break out of obscurity by amplifying their hidden expertise to a position of status & prestige to become THE go-to Authority & Expert in their industry. The Authority Positioning Coach is a Boutique Marketing Agency providing “Done-for-You” Authority Positioning Packages to elevate your brand to a position of status and prestige.

I am the author of Amazon’s Bestselling book, Authority Selling™, a contributor to The Huffington Post, an Adjunct Marketing Professor at several Universities, and a member of the Forbes Coaches Council – an invitation-only community for the World’s Most Influential Business Coaches.

Contact Info for Mike Saunders

• Primary Website
• Travels from: Arvada, CO
• Phone: (720) 232-3112
• Connect on LinkedIn | Twitter | Facebook

Resources Mentioned by Mike Saunders:

Below are key people, places, books, quotes, websites, and other resources that we discussed so you can explore further.

• Daymond John 
• Stephen Covey
• Seth Godin

Books Authored by Mike Saunders