The Unnatural Acts of Selling: How Top Performers Do What Others Won’t
Release Date: 12/04/2025
Are You Prepared for The Buyer Revolution?
Sales Today
The way buyers buy has changed - but most sellers haven’t. In this episode, Fred is joined by Steve Knapp (co-founder of PLAN.GROW.DO) to explore what the Buyer Revolution really means for modern sales. From buyers being 83% through their journey before speaking to you… to why most sellers are preparing for the wrong conversation - this episode challenges traditional thinking and offers a more practical, buyer-led approach. Key Takeaways Buyers are further ahead than you think Your first job is to validate, not qualify Preparation must match the buyer’s reality ...
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3 Steps to Combat Struggles in Sales (and Life)
Sales Today
In this episode of the Sales Today Podcast, Fred Copestake is joined by Marc Baladi, sales and senior leadership coach, and co-host of the podcast Beyond Enough. Together, they explore a challenge many people in sales quietly face: feeling overwhelmed, behind, or not good enough - even when they’re capable and putting in the effort. Marc’s argument is simple but powerful: You are probably not struggling with capability or effort. You are struggling with cognitive load - and not knowing what “good enough” looks like. In this episode Why...
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The Overlooked Sales Tactic That Builds Trust Fast
Sales Today
In this episode, Fred Copestake is joined by Ollie Whitfield of Slingshot Content to explore a sales tactic that surprisingly few salespeople use: running webinars themselves. While marketing teams often lead webinars, salespeople can use them as a powerful way to stand out, demonstrate expertise, and create valuable conversations with prospects. The key is doing them well. Not product demos. Not long introductions. And definitely not disguised sales pitches. Instead, the best webinars focus on insight, useful ideas, and real problems your...
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The Overlooked Sales Tactic That Builds Trust Fast
Sales Today
In this episode, Fred Copestake is joined by Ollie Whitfield of Slingshot Content to explore a sales tactic that surprisingly few salespeople use: running webinars themselves. While marketing teams often lead webinars, salespeople can use them as a powerful way to stand out, demonstrate expertise, and create valuable conversations with prospects. The key is doing them well. Not product demos. Not long introductions. And definitely not disguised sales pitches. Instead, the best webinars focus on insight, useful ideas, and real problems your...
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3 Ways to Improve Your Sales Prospecting Overnight
Sales Today
In this episode of the Sales Today Podcast, Fred Copestake speaks with Alex Nicholls-Gray, founder of The Prospect Experience Company, about why the prospect experience has never been worse and what salespeople can do to fix it. With automation tools and AI making it easier than ever to send thousands of messages, buyers are overwhelmed with generic outreach across email and LinkedIn. The result? Lower response rates, more spam complaints, and prospects who ignore most messages. Alex argues that the solution isn’t sending more outreach it’s improving the experience of...
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LinkedIn Is Not a Template Factory (Here’s What Actually Works)
Sales Today
Fred is joined by Mark Young, whose LinkedIn headline says it all: “A cat person helping technical AI founders earn trust before the first call.” This episode is a lively (and refreshingly sceptical) conversation about why so much LinkedIn advice is formulaic, outdated, or simply irrelevant - especially for technical founders and specialists who need trust, not vanity metrics. What you’ll learn Why a lot of LinkedIn “best practice” is recycled templates and pseudoscience The danger of chasing quick wins like “20,000 followers in 90 days” claims (and...
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Do Salespeople Need FBI Hostage Negotiation Skills?
Sales Today
In this episode of The Sales Today Podcast, Fred Copestake is joined by Sebastian Hidalgo, co-founder of DURINDAL and creator of the SWAT method - a sales framework influenced by hostage negotiation principles. Fred admits he’s often sceptical when crisis negotiation gets blended with commercial sales, so this becomes a lively, grounded conversation: what genuinely transfers, what doesn’t, and how to use “hostage” techniques ethically to improve trust, discovery, and positioning. What you’ll hear in this episode Sebastian’s unusual origin story: becoming...
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Surprisingly simple ways to use AI in sales
Sales Today
In this episode, Fred is joined by Tom Ridley, an AI sales coach, for a refreshingly grounded conversation about AI in sales. Instead of racing through a list of tools, Tom makes a different point: AI isn’t the story - being human is. The real value of generative AI (ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude) is that it removes the admin-heavy work salespeople hate and frees them up to do what matters most: have better conversations, build stronger relationships, and help customers make sense of complex decisions. They explore how to use AI to research accounts, focus on the right...
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Ethical marketing meets ethical selling
Sales Today
In this episode, Fred is joined by Chelsea Burns - marketing psychologist, brand ethicist, and non-manipulative marketer to explore where ethical marketing and ethical selling overlap… and where they can go wrong. Chelsea introduces a practical way to draw the line between persuasion and manipulation: Agency - a person’s genuine ability to choose. From there, the conversation goes deep into real-world examples of questionable tactics, why “FOMO” can backfire, and how the brain evaluates purchases immediately after the transaction. Chelsea also shares her four...
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The secret to faster training and coaching result
Sales Today
In this episode, Fred is joined by John Richardson, Co-Founder and Director of Coaching at My Sales Coach, to explore a key question: how do you get faster, more meaningful results from training and coaching? Their answer is simple but powerful: start with the right assessment. They unpack why great coaches are always assessing (without judging), how the right diagnostics can shorten the path to meaningful improvement, and why revenue alone isn’t a useful starting point for development. John explains how My Sales Coach uses assessments to build coaching plans with focus,...
info_outlineIn this episode of The Sales Today Podcast I am joined by Gerry Hill - widely regarded as a “pipeline savant” to unpack the uncomfortable truths behind pipeline health, buyer-centricity, conversational skills, and what truly separates top performers from everyone else.
Together we explore why good intentions often crumble under commercial pressure, how weak pipelines drive unethical behaviour, and why modern sellers struggle with basic conversational competence.
Gerry also shares practical guidance for sellers stuck in a “crushing low,” as well as his thoughts on resilience, generational shifts, and the realities of building a long-term sales career today.
Key Topics Covered
- Pipeline & Ethics: Why a healthy pipeline naturally leads to more ethical, confident selling and why scarcity triggers bad decisions.
- Buyer-Centricity Myths: The gap between what companies say about being customer-focused and what actually happens under quota pressure.
- Unnatural Acts of Selling: The uncomfortable tasks elite sellers consistently do (and others avoid) that drive predictable success.
- The Decline of Conversational Skills: How modern communication habits have eroded curiosity and real human interaction in sales.
- Resilience in Today’s Workforce: Generational differences, culture shifts, and why resilience is becoming a defining competency.
- Career Ownership: Gerry’s advice for younger sellers on financial literacy, choosing the right markets, and long-term career strategy.
“Selling is a series of unnatural acts. The people who win are the ones willing to do the uncomfortable things consistently.”
Links and Resources
Connect with Gerry: https://linktr.ee/gerryhill
Phone: +44 7702 034081
Follow Fred: https://linktr.ee/fredcopestake
Take the Collaborative Selling Scorecard https://collaborativeselling.scoreapp.com/
Watch this episode on YouTube: https://youtu.be/m9k5LXPqvoY
Watch my FREE YouTube Course: Sales Mastery for Engineers: https://bit.ly/Sales-Mastery-For-Engineers