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Selling in Color


Jun 8, 2021

Selling can be challenging, especially when your target audience is from a different culture. On today’s episode of Selling in Color, we’re joined by Felix Montelara, founder of the Latin Podcast Awards, who shares his challenges selling as a Latino, and how he overcame them to find success.

 Felix encountered challenges as someone of Latin descent.

  • Some challenges are the same - finding a way to address people's needs and wants. (Which are often two different things.)
  • As a Latino, Felix found he had to put his best foot forward to compete with the type of seller someone might expect.
  • Because he sold something specifically for brown and black people, his market was smaller, meaning he was limited on the number of potential sales.
  • People of color are often not in certain circles because they’re only a small percentage of media and the population.
  • Felix has also been hired for sales, only to have his company show him off for token diversity. 

How to overcome these challenges:

  • Whatever you go into, know your market. You want to go into each meeting feeling prepared to address any issue or concern.
  • You can find a mentor, read books, or just learn more about sales to obtain success. 
  • Don’t just sell to sell. Instead, sell to solve your target’s problem.
  • When Felix tried to sell to white people, he found them much more apprehensive and questioning his product. That’s when his deep product knowledge paid off- because he could address concerns to overcome reluctance. 

The importance of community in sales:

  • People of color can't expect an outside group to come to bail them out.
  • We need to create men and women who know what they're doing and can support from within.
  • Simultaneously, we need to branch out and create unity between different groups of people. 

Felix’s final thoughts:

  • We’re all in sales at some point in our lives. Everyone. Even just to get that first job, you put your best foot forward and present information that's needed to grab someone’s attention. 
  • Don’t allow your thoughts about “them” to sabotage your success. 

If you want to get in touch with Felix, contact him via the Latin Podcast Awards’ website, or email him at fmontelara@latinpodcastawards.com 

This episode is brought to you in part by Skipio.

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This course is brought to you in part by the TSE Sales Certified Training Program, a course designed to help new and struggling sellers to master the fundamentals of sales and close more deals. Help elevate your sales game and sign up now to get the first two modules free! You can visit www.thesalesevangelist.com/closemoredeals or call (561) 570-5077 for more information. We value your opinion and always want to improve the quality of our show. Complete our two-minute survey here: thesalesevangelist.com/survey.

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Audio provided by Free SFX and Bensound. Other songs used in the episodes are as follows: The Organ Grinder wrote by Bradley Jay Hill, performed by Bright Seed, and Produced by Brightseed and Hill.