Authenticity, Trust, And Communication In Marketing And Sales

People don’t choose the “best” service on paper. They choose the person they trust with their money, their time, and their expectations. Shelby McFarland sits down with Alexis Valenti to talk about what we’re both seeing right now in sales and why buyers feel more cautious, especially when they’ve had a bad experience with a past provider.

We break down the real differentiators that make someone pick you over a competitor: authenticity in your pitch, the courage to tell the truth when a solution isn’t a fit, and the patience it takes to rebuild trust after it’s been broken. Alexis brings a unique perspective as both a digital marketing consultant and an aesthetician, so we connect the dots between marketing results and personal-service results, and why both require consistency and proof over time.

We also get practical about follow-up, ghosting, and timelines. If someone isn’t interested, we’d rather hear a clear “no” than chase a “maybe” for weeks. On the business side, we talk about building a respectful sales process that sets expectations, keeps communication clean, and protects your energy. Then we dig into value vs price, including why high retainers and extra travel costs don’t automatically mean better outcomes, and how a local marketing agency can be an advantage when responsiveness and accountability matter.

If you want a stronger sales process, better proposals, and a client experience that makes trust easier, this conversation will help. Subscribe, share this with a business owner who’s hiring help right now, and leave a review. What makes you trust a provider fast?

Transcript

Welcome And Quick Setup

SPEAKER_00 0:27

Hey y'all, what's up? Welcome to the Marketing Happy Hour Podcast. I'm your host, Shelby McFarland, the marketing broker, and today I have a very special guest, the one and only Alexis Valenti. Hey girl. Almost Cody.

SPEAKER_01 0:43

Almost.

SPEAKER_00 0:43

Almost.

SPEAKER_01 0:44

40 days.

SPEAKER_00 0:45

40 days. And she's going to be tied away to her husband and turned into a housewife, right?

unknown 0:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 0:52

So Alexis works for me at the marketing broker, and she's one of our digital marketing consultants, but she's also an aesthetician. So tell us a little bit about yourself and your business.

SPEAKER_01 1:02

So I'm originally from Shreeport, Louisiana, and I moved here eight years ago, and I ended up going back to school for aesthetics. And then right out of school, I opened my own business. And so it's been almost four years now, and I love the marketing side so much. And so I went to school for that. And then I bugged Shelby about five times to see if I could work for her. And she finally gave in. Probably felt bad. But no here.

Honesty As A Sales Advantage

SPEAKER_00 1:29

No, I love it. I knew if she kept reaching out, I was like, I mean, if she's doing this, then of course you can work for me. And she's such a hard worker, been here a few months now, and have made lots of connections. But what we're talking about today is gonna be something that me and her both are experiencing in this very moment in sales. And I'm really hoping it's because of the economy, not because we suck at our job, because I mean we're pretty great at what we do, right? Okay. So we're gonna be talking today about what makes someone choose you over your competitor. And this is a topic that we discuss every Monday because we're like, okay, what can we change about our proposals? What can we change about our conversations with people? And there's a few things that really make us stand out above our competitors. So as we talk about that, I want you to be thinking about your own business, whether you're in marketing or your sales, or um maybe you have a product that you're trying to put out there and how you can really stand out above your competitors. So, what would you think is one thing that we do that our competitors may not do, or we do it better?

SPEAKER_01 2:28

I think our being genuine is our biggest thing. Like we are very upfront about what we're gonna do. We don't lie, and I feel like that makes the biggest difference in any business. Like being authentic and genuine, that's probably the biggest thing.

SPEAKER_00 2:43

Yeah, and when we're talking to people, we're like, yo, this isn't gonna work for you, or this is gonna work for you. I mean, just a couple weeks ago, I had to tell someone that they were using somebody else and they asked me, well, what can you do better? And I said, honestly, they're doing a great job. So if they're doing a great job, I'm not trying to come in and steal their business because then we're having to start over from zero, or I'm really trying to establish a relationship based on promises that would literally be equal of what the other person was doing. Exactly.

SPEAKER_01 3:11

You know, yeah.

Ghosting, Follow-Up, And Clear Nos

SPEAKER_00 3:12

And I really don't want to be that person that's like, oh, she comes in and steals. Although, I mean, we'll take it, but at the same time, it's one of those things. But with your like doing sales and things, what do you think is the most frustrating part? And I already know this answer, but what's the most frustrating part when you're dealing with um clients or potential clients? And before you answer, we only want to talk about this because if you are somebody that is trying to hire an agency, this is important because these are what like frustrations we have on the other side of things.

SPEAKER_01 3:41

I think my biggest frustration, and this goes for aesthetics as well too, is if you're not interested, just say no. Like just reply and say no. Um, don't just let us keep on keeping on with you. You know what you want from the very beginning, and we can only help so far. If you're not interested, like just say no so we don't waste your time and we don't waste our time either, honestly.

SPEAKER_00 4:05

And the way that I mean I've helped train you, but then also our personalities are the same. We don't want to nag. Exactly. I don't want to be like, yo, it's me again. Hey, what's up? You know, I had a conversation with an insurance guy last week. He told me something two weeks or two months ago, like, hey, I want you to do my social media. Okay, great. So what do I do? I'm following up with him. I'm trying to make a conversation. I'm having Alexis follow up with him. And he finally calls and says, you know what? I really want to work with you, but it's gonna be July. Okay, I don't like to hear that, obviously. I want his business now, but I appreciate him saying July.

SPEAKER_01 4:39

Yeah, you know, for sure, yeah.

Rebuilding Trust After Bad Experiences

SPEAKER_00 4:41

And then also I think something over with us is you can trust us, but we also um we are trying to gain the trust that other people have broken. And I'm sure you've had conversations about that with people. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 4:55

I think gaining trust back whenever you've kind of been wrong, not wrong, but maybe you've gone to a different esthetician and they might have burned you or something like that, and then they come to me and they're terrified. But that's actually the treatment that they really need most is really just building back that trust. And it's hard, it can take like two to three months depending on that person. But I think being patient really is the biggest thing, and being genuine, like being yourself is the biggest thing because once a trust is broken, there that's you know, that's a really hard thing. No matter how good you are, even you know, if you're the best of the best, like you still have to earn that trust back. And I think with both of these businesses, you know, we have a lot, people trust us a lot, and that's amazing feeling.

Value Over Price And Going Local

SPEAKER_00 5:43

Well, and they're trusting us with like giving them numbers as a results, not necessarily now. With you, I mean they have treatments and maybe their acne gets better, the rosacea gets better, you know, things like that. And with marketing or digital marketing, we're like your followers are increasing, you're getting more engagement, you're getting, you know, you're getting out there more, people are seeing you more. So it's kind of hard to sell that on an empty promise at the very beginning, especially whenever your trust has been broken with another marketing agency. I talk to a lot of clients and I just kind of refer to it as dating. Like if you're a man hater or a marketing agency hater, we are here for it. And we are trying to get your trust back and just let us, you know, have that three months to really prove like, hey, what we're doing for you is working. And then these are things that we can kind of change moving forward or pivoting or something like that. I would also say with a digital marketing agency, you need to think about like when you're hiring them, what their value is over just price. Yeah. I mean, think about that one that you just had, the dental guy. He said he was gonna pay seven grand a month and then he was gonna pay for them to fly in to our state. What do you think about that?

SPEAKER_01 6:51

I think it's wild because yeah, I feel like you can spend that much and still not get the results you want. And like with us, I I feel like we're very reasonable, but we're the best.

Communication That Wins Clients

SPEAKER_00 7:07

So duh, here we are. So what I did was we took that seven grand. We're like, okay, this is what our fee is every month out of that. This is what we can provide. And then we took the extra money on top of that and was like, hey, let's put that towards ads. And guess what? You don't have to fly us to Arkansas, you don't even have to pay us gas money to your business. Like, that's all included in our fee because we're right here local. And that's something that I really want you guys to understand is being with someone that's local is really a big advantage. Now, if you're out of the state and you're like, hey, I want to work with a marketing broker, absolutely, we'll take you on. We have people all over the US. But if you have someone down the street that can help you, that may be an avenue for you to really explore and see if you work well with them for sure. And the last thing is the quality of communication. That's really something I am harping on in general as with communication. I used to be terrible at it. Like, ask all of my exes for sure, you know. Ask all of them, all the people that used to work for me. Like, I was really bad at communication. And Nick's probably listening. I was like, used to be like, what are you talking about? Um, but it's something that I really have worked on really hard so that way we have open communication with our clients. If it's not working, it's not working. If they want to meet with me twice a month or once a month or three times a month, whatever that is, I'm always open. And I'm sure you also understand the importance of communication too. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:29

I mean, I feel like with both of our businesses, we're so fast in replying to each other. Like my other friends, I do apologize to y'all. But if it's I'm the best though, yeah, I'm still the best. But if it's business related, I'm replying immediately. I get all my texts, all my emails straight to my notifications, and they're getting answered immediately. So I think our communication is top tier.

Final Thoughts And Sign-Off

SPEAKER_00 8:56

Absolutely, because I mean we want to make money. Exactly. And if we're not communicating, we're not talking to them. And that's something I've heard from clients as well. Whenever they've worked with other marketing agencies, is like it's like 24 to 48 hours before a response, or you know, and if you're trying to get a hold of me and I'm not in the office that day, I have like a whole system in play of like, hey, you can reach me tomorrow, or hey, how can I help you? But someone else can. So that way it's always someone in um communication with you about everything. So if you want to close this out, you can. Thank you for listening to the marketing happy hour podcast. We'll catch you next week.