Category: Announcements

Blog posts that are announcements, usually about upcoming seminars and training workshops.

HPS Community Forum Meeting – It’s Not the Words; It’s the Intention — Thu 23 Oct 2025

Dear Readers,

You are invited to join this week’s High Probability Selling Community Forum meeting (it’s free):

It’s Not the Words; It’s the Intention Behind Them

In his article “Poison Words: The Top 6 Words that Sabotage Sales,” Jacques Werth, founder of High Probability Selling, described how certain words — like Interested, Help, Honestly, Just, Thank You, and Great — can create mistrust when used in traditional selling.

But as we’ll explore together, the real issue isn’t the words themselves — it’s the intention behind them and how we use them.
When we use words to influence or control, even harmless phrases can become “poison.”
When we speak truthfully and respectfully, even ordinary language can create a safe place for connection and trust to develop naturally.

We’ll talk about:

  • How intention shapes communication more than vocabulary
  • When some of those “poison words” might actually work with HPS
  • How to recognize and change subtle patterns in your language
  • How to de-militarize the language of sales and align words and metaphors with genuine respect

Two sessions will be offered this Thursday, October 23, 2025 (tomorrow):

  • 🕤 9:30 AM (USA Eastern) — hosted by Carl Ingalls
  • 🕡 6:30 PM (USA Eastern) — hosted by Paul Bunn

Each session will last one or two hours.  You’re welcome to attend either or both.  They will be different. 

Recordings.  Both sessions will be recorded.  Both recordings will be made available to everyone who attends either session (and provides a name plus email address).  If you are not sure that you will be able to attend, you may request the recordings in advance (by Thursday night at the latest). 

Join the Forum via Zoom: (it’s free, no need to register, just show up)
🔗 https://us02web.zoom.us/j/83436793215?pwd=amFiMVorZDFWbmxpdnJCOUphVThlUT09
(Same link for both sessions.)

We look forward to another thoughtful and authentic conversation on the principles that make High Probability Selling work.

After the Zoom meetings, this post will be replaced by a summary of what was discussed and revealed in the meetings.

Feedback We Received About This Blog

A few days ago, we sent an email to most of the people who subscribe to the HPS Blog.  We asked questions about posting frequency, length of posts, type of content, style, and anything else.

The email was sent to 256 subscribers.  The reported open rate was 36%.  Several people took the time to respond.  Here’s what we learned:

Frequency

Opinions varied.  Some want a post every weekday, while others prefer just one per week.  Most readers seem comfortable with the current pace of 3–4 posts per week.

Length

A mix of lengths works best.  Short posts are easy to digest, but many readers also want the occasional longer or deeper article.

Content

Readers are most interested in clear, practical applications of HPS and concepts that they can use right away.  Comparisons with other sales methods should be minimal.  Case studies are welcome.

Style

Most responses indicate satisfaction with the current style.  A practical and informative tone is appreciated, with some readers valuing variety in approach.

Our Conclusions

  • We will continue posting at roughly 3–4 times per week, while keeping in mind that some readers prefer fewer, and some prefer more.
  • We will maintain a mix of short posts and occasionally publish longer pieces, especially case studies or deeper explorations.
  • We will stay with our current tone — clear, conversational, and useful.

Thank you to everyone who responded.  Your feedback helps us keep the HPS Blog relevant and valuable.

How to Apply HPS Principles When Giving Advice

Giving advice can be tricky.  Even when people ask for it, they don’t always accept it—or act on it.  In a recent seminar (25 Sep 2025) we explored how to apply the principles of High Probability Selling (HPS) when offering advice, so that the advice is more likely to be welcomed, considered, and used.

We covered very specific examples of how to use HPS when delivering advice, both free advice and paid advice.

Here are a few of the key points covered.

The first principle is making certain that the recipient will value the advice enough to actually want to hear it.  The only way to know for sure is to ask.

Another principle is understanding that pushing causes resistance.  When you push your advice, even on someone who wants to hear it, they are less likely to accept it.  As an alternative, you could tell them what they could do, instead of telling them what they should do.  Our passion and strong opinions can get in the way here.

Remember, the advice giver is not the one who will have to live with what happens when the advice is followed.  When you make sure the recipient plays a major part in making the final decision without being pushed or even nudged, you provide far more value to the recipient, no matter what they end up deciding.

The full recording of the seminar is available.  Regular price is $50 USD.  A discount of $25 is available to members of our HPS Community Forum.

If you want this recording, you may purchase it here. 

“Advice is like snow; the softer it falls, the longer it dwells upon, and the deeper it sinks into the mind.” — Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Comments on this blog post are welcome, and especially from people who have watched and listened to the recording.

New Course: Fundamentals of High Probability Selling, an Interactive Workshop

In this workshop, you’ll gain a clearer understanding of what selling truly is, why “interest” doesn’t predict buying, and how to identify High Probability Prospects.  You’ll learn the principles and standards that guide HPS.  You’ll learn why most methods create resistance and weaken trust and respect.  You’ll see why uncovering potential roadblocks early shortens sales cycles, and how shifting from chasing business to choosing customers changes everything.

This workshop is the starting point for learning High Probability Selling.  Nothing else in HPS will make sense without it.

Details

  • Price:  $500 USD per student
  • Format:  Group workshop, live and interactive on Zoom
  • Duration:  2 weeks, possibly 3
  • Two sessions per week:
    – First session:  primarily instruction
    – Second session:  review and Q&A
    – Each session:  2–3 hours
  • Recordings:  
    – All sessions will be recorded. 
    – Students may view or download them at no extra cost.  
    – We may sell the recordings later.
  • Written materials included.
  • Schedule:  Will be set to meet customer requirements.
  • Open to all
    – with or without reading the book first
    – with or without prior instruction

To sign up and purchase:
https://highprobsell.com/product/fundamentals-of-high-probability-selling-500-usd

If you want to talk with an expert about this workshop, you may book an appointment here:  

Or email us: info@HighProbSell.com

Discovering Beliefs About Selling That May Be Holding You Back

Black and white portrait of a man with curly hair and a mustache, accompanied by a quote from Mark Twain about knowledge and trouble.

HPS Community Forum Discussion, Thu 3 July 2025 at 9:30 AM (USA Eastern Time)

During our last HPS Forum, one of our participants listed NINE separate sales training systems and trainers he had experienced in over a dozen years of his selling career.  There are over 70 sales training systems on the FIRST PAGE of a Google search for sales training. 

Most, if not all of them take the same general approach to selling; different tactics, motivation, processes, gurus, and psychological approaches abound.  All of them claim to be the end-all-be–all solution to everyone’s selling challenges and woes.  On the surface they are different, but underneath all the rhetoric and clever words; down deep they are all the same.  They are all founded on unexamined beliefs and thoughts from over 100 years ago.

The one premise that is sacrosanct and is “known” to all is that selling is about getting someone to buy, generally something the salesperson wants to sell but the prospect doesn’t want to buy.  Hardly anyone examines those principles and beliefs, and those who do question them are shut down by their managers and trainers.

The few who survive to transcend those beliefs become top producers and are no longer allowed near the group for fear that their perspectives will somehow damage the organization’s precious fragile status quo belief system.  They focus their time on the people who are ready to buy and do business.  But for heaven’s sake, don’t start thinking like them and scaring the rest of us…

Many of us, myself included, have been tempted by the lure of the irresistible offer… the no-brainer solution… the deal no one can turn down.  It’s not some kind of mass gullibility pandemic.  It’s unexamined beliefs and thoughts that keep us from a profitable outcome.

On this week’s HPS Forum we will uncover and examine some of these beliefs and thoughts that hold all of us back, waste our time and lives, or frustrate us far more than necessary.

We will, for an hour or so, stop chasing the dream pitch and the offer no one can refuse, and methodically take a real look at our collective and individual beliefs about selling, and share some ways to consider to change our perspectives, and therefore our results for the better.

Notes for the call itself:

  • Get back to the safety of Groupthink.  If there even were people who wanted to buy something, then there would be no need for a salesperson, right?
  • Nobody BUYS insurance; it HAS TO BE SOLD.  Everyone knows that.  And nobody (in their “right” mind) questions that because it’s so universally true.
  • All buyers are liars.  Prospects never tell you the truth.  Clients ALWAYS keep you from knowing what they can afford.
  • If there are no objections, then you’re obviously not working hard enough.  You can’t afford to leave money on the table.

Zoom Details Below

When:  Thursday 3 July 2025 at 9:30 AM (USA Eastern Time)
Google Calendar Link

To join this Zoom meeting (at the correct date and time), please click on this link.
[removed]

If you want to join the meeting by voice phone instead (audio only, no video), find your local number here and dial it from your phone:  
https://us02web.zoom.us/u/kcgbhyheSS
You will need to enter the following:
  Meeting ID:
  Passcode:

This meeting will be recorded.  A link to the recording will be emailed to the people who attend this meeting.  If you want a copy of the recording for this particular meeting, and are not sure that you will be able to attend, please respond to this email with a request for the recording before the meeting begins.

There is no charge to attend.  You are welcome to invite friends and colleagues.

No bots are allowed.  This includes AI note-takers and recorders.  Humans only. 

Perfectly Logical Reasons Why High Probability Selling Cannot Possibly Work

  1. High Probability Selling (HPS) is too direct.  I can’t communicate that directly with my prospects or clients, because they’ll be offended.  And if I offend them by asking direct questions, I will lose the sale.
  2. The reason people buy from me is because I’m so nice to them.  Everyone knows that people HAVE to like the salesperson.  If I stop being super nice to them, they’ll stop buying from me.
  3. HPS doesn’t require any sucking up or flattery or feigning interest in what the customer likes.  But if I don’t find commonality and create rapport, then how can I get them to like me?
  4. HPS will get me less appointments.  Sales is a numbers game, and less appointments ALWAYS means less sales.
  5. HPS recommends disqualifying prospects who aren’t ready to do business.  I can’t afford to leave money on the table without chasing every single opportunity, no matter how unlikely.
  6. The High Probability Selling book is all about outbound prospecting, and I don’t do outbound prospecting.  All my calls are inbound or referral, so there’s no way it will work for me.
  7. The book is based on selling B2B (business to business).  I only sell B2C (business to consumer), so it won’t work for me.
  8. I am in financial services, and I do seminar selling, and seminar selling isn’t mentioned in the book, so HPS won’t work for me.
  9. HPS says that you don’t have to educate people to get them to buy.  I sell to consumers who never know what they want and can’t make a decision.  Unless I am there to tell them what they want and why they want it, I won’t make any sales.  So HPS won’t work for me.
  10. The only reason people buy from me is because I’m able to impress them with all of my knowledge and credentials, and unless I wow them more than the other guys, they’re not going to buy from me.
  11. High Probability Selling claims to be selling without needing to overcome objections.  But that’s impossible, because everyone knows you have to overcome objections in order to sell anything.  My job as a salesperson doesn’t even start until they say “no”.
  12. Order takers aren’t real salespeople.  People who get lay-down sales aren’t working hard for it, and I don’t want to be perceived as someone who finds sales easy, so HPS won’t work for me.
  13. HPS is all scripted and C level executives hate scripts, so it won’t work for me.
  14. Success at HPS requires that I keep track of my prospecting and sales activity, and I hate keeping records.  I enjoy winging it and going by feel, so HPS isn’t going to work for me.

This is just a few reasons HPS can’t possibly work.  There are certainly a lot more.  If you have any to contribute, or if you want to learn more, please join us for our next HPS Community Forum meeting (details below).

You are also welcome to add comments to this blog post.  We will answer as many as we can.

When:  Thursday 19 June 2025 at 9:30 AM (USA Eastern Time)
Google Calendar Link

[Zoom access details removed]

This meeting will be recorded.  A link to the recording will be emailed to the people who attend this meeting.  If you want a copy of the recording for this particular meeting, and are not sure that you will be able to attend, please Contact Us and with a request for the recording before the meeting begins.

There is no charge to attend.  You are welcome to invite friends and colleagues.

Discovery/Disqualification Questions – Who really uses them?

For those of you who have been HPS practitioners for a long time as well as those who have just begun to discover HPS, Discovery Disqualification questions are a key component of the HPS process, typically done during the sales appointment.

As many know and the book discusses, these 12 or 13 questions are designed to discover, inquire about, and negotiate or disqualify the typical deal breakers in a sale. In traditional selling these issues often come up towards the end of the sales appointment, and require a myriad of memorized objection handling and closing tactics in order to chase this herd of deal-breaker cats and get the sale.

In HPS, we ask these questions as soon as possible in the process. Most people who are introduced to that idea find it a groundbreaking concept. And a real relief.

These questions are a great idea, until we go back to the real world, and scare ourselves out of asking them.

We agree they should be used. Most of us understand where the idea of asking them came from. But when  the real world is engaged, most HPSers bail out before they ask question 3 at best.

All the questions make perfect sense until we start hoping we don’t have to be that direct.

After all, being that direct might offend someone. Being that direct might make people (us) uncomfortable. And why the heck am I asking these questions anyway? Just cuz some guy named Jacques said so? What could he possibly know about my business? My prospects? My clients? I’m sure they worked great for him, but I’m different. 

It turns out that the reason we don’t use them, and the reason some of the more successful practitioners do use them, Is Not What It Seems.

It’s not a thick skin. It’s not being extroverted or introverted. It’s not being detached from the outcome. And it’s certainly not courage. And it’s not training. And it’s not fear by itself.

And “Just Do It” won’t work sustainably enough.

It’s something else. And that something else is a key component to what makes HPS as powerful and distinctive when compared to any other sales process.

And on this forum call we will share that key component, with which all things HPS are based and upon which all successful HPS practitioners found their feet and foundation.

When:  Thursday 12 June 2025. We will offer this meeting twice: at 2:00 PM and again at 7:30 PM (USA Eastern Time)
Google Calendar Link  

[Zoom access details removed]

This meeting will be recorded.  A link to the recording will be emailed to the people who request it before or during this meeting.  Use our Contact Us page to request the recording.

There is no charge to attend.  You are welcome to invite friends and colleagues.

Where the Heck Are These High Probability Prospects Anyway?

A Review of the Neil Myers’ Recording on High Probability Prospects, led by Paul Bunn (recording available here, $50 USD)

This week’s HPS Community Forum will be a live discussion on a previously recorded HPS workshop segment that delivers a mutual understanding of the HPS paradigm shift as it applies to your prospects, markets, and sales experience. 

For those of you who are relatively new to HPS, a High Probability Prospect is defined as follows:  Someone who needs, wants, and is willing and able to buy from you now, if you can meet the prospect’s conditions of satisfaction.

The challenge of course is, in a world in which salespeople are expected to make people into sales, by the force and irresistible rhetoric of the salesperson’s skills, how could these High Probability Prospects (HPPs) even exist?  Why haven’t I seen them before?  You have seen them, and you probably have been one, but never realized it.

One of the first steps in being able to “see” these HPPs is to realize they not only exist, but they have been right under our collective noses for decades.  Like other perspective shift experiences, realizing the presence of these HPPs is like viewing auto-stereograms, also known as Magic Eye 3D, (see Hidden Illusions That’ll Make Your Brain Hurt on BuzzFeed).

Once you’ve seen the hidden image, seeing it again gets easier and easier through practice. This HPS Forum session is intended to provide a similar “aha” level of awareness of the paradigm shift, which will provide a foundation for understanding and implementing HPS with minimal stress and effort.

By the end of this session, you should be able to answer the following FAQs:
Do HPPs really exist?
What creates HPPs?
Who creates HPPs?
What exactly are they?
How have I missed seeing them before?
Can HPPs be created by me?
Are there enough of them out there?

When:  Thursday 5 June 2025 at 9:30 AM (USA Eastern Time)
Google Calendar Link

[Zoom access details removed]

This meeting will be recorded.  A link to the recording will be emailed to the people who attend this meeting.  If you want a copy of the recording for this particular meeting, and are not sure that you will be able to attend, please let us know before the meeting begins.

There is no charge to attend.  You are welcome to invite friends and colleagues.

Introduction to How to Be a World-Class Listener, HPS Community Forum on Thu 22 May 2025

An interactive learning session presented by:  Nick Ruben, co-author of “High Probability Selling” and author of “How to Be a World Class Listener”.   Nick was the original HPS workshop leader and has also trained companies and organizations in improving their listening skills for nearly two decades since.

In HPS, we often say that we are “listening our way to a sale” but we haven’t yet explained simply enough how to do that.  HPS has elements of focused listening in the Relationship Inquiry, which for many of us has been daunting.  Nick’s book helped us understand that great listening can be applied to all of HPS, not only in certain parts.

While this will essentially be an introduction, as Nick’s full course consists of an entire day, you will likely gain a deeper insight into what great listening is all about, as well as how listening relates to HPS and can improve your relationships in business and in life.

When:  Thursday 22 May 2025 at 9:30 AM (USA Eastern Time)
Google Calendar Link

[Zoom access details removed]

This meeting will be recorded.  A link to the recording will be emailed to the people who attend this meeting.  If you want a copy of the recording for this particular meeting, and are not sure that you will be able to attend, please respond to this email with a request for the recording before the meeting begins.

There is no charge to attend.  You are welcome to invite friends and colleagues.

Micro Coaching in High Probability Selling (HPS)

  • Live, one-on-one video coaching, plus email and text support
  • Any HPS topic, from beginner to advanced, client’s choice
  • Customized guidance
  • Focused on applying HPS for the client’s situation
  • Defined objectives
  • For someone who:
    – wants more personal attention than what they would get in a group
    – wants an accelerated solution
    – feels stuck in some way
  • $500 USD
  • Flexible schedule
  • Start anytime

Call or text +1 484-464-2557
or email info@HighProbSell.com