When it’s time to sell, do you suddenly sound… different? A lot of people do. Their tone changes. Their words change. Their confidence changes. And without realizing it, they stop sounding like themselves. They stop sounding confident and start sounding desperate. That shift kills trust, hurts conversions, and slowly damages your brand. In thiss episode, I’m sharing how to sell in a way that feels natural, confident, and completely on brand… without sounding desperate, awkward, or fake. If selling ever feels uncomfortable or forced, this episode will help you fix that.
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Previous Episodes of The Affiliate Guy
Is AI the End of Affiliate Marketing?
How to Grow Your Affiliate Program with Podcast Interviews
2026 New Year’s Resolutions for Affiliate Marketers
New Year’s Resolutions for Affiliate Managers
The Future of Affiliate Marketing: 2026 Edition
How to Sell With Confidence (Not Desperation)
Matt McWilliams: When you promote affiliate offers or anything for that matter, do you have a unique voice that you use? When you start selling, do you suddenly turn into a used car salesman? If so, it’s killing your brand, and it’s killing your sales. Today I’ll show you how to sell without sounding like a used car salesman. welcome to the Affiliate Guy Podcast. If you want to grow your income, serve your tribe, and enjoy all the benefits of affiliate marketing and having your affiliates, you’re in the right place. Thanks for joining me today. Let’s get started.
Matt McWilliams: What’s your name?
Stanley Dewaski: Stanley Dawalski.
Matt McWilliams: Polish, eh? What a coincidence. Rudy Polanski.How are you?
Stanley Dewaski: Hey, I like that watch.
Stanley Dewaski: Great shoes. Love them.
Matt McWilliams: Thanks.
Matt McWilliams: So, Stan, you want to buy this Buick Centurion, huh? Good choice. Smart man.You got good taste.
Stanley Dewaski: I’ll tell you something a lot of.
Matt McWilliams: People don’t have these days.
Matt McWilliams: Nice to see somebody finally walk on this lot who knows a good car when he sees m. When I’ll tell you. So we, we rounded up.
Stanley Dewaski: Well, actually, I was. I was just looking. Oh, hey, terrific.
Matt McWilliams: Terrific.
Stanley Dewaski: That’s what we’re here for, Stan. Here you can look, browse, peek, touch, feel, taste, smell, do anything you want. Take all the time you want. Nobody’s going to pressure anybody around here, Stan. You know something else, Stan? I really think you ought to buy this Buick. I think you ought to buy it today, right now. You want to know why? Because this Buick is you. The color is you. Look at it. This is your car. Stanley Dewaski is Buick Centurion convertible. Now, I know what you’re thinking, Stan. You’re thinking, can I afford to buy a car like this?
Matt McWilliams: Am I right?
Stanley Dewaski: Seriously, Stan, you can’t afford not to buy a car like this. And I’m going to make it easy on you. When you add this whole thing up, taking in kind inflation rate, insurance savings, gas savings, easing comfort, going to come about $10,000 ahead after making this deal. Well, the rest is alone of owning a Buick Centurion convertible. Can’t even measure it in terms of dollars and cents, am I right?
Matt McWilliams: So that’s what happens when people start selling. At least a lot of times. They start using what I call the sales voice, right? I’ve made this mistake, I don’t know, thousands of times myself. It’s time to sell something, and boom, sales voice comes out. You know, this sales voice is the voice you. You think that you’re supposed to use to sell something, right? It applies in spoken word, you know, you Start sounding like a used car salesman. It applies in print. You know, it applies when you’re writing. It just sounds and reads different than, you know, your regular voice, right? So to the listener, to the reader, it’s alarming. It’s obvious that something is different. Something is different here, you know? So when I use my sales voice verbally, I actually, I sound more like, you know, monster Truck Announcer. Monday, Monday, Monday. Or I sound like this guy, start talking fast. And then I’m like, you know. And it’s not because I’m passionate. It’s because I’m, you know, I’m trying to sell.
Even my. My writing takes on a new tone. I stop using humor. I write in a different format than normal. I use words that I think I’m supposed to use to sell. So I use these words that I think I’m supposed to use. And that makes me no longer myself. Always backfires. Always. 100% of the time, backfires. Not only do I not make the sale, so that hurts me in the short term. Do I need the sale per se? No. Do I want the sale? Of course. But long term, I lose trust, I lose likability. I get off brand. Those are three things that can kill your business. You know, long term, if you get off brand, people don’t know, like, who are you anymore? I’ve talked before and I shared, you know, the eight kind of archetypes for your brand, right? The hesitant hero, the reluctant rebel. You know, I shared those, right? The master maestro and I shared these different archetypes. and I said, you know, you have to be consistent that it’s not which of those archetypes you pick. I don’t care if you decide that one day you’re going to be, you know, the hesitant hero. You’re going to be the Harry Potter. You’re going to be Frodo. I don’t care if that’s the one you pick.
Just don’t be Frodo one day and then Katniss Everdeen another, and then don’t be, you know, Ferris Bueller on another day. Don’t be Indiana Jones and then try to be Yoda. You can’t be Frodo and Gandalf and Samwise Gange if you know, Lord of the Rings, right? You can’t be all of them. You’ve got to pick one. And the problem is, like, sometimes we’re Frodo with our content or we’re Ferris Bueller with their content, and then we’re Braveheart, you know, we’re William Wallace with our sales copy, or we’re William Wallace with our regular stuff and then we’re Ben Stein, you know, in Ferris Bueller with our sales copy. And so I see people making this all the time, you know, making this mistake. They get off brand. You also lose trust because when you get off brand, you know, people don’t trust you. You also lose the likability. It doesn’t matter which of those personalities you are. You don’t have to be the Ferris Bueller type or, you know, you don’t have to be funny to be likable. People might like you as more of the Gandalf type or the Yoda type, although he was kind of funny, you know, they might like you as that, but then when you switch to a different Persona, they don’t like you. If you’re normally Mary Poppins esque, right? So you’re the cordial caregiver. That’s the archetype there. You lead with love and caring and then all of a sudden you come out and you’re abrasive.It turns people off. You lose that likability. And I see people make this mistake all the time with affiliate promotions. When it’s time to sell, they start using the sales voice.
So first of all, why do we use the sales voice? We’ll talk about, I want to talk about why we use it. And then as we go along, I’m going to talk about how to fix it. Right? But I think it’s important to understand the why. Why do you use this voice? Well, reason number one is that you try too hard. This doesn’t matter if you’re promoting your own product. a coaching program, a service, doesn’t matter. An affiliate offer. You really want the sale. I get that. So do I. Right? You really want the sale. You know, whether it’s $100 affiliate commission, an $801,000 affiliate commission, or $5,000 coaching program, or like for us, it could be a six figure sale with our agency. I want the sale. I want it. You know, wow, making $100,000 for our agency, that’s kind of a big deal. But when you try too hard to make the sale, something changes in you, right? You lose the relaxed tone that you normally use with your friends. You begin to talk faster and you get more pushy. Your vocabulary changes. You’ve become virtually unrecognizable to the people who normally interact with you, who read your regular emails. If we’re talking about email copy, it’s like, who is this guy? Why is this email, so different than every other email he sends. People don’t like that. The sight, the sound, the feel of desperation is a major sales killer. I’m just going to repeat that. Desperation. I don’t care if they sense it in any way. They see it, they feel it, they hear it. Desperation will kill your sales. So what’s the fix here? How do we not try too hard? Well, as simple as it sounds, the fix is to try less. Now, I’m not saying don’t ask for the sale. We do, but we do so in a way that is consistent with your normal voice. If you’re normally funny, continue to be funny.
If you normally use, you know, a certain more, relaxed vibe, use the relaxed vibe. If you are normally professorial is the word I would use. And you share a lot of research, continue to share research that leads people to a buying conclusion, right? Don’t sound desperate or needy. Even if you are. That’s the key. You just have to try less and stick to that brand. Number two, you try to be someone else. That’s the second reason why people use a sales voice, is that they try to. To try to sell like someone else. You know, you’re Jim Gaffigan, the comedian in your regular emails, and all of a sudden, when it’s time to sell, you’re, you know, you’re Big Bob’s Auto Superstore, right? You go from endearing personal stories to being a pushy salesman. You go to being like Kurt Russell in that clip at the beginning, right? Usually this comes. This is what I see.
I see others selling. You see others selling, and you try to mimic them. You see the techniques and the strategies that others are using, and you try to mimic them. The problem is, they might not work for you. Those strategies might not work for you. Grant Cardone, you try to suddenly be your Ferris Bueller and Jim Gaffigan in your emails, and then your Grant Cardone and your sales stuff. That doesn’t work. Grant Cardone is Grant Cardone all the time. If he’s trying to get you to go download a free app, he’s Grant Cardone getting you to do that. If he wants you to go listen to, you know, watch his latest video where he doesn’t make any money, technically, you know, then he’s Grant Cardone getting you to go watch that video. And when he sells, he’s the exact same person. So the fix here, don’t try to be somebody else when you’re selling. Be yourself. Observing others is a great way to learn. Maybe you can pick a, keyword or a format. You know, I’ll give you an example.
The way I format the links in my emails is one that I learned from Jeff Walker. Most of my other stuff is not like Jeff Walker, but I took one thing, one little thing that doesn’t have a dramatic impact on my brand and I chose that and I copied it. And then the way that I do, most of the lead ins, well, not most, but a good chunk of my lead ins I got from Kim Walsh Phillips. Did I copy her whole. Her whole thing, her whole format? No, but I copied a little piece of it and I liked it. I learned a few other little tricks that I copied here and there, but I wasn’t trying to be someone else. Observing others is a great way to learn. Like I said, provided you pick and choose what you copy from them. That’s the key. All. Ah, right. The third reason why you use a sales voice is that you haven’t clearly defined your brand. If you have not clearly defined your brand, then it’s easy to stray off course. You don’t even have a course. How do you go from point A to point D if you don’t have the map? Right. Your brand is your map. And so what happens is one day you’re the funny storyteller guy and the next day you’re the tough, in your face motivation guy. Right. You can’t be both of those with any consistency. Even when I feel like I need to get a little bit in your face, I still use humor.
So pick one theme and stick with it. You know, write out your brand statement. That’s the fix here. Yes. Have a unique personality, have a unique style, but you got to get crystal clear on what it is and stick with it. You’ve got to be crystal clear. Are you the master maestro? Are you the veteran in your industry? Just to be clear, this can evolve over time. I’ve evolved over time, slowly. Because, you know, the reality is when I first started my platform, I wasn’t the master Maestro. I wasn’t the veteran. I’d only been in the industry for six years. So the Master Maestro leads with authority and power and prestige. Right? That’s the Gandalf, the Yoda that we talked about. You’ve got that hesitant hero, you know, Frodo, Spider Man. Right. The humble origin story leads from a place of awe and wonderful. You know, they’re just like, oh my gosh, I can’t believe I’m even in this position.
That’s kind of where I started. I started probably as a hesitant hero. But I think I actually started a little bit more as the jolly journeyman. You know, the jolly journeyman, right. Only one step ahead of your followers. And what you’re doing is just simply sharing what you discover along the way, Right? So Harry Potter, Dorothy and the wizard of Oz, those are examples of that. We just saw a great wizard of Oz play last night. A bunch of kids, our kids are friends with. And I mean, it was unbelievable production. And I’m like, I’m literally watching this going, dorothy is the jolly journeyman, you know, the eager enthusiast. You lead with passion and enthusiasm. Luke Skywalker, Tarzan. Right? When you think about these. And I’ll share the other three in a minute, right? There’s three more of these, archetypes, these kind of hero archetypes, the roles that you can play.
But when I think about these things, like, the consistency is what’s important. If you’re the eager enthusiast leading with passion and enthusiasm. Luke Walker’s always the eager enthusiast. He doesn’t suddenly become the cordial caregiver type that we’ll talk about. He’s not suddenly the master maestro. Now, over time, when you get to Luke Skywalker in, like, Star Wars 9, he’s now the master maestro. He’s not the eager enthusiast who’s leading with passion and enthusiasm because he’s evolved. It’s 30 years later or so.
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The other three, by the way, there’s venerable visionaries, so innovation, creativity and wonder. Steve Jobs in real life, Willy Wonka would be like a fictional example. The revolutionary rebel. So Katniss Everdeen, Indiana Jones, Ferris Bueller, I always say they’re mad as hell at the status quo and they’re not going to take it anymore, right? And then the cordial caregiver. So Mary Poppins, as I mentioned earlier, Obi Wan Kenobi, they lead with love and generosity. They’re shepherds. They want to protect their flock. The thing is, it doesn’t matter what role you pick. Pick one and stick to it. Be clear on your role. Don’t bounce around from one role to the next. Roll the role. Your tribe’s not going to know who you are, so you can’t be the hesitant hero and then the master maestro. Are you truly leading with awe and wonder, or are you the leading expert who already knows the answer? If you go from cordial caregiver to revolutionary rebel, if you go from Mary Poppins to Indiana Jones, your audience is going to rebel against you. They came because you’re loving and soothing, not because you take on the establishment, so stick to it. This means every piece of content, every message, every product fits that role. So get clear on your brand.
The number four reason that people just end up using a sales voice is they learn too Daggum much. I am a big fan of learning. I talked about this in the last episode, right? How to start 2022 off the right way. Commit to learning. That was number eight, I think. Commit to learning. And I shared that great resource about, you know, read it for me. I’m a huge fan of learning. You should read everything I put out and listen to every episode. Make sure you subscribe so you don’t miss an episode. Like, you should watch everything I do. Okay. Do all my free trainings. Buy some courses. I mean, read my book when it comes out. Like, all these things. But you can learn too much about this stuff. You can learn too much about sales. You can read so many blog posts and so many books, take so many courses that you forget the basics of sales. Step one, get people to know, like and trust you. Step two, make recommendations about products to them in a way that’s actually consistent with your brand. That’s pretty much the formula. When you’re constantly learning new sales tricks, though, you basically devolve into nothing but a big pitch man. So I’m like, I’m gonna try this, and then I’m gonna try this. Here’s this cool thing, and then this cool thing, and oh, my gosh, it just becomes over. Overbearing. Stick to the basics. That’s the fix here. Stick to the basics of selling. Stop trying so many new things in a short period of time. Try one new thing, a quarter. That’d be a good compromise there, right? Maybe every couple of months.
All right, mistake number five. The fifth reason why people sound like they’re used car salesmen here. They’re using that sales voice. This applies only to affiliate promotions. But you copy the swipe copy exactly as it is. For the love of all that is holy, please don’t do this. If someone gives you swipe copy for an affiliate promotion, do not copy. Paste it. Hold up your right hand. Make this statement now. I state your name. I state your name. if you’ve ever seen Animal House, you get that. I state your name. Will not copy swipe copy without taking the time to make sure it’s on brand for me. When you copy swipe copy as is, you’re giving up your ability to keep sales pitches on brand. Swipe copy was written in someone else’s voice, not Yours. When I write swipe copy, I write it. You know, I don’t write swipe copy. I have a copywriter. Do it now because I don’t want it to be in my voice, but it’s in theirs. It’s not written in your voice. So the fix here, use swipe copy as a guide. I’m going to put a link to a video in the show notes where I show how I use swipe copy. That’s true to my brand, right? That’s the thing. You want to get the important points across. You got to get the important points across. You need to like you can’t write your email and then it’s factually incorrect about like when the webinar is or you know what the price point is or what’s in the course or whatever it may be. But you also need to be on brand. And so I show you how to use swipe copy. Go check out that video. Just go watch it. Watch how I do it. And it, it’s what works. You’ll find a formula that works for you. But this is a proven formula for using swipe copy the right way.
All right, number six reason you use a sales voice and how to fix it here is you sell scared. This doesn’t sound like it would make you sound used car salesman. Yeah, but selling scared is the number one reason most people suck at selling anything. They sell scared. They’re scared of looking ridiculous, being rejected, losing subscribers. I don’t know, someone’s not going to like you. They’re scared of a certain two letter word that begins with N and ends with o. Just scared. And when you sell scared, people know it instinctively. Right? Like a dog can sense fear. Right. Prospective customers know when you’re selling scared. It comes through in person, comes through on the phone, it comes through even an email copy. Comes through in the way you look at people. Comes through in your posture and your voice in the words you choose in a metaphorical, actually kind of in a literal sense really. You’re transferring your fears to the potential customer. No one wants that. No one wants your fear on them, especially today. I mean some people are weird and want that, but most people don’t. It feels weak, it feels slimy, it feels, it feels scary. I mean it’s like it’s terrifying. Nobody wants to buy from someone who’s afraid to sell. No one wants to buy from someone who’s afraid to sell or thinks that it’s immoral. You know, they think that I shouldn’t sell. I’m above that really, like, why are you above that? It’s your product. It’s, you know, you’re recommending this. Why are you. Why are you so scared of selling it? So, number one, to overcome this, you gotta believe in the product.
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Ask yourself this question, Would I sell this service to a friend? Would I sell this product to a friend assuming they have a need for it? If the answer is no, don’t try to sell it to your list, to your people, to your followers. Believe wholeheartedly in it. Secondly, you got to ignore the worst case scenario on this. Like, the worst thing. We focus on the worst thing that could happen, right? Oh, I’m going to be embarrassed. There’s going to be rejections. I’m going to unsubscribes, right? No other aspect of life, you know, do we focus on the worst case scenario? We don’t get into like, hey, honey, I’m going to the store. Worst case is I die in a car crash on the way. Really? Nobody says that, you know, oh, hey, honey, I made a reservation at that restaurant we’ve been wanting to go to for two years. It’s super fancy. Worst case is we’ll get food poisoning. Worst case is the waiter will murder us. I mean, nobody does that. So don’t focus on that. Third, we talk so often about this. Go all in Last episode, I said, pick four affiliate promotions this year and go all in on, them. You go all out when you sell. Go all out. That means sell with confidence, right? Don’t be afraid to get in people’s faces if needed. There’s a reason why when I go all out, I do so well. It’s because I believe in what I’m promoting and I want to go all out. Like, if something has impacted your life and you’re promoting it, why would you not go all out? In fact, not going all out would be a disservice to the people.
Fourth, stop using weak words and phrases. I hope I try. You know, if you’d like, maybe, probably, you know, things like that. Sell with the expectation that they’re going to buy. That single mindset shift makes all the difference in the world. Don’t sell in hopes of someone buying. Sell with the expectation that they will. Don’t ask the audience to try something. Ask them to make a commitment to buying. Try is such a weak word. Do or do not is what, you know, speaking of Yoda, do or do not, there is no try. So don’t ask them to check it out. If you’d like, encourage them Urge them to get it now. Use encouraging action words when you sell. That’s important. Sell with authority. Sell with confidence. Sell. Because you have to tell the world about what you are selling. That’s important. Like, I have to tell the world about this. So I’m gonna let them know. I’m gonna spread the word about this.
And then the seventh reason why you use a sales voice in your email specifically is you don’t have a consistent format. A lot of people, they format their regular emails. So the blog post, the podcast, the videos, they format them one way and then they format their promo email, their sales emails, completely different. Do not do this. If you want people to click on your promo emails, they need to look and feel just like your regular emails. So whether you’re sending them to a blog post, a video, a podcast episode, or a sales page, keep the format consistent. So you need a consistent template. I don’t care what that template is like. That’s not the point. Mine, for example, I tend to have, a story. So, you know, hey, the other day my daughter asked me, you know, such and such, or, hey, I just got back from a vacation, you know, or I ran into an old friend from high school the other day, and I start with that story and then I go to the lesson. And then I realized, blah, blah, blah, right? You know, and then it suddenly occurred to me, such and such, right? That’s when I thought about, whatever. So story, lesson. And then I apply it to the reader. I apply it to the reader by be like, have you ever felt like that? Have you ever been in a similar situation? Or here’s what that means for you. You know, sometimes I just say that and then I have a call to action. Join me today. Click here to get such and such. Watch the full video below. Doesn’t matter.
The format is consistent. And the problem is, like, if you don’t have that format, then what happens is your audience immediately got, this is a promo email. This is a promo email. I can already tell. Can already tell. And there’s no format there. There’s no consistency. So, number one, stop trying so hard, you know, stop. Number two, stop trying to be somebody else. Number three, clearly define your brand. Number four, stop learning so much. And if you are learning a lot, and I do recommend learning a lot, slowly roll out the things that you’re learning. Number five, do not copy the swipe. Copy exactly. That’s a huge mistake. Number six, stop selling scared. And number seven, come up with a consistent format for your emails. Don’t make These mistakes, right? Stay on brand. Be yourself when you sell. Be yourself when you sell. That’s what’s important here.
So I’d love to hear from you. I would love if you would text me. Just send me a text at 262-17-4619 and let me know if you’ve ever made any of these mistakes. And I’m kind of curious, what were the results of that? Like, I would love to hear from you about the results of that, Matt. I did that. I made mistake number two and here’s what happened, right? And then how you’re applying this. You know how you’re applying this. So again, 260-217-4619, just send me a text. I’d love to, love to get your feedback on this episode. Let me know how that goes with applying what you’re learning.
And then make sure you hit subscribe because you do not want to miss the next episode. I’m talking all about how to onboard affiliates the right way. So you’ve got some affiliates lined up now. What, how do you onboard them and actually get them just rocking and rolling? That’s what the next episodes is all about. We’re going to talk about how to get your affiliate started the right way. So come back for that. Make sure you hit subscribe so you don’t miss that. Make sure you check out all the links I talked about today. You know, how to use swipe copy and the other links there. And, I’ll see you in the next episode.
Thank you so much for listening today. Remember to check out all of our deep dives into affiliate marketing at the Affiliateguide.TV And if you have a question, ask it@asktheaffiliateguide.com who knows, maybe you even be featured on an upcoming episode. And lastly, if you haven’t yet, make sure to leave a rating and review wherever you’re listening to this episode. See you soon.