Close The Deal Podcast With Angie Weidel

Founder: Blended Strategies, LLC

Five Minutes of Guts: How DISC, Confidence, and Courage Close More Deals

Fear shows up for everyone in sales, even the confident ones. You can have the perfect pitch, the right product, and the sharpest suit in the room, but if fear takes the wheel, the deal stalls. My guest on this episode of The Close The Deal Podcast, Angie Weidel, knows that feeling well. She’s the owner of Blended Strategies, a sales and communication coach, and a master at helping people find their voice, their confidence, and their courage, sometimes in just five minutes at a time.

Confidence Isn’t About Perfection

When Angie first walked into a networking event in New Orleans wearing pink shoes, pink pants, and the kind of confidence that turned heads, I knew she was someone people remembered. Not because she was flashy, but because she owned the room. That’s what confidence really is. It’s not about being perfect but about being comfortable in your own skin.

Angie says that’s one of the biggest mistakes salespeople make—thinking confidence comes from having every answer, every number, or every word memorized. It doesn’t. “Confidence,” she said, “comes from knowing yourself and being okay with imperfection.” It’s about showing up as who you are, not who you think they want you to be.

That message hits home for anyone who’s ever walked into a meeting with sweaty palms and a forced smile. The truth is, people don’t remember perfect. They remember authentic. They remember how you made them feel. Angie reminded me that in sales, it’s not about performing; it’s about connecting.

Know Yourself, Know Your Buyer: The DISC Advantage

We’ve all heard of the DISC profile, but Angie breaks it down in a way that makes it practical, not theoretical. DISC, short for Dominant, Influencer, Steadfast, and Conscientious, is a simple yet powerful framework that helps you understand how you communicate and how others receive information.

She explains it like this:

• D (Dominant) types are decisive, goal-driven, and want bullet points, not backstories.
• I (Influencer) types thrive on stories, energy, and enthusiasm.
• S (Steadfast) types value relationships, stability, and reassurance.
• C (Conscientious) types want data, precision, and process.

Most of us lean naturally toward one or two of these. But the real power of DISC comes when you use it strategically, when you adjust your approach to match the communication style of the person in front of you.

Angie said something that stuck. “You’re not selling your product; you’re selling you. If you can’t connect in a way that’s meaningful to them, the conversation ends before it starts.”

That’s the art of sales most people miss. We tend to sell the way we like to buy. If you’re an I, you talk fast, tell stories, and bring big energy. But if your prospect is a C, that energy feels like chaos. They’re not rejecting you; they’re rejecting the noise. Once you recognize that, you can shift your tone, your tempo, and even your questions to make the other person comfortable. And when people feel understood, they trust you faster.

Energy Over Time: Managing the Invisible Currency

Angie said something every salesperson should hear. “You can’t win by managing time alone. You have to manage energy.”

That’s one of the most overlooked elements in this business. We talk about balance all the time—work-life balance, time management, efficiency—but none of that matters if your energy is off.

For extroverts, working from home for days on end can be draining. For introverts, a week of back-to-back networking events can feel like running a marathon in dress shoes. Angie calls it energy management. Know where you get charged and know what drains you. Schedule your prospecting and calls around your high-energy windows, and take intentional breaks when your batteries dip.

It’s not lazy. It’s strategic. And it’s the difference between burning out and staying consistent.

Five Minutes of Guts

Here’s the heart of the episode, Angie’s concept called Five Minutes of Guts.

She learned it during her time as a Sandler Training coach. David Sandler used to say, “You don’t need guts for the whole day, just for the call you’re in.”

Angie tells the story of sitting in her car before a prospecting visit, terrified to walk in and ask for a business card. She wasn’t new to people. She’s the kind of person who talks to strangers in the grocery line. But that day, fear had her frozen. Then she remembered the phrase five minutes of guts.

That’s all she needed. Not courage for the day, just enough to open the door, shake a hand, and start the conversation.

She got out of the car, nearly tripped on the curb, realized the door was locked, and had to come back an hour later—but she did it. That’s the point. You don’t need to be fearless. You just need to act before fear catches up.

Every deal, every call, every opportunity comes down to that short window of courage. And once you’ve done it once, it gets easier.

Pursuing No

There’s a powerful mindset shift Angie teaches called pursuing no.

Most salespeople fear rejection like it’s a career-ending disease. We dread hearing no, so we avoid the situations that might produce it. But Angie flips that fear into fuel.

When she walks into a meeting, she’s upfront. “I’m in sales. I’m doing my job just like you’re doing yours. You can tell me no. I just need to have the conversation.”

That transparency does something remarkable. It relaxes people. It humanizes the exchange. And more often than not, the honesty opens doors that pressure never could.

One prospect told her, “I kind of like you. I don’t know about your product yet, but I want to hear more.”

That’s the magic of giving someone permission to say no. It builds trust. It breaks the pattern of hard-closing and manipulation. It says, I see you as a person, not a transaction.

Angie summed it up perfectly. “If you pursue no ten times, you’ll still get a couple of yeses and maybe a few referral partners along the way.”

From Hello to Yes

All these lessons come together in Angie’s course, The Influence Advantage: From Hello to Yes.

It’s an eight-week program that combines DISC, self-awareness, and journaling to help professionals rewire the way they sell. Each week focuses on a different stage of the sales journey, from mindset to communication to follow-up.

The goal isn’t just to close more deals. It’s to build the kind of confidence that lasts beyond the call, confidence rooted in understanding yourself and connecting authentically with others.

As Angie puts it, “Everybody’s in sales, whether you’re pitching a product, a vision, or just convincing your uncle not to bring fruitcake to Christmas again. The key is learning how to communicate and influence with integrity.”

Final Thoughts: Courage Compounds

By the end of our conversation, one thing was clear. Angie doesn’t just teach confidence. She lives it.

Her approach is human. Her lessons are simple but transformative. And her advice to her younger self might just be the best way to close this post.

“Nothing worth having is going to come easy. If you want it, go get it. Pray about it. Pursue it. You may fail in the moment, but you’re not a failure. Everything you learn becomes part of your next win.”

That’s what Five Minutes of Guts really means. Courage compounds. Every time you push through fear, for five minutes, five seconds, or one brave conversation, you grow. And that growth doesn’t just help you close the deal. It helps you become the kind of person who deserves it.



Make today a great day.