#277 Michael Campion - How to Master The Art of Persuasion

Watch This NEXT: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HlK2P76_ZZs

Most people think they have a sales problem.

They don’t.

They have a communication problem.

The ability to speak clearly, move people, and drive action.

This will make or break your business.

Look at the best in the world:

Steve Jobs. Barack Obama. Tony Robbins.

They don’t just speak.

They move rooms.

They sell vision.
They sell ideas.
They sell outcomes.

If you can’t communicate clearly:
- You can’t sell.
- You can’t lead.
- You can’t scale.

I sat down with my public speaking coach and friend, Michael Campion, to break this down.

How to improve your communication.

How to become more persuasive.

How to grow your business through better language.

We put together a step-by-step guide for anyone who wants to dominate sales through better communication.

Smash that like button if you enjoyed this conversation


(00:00) The Psychology of Selling and Influence  
(03:18) Why Being Present is a Superpower in Communication  
(05:35) Mastering Public Speaking and Persuasion  
(09:00) Overcoming Fear and Building Confidence  
(14:49) The Shift from External to Internal Motivation  
(16:16) The Ethics of Persuasion in Sales & Marketing  
(22:08) The Power of Storytelling in Business  
(30:49) How to Structure a Sales Conversation That Converts  
(38:52) Why Relationships Are the Key to Business Success  
(43:43) Scaling a Business: The Brutal Reality  
(46:38) The Infinite Game & Playing the Long-Term Business Strategy  
(49:07) Who Are the Best Communicators Today?  
(50:36) What Makes a Great Podcast Host?  
(55:09) The Art of Short-Form Storytelling & Hooks  
(57:51) The Psychology Behind ‘If I Can Do It, You Can Too’  
(59:34) How to Build Credibility When You Have No Track Record  
(01:02:46) The Power of Free Work and Providing Value Upfront  
(01:12:25) How to Develop a Unique and Authentic Personal Brand  
(01:22:04) Purpose vs. Profit: The Key to Long-Term Success  
(01:30:06) The Science of Persuasion and Closing Deals Effectively

Chapters

• 0:00 Communication in the Digital Age
• 15:22 The Value of Observation and Active Listening
• 43:12 Building Your Communication Skills Through Practice
• 1:14:29 Using Persuasion Ethically and With Purpose
• 1:58:19 Adapting Your Communication Style to Different Personalities
• 2:48:02 Standing Out Through Authentic Communication
• 3:52:16 Finding Your Unique Voice and Building Your Brand
• 4:41:12 Practical Sales Communication Techniques

Transcript

Michael: 0:00

Sell them what they want, but then give them what they need. I've used that line for a long time and it's fine because you've given them what they need.

Darren: 0:06

Most people actually aren't chasing money. They're actually chasing a connection.

Michael: 0:10

You need to be able to tinker and tweak your messaging to appeal to all those different personalities. People always looking for a shortcut and they're trying to avoid the work. And you can't become the persuasive, charismatic guy or girl in the room without doing the work.

Darren: 0:23

The way you communicate determines the opportunities you get, the deals you close and the influence you have. Michael Campion has spent years breaking down the science of persuasion and communication how to make people listen, trust and say yes. Most people talk. Few know how to influence. Learn how to control any conversation. Create authority instantly and use words to get exactly what you want. Where I want to start is uh, do you think people are getting like shit at communicating?

Michael: 0:53

are they getting worse at communicating? Yeah, just in general, like how, how, let me? Let me point it back to you for a sec, because maybe you can help me distill it. In what ways do you think people are getting worse at communicating?

Darren: 1:03

so one interaction, so like we're meeting here. Why I think podcasts are really helpful is because we don't have our phones, like we're just actually engrossed in a conversation and there's no external factor. That's one side, and then, internally, which I want to discuss today is that I don't think people can listen, and because we actually. One other component, too, is the fact that, because we spend less time together, when we do meet up with people it's more like vomiting your ideas. It's like I went on vacation and this is what my grandparents are doing, and so on. You know. So it's kind of like a jostling competition, whereas before, when it was like you had no internet, you're sitting around the house, you could be at your cousin's house, you know everything about each other, so there is a time to listen and communication is a bit more open. And the last side of it, then, is, I think, that a lot of it's transactional, that we're meeting up for a coffee meeting, which is actually a sales call or you know it's a sales call in disguise.

Darren: 1:56

Yeah exactly, or we have a substitute of like alcohol, which basically is just a mechanism for people to loosen up because they're socially anxious. Yes, so that would be my observation.

Michael: 2:05

So the way you framed it there has helped me right. So we talk about communication is just a mechanism for people to loosen up because they're socially anxious. Yes, so that would be my observation. So the way you framed it there has helped me right. So we talk about communication. The way you framed it was brilliant when I asked you to go a bit deeper. So I think what you're alluding to is we've sacrificed depth for breadth and everyone is just vomiting on each other, right, and trying to get through as much as they possibly can. And you're right, it feels transactional and nobody likes to feel like they're kind of the equivalent, the equivalent of a one night stand, right, that I'm just going to come and use you for this thing and then I'm going to move on to the next target. Right, in the business sense, in the relationship sense as well. And he said we deliberately put our phones over there on the table. I don't want to hear it, I don't down with people, I don't even want it in my pocket, because just feeling it against my skin will give those feelings of distraction.

Michael: 2:50

You had Nir Eyal on the podcast very recently and he talks about, you know, distraction, attention and focus and the ability to be present. You talked about listening. Listening is a huge part of communication. Your skill as a podcaster will depend very heavily on your ability to listen and to be present. And you're nodding right now and that means something I've said I'm listening to your body language, something I've said has resonated with you and that's a clue right For me, like, okay, I've struck the right tone, I've struck the right chord and this is something worth exploring.

Michael: 3:18

And I don't think people, as you said, because we're constantly reaching for our phone I don't know the statistic, but it's probably every 30, 60, 90, 120 seconds we're flipping over our phone and having a look. We're just constantly distracted. And in a world that is distracted, that indistractability, that focus, is a superpower. If you can just be present with someone, it's unbelievably charismatic. If you can just make eye contact, be quick to laugh, quick to smile, listen, ask good questions, you'll come across so well and that's why I said earlier, it's easier than ever to stand out. Actually, if you get someone face to face, you can really stand out by being sufficiently different, by being sufficiently present.

Darren: 3:53

What do you mean by observation? Because you're speaking and then observing my reaction. Most people speak and they think about themselves and they're on that pedestal, but it sounds like to me that you're almost like observing what's happening so that, on the fly, you are thinking about how to position yourself in the next sentence. Just want to take one quick break to ask you one question have you been enjoying these episodes? Because, if you have, I'd really appreciate if you subscribe to the channel so that more people can see these episodes and be influenced to build an online business this year.

Michael: 4:27

Completely, completely. Yeah, you've nailed it and it's a really hard skill to develop. I think it's social science, right, we're all social scientists. As children, you understand what behaviors get rewarded right and what gets rewarded gets repeated. So this is how kind of your personality forms and if you can, I guess, continue that childlike curiosity throughout your life when you converse with someone and not be kind of over here and thinking about your own ideas, not worrying too much about what you're going to say next. For example, if you're the interviewer, just be here with me and listen. You'll see clues. You'll see when I light up. You'll see when I start to lean back and become disinterested. I see when you lean in and you've put your hand to your mouth.

Michael: 5:11

I have to take into account all of these different things, especially in my job, as you know, as a corporate trainer, as an executive coach, as a speaker. Anytime I've got an audience if it's five people, if it's 10 people, if it's 500 people I need to be dialed in to the energy of the room. I can sense when I've got them. I can also sense when I don't have them, and that means I need to change it up, either with my body language or my tone, my volume. I need to reel them back in somehow with a story by getting them interacting with me.

Michael: 5:35

It's it's a dance and it's really really hard to perfect. But the thing I love, and why I love teaching public speaking and communication skills and persuasion and interviewing and all of that stuff is because once you demystify it for someone, the matrix comes down. They're like oh, it's just technique, it's just skill, it's just attention and observation and I can become more charismatic, I can become more persuasive, I can get you know, I can have more fulfilled relationships. It's not just about sales and commerce and I love all that stuff, but you'll be happier when people respond to you in the way that you communicated, the way you intended that message to be delivered.

Darren: 6:10

Okay, that's super interesting. So how do you internalize that if you are someone who's, let's say, they're working off scripts in general? Right, people are generally working on scripts, so it's a pickup culture pickup culture for dating, sales, scripts for sales, podcast questions for questions or script writing for YouTube. People are so used to working off of like a verbatim, which is why I think communication is getting worse. How do you internalize this and find a balance? Because, as we discussed beforehand, the opposite of what I'm doing right now was moving away from the scripted podcast approach.

Michael: 6:43

You're moving away from the scripted podcast exactly yeah.

Darren: 6:44

But how do you do that? Because, like for me, I've done 250 episodes so I can sit and I think I have a sense of authority to some degree in terms of, like, I can sit and just have a conversation with someone, whereas some people are super nervous in that regard yeah, you've put in the reps.

Michael: 6:57

You the words came out your own mouth, so you put in the reps and I've also put in the rep. So the way I'm able to move away from those scripts and I think scripts are very important, by the way, especially when you're starting out having a sales script, having a presentation written out verbatim, word for word, is great, but it has to become a point where you've done the reps in the dark and you've practiced and you throw the script away. And I think the problem a lot of people have is maybe they're on a sales call, maybe they're cold calling someone, or they're standing up delivering a PowerPoint and they're looking at the slides and they're not looking at the audience, they're not giving them the love and attention they deserve. Or they're looking at the script, they've got a piece of paper and they're creating that barrier between the audience and that's why they can't feel you right. You have to put in the reps. You can't escape that. The scripts are helpful and, of course, rubbish in equals rubbish out. So you have to be aware of the source material, the quality of the source material. That you're kind of imbibing intellectually, because rubbish in equals rubbish out. But yeah, once you've done the reps and I don't really care how you do the reps you've used podcasting as a mechanism for self-development and a mechanism for enhancing your communication skills correct, exactly, and it's worked wonderfully well. And I've done that.

Michael: 8:06

I can't remember if I told you the story, but I'll kind of go back to childhood. I was very introverted, very shy, extremely nervous in social situations my mom will vouch for that 100%. And there came a day when I was a teenager I think about 15 years old I wasn't young anymore, relatively and I said I've had enough, I've had enough of being fearful, of being afraid, and I gamified my progress. So what I did was set myself a daily challenge, and this is before the days of productivity, apps and social media and phones. Every single day I'm going to commit an act of micro bravery One conversation with a stranger. That's my KPI. My KPI was one conversation with a stranger person at the bus stop, person, in the store, wherever they are. I'm going to strike up a conversation. I'm going to watch, I'm going to see what makes them lean in, what makes them laugh, what gets good eye contact, what makes them recall oh, I've said something that made them a little bit uncomfortable and I put in the reps every single day and then you get braver, right, it's that micro bravery.

Michael: 9:00

They say a lot of ways. You know one of the best ways to become better at sales is is you want to shed your fear of rejection, right, so just go out. You've heard of that, you know it's an old adage now, but you go and ask for a discount every single time. You go for a coffee, right, you go to Starbucks somewhere. They're never going to, you know. Just ask for 50% off, I just want.

Michael: 9:18

And the till Like no, okay, cool, but the point is just to keep trying keep hearing no, and yeah, all I did was reframe my relationship with fear, the same way you've done on the podcast. And as I got braver, I started to volunteer for more, you know, presentations, public speaking opportunities. This is 25 years ago now. So if you're watching this and you're thinking Michael, if you, if you're watching this and you're thinking Michael's a decent communicator, it's 25 years of intentional practice and I think I've shown you before in my phone Google docs I think I showed on the masterclass with the guys. There's thousands of pages of notes just on the art of communication, questions I can show you afterwards.

Michael: 9:59

And yeah, maybe it's a little bit obsessive and a little bit OCD, I'll wear that, fine, but I don't need it anymore because I've done the work. And if you think about kind of communication and the art of public speaking as that glass of water right, if we're using metaphor, right there it's clear my communication like an old tap in you know some New York apartment. You pull the tap, it's cloudy, dirty water. The art of writing, making notes and practicing is what will distill that water. It acts as a filter and you've used 250 episodes of your podcast as a filtering mechanism to get clearer and more articulate.

Darren: 10:38

So for people, what has been the outcome of you doing all of this work? Because they're thinking like, okay, there's a lot of insane stuff you've done. You're super crystallized, Like why is this actually important?

Michael: 10:49

Why is it important To me? I think it was important from a self-empowerment and self-confidence perspective right In the first instance. As I said, someone who identified as introverted for my whole life, probably up until my thirties actually I still self thirties, actually I still self-identified as an introvert, even though other people told me I was extroverted. I know my nature is. You put me in this beautiful room like we got here and plunk me down with a book. I'm super happy, dude, you know, just to be in my own company and reading good, good literature. I'm happy with that. But I also do get my energy from people. So I think from if you're someone who does actually enjoy getting energy from people and that social dynamic, the social game, the social interaction, if you feel inhibited, if you feel like you can't communicate yourself well, you're forever going to be frustrated, right. And if you're a better communicator, you will just have more fulfilling relationships. You'll get what you want out of life, right. If we kind of go up the ladder here into entrepreneurship and commerce and the world of business, if you're persuasive, yeah, you're going to get your own way and that's a good thing.

Michael: 11:55

And I think of persuasion and charisma and eloquence as a knife. It's a knife that cuts both ways. So if I don't have integrity, if I'm a man lacking morals, I can use my powers of persuasion to make you do something you don't want to do. I can do that. I've done it before and I'm not proud. But what I've tried to do for the rest of my life is try and use that power for good.

Michael: 12:18

Right, if you can persuade someone to come around to your worldview or push them into a direction that's going to help them, you know you can talk someone down off a ledge if you're persuasive. Right, you can. You can. You can get the girl of your dreams to marry you. Right, you can win that business deal that's going to look after your family for the rest of your life. You know that's going to take care of them. That's their nest egg. Those are good things. But you can also use it to cut someone down with your words. You can also use it to sell someone a shit coin on the internet that has no intrinsic value. So it's really up to you how you use that power of persuasion. And I said, it's a knife that cuts both ways.

Darren: 12:54

Because you're very conscious of the negative side of persuasion. So why is that I?

Michael: 12:59

think I mean we can go really deep down the rabbit hole if we want.

Darren: 13:04

We got time. We have time. I'm looking at the time. We have more than an hour. We have time.

Michael: 13:11

Look, are people born with a moral compass and some aren't. I don't know, but I think I have a very strong opinion that the strong should protect the vulnerable, the strong should protect the weak. And what you want in life is and I don't just mean kind of physically strong. Obviously you're much stronger than I am You've been a bodybuilder for a long time but you want to be capable, you want to be competent, you want to be, you do want to be persuasive and charismatic so that you can do it, you can do good and you can deploy that power in service of others.

Michael: 13:44

I think that's a good thing and you know very personally, you know my son has special needs and you know I have a very I don't know why even as a teenager at school, when I saw someone getting bullied, I'm not the biggest dude you can see, but I was always be the one that step in not the biggest dude you can see, but I was always be the one that step in Like I don't enjoy seeing it.

Michael: 14:07

So I think, if you can harness that power in a world where there's a lot of Machiavellians who are trying to just you know, they're just out for themselves Um, I don't know, I think if you can set a good example, I think that you want to leave the world a better place than you found it and if I can do that in some small way, by teaching people to be better communicators, by helping them become more confident, because when I, when I teach communication skills, I'm not just teaching them the art of public speaking, I'm teaching them about self-belief, I'm teaching them about motivation, I'm teaching them about discipline, and all of these things, I think, help make you a happier, more fulfilled, self-actualized human being yeah, it's more of an intrinsic driver they're utilizing.

Darren: 14:49

You know, like a lot of, uh, a lot of actions are driven externally initially, which is like status, girls, money, but then that reaches a certain point or fear, and then it goes back to intrinsic then, which is to the point that you're doing it for, like your family, who you are, your values. You talk about the values a lot as well, how that ties in together. So if you, if you flip that so from the negative side of things, which again is half of the internet, half internet businesses, so let's say positioning on that, because this is really interesting, because communication for you is speaking, but it's also writing very much so, and it's also how you display your ideas.

Darren: 15:26

So I'm just thinking the context of an offer for a business. It breaks down into, like, the concept of the promise which you can very much overrun with this if it's taken in the wrong way um, the process, the promise, the path, and maybe even like some sort of like adjacent things, like that that works within, let's say, the offer. So like, how do you think about that? Because, like, you know, you're a you're you're an honest guy, you're empathetic, you have really strong values, but you probably see a lot of shit, you know, that's taken out of context. Does that make sense? Because, again, the whole negative side of this is like, oh, like content without context. You can't really value it, but you can when you're looking at, let's say, like a sales page or a sales message or on a call, and you feel in a wrong way. So, like, how do we spin this? And there's a lot in that, I know, but yeah, there's.

Michael: 16:16

There's a lot in there, but I think we'll unpack it together, that I'm going to pick up on a few things you said. Use the, the word quality. I think quality is undeniable. Sometimes we can't explain why we think it's brilliant or persuasive or logical or it has resonance, but it does. I think when someone opens their mouth and like wow, just, they're a great speaker, you feel it before you've intellectually understood why. And it's the same with writing. Sometimes you'll read something like that's brilliantly persuasive, but, as you and I know, the deeper you go down the rabbit hole.

Michael: 16:48

There are ways you can write, there are ways you can speak that will increase your chances at least of being heard right and getting a positive response. You even used one just now. I don't know if you realize, but you used alliteration right, the three P's. You talked about promise, process and Was it purpose. So you open with a promise, you show your process, and then used another P. So that's rule of three, alliteration. When we talk about brands, you know, sometimes we talk about positioning, personality and purpose, right Again. So how? Positioning was maybe the other P. So, using alliteration, using rule of three, these are linguistic devices that are memorable for people and they will ensure that your message is heard and remembered. Yeah, the irony being that we forgot the third P. Yeah, help remind me where you want to go down the rabbit hole with regards to the quality, with regards to the writing and the sales process. How can I help?

Darren: 17:41

It's mainly the negative side, negative side of initially right. So so how do we flip that over? Because, um, like, my observation is that I think a lot of these promises are promising too much or they're uncapped. Or even the guarantees like I know some of the biggest guys in the space, the guarantees are wrapped in a thousand different pieces of tripwire. You know so. The guarantee is devised in a way to get people to buy but at the same time that guarantee you can't even go through the steps and get your money back. And different pieces of tripwire. You know so. The guarantee is devised in a way to get people to buy but at the same time that guarantee you can't even go through the steps and get your money back. And I know these guys, you know and I've seen it and it works and it makes a lot of money and stuff. But again to me, I'm pretty similar to you in a moral aspect, which is like I don't want anything like that to come back negatively.

Michael: 18:21

No, so I just don't. Yeah, there's a number of things. There's a number of things here, right. So there will be emotional and cognitive dissonance. If you're someone who knows that you're over promising and under delivering, you can't walk away from that. It should. If you have any thread of decency, it should keep you up at night, right.

Michael: 18:38

And there's nothing wrong with making bold promises as long as you deliver. Nothing wrong with it. And sometimes you do have to put a bit of lipstick on the pig and enhance how something looks and maybe use a bit of hyperbole right, for how amazing your life will be in the transformation. But the thing is you deliver, you have to deliver on it. And if you do that, there's nothing wrong, I think, with with being um, a bit hyperbolic and being a little bit salesy in terms of your marketing, as long as you deliver.

Michael: 19:10

The problem is when you promise the world and you deliver nothing. Right, if I have promised you that you're going to walk out of this program, uh, more confident, more charming, more, more persuasive, happier, uh, more empowered, I better deliver on it, and I think I can. But the person who deliberately inside knows that I don't have the material here, I don't have the substance and this is all style. I think when they look in the mirror they'll know, because that's the thing with self esteem you will always know. When you go home and you look in the mirror and you get out the shower, you know if you're a good guy or not, unless you're that 1% of psychopaths that just don't even realize. Yeah To you are when no one's looking. Right, yeah who you are when no one's looking. That's your character.

Darren: 19:50

So just on a slight tangent, so I'm doing this thing like once a quarter, whereby I basically go somewhere on my own, and I just do like a week I call it ninja mode where I just go like off the grid. So I'm building either like. I'm building like the body, brain and mind and business, sorry. So the tree bees the tree, as always. And as virtue of that, I see who I am way more when I'm on my own than when I'm with my wife or with my dogs, or with my friends or with my team, because that's a representation of who you truly are. So the reason I'm doing it is because, like, I can actually see those values, like, am I actually the person that I say I am?

Darren: 20:28

And like, and sometimes I'm not, like some of my voices might pop up and this might happen, this that might happen Of course, of course, but it's recognizing that, because then I can almost be a better CEO, be a better husband, you know, and then even speak with more confidence, because I'm that person that I said I was going to be right, not the snake, because you went into the cave and you saw yourself when you came out.

Darren: 20:49

Exactly so I'm doing this once a quarter, dude, and I'm just going to go different places, um, that are nice and so on, that I can train and work hard, and then it just builds character. You know, and my thesis for this is that, like when you're doing those different periods of working on your speech or working on communication, that's what leads to asymmetrical returns, that's what actually leads to it it's actually not doing the BAU stuff every single day.

Michael: 21:11

Slight little tangent on that no, no, but I like the tangent, if I can build on what you've just said, I fully agree. I think it's a lovely practice. My kind of little one liner on this is if you want to be happy, you need to be doing three things Building, moving, connecting right. So building, that can be literally you're building muscle, could be in the gym, could be building a business, building a craft, building a family. Moving is obvious. Get your steps in, go for a run, hit the gym. Whatever it is that you enjoy doing, playing sports and connecting with people right, connecting with new people, new conversations, new ideas that are stimulating to you.

Michael: 21:44

And you'll find that most people that are deeply unhappy they're not doing any of those three things, are they? They're in a job, not moving, they're not building any new skills, they've stagnated and they're not meeting anyone new and being stimulated in new ways. And then that's why you become desperately unhappy, I think. So it's very simple, just if you feel like oh man, I'm feeling a bit down this week. Why Okay, look at my calendar. Am I building, moving or connecting? Ah, I haven't seen my mates for a while. Maybe we should go do that.

Michael: 22:08

Maybe the best thing you can do is actually to get out of work and just go for a few beers or or go hit the gym with the guys. Um, maybe you need to start a new skill, maybe you need to start a new business, whatever it is, but that will help, yeah, but I mean to to pivot back to to kind of the promise and and kind of ethics and the values. I think you know the line in sales. I fully, fully subscribe to it. Um, sell them what they want, but then give them what they need. Right, I've used that line for a long time.

Darren: 22:32

I know you really like it as well.

Michael: 22:35

And it's fine because you've given them what they need. On the backend, I don't you know.

Darren: 22:40

I quite often 90% of what I have to do because someone I'm sorry, I know we're jumping over each other, but like it's just, it's just so important. Because like people come to me with a specific problem and like the problem is like a, but it's actually B to Z, you know. And it's like no, no, no, we only have problems with a. And I'm like, all right, cool, just let's get started. And then it's like like, all right, this is what we're actually solving. Does that make sense? So I think, uh and that's that's honestly an observation perspective it's like looking at something and if you truly believe in what you're selling or what you're doing, you will know the like, the tangents basically, that are associated with it, you know. So a perfect example is like, let's say, someone says I don't get leads. It's like, oh, that doesn't mean there's something wrong with your business or what you sell, or even your marketing. It could be to do what you're positioning and how you speak. So there's different nuances with this.

Michael: 23:28

It's a great line and it works right, as long as you can give them what they need. So you say, for for both of my businesses, right, I have the corporate training, coaching, speaking business and then also have the sake, the Japanese sake drinks business. It's the same principle when, when I'm walking into a bar or restaurant or a hotel, they might think that they want this right, this thing, or delivered in this way, and I'll say, yeah, that's great, yeah, you need this cocktail, whatever. But I know actually that's not what they need on the menu, right, what they need is a sake from this particular prefecture and this profile. But I'm going to give them what they want, just so they can give them what they need.

Michael: 24:06

And with the corporate training, coaching and speaking, as you said, a lot of the clients will come to me and be like you know, our people aren't polished presenters. I think they need to focus on, they just need to be charismatic, like you. I'm like, okay, that's great, but I hear what you're saying and it's a lovely compliment, but it's charisma is actually a component of xyz and you. First of all, let's just get them structuring their presentation correctly and making sure that their their body language is good and, as you said, there's a whole menu of things. They think they just want a and, as you said, it's b to z and if you can be the man or woman that delivers that awesome or power to you makes sense man.

Darren: 24:40

Tell me true, uh, storytelling. What's your? What's your framework for that, especially when you're doing presentations or even maybe positioning ideas? Is there a framework that you use? Before we go any further, I have one question for you. Do you want to generate more leads for your business? Well, I've put together an entire system how anyone can use a podcast to generate more leads for their business, and the best part is, you don't even need a podcast to get started. I've created an entire guide and framework for you to be able to get more guests, more clients, more customers, more people in your pipeline and generate more revenue. This exact system is available right in the description down below. You'll be able to leverage a podcast to generate more leads for your business and be able to increase your exposure, increase your authority and increase your influence in your industry. So check that out right down below.

Michael: 25:27

I wouldn't say there's a specific framework, and there are guys out there you know, people you've had on your podcast that do have a very specific framework. What I will say about storytelling is that people under index on how important storytelling is as a general rule. So most people, especially smart people if there's people listening to this who are intelligent human beings. Unfortunately, one of the things they do a lot of the time is over-index on facts, logic and data. Right, they're trying to show all the features and all the specs and look how amazing this technology is and you haven't actually thought why the other person cares. Right, how is it going to make their life better? So I always begin with the end in mind. So what I do when I'm delivering any presentation or a speech it doesn't matter if it's a one minute conversation or if this is a 20 minute keynote I start at the end and I say what is the emotion I want to create? How do I want this person to feel when they walk out of the studio, walk out this room, leave this workshop?

Michael: 26:20

Okay, now I'm going to try and reverse engineer that and think about the different stories in my life and my experiences that I can tell in a genuine, authentic way that will relate to them, not about me. How can I relate it to them? So if I'm speaking to a bunch of lawyers, it's going to be different stories. If I'm speaking to a bunch of hungry 18 to 21 year old solopreneurs, it's going to be different stories. If I'm speaking at a high school, again it's going to be very different.

Michael: 26:43

But what do they need to hear to make their life better? So it always starts for me from a place of empathy and understanding what they need to get out of this conversation and this presentation. And then I'll go through my catalog of thousands of pages I've got in Google Docs and think about what are all the different inflection points in my life. What are all the different lessons I've learned through bitter experience or through learning from other people? Right, we've both got phenomenal networks that I'm so grateful for. What have I learned from all these amazing people that I can tell this group hey, this is why I messed up, so you don't have to.

Darren: 27:14

Yeah.

Michael: 27:14

So that's how I try and loop it in in terms of storytelling. What emotion do I want to create? How do I want them to feel?

Darren: 27:21

Can you focus more on the, just for a second, on the document you have building it out Like what's the thesis there, what's the process? You have to integrate that into your life.

Michael: 27:30

The document itself is literally, I'll show you it's called Thoughts on Communication. The title was made years ago. It's not particularly great or mind blowing, but it was just to get started and start documenting kind of the journey. So anytime I encounter quality, I write it down. And what most people do through life is they encounter quality and then they just they let it wash over them and they don't document it. So what I mean by that is anytime I'm watching a standout comedian or I'm watching something on Netflix or I watch someone present at a fireside chat or I listen to a podcast or I read something right in a book, a magazine, whatever it is, if it's quality and it moves me, I write it down and then later you can go back and start to deconstruct and analyze what were the component parts that made me feel something on an emotional level. Because it doesn't matter who you speak to or where you speak to them, right, if I speak in London, if I speak in Dubai, if I speak in Shanghai, hong Kong, singapore, where we are now, we all have the same range of human emotions, right? Yeah? And when you talk about the hero's journey and there are certain motifs that everyone can hang on to right. We all love the underdog. We all understand the motif of Robin Hood right Robbing from the rich to give to the poor. We all always fight for that guy right.

Michael: 28:45

So anytime I encounter quality, I write it down and then I will try to add my thoughts to it. So I just used my system. I just put three asterisks, so I know it's mine and I haven't just borrowed completely from them and I almost try and rephrase, paraphrase or reframe it using my own lens and using my own experience, and then I can actually teach that to other people. That's great and, as I said, there's nothing wrong with kind of binging on Netflix every now and then. It's actually fine, as long as you also expose yourself to quality and you expose yourself to genius, because regularly exposing yourself to genius will actually expand your consciousness. It will make you better right.

Michael: 29:23

Rubbish in equals rubbish out. You've got to put the good stuff in there. So I just keep it as a running kind of running catalog of beautiful ideas. It could be passages of poetry, it could be things I heard in a conversation over a few beers at the pub. Some, you know someone made an incredible joke. I'll write it down. That was brilliant. I love that. I'm going to steal that little one-liner and use it somewhere else.

Darren: 29:44

And I'll. I'll quote him right. I'll attribute him at the end.

Michael: 29:48

Once I've got my laugh, I'll attribute it to my buddy, steve Um, but yeah, I think it's a great practice and we always you always believe you're better than you are, don't you? You always believe that you're going to remember the thing, right when someone says I'm going to remember that, no, you won't, you're human. But if you write it down, it's there forever, which I love.

Darren: 30:09

That's super interesting man. So how do we tie that into the storytelling? I know I stopped you on that point, but like, so let's say you're speaking an event or you're you're meeting someone. Let's say we're walking through, like a sales process, so you're speaking to someone on a call and you're trying to show them that this is valuable for them, persuasively, and you're trying to bridge the point of where they are, where they want to get to, and avoid them doing it themselves or fucking up. Basically, so you're showing, showcasing stories of people that are just like them, that have had similar experiences, that walk through that process. How do you, how do you tell that, though? Because, like, that's sometimes where I would feel like that might go off in a random tangent with someone. So, like, how do we? This is fun. How do we? This is good?

Michael: 30:49

um, something you said again I'm observing, when you said they have to see something of themselves in the story.

Michael: 30:55

Right, so it has to be a story about someone like them it's like what you said, yeah yeah, so they have to see some part of themselves in your story, which is where a a lot of people mess it up, as you said, because you're rightfully worried and I don't always get it right, but I think I'm more right often than not in that telling a story that is actually relevant to the audience or and sometimes audience is just one person that you're selling to or talking to, so there has to be something in there that they're like oh yeah, I'm a bit like that, or I didn't realize I was the only one that saw the world that way, and to you as well, like no one wants to feel alone, and that's quite enlightening and inspiring. So what you're trying to do, there's multiple angles. Number one I'm going to say it before I forget it because preparation, for God's sake, preparation and due diligence is so important. You know how much, because we've spoken before how much research and due diligence I do on guests before they come on my podcast or before I interview someone. I do a lot of live events, right, that aren't recorded at a conference.

Michael: 31:53

I'm going to research the hell out of that guest, because most people, if they're semi-successful semi-successful forgive me there's quite a lot of their content on the internet, right, whether it's written or whether it's an interview on the company podcast or on YouTube, whatever it is, there is enough out there for you to get a sense of who they are and what their personality is and what their communication style is. So I can dial into that. So if I know that someone is very left brain, very logical, very analytical and really loves to get a good handle on the numbers, that is how I'm going going to present myself, which is anathema to how I naturally communicate. So I'm naturally more about emotion and and kind of storytelling. But I'll have to adapt my style if I'm going to resonate with that man or woman so let's use that in context for me chameleon so like how would you describe like my personality for that?

Darren: 32:38

like how would you communicate a message to me, so I need to.

Michael: 32:41

If I, when I speaking to you, I need to tap into certain motifs, right? One of them is is the young man on a journey, fulfilling his potential which you're doing a fantastic job of doing, by the way, and kudos to that and you're making mistakes, you're breaking some eggs, but you are becoming the man that you wanted to be. All right, and none of us is perfect, but you're getting there and that's what I love to see. I know that if I speak to you about committing to one person for the rest of your life, that will resonate with you, cause you've seen me with my wife and my kids and I know, you know I've met Elise and I know you've made a commitment to her. So I know that if I, if I, wander into that territory, you've got practice babies, because you've got a hundred dogs in your so I know that there's a soft spot in there that I can get to.

Michael: 33:26

I know that we can talk about the power of repetition and outworking people, because you've been a body builder, you've been a sprinter, so I know that the motif of hard work beats talent will always resonate with you, and I can package that in a million different ways, right? So those are just three things, and there's many others, right? But I know that if I, for example, if I tell stories that touch on those threads, you're gonna be like yeah, michael hears me, he gets me, he understands me. And again, to tie it back to the business context, I will do as much research as I possibly can so I know what they're like and I know what's going to sing to them, and that's not manipulation. This is making the experience better for them, right?

Michael: 34:07

If I'm speaking their language and also using their terminology, I will even go as deep sometimes as using their favorite words and phrases, because some people will have particular phrases or tons of phrases or words they love using, and I'll try and match their language and mirror them. That's very powerful, right? But the thing is, is any of this easy? No, it takes a lot of hard work and time. How much do you care? It's up to you. If you really care about stacking the odds in your favor and the thing going well, you're prepared to the nth degree.

Darren: 34:38

And there's also an element as well that you can systematize this to some degree. Right, you get faster. So I'll just give you an example. Why I was laughing was because in sales, specifically like what I'm doing, it's podcasts, but it's different industries. Could be real estate bros, could be like personal development people, could be what else, uh, like it could be tech guys and, um, the biggest thing is about customizing your language to their lingo.

Darren: 35:03

Yes, so especially, let's say, if it's an investing podcast, you would say something like oh, I've seen like the compound effect of your show, because that's how they speak to each other, and like, actually, honestly, the way I've done this is, if I'm using, let's say, a script or an email, I'll run it through gpt, chat, gpt, and let's say, rewrite exactly this without changing it, but use the lingo and language that someone in this industry would use, and then you get. You almost get like a breadth of their angle, and if you just do that a few times, you realize that there's a lot of nuance to how different people speak. So then you can pretty much you know that you need to customize messaging and that's why it's funny, because you did the hard work of that. I did the automated work, but we've we came to the same destination, which is like, yeah, you can't say the same shit, you can't send the same email, it has to be different, right.

Michael: 35:57

Yeah, to use the old Paul Graham quote, you do stuff that doesn't scale right, or do things that don't scale, and just taking the extra bit of time and legwork to customize things for certain people and certain audiences will make your message. It'll take you from an eight out of 10 to a 10 out of 10. Sorry, no one's a 10. Take from a seven to a nine. Right, let's be realistic. But yeah, it's the same.

Michael: 36:15

A lot of the the talks that I give at corporates right, sometimes it's a law firm, sometimes it's a pr firm and they'll ask me essentially against. This is like selling them what they want and giving them what they need. They'll always be like michael, we love your stuff, but can you use our eight corporate pillars, values or whatever? Right, you know we've got these core values or whatever. Can you weave that in? I'm like'm like, sure, sure I'll weave it in, and I always do, and I actually it's just a fun challenge to try and weave in their terminology and how they view the world and then actually give them my message that I want to land. So I am using all of my same source material, but I'm delivering it in a way that will sing to them. Right, and there's nothing wrong with that. There's nothing wrong with that. There's nothing wrong with that. You want it to be heard.

Darren: 36:57

Well, you're understanding who your market is right at the end of the day, what elements of psychology you're tapping into. So you know there's the seven big pillars from like influence, how do you position things like social proof, like ability being relatable, like how do you think about that in the context of communicating with someone?

Michael: 37:16

In all, honesty, I don't know how much I consciously do it. Now again, one of my principles with public speaking is it takes a lot of effort to make things look effortless. Takes a lot of effort to make things look effortless. And I remember I got a specific question similar to that from the audience. Well, I basically went through my workshop on mini masterclass on public speaking and then it was a girl in the audience. Well, I basically went through my workshop on mini masterclass on public speaking and then it was a girl in the audience.

Michael: 37:41

She said how on earth can you think of all these different things Like, as you said, social proof, likeability, reciprocity on the fly, while your eyes are open, you're trying to look at someone and remember your sales script, and I was like I just said you can and I don't know how and I think it's just reps and I think it's practice.

Michael: 37:58

But you have to internalize those principles first, right, those principles of psychology. So, again, people buy from people that they like spending time with as a rule. So, one of the things I'm trying to do and I don't think it's manipulation, because, um, I think anyone in my network who knows me if you're out there watching I love doing business with friends and again I got some pushback from an executive coaching client. He was like am I overstepping the mark by inviting this guy to go play tennis with me? And like go for dinner with the wives? I was like no, do it. It's exactly the right thing to do. Go play tennis, go have a double date with the wives, because that's going to solidify the relationship and it's just.

Darren: 38:37

It won't be awkward if it's only awkward if you make it awkward, dude 100, and what's funny about that is, I think you work better with people that you're friends with, to give an example. So you know, tom, that's in a program. Yeah, so me and tom were friends for so long. We're very similar.

Darren: 38:52

And then I was like it just makes sense for us to work together, literally because we both know each other's mannerisms yes, like, and it will come organically of course, but like my logic and this is actually from justin waller which is like you want to be making money with your friends, genuinely right and like if you can create a win-win situation whereby it's progressing, both people fucking do it because that's better than a random person, or like a random client that comes in, you know.

Darren: 39:16

So it's like fostering that within your network, um, and that's that's what I'm doing. Like all of my friends, we all work together in some capacity you know whether it's just referrals or an actual agreement and it's funny because, like even my friends from like you know, like the big YouTubers or like people on LinkedIn that are big, we're friends because we work together on stuff. Do you get me me like, and then we have similar values and we can go for dinner and stuff like this, but we're at, we actually know each other because we work together. Um, and that's funny. Because you work, you're in the same space, because you're similar anyway, um, versus like people you grew up with and then you have a friend that's a co-founder and then you're like completely different people. So that's just an interesting, interesting kind of tangent on that.

Michael: 39:56

Yeah, I don't. I don't see anything wrong with trying to get people on side really, really quickly and become friends with them, cause I do actually want to be friends with them. I think anyone who knows me will maintain that I keep those relationships warm and I don't just ask for stuff when I need stuff. So I can think of multiple people right now off the top of my head. I won't name them because it's not fair, but they've been friends for a long time and I have maybe soft pitched something you know, whether it's the Sake business or some corporate training or coaching work six, seven years ago. I I'm visualizing them right now in my head and never asked again, like they know what I'm doing, they know what I'm good at, they see stuff on the internet, you know LinkedIn or whatever. And yeah, they brought me in right, right Yesterday, a couple of weeks ago, in Singapore and Hong Kong you know, good ticket, great, but I never asked explicitly for it.

Michael: 40:43

I wasn't desperate, because the quicker you want something, the easier you are to manipulate and people can smell desperation Again, attenuate like trying to internalize and become a tuning fork for quality. You want to hear it? The best line from one of Daniel Priestley right Was a guest on your podcast as well. Daniel's best line for me was every good pitch has, with or without your, energy. My life is going to be fine with or without you.

Darren: 41:09

It's from Ozzy too.

Michael: 41:10

Yeah, it's brilliant right, and I love that. That one stuck with me because I wrote it down. I would have forgotten if I didn't. And he's right. I know I have value and that's not arrogant, right? I know I can help you with your specific problem. I can make your life better. And if you don't want to work with me, that's cool, we can still be friends and I'm not going to nag you, by the way, and then five years later they'll be like Michael. Actually I need some help. I've got a presentation, a speech, 500 people. Can you help me out? Of course, mate, happy to.

Darren: 41:43

But I didn't bug them for five years. Man, that's so much wisdom that, because I think the biggest thing with this is the fact that it is a very interesting observation, because that's part of the infinite game, which is like we don't need the cash now because we can. We know that we can solve that problem. We have that confidence in ourselves that we're able to actually go and do this and then, like true serendipity, these things actually just like it's like the universe theory, man, they actually physically work out over a longer period of time.

Darren: 42:05

And that's a very strong frame to have, because if you're in a sales position or even with your content and whatnot, it's like you need to be doing this stuff as a podcaster, you need to be in studios. You can do it remotely on Zoom, but don't complain if it's not growing, because you need, in 2024, to be in studios and you can do that yourself. I can help you or I can coach you, and it's like, but at the end of the day, you need that, I'm going to be fine regardless, and it's like a very strong frame. But then, as a result of all of that is that they respect you more in that regard Because frame, but then, as a result of all of that, is that they respect you more in that regard. Yeah, exactly, you know, and I think that's uh, yeah, I'd like to get your thoughts on that, because I feel like when you, when you chase something so much, you almost push it away and you repel it right and the more, and like I've gone through those periods too right, like I was in, you know, we've made a lot of money, but at the same time, I'm always thinking there's, and then whenever I push for more, it's almost like it just doesn't happen.

Darren: 43:00

And that's even a current period that we're in. Is that the more that I push? Yeah, because, like the position that I'm in so I heard this from Hamosi is that the one to three million a year business is one of the hardest to grow, because you, basically you're doing the manual stuff to get to that period, but then you need to have so much more infrastructure to break past like three million a year, and where we're at right now is that we're burning so much cash to be able to get through there but we're not actually getting the return. So so I'll give an example like we're building more sales, we're running ads for the first time. Um, and I know that's what's necessary.

Darren: 43:43

And I'll give you a very simple example. I don't know if you're familiar with ship 30 for 30 by Dickie Bush. Um, I know those guys like personally and, uh, they're doing a million a month, but they had met a very, very big name at a mastermind and they were similar to me. They were like 70 percent margin oh, the high margin, whatever but all the guys that were at the mastermind were 10 times bigger and the reason why is because they took these bigger feats of running ads, building sales teams and stuff like this, and they had the same realization that I had that they had to become big and they did it and it's worked. So that's's a realization that I'm at, which is why it's like extremely painful, because you're just like you know you're spending like.

Michael: 44:22

You're spending like 30 K a month Watching the money go out the door.

Darren: 44:24

Yeah, you're spending 30 K a month and it's experimenting, um, so it's brutal, but at the same time, the reason I'm saying this is because I'm pushing, pushing, pushing and then the returns are coming back directly. But it is coming back Like it's just not reflecting the P and L.

Michael: 44:39

And it will. Right, and it will, because I know enough about you to know that you'll succeed and you'll break through, as painful as it is right now yeah, of course you will. But the point is how you're feeling cannot come across in the way you're speaking. It cannot because you can, internally and within the ecosystem of VOIX, with your employees, you can show some honesty and vulnerability in the sense that you know this is painful and I don't know if we're going to make it. But externally, when you're presenting, you have to say we're going to make it. And right there, there's a bit of a duality there and that's not lying. It is that insane levels of self-belief mixed with a healthy amount of realism, that this is going to be painful and and it's going to hurt for a while, but that this is necessary if you want to escape this kind of one to three million it's rational optimism right, rational optimism, yeah it's basically like change.

Darren: 45:31

There's a point that I was at I don't know how you feel, a category of one, the book. Yeah, so the book has been criticized quite a lot, but I did really enjoy it. But the main thing that I enjoyed from him was the first chapter, which is just like you have to make a decision to go or not to go, and the decision to go just means that, like, everything that you did up to this point was good, but it's not going to get you to the next level. And if you just want, if you want to get to the next decisions and I remember that was about five, six months ago or something like this, which was, like you know, we have like a lifestyle business to some degree, I can travel and so on, but the jump is just such a big jump off the edge which is chill.

Darren: 46:06

We just made the, the, the, the change, but then I hired a lot more. Uh, I caught a lot of people, um, made a lot of changes, but for, for the, for the better, like as in, like, every metric is up. It's just the fact that, like, when you're doing it, you're just like there's a lot involved. You know what I mean. There's a lot of things that you don't see, that go involved and like growing a pnl, that you don't even anticipate on your to-do list or whatever. So the reason I'm just saying that is because again it goes back to presentation like how do we show up and how do we get it across?

Michael: 46:38

yeah, to unpack that I mean first and foremost I think you remind me of. I love the concept of the infinite game and also a category of one. It's like are we gonna go, are we gonna go right? It's like one of my favorite guests on my own podcast was um, a spanish guy, manuel palacio, really good restaurateur, and he has this great. He was like first question you have to ask yourself do you believe?

Michael: 46:58

Do you believe yes? The answer is yes. If the answer is yes, are we doing everything that it takes? Question two Because if you're in, you're in with all of the consequences is what he said If you're in, you're in with all of the consequences, you have to ask yourself I love that. That stuck with me. I was like, wow, really smart guy, check out his restaurant in Bangkok, If he's down there, called Chento, brilliant. So I sit with that question a lot. And what you said also about what got you here won't get you there. That there's again.

Michael: 47:30

I'm trying to remind myself pieces of quality that the poet David White. He says you must abandon the shoes that got you to the water's edge. It's like you've got there. You got to take them off. They're comfortable. You know what to do there. You got to go swim now, um.

Michael: 47:45

But it cannot come across as desperate and sometimes it will slip out subliminally because you're chasing PNL and you might have this figure in your head like we need to bill a million bucks this month or in trouble. But you still need to come with a smile and be relaxed and have that, with or without you energy, and you'll do much better. And the way you can do that is you don't have to lie, you can just actually be doing it for a higher purpose, right? So all entrepreneurs who are purpose-driven as opposed to profit-driven make more money anyway. Fund that, right?

Michael: 48:15

Elon Musk we don't admire him because he wanted to be a billionaire or the richest man on earth. We admire him because he's trying to make humanity and multi-planetary species. Right, he's trying to get to Mars. Right, he's trying to solve for the energy crisis. He's always talking about some higher purpose, right. It's not just about P&L, but I'm sure he loses some sleep. Right, and they're the patagonia, right? Classic example in the world of brands. Right. Earth is our only shareholder. Okay, cool, now everyone's gonna buy their stuff and they'll make more money anyway. Right, so you can be virtuous and make a lot.

Darren: 48:47

It was cool as well. Great story, it's a great isn't how to make the change.

Michael: 48:50

Yeah, you can be genuinely virtuous and make money at the same time, which I I love Great. Everybody wins.

Darren: 48:56

Okay, so who in the space is an excellent communicator that you observe in online space or whatever? What's your observation? Who's crushing it?

Michael: 49:07

Who's crushing it. Okay, Again, this is always subjective, right, so I can reel off names that aren't very famous, like David White that I just said. So David White is this beautiful English Irish poet, philosopher. I could point you towards the Irish philosopher, poet he was an ex-priest. John O'Donoghue Brilliant. Listen to anything by John O'Donoghue, your life will be better. And he does it in an Irish accent which you will love. If you go into the more modern podcasting space, I love Chris Williamson at Modern Wisdom. I think he's done really well and the reason I like him is not because he's good looking and he's English like me. I like him because he's done the work and he did the reps on a nightclub door, didn't he? He ran nightclub events for years and years and years and just that number, that volume of social interactions, should you choose to care and pay attention has made him a really effective businessman, a communicator and podcast podcaster and interviewer, right, and he's got massive guests.

Darren: 50:07

Why do you think he's so good? Like what? How can you deconstruct that?

Michael: 50:10

So he's always teaching you something new. For one, I think that is an explicit KPI for him, whether he's he has clarified that to himself or not His rate of revelation is pretty high. You know we talked about ROR, right? Ror is rate of revelation. His rate of revelation is very high, like per 30 seconds. Per 60 seconds he's coming out with something new, or coming out at least with something that is interesting, some theory or concept.

Michael: 50:36

You know he coins a lot of terms and it's great. I love it. 90% of the times it hits. Sometimes it misses. Who hits 100%? All the time? No one. But I think he's really good in terms of that rate of revelation. He's very good at giving a platform to people and bringing out the best in them. So I get the sense that he researches to the nth degree in terms of how do I bring the best out of this person? He doesn't talk down to his audience, even though he sounds very articulate and intelligent. And, yeah, I think he again, from a social proof perspective, like you, you know this beautiful studio he's upped the levels in terms of production quality, right? My original inspiration for the podcasting world was Tim Ferriss. I don't know if he was was the same.

Darren: 51:19

Yeah, same to you. First ever podcast I listened to.

Michael: 51:20

Yeah, brilliant. So, ironically, one of the and I know this goes against everything you believe in in 2024, but the reason, if anyone out there is- still listening to my podcast has listened to my podcast because I haven't released an episode for two years.

Michael: 51:35

That's because I haven't released an episode for two years but it you know it did do well previously it was I deliberately did it audio only, as you know. Deliberately because I'm I'm old school and I love long form radio and I love Tim Ferriss and I wanted to see if someone would listen, if they didn't see my face and didn't really know who I was. And I took that as a bit of a challenge and and I loved, I loved the whole experiment. But Tim is unbelievably structured right and how he approaches things and I was shamelessly read. You know four hour work, week tools of Titans and his whole. Basically how to start a podcast. Blog post was like that was the framework for me.

Michael: 52:09

You follow the recipe, you get the results or same similar results. You know, went to number one in Hong Kong, which is very small, the podcast, but it worked. All the principles worked and what's interesting about him? Similar results, you know, went to number one in hong kong, which is very small, the podcast, but um it worked, all the principles worked, and what's interesting about him is he's actually still doing what he used to do yeah, still doing it, yeah but in terms of, like, he doesn't have video after him, he doesn't have a thumbnail, yeah, yeah yeah, I love it.

Michael: 52:30

He doesn't show up on youtube. It has no thumbnail no title no title, no thumbnail.

Darren: 52:35

No title, no thumbnail no video, and I'm like Jesus Christ, it's built up enough goodwill, but he's a great interviewer, right.

Michael: 52:41

He is. Some people I've heard don't like. They find him a little bit dry, perhaps not interactive or humorous enough, but he is a very intelligent questioner which I love.

Michael: 52:51

In what regard? Because this is really important for people too. Okay, so for me, in terms of advice to anyone who's listening, who's a podcast or interviewer, find the throwaway line. So your task, if I was to give you a task before you interview me, is go through all my podcasts before all my interviews, all my LinkedIn posts, whatever it is preferably video, because you can see them and hear them in real time or audio. Find the throwaway line. Find the throwaway sentence that you could hear the emotion in my voice and the other interviewer didn't pick up on it. He or she failed to notice it, and you can sense internally like, oh, there's something there, you know, maybe you talked about, you know when his dad left him, or something when he was 15. And then the interviewer just barreled on and kept asking about e-commerce Like whoa, hang on, there's something deeper there and you missed it, right.

Michael: 53:39

So I'm always looking for the throwaway sentence and I think Tim is really, really good for that. He'll always try and start on a tangent and start somewhere that's a little bit left field, and then he's super present. He's super present in the moment and guiding the conversation. Again, he uses storyboarding. I'm always storyboarding my episodes as well. You want to have a narrative arc, but you don't want to prepare specific questions, like we haven't done that for today. Right, you didn't send me a single question. I didn't come with a script, but, thematically, I'm arriving here in a taxi, thinking about the principles and themes I want to talk about, and then you just have to believe that you've done the work and you know your stuff.

Darren: 54:14

The majority of my guests run content businesses. They've used content as the main element of their business to drive more revenue and build their influence online. We've been doing this through a podcast for many years. We have many guests, clients and even customers use a podcast as their main source of driving more revenue for their business and building their influence online, and we're offering a handful of spots to book in a call with our team to learn how you yes, you can leverage a podcast to generate more revenue for your business and drive your influence online. Many of our clients and customers start from nothing, but each one of them are action takers and they want to learn more about how to build a podcast and a brand right around their business. So if you want to learn more and you're really interested in building a podcast, check out the link down below and book in a free call with our customer success manager and he will guide you into how you can build and generate more revenue from your podcast this year.

Darren: 55:09

Super interesting man. So how does that like evolve then as a result in terms of? So you have these guys who are killing it on that side from a presentation perspective. What about the guys on the front then. So let's just use a carmosis example, because he's like, and he's probably at the top of the of the food chain in this space. He's probably less empathetic, more logical, but his storytelling ability, especially on short form, is fucking crazy. You know like he can wrap this crazy story into it. He's using a lot of like, analogies and analogies continuously. What do you think about? How do you think about that?

Michael: 55:47

Yeah, so again the good thing about Hormozy again, rate of revelation is super high. In terms of how he speaks, there is very little fat and a lot of muscle, just like how he is actually physically right. He doesn't use a lot of fluff, he cuts straight to it and sometimes there is a lack of empathy or a perceived lack of empathy, but actually I like his form of self-improvement, which is somewhat similar to Jordan Peterson, which is all about radical accountability and personal responsibility. And I always believe that the best place to start is here with you. With one person, you make yourself better, people around you will get better, their lives will get better. So it's actually the right place to start.

Michael: 56:25

And you know, sometimes when Hormozy talks about stuff it comes across maybe as, as you said, lacking empathy and insensitive and um, it's, it's not nuanced. The guy's a smart guy. His brain is running a hundred miles an hour, but I bet you he's also taking the time. He probably has a Google doc of some kind or notebooks physical notebooks where he is writing these things down. And it's not my line, I can't remember who said it, but clarity of speech comes from clarity of thought. Clarity of thought comes from writing. You distill it through your writing, right? I used the cloudy water example before. That's how you distill it through your writing, right? I used the cloudy water example before. That's how you distill it. That's the theory behind his book. I don't know if you're familiar with this.

Darren: 57:01

I can't remember so for 100 million dollar leads and 100 million dollar offers. When he was writing the book he went on a podcast tour like everyone does, but he didn't do it after the book was released. I think he did it towards the last edit and he'd come in, like a comedian does, to a dive bar and drop like one liners and he'd wait to hear the response and he'd go in and like fill in the gaps and apparently for 100 million dollar leads, he did like 30 interviews in like 30 days, some shit. He was almost like gutting stuff out of the book and adding stuff into the book, depending on how like the interviews were basically going um, and it just gave him like a lot of data, basically as like a product, you know, the product of him being him. So it goes back to that exact entire thesis that you described, which is like understanding the cues, like what's actually hitting, why does it resonate?

Michael: 57:51

yeah, and if I, if I can sorry to interrupt, but just while I've got it, hormosa, you made a great point. Right to single him out. In terms of the storytelling. What is is the motif? What's the dominant motif? The dominant motif is I'm not special, actually, if I can do it and I was sleeping on the gym floor right On a mattress, I had $0 to my name If I can do it, you can do it too. That is the motif. If I can do it, you can do it too. I'm not particularly special. The magic you're looking for is in the work you're avoiding, right? Hormozian, chris Williamson, they both beat that drum all day long and I love it, I agree. So that is why it appeals to us. There is a deep, deep resonance with that belief that if he can do it, I can do it too. If only I can find the motivation, if I can find the resilience, if I can find the right technique.

Michael: 58:36

Um, you know, we, we all hope and wish for a better life for ourselves and for our loved ones. And, and he is in real time, showing you with the numbers again, with that transparency, um, how he did it and how he continues to do it. Well, it's social proof right and uh.

Darren: 58:51

So that's why these guys in particular and I met Brett Malinowski last week in New York like he's super dialed in on the psychology side and his script thing is like very, very clear. It's like dream outcome, like how to build a hundred million dollar business with AI, and it's like just like Alex Ramosi did it, dan Coe did it, chris Williamson did it, and so he walks through like all the elements of psychology continuously and that's what Ramosi does. He opens his video being like 76 minutes of no BS business advice from someone who sold the company for 46 million, has a portfolio that makes 250 million a year. So does that make sense? The framing is important. So how do you think about positioning and framing, especially for someone who doesn't have the receipts?

Michael: 59:34

Doesn't have the receipts yet Yet. Yeah, this is a hard one, and this one I get a lot as a question, because there's a lot of guys in their twenties and they're like how do I project confidence? We're not even confidence, but how do I project credibility when I haven't got the receipts yet and I don't have the client list? There's a lot of stuff you can do and offer and I know you will have done this and probably still continue. I do it as well. You can impress important people by offering value right up front without asking for anything in return. Okay, so the credibility can come through the quality of your thought and the quality of the work that you're doing, and it costs nothing to send it to them.

Michael: 1:00:12

By the way, you know I speak a lot about kind of increasing your chances of getting lucky and how you spin the wheel of serendipity to work for you by.

Michael: 1:00:21

You know, if you wanted to contact Hormozy or maybe you're the wrong example because you have a platform now, but someone who didn't have a platform there's nothing to stop them sending a cold email or a DM showing them hey, I've analyzed school and I think you could do this, this, this, differently, and this is what I think you could achieve.

Michael: 1:00:38

And yada, yada, yada, nothing to stop that guy doing that, um, dialing it back one level if that's too much, I can just say the way you present yourself in terms of your demeanor, your body language, the clarity of your speech, the way you dress, the way you turn up, um, that all breeds and projects confidence, right, and authority and credibility, right. So the way you show up is a lot of it, I think, right. Having that, with or without you energy. It's even better if you can actually turn people down and you can still afford to pay your rent In the early days. You might not be able to, but you still have to give that, with or without you energy, because fortune is a woman and she plays hard to get and you know they'll run away if, if they can smell the desperation on you framing is so important.

Darren: 1:01:19

Um, even our sales process now, because we're helping some people, you know, go zero to one. We're booking more calls, but booked calls is a terrible metric because you could book awful people. So I have two. I have two very important questions. One it's like in the application form, it's like if you're not looking to get started, like now, like, don't book. And secondly, if you're not, it's like if you're not looking to get started, like now, don't book. And secondly, if you're not the decision maker and you're not willing to invite them, don't book, because the result is we will cancel, you know. So it's just like a strong frame. And even like how it's called it's not called a discovery call, it's called an intake call. So you're booking the call because you know what's happening next and it's just a very strong position of frame. What did you mention? Just to go back a second ago about the framing question, I asked what was it you mentioned specifically? I had another example.

Michael: 1:02:08

I think in terms of how you can project credibility before you've got the receipts.

Darren: 1:02:10

Yes, yes, yes, yes. So sorry, what I was going to add to that was the best example is yourself, right? If you can do it for yourself, if you're a personal trainer, if you get shredded, if you're a financial advisor and you can manage your own money, if you're a relationship coach and you're married and you're successful, then that's the best example to go benchmark other people. So, to this day, when I get on a call with someone, it could be like a hundred million dollar CEO at a huge company that's never heard of him in my entire life and he's like show me an example. And I'm like, before I show you an example in my niche, here's my YouTube and I'll open it up and I'll be like see how this looks, same shit for you.

Darren: 1:02:46

And then that's the first basis point, you know. So I think like that's one element that works really well. And then the second element then is free work. So even yesterday, I had a call with someone and I was still doing free work for them, because I think like no one is too successful to be able to offer something to someone to help them. From that regard, initially, does that make sense? So it's a you are.

Michael: 1:03:09

Yeah, as you said, you are the best proof, right, you are the living proof. You're the role model, you're the case study and show your work there. And also I will add to that on top of that, if you can be again, if you've dialed in your communication skills right and your interviewing style say this is a sales pitch, right You're in the position of authority. I'm the young pup who doesn't really have a track record. Through the quality of my due diligence and my research and going the extra mile, I can ask you really good questions and then just shut up. The quality of my questions will elicit better answers.

Michael: 1:03:43

So if you're 50, imagine you're a 55-year-old gray-haired CEO and I'm just a 21-year-old and I've come in and I've asked the best questions you've heard all year. That's going to get you curious. Oh, this Michael kid's got something about him. He doesn't have the track record, but maybe I'll give him a shot, because no one else none of these other sales reps are asking anywhere near this depth of question, right? So the quality of your questions will elicit better answers and that will become very apparent to smart people very quickly. Like, this guy knows his stuff, he's done the research and what's funny there is that it can be opening the dialogue, because you may not even know the answer.

Darren: 1:04:22

Right, yeah, you don't even have to. Yeah, and that's actually. Have you studied imagery? Imagery enough for communication. This is really interesting.

Darren: 1:04:30

So in a sales context, the best thing you can do is create imagery for the person of what the transformation would look like. So, like one thing is like you know one, like understanding, like the end goal. So if you start a podcast, what's the end goal? I want to be famous, okay, cool. What does it look like if you were to become famous and everything was taken care of for you? It ran seamlessly, you weren't stressed, you weren't waking up in the middle of the night, wrong or whatnot. How does that look? How does that feel? Most importantly, so it's almost like implanting images in their brain and they're like oh, okay, now I can see what the end goal is. It's just a combination of do I want to work with that person?

Darren: 1:05:09

And then it's basically like when you have the imagery set so they understand where they're going, where they're doing it, then you just need to get them all okay on the process. So the process could be like we've run the podcast for you or whatever, and that's okay, process good. So imagery is dialed in, the pain point is dialed in. There's um self-admission, they've admitted to themselves that there's a problem and they want to solve it. And the last thing then is their process. And if you can basically tee up all of that, then the price they will actually figure it out. So, whether it's whether you say 400 or 4k or 40k for the year, they'll fucking find the way they'll. They'll use their credit card or whatnot, because it's not, it's not a process problem. They're bought into the division, you know. So I think it's just an interesting again, it's just a lens versus getting on and saying I do short form content and guys like, okay, give me, whereas I know guys who were absolutely crushing it with short form content because they've done this no, I love it.

Michael: 1:06:06

and imagery. Yet we're using different words for this same thing and you explained it beautifully. So kudos, yeah, so I my. My frame for it is future casting, so it's like I'm trying to throw them into the future of what their life might look like. It's the same principle. We've just we've arrived at it from left and from right, but it's the same thing. Visualization create a picture in their minds of how good their life would be.

Michael: 1:06:27

So, in the context, for me, with the public speaking, the presentation skills, the question would be imagine what it would feel like to actually look forward to going on stage. What would that feel like? If you're actually looking forward to giving a presentation, 99% of people dread it. They're like, oh, you can actually look forward to this stuff. I'm like, yeah, I love the fact that I get to speak to you and go on the mic today and I might mess up. Brilliant, Bring it on. And with live events it's even better. I love live events, emceeing or giving a keynote speech. I love being in the arena and seeing the red light is on right now and it's like go live, love it. Adrenaline yeah, it's the sportsman in me. I like being in the center circle in the arena. But imagine what your life would be like if you actually look forward to giving that presentation at work, If you're confident going into every pitch confident, going into every pitch, confident going into every sales call.

Darren: 1:07:21

What would that be like? And then you, as you said, you rightly said, they will then justify the price to themselves. Okay, so let's go a little bit deeper on that, because it sounds like, it sounds like appealing to more. The emotion is way better from that perspective, in a in a persuasive, persuasive way yep.

Michael: 1:07:31

And because emotions override logic, we see that all the time. Right, you, you, you're, you know your, your reptilian brain audit will decide uh, way before the, the, the logical part of your brain says, yeah, this is a good idea, I should definitely buy from this guy. Right, you, you know it's. Before you walk into the store, you know if you're going to buy the t-shirt or the car, or that you'll justify the watch, or you'll justify it to yourself with logic. I've earned this, I'm working really hard. Next month is going to be killer. I can afford the Rolex. It was a gut decision, it was an emotional decision, whether you realize it or not, and we with people as well. Again, we're in a world where AI is the dominant kind of topic of conversation. I think you're built of a similar ilk to me in that every action has an equal and opposite reaction, right? So all of these people are going to chat to you with tea at Gen AI.

Darren: 1:08:21

And.

Michael: 1:08:21

I'm like I don't want video, I want face to face. No recording, just this and you know there will be this fierce opposition to everything. Where people will want masterclass retreats, they'll want to have these face to face conversations, um, and there's group coaching and you know there's room for all of us actually, if you know your niche and you know your positioning.

Darren: 1:08:41

but um, counter trends are super interesting, right, it's just a counter trend. So, like, what's your observation there? Because I saw, you know, Greg Eisenberg, big prolific name on LinkedIn and different platforms too. Uh, I'll never get this out of my head, but he wrote a post being like I just saw the worst written LinkedIn post of all time, but I'm so happy because it was. I can see that it was written by a human.

Darren: 1:09:04

Yeah, I'm the same, I love it so he said he saw like a bunch of grammar mistakes. There was like multiple spaces between words, there was spelling mistakes, and he was like it worked really well, because I actually figured out what this person liked and I looked and I saw what he was like. It worked really well, because I actually figured out what this person liked and I liked and I saw what he was, uh, promoting and whatnot. It looked pretty good, and I just think to myself, like fuck me, dude, like the bar used to be low, but now it's just so low in terms of competition, and like the typical example is like you click on someone's linkedin profile and it starts with like an emoji. It's like a rocket emoji. Unleash your potential Rocket emoji.

Darren: 1:09:37

And what I just think, though, is like who has got that fair in life to think that it is okay to now post this shit, to write that stuff, to create the clips with AI? You know, it's just an interesting observation, right? Because, like now it's. And then, if we go back to the very start of the conversation, being like like all of this stuff makes things worse. Now, technology enables things to be easier that's the whole purpose of technology, but when the agents that are using it are lazy as fuck.

Michael: 1:10:12

They're looking for shortcuts. Yeah, again, we dial it all the way back to universal principles People always looking for a shortcut, right, so that. And they're trying to avoid the work. And you can't become the persuasive, charismatic guy or girl in the room without doing the work, right, and it's the same way they're trying to do short circuit with their content and the sales copy and everything else and it will work on some. I see your AI comments. If you're using them.

Darren: 1:10:37

I see you like, don't think, I can't see it, I can see it.

Michael: 1:10:41

Right. I don't always choose to call it out, but we all, we can see it. I think if you have a modicum of intelligence, you can see it and it instantly diminishes my respect for you. If you're using AI and you can use AI for ideation, absolutely fine, but then please paraphrase and put it into your own words and your own language and insert some stories about your life experiences that make it real.

Darren: 1:11:01

Yeah, I had a client call late last night. It was super interesting because they were pulling the transcript out of all the podcasts that we've created and they were writing three blogs per podcast and it would like create like a very detailed blog as per their language and then at the very end of it it would go to a copywriter to to re rewrite it. And it was yeah, exactly, and and then post it. So then their volume has gone up, their quality has gone up, the workload for the copywriter gone down, and it was just such an interesting observation because they'd built the systems in the back end to allow for quantity and then it just came in and added quality and I was like what's wrong with that? Nothing wrong with that, you know, but it's just like most people will got got the copywriter to save two and a half k K a month and then end up with a shit business and a shit brand image, because that's this, all of this shapes the brand and it just shapes like how do we position everything from this?

Michael: 1:11:55

point forward. You know, yeah, every touch point. I think that it's you know you? To go back to the first point, is communication getting worse? Yeah, it is across the board, probably, but again, it allows you if you can be one of those people that has an authentic and unique voice. We talk about one of one content, right Often in the online space. If you can make one of one content, I like to think that if you go through and I don't have a huge internet presence, anyone watching this will know that, but I'm pretty regular and prolific on LinkedIn in terms of just the content and thoughts I'm putting out I want to put my thinking in public.

Michael: 1:12:25

Right, if you go through my posts, you can tell they're not written by AI, because there is a consistency in the tone of voice and the messaging and I think just the, the emotional lens I put everything through is like oh, that's Michael, do you know what I mean? You could take away the, the author's name, and just I could present you with three posts and you could probably pick out oh, that's Michael, do you know what I mean? And I think Darren Lee should be able to do that. Everyone watching should be able to speak in such a way that I can identify as oh, that's Darren. In the same way that you can identify a Nike advert from an Adidas advert. Right, because of the language. Nike will never talk about taking part, the joy of taking part. It's about winning. Nike is the goddess of victory. So then they're never going to put out an ad like oh, it's really nice that you took part and you got a participation trophy for finishing. Third well done, that's like we're Nike, we win, just do it. How do?

Darren: 1:13:17

you find your voice when everyone is trying to like copy everyone, because you stand on the shoulders of giants. But how do you like actually create like an individual brand?

Michael: 1:13:29

effectively. It's such a good question and I don't know if I have a sufficient you know, sufficiently articulate answer for it. But how to find your own voice? I'll go back to where you finished stand on the shoulders of giants. So this is the first and good place to start.

Michael: 1:13:43

I don't think there's anything wrong with borrowing from the greats. So so you go back to. You know, you can go all the way back to kind of the Greek philosophers, right? You read Aristotle and Socrates, and then you can read great poetry Rilke, david White, I mentioned, right, mary Oliver. You can consume that. Then you look at the more modern content creators like Hormozi, right, like Chris Williamson, like Eric Weinstein, like Jordan. Creators like Hormozy, right, like, like Chris Williamson, like Eric Weinstein, like Jordan Peterson, whatever.

Michael: 1:14:11

You stand on the shoulders of giants. And then you have to go away to your point, into your man cave or your woman cave, and sit with them. Right, and I've written them all down, distill them, sit with them, think about the points in your life Like oh, what was the most painful thing that happened to me? What was the best thing that happened to me? What was the moment in life where they're sliding doors and, if I turn left, my whole life would have been different.

Michael: 1:14:29

Because you have one, I have one, I know instantly what it is. Everyone listening will know. But not many people take the time because it's so busy and we're all distracted and we're all running a hundred miles an hour to go away and time is a luxury to go and sit down and actually ride out Like. These are the most poignant, most influential moments in my life. How can I then arc it back to all these brilliant people who've written about the same motif, same emotions that we all go through, and make it relatable to my business? It's not easy, but it's very powerful. Well, I think that's the uh.

Darren: 1:15:00

So I'm going through lara costa's program at the moment and like the first element of it is like finding your unfair advantage in positioning. So it's like understanding, like where you sit in the universe number one, like what are the big, what are your points of leverage? So, whether it's like capital, status, money, geographical, what are those main overarching themes that you can hold on to, and then we go build the frameworks, the tools, the tactics, the tactics you know, and like that's the best way to do. It is like buy into someone's program, understand how the best you're doing it and then replicate it for your way. Because, at the end of the day, what's ironic is like especially in a podcast sense anyway is that when you try to completely purely replicate someone, you can't. So, like chris williamson set the standard for production, but we're here today in singapore doing it. I can't set his studio. You know he has like a.

Michael: 1:15:47

He had a garage set up you see that, and it was a load of vintage cars and stuff.

Darren: 1:15:50

Yeah, like, how can I do that? I can't. But what I can do is just take inspiration and almost level my game up and think, fuck, these guys are doing it this way. I got to do something. So there's no ideas. People just look at existing ones and then you can replicate it.

Darren: 1:16:08

So that's the reason I asked about that, because for me the biggest thing was like, I think, especially when I left the nine to five world, I didn't have to be anyone else anymore and I knew the concepts of building stuff, writing building offers, to the point that it was just like, okay, these are the skeleton pieces, I just need to add. I'm not even add, I just need to be myself, and then it will go like disperse. And I think the best litmus test for me was the fact that I spent so much time recording that when I go on shows, I get asked those little nuances. So people ask about the infinite game and about X, y and Z, and I'm like, ah, that's what's actually really hit with people. Back to the Hormozia moment. That's the penny that's dropped and it's a super interesting observation, right? So that's how I've found my space effectively, you know, and the worst thing you can do is try to replicate someone's space.

Michael: 1:17:04

Yeah, yeah. And then the key word you used is found right, it's a discovery, it's a continuous or continual process of discovery. Uh, my, my story is still evolving. Your story is still evolving. Life gets pretty boring if it, if it stops evolving, which is probably why you left the corporate nine to five, correct? Yeah, because that that's not helpful.

Michael: 1:17:20

And I'm not saying all corporate nine to fives are bad. They're not all bad, but, um, there's a lot of people who are in there who are caged birds and they and they need to break free and spread their wings. Um, sometimes there's the reverse as well. You think you're an entrepreneur, you actually should be nine to five and that's fine. That's the, that's the animal you are. Um, but with finding your own story, yeah, borrow from the best, borrow, don't steal. Right, and you're absolutely right.

Michael: 1:17:43

I bang this drum all day long. There was nothing new under the sun. I can't remember it was. One of the old philosophers said that there was nothing new under the sun. But what we do have a new characters, right, and and new, uh, messengers, and they can repackage and repurpose these motifs and stories in different ways that will land with you or land with her right, because some. Some people won't listen to me, but they will listen to you, and vice versa, and the message might be the same, but the messenger brings it to life okay, so that's super interesting to dive into.

Darren: 1:18:13

So that's why hermosia will start with. Here's my business advice and I've sold a 34 million dollar business is because the credibility of the same stuff means different. The predicated based on that person's social proof and integrity and positioning, whatnot. Because for the most part, like all business advice, it's the same right get more people to your offer, don't fuck it up.

Darren: 1:18:34

The harder I work, the luckier I get yeah, and then just get them to basically become like advocates, but it depends on the messenger underneath it, so like is there anything there that I'm missing, that you think that you'd want to add?

Michael: 1:18:45

specifically on like positioning framing I love that as a question. Let's dance. What do you believe your unfair advantage to be if you're going through the process with Lara now? Have you arrived there yet?

Darren: 1:18:58

Yeah, it's just. It's the fact that, like, I've deliberately stayed very narrow within the podcast space so I don't have like girl in the red dress syndrome, like I'm. So as a result of that, you click and see what I do and then you see what I have done and it's just like it's a one-to-one relationship. So with every single rep I do it almost like adds more value to the business. Does that make sense? So it's just this constant loop. And then my second unfair advantage is the fact that my feedback loop for people that I help is so tight. It's just like I mentioned you earlier, I've got feedback from people that people don't like being interviewed anymore because they feel like they're being caught out. I can just go and integrate that into one my style and two everyone else's style. So you're not getting information that's outdated. You're getting information that literally works right now and not from someone else who's doing it, from someone who's doing it at the top end of the market.

Darren: 1:19:50

Right, you get me because, like on all variables, we're like maxing it out, you know, and like as a result of that. Like that does not mean that the results are like the best and the best and the best, but the inputs couldn't be better. You know what I mean. Like we're literally setting up studios around the world. Does that make sense? So, like the and as a result. So that's, that's the second side, and the third side is capital. We have more money to to use in most people. So most of these like kind of indie podcasters, they don't have the cash, whereas, like, if we want to run these experiments and so on, we can burn the money. You know. And like you have to understand that. You know because I know geographically I don't have an advantage.

Michael: 1:20:31

I'm not based in the states, you know like I know, yeah, similar, similar issue for me.

Darren: 1:20:35

Yeah, it's a disadvantage now? Is it as much as what it used to be? No, but I use that to my advantage, because I basically kind of say that like, look, I don't need to be because we don't need to be anymore. Does that make sense?

Michael: 1:20:49

So can look at what the Williamson's and the Hormoses of the world are doing and be like oh my God, I'm not based in the US, you're coming from a place of lack, right? Just scarcity mindset. Or you can say oh, actually, I think the next big wave is actually in Asia Pacific. It's going to be Singapore, it's going to be Dubai, it's going to be the axis of power is moving east, right To the Middle East and Asia, and actually I don't need to be the best in the world, I just need to be the best in APAC or the best in the Middle East. I just for me personally, I just need to be the best in Singapore and Hong Kong. I'll be just fine if I do that. I don't need to be a billionaire or a decamillionaire, I don't need it. But if I'm Singapore and Hong Kong, I'll have a good life for my kids, for me and my kids, and that's fine.

Michael: 1:21:43

So that, becoming okay with your positioning and then really running at it, I think is helpful. Can I ask you two more questions? Yeah, so what do you stand for? And then, what do you stand against? All right, we're talking about your unfair advantage. You and Voix, right, we're telling your story. What do you stand for and what do you stand against? Because that will help again with that category of one.

Darren: 1:22:04

So what we stand for is more like this personalization element of human touch, bringing it back to the core basis of communication, like whether that is how we're communicating, how we're building products, how we're building services. At the end of the day, it's very much more of a hands-on approach versus, like this automation, everything outsourced to some bot on Zapier. That's basically what we stand for, because it's a strong value of me, which is why we've become friends. We met at a dinner and many years later that we're here, and then what I'm against to some degree is all the hacks, all the tricks, the short game, not playing the long game, which is basically rife in my industry.

Darren: 1:22:39

You know all these guys are doing like cash grabs, rug pulls, they're focused on launches and then that's it. We got much more focused on like sustainable, like multi-decade business building, Uh, and I just have a longer time horizon than most people, so I just try to stay away from anything. That's that's you know, that's basically, and that can be people you know. Opportunity Um, we get a ton of like opportunities, but I have to turn down 90% of them because they don't serve my values.

Michael: 1:23:08

Yeah, that's good. What do you? Why? You know we talk about purpose being purpose-driven over profit-driven. If you can distill it to one sentence, if it's possible one, why are you in this game? Why is it important to you that Vox does well?

Darren: 1:23:24

Because when I started so basically when I started everything that was going wrong was due to, like, a lack of education, and now my podcast has enabled me to get all the information that I needed to build the life that I wanted. So to elaborate on that, my first business was an e-commerce business went to zero, lost a ton of money. I tried to build a startup went to zero. I did a bunch of other random shit. All went to zero, and it wasn't to do with a lack of drive and purpose, it was just to do a lack of education. And back then there was no one that was speaking to the bracket of 20 to 30 year olds to build offers, have a life of independence and life of self-sovereignty. There was nobody self-sovereignty is important and there's still.

Darren: 1:24:05

There still actually is no one doing it at a high level, like there's small indie people but there's okay, there is no one no.

Michael: 1:24:14

So, if I can, all right, poetry and communication is about compression. If we compress it, the lesson then, I think, is forgive me if I'm wrong and you rephrase it better for me, because this is about you. Um, self-education and human connection will set you free. Yeah, effectively. Is that the motif?

Darren: 1:24:30

yeah, for the most part you know.

Michael: 1:24:32

So like self-sovereignty basically um, but through, only through the action of, I guess, self-education, self-improvement and content creation will can deliver you self-sovereignty. Right, because everyone wants freedom yeah, more, more like um.

Darren: 1:24:49

So I would nearly like flip it opposite sides, like having that self-sovereignty of like taking responsibility effectively, um, in all aspects health, wealth and relationships will give you the lifestyle that you need. Right, because, like when I was younger, I'd maxed out the health side and then I was working on the relationship side and actually the wealth side for me, came last, you know, whereas, like, a lot of guys in the space would do the reverse, um, but I knew that all the lessons from like fitness were applicable to business, and then all the applicable the relationships from business were applicable to my personal relationships and, as a result, and that's actually what gave me the freedom to do what I to have to have a life of freedom effectively, you know. So that's a longer version of it, but that's how I just flip that frame.

Michael: 1:25:32

Yeah, yeah and this is how, continuously, every time you pitch someone to become a client, it's going to get better and better.

Darren: 1:25:38

The story will get tighter and tighter, and you'll know in the moment what part of that story that they need to hear yeah, yeah, because that's an interesting point, because Tom Oliver makes a point to me that, like all these younger guys like, want more like the network aspect, the relationship side of podcasting.

Darren: 1:25:54

But I've never felt that because I've always had relationships because of my podcast. So I don't know what it feels like to have the absence of that, because I've never had the absence of it, especially as I got into the game was I've never been a lonely entrepreneur. Does that make sense? Whereas most people struggle the entire period, for me the biggest thing is actually the wealth side, because it's something that I've just been able to maximize in an industry that is infamous for not making money. Yeah, so that's why it's hilarious for me, that's why I'm so much more over indexed on the marketing side of that, because, like, I literally just know how to do it yeah, and that is the limiting belief that you can shatter for others, exactly, and you put that front and center.

Darren: 1:26:33

But that's something that I really focus on, whereas, like my team, are like we actually don't need to focus on that as much as you do, which is interesting, yeah, because he's like, because most people and lara talks with us too Most people actually aren't chasing money. They're actually chasing like connection, genuinely so like especially in like a social media context and a content and a contact context, whereas for me that's not the case because, like, I've had, like you know, like really rough, really rough life, like didn't have money growing up, all that kind of stuff. So for me it's the opposite.

Michael: 1:27:03

Yeah, Interesting. And that's why, in that sales situation and again, when we say sales, this is kind of all encompassing just every interact.

Michael: 1:27:10

Everything is sales you know that and everything is persuasion, but you need to be able to tinker and tweak your messaging to appeal to all those different personalities. So in the moment, you need to, on the fly, adjust to. Does this person need to feel that they can achieve connection, right, human connection in the network? Is this person actually all about the money? Is this person about status? Do they feel unappreciated, that their ideas have been too long hidden from the world? And that's what they're looking for. And in the moment you're going to have to figure that out, right, because everyone's different. So I think again to make it more bite-sized and snackable, I think about the four Fs. So one of them was future casting. We talked about already, right, project, an image of the future, right, what would it be like if you could actually look forward to every presentation? What would it feel like to be confident going on stage? Right? So that's the F future casting.

Michael: 1:27:56

Then some people are all about feelings. Right, that's how I'm naturally built and it's how most people are naturally built. Probably 80% of people have more feelings than over-indexed on logic. Yeah, so that's the other F is facts. So you need to know if you're speaking to someone who over-indexes on feelings, or if someone who's very fact-based your lawyers, your accountants, your bean counters right, I might need to speak to them in a very logical way, and the way you would open that sales meeting is here's the numbers.

Michael: 1:28:21

The numbers don't lie right, because then they'll listen, whereas if you start from the place of feeling and talk about networking connection, they'll be like same same product. You just packaged and sequenced it differently, right? So that's where I would start, with the person who thinks about facts and figures. And then the other one is flashy. Some people just want the best of everything. Some people just want to see them driving a Lamborghini and wearing a Rolex. I personally don't give you know, I'm not a materialistic guy, I couldn't care less. But some people just like to be able to tell their friends I've got the most expensive executive coach in Singapore.

Darren: 1:28:52

Yeah, a hundred percent.

Michael: 1:28:53

Yeah, it's like a thing at the gym I've got the most expensive personal trainer, so know who you're talking to and adjust accordingly.

Darren: 1:29:02

Anything else you want to like ask me on that, or like, cause you can use me as like a guinea pig, like how do you anything else just comes to mind.

Michael: 1:29:10

Yeah, I think. What is your process for going into a high stakes sales situation? What does that look like? Is it be honest on camera? Is it just on the fly and you're winging it and hoping that your experience will get you through, or are you doing due diligence on the opposition?

Darren: 1:29:29

No, I have such a unique advantage on that because everything to do with content is public, so I can. If someone has a podcast, I can go in and look at it straight away and I can see 150 things we'd change. I can then have an exact roadmap, because it's always going to be strategy, growth and monetization. Yeah, 100. Yeah, because, like we'd send over a loom video, they'd see everything already in advance. We know exactly what's happening. And then we have like a strategy to either launch a show if they don't have it, which is even easier because you look at their current it's very simple, like you look at their current um digital profile, I guess, and you see a huge gap and then you see where they want to get to right and it's pretty clear.

Darren: 1:30:06

Like I spoke with a very famous luxury real estate company recently, they didn't have content on the front end but the backend. It was so easy, right. Like they have one podcast that goes into luxury real estate. They make so much money. It was a very simple process so it was a very easy conversation from that regard.

Darren: 1:30:24

So that's one side, so it's very, it's very visible and then, from like an actual, like sales perspective, it's just very logical at that point then, because you know these people are either highly qualified financially, we know what they're trying to go towards and it always goes back to some element of status. So they're either trying to increase the brand, increase the brand, increase the company brand, or internally, and then, um, at that point then it's about the kind of mechanism to get there. So it's very easy from that perspective. And then, even if someone was coming completely cold, you know, with tools like crunch base and whatnot, you can see if they raise capital, do they have enough? You know, to qualify financially.

Darren: 1:31:01

And every, every company at any stage are thinking about product and growth. So when they come to us, it's for growth at the end of the day. So it's the same. It's the same message, dude, and what's funny is it's an elastic message. You could be a solopreneur, you could be someone who's a kid, or you could be someone at the very, very top end, and it's generally the same stuff.

Michael: 1:31:19

Cool. Do you have lots of people have openers? Do you have closers Like and I don't necessarily mean in the in the old fashioned kind of sleazy puppy dog clothes and things like that? But is there a way that you try to finish? Finishing is the correct terminology, because closing has negative connotations. How are you trying to finish every meeting on a high?

Darren: 1:31:39

So I learned this from William Brown, if you're familiar with. He got this from Cole Gordon. I think I bought into William's program. That's why I got this.

Darren: 1:31:45

But basically, like you, you go through that process like self-admission understand the pain points, qualifying financially, getting them to understand the imagery and the future state, and then, once they're bought into the process, you stop and you slow down to make sure that they actually are bought into the process with a temperature check. So it's like all right, we want to check. Like you know, how does everything sound from one to ten. Ten sounds all good, ready to get started, or one sounds not a good fit. And they're like oh, maybe like an eight or nine. And at that point you move forward. And then, if, if it's below an eight, you ask them for more questions to bring them up to an eight or nine. And then we get them to eight or nine. And then at that point then it's like right, where do you want me to go from here? And they're like oh, I will understand a little bit more about the pricing or the process. All right, cool, because they're bought into everything and they've already qualified financially.

Darren: 1:32:33

So now, just like here's investment, let's say it's like 5k a month, reoccurring at that point. Then they're like, okay, that sounds good. I don't really make decisions at that point where it's like all right, like is this something that you want to do? Or you know, cause you said up here that you want to do so we could bought in the entire way. They kind of worked through like a mental model of that kind of point and ideally at that point because I'm doing B2B stuff it's a bit harder to sell, like on the phones effectively, but you're just trying to get full buy-in during the entire process. And then it just becomes a combination of like how do we take the payment? Do we split the payment? Do we offer them discounts and so on. And one thing that I learned as well from james kemp was it, james kemp, not too sure it was um, always offer a six-month discount and 12-month discount, so like let's say it's 5k a month just to try lock it in and get that predictability?

Darren: 1:33:22

well, this is interesting is because the logic, which I believe, is that reoccurring revenue is a mirage. It's a safety net that doesn't actually exist unless the money clears. So let's say it's 5k a month and they've signed for six months.

Michael: 1:33:35

There's nothing stopping them locking the payment To not paying the invoice. Okay.

Darren: 1:33:38

So the logic is, if it's 5k a month, which is 25k for or 30k for six months, you give them a 5k discount to pay in once. So they pay in once.

Michael: 1:33:47

Okay, and then that's the illusion of the mirage disappears Exactly, and then they're committed, yeah.

Darren: 1:33:52

And then you also offer them a discount for 12 months. So let's say, if it's 12 months of 60k, you give them a 10k or 15k discount and then, like companies, will pay because they see the value, you know. Or you might give them a window and we'll get started for the first month and then at the first month, then we can make that. I do that all the time. Most people don't do that, but I do that as a result because you get people on the higher one and it's just simpler for people. You know, instead of you taking out your credit card every month, you just make one payment. You know that I'm not an idiot. I'm not running off to the Barbados. So the way the system is created is actually to help someone. You know it goes back to persuasion. So all of these points, including the discounts and stuff, is to actually help someone.

Michael: 1:34:35

Yeah exactly Because I want them to. So, the best, a lot of coaching and Vox does coaching as well as part of the service, right? Coaching is about accountability all of the time. Right, always. Do Do what the best version of yourself said you would do five weeks ago, right? You know what I mean.

Michael: 1:34:52

So, accountability, the best description or I've ever heard of accountability is holding your feet to the fire of your own best intentions. I'm holding your feet to the fire of your own best intentions. I'm holding your feet to the fire of your own best intentions. So, the version of you that woke up one morning like super pumped and motivated to make all these big changes, I'm just holding you accountable to that guy, to that version of Darren. That's my role. And, yeah, you can do that in the sales discovery process by, you know, building up that excitement and showing them solution and you're actually trying to help them for good. You are trying to push them through the door, like I can help you. Stop being your own biggest obstacle, right? The self-sabotage is huge for me, for you or for all of us. Right, we all suffer. Some of us recover quicker than others, for sure, man.

Darren: 1:35:35

Yeah.

Michael: 1:35:37

Thank you, man Thank you. It was a privilege coming on.

Darren: 1:35:39

Yeah, I'd love to keep on going, man, we're going to go for dinner, but honestly, man, you've taught me so much over the past couple of years and I really, really do appreciate it. You've helped so many people that I work with as well, and all we got to see is you putting out more content.