All Selling Aside With Alex Mandossian

Somewhere in Asia, a hermit was meditating by a river when a young man interrupted him to ask to become his committed disciple. “Why?” the hermit asked. The young man answered, “Because I want to find enlightenment.” The master grabbed the young man by the scruff of the neck and plunged his head underwater. After a long moment of the young man kicking and struggling, the master released him and asked gently, “Young man, what did you want most of all when you were underwater?” “Air!” the young man replied. In response, the master instructed the young man, “Go home, and come back to me when you want enlightenment as much as you wanted air.” If you don’t immediately All businesses do three things: production, operations, and marketing. As you’ll probably recognize, most people don’t want to sell as much as they want to breathe! And yet, sales is marketing oxygen; without it, you suffocate your business. In fact, I recommend allocating 50% of the total amount you spend on your business to marketing, with 25% each

Herman Miller was founded by D. J. De Pree in 1923 and is one of the most profitable in the Fortune 500. While it’s #456 in revenue, it’s #7 in profit. Isn’t that incredible? This is because revenue never equals profit. Revenue is top-line, and profit is bottom-line. Are you wondering how to get more profit, and why Herman Miller has been so profitable relative to its revenue? The answer is leadership, specifically servant leadership. At Herman Miller, the concept is that leaders don’t inflict pain. Instead, leaders bear pain. In other words, leaders aren’t command and control, they’re engage and enroll. Another reason I love using Herman Miller as an example is that Max De Pree, one of my mentors, taught me the three responsibilities of a leader. Let’s shift gears for a moment and talk about agreements, their three functions, and the three ways to handle them. The functions of an agreement are who’s in charge, what’s getting done, and when is it due (or who, what, and when). The first way to handle an agree

In 2010, in Los Angeles, my good friend Dave Buck (the CEO of CoachVille) taught a session to my students at the Ultimate Internet Bootcamp. While on stage, he talked about how life is a game, and in all coaching, the best way to coach someone is to identify what game they’re playing and how they’re playing it. The most noble, easy, and consistent way to develop permanent change in your life is by changing the game you’re playing, and the way you’re playing it. With all that said, here’s my question to you: what game are you playing right now? Answering this question lets you take the step from unconscious incompetence to conscious incompetence. That eventually evolves to conscious competence, and finally flow state or unconscious competence. What Dave taught me is that there are four ways to play any game in your personal or professional life, and if you’re playing a winnable game, there are only two results you’ll get. The four ways to play the game are these: Refuse to play. Pretend to play. Play not to l

 In 2016, my friend Ryan asked me if I would support him for his first product launch, The Ask Method Training. It ended up being pretty successful, and generating over $3 million in revenue in just two weeks. The problem, though, was his profits. After the fees, advertising, joint venture payouts, refund requests, and affiliate contest payouts, the typical profit margin is about 20%. Ouch! I prefer to be in the 50% to 60% range. In my own launch, I used the PLUS Method, which stands for Post-Launch Upsell Strategy. This term was coined by one of our top producers of sales. Jeff Walker created a powerful formula for the front end of a product launch. It involves two weeks of creating pre-launch content, typically three videos, followed by a final video that leads to the cart opening and closing. Here’s the problem: when the cart closes and you’re done, 15% to 20% profit is considered good. Typically, at this point when the cart closes, the game is over. I knew there had to be a better way. Jeff’s powerful for

In 2002, I tapped into a 2400-year-old technology that the most revered universities across the globe embrace: the Socratic Method. This method involves asking questions. When you’re thinking about applying this to your sales presentation, keep this in mind: the question mark looks like a hook. It draws people in. The exclamation point, on the other hand, is like a spear that can shoo people away. Back to 2002: my children were very young, and so I didn’t want to travel as frequently as my colleagues did. Instead, I focused on teleseminars and creating courses online, on CDs, and in three-ring binders. The teleseminars were free, but the recorded interview and transcripts available afterward became a course for sale. In this process, I created a database that became my secret weapon. It would take data after surveying someone, put the data into the database, and make it keyword-searchable. For example, if I wanted to do a teleseminar with Brian Tracy, we would set up a time. He would ask what we would talk a

In 2006, I sat in a converted office in my home in California. My wife and children were asleep, and I wondered what the topic should be for the next course I wrote. In 2001, I had developed the course Marketing With Postcards, which earned me nearly $1 million. At that point, I wasn’t great at creating traffic, but I was very good at converting traffic. The success of this course led to my next course, Traffic Conversion Secrets, which I sold for $1,800. That course, in turn, led to TeleSeminar Secrets, which made over $14 million in under six years. These courses brought me great students, some of whom are now my teachers. They also taught me about the different types of students. There were those who asked “what” questions. Others asked, “Why?” Others asked, “How?” And still others asked, “What if…?” Going back to 2006, I created the course Web Communication Secrets. In that course, I developed something that I’ve been utilizing ever since: shifting the curriculum to appeal to all four of these learning st

Dale Carnegie was the author of the book How to Win Friends & Influence People, one of the best-selling self-help books of all time. Perhaps surprisingly, Carnegie was born into poverty in Missouri. As a boy, Carnegie won friends through his knack with words. At various assemblies he attended in high school, he became inspired by speakers, and joined the school’s debate team. During his horse rides to college, he practiced his speeches and style. After graduating, Carnegie’s various jobs as a traveling salesman earned him enough to quit his job and move to New York City to try his luck as an actor. He landed a leading role in Polly of the Circus, which allowed him to continue practicing his public speaking skills. However, he hated acting itself, so he enlisted in the army instead, before working as a business manager of a traveling lecture course taught by Lowell Thomas. When Carnegie realized that his skill at public speaking was what helped him succeed as a traveling salesman, he successfully pitched

In the summer of 1992, I learned an important fact that has stuck with me ever since: leadership is a choice. On the day I learned this, I was climbing a wall in an obstacle course as part of a team-building exercise. I was dripping with sweat, my shoulders were aching, and my legs were throbbing. I felt battered, but ready to take on the challenge. (This feeling probably sounds familiar to you, even if the battering is a mental or emotional rather than physical one!) The pain didn’t matter to me. If I could prove my mettle and see the competition through, I knew I would impress both my fellow competitors and myself. There I stood, with over 20 other people all equally bent on climbing that wall. There was no way to get over but through physical strength, stamina, determination, and help from the others. My instincts told me that if I scaled the wall first, I would inspire the others to do the same. That was leadership, I believed. Within seconds of being told, “Go,” I made it over the wall. There I was, all

I want to introduce you to someone I like to call Coach Carla. Most of my list is made up of Coach Carlas. These women are consultants or service professionals, typically in their 40s, and typically making under $100k. Coach Carla hates to sell. She’s not very good at technology. She has fears, frustrations, and foibles, but she’s a really good coach. She lives a simple lifestyle, but spends rich for continuing education and has a habit of hiring mentors. She’s proud of the quality of her work. She desires a passive income, but her business model forces her to consistently trade dollars for hours. If you’re Coach Carla (or Coach Carl), you probably recognized yourself in the paragraph above. If you’re ready to stop trading dollars for hours, you’re in the right place. You’re probably so busy working in your business that you don’t have time to work on your business. Through All Selling Aside, Coach Carla (or Carl) learns that seeding through storytelling is the new selling. Many of my colleagues and many very

In 2016, in Sao Paulo, Brazil, in front of 850 crazy, outrageously influential and enthusiastic Brazilians. I was there for the first time for what’s called Guerrilla Business Intensive. It’s a three-day intensive that starts at 8 AM and goes until 10 or 10:30 PM each day. On day two, I was making a mention that Brazil is the 8th largest sovereign nation in terms of GDP, but 1st in natural resources. In other words, Brazil is a testament to unmet potential. The key to any nation’s success is entrepreneurship. I asked everyone in the audience to raise their hands if they believe that Brazil is a first-world nation. Only about 20% of the hands went up. I then asked them to raise their hands if they believe that Brazil is a third-world nation, and the majority of the hands went up. This is a problem, because believing that you live in a third-world nation gives you mental constraints to never meet your potential. Finally, I asked them to raise their hands if they were passionate and committed. All the hands went

Many years ago, in northern Asia, an arrogant samurai warrior challenged his Zen master to explain the difference between evil and goodness. The master’s response had a sense of mockery, even disgust, as he said, “I will not waste my time with such scum as you.” The arrogant samurai reacted by pulling out his sword and screaming in a rage, “Little man, I will cut you into pieces for your insults!” The Zen master responded, “That, my dear friend, is what evil is like.” When he heard this response, the samurai calmed down and began to understand the deep wisdom that the master was teaching him. He thanked the Zen master for the insight, and went down on one knee in gratitude. “That, my dear warrior,” the master replied, “is what goodness is like.” The moral of this story is that experience is not the best teacher. Rather, experience is the only teacher. Think of the words “empathy” and “sympathy.” Imagine trying to describe the difference to someone just using descriptions. This probably seems pretty tricky, ri

Once, I was speaking on stage in front of hundreds of other thought leaders and entrepreneurs. I wrote down the word “compassion” and asked what it said. When we unpacked it, they learned that the word “compassion” has three other words inside of it. Compass, the first word, is about knowing which direction to go. Passion, the second word, is about the heart (whereas compass is about the head). Ion, the third and final word, is the smallest substance that we can study. It represents the small action that you take when you’re thinking big with passion. The word “accountability” comes from the Roman senate, when it meant nothing more than showing up, so you were able to be accounted for. As you’ll learn in this episode, accountability is the derivative of compassion. When you’re accountable, you’re showing up for the task and taking responsibility. This is your most reliable path to execution intelligence and getting extraordinary results. In this episode, I’ll talk about three of a leader’s biggest responsibil

Sir Richard Branson, who you may know for his Virgin companies, is dyslexic. While he may not be known as one of the great speakers of all time, he’ll absolutely be remembered as one of the greatest entrepreneurs of all time. He’s a perfect example of how someone who’s willing to try more things (despite potential public embarrassment) is more likely to be successful. Barbara Corcoran, who you’ve seen if you’ve watched the show Shark Tank, is one of 11 children, and has been fired from many jobs. Even so, she became the queen of New York City real estate. This is partly because she isn’t concerned about looking bad, and doesn’t judge herself for making mistakes. Mark Cuban’s father was an auto upholsterer. Mark was a bartender for a while, but got fired from that job. Next, he got into the software business. Mark is fearless when it comes to taking calculated risks, and is great at thinking big and acting small. He also makes sure he has the right people around him. General Colin Powell was born in Harlem to

You may be surprised to know that one of the world’s wealthiest men rarely showed up on the lists, because he had children and his fortune was divided among them. The man in question is Sam Walton, the founder and owner of Walmart and Sam’s Club. The story of how this man from a modest background created such a profitable company is fascinating and provides incredible insights. Sam would fly a small plane over the parking lots of other five-and-dime stores, looking for parking lots full of cars. When he found them, he would land his plane and go inside the store to learn what his competitors did. Through this process, he learned what worked for his competitors. Once he figured this out, he used the knowledge that he had gleaned to go into small cities, open a Walmart location, and become the biggest employer in town. This story illustrates the idea that originality is the most dangerous principle in sales and marketing, as Rosser Reeves thought. It was through deeply researching what his competitors were doi

Around the time of the Depression, a young entrepreneur was the number one printer in New York City. However, his attitude was bad, and he started to lose clients, team members, and even his family. Before long, he couldn’t sustain being in business, and found himself unable to pay his bills. Things got so bad that he even considered suicide. While sitting on a bench in Central Park, he encountered a distinguished elderly gentleman. The young entrepreneur told the story of what was wrong in his life, and the elderly gentleman handed him a check for $1 million, asking him to come back in a year and explain what he had done with the money. He looked at the check, saw the name John D. Rockefeller Jr. in the corner, and excitedly thought that his life was finally changing for the better. Instead of cashing the check, he carefully tucked it away in his safe, resolving to see what he could do without it. Over time, he won back his customers, his children, his vendors, and eventually his wife. The important thing to

Remember Aesop’s fables? These stories were full of political points and lessons for listeners to learn. As you know if you’ve been listening to this podcast, storytelling is central to selling through ethical influence. So, let’s explore one of Aesop’s stories! Once upon a time, there was a donkey who was starving. To his left, he saw an apple on the ground. To the right, he saw a pear. He looked back and forth between the two. Should he eat the apple? The pear? The apple? The pear? Before he managed to make a decision, he collapsed from hunger and died of starvation, all from his indecisiveness. The could have tasted the apple and then tasted the pear to see which he liked, instead of trying to permanently choose one or the other. From there, he could have stuck with the second fruit, gone back to the first fruit, eaten one after the other, or even decided to go back and forth between the two fruits, one bite at a time. This is the sort of thing that happens to us as parents, as children, and as ethical inf

Let me share a quick story from several hundred years ago: people used to believe that a heavier object would fall faster than a lighter one. One day, Galileo dropped two cannonballs and found that they landed at the same time. This was significant because one of the cannonballs weighed twice as much as the other. If it’s hard to believe, try this yourself! Take two things that weigh different amounts (like an almond and a bottle of water) and drop them from the same height. They’ll land at the same time. What this taught the world about gravity was important. Far more important, though, was what the incident represented: a new problem-solving method based on the authority of experimentation and observation. Today, we apply this scientific method to marketing as well as physics. Picture a marketing funnel for a moment. Because it’s a metaphor rather than a physical funnel, gravity doesn’t apply. Instead, the gravity that pulls leads through the funnel is your ability to ethically influence them. There are sev

In 2016, a former partner and I had launched a product that we had worked on for about a year. We grew a list of 85,000 people, and during our two-week launch based on Jeff Walker’s Product Launch Formula, we expected to generate $2 million to $3 million. Instead, we generated less than $400,000 in gross sales—and we were over $400,000 in debt! To break even, we would have needed to make almost double that amount. I was embarrassed, demoralized, and humiliated, and nobody seemed to care. So what went wrong? As you’ll learn today, there are three reasons why people won’t buy from you: they don’t understand you, they don’t believe you, or it’s not the right time. In this case, our specific mistake was that we didn’t start with the end in mind, namely starting with the offer. Our audience liked and trusted us, and it was the right time, but they didn’t understand us because we didn’t make the offer clear. Let’s talk about context. Without context, pushing an elderly person is always problematic and wrong. But we

I’m friends with David Perdew, who runs Novice to Advanced Marketing System (NAMS). In 2015, David hired me to coach him to do two new things: to get pre-registrants for the following year, and to sell a high-end offer. When it came time for him to make the offer, people asked, “What’s in the offer?” My response was, “What difference does it make?” If you know, like, and trust David, then what’s in the offer shouldn’t matter, because you already know it will be something good. If you have enough relationship capital, then people will buy on command. This is what I mean when I say that the who is more important than what, how, when, where, and why. Tune into the episode to learn how David’s high-end offer turned out, and why the unusual way we went about doing it (by allowing the students to create the offer) was so powerful. Today’s Alexism from my book Alexisms is this: you don’t need a parachute to skydive. You just need a parachute to skydive more than once! This ties into today’s topic because getting so

Consider this story: in the 13th century, there was a Turkish trader who would go to the border with the Orient. When the border guards asked what he was smuggling, he’d shrug and point at his donkey. The border patrol burned the hay in the donkey’s cart and search the donkey closely to figure out what he was smuggling. When they found nothing, they let him pass. Later, he returned empty-handed, without a donkey. The next day, the same thing happened. Over the course of 30 years, he became a wealthy trader. After this time, the retiring chief of the border patrol asked the trader what he was smuggling and swore not to punish him. Only then did he admit to smuggling... donkeys. Do you see what he did there? He was so transparent, and did his smuggling in such plain view, that everyone was too busy looking deeper to see what he was actually doing. When we tie this back to today’s three insights, you’ll see that the trader was also designing his offer first, before focusing on being as transparent as possible. W