I lost my Navy ROTC scholarship to Tulane University after my freshman year.
I’ll pause now so you can all recover from the shock that, yes, at one point I was going to join the Navy. The guy with spiky hair and black nailpolish was a midshipman..
But the week before classes started, they took us out on a 50-foot training schooner, and I immediately became so seasick I could no longer function.
Between that and a pronounced lack of interest in attending university classes, the Navy suggested we go our separate ways.
So I moved home.
One day my mom, fed up with paying for my life, told me I needed a job. “But Mommmmmm,” I whined, “I don’t know how to find a job.”
She handed me the Yellow Pages (yes, the real book) and told me, “Call everyone. Start with A.”
So, that’s what I did. I called maybe two dozen companies, and in two days I had a job as a host at a Hibachi grill (under Asian restaurants).
That job sucked and, thankfully, a week later a law firm called me back and asked me to work in their mail room, so I spent six months working for Gray Harris Robinson Kirschenbaum & Peeples (under Attorneys).
Now, my mom could be a cold chick sometimes. But she knew something many people I talk to don’t…
The more you’re talking about or thinking about doing something, the less you’re actually doing anything.
There’s a time and a place for thinking and talking, but at the end of the day, the only way to get work done is by doing.
So, start with A.
Recently, a CEO was complaining to me about his salespeople.
He was frustrated they weren’t making much progress, but when I asked them how many people they were talking to, he said that the two of them were talking to a combined eight to 10 people each WEEK.
Holy hell, I said, they EACH need to be talking to that many people, every single day.
They gave the CEO lots of excuses, saying they don’t have the right materials and they needed a finished prototype and they needed to figure out how to better segment their prospects.
Seriously, fuck that noise.
How are they ever going to figure what the market needs until they start talking to people?
You base your materials on what language resonates with prospects.
You segment your market based upon which prospects convert.
Get your ass out there and talk to people!
I told him to grab the local yellow pages, turn to T for “Therapists” (his company’s market), and have one salesperson start with A and the other with Z.
Just pick up the phone, call them, tell them what you’re working on, and see who’s interested.
It’s not about closing, it’s about learning how to close. And the only way to do that is to talk to people.
Stop overthinking it, because early on you have one goal: to have real conversations with your customers and find out their problems.
You don’t need the latest tech, more “research” (procrastination in disguise), or fully aligned chakras.
You just need to do the damn thing.