Speaker 1 (00:00:01) - Welcome to the G.E.M. Series powered by RocketLevel. On this podcast, we empower entrepreneurs to succeed by setting big goals, executing like a pro, and having a fearless mindset. The series is all about investing in yourself. We're here to share the path to getting what you want out of life, by sharing the stories of entrepreneurs who have done this themselves, providing thorough research from our team on what careers and habits are yielding the best results, and discussing the mindset it takes to overcome the obstacles that all future entrepreneurs will face. Investing in yourself starts with putting in the work every single day, and this podcast is here to help you do exactly that. My name is Blake Chapman. I'm the vice president of the ambassador program here at RocketLevel, and I am thrilled to be your host for the G.E.M. Series. Hi, everybody, and welcome to another episode of the G.E.M. Series. I am honored to welcome Matthew Pollard to the show. Matthew. Hey, how are you doing?

Speaker 2 (00:00:57) - I'm doing terrific, Matt I'm ecstatic to be here.

Speaker 2 (00:00:58) - Thanks for having me.

Speaker 1 (00:00:59) - Hey, am very happy to have you on here. You're talking about a topic that I have been super curious about. And, you know, Matthew is the author of The Introverts Edge, a book that, you know, just share some perspective of, you know, one, some of the stigma that introverts get. But then two, actually what superpowers introverts have inside of them that maybe people don't even realize. So I'm really, really amped to get to talk to you about that a little bit more. Um, Matthew, if you don't mind, would you just mind? I know I kind of gave a little spiel, but would you mind just elaborating a little bit more on, you know, who you are and what you do and just so our audience can learn more about you?

Speaker 2 (00:01:38) - Yeah, absolutely. And I think one of the things that's going to shock people, because we just mentioned introversion and introvert way too many times at the intro. So a lot of people are going to go, oh gosh, it's going to be one of those uplifting shows about how introverts can survive in an extroverted world, and they actually just don't believe that it's an extroverted world.

Speaker 2 (00:01:54) - And we're going to we're going to talk about that. But I also believe that introverts make the best salespeople, the best networkers, the best business people, the best public speakers. By the way, these are all things that we think that introverts can't do, right? So, you know, it doesn't matter that, you know, Zig Ziglar, the most well-known sales trainer that ever lived, happens to be an introvert. Doesn't matter that I've admired one of the guy that founded BNI, the world's largest networking group in the world, happens to be introverted. And oh, by the way, if you think you can't do small talk, Oprah Winfrey and David Letterman also happen to be introverted, so I'm always blown away. But I used to believe that introverts couldn't succeed, so I understand it from your perspective. I mean, going back to to my early years, you know, I had a reading speed of a sixth grader. I was super introverted. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life.

Speaker 2 (00:02:36) - And if it wasn't for losing my job just before Christmas and falling into a commission only sales role with a guy with chronic acne that had funny colored lenses to read just like everybody else. This is the last type of job that anybody would want. And yet, after 93 doors of rejection, getting sworn at, getting told to get a real job, I made the decision that sales had to be a system. And I went to work learning that system. And then very quickly, instead of 93, it was 78 doors. It was 41, then it was 26, then it was 18, then it was nine. I got it down to making a sale on every third door. On average, about six weeks in, my manager pulls me aside and sort of says to me, we've just got our national sales figures, which back then they used to get, you know, once a once a month. And it turns out you're the number one salesperson in the company, which, you know, kind of blew their mind.

Speaker 2 (00:03:21) - I thought I was about to get fired. They look like they were freaking out about what they were looking at. I'm like, have I done something wrong? And so naturally, they threw me into a management role, which is ridiculous. Just because you can sell doesn't mean you can manage. But after losing, they gave me 20 sales people and was like, I don't know how to trade. You're like mud against the wall. Don't worry. Just see if anyone sticks. No one stuck. Everybody quit. I went back to YouTube, learn to manage. Got pretty good at it. Got promoted about seven times in the space of 12 months. I then started up my own business, which was in which is in telecommunications. We ended up growing to the largest B2B cell phone company in the country, which is Australia, much smaller country than America. And then fast forward just shy of a decade, I've been responsible for five multimillion dollar success stories. And the thing that I love about these books and I mean, yeah, it's great that it's gone on to to help over I mean, there's over 100,000 copies sold.

Speaker 2 (00:04:10) - It's in 16 languages. What I love to say is that people read them and then realize that they're not second class citizens. They're not disadvantaged. Their path to success is just different. And more importantly, going to the whole theme of your podcast, which I think is great, is that they can stay authentic and congruent to who they are as people and stay aligned with with their goals. I mean, if your number one goal isn't to be authentic, what are you doing right? And you can actually make sure that you don't have to become someone that you're not to succeed in sales. As a matter of fact, the extroverts in sales, in networking and public speaking, in business, pick leadership, pick your extroverted so-called arena. They don't even tend to do that well. Behaving like extroverts. That's the last thing you should copy. It's just the best worst case scenario based on no systems and no process.

Speaker 1 (00:04:55) - Absolutely. Oh man. Matthew, there's so many places I want to start, but.

Speaker 1 (00:05:00) - I got to say, I commend you for for door knocking. Mean holy smokes. Talk about a way to fast track you know, your your sales process and experience. Yeah, I mean I it reminded me of whenever I first started as a, as an SDR, you know, I, I was basically given a list of people to call. And I just started dialing and I think I made 370 calls before I had somebody that did everything but tell me to kind of fuck off.

Speaker 2 (00:05:32) - And but luckily for a lot of people, right. Like, a lot of people wouldn't have even got that far. I mean, my first door, I was so lucky, I got told, and this doesn't sound like a good thing, but I got politely told to leave and was like, that's so mean. And then I went to the next door and I was sworn at. But my favorite was always getting told to go and get a real job. I mean, that's the one that hurt the most because I was like, that's the only job I could get.

Speaker 2 (00:05:55) - And people like, go and get a real job. And I'm like, I'm trying here. Like, it was not like there was anything else. Like I lost in Austria at Christmas time. There's nothing available. People go on holidays on the 20th of December, and they come back on the 15th or 20th of January. Right. So you're not willing to step into commission on themselves? No one's willing to take a risk on you and mean. I remember getting five days product training, not a single second of sales training, and then get thrown on this road like Sydney Road in Melbourne, Australia, like a thousand doors. Just go do it right. How is that not a real job? That is like death by fire. And yet all of a sudden people are like, this person's beneath me, this person's not good enough. And I really struggle with that originally. And then what I realized is that I was making it all about myself. And I think this is really important for a lot of introverts.

Speaker 2 (00:06:39) - My number one rule in networking, sales, public speaking, everything is it's not about me. Gets rid of all the nerves because I knew and let me. Back then I was selling to retail stores. So what I did is I put it in my head that a lot of these retail stores would be lucky to make $100 for the day. Right now, $100 for the day is not profit. I mean, a lot of times people will mark it up, you know, 150 cent, they're making $50. So if they're making $50 and I can save them $200 a month off their phone bill, well, hang on a second. That's like four days off, right? That's over the course of a month. It's it's a huge amount of money over the course of a year, it's enough to go on a holiday. Like, how is this not something I'm doing for them? And I think that salespeople, especially, they're extroverted people. And don't get me wrong, it's a battlefield. It's not like they want to be self-serving, but what happens is they charge in and they take pride on it.

Speaker 2 (00:07:26) - Introverts don't. They're like, oh, I don't want to disturb this person. Well, if you make somebody's life better off, how is that disturbing them? You're helping them. And that brings me back to the original definition of sales. Before, I'm going to say, the extroverted used car sales people kind of destroyed it, which is the best the true definition of sales is to serve. It's derived from the Scandinavian term to serve. The best way to serve your clients is to get them out of their own way and give them products and services that better their life. And everybody knows that sometimes you're in your own way. So if you truly believe you have a product or service that helps, you should be networking. You should be selling. You should be speaking from stage, you should be doing podcasts, and you're not getting in anyone's way. You're serving. Now, if your product doesn't help anyone, perhaps turn off this podcast because I really don't want to help you at all.

Speaker 3 (00:08:14) - Man.

Speaker 1 (00:08:15) - Matthew. You know, I think that's such an important discovery of, you know, the type of mindset shift that it just has to happen to be able to feel like you're not just a, a burden to the, to the world or anything like that, because very quickly, you're right. I mean, it is quantifiable, the kind of value that you can bring to these, you know, whether it's a business owner or consumer or anything, you know, you have to really get attached to that end result that you're going to be able to, to provide them with. And that might be something as small as putting three hours back in their week, which would be amazing, and it might be as big as as doubling their business. But you can figure that stuff out. And being an amazing listener is probably something that will take you to that, to that next stage. So tell me, so when did the dots start connecting for you? When you were, you know, when you were performing sales and realizing, oh, really drawn to to understand introspection more.

Speaker 1 (00:09:18) - And, you know, this concept of being an introvert, you know, I want to, you know, when did that start sparking in your brain, you know, and becoming part of your mission?

Speaker 2 (00:09:28) - Yeah. That's a that's a great question. And I want to flag something because I think we should talk about it next is a lot of people do believe that they're trying to help people. But when the concept of money exchange comes into it, they're like, well, how can I not be self serving? Because I'm getting paid. And to me, well, if you're truly offering something of value, you're not going to be doing it for very long if you can't eat. So because of that, to truly provide service to as many people as possible as opposed to just a single person, you need to get paid really well. And at the end of the year, don't get me wrong, you can sit there with all your piles of money. If you're able to make huge amounts of money, donate it to Greenpeace if you want, or reinvest it into educating people to better serve themselves.

Speaker 2 (00:10:07) - But make sure that if you're giving value to someone, you're getting value in exchange. Because if you get that value in exchange, you can do something with that. They might blow it on, you know, alcohol, or they might blow it on a big mansion and you might blow it. On helping and serving a community like you can decide. Let your morals decide that in your personal life. Afterwards, make the money in a good exchange of value. But make sure you get to eat and serve yourself. And actually, this was a really big pivotal point to answer your actual question, which for me, what I found is that some of the introverted skill sets or the advantages I think we have once we lean into a system, is our ability to actively listen. Like you pointed out, our ability to empathize. I think that's huge, right? To actually feel what somebody is feeling or to imagine what they're feeling. And funnily enough, and it kills me to see this when we're selling.

Speaker 2 (00:10:56) - We actually switched that twitch that off because it's so painful to sell, because we're trying to make it all about ourselves, that we all we talk about ourselves even though we hate it. And it doesn't make any sense because you shouldn't be talking about yourself in sales or networking, which usually most people have no understanding of how to communicate in those things. So we can talk about that. But what I found is the ability to empathize was hugely powerful, and planning and preparation was really powerful. But the problem, and I think this is both a huge positive and a huge negative, is the fact that we tend to catastrophize or we tend to ruminate afterwards. And what will happen is we will go home after a day of selling, a day of networking, or just a conversation we had with our kids, and we will go home and we're like, oh my gosh, I wish I should have said this. Maybe they perceived it this way and we start to catastrophize or ruminate on things we could have done differently.

Speaker 2 (00:11:43) - Now, firstly, if you go into a networking room without planning and preparation, what is it? Winston Churchill said those who plan failed a plan, plan to fail, right? Like, of course it's not going to go well for you. And yes, you're not as good in the moment if everyone thinks that I'm really articulate right now and gosh, I hope you do, that doesn't mean that I'm an articulate person. Ask my wife I'm not, but during podcast am because this stuff's planned, prepared, and rehearsed. However, here's the critical moment that I decided that as an introvert, I had to take control. I would go home and ruminate over the things that I could have done better. And that's not continuous improvement. That's punishing yourself for bad behavior. And that just leads to more bad behavior. It leads you to switch off. And what I realized is that I needed to make everything an external system so that I could focus on a continuous improvement approach. So instead of ruminating, which is a negative introvert behavior, I focused on continuous improvement.

Speaker 2 (00:12:36) - And I'd say, okay, so it's an external system. So I take rejection a lot less personally. But then which part of this process should I focus on to make a better outcome for the customer? Again, not about me, right? How do I serve? The customer will get them out of their own way. Well, how do I notice that they got in their own way a lot? What one thing can I change in my process to better the outcome for the client i.e. they buy my products and services and therefore they're better off and I can then use that money to make myself better off and then go and serve more people. And by doing that, everything changed. And what I found is that I had to keep a logbook of what happened today. Because if if I focused on it today, would ruminate on it. But if I looked at it tomorrow, I was emotionally disconnected from all of that. And because of that, I could focus on it a much more productive way.

Speaker 2 (00:13:22) - Like, I'm a I speak all over the world now, and I know for a fact if I go home or that day, if I go and think about the things that I did wrong. Wow. That's a that's a roller coaster ride to doom. But if I look at it tomorrow, in retrospect, I'm like, you know what? This one and two things, those things, if I did them differently, I would have had a better impact because that question, I answered it, and I answered it in a way that if I answered it differently, I don't think, I think I would have got a better outcome, or I think I could have done that now that is what's led me to be. I mean, you know, Salem Power Magazine just listed me as the number one sales kickoff speaker in the world. That's what got me to that level of success. Not ruminating and beating myself up about not being a great speaker, but focusing on one micro improvement every single time.

Speaker 1 (00:14:08) - I love that as a framework for interacting with failure.

Speaker 1 (00:14:13) - Right. As it's it's so it's so important to make these things a bit more objective. And, you know, you don't have to you don't have to label these things in such a pejorative way for yourself, because at the end of the day, it's just not going to be all that productive. You know, like the more you sit there and beat and chip away at your confidence, the less opportunity you're going to have to be able to make the kind of impact that you're actually capable of, that compounding effect. I mean, gosh, it's just it's just massive. So you're pumping me up talking about this, you know.

Speaker 2 (00:14:46) - You know what's interesting about that? So, I mean, there are studies to highlight that you need to say three positive things to yourself just to combat a negative thing. Now, I mean, that's horrific, by the way, because if you think about our dialogue and there are studies that show that we tell ourselves over 80,000 things a day. Now, I know that sounds unrealistic, but we can tell ourselves the equivalent of a presidential speech within 60s all in our internal monologue.

Speaker 2 (00:15:10) - And, you know, it's interesting. I did a couple of interviews during the Introverted Seller Summit we just had, and one of the the speakers highlighted that a lot of those things that we say are on repeat, they're repetitive, like 80% of what you say to yourself is repetitive. And if you're saying to yourself negative things. So this is the thing that I struggle with when we look at our behaviors, if we constantly say, I did this wrong, I did this wrong, I did this wrong. Well, that also leads to you have to to I mean, that's why gratitude is such a huge, momentous, you know, implementation into brain, into mind psychology. Because you have to be you have to show gratitude. You need to focus on what you do. Right. Just to come back. All the things you're saying you did wrong. Well, what if you just focused on saying, forget about all of that? What one improvement opportunity is there? I mean, you think about if I think about sales, networking, public speaking, really anything as a production line, right? Can you imagine Henry Ford when he invented the production line because he didn't invent production lines, but he did apply it to motor vehicles.

Speaker 2 (00:16:04) - Can you imagine him looking at the production line and seeing a few defects or a few issues? And instead of looking at for an opportunity for continuous improvement? Oh my gosh, it was never meant to build cars and just walk out of the factory. That's what people do when it comes to selling, networking, public speaking. It drives me crazy because if you saw me the first time I was on stage, I was on this small stage and I must have bounced off the corners of that stage a thousand times. My hands were flying like I was not the speaker I am today. Let's just put it that way. I had no right going on stage at that point. But hang on a second, didn't I? Because I still help some people. As a matter of fact, I had a whole bunch of people afterwards telling me the information that I gave changed their lives. However, I now change more people's lives because some of the hand gestures, the walking, distracted people. So to serve people, I had to get better at those things.

Speaker 2 (00:16:51) - And then what I realized is I gave too much information. I was like a firehose of information to people. So while they walked out thinking their lives were changed, what they didn't do was take action. And there's no point learning something or having an epiphany if you don't take action. We just go back to past behaviors. So simplifying and using story allow me to provide a much better impact. So now I actually provide a lot less than I used to. However they go out and take action on it. And then they send me messages afterwards about how they applied this principle or this concept, or they went out and did this and it made a meaningful impact. So it's funny, especially as a functional service provider, to think that you have to hold back to serve your clients. But realistically, the reason why you're getting up on stage and throwing a firehose of information at people and do this at the ton at small business conferences, I see another speaker because that's my passion. I love helping small business, and I see this other speaker, and all they're doing is throwing jargon at someone and they're saying, well, I'm trying to give the client as much information as possible.

Speaker 2 (00:17:49) - And I'm like, well, you're either not serving them by not working out how to simplify it for people, or you're trying to make it all about yourself by saying, look how smart I am. Here's all the information. Neither of that's about the customer. When you say or the audience member when you say, how do I get them to take meaningful action, not know this stuff, but take meaningful action because that's what a speaker does. That's what a salesperson does. That's what a person networking should be doing. Then it becomes so much simpler. And how do you not consider that continuous improvement? As long as when you're sitting there going, how do I improve the impact to these people? It's not about you, it's not emotional. It stops you. Catastrophizing.

Speaker 1 (00:18:26) - Now. You're right, you're right. And, you know, I think a huge component to that is it sounds like you also are really adept at finding what kind of pain somebody is experiencing, too, because too often I run into folks where like, oh, I'm just throwing everything out there.

Speaker 1 (00:18:43) - And, you know, I've, I've given every possible option. And the problem is that, you know, it's it's like the same as the, you know, the supermarket effect. If you didn't have a list or any kind of direction, you would, you know, you might you might leave with $300 worth of groceries or you might not get anything because you're too overwhelmed. But at the end of the day, I think the thing that I always have to remind people is you can ask people, what are they? What are they looking for, what do they want? Or where, you know, what are they experiencing right now? And then simplify it down and provide a story so that they can actually take action. Now I love that so much. You know, think that's. Yeah, so so impactful.

Speaker 2 (00:19:22) - You know what's interesting about that. And you're 100% right. I'd be look I think empathy is one of the best skills in the world that you can have. Like and yet I find that most introverts have it in spades, but they don't apply it to selling a networking.

Speaker 2 (00:19:36) - It's like their brain says, no, no, I can't use it in a negative way, right? Like I can't use my powers for evil. Well, what you're doing is not evil. You're trying to sell products and services that help people. But the other thing is that it's impossible to understand everyone's circumstances as well without huge. You know, I've been lucky to have years of experience that now, you know, I've spoken at everything from the National Association of Home Builders right through to huge SAS, and I've been paid to deep dive and actually understand their business so that I can then go and speak. But a lot of people, I mean, let's face it, if you're starting a new business or if you've been in business for a few years, most people become like this everything salesperson. And that doesn't work. Like, truthfully, you can't service all of your customers equally and you can't provide them value, and you are actually not serving your clients by trying to do everything for everyone. And the reason why you feel so disingenuous is because you're being disingenuous, right? Like, you have to understand that the hardest question sometimes to ask is, who do I care most about serving? And you can lie to yourself and say, I care about serving everyone.

Speaker 2 (00:20:35) - It's just not true. At least it's not true equally. And you have to understand, like for me, I believe that like, truthfully, I love helping the downtrodden, the disenfranchised, the underdog. But truthfully, there are people that I don't care about helping as much as the small business owner and the introvert. So you put those two together. That's who I love helping. But I hate to say this. Like, if you've got a product based company, I can absolutely help you. I just don't love it as much as helping the introverted service provider. And when had to really think about it when I started, well, I really wanted to help as many small businesses as possible. So the best way to do that was by helping business coaches, because I believe in coaching. So because of that, I became the rapid growth guide for introverted coaches. And the thing you have to understand is you have to simplify. But more importantly, as an introvert, you have to look within.

Speaker 2 (00:21:21) - And if we've got time, I'm going to explain how to do that, because I think it's really important for people to look within and the best example I can give you is actually a language coach out of California. She taught kids and adults Mandarin. Now, if you want to think of something that's more commoditized, like you could say, well, accounting is getting really commoditized these days, or graphic designers or copywriting. Yeah. Language coaching. I mean, let's be honest, you have firstly, she had people moving into California willing to charge 30 to $40 an hour when she was charging 50 to 80. And she'd successfully done that for a decade. But not anymore. Not only that, she had people in China offering to do it for $12 an hour on Craigslist. Now, thanks to our friends in Silicon Valley, you've got you teach me English, I'll teach you Mandarin. We just won't charge anyone anything. And then into AI, right? Like it's a minefield of things and it's commoditized like crazy.

Speaker 2 (00:22:09) - So what I did is, while she came to me for sales advice and looking to be more authentic in the sales process, said, let's just avoid the battle altogether first. So what I did is I looked at all the clients she'd worked with, and over the nearly a decade she'd been doing this, she worked with hundreds of people. But there were two people. I was surprised at how much she provided them, and while she didn't see it as amazing, it was phenomenal. And this is the thing that I always laugh at when people like, there's nothing different about me and everybody else. There always is that people have got unique life experiences, unique past customers, like unique qualifications. It's amazing, unique passions. And what I noticed with these two people is these were executives being relocated to China, and she helped them understand, firstly, the difference between e-commerce in China, in the Western world, which is huge. She helped them understand the importance of respect, like how to handle a business card, how to reduce your accent because I mean, truthfully, if you don't reduce your accent in China, you just learn the language.

Speaker 2 (00:23:00) - They think you don't respect them. But most importantly, she taught them the difference in rapport. Mean like you're an like, you know, any time you see a salesperson, like at the end of 45 minutes, if they're bad at their job, they'll say, so what do you think? And if the person says, yes, great. They say, no bad. If they say, let me think about it. We know if we follow up a week from now and they still want to think about it good by sale, right? It's not going to happen yet in China. They're gonna want to see you 5 or 6 times before they even discuss business. They probably don't want to see you. Karaoke once or twice. It's just who they are. But the reason for that is they're talking about 10 to 20 year deals, not transactional 12 month agreements like we do here. And she helped them understand that, like Wendy, this is so much great stuff. You're doing so much to help them.

Speaker 2 (00:23:39) - What are you doing? She's like just a few things. I'm just trying to help. And everyone listening. By the way, everyone has something that you do for somebody. I promise that otherwise, no one's going to be willing to pay you a premium price. And no one is going to sing your praises. Because if you're doing what everyone else did for them, why would they? So if you've survived past six months, you're doing this stuff and said, look, Wendy, you're stuck in your functional skill. Is it fair to assume as a result of the assistance you're giving these people, they're going to be more successful when they get to China? And she's like, yeah, that's the point, right? I said, great, let's call you the China success coach then. Simple. Now let's create what we ended up calling the China Success Intensive, which was a five week program that worked with the executive, the spouse, any children being relocated to China. And then what I did is I said, now who should you sell it to? Now everyone listening is like, well, mean.

Speaker 2 (00:24:24) - Every executive would benefit from that. That's what she said, right? Because that's the biggest market, not always the best decision. I said, well, yes, I mean, I was terrified moving from Australia to the United States, but I don't think it's your ideal client. She's like, well, the companies will pay. I mean, she's right, millions of dollars. Often they have riding on it. But I'm like, what about the immigration attorney now? She looks at me like I'm speaking a different language. I'm like, think about it. These people make 5 to $7000 for doing a visa. All the bureaucracy and paperwork that comes with that, they've got to get a customer, which isn't cheap. Sometimes they'd be lucky to make $3,000, I said, so network to meet immigration attorneys and offer them $3,000 for a successful introduction. They loved it. They're like double my profit for a simple introduction. What have I got to say? And she said, all you got to do is say, congratulations, you've now got your visa.

Speaker 2 (00:25:09) - I just want to double check you're as ready as possible to be relocated to China. Now, they would say, because they're always overconfident. You know, I've got the visa now. Thank you. You've got the place sorted. Learning the language kids are getting pretty good at to. We're set and they would just respond with this. There's a lot more to it than that. I think you need to speak to the China success coach when he gets on the phone with the easiest cell in the world, they're terrified to go. The organization's motivated to pay. Recommended by their attorney, she charged $30,000 for doing this minus the $3,000 commission. She makes $27,000 for the easiest sale in the world, and she doesn't even need to go looking for customers. She goes looking for people that want to double their revenue by getting an additional service to add to their kit bag. It's the easiest thing to network. The easiest thing to sell. The problem is she had to look within to do that. And a lot of introverts are like, how do I sell my wares right there in that scarcity mentality? If anyone's a great customer, if you're not willing to take a back step and say, what is it that I do outside the scope of my functional skill, what's the high level benefit of that? For Wendy, those three things became the China success coach.

Speaker 2 (00:26:09) - For me, the branding expert. I'm a social media strategist. I'm a sales expert. I'm an introvert expert. I'm a master in NLP. No one cares. They don't care how hard it was for me to learn these things or how long it took me. But when I say I'm the rapid growth guy and I specialize with helping introverted service providers, the simplicity of that message gets me heard in a crowded marketplace. And if you don't have that for you, then how can you possibly feel authentic? I'm an accountant just like everyone else, but fight for me because I'm better. How does that even work? Yeah.

Speaker 1 (00:26:36) - Yeah. And how would you say that an introvert can leverage some of their own, maybe natural strengths to be able to figure out what that statement is for themselves? Do you have any advice around that? So a number of you have probably seen the words RocketLevel thrown around a little bit here and there, and I wanted to take a moment just to explain what that is.

Speaker 1 (00:27:00) - So the G.E.M. Series comes from RocketLevel, who is somebody that I work with directly? And RocketLevel is a marketing technology company that specializes in meeting the unique needs of small and medium sized businesses. So over the years, through strategic collaborations with national brands, franchise groups and local partners, RocketLevel has become a trusted ally for SMBs operating in the market. And right now, RocketLevel's primary focus is to provide a comprehensive range of marketing solutions for SMBs, including website development, SEO, paid ads, email marketing, social media management, and just about anything you can think of by offering a done for you approach. RocketLevel takes care of all aspects of digital marketing, allowing SMBs to focus on their core business operations. I know that everybody talks about this all the time. It's so hard to focus on the fulfillment side of things and been an absolute honor getting to partner with RocketLevel throughout the years, and be able to see them provide a solution for people that maybe don't have the talent right now, maybe don't have the time, and maybe don't have the playbook or the tools available.

Speaker 1 (00:28:07) - It truly is buttoned up in such a way that you can give somebody your high level objectives and get this stuff knocked out. So if you're curious, you should definitely, definitely give us a shout.

Speaker 2 (00:28:18) - Yeah, absolutely. And I think for introverts, the most important thing is to realize there is something unique and different about you, because what introverts tend to do is devalue everything that's amazing about them, and focus on the functional skill that they spent ten years. It makes sense. They spent ten years honing this skill to put more value on the things that come naturally. It doesn't doesn't make logical sense, but it's the things that make the biggest difference. So the first thing you have to do is believe that there is something unique and better about you, rather than you are disadvantaged and there's something you can't succeed at. So actually, I'll go one better. There is a template that I offer at Matthew pollard.com/growth that will literally break down. There's a five step process. It'll help you work through it yourself.

Speaker 2 (00:28:59) - My recommendation is give somebody else this podcast to listen to. So they've heard the Wendy story. So that so they get it and then spend an hour working on them through this template. And then get them to spend an hour working with you. Now, if you're a business coach, don't work with another coach. If you're a ghostwriter, don't work with another ghostwriter. You're going to get out of your mind junk and your functional skill. And you know, I did this at the National Freelance Association and nearly 200 people in the room. By the way, this is really sad story. At the end of the session, I said, look, do me a favor. Put your hand up. If you've identified a unified message that will excite and inspire people to want to know more, and like 97% of the room puts their hands up, which sounds great. And so I said, look, do me a favor. Just keep your hand up. If this is the most time you spend actively working on your marketing since you started your business, like 85% of the room kept their hands up, right? The whole picture was 90 minutes long, right? So the key is that this stuff works if you spend the time doing it.

Speaker 2 (00:29:50) - The problem is twofold. One is we don't understand, especially when we're working in a business. It's funny. See, businesses that are living off their Rolodex for the last five years, but they've got no idea how to get out of the feast and famine of referrals. Now, they've still not done this stuff, right. So what happens is they may lack on on some level of success, but I see MSPs and accountants that have got five years and they've got customers that are underpaying them. Like the number one complaint is I'm fully booked. Their second complaint is I'm not making enough money. How can those two things be true? Well, the answer is that you're devaluing yourself and you feel bad about selling and asking for what you're worth, and you don't see any difference between you and everyone else. So you're constantly getting taken advantage of, and you're constantly in this hamster wheel of struggling to find interested people, setting yourself apart, trying to make the sale. And, you know, it really comes down to price.

Speaker 2 (00:30:36) - And how could it not? Because you're not servicing the client with what you're uniquely great at. And the reason for that is you're scared. You're scared, like any customers are great customer, and you don't want to lose your current customers by saying don't work with you anymore. Like, truthfully, the customers that you already work with and the referrals, they don't care if you put on your website. You're a dentist now, right? They're going to call you and say, I thought you were a really great accountant. Are you still going to work with me, or can you still work with my friend? Like they're not going to care. What you have to understand, though, is how it applies, because most people and I have to tell you, I see so many people go to a marketing specialist and they pay 30 grand for a 30 page document with, you know, color codes and slogans and all the rubbish that will never really work for you. And what I say is like, all you need is a way of introducing yourself.

Speaker 2 (00:31:18) - Like, I'll give you an example, most people hate networking because it feels so transactional. And by the way, you shouldn't be going to networking to sell to prospects anyway. Like even if somebody asked to buy, never, never had that conversation that you will get interrupted. You'll feel tacky. They'll remember that you did it and they'll they'll resent you for it. But and yes, there are ways to do that. But here's the thing. You also are coming across salesy from the moment you speak. Like if you think, firstly, you should be interested rather than interesting. And most people get that now, at least I hope you have now that generally. However, leads to most introverts doing what I call aimless networking, which is like they have all these shallow conversations. Somebody asks what they do and they're like, well, my day jobs. This like wants to buy from somebody that says, my day job. Is this right? Or oh, it's complicated. And you start explaining all the things you do.

Speaker 2 (00:32:04) - I heard it's complicated. I've already given up. Or I do two things. You've got to simplify it. Now, the ones that have learned that will say something. And I still hate this. It sounds so contrived, like I do this for this group of people, even if they have this common problem. Right. So I help with sales and marketing growth, right? That's it. I hope that even if they have this common objection, right, even if they're introverted, right. Now. I hope this group, you could say like that's even better, right? I help introverts overcome their sales and marketing challenges, even if they think they can't sell. All of that still sounds like, hey, you know what, Blake? I'd love to sell you something because I'm trying to buy a new car. And I really think that if you worked with me, you'd pay me enough to. I can afford the deposit. So let's get together. It doesn't sound great. What I do instead is I talk about my passion and my mission.

Speaker 2 (00:32:51) - And I'll give you an example. When somebody asks me what I do, I say, first, thanks for asking. And then I say, I'm the rapid growth guy, full stop. And then when somebody looks at me and says, well, what exactly is that? Because people's brains are. The science behind this is really interesting. But they have to solve the puzzle. They want to put you in a box, and because you've been interested rather than interesting, they also feel like they owe it to you to ask. So the two together is like the psychology that copyright pass. So they're like, what's that? Or how do you do that? And say, one of the things I love to say more than anything in the world is an amazing, introverted service provider with enough talent, skill and belief in themselves to start a business of their own. But what I find more often than not, they just hate seeing this is they get stuck in an endless hamster wheel, struggling to find interested people trying to set themselves apart, trying to make a sale, feeling like people care about only one thing price.

Speaker 2 (00:33:35) - Do you know anyone like that now? Of course they'll say yes, especially if I've gone to the right networking event, which, if you know how to research networking events, why are you not? Why are you going to the wrong ones? Don't go to the same one. By the way, there's the secret. And then when they say yes, I say, well, I'm on a mission to help these introverted professionals realize they really can have a rapid growth business doing what they love, but not by focusing on their functional skill. They're usually amazing at that, but instead the three things outside the scope that really allow them to have a business doing what they love. Now, here's what's interesting. I didn't tell you what I do. I just said, here is the group that I love to help. Here's what I'm passionate about. And this is my mission. That is it. I rely on the story to explain the rest, and all of that gets people to lean in more and more.

Speaker 2 (00:34:16) - And more importantly, I'm not making it about me.

Speaker 1 (00:34:19) - Absolutely, absolutely. And you know, what I really love about that approach, too, is it's it's different than saying the other one is just such a thin veil, right? It's it's like, so if you do want to buy something from me, here's my card. You should buy something from me. And it's it's just never going to work, you know, whereas this approach is a little bit like, hey, look, people are are hopping on the train with me. Maybe we can take a ride together. I don't know, but but I'm open minded, you know, and I and I and I really love what I do and I really, really like that a lot. You know, I got to ask, this might be a little bit out of left field, but how do you feel? You know, growing up how how how similar, how similar and how different are you from, from, you know, when you were younger, you think.

Speaker 2 (00:35:09) - Well, I mean, I second guessed everything I did when I was younger and I did use my my mindset as a constant ruminate. Right. So I would go home and I would catastrophize I'd ruminate. And it was it was a very negative thing. The one thing I will say is, and this was, you know what they say, like the, the adversities we face, see the success of our future and not sure if they say it or if I say it, but the the thing that I will tell you is when I was in late high school, I had a reading speed of a sixth grader. I was super introverted, and it was only when I got diagnosed with this thing called syndrome, which basically means I put on a funny colored pair of lenses and miraculously, I can learn to read. Not like everyone else, but I could start the process of learning to read. And that was kind of a revelation moment for me, because I realized that the world as it is doesn't need to be the way it is.

Speaker 2 (00:35:56) - You have to say, firstly, you have to take responsibility and then you need to say, what is what if there was a different way and then you've got to put good and hard work behind it, because the glasses didn't help me, they just allowed me to start the process of helping myself. Right. And if I didn't discover the glasses, then I wouldn't have been able to help myself. So sometimes they can be a thing in the way of you helping yourself, and that's fine. Find the thing. But for me, that was a huge moment. Because if you think at the 93rd door, remember I walked out of that door, I was ecstatic for like 40s I'd made about $70, right? Which was a lot of money back then for me. And. And then I had my next realized, I'm going to do this again tomorrow. And I could have done what most people do. I have to do this forever. Like this, which would have been a horrible year. But that's what most people do, right? They just accept that they don't have the gift of gab.

Speaker 2 (00:36:39) - That's the way it is. And especially a small business owner, that means your whole family has a worse off life and it's a horrible thing to just accept. But then on the other side, I could have just quit, and then I may not have mean. The job that I'd lost just before Christmas was a data entry role, right? I would have happily done that for the rest of my life. So it was my. And I probably would have quit. And if I quit, I would have found my way into a data entry role. And there's nothing wrong with that. But I wasn't in love with that. I love doing what I do now. I hope everyone, this is a huge thing. When you attach passion to what you do, you have this avalanche of energy. With practice and preparation you can use to compel people on things like podcasts, which is what hopefully everyone's feeling now. But it was until I learned that I had to first take responsibility for anything that wasn't working and assume it was my fault.

Speaker 2 (00:37:24) - And I know that sounds unfair, just the only way out. I had to take responsibility that I, you know, I could. I didn't have gift of gab, so find a way out. What if there was another way and then put good and hard work behind it? But the first thing is you have to stop lying to yourself. And that's why for those people, because we are talking about introversion today, for those people that believe that their introversion is different, they're just so much quieter. Like see me like, I put up this present slide at my presentations of me with really bad acne and talk about me at my sister's wedding and let people laugh at it. Right? Because I put it up and I'm like, you only going to see this for three seconds. But it's important for people to stop projecting extroversion on everybody that's successful, that's done well. And like, this is a great time for me to out you as an introvert yourself, right? Because we were having this conversation and I was like, you know what? Where do you draw your energy? Because that's the only difference, right? Does it mean you can't sell? You can't network, you can't public speak.

Speaker 2 (00:38:13) - It's just where you draw your energy. And I draw my energy. Like after this, I'll be tired. And because of that, I've got recharge time planned doesn't mean can't do it. And like, you kind of had this and I think it would be if you're open to it, sharing what you shared before with me because you kind of went through the self-discovery yourself.

Speaker 1 (00:38:31) - Yeah. Absolutely. No. And I so appreciate you for hopping on the show because I've just had a lot of curiosity. It felt like really a really good fortune getting to getting to talk to you, you know, because it's something I had a lot of questions. That's why I've just been rapid firing, trying to learn everything I can, you know, because I know there's a lot of other people like me growing up, I always kind of thought I was like, oh, I think I'm an extrovert. But what I realized after kind of learning more about the definition is that, yeah, I would feel drained and totally drained until I had some time alone.

Speaker 1 (00:39:06) - Right? Just some complete me time, and then my batteries would be would be completely recharged. And this actually kind of took a toll on me for a while because I neglected that side of things always, you know, going to different social things and, you know, trying to to constantly be interacting with, with, with all of my, you know, my community, which I still obviously love and, and beyond grateful for. But I wasn't taking any me time, you know, and and you know, I quickly found them like, look, I just need to like either, you know, go and write out my list of things that I want to work on and just have time. Then that way, go for a walk, play my guitar and be completely on my on my own. And you know, that's yeah, that's how I discovered I'm like, yeah, absolutely have introverted introverted tendencies, you know.

Speaker 2 (00:40:01) - And that's a really important thing for people to hear because I hear people say, oh, you know, I was introverted, but don't worry, I'm not introverted anymore.

Speaker 2 (00:40:07) - I'm like, what do you mean, don't worry? Like, there's nothing wrong with being introverted. And I also see a lot of other people try to become more extroverted. And truthfully, if I tried to be more extroverted, firstly, it would take a lot more energy than what I do now. And then secondly, I would feel really inauthentic. So it's not a long term strategy for success. And don't get me wrong, I do know a lot of successful introverts that behave extroverted. I also know a lot of other introverts that lean into their introverted strengths and are a lot happier and a lot more energetic in their social life, in their personal life. And and that's the path that I would suggest people people follow. But you've got to understand that the goal isn't to become ambivalent or to become extroverted. The goal is to embrace your natural, introverted strengths. And yes, I mean, absolutely, you want the test to say amber version, but that doesn't change who you are because the tests are designed to understand how you cope in the world and how you what you enjoy, what you don't.

Speaker 2 (00:40:59) - And you know, if I was to do some of these tests, like I would say, I love public speaking, I love networking, I love selling, I love going out and being social. It doesn't mean that I also don't need charge time. And a lot of the tests are starting to evolve. But the truth is, people have made things way too confusing. Maybe because there's too many grant dollars in making things confusing, but for people that are listening, like just ask yourself this question do I charge from being by myself or with others? And if you say, oh, but I enjoy networking, didn't say that. I said, do you charge by being with yourself or with others? And if you charge, you know, I find like even introverts need to have social time like they if you put them in an isolation for long enough, they need to go and talk to somebody, but then they're still tired afterwards. And that's the question you have to ask yourself. And there's nothing wrong with that.

Speaker 2 (00:41:39) - We're not second class citizens. Our path to success is just different, and it doesn't need to be different. It's just a lot more authentic if we choose that different path.

Speaker 1 (00:41:48) - You're absolutely right. And you know something? Just from reflecting on my experience as somebody that recharges on, on, on, on his own, I, you know, I found that it is a superpower also in the sense that I got I know plenty of people that are, that are extroverts that, you know, don't have the capacity to maybe sit alone with themselves and like and process through some of their thoughts. And it's something I'm really, really grateful for is the opportunity to develop like, you know, even just basic coping mechanisms to, to figure out things like that. So I'm sure you come across things like, like that, talking to introverts all the time, you know.

Speaker 2 (00:42:31) - Absolutely. I can tell you that the founder of Selling Power magazine introduced the concept of the unconscious mind to a whole bunch of people at a conference, and it blew him away.

Speaker 2 (00:42:41) - How many people didn't didn't even know they had an unconscious line. He called it an internal CEO. And it was like, oh, that's a really interesting. How can people not know that now? Like an introvert knows? Because that internal voice is yelling at you a lot of the time, and we have to learn to control it. But a lot of extroverts, because they don't spend any time alone, they don't mean what have we used to do? We used to go out into the forest to find our purpose in life. Now we're like, what should I do? Oh, let me call so-and-so. Let me message this. We spend no time truly understanding ourselves, and we're always we always have something to distract us. So you're 100% right if we as introverts have a huge advantage there. And for every introvert that says they get social anxiety going to networking events, I'm like, systems and planning will fix that. It's a lot harder for an extrovert to learn not to talk, right? They're like, no, I'm over talking, but I just I'm learning how not to do that.

Speaker 2 (00:43:29) - Like they're apologizing as they won't be quiet, right? It's really tough for them also.

Speaker 1 (00:43:35) - Absolutely, absolutely. Um, Matthew. So tell me right now. Mean what's what's your your your big mission that you're on that you want everybody to kind of kind of kind of know you for. I know we've talked about it quite a bit, but I'd love to give the floor to you to kind of let let the people know what you're working on, what's coming up next and where they should, you know, interact with you at.

Speaker 2 (00:43:59) - Yeah, absolutely. Well, I mean, the big thing that I'm working on at the moment, and I do this about this time every year, is getting ready for National Introverts Week, which is a week I founded. It's the third week of March, and it's really about shining a spotlight on helping introverts realize they're not second class citizens. So during that time, and if anyone's part of any of my mailing list or connected with me on any of my social medias, I share a whole bunch of imagery, doesn't even have my logo on it because it's not about me, right? It's about getting out that mission, and I just want people to out themselves as introverts, because a lot of people that are successful out themselves as introverts during that week, and it inspires a lot of people that felt that they couldn't succeed to go, what if he can do it? I can do it.

Speaker 2 (00:44:35) - I just didn't know that they were introverted. So that's what I'm working on. That's what I'm really passionate about for those people, because, I mean, it wouldn't be this show wouldn't be anything without the take action part. It's kind of pointless, right? So I really want people to take action. So I think the best way to take the next step is actually to go to Matthew Pollard. Com forward slash growth. So you get to create your version of the rapid growth guide, the China Success Coach, and discover your niche of wanting willing to buy clients and download that template. Now remember don't do it in isolation. You don't need to hire me for that. But you need to work with somebody, right? And just find somebody else to listen to this podcast that's not in your functional skill. And then the other thing is that if you're still an introvert that believes you can't sell, go to the Introverts Edge. Download the first chapter and I will help confront that stigma for you. And I go more than that because I am very passionate about this.

Speaker 2 (00:45:19) - I outline the full seven steps to a sale and I literally say grab what you currently say and put that into this, because what you'll find very quickly is there's some things that don't fit. Throw that out. You shouldn't be saying it to customers. There's some things out of order, which is why it comes across as salesy. And you can fix that. And then you'll realize there's some gaping holes that you can fill. And if you do that, just that you'll double your sales in the next 60 days. And then for those people that believe they can't network because they're introvert, you know, the introverts edge to networking. You get the first chapter of that book. It'll do the same thing in the networking field for you.

Speaker 1 (00:45:49) - Amazing. Well, Matthew, I got to say, it's been such a pleasure getting to talk to you. Thanks for joining me on the show today.

Speaker 2 (00:45:56) - It was my absolute pleasure, mate. Thanks for having me on.

Speaker 1 (00:46:00) - Absolutely everybody you know. Stay tuned for more of, you know, what Matthew is working on.

Speaker 1 (00:46:06) - I'll include all of the links that you should check out. This has been an episode of The G.E.M. Series. I hope everybody has a wonderful day and we'll talk to you again soon. Bye. Thank you for listening to today's episode of the G.E.M. Series, where we're always here to share the goals, execution, and mindset of thought leaders around the world. If you're listening to this, I'm sure that you have some pretty big goals for yourself, and I would absolutely love to hear them. Actually, here at RocketLevel, we just launched our newest partnership program where the goal is to, well, build a relationship with you guys. I want to talk with all of you coaches, consultants and entrepreneurs. This program is going to be providing free sales and marketing training, giving you access to a massive network of small businesses, and even paying you to allow us to handle the fulfillment side of things. Over the last 20 years, we've been able to learn a lot about how to handle digital marketing for a small business, and frankly, we want to pass that along.

Speaker 1 (00:47:06) - After working with business coaches and consultants all over the world, we decided, let's make it formal. Let's make this thing happen. So if you're at all curious, check out the links attached and please reach out directly. I would love to meet you all. Remember, I'm always a email, text, phone call or DM away. Everybody remember to be awesome and do awesome things a whole lot more coming soon. Take care.