7 simple rules to become a sales machine

Key Takeaway

People buy four things only: time, money, sex, and approval/peace of mind. They buy aspirin (urgent pain relief) always, but vitamins (nice-to-haves) only sometimes. Focus on selling aspirin—solutions to immediate, painful problems. Make everything else equal, then go make friends. Being valuable and useful is all you need: help people, share ideas, introduce connections, and expect nothing in return. Do this authentically and consistently, and people will find ways to give you money.

Episode Overview

A conversation exploring timeless sales wisdom from a legendary Hacker News comment, the power of rereading great books like Robert Cialdini's 'Influence,' and fascinating stories including United Hatzalah's life-saving volunteer network in Israel and Bernard Arnault's masterclass response to media scrutiny.

Full Transcript

Transcript of 7 simple rules to become a sales machine from My First Million. Auto-generated from episode audio; may contain minor errors.

Can I show you the highest value comment on Hacker News that I've ever seen? Yeah, that has a lot of weight. This is from like years and years ago, but it's this comment about sales cuz Hacker News is full of engineers and they're like, "Hey, like, you know, I suck at sales. Anybody can help me get better at this?" And this guy wrote seven points and I just nodded my head so vigorously that my C4 C5s all sore. So, let me just give you this here.

here. here. He said the guy goes, "Yeah, there's tons of resources to help you with sales, but I'll start with I'll try to offer some simple tips. Number one, sales is a lot like golf. You can make it so complicated that it's almost impossible, or you can simply walk up and hit the ball. I've been leading sales orders for about 20 years. My advice is to walk up and hit the ball. Number two, sales about people and it's about problem-solving. It's not about tech or solutions or chemicals or lines of code or artichokes.

It's about people. It's about solving problems. Number three, people buy four things and four things only, ever. Those four things are time, money, sex, and approval or peace of mind. If you try to sell anything other than those four things, you will fail. Number four, Number four, Number four, people buy aspirin, always. They'll buy vitamins, sometimes, and but it'll be unpredictable. Sell aspirin. Number five, Number five, Number five, I say in every talk that I give that all things being equal, people will buy from their friends.

So, make everything else equal and then go make a lot of friends. Um number six, being valuable and useful is all you'll ever need to sell things. Help people out, send them interesting posts, write birthday cards, record videos, like sharing your ideas of how they could grow their business, introduce them to people who would benefit from knowing each other, and get out of the way. Expect nothing in return. Do this consistently and authentically and people will find ways to give you money. I promise. Number seven, no one cares about your quota, your payroll, your opex, your burn rate, no one.

They care about the problem you're solving for them. There are more than a hundred trillion dollars in the economy just waiting for you to breathe it in. Good luck. Who is the god of Hacker News? Are you reading any books? I am reading Influence again by Robert Cialdini. Cialdini. Cialdini. Why are you rereading Robert Cialdini's Influence? Influence? Influence? Because as the great Buddhist proverb says, "No man steps in the same river twice, for he is not the same man and the river is not the same river." Oh my god.

Have you How long have you waited to use that one? You start reading books, what are you doing? You just start turn You're turning into a quote machine. No, but really I think, you know, reading the best books again at different times in your life, it's a totally different book. You think you've read it and what I found is you you remember, you know, shockingly little of books. And so, going back and reading great books is um is like, you know, the gift that keeps giving in that sense.

So, so that's what I'm doing. I'm doing. I'm doing. Uh did you ever read the blog post that I wrote about Influence, his book? No. No. No. Uh in 2014, I had just read his book and I wanted to implement what he what he he talked about and he has this rule called the rule of reciprocity, which basically just says, just says, just says, uh let's say that uh neighbor one goes to neighbor two, let's say I go to Shawn and I say, "Hey, can I borrow a cup of sugar?" and you say, "Yeah, I got you." The next day, if you come to me and say, "Hey, can I borrow your car for the day?" even though even though those two ask aren't even remotely equal, I, because of the rule of reciprocity, am very likely to lend you my car because the rule of reciprocity states that if you do something nice for someone, they are they have a high chance of doing something nice in exchange to you, even if the they aren't equal.

And uh that's like how society is is built, one could say, is like based off the rule of reciprocity. So, when I was a kid, I was uh 24 years old, there was a motorcycle for sale, I think for $1,800, and I went to buy it and I took photos and documented all of this as I went, and I was like, "Hey, uh you have the motorcycle for $1800? Let me see it. Let me check it out. Awesome. Oh, by the way, I'm really sorry I'm late.

I I just I wanted to stop and get a Coke cuz it was kind of hot outside. I got one for you if you want one. Do you want one?" And he goes, "Yeah, sure. Thanks." Um and then uh as I start talking to him and I'm like, "Look, I love this motorcycle, but like I'm a young guy. I don't have a lot of money. I know you're asking for 18. [snorts] [snorts] [snorts] Could Could you do 14?" And he goes, "You know, you brought me the Coke.

You seem like a nice kid. Yeah, I guess I can do that." And so like there's a blog post where I took photos of myself like when he was like turned when he was like turned around like signing the paperwork, I like like like took the took the photo. But anyway, the rule of reciprocity is pretty amazing. So, let me tell you a funny follow-up story to that. I remember you telling the story about the Diet Coke and the negotiation and how you always bring two Diet Cokes to a negotiation, correct?

You've told me this before like 10 years ago, right? ago, right? ago, right? to bring a gift. Yeah, I try to bring something. something. something. Well, I took it as Diet Coke. So, here's what happened. I uh recently uh I was coaching this high school basketball team, as you know. And anytime I'm doing a project, I want to try to make it as interesting, as cool as possible. And what I do sometimes is I do things that are maybe like not the default way of doing things.

So, I was trying to create content for the team so that the team would have like really cool like media going with it. And so, the principal and the AD did not like it. it. it. Are you talking about the the post that you made about your doing being a coach? Of being a coach, yeah. And how we were going to try to have this take this underdog team and try to get them to be state champions. And I was going to we're going to record the vlog along the way.

So, way. So, way. So, post the vlog, it gets 20,000 views in the first 24 hours. But one of those views was the principal or the AD. They call me, they're like, "Hey, you need to take this down." So, we say, "Okay, we'll take it down." And he says, "I want to meet with you. Be in my office Monday." Monday." Monday." Dude, you got called to the principal's office. That's the most principal thing ever. ever. ever. And so, here I am. I thought I was past this.

I'm now in my late 30s. And I'm I'm I'm nervous. I'm going to the principal's office. And I bring So, we're we're recording a vlog of this thing and I I'm telling the vlog I said, "You know, my friend Sam taught me this this trick, this little little the law of reciprocity. Let me Let me put you guys on some game. You know, people have this really high likelihood to return the favor if you do a small favor for them." I said, "Watch I said I'm I'm going to be late to this meeting, but I'm going to stop and get this Diet Coke cuz this is the most important part of the meeting." And I'm like, "Follow me." The vlog camera follows me and we get two Diet Cokes and we go and I'm so ready for this and I get to the meeting and we sit down and I'm like, "I don't fully remember the line that you said about like how to do it." And I think there's a actually a really specific way in the book that Robert Cialdini describes it, which is um two people are doing a psych study, the guy walks out, and he comes back and he says, "Hey, they I asked the guy if we if I could have a Coke." He said, "Yeah, so I brought you one, too." one, too." one, too." Um so, it's kind of kind of sounds like very like you know, thoughtful and in passing.

And you said a set a very similar thing. similar thing. similar thing. And so, I walk in and I just go He's like, "Hey guys." And I go, "You want a Diet Coke?" And then he's like And he just goes, "No, thanks." And now I have two Diet Cokes. I go, "I have two." two." two." I go, "I have two." And he goes, "I'm all set." And then I And the vlog camera's on me and it's like The Office. I look at the camera camera camera and it's like, "This is not going as planned.

I'm Michael Scott-ing this." And then I open up the Diet Coke almost explodes cuz I've been like, you know, nervous the whole time. Luckily, doesn't totally foam over and I proceed to drink two Diet Cokes while this guy absolutely shuts down my program. And so, that's the law of reciprocity gone wrong. That is so funny. That is so good. All right, I have a story for you. Hey, everyone, really quick, if you're enjoying this episode on CEO stuff, so delegating, having hard conversations with your team, hiring, then I've got something for you.

So, the team at HubSpot, they actually went and put together a bunch of best practices that Shawn and I use in our own companies. And they put it together in something that's really easy to read and understand. And so, if you want to just save yourself 10 years of headache and heartache, then you should check it out. I wish we had this a long time ago. It would have helped me a lot. But, there should be a QR code on your screen that you can scan or a link in the description.

So, check it out. It's totally free and totally awesome. So, I told you the other day how I like for the first time ever, I like went out to dinner with someone. And I'm like such a homebody. Well, my friend What are you talking about? I visited you in New York. You literally walk around New York with a briefcase and like, you know, business cards and Altoids in your pocket trying to meet people riding the subway. You're You're Don't try to take my stick. I'm the homebody.

You're the You're the guy who's out there. But, go ahead. I just carry the briefcase. My wife's like, "Why do you have this?" I'm like, "To do business." Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Sam cosplays a businessman in New York City. City. City. I'm doing business, Sarah. I need a I need the case. It's got the crayons and the snacks. Get off my back. Yeah, when when you said attaché, I was like, "Okay, that's enough." enough." enough." So, So, So, I've been hanging out with this guy named Mark.

Have you heard of GLG? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. The expert network. So, you you know, you want to find out a whether Nvidia chips are going to go up or down. Maybe you call someone in the supply in the one of the buyers who's like an expert buyer who'd give you insights about the industry. Huge business. business. business. Yeah, and I've become good buddies with him. I've hung out with him a bunch because he lives in my neighborhood. And basically GLG, like you just explained, huge business.

They filed to go public at one point. And so, some of their numbers were public. It does something like over $100 million a year in profit and cash flow. Very amazing company. And we were just hanging out. He owns another business in the community space now that he loves. And he sits down and he starts telling me, I'm like, "What are your hobbies? What else are you into?" And he told me this crazy story. So, I want you to Google something. Google It's called United Hatzalah.

Okay, I found it. Okay. Equipment aid. Equipment aid. Equipment aid. Uh looks like a charity of some kind. Volunteer medical emergency services. Exactly. So, listen to this story. So, he tells me this story. So, Mark, he started JLG when he was only like 23, 24. Pretty young guy. When he's something like 27, 28, he meets this guy named Eli. Eli was either an ambulance driver or was at the scene where this happened. But basically, a kid was choking on his food and the They called an ambulance.

The ambulance didn't make it there in time and the kid died. And he was like It really sat with him. He He was really bothered by that because they lit come to find out that there actually was a doctor like next door or like down the block or something like that. Within like a pretty close vicinity. And he's like, "It really stinks that this ambulance took 15 or however many minutes to get here when there was a guy right here that could have like cured this kid and he didn't have to die." And so, Eli ends up starting this very small thing with only like six or 12 people where they basically self-organize and they train themselves on how to do very simple things like CPR, the Heimlich maneuver.

And they train themselves on that. And then eventually, went to like they could even like do like an emergency baby delivery. And he had started a nonprofit where he would actually give out these like 40-lb backpacks that had like very a small amount of oxygen, a baby kit system. So, a baby delivery kit so you can like deliver a baby in case of an emergency. Like these like really essential supplies. And he starts telling Mark about how he's got these things going. And Mark's like, "That's awesome.

awesome. awesome. This thing could be it. This could be like a really big thing." And Mark gives him $18,000 cuz Mark was just getting successful, but he's like, "I have 18 grand I can give you, but I can be your co-founder and I can help commercialize this thing and make this a huge thing." And so, it's been around since uh for the last 18 years. And at this point, they have 18,000 volunteers in Israel. It's mostly it's it's only in Israel. They answer something like 2,000 calls a day.

And the mission statement is very simple. They say that on average it takes something like 12 or 10 minutes for an ambulance to arrive to you. Our goal is to get there in 90 seconds in anywhere in Israel. And right now, I think they do it in like 2 minutes. And Mark was telling me, he's like, "Basically, right now, we are uh him and I went out to eat. He was like, 'If you were a member, you would carry your bag with you at all times.

And if somebody 10 floors down got uh got sick or something happened where uh they had to call an ambulance, you would be alerted uh because you are nearby and you could run down and give them some type of need until the ambulance got to them and they could actually do the real stuff, but at least you could be like a life-saving thing.'" And because of this, this company uh it's a nonprofit, they have saved uh potentially millions of people because they've done this since uh for in the last 18 years.

And what's interesting is they started this before iPhones, before GPS. And when they started it, they actually just gave out these like walkie-talkies, like these radios. And now, it's gotten quite sophisticated. So, they the the the entire foundation runs off of donations. And they are spending many tens of millions of dollars a year. And what they have noticed is like, for example, through 18 years of data, they know that heart attacks are more likely to happen in the morning. Which means people are probably in their home versus the office.

And so, they know that they need to recruit volunteers who are on call and ready and other prepared for a potential heart attack within these areas. And they have this They actually did a YouTube video on it. They have this entire uh like AI setup that they know when to predict that something bad potentially might happen and to have their 8,000 person volunteer force to do it, to be ready. And there's a few interesting things here about this. One, there's this thing called like it's called Good Samaritan Law Laws.

We have it in America, they have it in Israel, which basically just says like when you're on an airplane and the captain goes like, "Is there a doctor on board? Can someone help me?" As long as that doctor acts in good faith, they can't be sued by the person. You know, it's it's called a Good Samaritan Law where it's like as long as so, but if you are on there for pay, meaning if you are a professional, like I'm paying you money, there's an exchange of goods for you to do a service, you could potentially be sued.

So, Mark was like, "This thing, it needs to strictly be a nonprofit." He said the second thing, he was like, "In Israel, what's cool about this? He's like, we have uh super Orthodox Jews who are doing it. We have non-secular Jews who are doing it. We have Arabs, we have Muslims, we have Christians." He was like, "I've noticed that what has brought us together is not just us sitting around talking, but I can get all groups of people to come and work together on something and and and get their hands dirty, and it really brought us all together." And he was explaining this in a very altruistic way, and I totally got bought into it.

And I was like, "Why aren't you in America?" He's like, "Well, we actually did try to, but we started in 2019 or 20, like right before COVID, and it it was a false start. So, we just haven't we just haven't made it here." But he's like, "This 100% could work in virtually every city in America." And he was like, "It could even work in rural areas." He's like, like, like, "Uh in rural areas, they have volunteer firefighters." But it was really fascinating to hear all about this stuff because I think that, you know, we talk about money and for-profit stuff, but if you are like a social entrepreneur or something like that, this is a really interesting opportunity.

And hearing him describe this, it was amazing. Dude, so cool. I mean, I was reading the stats about it just now. It says they basically handle one call every 45 seconds. seconds. seconds. Crazy, right? Crazy, right? Crazy, right? The scale of that's crazy. There's only There's only like 8,000 volunteers or 9,000 volunteers, so that's a lot of coverage. I mean, 2,000 calls a day and you only have 9,000 volunteers. Everybody's busy. Everybody's busy. Everybody's busy. This is like This is not like a once in a blue moon, you know, thing.

This is This is wild. The average response time is 3 minutes. Their goal is 90 seconds. That's nationwide and 24/7 coverage, which is pretty pretty incredible. It kind of makes sense in a way, right? Because Because Because I mean, what a cool Like, you asked him what are your hobbies and he told you this story, this story, this story, which is hilarious cuz you're probably like He's like, "What about you?" You're like, "Skateboarding." like, "Skateboarding." like, "Skateboarding." But but like for for people, I mean, to be able to be like, "Yeah, I saved a life life life today or this year." I mean, what a Yeah, like what an Where else can you get that?

That That would be actually like really meaningful for people if they felt like they could join something where they could actually do that. that. that. Well, think about the people who have like kind of crappy jobs that they're not particularly motivated by. Like, this is something where you're like, "Yeah, I'm I'm I'm I can do that non-motivating thing. That pays the bills. I'm so thankful I have this Yeah, like I have this thing that like I'm I am needed and my and I actually have a literally a life-changing impact on people." Yeah.

Yeah, that's crazy. I thought you were going to say in the US they just pivoted to DoorDash. It became DoorDash. Well, Well, Well, This is the founding story of food delivery in America. of interesting. of interesting. of interesting. But I thought this was awesome and I was pretty inspired like hearing I I think he said that he goes, "We have 8,000 people who are part of the network and he's like, "We're growing." He's like, "We're going to keep on growing." He's like, like, like, "And he's like, one doctor who is probably doing okay, but he's not wealthy.

He gave us $4,000." And he's like, "I got this line where I tell them this because I believe it to be true." He was like, "You giving us $4,000 is the best donation we've ever received. Like, the fact that you are willing to do this it is so important to us and and that's how they've grown to be able to spend tens of millions of dollars a year. year. year. Very cool. Very cool. Let's see. You want a lightweight? You want You something quick and fun?

You want something a little more cool and deep? Did you see this amazing It's a masterclass of PR by Bernard Arnault? I didn't read it. What happened? It happened this morning, right? Okay, so Okay, so Okay, so So, I don't I don't normally pay too much attention to this stuff, but check this out. So, I saw this from Lulu I don't know how you Lulu Chang. I don't know how you say her last name. She's Survey. She's like the kind of go direct direct direct founder.

She She She's like she was doing PR at Anduril, and now she has her own fund and whatnot. Is she the one who has the handle where it's like, here's how you should and should not address like PR issues? Yeah, yeah. She's just like constantly giving founders like advice. And her her philosophy is go direct philosophy. So, anyways, anyways, anyways, check this out. So, the backstory is that Bernard Arnault, who you know probably better than I do. He's the the titan behind um the luxury conglomerate LVMH.

And every once in a while, he's the richest man in the world. Yeah, he he's kind of yeah, he floats, you know, between number one and four in the richest men in the world. And he writes this post and it's just titled merci, right? Thank you in French. And he basically says So, so what happened was this publication in France did this like year-long kind of sort of exposé on his family. And they tried to make it as like juicy as possible. So, they dropped a six-part investigative series called The Empire of Bernard Arnault.

And it was talking about how it basically paints him as the last royal dynasty of France. And it describes like tension between his second wife and his son-in-law. And how their Sunday family dinners are like, you know, palace intrigue type of thing. And how they're, you know, they're trying to figure out the you know, the five heirs or the five kids are sort of jockeying for position cuz he's he's now close to 80 I think of who's going to succeed you know it's like basically succession but for real life.

life. life. And so he so they they dropped this whole series and he goes here's a three three-page open letter that he he basically posts and I just want to read you a little bit of this so he goes thank you. That's how he starts it. Instead of being defensive he just starts with thank you. He goes it seems I am the head of quote the last royal family of France. I'm reading this between two cups of tea and my children who were alerted to this over WhatsApp um asked me if they should now curtsy in my presence and I told them hello sir would be would be sufficient.

They burst out laughing um and I you know this has just been a wonderful week and it basically says it seems like Le Monde has decided to roll out the heavy artillery six months of investigation two full-time journalists blah blah blah. He basically like paints them as absolute overkill for what they were trying to do. And it this deserves a word and that word shall be thank you. You know I haven't been granted this treatment since I took over you know the company in 1984 and at that time they called me the Terminator but I far prefer the last royal family it's far more elegant and really good for sales at Dior.

Then he continues on and he basically says um says um says um uh uh uh he goes he goes on and he goes apparently I'm the whisperer into the ear of every president. Well, I plead guilty. And he starts naming the different presidents and he says oh and by the way it's not just the French you know presidents it's also five American presidents I've whispered to three British prime ministers blah blah blah. And am I to understand that whispering into uh that that only French whispers are scandalous that a group that earns 75% of its revenue outside of Europe um should should should be sort of isolated and not be talking to leaders of these countries.

And then he basically just addresses point by point the accusations in the article, but does it in such a smooth, non-defensive, smooth, non-defensive, smooth, non-defensive, French way where he basically turned a diss like a a diss track into a into a giant compliment for himself. And you know, he he he he he just addresses each term one by one. I'll give you one more. He's known as a lover of arts and tax breaks. And he's like, "Yeah, I contributed 200 million euros to the reconstruction of Notre Dame.

I fund to the tune of 50 million mathematics research at the school. You know, I pay this much in taxes every single year. We employ 220,000 employees, 40,000 of them who work in France itself. Um yeah, like I'm sure you forgot to mention that in the research, but I'm you know, happy to help. Uh you know, happy to help you here." And um And so he's just he calls out like the wording, you know, that that they use for for the different things just making them seem a little bit ridiculous.

And he ends um with "Rest assured, I will keep doing the Monde crossword, which I which that I must say is excellent." So he's leaving complimenting the crossword and basically inadvertently dissing the article. And I just thought, "Damn, this guy this was like such a perfect takedown takedown takedown where you normally see CEOs get really flustered. They either ignore, they deny, they go start to complain and say they're biased and they're it's a hit piece and, you know, play the victim. And instead, just so smooth.

And I thought there's a lot that that American CEOs could learn from this." Do you know what the biggest thing is to use hu- humor? Bring to bring it back to Robert Cialdini, he says the rule uh likeability, how to be more likeable, one of the easiest ways, I don't know if he actually said it this way, but an easy way to be more likeable is to be humorous. humorous. humorous. Make them laugh. Yeah, it's to make people laugh and smile. And like make people laugh about the silliest stuff.

And like if I heard about someone doing an article, if I was in this guy's shoes, and he was doing an article about my family, I would be livid, right? I wouldn't want to laugh about this. I'd be so angry. Um and the fact that he could do that is awesome. And it makes him 100% more likable. I didn't know anything about him other than like he's a business tycoon, but now I'm like, oh, I'm kind of a fan of you. you. you. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, exactly.

Yeah, exactly. You know, I wasn't going to read their annual letter this year, but this like basically he used the intrigue of gossip, that attention, that spotlight to say something very different, which I would say would say would say Obviously, if you just hate the guy, you're going to still hate the guy. If you love the guy, you're still going to love the guy. But the sort of the mass in the middle, which is folks like you and I who don't really care, aren't really paying attention, it's just one little nugget where you're like, "Hmm, I like that guy.

Couldn't tell you exactly what he said, but I I liked his approach. And and if you've ever studied that word as well, je ne sais quoi. Yeah, he's Yeah, he's Yeah, he's got that je ne sais quoi, you know what I mean? I mean? I mean? And it's people have studied this with like presidential debates and whatnot. It's like after the fact, you know, whether it's 2 hours later or 2 weeks later, you rarely can remember anything that was said, um, but you do remember how that person came across, um, and and the level of like sort of inadvertent, uh, trust and likability that you felt, uh, in the moment.

So, your your impression lasts, although your memory for the specifics does not. Dude, what's crazy is I'm um, I'm not aligned with Mumford and Sons' beliefs. Mumford and Sons, the the mayor of New York, I'm not aligned with a lot of his beliefs. I'm not aligned with a lot of his ideas for policies. Uh, I see him talk on the internet and I'm like, "Oh my god, you've got this dialed in. You know how to be likable." It is just insane. Have you ever watched any of his videos?

Oh, yeah. And it's same same exact reaction. reaction. reaction. Oh my god. Like he just has it dialed in perfectly. I went to um, out here in um, New York City there was the um, national track and field meet for like the profes- professionals and he popped in to say hi. And uh, like it it got more cheers than the actual race did. And uh, like I I I really disagree with virtually everything he's about, but he just oozed the cares the charisma. It was crazy.

It It just absolutely crazy. I've I've he's just been on all the time. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. He's He kind of ran like a like a like a social media master class, right? Like just figuring out little memorable um likable things to do along the way, whether it was the speech at the Knicks or talking about like, "Oh, the like the halal food trucks is $14 now for a plate of chicken. What's going on?" And you know, just rather than like boring people with with uh you know, political jargon.

political jargon. political jargon. What's the second thing? All right, let me tell you about uh Let me tell you about this company. So, I want to tell you about a company that is is is I had written off. I I just thought it's sort of like, I don't know, some archaic company. And then I saw some news recently that kind of blew my mind, some numbers, and it led me down a rabbit hole. And it's the business of Magic: The Gathering. The nerdy business of Magic: The Gathering.

And And And I wasn't interested in this at the beginning. Let me just start with that. If you said, "Hey, would you like to know about the business of Magic: The Gathering?" I would have just, you know, moved on to the next stall. Uh I I was not paying too much attention to it, but I actually think Do you think someone would be talking to you with you guys for like urinal urinal? Yeah, yeah, exactly. It's like, "What's up, bub?" up, bub?" up, bub?" "You like magic?

Do you want to hear Do you want to hear about the economics?" I just feel like I wouldn't have paid attention to this, and I'm telling you it's very, very interesting. Okay, so the way I noticed this was uh Diego was telling me, he's like, "Oh, Hasbro stock popped." And he's been going to these card collectors conventions every weekend. So, he's been telling me about the Pokémon scene. He's just He's just been getting into that like subculture. He doesn't really buy any stuff himself, I I don't think, but he um um um He participates.

He participates. He participates. interested in the obsession and the fanaticism and the like the subculture that that exists cuz it's like invisible to you unless you're in one of these conventions. conventions. conventions. So, he's like, "Yeah, Hasbro stock just popped." And it was because Magic just hit like an all-time high. Magic: The Gathering. I'm like, "Magic: The Gathering, isn't this like 20 years old? And it's true. Magic the Gathering has been compounding 17% a year on average for 17 straight years. And so the it's just been this like incredible compounding machine.

This franchise which sounds like, you know, it might be like a quick fad like Beanie Babies. what it is. So like I had the cards when I was a kid, but I don't even know if it was a game or not. Yeah, so it's a it's a it's a game you can play. Two people can sit down and you can kind of like have a duel. So it's like a card game, but and this is kind of the genius of it, a lot a lot of the fun isn't even playing the game against each other.

Like Pokémon, it's about collecting. about collecting. about collecting. And so how did they do this? And so this the backstory is pretty fascinating. So for So first of all, Hasbro is this company that owns Monopoly. They own Nerf guns. They own They They own a bunch of stuff. But like every you know, of every dollar that comes in, one out of every three is driven by Magic. It's like it is their cash cow. Magic will do, you know, 2 billion this year in revenue. It's been just cranking along.

This was like, you know, an all-time best quarter. So you'd think like think like think like is this old IP not like fizzling out? No, no. It's like having its best quarter ever. If you read the true backstory, you realize one thing, which is what true sort of tinkering, the power of tinkering. So this guy starts with this He's making this game called Five Magics. Five Magics. Five Magics. And Five Magics is a game he makes, doesn't go anywhere, but he puts a lot of heart and soul and sweat into it.

And he puts it on the shelf cuz who cares? And then he goes along and he's working a job, but then he creates this He has this other idea for this like more advanced game like robo something where you like kind of like build robots in the It's like a board game where you're actually like building a robot. And then he pitches it to this guy who's doing this Wizards game. And that guy's like, "Dude, this is too hard to build. Can you build something that's like more like kind of you know, this sort of sci-fi lore type of game, you know, this wizarding lore fantasy stuff.

And make it like something simple. Not the like You you to build a robot, but like just like a card game or something. So he goes back and he's thinking and he's on a hike one day and he has a sort of eureka moment. He's like, "Oh, I could take five magics, but I could change it." And he has this really good insight, which is most games like chess or checkers or checkers or checkers um um um at the time were all like fixed games, meaning you open the box and the pieces are all what they are.

Monopoly, like the the pieces are exactly what you think they are and I'm going to play with you and then when we're done we put the box the put the close the lid on the box and the the game stays in the box. And when Richard was growing up, he had a very unique upbringing. This is very This is like a fascinating part of this, how these like this like butterfly effect. So his dad moved him when he was very young to like Bangladesh and Nepal, these countries that you know totally fish out of water, didn't speak the language.

the language. the language. And so to make friends, really the only thing he could do was play games because he didn't he didn't know how to talk, so they had to use the shared language of a game that he knew, that they knew. And that game for him was marbles. And so he would go and he would play marbles. And marbles is a very unique game where you don't go and open a box and play marbles, each kid brings their own marble set to the game and you play and you can win other people's marbles, you could trade marbles and you have your own ever-growing collection of marbles.

And sometimes you'd run into a kid, he's got a marble you've never seen before and it made you just want want to go find your own version of that marble. You didn't even know it existed. And so that was part of the allure of the whole thing. And so he has this idea like, "Hey, what if I take that mechanic from marbles where marbles where marbles where it's this like infinite set of of of possibilities. You have your own collection, you bring the pieces to the game.

It's not a game where the pieces are already inside the box." And that was the core insight for Magic the Gathering and why 20 years later it's printing, you know, $500 this quarter off of that single insight about like, "What if the players have their own collection that they would bring to the game, that would walk around with rather than like a fixed set of pieces. It It's a right now it's doing 2 billion a year in revenue. It's on pace for that this year, yeah.

Like 1.7 last year, 2 billion this year. And so he's And by the way, he's the great great grandson of James Garfield. It's kind of cool. Yeah, the of the president, exactly. Yeah. So, he was like doing this. Did he sell it or what did he do? Yeah, so he sells it about, I don't know, know, know, I don't know. 6 9 years in, something like that. He sells it to Hasbro for 300 something million is the reported price. Then he had an earn out that took it up to almost 500 million.

The what So, he was only 5 years or 7 years into this when he sold it? Something like that. He was very smart. So, he was building this game and I'll I'll tell you kind of like how we got it off the ground. I'll tell you how he did the very smart thing he did right before he sold it. And then why this is so great as a business model. So, so first how he got it off the ground. He has the idea, he starts tinkering with it and he's he and he's a total like game design nerd.

He's been focused on game mechanics and game design for a long time. In fact, when I told you he like grew up in like Bangladesh and Nepal and he was playing these games, he actually got into Dungeons and Dragons, but he didn't know the rules. Like they didn't come with the rule set. So, he had the pieces, but he didn't know how to play. So, he was inventing his own rule rule set, which again is like, if you've looked through, you know, great inventions, it always comes with this weird constraint or this irritation that sounds like a total problem, but if if you they turned it into actually like the irritation drove the innovation.

So, him not knowing the rules led him to experiment with all different types of rule game design and rule design and he would play it and later in life he actually found the official rule set. He was almost like bummed out like, "Oh, that's how you play? I've been inventing all these other like versions of this that were really interesting." So, he had been studying game mechanics for a long time and so even with Magic, he was play testing like crazy and he would do things that others weren't doing.

So, he would find he would say, "Okay, who would be the best play testers for this? I can take guys who play these card games or these like board games, but he also went into baseball. He's like, "You know who really loves studying the the statistical statistical statistical um aspects of games with Strat-O-Matic." which was this like base baseball simulation game that like uber statistical nerds who love baseball would would get really into Strat-O-Matic. So, he'd find the best Strat-O-Matic players, get them to test this.

Cuz he knew if you get the game design wrong, the game fizzles out. He's like, "You could have the rich kid problem, which is just it's all about going and buying the best cards, and once you have the best cards, you can't be beaten." He's like, "So, [clears throat] I can't have that problem. And I can't have this problem. And I can't have this problem." He's finding all the bugs before he ever got to launch. And by the time he gets to launch, he doesn't just try to launch this widely or, you know, just like launch it to his friends.

He goes and he drives basically like down the coast, and he's going from like uh Comic-Con to like trading card conventions to conventions to conventions to um board game conventions, and he's finding like the white-hot center of who should love this game. And it should be basically like board game nerds. And he would go and he would demo it to like very small groups of people, but he would influence the influencers. He would get the guys who owned the shops. He would get the guys who write the magazine articles.

He would get the guys who are the the pro players of other games. He would win them over. And once he won them over, they would then be his sales engine explaining it to the next people. And so, he would just like, you know, kind of like traveling in his truck with the game in his trunk, go and win over like hand-to-hand combat So, this is in uh it says he it's he says he launched this in '93. So, he was doing that in the '80s.

And well, that was kind of his launch strategy. And then he right away it sold out. He sold like like hundreds of thousands of cards like in the first 4 days. And then he reprinted and he sold he had sold 10 million within the first like year or something like that. Like it was crazy. great movie. Like the the like early '90s, late '80s and San Diego, LA, like that is like a really cool setting. And then like a guy like going through all this like it's not going to work.

It's not going to work. Oh, it might work a little bit. It's not going to work. Okay, it works. Like that type of movie would be great. to like boons, right? So he he runs out They it sells so fast, he has no cards. He can't print any more cards. It takes time to do a print run. But the scarcity of there being no more cards and people going into shops being like, "Hey, do you have any magic?" And the owners being like, "What's magic?" And then they would have to go figure out, "Why are people walking to our door like hunting for this thing?

I've never seen this level of passion." So the scarcity drove the like economy of the of the game. And so he and and again, the business model, the genius of the business model. So normal board game will sell for like whatever, 20 bucks, let's call it. Well, the average Magic player is spending 100 bucks a year for like eight or nine years of their hobby. So the average player is spending like a thousand dollars. And obviously there's extreme collectors who are spending hundreds of thousands. There's casuals who fade out right away.

But if you just do the math, like the LTV per customer is in the thousands of dollars per player. You could never get somebody to buy a board game for a thousand dollars. But by doing this kind of drip drip drip mechanism where you get into the game, but then you want your collection to become better so that you show up with like the ace up your sleeve and you have social status because you have cool cards. And then you can trade or sell those cards, so it's an investment.

It's not spending. And that's what, you know, Pokémon did that afterwards. Uh Hearthstone did that afterwards. And now like, you know, a lot of the like sports card stuff have have have really taken that model and run with it. But, you know, Magic was really one of the OGs who did it. So I thought that was pretty amazing. amazing. amazing. The other cool thing he did was he bought Dungeons & Dragons. So he wanted to IPO the company. He realized like if I'm just one piece of IP, I'm going to be seen as inherently risky.

And so Dungeons & Dragons had been out before him and it had like 40 million in revenue, but it had like 30 million in debt. And it was doing really poor They could they stopped printing cards cuz they just had too much debt. They owed a bunch of money. They were They had scattered their business too much. So he bought the company. Nobody knows exactly how much, but like it looks like it was like 30, 40 million maybe. And he just took care of their debts.

And in doing so, he had a a more diversified, you know, uh brand portfolio of like another franchise that had millions of players and had been around for a while. And so, he's, you know, you buy it for 30 million, but then your egg your eventual exit is for, you know, 300 to 500 million to Hasbro because you were more defensible. So, I thought that was actually pretty brilliant as well. If you go on eBay and type in Magic the Gathering and sort by most expensive, there's cards on here that are hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That is wild. That is absolutely wild. I think the most expensive Pokémon card sold for like 10 million or something, 12 million or something. Yeah, you know the Gooch? You remember the Gooch? Or sorry, not the Gooch. Mooch. Mooch. Mooch. I sure don't. Yeah, he's not the Gooch. He's he's the Mooch. Uh Anthony Scara- Scaramucci. The Mooch. His kid bought it from uh Logan Paul for like 10 or 17 million dollars, something like that. like that. like that. Right. Right. Right. What's the Gooch known for?

Uh you don't want to know. Um but uh did he raise funding? No. This is like a bootstrapped thing. bootstrapped thing. bootstrapped thing. And what year did he sell it? I think he sold it late '90s is my my guess. Um guess. Um guess. Um But it was like, you know, it was like eight years in the making before he even launched the game because he's been I mean, and it really he'd been thinking about this stuff since he was a child. I think there's a belief in entrepreneurship that entrepreneurship that entrepreneurship that these ideas just sort of exist, you just have to sort of find one and make one.

And um or you sort of get to be the one who gets the winning lottery ticket. And then you read about stories like this. You read about the story of how the UFC, you know, almost went bankrupt and really like Dana White and the Fertittas, Fertittas, Fertittas, you know, built that thing brick by brick against pretty much every headwind you could have, being outlawed by by states, losing money, nobody would put them on TV, like just every headwind you could have, they faced and still built a multi-billion dollar company, still doing it today even after cashing out.

And I think there are actually many businesses that were only going to be built like by one person. It was either going to be built by that person or it wasn't going to exist. And I don't think that's a popular belief, but when you hear these stories, you just can't imagine. Would there really [clears throat] have been another person who had the this combination of the background, the the hustle, the insight, the personality, the force of will, like the combination of factors that it takes to make it happen.

Um the other time I felt this was when we were uh talking to Joe Gebbia from from Airbnb. And he was telling the the true founding story of Airbnb and all of the headaches that they faced along the way. And you know, just being shut down and being sued and being this and being that. And it was like being copied by these like much bigger, more well-funded competitors. And just the the number of times they escaped death in the first two years. It's like a dozen deaths that they escaped.

You know, they're they're out of funding and then they create a cereal box for John McCain and Barack Obama and they sell that at the conventions and they get just enough money to continue their business. It's like, what the hell is going on? And so, you know, those are businesses that it's like, oh, Airbnb was not meant to survive. It broke the rules. It was supposed to die 12 times and it it finally the universe gave in. It was like, fine, go ahead and exist. It was not like just anybody was going to make that happen.

It was it was not going to happen that way. way. way. So good. There's a scene that um in in the movie Rudy. Have you seen the the football show or the football movie Rudy? Rudy? Rudy? Yeah. The like Rudy's like talking to a priest. Uh and the priest is like, Rudy, I've been a priest now for this long and there's only two things that I I've realized I believe in. There is a God and I ain't him. And uh And uh And uh And whenever I hear stories of like Dana White, what do we say or we were we were paraphrasing someone else, but it was it was like, "Make sure your passion burns so bright that everyone will come to town to like watch you burn." Something like that.

When I hear stories like this, that's what I'm envious of. I'm like, "Ah, I wish I cared about anything as much as this guy cared about a stupid card game." card game." card game." Yeah, that's exactly right. When you hear the stories of like these kind of like singular singular singular force of will, creativity, you know, like the guy who Who is it? The guy who created created created Minecraft? One guy, Notch. Notch, yeah. Notch, yeah. Notch, yeah. The whole thing himself, you know what I mean?

Um I I have I have a friend who's a very, very smart venture capitalist. You know, this guy is like backed to some of the biggest winners. And he said something to me once about I remember when esports was like on trend, and people were investing a lot in esports, and and and uh Overwatch franchises were selling for 20 million a pop cuz they were trying to make it the next NBA. And he wasn't buying any of it. And I'm like, "But this is kind of your thing.

You like these like weird, niche uh things that could be huge, but they're kind of written off, and now they're starting to pick up steam. Like I'm surprised you're out." He goes, "Esports needs its Dana White." And he was like, "Uh I don't know who that person is." But he goes, "Anybody could have told you that. Like fighting, martial arts, like it was a thing thing thing for sure. for sure. for sure. But the guy who was going to make it the worldwide thing, it took a very special like batch of entrepreneurial energy to do that.

And somebody who was going to just break through walls for 20 years. And he's like, "You just need to And he's like, "So I'm just waiting. I'm just waiting till esports has that." He's like, "I don't think esports is not going to be a thing, but I also don't think it's a thing it's going to be a thing right now because I don't see who that person is yet." And you see this with other things. Like right now longevity is obviously a huge trend. Wellness, longevity, it's kind of replaced health and fitness as like the way people want to optimize.

And Bryan Johnson I think was the Dana White of that industry. I think Brian Johnson was willing to do things no one else would do in a way in a combination of like skills and personal sacrifice that uh very few people were ever going to um ever going to do. And he had that special combination. I think he's going to do it for a long enough time that it's going to be I mean it's already broken mainstream, but I think it's going to just keep going.

And he you know know know in his case he's not creating like the one company necessarily that will be the winner in the way that like the say the UFC was. UFC was. UFC was. But I think he made it happen in a way that no doctor, no scientist, no fitness athlete was ever going to do. Yeah, man. I remember when we first came across him we were like there's this guy, he's got a blog, and he's like just writing about his blood levels, but look how he does it.

Look how nerdy he is. Well, what were the factors, right? He had to have first personal wealth to start spending millions of dollars. No investor would have funded that. Right? Hey, hey, I'm going to go raise money to inject myself with crazy measure every organ in my body individually for its aging speed cuz I want to know that my left earlobe is aging differently than my my kidney. And I'm going to do that for years and like you know somehow that's going to work, right? Like he he needed personal wealth.

Then how many wealthy guys would want to like like like donate their body to science while they're still alive? Yeah, well he you need someone who's basically like a little bit autistic and a lot a lot a lot ranks high on disagreeableness. And he I mean he admitted himself he was depressed and you know suicidal. And so he had nothing to lose. He's like, "Well, being rich isn't making me happy, so you know let's spend the money and do something else that will give me some sense of purpose and and and something that will will take me out of this funk." Then you needed somebody who had the unique quirky personality to be loved by some, hated by many, and watched by all.

And so you know his look, his personality, his combination of scientific intelligence, business acumen, and then like willingness to look like a fool on social media, right? He's like, I actually believe that Brian Johnson is the greatest social media marketer in the world. And so like if you see him now, you know, he's like I'm going to live stream myself taking taking DMT or whatever like what's the thing like the toad pissed in my mouth and I'm going to hallucinate you know, whatever it is like he's doing that type of stuff on a live stream.

You're like, oh my god, who would think to do this like is he he's got like Jake Paul's social media instincts packaged in Elon Musk's wealth and you know, Huberman scientific right? Like he's got like elements of each one of those not at the each one's level, but like that combination is just a very rare skill stack. stack. stack. Have you seen his YouTube videos? They're great. They're so good. They're they're not at all like anyone else's stuff. They're so good. And I'm not saying I agree with everything he's saying.

I'm not saying I endorse whatever. I'm not I'm not saying any of that stuff. But all I'm saying is he undeniably he undeniably he undeniably broke through the noise and broke through the barriers and brought so much attention to this entire like way of living that it just seems like who else was going to do that? He told me his motivation. He was like I can't tell you who the 70th or 50th or 100th richest person was in 1975. But I can tell you who Galileo is.

I can tell you what the Wright brothers did. I there's about five to 10 people who I could tell you what they invented and how they impact society. And none of them does it relate around money. And so that's when I realized that going after just business and making more money was not the answer to my question of how do I be somebody that other people remember in 500 years? Cuz that's my motivation. Dude, when you hear stuff like that, it's like such an amazing one-line kill shot because you know, 5 seconds earlier it's like it's like it's like you're crazy you'd be crazy to do that.

And then he says one thing and like, I guess you'd be crazy not to do that. You know what I mean? Like, that's how effective that is. It's like, yeah, you're right. Like, what is the money for? Nobody cares that you, you know, you sold Braintree/Venmo for $700 million, and then, you know, what are you going to do? Live the rest of your life sipping piña coladas? Like, you know, on islands you own? Like, yeah, you could do that. Or you could be a man of history, and like, you could do this.

Oh, okay, you could help people, you know, live forever. That That That I guess that isn't crazy. I guess that's actually sounds way better than the alternative. alternative. alternative. Do you ever watch the Grammys where they do like the seg- or like the Oscars, I forget, where they do the segment where they remember the people who died that year? It's like a constant of like, Oh, Oh, Oh, he died? Or like or like, oh, I remember that guy. And like, you maybe are thinking back to a time when you did remember because that movie that that person in was like your favorite movie when you're a kid.

And you're like, he was the man. I love that guy. that guy. that guy. Okay. And like, it's just like, next. And whatever whatever I that segment exists, I'm like, the vast majority of a large percentage of the people who they're talking about are probably significantly more successful and impactful than I am. And yet, all they're going to get from me and millions of other people is a Huh. Right. Right. Right. Okay. Yeah. And like, and and and some hand, I'm always like, that's a bummer.

And then on the other side, I'm like, that's kind of freeing, right? Like, just do whatever you want then. then. then. And so, those segments always remind me of what Brian Johnson said. So so much of the worst things of our living life are caring about what other people might think of us while we're alive. If you stacked onto that, and you knew everybody would care about you and think about you when you were dead, it would I think it'd be net negative, right? Like, it's a good thing we don't all have these insane legacies that everybody knows about cuz it's freeing to let you actually just live your life on your own terms for what you you know, because nobody's thinking about you anyways.

I don't even know how we got onto this. Magic the Gathering? Oh, Magic the Gathering. What's the guy doing now? doing now? doing now? That's the true magic of Magic the Gathering. Gathering. Gathering. How it brings us together. All right, is that it? That's it. That's it. That's it. That's the pod.