How to Sell Podcast: Make How You Sell, Why You Win

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Luigi Prestinenzi: This is
the Scalable Growth Podcast.

I'm your host, Luigi Prestinenzi and each
week we will go on a journey, A journey

that will inspire you, motivate you, and
help you be the very best you can be.

Our focus will be on mindset, tactics
and the strategies that will enable

you to create more opportunities and.

More deals.

Okay.

Welcome to the Scalable Growth Podcast.

I'm your host, Luigi Prestinenzi,
and as always, I'm honored,

pumped, and excited to what will
be another incredible episode.

Now, this week we are
talking about a topic.

It's a topic that's been, I think, you
know, if you, if you scroll through

LinkedIn, There's been a constant
flow of conversation around ai.

So there's a lot of salespeople
that are fearing change, they're

fearing ai, they're fearing, you
know, what does the future look like?

But the reason why I'm excited to
share this episode is because the whole

premise of change, the way in which we
look at it from a mindset perspective

is how we can capitalize on it.

And AI should not be something
that we should be fear.

It's an opportunity for
sales professionals.

It's an opportunity for us
to be the best we can be.

It can help elevate what we do
in our roles and really provide.

A better experience for our customers
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Now, let's get into this week's topic.

So we have, um, Steven Messer, who's
the founder or the co-founder of

Collective ai, which is a really cool
AI platform, which he's gonna talk a

bit about in a moment, but not just
the founder of Collective ai, but he

co-founded the first affiliate marketing
company, LinkShare, which sold to a

huge Japanese firm also has invested in
over 80 companies, sits on a whole range

of boards in his spare time, and now
building another tech company, another

company that's making a difference.

And he also has an interesting
story about Ronald McDonald, which

will share with us in a moment.

So welcome to the show, Stephen.

Stephen Messer: Uh, thank
you so much for having me.

Um, I'm really excited to be here today.

Luigi Prestinenzi: Yeah, awesome.

I did let them know.

But before we get started, I, I ask
every guest, I ask bef, you know, how did

you get started in the world of sales?

But can you just share with us your
first fistfight with the original

Stephen Messer: Ronald McDonald?

It's so funny.

So this is a story that
everyone seems to love so much

because, um, it's a weird one.

Um, so Willard Scott was the
actor who originally played.

Ronald McDonald, the early commercials,
and he was loved by everyone.

And in America, he was
on the morning TV show.

He is the newsman, um, for,
uh, the big, uh, you know, uh,

nationwide network program.

And one of his favorite things to
do is he got older was he would wish

grandmothers who are 90 plus years
old, happy birthday on their day.

So everybody in America loved him.

And I, it was, it was one of these things.

I had gone skiing, uh, for a holiday
and, um, and, and unfortunately, I,

I, I had a, I, I went a little bit
too extreme and broke my collarbone.

And so there I am with my arm strapped
to my body as I'm trying to get back

to New York to go to, to the hospital
to get a real doctor to look at it

and, uh, and who do I sit next to?

But Willard Scott, he's across
the aisle from me and his wife

is looking out the window.

The person I'm with is looking
out the window and he and I just,

you know, just start chit-chatting
away, becoming great friends.

Yeah, because any good seller knows you
make friends with everyone next to you.

Sometimes it's Willard Scott.

Always, it's someone interesting and
who doesn't love getting to meet new

people when you're sitting on a plane.

And he and I have what is a
probably three hour just ball of

a time getting to know each other.

He's funny, he's charming,
he's 86 years old.

He's going to see his grandkid children.

You are having this great time, and as
the plane lands and pulls up to the.

He gets out and, uh, and starts
talking to me and says, Steve,

we've had such a great time.

I'm, I'm enjoying this.

His wife walks out the front door,
the person I'm with walks out, and

then he turns, takes his bag down
and gives me a good old boy slap

in the back and says, I've enjoyed
this so much and walks out now.

My shoulder disconnects completely from
my body and I just dropped to the bottom,

and I know it must have been bad, not
only to get beat up by an 86 year old.

Not only to do it where I dropped to
the floor, I didn't even hold my own.

I would like to say I was a man.

I was not.

But I could tell, it must have looked
pretty bad to watch my shoulder come off.

Cause all I remember is someone
behind me saying, you take all

the time you need to get back.

Because it was that bad.

And that's how I got beat up by
the original Ronald McDonald.

Luigi Prestinenzi: Mike, what a story.

You know, that's actually
a pretty cool story, right?

Because that's, that's a good
conversation starter and it's a perfect

way, I think it's a perfect way to
lean into this episode because I.

I don't wanna make it a comical event.

Right.

But at the moment, there is a lot of pain
in, in, in the sales and marketing world.

Um, and you know, if you think about
it from a marketing perspective,

we are seeing inbound leads
are dropping, which is having a

flow and effect to sales teams.

We're seeing deals are slowing down.

Um, more people are needed to get
involved in the decision making process.

It's getting harder, um, discretionary
spend is being questioned.

Um, and on top of all of that, you wrap
up chat, G P T and AI and all this stuff.

And it's creating a lot of
fear in the marketplace, right?

So to some extent you could say
a lot of salespeople are being

beaten up at the moment, right?

Um, but just would love to know
because you've been, this is not the

first time you've sold during tough
times and you've done amazing things.

You've built some amazing companies,
you've sold them, you're back at

it, you're advising other companies,
but would just love to know, um,

tell our audience a little bit about
how you started in sales, right?

And how you used your
early days of selling.

And how that's helping you sell in
today's modern world as a co-founder.

Stephen Messer: That's a big
question, but let me start by

saying I am so grateful to be here.

Um, uh, you know, for your audience,
they may not know that I have gotten

some great coaching advice from you.

Um, mostly around mindset, a lot of which
I think most founders learn the hard way.

Um, but, but you.

You do a service to this audience, um,
by helping them understand that the

world can be easy to, to change with,
or it can be hard based on one thing and

one thing only, which is your mindset.

Because if we look back in time, History.

It's funny when you hear people,
and I remember this even during the

election, make America great again.

Well, I, I, you know, and this is not a
political thing, I, I actually believe

America has gotten better and better.

We sit with, with a phone in our hand
that has more computing power than the,

the rocket that first went to the moon.

It's in our hand today.

Like I don't have an NASA supporting me.

There's not 50 people sitting in a room
looking at these huge computers, right?

It's just sitting in my hand
for me to do what I want.

The world continues to get better.

50 years ago, you know, we
had diseases that killed us.

Today we come out with diseases.

We're talking about curing cancer.

So the world, if you look at it, can be
a world that is leaving you behind or

can be a world that's getting better.

And it all comes down
to the way you think.

Like I follow, I don't know if people
here are really into their health, but

I follow aging as now something where
10 years ago if you treated aging as a

disease, they thought you were a quack.

And today what they're
finding is there's Dr.

Sinclair at Harvard who's turned the age
of, uh, uh, of the eye in a mouth back

to zero, where it had glaucoma, it had
all these other problems, not anymore.

It's like a brand new eye.

They're actually learning how to cure
age related diseases, and these are

things that even 10 years ago would've
been unthinkable in, in the AI world.

Think about d uh, uh, deep mind.

Company that was acquired by
Google maybe eight years ago.

They did something that theoretically
people thought could do but never

thought would happen in their lifetime,
which is predict protein polling.

And for those of you who hated biology
in high school, imagine this is the

ability to actually do drug discovery.

Not over 30 years, but in 30 days.

Yeah.

These are just, look, we're living in a
time of science fiction now and I know

that can feel like scary for people
cuz we're also in a time of a harder.

May not be a recession technically,
but it sure feels like one.

Yeah, yeah, absolutely.

And you can walk in that mindset and
say, I don't like where all these

things are going, and this is all bad.

Or you could say, geez, the
world's getting a lot better.

And if you start with that
world's getting a lot better.

All this stuff is magical and fun.

Not scary,

Luigi Prestinenzi: Man, i, I love that.

I love the way that you've, you've
absolutely flipped it, right, is the way

in which we look at things or ultimately
control how we experience things.

Right.

So, but I'd just love to go back
because you started the f you know,

the first affiliate marketing,
which ultimately became the largest

affiliate marketing company in
the world, um, before selling it.

Um, you know, what was your, what was
your, if you think about the sales focus.

How did you go out there and engage
people around something, around a

very new concept that probably wasn't
widely used or, you know, probably

people didn't really know about it.

What, what was your strategy to, to get
out there and, and engage with people?

Stephen Messer: Look, I, I, for
whatever reason, have a, have a.

Either a thick skin or a desire
to, to try to do, to fix a wrong.

And when we started affiliate marketing
with LinkShare, what was really hard

was that the entire world believed
that the internet was a newspaper

medium or or a, or a TV medium.

And the only way that they thought you
should make money was on selling ads.

And the problem at that time that
we looked at was you basically had

the smallest amount of traffic.

Was going to the top 50 websites, but the,
because they were the biggest websites,

in other words, the long tail, all these
little blogs and all together, they had

most of the traffic of the internet.

But there were a few top 50 websites that
had aggregated more than anyone else.

And while that traffic was still small
compared to the overall internet,

it was the biggest of the small.

And that meant that they got
95, 90 8% of all advertising.

So 50.

Got all the money and nobody else did.

Even though all the
traffic existed elsewhere.

And we came out and said,
that is broken model.

How do you have all these amazing people
out there creating great new ideas?

And yet the entire advertising world
was trying to fixate, fixate like

it was, uh, four television stations
and they should get all the money.

And so we started affiliate
marketing because we thought,

okay, this is just not right.

And we went out to the marketplace and
we said, let me tell you about this great

idea of a performance-based marketing.

And you know, you think that
logically people would say,

let me get this straight.

I only have to pay for when I get
something of value that I want.

Boy, that's obvious.

And you know what the answer was.

No effing way.

Yeah.

That's not how we do things.

That's not the way it operates.

And I think there's a problem when
people try to put new paradigms in the

way they understand the old paradigm.

It's funny, I have a friend who has
a vertical takeoff and Lyft company,

if you've ever seen these flying car
companies, and his first goal was to

hire as many people out of the airline
industries that he could because he is

like, they understand all the things we
need to deal with the regulatory market.

They understand how the business
works and you know what he found out,

none of them could make the transit.

Because the concept of a flying
car, while yes, it was similar

to a plane or helicopter in
reality, was nothing like what?

A flying car.

A flying car could land in your backyard.

It doesn't need an airport.

A flying car could have a autopilot
that takes you from point to point.

A flying car doesn't have fuel
or mechanical parts, and so

they were thinking of it in the
paradigm of the airline industry.

And actuality though, the
benefits had nothing to do.

With an airline approach.

And frankly, I looked back at him and
said, how would you try to replicate an

industry that is so hated in the market
by bringing people in who are gonna

bring those ideas instead of nuance?

And his answer was, you know,
it just seemed like it was

a good idea at the time.

And I think that is what sellers
are running into today, which is,

yeah, they're still trying to sell.

In the same way they sold
in a pre covid world.

And the reality is that's not it anymore.

Luigi Prestinenzi: And I think this
is a perfect segue into what we

wanted to talk about today, right?

Because, because with all your
experience with ai, like you are

absolutely trying to change and,
and, and bring a new paradigm, right?

A new point of view to the table that
can be challenged from a few people.

You spoke about, you know, when
you first started your business,

um, LinkShare or your, your
affiliate marketing organization.

You did hit a lot of, uh, barriers
around, you know, your new model

and people were still pushing back.

And again, I think if we look at
what's happening right now, That is

a perfect, uh, not a perfect, but
that, that's actually, that represents

what, what a lot of salespeople
are coming up to now, right?

They're getting a lot of pushback on their
deals, et cetera, and creating urgency can

be somewhat difficult during tough times.

Um, so we'd love to talk about that,
like we'd love to talk about, especially

in the business that you are working
with now, um, from an AI perspective.

Because to some extent some companies
might not necessarily understand exactly

what you do as an organization, right?

So that's your first challenge.

You over have to overcome.

How have you overcome that challenge?

Um, In educating organizations on what you
do as an organization and how you can help

them achieve and improve their outcome.

Stephen Messer: Let's, let's
do first principles here.

Where we start back.

Uh, why, why is AI coming
up at this moment and why

is it so important to sales?

And what I would probably say is
this, look, sales has been a horrible

experience for the buyer, for the for,
for basically, A long time, right?

If you look at every survey every year,
more than 75% of buyers hate the buying

experience and would buy somewhere
else if they had the opportunity.

Yep.

That should have been
an early warning sign.

Right?

There is a canary in the coal line
that tells us, yes, we've been

buying now that the market is bad.

Now you're starting to see the
actual feel of what is mean.

Right.

When things were great, they
were gonna buy, whether they hat.

The experience or not now that they
don't have to, or now that things

are slowing, you're starting to see
that finicky really coming through.

And I, I would say, uh, first to ask why,
and I, I mentioned that I think, think the

world changed dramatically after Covid.

And I'll tell you a few reasons why
and then I'm gonna get to what we do

and why I think it's so important.

Cause I think.

If you start at first principles,
it's all logical of what's going on.

And I know a lot of people here,
probably when I say 75 or more than 75%

of buyers hated the experience would
probably go, no, but that's not me.

Well, 75% means it is you.

I'm sorry, like it's me, it's
you, it's everybody else.

And so I go back to why do they hate it?

And I think a lot of things happen
during Covid that accelerated a

bad trend that we were already.

And that first trend was this
idea that cadences are in spam.

I think if you look at the rise of
a lot of these automation tools, you

know, we think personalization is, dear
Steven, that is not personalization.

I hate to break it to you.

That's not selling.

Um, you and I have talked about this.

You know, cadences are,
well, let's put this way.

A cadence is what someone
does when they're sending it.

Spam is what you feel
like when you receive it.

When you receive it.

Yeah.

And I think we have bombarded people
and driven them into hiding Today.

You can find buyers on dark social,
you can find, and mostly because

they're, they're gating it so
that sellers can't get in there.

They are hiding from their cell phones.

You are hiding from your own cell phones.

Right.

They, they're hiding from their emails.

You.

From your emails, I bet you
your whole audience can spot.

If I did a game of how fast can you
delete the fake emails, they will do

it in seconds and they'll do it so
quickly without even paying attention.

And then they'll think
their email is special.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And I think that's led
buyers to get so frustrated.

Uh, you know what?

I think the second thing is we've
lost the art of selling by these

cadences, by these playbook.

Sellers used to learn
about their customers.

Sellers used to actually get to know
them and become trusted partners.

Sellers used to actually do
introductions to other people that

could help them with a problem that
has nothing to do with their own.

And today we're looking
at the wrong metrics.

We're looking at how many
activities did somebody do.

So what it's training us to
do is say all activities are.

And bombard, bombard, bombard.

And now it feels like we are, we're
training sellers to be bad websites.

Hmm.

And so that's why you hear people,
I think, wanting to just go to a

website without talking to a person.

We've stopped doing what
sellers are great at.

Luigi Prestinenzi: So Steven, I
actually really love the way that

you've explaining that, right?

Because what you're sh what
you're sharing with us is, This

is what AI could do for sales.

It will make it harder for the
buyer because they're just going to

get, they're already overwhelmed.

I think I looked at a
recent stat, 140 emails.

On average, they're getting a day, not
including all the other notifications

on Snapchat, LinkedIn, Facebook, instar,
text message, WhatsApp, telegram.

So they're already overwhelmed with
communication from the, from the mass.

And I really, you know, the way
that in which you explained it is

that what, if we're not careful what
these tools will do, it'll make it

harder and harder because the, the
buyers are just gonna continue to

get overwhelmed, which is gonna put
more of a wall up for salespeople.

So, in fact, these tools, although they
might sound amazing, it's essentially.

Laziness that I'm hearing because again,
if, if they're just using tools because

the tool can do the job, then what's the
point of actually hiring a sales team?

Right.

If these tools can
facilitate that function.

So I actually, you know, really resonate
with what you're sharing there because

again, we've gotta stop thinking
about how we can sell to customers.

We've gotta start thinking
about what they need to buy.

Right?

Yeah.

We've gotta, we've actually gotta
flip the way we think about this.

So you've explained the one paradigm.

You know, we'd love for you to
explain the other flip of the coin to

the other side of what sellers can.

Using AI to be that new
age sales professional.

Stephen Messer: Yeah.

Look, i, I, I would say, just to close
out that last point, which is the guys

who go down that road of those volume
metrics and think, oh, this is great.

They're gonna, you're, you're inevitably
ending up with a low value product

where they're gonna do eCommerce.

Yes.

That's essentially what they're
going to, oh, I'll just use a

chat bot to answer the questions.

Yeah, you can do all the
e-commerce and there's gonna

be some products that do that.

That's fine.

Things like reorders, et cetera.

But the bulk of sales, when you look
at buyers, they're still putting

up with the salary because they're
unhappy, but they're putting up

with it because they need help.

Yeah.

And rather than fight it,
you have to embrace that.

Yeah.

And so we look at a paradigm to
say, who does it today really?

And can we learn from that model?

Mm-hmm.

And the first thing you learn
is that you've gotta get all the

non-revenue producing tasks off seller.

Yeah.

I don't think there's a single seller
here that's gonna be shocked by that.

They should not be logging activities.

Yeah.

They should not be doing forecasting.

They should not be sitting there
trying to do coordination meetings.

Uh, they should not be briefing their
manager on what's going on with the deal.

They should not have to guess at what
their likelihood of closing a deal is.

Like these are things that let the
AI do it, it will do it better than.

But when you get a full five days
back to sell, what do you do?

Well, let me give you a few examples
of models that I look at and say,

okay, they're onto something.

Hmm.

I want you to think about the beans.

The McKinseys.

The BCGs, the PWCs.

They're consultants.

And you may say, what does a consultant
have to do with a modern seller?

But here's what I'll tell you that
I watched and learn companies when

they wanna work with the McKinsey.

Hire them to come in to analyze
what's wrong with their organization.

Now they're not coming in to
say, I found these problems.

If I'm Bain, I'm not coming
in saying, I found a problem.

You know who's good at it?

McKenzie?

No.

They're being paid to come in
to understand the customer's

needs to then sell them.

Bain McKinzie, Bain products,
not McKinzie, not bcg.

They come in and they are the ones who
are then kind of turning back around

and saying, I found your problem.

Here's a team that can solve it.

I know what I'm doing.

Yeah.

So how is it that in a world where people
are running and hiding from sellers,

the Banes, the McKinsey, the bcg.

Are being paid to come in to
figure out what to sell them.

Yeah.

That's the paradigm we
need to think about.

How much value does the customer
look at and say, I'm willing to trust

this person so well, because they
understand my problems in the industry.

They know they're gonna solve the problem
and they want to stay close with me.

To figure out how it works with
the rest of my business, and they

have experts who really know it.

Yeah.

That's the new paradigm.

Luigi Prestinenzi: Yeah.

And, and for, for, for me, that's kind
of, if I think about myself, you know,

the, the roles that I've, that I've.

Been involved in.

I remember back in the
management days as well.

I think you're right, and I also
saw a recent study that said the

seller, an average sales person is
spending about sort of 32% of their

time selling because there are all
these other tasks, and I love the

way that you've split it up, right?

You've got.

Sending spamming messages on a sequencing
tool is not selling right, but if we

can use technology to remove all the
laborious tasks that don't drive the

high payoff activity, the revenue raising
activities, if we can remove that aspect,

it'll give us more time to do research.

It'll give us more time.

To come to our prospects with
a point of view and also become

that, that that consultant.

And I think even though
consultative selling has been

around for decades, right?

This is not a new concept.

Trusted advisor, Miller Hyman,
like these books are f you know,

they've been around for a long time.

Um, I actually think that there's a
lot of sellers who aren't facilitating.

The consultative part,
and I don't blame them.

I blame the fact that they're going into
a role and they're being given all these

tools they have to use and told you need
to make X amount of outreach activities,

X amount of this, X amount of that.

That's what matters.

So they're like, I've gotta do this right?

And if I take it back and there's,
and, and Alice would be listening to

this, um, from DocuSign in Australia,
somebody that I've in thoroughly

enjoyed coaching for a number of years.

I think at one stage he was doing
12 outreach as a as as a B, D R.

He was reaching out to 12 prospects,
booking for appointments with CFOs, by the

way, and he didn't use a sequencing tool
and full disclosure, um, DocuSign using

outreach.ao, but he chose not to use it.

Because he was spending a lot of time
looking for triggers, a lot of time

looking for events that would make it
absolutely relevant to be reaching out.

Yeah.

Um, and I think that's a clear
example of how he's looked at the

role differently and thought of,
brought the consulting part in.

But if he had used the tools and
just jam the tools, data sequencing

people and going through 1, 2, 3, 4.

He would not have been able
to get to that outcome.

So I think you've, you've actually
positioned this perfectly, right?

So if you're listening to this
going, you know what, you're right.

Um, I've been fearing technology.

I need to embrace it more.

I have, I've forgotten
about the fundamentals.

Yeah.

What are some of the things, and you're
probably on the receiving end of a lot of

people trying to sell your stuff, right?

What can sellers do differently so that
they can make, they can make buyers

actually enjoy the buying process again?

Stephen Messer: You know, look, I, I'll
give you an example from Collective Eye.

We don't sell our product.

Most people think we're
selling it all the time.

We start off by saying we
wanna do a launch preview.

Where we'll load your data
to see what's going on.

Because if our product doesn't
actually help you, we don't want to.

Yes, we're known for our forecast, right?

Where the AI does it all, no
one needs to deal with it.

That keeps it up.

Every day.

It looks at a global market
of all of our users, like ways

to make better predictions.

But we say to them, let us test it first.

Yeah.

To see if it works.

And then let's look at the.

And if we don't solve your
problem, you shouldn't pay us.

We wanna understand if, if we're gonna
be able to solve your problem or not.

And I think that's a different method.

The second thing is we don't
charge for a lot of things.

A customer can buy our product
for free, for all their sellers

and never pay us a penny.

Our model is a community model.

We want people.

To, uh, use the product because it helps
the network get smarter because the more

drivers on the road in our model, the
more sellers, the more the AI gets better.

So it starts to show that
we're in it together.

We do other things that have
nothing to do with our product.

We run an event once a
week called Forecast.

It's had some of the
greatest minds on the planet.

For any of your users that can
go to ci forecast.com, like

collective i forecast.com and every
week you can sign up for free.

We give this to our customers, not just
to observe cuz it's 90 minutes where you

get to speak to a, an expert in the world,
but also for their sales organization to

use with their customers and prospects.

We believe that you build trust.

By being a trusted partner, not saying
you could be a trusted partner Yeah.

But by doing things that show that you
care about their wellbeing and success.

And you might say, or I'm sure our
competitors are gonna say, what does

having, you know, uh, Terry Cruz to
down to John Chambers, to some of the

most well known people in the world have
anything to do with AI and forecasting,

or AI and activity capture, or AI
and relationship mapping, or ai and.

And they may think we're like, that
has nothing to do with do a webinar.

But we look at this and say, we are
your trusted partner in understanding

where technology and in innovation is
gonna affect your sales organization.

We want to be there with the
journey and even if we don't have a

product, we're gonna be the people
help you get to the right people.

We want just to be along with
the journey of your success and.

Is a who different approach to
thinking about how do we build a

win-win relationship for our sellers.

Luigi Prestinenzi: Yep.

Stephen Messer: For our customers,
for our cus for our community.

Um, that's the big difference by the way.

You can see that even the fact that
we have a discord channel Yeah.

To make sure that our community can
find each other and help each other out.

But, but

Luigi Prestinenzi: I think there's
a couple of things in that, right?

Because what you are doing is
first, your first principles.

You really are trying to make a
difference in your customer's world and

not make a difference by saying, the
only way we're gonna make a difference

if there's a commercial transaction that
occurs first, you're actually putting

the commercial transaction second
and saying, Hey, let us educate you.

Let us really create value in your.

And when you see the value
from what we do, the commercial

relationship will actually occur.

And it's, and I love that because I had
this conversation with somebody only last

night about saying, you know, from my
perspective, I truly wanna make an impact.

I truly wanna help people.

And by living that level of
purpose, I will be, I will see

the commercial benefit, right?

But the, I'm not using the
commercial benefit as the.

Yeah, I'm actually making that.

That's not my first principle.

So, you know, for me, I love the way that
you've wrapped that up and that that's.

That and that demonstrates why you've
been so successful and you've been able

to build so many companies and achieve
such amazing results because you're using

those first principles, which is great.

Stephen, may I could probably talk
to you for another hour, right?

But we, um, yeah, and I think there's
another podcast in here that's

probably, we could probably get you
onto one of our community sessions.

But, um, just before we wrap up,
where is the best place for our

listeners to find and engage with you?

Stephen Messer: I think there's
a lot of different places.

One, come to one of our event.

Um, if you, if you are able to show
them, it's, uh, www.ci forecast.com

come, it's free, it's open.

It'll be the most interesting
90 minutes of your life.

Um, because our community asks
questions of these unbelievable

minds, and they are some of the
most well-known people in the world.

It is amazing.

You can see prior speakers and current
speakers, uh, that are upcoming.

Um, and it's really, it's, it's just
amazing way to stay on top of innovation.

Yeah.

Second thing, come to our Discord channel.

We really want everyone to come
ask questions of the community.

We welcome you to do that or
feel free to write me directly.

Um, my email is my first initial
last name@collectivei.com, and

it's C O L L E C T I V E I.

the letter I (dot) com and I will answer
personally, everyone's email, everyone

in my community is welcome to me.

You're always accessible.

We really just wanna have the
opportunity to build something

together, um, because it's our
community that's building our product.

Yeah.

Not us.

We're, we're, we just, are there.

To help them achieve their greatness.

That's awesome, Stephen and I'll make
sure that those links are in the show

notes for, so for our listeners, you
just go into the show notes, click those

links, and you'll be able to go and talk
to, to Stephen, check out the Discord

channel and check out his community.

So Stephen, I just wanna say I
really appreciate you coming on, um,

and sharing some of your thoughts
and ideas on what selling is all.

In 2023 Beyond, and, you know, actually
sharing why mindset is so crucial.

So I just wanna say thanks for, for,
for coming on and the contribution

you make to our community.

If I could say it back, uh, which
is, I've been a long time, follower

years, then I, I can't explain
how, uh, helpful it's been for me.

But, you know, it's so nice to be
able to participate in a place where

we're helping change an industry to
be what, what I think most sellers.

Which is to be the person that
everyone goes to when they need help.

Yeah, I think salespeople are some of the
most important people and when you combine

the superpowers of collective eyes AI with
salespeople, it's just amazing what we can

do together.

Luigi Prestinenzi: Absolutely.

So, and that's, that's a great
way to wrap up their show.

So, for, for our listeners
from a listeners just wanna,

you know, reinforce right?

Is that even though we're in a market
that there is a lot of uncertainty,

you can actually have a lot more.

Then, you know?

Right.

And it starts with the mindset and
it starts as really going back to

your first principles, going back
to your fundamentals, and really

thinking about how can I create an
exceptional experience for my customers?

Because if we focus on that experience,
if we focus on leading with, how can

I help them, how can I create value?

How can I guide them and educate?

We will see a positive return
from the, from the efforts and,

and the, and the, and the value
that we go out there to create.

So just remember, you can
always be the best you can be.

Just focus on doing what you
do and doing it really great.