Can You Call?

Yesterday, I had a message on my voicemail from someone we’ll call Paul. It said something along the lines of ‘Hi, it’s Paul. We met last night at the networking event. I made a note to call you because you had mentioned having to deal with acid reflux.” Now I go to my fair share of networking events. I meet a good number of people and they always ask for my card. I’ve been giving it to them. The funny thing is they never call me. Paul did, so I called Paul back.

Now when Paul called me he was focused on the call and was probably all ready to talk. When I called Paul back, I could tell he was searching or going through his stuff to figure out what he wanted to talk to me about. Now I told Paul that I was calling him because I was impressed he actually called after a networking event and I was showing my respect for him and his business by returning his call. But he wasn’t ready because I called him and when he couldn’t find his notes on me, he did what every cold caller does, he talked. He was off and running.

When I mean off and running, I mean talk, talk, talk. I couldn’t get a word in. I don’t even know if he took a breathe. Everybody has had a call like this right? The kind of call that you barely have enough time to squeeze in the uh-huh. So I waited and waited for my chance to speak. Then I think he took a breathe. I looked at the phone and said something along these lines “Paul, I’ve been on the phone with you for 7:38 and I don’t want you to take this the wrong way but I haven’t been able to say a word. It sounded like in the beginning you were looking for your notes on me, I’m guessing you didn’t find them?” Paul said “no I can’t seem to”. “Well in your message you mentioned acid reflux. I know that, why didn’t you ask?” Paul stuttered. So I said “You’ve told me how great this product of yours is but unfortunately, most of it doesn’t apply to me. However, if you had got me talking about my acid reflux, you might have just gotten somewhere.”

Now me and Paul continued talking for about a half hour. The conversation ended with him thanking me for my honesty and constructive criticism. I also ended up learning that not only was Paul trying to sell me a product but he is also sort of in between jobs and this is a part-time thing for him. I’m going to introduce him to a couple of people I know that might be able to help him find a job. Why? Because I like Paul and I like the fact that he called. He can learn to talk better on the phone but you can’t teach people to actually call. (Well, technically you can it’s just a lot harder to do)

Why am I tell you this? I was reading Knowing vs doing: Let’s compare these 2 friends who try to earn more from @ramit. The difference between your financial success and your financial failure begins with your income. If you don’t have any or enough then how can you succeed and it is a lot easier to succeed with a big income. So can you call? Erica Douglass teaches us that if you can make 5 call you can make 500. And if you can make 500 you can make 5,000. Whatever it takes. Paul can call. He’s ahead of about 95% or maybe even 99% of all the people I meet networking. These people call themselves entrepreneurs or worse yet they are working for someone else. Paul is one step closer to succeeding than they are, he called.

If you can call then go see The Rainmaker Maker so you can learn about what to do next.

If you can’t call then you just might want to devote some time to that or find a new job. Something is broken, are you going to, or better yet willing to, fix it?

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