#102: Joseph Cole on Prayer and Meditation as a Business Strategy

Welcome to the High Income Business Writing Podcast, helping you propel your writing business to a whole new level. And now, here's your host, Ed Gandia.

Hey there.

Thank you for joining me for episode 102 of the High Income Business Writing Podcast. My name is Ed Gandia and this is the podcast for business writers and copywriters who want to take their writing businesses to the six figure level or or the part time equivalent. As a quick reminder, you can find detailed show notes to this episode by going to b2b launcher.com episode102 so if you've listened to episodes 33, 34, or 66, or even some of my other episodes where I kind of inject some of this message into them, you probably already know that I consider myself to be a spiritual person. I believe that there's a big spiritual component to succeeding in any big endeavor. It's not all about brute force or persistence or hard work and long hours. At the end of the day, I truly believe that there's only so much you can personally do and you can't do it alone. And when you're trying to go after something big, you need the help of a higher power. I call it God, the Universe, the Divine, or whatever you believe or feel comfortable with. And you need the help of this higher power to help get you there. There have been way too many instances in my life where I just cannot explain how things came about. It just didn't make sense. And I'm more convinced than ever that I had help. I had help. I'm not sure how it happened, how I summoned it, but I know that I had helped that wasn't from this world. Now, don't misunderstand me. I am not talking about kicking back and visualizing good things or hoping that they'll magically manifest themselves. I'm not referring to that. I'm talking about doing your part as best as you can, but then turning the rest to a higher power. Now, I know this is a controversial subject. You guys know that I'm not into controversial things. And getting into subjects that are, that are really going to create a big stink in the comments section or get a bunch of hate mail my way. And I also realize that many of you disagree with me on this issue. And I respect, I totally do. If that's you, you may want to skip this episode. Now, this is not a religious episode. I want to make that clear. It's more of a spiritual topic. But either way, my guess is not here to try and convince you otherwise. And again, I'M not trying to do this show to create controversy or heated discussions in the comments section or to get a bunch of hate mail. Now, if you believe that there is a connection between the spiritual and the physical, even if you don't fully understand it, then I urge you to give this a listen. My guest is freelance copywriter Joseph Cole. Joseph is a former coaching client of mine, and he is a former pastor who stumbled into copywriting when he was looking for ways to raise money for his church. It's a really cool story. So Joseph has some pretty impressive success. He's had success with his strategy. In fact, I've always been amazed when I was working with him. I've always been amazed at how quickly he succeeded as a freelancer. He had the same challenges that many other people did. In some cases, he had more challenges, but he was still able to accelerate his progress so quickly. And it was very obvious to me early on when we started working together that this was no coincidence. There really was something to what he was doing and how he was approaching it. At the time, I didn't know what it was. But later he approached me about doing a show together on this topic, and it all started to make sense, especially when I listened to what he shared with me in this interview. So if you're willing to give this a listen, all I ask is to keep an open mind. And I think you're going to get some great benefits, some great ideas from this interview. So I'll leave it at that. I hope you enjoy it.

Joseph, so great to be talking with you today, man.

Well, I'm glad to be here, Ed. Thank you.

We are going to be talking about a very interesting topic today, and I really appreciate you coming to me with this idea because I think it's fantastic. It's so different, and I think there's a lot of merit to this, and I can't wait to hear more about it. But it's this whole idea of prayer as a business strategy. Before we get to that, Doe, why don't you start by telling us a little bit more about you, where you live, what kind of work you do, a little bit about your background and so forth.

Okay. Well, I am a business writer, and my target market is I write for companies that sell or serve nonprofits. I've been in the nonprofit sector for about 11 years, and that's where that specialty comes from. I can write very well for companies that are selling to nonprofits because I've been their customer, and more than likely, I've actually bought a Service like theirs, or maybe even bought their service before. So it works out very well that way. I live down here in Dallas, Dallas, Texas, and we've got a lot of nonprofits down here in this big city, and so we have a lot of vendors that come through town. So it's kind of the perfect niche for me where I'm at. I came at copywriting from a very unique angle, and I think that's the story for most people. I started out my career as a pastor, so I graduated from a Bible school here in Dallas, and I became a pastor of this church up in Ohio, where I'm originally from. And while pastoring, I discovered that pastors are also responsible for fundraising. I didn't know that. I thought I could just go and talk about cool things with people and that the money would all figure itself out, but it doesn't. So in learning how to raise money, I also discovered copywriting, learning how to do direct mail fundraising appeals. And we were able to increase our contributed income every single year when my skills started increasing. So I started the copywriting business, helping my ministry buddies out to write their fundraising appeals. And that got me in the door. And I've been on this copywriting business road for over three years now.

Fantastic. You're right. So many people come to this, I guess, kind of by accident, don't they? Yeah, it's interesting to hear the stories, and this is a very unique one. So that's a great segue. I guess we should just kind of dive right in. You came to me with this great idea, this concept of the power of prayer as a business strategy. Why don't you just kind of tell us what that's about and what it means to you and how it's helped you.

Okay, well, let me just say first of all that prayer in the faith sense or religious sense is always about communication between human beings and the divine man or woman speaking to God. It's a spiritual exercise that it's how we come into a relationship with the divine, with God. So that's first and foremost what it's supposed to be. So I don't want to detract from that in any way. I just feel like for most of us, we tend to compartmentalize our life. We categorize things. So this is my religious box or my religious life, and this is my business life. And we don't often think about how those two lives work together and support one another. But when I was learning how to be a freelance copywriter, I wasn't just learning the Craft of copywriting. I was also learning how to be a businessman. I was starting out my whole career as a man of the cloth. I'd never been involved in entrepreneurship. I had limited employment experience, and so I had to figure out how to grow a business and keep it afloat. So there's a couple of the problems in bringing in new clients that I was encountering. And the first one was that content marketing and prospecting is a long game. It's something that you don't just jump in and they're like, oh, there's Joseph. We've been waiting on you and we need your services. Normally when I show up and say, hey, do you need a copywriter? They say, oh, that sounds great. We'll keep you in mind. So then I have to keep up with them because they're not going to remember me. So that was a big problem that I had. So how do I remember all of those meaningful connections and conversations? So even with a good CRM, I can track those conversations. But what I want to do is go a bit further and remember the emotional connection that I had with that prospect when I spoke to them last. I also encountered another issue with keeping up with people over a long period of time was how do I as a busy freelancer, I'm jumping from one project to the next. How do I keep up fresh ideas about reaching out to prospects? I send them little notes in the mail. I sometimes send them little gifts. How do I keep up the fresh ideas? Coming to know what will fit that person and what will be meaningful to them. I don't want to get stuck on what worked in the past or what I've always done before. I want to come up with new ways to engage with my prospects and my current clients. So for me, a great way to stay fresh and emotionally engaged with my prospects and current clients was to pray for them. I would literally open up my CRM and I would go down the list of prospects that I was reaching out to intentionally. Those people that were on my nurture list, as we Learned in the B2B launcher program. So everybody in my nurture list, I would go through it in what we evangelicals call a prayer list. I just go from one to the next to the next, and I'd say their name aloud. I would talk to God about them. I would ask him to bless them. I'd ask him to increase their business. Just general good things is what I'm asking God to do for them. And what that did for me is it put me in a posture Where I'm constantly thinking about them all the time. So as I pray for them, ideas come to mind. Well, they could use this book that I read, this business book or this marketing book that I read, and this would really help them. Or, oh, they're having that baby. I could send them a congratulations note or maybe a box of diapers or something, because I'm praying for them. I'm thinking about them as a human being and not just as a business prospect. Prayer helps me think about them holistically rather than just one dimensionally. That, to me, has extreme value. The other thing I was noticing in my prospecting was that these prospects, they are humans with failures and tragedies in their life and challenges. And it's very strange how they're willing to share all of those with you. It can be a little awkward at first, but as a pastor, I was really used to it. I was just surprised that people would do this in the marketplace. I call somebody and we talk and find out they just got divorced and they'll actually talk about that, not too deeply. They're not going deep. I'm not their pastor or anything, but it shocked me that they would be so candid sometimes.

Would those be new prospects or these be clients, typically who already know you, you've been working with them, or both?

I've encountered these conversations with both.

Interesting.

Of course, the current clients, we'll talk a wee bit longer about it because we have a relationship and they trust me. But somebody will mention, oh, well, I've got this issue going on, or my daughter's sick and I have to get off the phone real quick, or, hey, I've been running down this person to get this deal and he's just calling me now. Can you wait on me? And then when we actually do connect, I found out they lost the deal or things of that nature. So it's not like they're going into detail. They're not crying on the phone with me, but they're willing to share these vulnerable parts of their lives, whether in business or personal life. I wanted to not only remember what we said as far as concerning my business, but remember what they said concerning their personal life and their business so that when I connect with them again later, I can follow up on that. How's your daughter doing? Is she out of the hospital? Is her leg healing up? Things like that. And prayer helps me do that because I'm literally praying for their situation to be better.

I think that's brilliant. And I'm curious, Joseph, so when did you Start noticing this connection, because it sounds like you were doing this already because of your background, but it sounds like at some point maybe it clicked. Can you trace it back to when that happened?

Yeah, I agree with you. I think it's something I just did by, you know, according to my faith. I mean, that's just what we're supposed to do. We're always supposed to be praying as Christians. And so I just brought that into the business. But I think I made the connection one day when I was in the B2B launcher program with you and our class and you had put out this homework that we were to email about five people that we had worked with or family or friends and asked them what our strengths were and what really stood out to them and how we helped them. So I was getting responses like, you always seem to understand me. Or another person said, you have a great way of explaining things in a way that doesn't make me feel dumb. And I thought, man, this has nothing to do with my writing. It has nothing to do with the content that I'm producing. It has everything to do with how they feel when they're around me. I started thinking about that. I'm thinking, man, I think one of the biggest pieces of value or the best thing I bring to the table really, is how they feel because they've been with me working on this project. So I realized that I'd been praying for them. I would offer to pray for them when the situation was appropriate. Of course, if they said no, I wouldn't, but I would offer kindly to just pray for their situation. And it set me apart from other copywriters or other vendors in general marketers because I was willing to listen to them about what was important to them and I cared about them and enough to do something according to my faith to help them in their situation.

So I'm curious about one thing, because some people who are listening might be religious, some may not be. Some might be maybe somewhere in between. Do you feel that this is something that. Strictly for people of faith, people who follow a certain religion?

Well, I think it can definitely be used by people who are not religious. Even as a pastor, I encouraged everybody, both the religious and irreligious, to pray. God's never going to say, I'm not going to be. I don't want you to pray out loud or anything. But I think it's definitely, as a business strategy, can be used by anybody. First of all, for people of faith, I mean, even people outside of the Christian faith, all of the great Religions of the world incorporate some type of prayer. It's just kind of a bedrock principle for all faiths around the globe. Some people pray according to liturgical prayers. They actually have a book of prayers that they use when they pray. And so what I would encourage people who have that tradition is take those prayers that are written down and start thinking of your prospects or your current clients as you're going through your prayers or devotionals. For those who are not religious, who don't have an organized faith that you go to, I would suggest doing what I've heard on the podcast before. Ed, you've talked with other people about the power of meditation. Well, why not send some good thoughts their way, like actually just meditate on their situation for a little bit. Stop yourself from the temptation to be thinking about yourself and your needs and what your goals and what you got to accomplish and think about them, what's going on in their life, what do they need to accomplish in their business, what do they need to accomplish in their personal life to feel fulfilled and satisfied. And I don't think you have to be a person of faith to take that time out to do that. And that is just that the discipline of prayer does that for me. It gets me out of my skin and start to think about other people and what they need.

A couple of things came to mind when you were talking about that. One is the guided meditation that I've been doing over the past few weeks. It's interesting because the, the guy actually talks about that. Every meditation has a part where you are supposed to think about other people you're doing this for and in. In their well being. Right. So it's you in. In he explains that it. That forces you to kind of step away from your situation and focus on the well being of others. And it makes just every. It makes you better and it helps others. So he's got a great explanation for that. Better than what I'm suggesting now. But what you just said corresponds to what he's suggesting. That it's important to kind of step away from your own, what you might be going through.

Right. And that does several things. The first thing is it reminds you that your business is about serving other people. That's the bottom line. If you can't serve somebody, if you can't be useful, then business isn't going to happen for you. So you want to make your marketing communications less greedy and certainly less desperate. You don't want to come across as desperate. Well, when I'm praying for somebody or meditating on their needs, then my needs don't seem so great anymore. I don't feel that panic in my heart about my situation, like, oh, I lost customer, or oh, I didn't make my income goals this month. When I'm thinking about them, it decreases my anxiety. And then I can have a thoughtful, caring conversation with them. That comes from a position of meekness, but strength because it's not all about me in this life. It also reminds me of the meaningful connection that we have, which is, I think, very important to specifically like the warm email prospecting strategy that you teach. You have to have a meaningful connection with your prospects so you have a good excuse to send them a message out of the blue, something that they'll look at and see as relevant to their life. Well, when I'm thinking about me, me, me, then my communication, just by my posture, my mind is all about me, which is never relevant to them and their situation.

One of the things I've noticed when I pray and meditate is that, and this is just my belief, the conclusion that I've drawn is that the shift really happens within me. It's not about God suddenly deciding, well, okay, well, you've asked nicely, therefore I'm going to give you this or make the situation happen. Which is the way that I was brought up, right? And I think many of us were brought up that way. What I've noticed is I've grown and matured, is that it's always been there. It's just that I had to make a shift inside myself and suddenly things start opening up.

I think that's very profound. I think that's when I was pastoring. That was the moment I saw people become mature in their faith when their prayers were less about them and what they needed. Even though the Bible is clear that we are to talk to God about our needs, we need to ask him for what we need. And that creates a humility in us that we're relying on him for what we need. But as a mature person, we have to go beyond that and start praying for the needs of others. We start to realize that, yes, God answers prayer. And I've personally seen beautiful miracles in life as a result of prayer. But like you said, I think the results I see most often, the daily results, are the changes I see in myself, which cause good changes to happen in my life.

So you mentioned, Joseph, that one of the benefits was the fact that you tend to create a situation in which clients and prospects open up to you a little bit more. So there's that empathy. There's that connection you also talked about. The tone and the energy of your conversations are much more positive. Right. There's no energy of, like, desperation. I need this nervous energy and so forth. You'd also mentioned to me that the prospects that you pray for tend to get back to you like that. The people, right. They actually return your calls and emails. People get back to you. Can you speak to that a little bit? Because I thought that was really interesting.

Yes, yes. I have watched this. So, you know, I look at my CRM and the people that I pray for have a higher chance of getting back to me. I don't always get the work. I mean, I just want to be very, very upfront. It's almost like praying for your favorite football team. I mean, you know, for everyone that's praying for one team, there's a hundred others that are praying for the other team. So, you know, this is very much the same. You know, God's not going to manipulate people because, like we mentioned earlier, prayer was more about changing my heart rather than changing the prospect. However, they do have a higher chance of getting back to me because of the way I'm positioned. You know, there's an emotional connection where they know that I'm sincere. I am sincere when I say I want to find the right fit for you. And if I'm not the right fit, then I'm willing to walk away from this deal. And prayer actually helped me with that one day. I know this might be a little bit of a rabbit trail, but it's closely related to doing things that are right for the prospect and not just for me. There was a company that I just recently reached out to in January, and they were a startup tech company here in Dallas, and they're just making great headway. They've got lots of investment money behind them. And to me, it looked like the perfect prospect because I like technology and they had a lot of money. They had the money in the budget. They didn't have to worry about where the money was coming from. So I thought, this is good. I had a series of conversations with the prospect, and they all went very well. I had at least two meetings, one with the actual buyer and then one with the team, the CEO, the cmo, and then the buyer. They were all there in the second meeting, and it just went marvelously. They loved it. However, the more I started to research that type of technology, it got really deep into coding and program development. And I'm not a coder. I don't know the first thing about coding programs or Programming languages and stuff these guys were selling to programmers. I started to realize that even though I love technology, that's a part of technology, I have a huge learning curve to get into. I would write terrible copy for the first several months of our business relationship, no matter what I did, because I was that far behind in my educational curve or my knowledge of that subject. So I was praying about it and I was just asking God very, very simply, what's the best thing for this client? Should I walk away from this? Because I don't know if they're going to get a good deal out of this. They'll pay all this money and I don't know if I can handle it. Well, I felt in my heart that the best thing to do was to call them up and just say, look, I'm not the right person for you and I wish you all the best. And I did that. And they told me they would like to refer me to other people because they saw the sincerity in my heart and I don't think that I would have been that level headed if I hadn't been approaching the relationship prayerfully.

That is so interesting. I bet they did sense it. Not just in your words or through your words, but they also sensed your sincerity and honesty. That's fantastic.

Well, prayer reminds us that there's a higher power to account for. Now, even for someone who's not religious, you realize that what you do is going to come back to you, right? That whole idea of karma. Well, for me as a Christian, I have a responsibility to the Creator to treat his creation in a manner of dignity and do it with honor. All those moral values that we all want to have, but when we're desperate and when we get a little greedy, we tend to forget those values. Well, prayer brings me back to those values and reminds me to treat them right.

So that reminds me or brings up another question. Do you ever pray for not just the client or the prospect, but do you ever pray for patience, for the best outcome? In other words, for. Look, I don't know what the best course of action should be here, but I just pray that you know that whatever happens is for everyone's, in everyone's best interest, that everyone wins.

Yeah, absolutely. I pray for every business deal that I'm currently working on. I pray for the current projects that I'm involved in. I ask for creativity. And I think an important thing is that prayers is two way communication. After you ask for that creativity, you need to sit back and listen. You need to carve out time to listen to think, create head space. Not just fill the air with your words, but really listen, and you will get the ideas that you need as you're thinking over that situation. I also pray about my business as a whole. I want it to grow. I have goals, and I pray for those goals. I believe that God is active in helping me achieve those goals as I involve him in the business. But also, I believe it was a Jewish rabbi that said this, but so many people have echoed it. It's hard for me to know who said it. But they said, when you pray, pray as if it all depends on God. But then when you finish praying, act as if it all depends on you.

I love that.

Yeah, it's a great balance. It's a perfect balance. So when I get done praying, whatever strategy I got, I got to apply myself to. I can't just stay in a state of indecision. I go searching for coaches. I search for relevant information. I get on the ball, I try things, I analyze it. I just don't sit and pray and lock myself away in a white ivory tower. This is prayer in the trenches, if you will. You do it as you go.

I'm curious as to your habits, routines, rituals around this. Is there a specific time of day when you pray? Do you pray throughout the day?

Well, I have a personal time of prayer in the morning. I like to read through scripture in the morning, and they guide my prayers. Just whatever daily reading I'm into, I talk to the Lord about those specific topics that I'm reading about. But through the day, as I'm getting into my business, I will take stopping points and I will put my keyboard and just kind of move it up. And I will spend a moment just praying for that specific person, specifically before a sales call. I almost always do it before a sales call, not because I want God to make this person hire me, but because I want to approach the call in the right attitude. For me, a successful sales call is when we both figure out what's right for the prospect. That's the successful sales call. And I don't want my ego to get in the way. I don't want to let my fears get in the way. And so my specific thing I'm asking God for when I pray is help me to think of them and their needs first and then my needs secondly. I don't want to forget about my needs. I don't want to let them run over me. But I'm going to trust you first, God, and then I'm going to trust the client that they're going to take care of me because I'm taking care of them.

So that leads me to, as we wrap up, to a question about, what do you say? You know, how do you say it? For people who maybe haven't prayed before or it's been years, or they're not sure what to say, it's awkward. Is there a right or wrong way of doing this? What would you advise someone in that situation to do if they really want to give this a try?

Well, again, if you're a person of faith, I would definitely say check in with the traditions of your faith. Go to the clergy of your faith, like a Jewish rabbi or Muslim cleric. We have pastors in the Christian world or priests in the Catholic world. Definitely go to them and talk to them about it. I'm sure they'll be happy to hear from somebody in their community that wants to pray. So they'll definitely guide you. For me, personally, I love speaking very naturally to him when I speak to God. It's very natural. I don't make a big deal out of it. He created me. He knows what language I would use. And to me, it seems a little bit pretentious or hypocritical to try to be somebody that I'm not when I'm talking to him. It's almost like my dad. My dad would think it's very strange if I come to him and I use big words when I'm talking to him. He's my dad. He knows me. I grew up around him, and he's seen me do really crazy things. So the same way with God, he's our Father and he's seen us in all kinds of situations. There's no need to try to speak in big religious terms. I just tell him, lord, I am a little nervous right now about this call. I don't know what to say. But I just want you to help me to focus on their needs. And it's just as simple as that. It's really not that complicated.

That makes perfect sense. Joseph, this is. This has been very insightful, really got me thinking about this. And I think, and I know, I know that many people in our audience have been enlightened by this idea. So I appreciate you sharing this big idea with us and how you've used it. And before we wrap up, where can people learn more about you? People who want to connect with you, want to learn more about what you do?

Well, for my business, you can always go to freshideacopywriting.com that's got everything that I do as a freelance copywriter. But if you want to go to some of my spiritual writings, writings on faith and family and how faith and business work together, you can go to hopebydesign.org and in those two places you'll find me.

Super.

We'll make sure to include those links in the show notes. And again, Joseph, thanks for coming on the show today. Really appreciate what you've shared with us.

My pleasure, Ed. Thank you.

Well, I hope you enjoy that interview. And again, you can grab the detailed show notes for this episode@b2b launcher.com Episode 102 and I have just one quick announcement today. I'm hosting a brand new online class this coming Tuesday, Tuesday, May 17 and it's titled White Paper how to pocket an extra $900 on every white Paper and Gain a Competitive Edge Over Other Writers. So this class is for white paper writers at all levels of experience, even aspiring white paper writers. And the instructor is Gordon Graham, one of the top white paper writers writers in the business. And in this class, Gordon is going to show you how to use white paper plans as a way to earn extra money on every white paper project and also as a tool for ensuring that every white paper you write goes smoothly. You're going to get Gordon's actual white paper template plus a step by step system for pitching, creating and delivering these plans. You also get two actual white paper templates, plan samples, and over 20 very specific tips on how to make these plans work. You can learn more by visiting b2b launcher.com forward/wpp. It's in a white paper plan. WPP will include links to that in the show notes. So that's it for today. That brings us to the end of the episode. I am your host, Ed Gandia. Thank you so much for listening and I hope you have an awesome day.

Take of care here.

The High Income Business Writing Podcast is a production of B to B Business Launcher. Learn more@b2b launcher.com.