In this 8‑minute monologue, entrepreneur and mentor Evan Carmichael recounts a real LinkedIn interaction with a contact named Scott who initially bombarded him with generic, sales‑heavy spam messages. Evan calls out the ineffective, desperate approach and challenges Scott to adopt authentic, story‑driven marketing. Through a series of candid email exchanges, Evan pushes Scott to articulate his personal “founding story” and a “strong‑opinion” video, emphasizing vulnerability, purpose, and emotional resonance. Scott follows the coaching, creates the videos, and later reports a dramatic business turnaround: expansion into the UK, entry into all 28 EU markets, and a surge in client engagement. Evan uses the narrative as a teachable lesson, urging other entrepreneurs to abandon spam tactics, focus on genuine storytelling, and connect with audiences through purpose‑filled content. The video ends with a call to action for viewers to apply these principles.
Chapters
Hey, it's Evan Carmichael, and today I wanted to share a great story about someone who spammed me, and I managed to help turn them around and realize that, you know, you don't have to be desperate in business. You don't have to spam people to get people to pay attention to you. You don't have to yell at them. You just got to be genuine and authentic and realize that you're doing something important. So here's the story. It's a guy named Scott. Asked to be my connection on LinkedIn and I approved him and right away I got a message back, "Thank you for accepting my friend request, blah blah blah. Have you ever been told that if you ever see a once in a lifetime opportunity to grab it and run with it? All this stuff about making money, quantifiable money in your pocket, not just perceived money, blah blah blah blah blah. Everybody needs this product, trust me." This is like screaming spam. This is not what I want to see from people. And it doesn't get results. You know, like, I know you may be frustrated and desperate and you're trying to feed your family, but this isn't the way to do it. So I wrote back. It was another message, another spam he wrote too. He wrote two spam messages. I wrote back to say, come on, Scott, is spamming people on LinkedIn really working for you? I know it's hard getting people to sign up for something new and you really want this thing to work out for you, but you're focusing on the wrong marketing. If you want to have success, you want people talking about you, right now all they're saying is Scott's a spammer. The key is to stand for something. What do you believe in that will move people? What is your strong opinion that you need to share with the world? Believe in it passionately, share your expertise, create content that people actually want to share and they'll do it. You'll get people coming to your website and signing up. You'll feel better about yourself and get way better results. Wishing the best of luck, Scott. I hate seeing entrepreneurs struggle, especially when they have no noble goals and want to make a difference. Believe, Evan. So this started an email thread, okay? And the first one was defensive. Excuse me, Evan, why would I spam people if I don't like being spammed? Your profile says you number one believer in entrepreneurs, but then you go and say this about me, spammer. I should feel offended with such accusations. I stand for a lot, Evan. Integrity, belief, and honor in my company and product. I would love to set up a phone call and talk with you. Right? Now the guy plainly spammed me, okay? He spammed me full out and I called him out on it and he's getting defensive. Wrote back, "Come on, Scott, I'm here fighting for you. I'm the only guy who wrote back to you and is trying to help you even though you invaded my inbox. You sent me this message without customizing it at all besides my name. It's unsolicited, you're trying to sell me on something. How would you define spam? I believe you stand for something. LinkedIn spam is beneath you. It also doesn't work." Stand up and show me what you stand for. Make me want to talk about you in a good way. Cheers, Evan. Believe. He writes back, I think we got off on the wrong foot, Evan. To be honest, I hate typing. I'm not very good at it. I'd rather talk on the phone. It's hard to understand people's emotions through email. People can jump to conclusions, so I'd rather talk, get to know you, and share our stories. Congrats on your success. So we've turned it around a little bit. We've turned it around a little bit. Now he's, you know, he's not being defensive, he's just blaming that he can't write, you know, whatever. He made a mistake, not owning up to it, but still, it's on the path. So I wrote back, "Hey, we all make mistakes. I've made tons, but if you're defending your spam or gonna keep doing it, then I have no interest in helping you. If you want my attention or anybody else's, you have to start by giving me something to believe in. What does Scott Smith stand for that will change the world? Why should I care? Make me feel something." If you're not great at typing, that's cool. Don't type. Make a video. Record an audio clip. This is important, Scott. This is how you're going to reach people. This is how you're going to get people on board and change their lives. Otherwise, people are going to ignore you. He writes back this whole thing telling me his life story. This whole thing. So this is deeply emotional, personal. We don't need to get through it, but now he's starting to open up, right? Now he's telling me why this is important to him, his family, his background, right? And this is not just Scott's— this is everybody's story, okay? You're struggling with your business, you're trying to get it going, you know, you have bills to pay, you're trying to put food on the table and it's not happening. And so your default is, "Hey, I'm going to go drum up some business, I'm going to go email people, connect with as many people on LinkedIn as possible and spread my message to them." But you're just wasting your time. This is not the way to build the business. If you are not authentic, if you're not building something that's important, then nobody's going to care and shouting louder is not going to help. Why am I helping Scott? You know, I wrote this message to a lot of people who spam me, and he was the main guy who wrote back, a few others, but I like helping people who want to make a difference in the world, right? That's why I'm doing this. And if you're responsive and you're open to change, open to listening to advice, then I want to help you. That's what I do. I believe in entrepreneurs. So I wrote back, "S, this is a great start. Now crunch it down and make it relate to your audience. This is your founding story. It shapes everything, and it moves people to trust you because you're being vulnerable and are sharing What you know works with people to make their lives better. Hashtag on your way, happy face. We're turning things around here. He writes back, thanks Evan for your input. I'm working really hard to make my family's and so many others' dreams come true. If you have any more advice, please share as I'm very coachable. Hey, we have turned this man around. This is great. So I said, okay, you want coaching? I'm gonna give it to you. Here we go. Do this, make 2 videos. One, your founding story, why you are doing this and why it's important. Basically what you wrote to me but condensed. Make it powerful. Make it mean something. 2. A strong opinion video. Tell me something that is wrong in the world and how people can fix it. Make it important. Make it emotional. Do those and send it to me. Note: It'll take a while to do, and you'll feel like the videos suck, and they will, but it's how you start, and I'll give you feedback. If you haven't spent at least 10 hours on each video preparing and practicing, recording and re-recording, don't send it to me. "#honorsystem, this is for you." And he wrote back, "Awesome, I'll get on it ASAP, thank you so much." He wrote in to say, "Will do, so thanks again for your support, the videos are coming along, they look horrible on camera, lol. Anyways, I'll keep you updated, cheers, Scott." So I didn't hear from Scott again, and that's fine, but he just recently wrote to me, and he said, "Hello Evan, it's been a long time since we connected." I want to thank you for inspiring me to make videos and believe in myself as an entrepreneur. Since then, I've made many videos which have received great feedback and have also made its way to Europe. I've also inspired so many to do the same. I met a person over in the UK and introduced them to Syntech Global. January, I was given the green light to open in the UK. April this year, my business partner and I were given the green light to open in all 28 countries in the EU. I'm now traveling over there for 17 days to share my story and to meet everyone that has joined my organization. Anyways, I wanted to give you an update but mainly to say thank you. Scott. See how this guy's life has been turned around? You know, here he was struggling to get his business off the ground, connecting with people on LinkedIn because he probably read it as some marketing strategy somewhere, and then spamming them to say, "Join my network," and he got no results. I was probably the only guy who wrote back to him, and I was challenging him. And he fought with me at the start, defending his spam. And then blaming it on not good typing, and then finally accepting coaching and doing the videos, doing the homework that I assigned him. And look at what's happened! Like, I'm so proud of this guy now. I'm so proud of him. He's making videos, he's opening opportunities, he's helping people's lives be better, and it's great. I couldn't imagine a better result for him. And this is important for you guys too. Like, the whole point of sharing this is having a teachable lesson for you, right? If you're struggling with your business, you're trying to get something going, you're trying to drum up new business. You might be looking online for strategies on how to get people now into your company. It's not gonna come from spamming people. That's what you're doing right now. Really look at your strategy. Is it working? Are you actually getting any results from this? So you don't have a lot to lose here. Share your story, make it important, make me feel something. If I understand what you're trying to do and why it's so important to you, If I connect to you, then I'm much more likely to take action, to buy from you, to refer you, to pass your name along. Anyway, great message that came in. I was honored to be able to help this guy out, and I hope through his lesson you're able to learn as well. Let me know what you guys think. Leave a comment below, give it a thumbs up, click on my face, subscribe to the channel. Thank you so much. Believe, and I'll see you soon.
