Staying Authentic In Sales With Kevin "KD" Dorsey

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Welcome to Coffee with Kim. I'm Kim Kalp and every week you and I sit down with fascinating, smart and talented leaders, CEOs and founders so that we can copy their homework. If someone knows how to do something really well, I want to know what it is and exactly how they're doing it. Get ready for aha moments, gems of wisdom and little known tips and tricks that we can steal and use use in our own lives. If you want to join these conversations and ask these experts your own questions, no point in just me having all the fun. Join us on Wednesdays at 1pm Eastern live over on LinkedIn. Happy Wednesday. As you can see, it feels a little bit like Monday over here in the tech department, but thank you so much for joining. As always we have such a warm and cozy group here. I am bringing you some hot mint tea from West Palm Beach, Florida. If you haven't already, drop in the chat, where you are coming in from and perhaps what is even in your cup so that we can all feel like we are part of the same cozy coffee shop somewhere glamorous in the world. But thank you so much for joining. As you know, every week we join here in community to be better, keep ourselves accountable, learn from each other and most importantly, learn from the experts. See CEOs and top of their game players who like to share all of their secrets with us and then we can copy all of their homework. So today is no exception. We have an amazing person who's joining us for coffee today. If you have not googled him already, holy moly. Get your Google clicking ready. Because Kevin kd as he's better known Dorsey is an amazing sales man. Salesperson. Salesperson. I think that's what we're going with now. Salesperson extraordinaire. He is the VP of Insider Sales at Patient Pop. He was a LinkedIn Top Voice in Sales for 2020 last year. And on top of that he also has a heart of gold because he is a mentor at 500 Startups, which is a super prestigious organization. So I'm really excited that Kevin took time out of his very busy week and his very bus day to join us here. As you already know, this is a live conversation. We're all sitting in the same cozy coffee shop. So if you have questions or thoughts or Kevin, what about this point? Drop them in the chat and we'll get to them as they go. Don't feel like you have to wait until the end. So please raise your cups wherever you are and help me in welcoming Katie.

Well I Feel welcome. That was great. Thank you very much, Kim.

Well, we like that. It's a good feeling around here. How are you doing?

I'm good. Good. Cranking away. You know, I always look up, I'm like, dang, how's it already? Noon. It's noon where I am. So I was like, what happened already in these six hours of the day? So feeling good, getting after it, and pumped to be here with you and your squad.

I would say, forget it. Forget noon. I would say I woke up and it was June. I don't know if that happened to you, but I was like, half the year is gone. Where did it go? How did we get here?

Indeed? I don't know.

I'm blacked out for 2020, I imagine, in sales, too. Whether it's quarterly or half a year, like, that's always also something that I feel like causes a lot of stress, right? Like, you're halfway through the year and it's like, where are numbers? What are we hitting? Where are our goals? Where do we get? Seems stressful.

It can be. And what's interesting, especially as you continue to move up, like the ranks from rep to manager to director to vp, is you actually spend a lot of time thinking forward, right? So it's June right now. I'm thinking about January of 2022, right? So my days and everything get messed up because I'm thinking about Q3 and Q4, and I don't even know what the date is anymore. And so stress is, you know, part of the gig with sales. But I also think it's something where if you. If you're proactive around it and try to do the right things around it, you can make it much more manageable. You can't get rid of it, but you can make it manageable. And that's something I work with a lot for myself and also my team.

Well, and it seems like from, like, the articles that I've read that you've written and your podcast, and obviously the amazing content that you push out every single week on LinkedIn, it seems like you are very entrepreneurial, even though you work in a corporate sphere. So I'm just curious, like, did you always have that entrepreneurial bug? Like, how does that come to fruition? Because I think most people say, like, well, you're either an entrepreneur or you work in corporate, and it's very, like, black and white and there's no gray. But I think that you are the definition of great because you've done so many entrepreneurial endeavors, initiatives, starting teams, growing Teams within like a corporate infrastructure?

I mean, I think so. I would say yes, the entrepreneurial bug has always kind of been there. But I also think it's part of why I've seen success in the corporate world is because you can, when you're trying to build your own thing, you get really good at some of those things and also then help other people build and their things. Right. And I do think you can walk that line a little bit. There's actually a really good book I'd recommend to people. Right. It's called she's like 10% entrepreneur I think is what it's called. I'll google it while we're chatting here, but actually talks about this concept of like a lot of people feel like they can't go the entrepreneurial route because you gotta, you know, drop everything and burn all the bridges and burn all the ships and like go after it and you don't have to. Right. And. But I would encourage everybody to start building something of their own on the side when you don't need to make money from it. I think that was some of the mistakes I made early with some of the other things that I've started and we might get into that on this call. I don't talk about them a lot, but it's like when you need to make money from it, it almost never works. But if you can let it build up over time while you still have a full time job, then you can make potentially a transfer when the timing is right and it's not nearly as stressful.

Oh, we're getting into all of that. Don't think I'm not going to talk about your podcast, your patreon. We're digging into all of those things that been working on on the side. And, and I think really what you do, at least what, what I have, if I could interpret what you do is I really think that you do less of sales and you do more of storytelling. And so for anybody that might be new to sales or has never worked with a sales department, what would you say is kind of the, the maybe the typical description of the sales team versus like what you define sales as?

Yeah. So unfortunately the stereotype of what salespeople are come from, you know, where the most common salesperson that everyone always interacts with at some point in their career is a car salesman or an insurance salesman. And so like that gets labeled. And then you think about some of the classic movies, right? The boiler rooms, the Glengarry Rosses, like we have this image of like this fast Talking slick, swindler type individual that's only looking out for themselves. Now, are there people like that in sales? Yes. But there are also people like that in schools and churches, in corporate, in restaurants. Like, people are people. You're gonna have those subsets everywhere. But the sales people that last the longest intend to do the best are the ones that truly do have the customers best interests at heart. Right. I think people get influence and manipulation confused sometimes. Right? Like, the only difference between manipulation and influence is who benefits. Right. Manipulation means I benefit. Right. I'm trying to convince you to do something that I benefit from. Influence means I'm trying to influence you to do something that you benefit from. Right? And that's the difference between them. And so it's a shame, like, you don't have to be an extrovert to be great at sales. I'm not an extrovert at all. I am way more of an introvert, which surprises a lot of people. I'm not a social butterfly. Like, I'm not, you know, hopping through, like, the networking events. That's. That's not me. Right? But when you care about other people, you can be really good at sales. You really can.

Well, and it's something that I feel like that's like my little soapbox that I get on about because I feel like so much of selling yourself, it's not just, oh, I'm trying to get a job, Right? It could be I'm trying to find a mentor, or I'm trying to find somebody to date or, you know, so much of our stuff. It's. It is selling ourselves. It might not be selling an idea or a product or a service, but every single person, no matter if they work in it, no matter if they're a lawyer, whatever, we are all selling ourselves every single day. So it always drives me crazy when people say, like, I don't need to pay attention to sales, or like that. That's not my job. That's not my responsibility. Because I really feel like it's everyone's.

Doing it and you nailed it then. So anyone that says that, fine, don't pay attention to sales, but learn how to be a great storyteller. Learn how to ask great questions, learn how to solve other people's problems, and learn the psychology of influence and rhetoric. Yeah, don't pay attention to sales, but go learn all those things. You'll be just fine. Right? Like, sales is just made up of those things. So label it what you want, call it what you want, go learn those skills. Because at the End of the day, sales, leadership, you know, thought leadership, mentoring. It's all about helping people change their mindset and behavior. That's all it is, right? So start to study mindset and behavior. Right? How do people think? How do people make decisions? Why do people do the things that they do? We are really interesting species, us as human beings. We do some things that don't make decisions, any sense. But once you know that, you can lean into it.

Do you feel like then one of the main qualities that we should all have or especially as salespersons should be curiosity to, like, get curious about other people and things and products and services.

Absolutely. Like, curiosity is. And this is one where, you know. And I read a lot on this too. I don't know if curiosity can be tough, hot. It's such a phenomenal trait and such a phenomenal characteristic. But, you know, ask, like, why. Actually, I'm reading a really good book on this right now, actually. It talks about these things, is like, why everyone's creative when they're a kid. Why do we stop? Because we're told to stop, right? We're told, like, no, this is how you do it. That's not the right way. No, that's the wrong way to do it. We stop being creative. And so, like, actually, I'm gonna grab this real quick. I'll just show it to everybody.

I love it. And as you're grabbing it, will everyone in the chat. I'm just curious of, like, Jeff and Kelly and Giacomo, what you guys think, but, like, type in yes or type in no if you feel like. Yeah, like that curiosity is. Is something that's essential for all of us.

Yeah, I think. I think it's essential for sure. Because curious people will ask better questions. Curious people tend to seek out knowledge. Curious people tend to be more receptive to new ideas. Right. You don't think things as personal if you're, like, curious because you want new insights. Right. But as. As we grow older, people get less and less curious, right? They either feel that they know it, right? That, oh, I already know it, so I don't need to learn it or I'll never be good at it. So why learn it, right? So I think it's so critical. But right now, a book I'm reading called Da Vinci and the 40 Answers by Mark Fox, and it's about, like, one, like the science of creativity, right? But then also talking, like, how to come up with ideas and what it's based around is there was this Russian scientist who reviewed like 300,000 patents right. And found that almost all patents solve the same 1500 problems. And all 1500 problems were solved 40 different ways or a combination of. And so that's what the 40 answers are. I was like, here are the 40 ways that you can solve a problem. Right. And so it's things like this that can get the creative juices flowing. But you got to be a curious person to want to read things like this to try to solve these problems. I don't know if I can teach an adult now to also be curious. Again, not sure if I can do that.

I love Jasmine here because I agree with you. I think teaching curiosity is hard, but I do think that you can teach creativity, and I do think you can teach people how to think. You can teach them a little bit how to think outside the box, but definitely for some people, comes very naturally. Like, whereas other people, it takes a second for them to think outside the box. But I also think that that's insanely important when it comes to sales. I heard you on a podcast and you were talking about how you think beyond just emails and phone calls to physical packaging. And if somebody's not answering your phone call or your email, you're sending them. I think you were saying you sent a mini garbage can with, like a crumpled up note in it, which is just like, what I mean, talk about outside the box. You're literally sending garbage cans to people.

So, like, it's sales and life and relationships is all about being memorable, right? Do they remember you before they can buy from you? They need to know who you are and they need to trust you. They need to have a positive emotion associated to you. Right now. If I'm cold calling you, what is that emotional response to all my people on here? You get called by someone you don't know. What's the initial emotional response? Not great, unfortunately. Right now I send you something, right? So you go, okay, well, what would I send to somebody? Well, what do most human beings have in common? Do most humans like to laugh? Do most people like to smile from time to time? Yeah, they do. So you go, another leverage. What would make these people smile? What would be something silly? What would be something goofy? That, like, even if it's a no, like, you open the package and you go, like, what, a trash can? Who the hell sends a trash can? And you open it up and in there is a paper that says, look, I knew you were going to throw it away anyway, so I saved you some time. If I'm saving you time now, imagine how much time I can Save when I work with you. Now that is corny, that is cheesy, that is goofy. It is cringe worthy, but is memorable. And I'm going to get you to crack at least one half of a smile. Now, not only am I memorable, but like, that positive emotion is there. And even if it's a no, you're like, hey, yeah, Katie, I got the package, I appreciate it, but we're good right now. That's way better than get the F off my phone. Why are you calling me? So it's things like that. It's a better way and a more fun way to sell. Why not have fun with this?

Totally. And I feel like it's really, I feel like people can grasp it when they're talking about, in that example, you're selling a product or a service. But when it comes to selling yourself, I'm curious, you know, you have an amazing podcast live Better sell better. How do you incorporate these techniques to, like, your podcast? Like, you have to get listeners and you have to have people get excited about each episode. Like, how do you do that when it's you, like, you, you are the product, you are the service.

So by not pretending to be perfect, right? So, like, I share my flaws, I share my mistakes. That's what people remember, right? As, like, it's when you try to, you know, always, as y' all can tell, I'm not very buttoned up. I can flip it on if I need to, but that's also no fun, right? Like, I'm going to be me here and that's going to be memorable because, you know, you're getting the real person, right? So I think that's part of it is just being human, right? No facade, no covers, nothing like that. Also having fun, right? If you listen to the podcast, right? Like, yes, we're getting very tactical, but we're also going to joke around a little bit. We're going to make fun of ourselves, right? We're going to do those types of things. Because with the podcast, I do very little promotion. I really don't do very little promotion. I do very little, like, you know, ramp up or ramp down. I create the content and I share it. But again, the goal of the episode is if I can make the episode memorable to one person and they tell one person and then that person tells one person. That's how it spreads, right? Like, I don't know how you found me, but I didn't reach out to you to find me, right? Like, it kind of just happens organically, right? And I Do think too sales. Entrepreneurship. In life, we tend to rush. We try to do things too fast versus letting something build over time organically. And then all of a sudden, that flywheel is just spinning and you don't actually have to do that much for it. So I think it's just. It's having fun. It's telling good stories like you brought up before. It's just being real. Like, there's a craving for authenticity right now, which is also just a weird thing to say. Like, why, like, the world has gotten so fake. So, like, like, no one. It's just that often when you meet someone, you go, that person was real. Like, how rare does that have to be? Where now that's a call out. Like, like, that Kim, she's real. Like, what happens? Like, why is that such a big deal anymore? So I think that's something that also people remember. They really do.

It makes a huge difference. I'm curious, you know, with. Speaking of the podcast, like, what was that aha moment that you woke up and you're like, got to start a podcast. Like, got to do that? Because most people would say, well, you know, you're really busy in your day job. You know, you have a lot of other things going on. Why add one more thing to your plate? I think that I would guess that's most people's response. Whereas obviously to you, you looked at it and said, I'm definitely adding this to my plate. Let's go.

So I think it was threefold. The first is just a personal challenge. I mentioned this earlier. I'm not an extrovert, so I can go into my shell, right? Or like, I work and I enjoy work and I enjoy reading and developing myself. And so I may not reach out to. To people to have, you know, good conversations. And I was like, that's not good for me, first of all. And two, like, it's impeding my growth. So that was the first is there was a challenge to myself to be a little bit more social, right? Reach out and just have good conversations with people. The second part of it, right, Is if I look at where I'm going, right, in my career, right, eventually I'm going to start my own thing. Like my true own thing, right? My own company. Company. My own product. Product. More than likely, that's going to be selling to salespeople. Well, if I want to continue to build my audience of salespeople, what do salespeople tend to do? This is, by the way, why I haven't written a book. Because salespeople don't read books. So. Right. What are they consuming? A lot of LinkedIn and podcasts. So, okay, let me focus where they are, and if I can build a foundation there, then when I eventually launch something, I've built that audience, right? And so. But I'm. I'm thinking three years out, not three months, right? Where I'm like, oh, I need this to work now. Kind of like I mentioned before, I'm thinking, okay, if I started now, what's that look in one year, two years, three years? And now all of a sudden, I'm having 20, 30,000 downloads per month. Whatever I launch at that point is going to be in a good position, right? So that's why I thought about it, and it's been great. It's been so good, right? It's fun. I enjoy it. I get to have really good conversations with really smart people, and I get to learn some stuff, too. Like, I'm still learning, y'. All. Like, I'm not. Like, some of that's even selfish. Like, who? Man, I can't get this person to respond to me. I can put them on podcast now. I bet you they respond to me, and now I get to ask them the questions I want. So it all works together.

I mean, that's what I basically, I'm like, this is so selfish. I'm like, so about all my questions. But I love this idea of these really kind of like thinking long term. And to Jeff's point, if you are starting something, whether it's a podcast or a Kickstarter, for you, would you give the same advice, which is, man, you really just gotta back up. You gotta be thinking, not when you notice start the Kickstarter, but a year before you start the Kickstarter.

So, yes. So funny enough, I helped. We almost did a Kickstarter right before 2020. So I helped my wife run an E commerce business as. As well. And, like, we're probably going to do one later this year. But the key to it, right, Is start building your audience early, right? Where a lot of Kickstarters or business launches, where they fail is like, they build the product in a dark cave somewhere, convinced that once it comes into the light, everybody's gonna love it and want it. Versus, like, okay, but then crickets, because no one was ready for it yet. Back to what we were talking before you, they don't know you yet, right? Versus if a year before, you're like, okay, I know. I want to try to launch this. Start building an audience. That. Right? And the easiest way to do that is, through interviews, I'm thinking about building this. Could I ask you a few questions about this and the problem it solves? Whatever. And now here's the thing, right? And Jeff, if you're considering this, if you commit to that, if you commit to interviewing 10 people a week for a year, that's 500 that now you have a personal relationship with, right? So when you launch that Kickstarter, because also too just the algorithm with Kickstarter is very similar to a lot of things. If it starts hot, that's what keeps you on the first page as an up and coming project or whatever. So if you have the 500 that already know you, you interviewed them so they feel respected and you made them feel good about it. He's like, hey, it would mean the world to me if you could be some of my first like donors momentum. And then you go, right. So that's the way to do it. And one extra bonus tip, Jeff, on Kickstarters, the creative stuff like garbage cans and stuff, you send those to the influencers that your audience follows. So say you were launching something in the sales world, right? You can't send garbage cans to every salesperson hoping they sign up. But you could send a garbage can to me and say, hey, I'm doing this for salespeople. Here's why I think you might like it. Would you take a look at it? And if you like it, would you mind putting a little something, something out there? When I launch, that's all I'm asking for. Now I know you, and now it's memorable and now we can do something about it. So it's things like that I'm.

I feel like that's such a, that's such a good, like, aha, like moment that I know I wouldn't have thought of. And I hopefully Jeff also had an aha moment. But I'm curious for you. You know, as you're talking to all these interesting people, you know this concept of talking to 10 interesting people a week, obviously on your podcast you get to talk to interesting people all the time. What is something that you learned on the podcast that was sort of like an aha moment for you with someone that you were interviewing?

Oh, man. I mean, I think there's. I did an interview yesterday with George Leith. He's the chief customer officer at Vendasta. He created. So he has almost like a 250 person sales and CS team. He created a testing team, which is something I have always wanted to do. I've done it with reps, but he created a testing team. Mean a small segment of this team that's just there to test things. New messaging, new product lines, new customer segments, right? New approaches, right? Like before you roll out garbage can mailers to 250 reps, maybe you try it with five, right? But this is a key to it. Their job is to test, right? Their job is to test. Whereas if you want to test things with established reps, you're almost always going to be hesitant, right? Because they're like, well, I got a system, I've got something that's working. Why would I want to test something new? So he pays them to test. I think that's absolutely genius, right? And I've done it with individuals, right? I've said like, hey, Gabby, I'm going to pay you full commission for the entire month to just do Vidyards. That way there's no risk to them. But that's still only one point of failure, right? It's only one person doing it versus having a team dedicated to it. It's like, it's things like that that you learn when you start getting into the inner workings of how people actually do things. Because like what people put on LinkedIn and the social media, right? Like all that is like, you know, you never know if they're actually doing it or not. But when you get to have these one to one conversations and you get into this a little bit. So that, that's just, that was literally just yesterday, an aha moment that I'm like, yeah, I'm gonna do that. I'm gonna do that.

I feel that way about Clubhouse. Like half the people I hear in Clubhouse, I'm like, there is no way you did that. And there is no way to like check and see if you did that unless I come off and start Googling you. And then I'm like, no, that's not true.

It's so funny. I just deleted Clubhouse yesterday. Like literally just yesterday. I'm like, dude, like, I'm done with this. Like, no, I can't do this anymore.

I'm curious, you know, I know for me it's a little hard, but I'll still ask it to you. There are episodes that I've done of Coffee where it's been popular based on like the number of viewers. But then there's ones that I think are like hidden gems that I'm like, well, it didn't have as much views, but like, I actually think that there are some like, real, like little gems hidden in there. Do you have episodes like that with your Podcast. And if so, like, what are they? Because I won't ask you to pick a favorite. I hate when people ask me dad, so I'm not even gonna ask you that.

Yeah, so absolutely. And it's. And it's funny because often, I don't know if you ran into this. Oftentimes there's some of your earliest episodes, right? Where, like, you didn't have a big reach yet. You didn't have a big audience yet. It's your first few episodes, and people never go back to listen to the first episodes. They're always on the. So, like, they get buried, and you're like, jesus, like, y' all need to go back to this one, right? And so, like, I did one with Patricia McLaren on, like, how to build cadences and sequences. That was just a goldmine, just a gold mine. I promoted almost every three months is the only. Like, that one was huge. Justin Welsh did an amazing one on brand building, right? How to build your brand. Right. I think it was my second episode, you know, so, like, most people don't even know that one. It was. Was there, right? So, like, there's a. There's several of them, and I feel like almost all of them are, like, earlier ones because those like. Like, the people I was closest with, tightest with, right? So they were more than willing to start to be those episodes. But then there's some of the first ones, and I'm like, well, shit. Like, no one's heard that. Sorry. I'm trying not to cuss that much. I think no one's heard it. So, like, I try to bring that back up. So I think, yeah, those. Those are a few just, like, right off the top. Oh, like, Bilal did an amazing one on provocative messaging. Same thing where, like, you know, is there. Now, here's what's interesting, too, about most podcasts, and this is something I want to do differently. No one brings guests back again, right? So I've been on probably, I don't know, probably 50 or 60 podcasts in, like, the last, like, four to five years. But once y' all don't think I've learned something new? Like, do you think I was reading this three years ago? Like, there's new stuff here, right? Like, bring people back that gave you good stuff because they're still learning, and you can't cover it all in 30 minutes, 40 minutes. It's impossible.

Well, and not only that, that I also find in those earlier episodes, to your point, it's usually people that you're close with. It's Usually people like you just started that. I also feel like they let their guard down a little bit. Like, they're a little more loose. They're a little bit. And they know you, so it's almost like they're shooting shit. I'll curse too. They're like, shooting the shit with you a little bit more than. Now that, you know, I think this is our, like, 60 something episode, you know, now the publicists get involved, right? It's like, we have a new book out, and here are the three points we want you to hit. And it's not as sometimes organic because people come in with, like, an agenda. And so I think those earlier episodes are also good because people are a little more like, it's new and they don't really have expectations. So they're a little more, like, open with it than maybe once you've been doing it for a while. But I'm curious. Speaking of, like, going back, I totally agree. I'm guilty of this too. When I find a new podcast, I very rarely go back, you know, from the beginning and start. I'll usually just start from wherever I found it. I'm curious for you. Different platform, but same concept. You know, we touched on the fact that you have a Patreon. I'm freaking fascinated by this. I have, like a million questions about Patreon, but do people go back in Patreon? Like, do people feel like, okay, I'm paying KD now. Let me go back to the first Patreon post, you know, 486 posts ago. Or do they also just say, like, well, now I'm starting. I'll look at the June post because it's June, so.

And we don't have enough time to go into all the things with Patreon, but I'm happy to go one on one with you to talk through the pros and cons. Because what I use Patreon for is not what Patreon was built for. And again, I didn't know what the hell I was. Oh, absolutely. I didn't know what the hell I was doing. One of my good friends, Dave Gerhardt, right, dg, he launched. I'm like, yo, he's got like a thousand people on here. I want some of that. Let's try it. Right? And so I. My Patreon is almost more of a course with a community. So I don't do a lot of posts in Patreon. I do, like, heavy training content in Patreon, right? So if you join my Patreon, you're not getting like my LinkedIn posts and stuff like that. Like I'm dropping hour long trainings in there, I'm inviting other people doing hour long master classes in there, right? So people do tend to go back. But I'll put this in quotes because the number one reason why people leave is that I didn't have enough time to go through all the content. Not that it wasn't valuable that I just couldn't get to it. I have almost 30 hours of live training. I'm covering scripting. Objection. Handling scaling, management, hiring one on ones issue, diagnosis metrics and analytics. Like there are heavy things in there, right? So that's how I use it. And so people do go back because they're looking for specific topics right now I also have another idea for you for podcasts if you want to chat about that too. Because this was something I almost started, right? So I own podcast recap and podcast bytes.com I wanted to create something that summarized all the episodes, two pages, key questions, key answers, key like books that were mentioned, whatever else, so that you could. Right. You know how many episodes Gary Vee has on his podcast?

Too many.

You'll never be able to go through them all. But then here's the second part. If you're looking for a topic, right. To be able to search audio, you can't do that right now, right? If you wanted to go through my episodes and find out which ones talked about Cold calling, it has to be in the description or the title, otherwise you don't know. But if the summary mentioned Cold calling is now, podcasts are searchable. So if anyone wants to team up on that, I already own it. I've already got ideas on it, I've already tested a little bit. It works. Just don't have the capacity. This is why we talk about things.

I feel like there is something I vaguely remember and maybe Shelby can drop it in the comments if Shelby remembers. But I vaguely remember we did look at some sort of technology plugin magicness that if you put in a keyword, like if I remembered 40 years, I don't know, let's say you and I had said something with 40 years, but I couldn't remember, like where it was in the episode that you can somehow upload this audio, type in 40 years and it will find that part.

So there's a lot of tools that will do that with the audio. The problems, they're not necessarily categorized, right? So like as long as there's a transcript, you can search a transcript that's easy enough to do. But you actually can't do that on itunes. You can't do that on Spotify. There's not a catalog of it. Right. So it's searchable. You can just bring that in. But like, to the point there, right? Like, you do cheat sheets. I try to do recaps. Right. Which is great. But again, they're not searchable unless you're on that episode versus if all of those were put into like a micro search engine where now I could go to coffee with Kim and I could type in, I don't know, startup, and it searches all of your episodes for those words and pulls up where it's mentioned and what was around it. Now I get access to everything. And I think that's what would make it easier for people to go back because you also don't know what was covered. Like, all right, well, I'm gonna go back to episode two. Who was episode two? I don't know. Right. So it's this thing. Always ideas, always ideas.

Shameless Plug I did on my brand new website, Bells and Whistles website that I'm so proud of, we did put in like a little search bar that when you type in like sales, it'll pull up all the episodes that have sales in the title. It's not as in depth as what you're talking about, but it's like a duct tape solution. But I mean, a duct tape solution is no solution.

So true story, true. Progress over perfection, y'. All. Progress over perfection.

Exactly. Speaking of progress over perfection, I'm curious for you, like, for me, looking at somebody like you, you have a full time job. You apparently are using Patreon for more than it was originally used for. We have hours and hours and hours of content. You know, you're also doing this podcast. You mentioned you have a wife. Like, work life integration, calendar blocking. Do you have 10 assistants? Like, I'm hearing this and the minute my head starts spinning is like, how, like, how is he doing all this? Like, I don't understand.

So. So I have no assistance. I've got one community manager for my Patreon, Anish, who definitely does help me, like, manage that a little bit more. But when people ask me this question, what I tend to actually start with is what I don't do. Because I think that's just as important as what I do do. Right. I don't have social media outside of LinkedIn. I don't have Instagram, I don't have Twitter, I don't have Snapchat, I don't have TikTok. I have a Facebook. I never use it, and you don't.

And you just deleted Clubhouse.

Right? Right. And I was never on it, but, like, the notifications and shit were driving me nuts. I'm like, all right, you're gone. Right? So I don't do social media. For a lot of people, that's an hour plus of their day. Sometimes more on social media, I just gained an hour back. I don't really watch tv, right? Like, I'll put sports on when it's, like, when a game is on, but oftentimes it's in the background, right? I don't watch tv. I don't binge watch Netflix. So I just saved myself another two hours. The average American right now watches four hours of TV a day. Four hours. And people want to ask how I get stuff done. Okay, well, there's now already between social media and, you know, tv, I'm looking at an extra four hours plus per day that other people don't have. Right? And then I am very efficient with my time. I block my calendar, I plan out my days, I plan out my priorities, like, almost to the minute, right? And then the last part of this is like, I think intention doesn't get talked about enough. Right. Like, doing something with full intention, you will be shocked at how much faster you can get it done. Right. And this also applies to my family and my kids and my wife. Like, five minutes of intention is better than an hour of attention. Right. If I walk out here right now, which I actually will in about an hour after my next meeting, with the full intention of making my youngest daughter Luisa laugh, what's gonna happen? She's gonna laugh, and we're gonna have. And it will take 30 seconds. Right. But that impact is way more than, like, all right, let's go to the park. Yeah, looks good. Yeah. I'll push you on the swing. Like, the intent. Most people are missing the intention with their time, too. So I'm very intentional. Like, I check email three times a day. I have a sales team of almost 100 people. I am not in Slack all day long, right? Because I'm busy doing. Right? So, like, that's. That's what I think. People misunderstand. Actually. I just talked about this with my managers. This was last month. So one of the biggest differences is y' all stack and I chop. I look at what can I get rid of versus what can I add, right? If I'm going to add something, what do I need to get rid of that is no longer as valuable as this thing? I'M trying to add, and if there's not something more valuable, then I shouldn't be adding it. Right. So I'm very ruthless with my prioritization as well. And so I think that's how I get it done. But like, podcast, Patreon consulting, things like that, I get that back just from screen time alone. Most people, like, I don't know how many people are on here right now. Go ahead, pull up your phones. Pull up your phones. Check your screen time average. Because if you're averaging five plus hours a day on screen time, and I'm not. Okay. Like, literally right now, it is almost one o'. Clock. I'm at one hour of screen time. Yeah. Kim.

Let'S just not talk about it.

Okay? So. Okay. Right. And for proof, in case anybody's wondering, can you see the number where. Yeah. And look at where it was at, by the way. You see what's. Kim, what time is my screen time at?

Oh, my God. It's starting at 6am and then it stops.

My screen time looks like a. You start of the day, low end of the day. I'm not in this stuff during the day because I'm working.

Whoa. I have some improvements to make. That's what I'm gathering from this. Maybe I should. I want to disable my phone.

Oh, yeah. Like notifications, mute them. No push on your email, no push on your slack. Right. It'll take about two weeks for the people around you to adjust, but after that, they get it right. They get it right. So, like, those are the things to do. And then you look. Now I want to make sure I'm not coming across preachy. You don't have to do this right, people. You don't have to manage your day the way that I manage my day. But there are places, right, where people, like, they say they don't have time. It's not that you don't have time. You haven't made the choice. Right. If you are living the life that you want to live right now and you are achieving the goals that you want to achieve right now, and you're able to do that with screen time and Netflix binges and everything else. Yes. Like, God bless you. Like, that's the whole point of this whole thing. Life is to feel fulfilled in with what you're doing. But if you want to do more, if you want to achieve a little bit, then you got to make some chops somewhere else. And I say chops, not sacrifices. Instagram is not a sacrifice. Okay. Netflix binges is not sacrificing anything that's a choice, right? Like, just make that choice and be shocked. Shocked what you can achieve in one to two years. Absolutely blown away.

I'm motivated. Okay. You've kicked my butt on that. So that's a note for me and hopefully other people. I'm not alone in my way. More than one hour of screen time versus Katie, because it is way more than one hour. I'm curious for you. Thank you, Jaguar. I'm doing the same. I'm curious for you. You know, one thing that I, again, I could get on a soapbox about it for hours is like, mentors, advisors. I just think when people try to go at alone, it is so much harder than when you go at it with, like, there's a reason the Avengers, like, exist. You know, we all do better together. Like, a little bit of Captain America, a little Black Panther, a little, like, Black Widow. Like, it's just. It's a whole vibe that is just better as a team. I'm curious with you. Like, do you have mentors? Do you have advisors? Like, you've been able to do all of these incredible, like, moves and pivots and obviously, maybe one day starting your own thing, maybe that's sometime soon. Like, who's helping you kind of, like, think about these things.

So. And what's been fun is, you know, they change over time because what you need changes over time. There are mentors that I have outgrown. There are mentors who I am now at the same level at, right? And we are now just peers. There are mentors who have fallen off where that value and that relationship wasn't there. Now I have, like. I like that you use the two words. I look at mentors and advisors as different things. So, like, I've got, like, my board of advisors, right? And my board of advisors are people that, like, probably don't even know who the hell I am, right? But they're people that I think about, right? Like, what would this person do in this situation? How would they handle something if they were watching me work right now? What would they think? Right? Like, that type of stuff. So I learned that from thinking grow rich, right? Of, like, this personal board of advisors. Of, like, you can. They can be who I could be on all yalls boards of advisors, if you want, right? Like, it's just like thinking about it, right? But then my mentors, they're in it. They're with me. I can bounce things off them, right? But I think where a lot of people go wrong with mentors, too Is like they're looking for a friend more than a mentor. And actually just talking about this with a good friend of mine now who I will say was a former mentor, Scott Lease. Right? Like, you know, like friends make you better. Sorry, Friends make you feel good. Mentors make you feel better, right? Like you're here to make me better. Not to make me feel good, here to make me better. Right. But a lot of times when people are looking for mentors and this is all things in life they're just looking for people, like, reinforce that they're doing the right things and give them that little pick me up versus like, no, like, you know, you're slapping me around going like, yo kd. Like you're spending six hours on the phone per day. Like, get off the goddamn phone and go do the thing you're supposed to go do. Right? Like, so mentors are there, but also people underestimate how much outreach you need to do. So I told Jeff earlier, right? 10 a week. This was 2013, 2012, somewhere in there, who the hell knows? I reached out to five VPs, US sales a week for a year looking for mentorship. Five a week, y' all do the math. That's over 250 in a year. Hey, I'm a first time VP. I'm looking to learn and grow and I'm hoping to learn from people that have gone through it before so I can hopefully avoid some of the mishaps and mistakes that I know I'm going to run into. Would you be opening, open to mentoring? 5, 5, 5, 5, 5. That's how I met Kevin Gaither, Scott Lease, Colin Coggins, Dave Brock. Right. Some of my foundational people. Jeffrey Rittler, like all these, like, you do it right. But that's 250, not. Oh, I sent KD a message. You never got back to me. Well, like, okay, like maybe I didn't see it, right? And there's also people, right? Like as I transition, right. I have new mentors now, right. People that are on the next level of things, right. I'm very excited to be connected with George Leith now. Jocker Vanderkoo, Winnie now by design is a very close mentor of mine. Now people are accomplishing the next things. Alex Boyd, right? Like these are the types of things that people like you do. You seek it out, like, why take 20 years to get good at something if you can learn it? Somebody who did it for 20 years.

Oh, are you kidding me? I'm all, why do you think we're. Why do you think I'm copying your homework? I don't want to go learn that for the next 10 years. I'd rather just copy your homework. You already did the work.

The real secrets of success. R and D. Not research and design. It's rip off and duplicate. Someone else is doing something, and it works really well. Do it.

I love that. Rip it off and duplicate. That's the R and D we all need more of, right?

Unless you're creating something. Unless you're creating something, don't take someone else's content. Rip it off and duplicate it. You enhance it. But the secrets of success are there, right? They're there. Do it.

You just have to find them. Speaking of the best type of R D, ripping it off and developing on it, I'm about to ask you my favorite, which are the speed round questions, which is basically all of us ripping you off. Like, just. Just. Just pure and simple. We're going to be ripping you off on these. So as long as you're okay with that.

Yes, 100%. Well, it's funny enough, you mentioned before, like, having organic conversation. I don't read the prep sheets. Y' all sent me stuff I'm not going to read that. I want to come in completely blind. Let's do this for real. Like, I don't want to have time to think about it.

I'm the same way you are. And I realize, though, that there's, like, different types of people, and some people got really, really anxious without having these speed round questions before. And then Shelby and I were like, oh, we don't want to make people uncomfortable. But I'm like, you. I never read. Like, they always send me prep stuff. I never read it. I'm like, we're just going to wing it. It's going to be great.

So funny enough, just because I'm sometimes a little bit savage, I won't have those people on my show. You're like, I mean, this.

You're nice, but you're out.

It was like, hey, I need to know what we're going to talk about. I was like, this is the topic, but I want an organic conversation. No, Like, I really want to meet in prep. Like, that's not what this show is.

Sorry, sorry. No, we don't. We don't give them what we talk about the majority of time with speed round questions.

Well, here we go. I'm pumped. Let's do this.

We do get those.

Okay, I'm getting feedback. One second, though. I'm getting feedback. I'm hearing myself. Which Is always fun to hear the sound of my own voice for some reason I'm hearing it back.

No. Do you still hear it? Does anyone else? I don't hear anyone else hearing me twice.

Well, I am, but I can deal with it. Let's go.

I am, but I can deal with it. Okay. What is something that you have started using lately or doing lately? So it could be like using a meditation app or doing, I don't know, yoga in the morning, but something that you've used or done lately that you are obsessed with, you're recommending to everybody. You're super stoked on it.

Rucking.

What?

So it's walking with a heavy backpack. So it's. So it's, it's one of the better cardio methods you can do if you don't like to run. Knees and back is very significant, but walking you adapt to very quickly and it doesn't burn that many calories. So throwing on a backpack with 25, 35, 45 pounds in it and speed walking, right, like 15 minute mile average, significantly better cardio gets your heart rate up, strengthens your core, your back, and it fix your posture. I don't know about you all, but like I can, you know, cave in a bit while having that backpack on you pulls you back a little bit too. So rucking is one of my new favorite things to do.

That's amazing. I've never even heard of that before. I'm clearly out of the loop, so I'm gonna have to go Google that now. What is the best gift that you've given yourself or done for yourself in the past year?

Oh boy. I would say actually probably just recently as well. So I took the family down to Costa Rica for about two and a half weeks a week ago. But the, the difference with this one is had my mother in law come to Austin to watch our kids for a week so Jess and I could go down a week ahead of time solo, which we, I mean, people don't talk about this enough too. Like in this pandemic in digital, like kids are always there and I love my kids to death, but they're always there. Like just always there, right? So like that was a gift just to have time to relax and just be together and chill and talk. Right. We have a little plot of land down there that we bought, so we get to talk about building and all that. So like that was a recent gift, like you know, to myself because like 2020 was a hell of a year and I know this might shock some people on here But I'm not the best at taking time off. Shocking, I know. So this was an important thing to do for myself and for my family, and I'm very glad that we did.

That's such a good one. I feel like we all. We all need a little more of that in our lives. What I feel like you're constantly learning, hence, like, the two books that you've already called out that you. You're currently reading, what is the next thing that you are hoping to learn? Whether it's like, a language or coding or I don't even know what.

So there's a few things that I keep kind of a list there. Like, I want to freshen up on my Spanish, right? Obviously with Costa Rica. Like, I want to get sharp there. My wife speaks pretty fluently. My youngest or my eldest daughter, she went to an immersion school for three years. She actually speaks really well. And I'm the one standing there going, like, donde esta la biblioteca? You know, because we all learned where to ask where the library was in Spanish, you know, so, like, so I want to learn Spanish. But really what I'm trying to learn a lot on right now is the science of decision making and mental models, right? So, like, this is on mental models. There's two other great books on mental models as they're. They're a shortcut to thinking, right? There's patterns to how to solve problems and things of that nature. So I'm focusing a lot on that type of stuff right now. Mental models, decision making, how to, like, piece things together from different perspectives. That's a lot of my learning this year.

Oh, I like that. What's that? Have you read Farnham Street? I think they do a lot of, like, mental models. No, I think I'm saying that, right? It's Far Nam or something like that. Farnham Street. Okay. And I'm curious, you know, I have this theory that kind of the old saying was that, like, you are the combination of the five people you spend the most time with. And. And I think that was true in, like, 1985. But I think now with these things, you are the combination of the five people that you also digitally surround yourself with. Like, you've mentioned, whether it's Justin Welsh or whoever. So I'm curious, what are some accounts or humans on LinkedIn that you follow that you just feel like they light you up? Like, every time you see their content or every time you see a post in them, you're just like, yes. Like, that was awesome.

So Kyle Coleman Amy Volis, Ashley Kelly Mealy, Scott Lees, Richard Harris, Justin Welch, Jocko Vanderkoosh. Those are ones right off the top that I follow. And what's interesting, though, is I follow them, but I'm blessed to be in a position now where I know them. Right? And so, like. And so, like, the caveat, right, of, like, the. The quote, of, like, the five people that you, you know, spend the most time with or the five people that you follow. The real impact is the five people you have good conversations with, right? Like, who are the people in your life that you get to talk about? Your hopes, your dreams, your ideas. Who are the five people in your life actually making you better? Like, who are the people that you can hit up on the weekend? So actually, this. I can tell the story here, right? So I'm in Austin now, and there's. There's a really good, like, you know, group of people here, right? So we went out to a late lunch with myself, Jake Dunlap, who is the CEO of Scaled Consulting. Right. Okay. So you know Jake. Carolyn Betts, the CEO of Bets Recruiting. Scott Britton, the CEO of Troops AI. They're doing crazy things. Max also. Sure. Like, sales hacker and. Right. And myself. So we go to a place called Bolden Acres. Bolden Acres is like, this fun bar in Austin. They've got pickleball, right? Like, it's just a fun thing. And we were there for probably five hours, right? You know, eating, drinking, pickleballing. But all we talked about for almost five hours, sales scaling, recruiting, going public, raising money. Different. Like, this is all we talked about for five hours. And at one point, I was like, man, like, I wish I could, like, take a mic and put it on the table so people could listen to. Like, this is what we talk about this. Like, those are my five people. Now, all five of those people are great people. But if we've been sitting there for five hours talking about the football game on the weekend, it doesn't matter that they were great people. We're not talking about the right things, right? And so those. Those are the things, right? Like, I golf with Jake. We're out there having a blast, talking about the most random ideas and softwares we would start. And, like, how do you know when to fire somebody who's the last person you like? So surround yourself with people that you can have great conversations with. That's what elevates you, right? And these people that you follow, see, if you can't get a conversation with them, you might be shocked how many of Them are willing to say, hey, I got 30 minutes for you. Let's do this.

That's so true. And just to ask. Sometimes I find, like, even if you can get yourself to ask, you'll be surprised what comes out of it. Most people don't ask.

Absolutely.

It's shocking. Okay, for the last question, if you could give us all homework for the week, it could be to eat a certain food. It could be to try a breathing exercise. It could be to read the book that you're reading. What would be your homework assignment that you would give us?

Start one small, healthy habit. Start one. I'm not going to be prescriptive to what it is, but as soon as I say it, something pops into everybody's head. Start one small, healthy habit. And when I say small, I do mean small, right? If you want to start reading more, read a page a day for the next week. Page a day. If you're trying to cut back on your phone time, set a limit on it minus one hour. You've been averaging six. Shut it off at five. Right? Like, it's the small things to come back. You want to exercise, exercise for five minutes, right? Throw some weight in a backpack. Go walk for five minutes. Go walk down the block and walk back. But, like, start one small habit. And do you make it small? You make it laughable. You make it like, why am I even doing this? Because that's why you'll do it. We tend to go the opposite direction, right? We're like, oh, I'm gonna go run a marathon tomorrow. Dude, you haven't run five miles. Like, what? Like, small, small. That would be my advice. Pick one habit that you know, like, you know, you know, there's we all got something we know. Pick one of them, and how small can you make it to get it started? That would be my home.

I love that. That's so good. My one small thing that I'm going to do is I'm going to be emailing you after this saying, can we just nerd out on Patreon? Let's set up separate time about it.

Count me in.

That will be my one small habit. So for somebody who is like, oh, my God, Katie's amazing. He just won me over during this chat. Where's the best place for them to learn from you, find your content, interact with you?

For sure. And if you thought I was amazing on this, just know this is all smoke and mirrors. Like, I'm all talk. Like, none of this is real. I'm just a paid actor that Kim found on LinkedIn. But no, I mean, you can follow me on LinkedIn. Unfortunately, I'm at the stupid connection request limit, so I actually can't accept connections. But you can follow me there for, like, you know, I post. I've cut back there a little bit, but I post at least three to four times a week. My Patreon is where you can get like, my heavy stuff. So that's like real, like, trainings, coaching. I do AMAs. There's a Slack channel. Like, it's way more like, intensive around. Like, the reason I did it is because, like LinkedIn, you can only teach so much in 1300 character. Come chat. This was one hour. Y' all got one hour of interaction with me. Like, that's where you start to get some of, like, the. The juicy stuff. So the Patreon is called Inside Sales Excellence. My podcast is called Live Better Sell Better. It's on Apple and Spotify, maybe other places. I don't know. Like, I'm not a professional podcaster. I just do interviews and put them on there. So those are. Those are the places to follow. And, you know, like, I wish everyone the best of luck and best of success and whatever it is you are trying to achieve. And if I can ever be a resource in that, just let me know.

Katie, you are such a gem. Thank you, thank you, thank you for joining. I owe you so big. And look out for an email from me in the next like 10 minutes.

Now, real quick though, just because I can and I'm on here, that's not a habit you reaching out for. Hell, I want to know what your small habit is going to be. I'm happy to talk to you about Patreon, but I want to know what the small habits going to be.

I'm gonna. I'm gonna limit my screen time. I've been publicly shamed by you, so now I'm going to set up. I think you can set up like, child locks. So I will set up Kim locks on here to make me stop looking at my phone so much.

There you go.

Done. Well, thank you, Katie, and thank you everybody for joining. Follow Katie, follow me, and we will see you here next week. Bye, everybody. That was some good stuff. Thanks for being a part of this week's Coffee with Kim. If podcasts are your thing, subscribe to the show and you'll see a new episode appear next week in your favorite listening app. If you want to be a part of the conversation, join us live on Wednesdays at 1pm Eastern over on LinkedIn. You can RSVP. I want you to have your questions answered. Because why should I get to have all the fun? And let's be honest, you know how to ask some hard hitting questions. My guests and I cannot wait to meet you. See you soon.