MBA1041 How Small Gifts Can Make a Big Difference

Hey O welcome to the Hundred Dollar RMBA show. Taking your business to the next level every single day with our daily 10 minute business lessons for the real world. I'm your host, your coach, your teacher Omar Zenholm. I'm also the co founder of the $100 MBA, a complete business training and community online over at 100mba.net. In today's lesson you'll How Small Gifts can make a big difference. I'm going to share with you some stories and some strategies to show you the psychology behind these small gifts and how they can really affect and improve your business and relationships and open opportunities for you you normally would not have. Now this is not bribery in any way. These are tokens of appreciation. These are thoughtful gifts. These are ways of saying thank you for that conversation or that introduction or just doing business with us. I'll tell you what kind of gifts work best and how to do it without breaking the bank. We got lots to cover so let's get into it. Let's get down to business. Today's episode of the Hundred Dollar MBA show is supported by Podia. Podia helps thousands of creators earn money from their passion. It's an all in one digital storefront that you can sell courses, memberships and digital downloads in one place. It's the most creator friendly platform on the market with zero transaction fees and a super friendly 247 life support team no matter what plane you're on. So they're going to take care of you even if you're just getting started. What's great about Podia is that it eliminates all the technical headaches. It takes care of every aspect of selling your course or membership or digital download. If you got video courses, they do the video hosting for you. If you want an easy way to charge your members on a reoccurring basis for a membership, Podia takes care of it. You want a secure way for people to download your products. When they pay for them, they take care of that too. They also offer free migrations on their Shaker plan. Best of all, Podia puts their money where their mouth is. They have a 30 day free trial with no credit card required. So if you don't love it, you don't pay a penny. If you're looking to start an online course, sell any kind of digital product or start a membership site, check them out and support the show by going to podia.com that's P O D I-a.com MBA let me start by sharing a story about how powerful gift giving is in business. A Few years ago, I attended a conference called fincon. Had the honor of speaking at the conference, so I had the opportunity to network with other speakers. One of those speakers was somebody I really admired from afar, kind of new through some, you know, online conversations. But we weren't friends. Well, at least not yet. And that person is Noah Kagan. Noah Kagan is the founder of Sumo.com and AppSumo. He's also the founder of the newly relaunched Kingsumo, a great platform for giveaways and referrals. And for those who don't know, Noah's been in tech for some time. He was employee 30 at Facebook, one of the early people at Mint. And as somebody who was starting a tech company, Webinar Ninja, myself, I really looked up to him and what he's built with Sumo.com and being self funded. So I had a chance to get to know him a little bit, talk to him at the conference, have dinner, and I really felt honored and I really felt lucky that I got to know him a little bit. And I sincerely told him at the conference, hey, man, I would love to continue to be friends and get to know each other when we go back home and maybe we can set up some Skype calls. And we actually did, and we followed through that and we're really good friends now. But to my surprise, when I got home from the conference, there was a little gift at my door, a little package from Amazon, and it was a book, and it was actually a gift from Noah. When we were having our conversations over dinner, just in passing, he was asking me, what kind of books do you read? I mentioned a few books that I've read recently that I really liked. He told me that he's trying to get into fiction to kind of relax his mind before bed. And he mentioned that he just finished reading Ready Player One and I have to read this book. It's an amazing book, it's a fun story and you'll really enjoy it. I said, okay, sure. I don't read fiction that much, but I'll check it out when I get a chance. Now, as you can guess, that little package from Amazon was that book Ready Player One. He had a little thank you note inside the book thanking me for the good conversation and a little gift to say, hey, here's the book. Read it. That small gift, that less than $10 purchase had a profound effect on me. I was like, wow, so thoughtful of Noah to remember this book and order it. And in fact, later on I asked him about it and he said, well, I Just ordered it on my phone, you know, know, while you went to the bathroom. So I don't forget. I ordered the book and I sent it to you. And I asked him, well, how did you get my address? Well, he said, well, you're a sumo customer, and I just asked my team to give me your billing address. So he found a way to send me this book somehow. And for a while, we went back and forth sending each other books that we recommend. So that exercise where he gave me a small gift had a profound effect on me, and it really did three things. Number one, I just generally liked Noah because. Because he's thoughtful and he got me that little small gift. Number two, I have a pretty good impression of him because he's an action taker. He just does things like send you a book in the mail. Number three, I'm more likely to want to do business in the future. And we actually did. We did a lot of partnerships with each other, with each other's businesses, which was a lot of fun. So I share this story to show you that a small gift can go a long way. If you meet somebody interesting, somebody you look up to, or somebody even want them to be your mentor, pay attention to what they say, what they like, and send them a gift in the mail. If you don't have their address, ask them for their address. Hey, I would love a mailing address to give you your office, give your home. I'd like to just send you a quick thank you note. They're not going to say no. Just send them an email and they'll give you that information. And again, it could be simple things, like a book. You want to get a little fancier. It could be a little care package, a little basket full of goodies like nuts and chocolate. I remember a few years ago, Nicole and I were invited to Dave Ramsey's event, the Entre Leadership Summit. They really loved our podcast and they thought, hey, we would love to have you guys over as guests at our summit. And this is a huge, expensive summit. People pay thousands of dollars to get a ticket. And he gave us VIP tickets. And not only then, he took care of our accommodations and everything. I was like, wow, that's so generous of them. And it was a fantastic event. And I shared that story on the podcast before I went to the event. And they heard about that, that we talked about the actual Entre Leadership Summit on our podcast, and they were even super grateful we did that. And I was like, wow. I just felt, like, obligated to do that. And then they gave us another gift. They sent us a care package, a huge care package of chocolates and brownies and things like that to our house. So you better believe I love Dave Ramsey. And if Dave Ramsey ever approached me and said, hey, I'd love to do a mutually beneficial thing or work together or my ears are going to be open, I'm going to talk to me, Dave. Let's see what we can do. This is because they were very generous with me. And when people approach you with generosity, you just want to reciprocate. That's just how it is. Now, the key to all of this, whether you're giving somebody a small token gift like a book or even just a thank you letter, a physical letter or postcard that you write, the whole key to this is not to believe you should get something in return, not to expect that you should get something in return. And we learned this tip from one of our guest teachers, Jordan Harbinger, from the Jordan Harbinger Show. Great podcast, by the way. Give these gifts as sort of like, hey, this is just what I do. It's like giving out a business card, except I give out gifts and they go a long way. It makes you memorable, it makes you thoughtful. And not every single person you give a gift to, they're going to feel appreciative and want to do business with you. But chances are most of them, or some of them will if. And it's a good practice to have. And ever since that experience I had with Noah, I've been picking up this habit and try to give small gifts to not only people that I want to get to know, but people that I already know that I just want to, you know, just thank them for being a friend. I want to reiterate, this is selfless giving. This is thank you note type of giving. This is I'm thinking about you, and I appreciate the time we had together. Giving, not bribery. We're not bribing anyone. We're not expecting anything in return. We're not telling them, I'll give you this for that. This doesn't work that way. You got to be selfless in your giving. That's how it works. And one hidden benefit that you don't realize in the moment is that this becomes your reputation. People see you as a generous person, a giver, and not a taker. Guys, I got more on today's episode. But before that, let me give love to today's sponsor. Building online courses, memberships, and digital downloads is a great way to earn money by sharing your knowledge with others. But a lot of these tools out there are so complicated that it's a headache just to get started. Podia eliminates all the hassles. It handles your sales page, your email marketing, your payment processing, your content, hosting and delivery all in one gorgeous designed package. It gets out of your way and makes it easy to create and sell. Best of all, unlike the competition, Podia takes zero and we mean zero transaction fees. So you actually keep what you earn. I love what Podia offers. The ease to sell your courses, your products and your memberships while looking gorgeous. And it's super simple to get started. Their customer support, top notch. And they believe in their products so much that they give you the first 30 days totally for free. There's no commitment and there's no credit card required. Just try it and if you love it, just hang on. If you don't, you don't pay a dime. So there's no excuses. It's never been easier to get started and make money from your passion. Join over 10,000 creators and start selling today with a 30 day free trial at Podia. Just go to podia.commba to get this offer again. Go to podia.commba that's Podia P O D I A.com MBA to wrap up today's lesson. This is not a revolutionary idea. Back in the day, people used to give out Christmas cards every every Christmas to all their contacts, personal and business. It was something sweet to get a nice little card from somebody every single Christmas in the mail. It was a reminder that, hey, I'm thinking of you and you're important enough that I wrote you a handwritten note. Another idea or twist on that idea is sending out a thank you card on the anniversary on the day you met this person. So if you meet somebody and you really think, hey, this is a great person to know and build a relationship with, maybe make a note of when you met them or go back to your calendar and see where and when you met them and put a reminder to send them a thank you note every year at that time. That wraps up today's lesson. If you love the show, leave us an itunes rating and a review. We'd love to hear from you what you love about the show. I read every single review. Just tell us what you love, what we should keep doing so I can keep pumping out these episodes for you. Before I go, I want to leave you with this. I understand if you're bootstrapping your business, if your finances are super tight. I've been there, trust me. This may sound like I really can't afford to give these, you know, gifts every so often. My advice to you is make a budget. Even if that budget is only $100 a year, you're putting aside $100 for the whole year and you're saying, hey, I'm gonna send $10 gifts to 10 people this, this year. That's gonna make a big difference. And you only invested $100. You can lose $100 in a few seconds on a Facebook ad. The point here is that put some money aside, even if it's something minimal, it's gonna make a huge difference in your business, in your relationships, and in your own life. It feels good to give. Alright, I'll check you in tomorrow's episode. I'll see you, Sam.