11,000+ Followers - Thank You! Let's Start Over.
Elliot Grossbard ???
I take a Growth?listic approach to building sustainable growth. I work with startups - scaling founder-led sales and SMBs ? A growth mindset isn't just for individuals; it's the driving force behind successful companies.
Welcome to my newsletter Stop Selling; Start Helping - "Thoughts, Lessons, and Rumblings from 30 Years of Sales, Marketing, and Leadership."
First check out the weekly What I Learned This Weekend, which shares posts worth saving, people to follow, articles I've read, what I found on social media, and "Innovative Profiles Headlines". Each week I share what I learned from the past week(end) so you don't have to.
I also regularly share lessons learned, old-school guidance, and tips in business, leadership, and life; leaving a legacy for my children and grandchildren through "An 'E'-volving Mindset".
Should I be expecting a LinkedIn plaque celebrating surpassing the 11k mark like YouTube celebrates their creator awards? (Good idea right?) I don't know how my follower count matches up with others but it's not my primary focus. I did a bit of digging and was unable to find these statistics.
Thank you to all those who have joined me in my second act which I refer to as Elliot 2.0. Turning 50 has given me an extra jolt on top of the two cups of coffee I had this morning. Many of you have begun following me upon seeing one of my #HiringHeroes posts.
If the concept of Hiring Heroes is new to you, you can quickly get caught up here. And make sure to be vocal here.
With all the frustration we see people going through as they struggle to find their next job, on a small level, it's nice to know that there are authentic and caring people on LinkedIn that intentionally share open roles they find in their network. Many of them index and verify the open roles making it easier for those searching and applying to what seems to be hundreds of positions.
The Hiring Heroes initiative is my small way of doing what I can to help promote these unsung heroes and by proxy job seekers. Ten minutes here, five minutes there, my father used to say:
"It's the little things that often make the biggest difference."
Hitting the 11,000 mark made me feel it was time to introduce and to many re-introduce myself. My intention is to create the opportunity for us to connect on a deeper level as well as lay down the foundation for warm engagements with each other.
I'm a people person. I love people, well most people. I'm also a salesperson, and proud of it. But I didn't always feel that way about sales.
I grew up in a suburb of Detroit, in a close community of Jews. Religious Jews generally settle down and purchase homes based on the location of their schools, synagogues, and community centers because all three are a central part of our religion and beliefs. Growing up in Detroit had the benefit of the Midwest hospitality and grace. Our next-door neighbor was (and still is last time I visited!) was a Black family that till this day I still believe had a pet Tiger in their basement. I was friends with their only daughter despite going to different schools and different families.
Our back door was left unlocked more often than not (despite being a suburban neighborhood, it was still Detroit) though I'm unsure if that was really safe even back then. My parents' friends often had Uncle and Aunt before their name because calling them Mr. So and So was too formal. We had Farmer Jacks and A&P grocery stores close by and going to the 7-Eleven and Baskin Robbins after Little League was a requirement.
I remember when my father asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up, I was about 12. My reply was, not what I wanted to be but what I was going to be; "The Jewish Jordan." Now before you point out how a kid from Detroit was emulating Michael Jordan from the Chicago Bulls, I'll point out that I was not a fan of the Bulls. I was then a Detroit Pistons "Bad Boys" fan like everyone else following Isiah Thomas, Kelly Trapuka, and Vinny "The Microwave" Johnson. But in order to watch Pistons' games on TV you had to pay extra for that channel, whereas WGN Chicago was included for free in the basic cable package. Inevitably I saw and respected the greatness of Jordan, and recorded every game on a VHS cassette in order to learn his moves to perform on the basketball court. (Although I never made it past 5'8" I could dunk one-handed at 9.5' and at times two-handed on a regulation 10' rim) ??
My father told me that it was a nice dream but that I was going to be a salesperson, which I hated hearing because, A) Thanks for crushing my dream Dad, and B) My image of a salesperson was a guy with slicked back hair in a sharkskin suit just the way they portrayed them in the movies. When I asked him why would he think that, he said, "Because you like talking to people, and people genuinely like talking to you".
He was right. Though I didn't understand it yet.
Fast forward - Once married and needing to find my first job I opened the classifieds (in a real newspaper) and did what anyone would do; look for the first job they could get, sales. And the rest is well, still being written.
The title of this newsletter is Stop Selling; Start Helping. I first read that quote from Zig Ziglar years ago and internalized it. It's been on my wall ever since I became a sales leader. Everyone is in sales, yes even you. You sell to your kids, your wife sells you, you sell yourself to the driver to let you cut in on the exit ramp of the freeway.
Think about it. Teachers have to convince students that what they are teaching them is important, useful, and for some fun. I imagine Algerba teachers being some of the best salespeople on the planet!
The difference between HELPING and SELLING is:
A few years ago a client gave me the title CHO - Chief Helping Officer and I loved it.
Over what is almost three decades in this profession called sales I've embodied what I've learned from others, and developed my own thoughts along the way. I'll share some now:
Some of you may be licking your lips at the site of these hot and fresh boxes of Krispy Kreme donuts, but not me; I'm actually trying not to get sick.
Towards the end of 2003, I was hired by an Educational Furniture company based out of New Jersey. Essentially my job was to grow their presence in South Florida by visiting decision makers of educational furniture and equipment. My daily destinations were public and private schools, preschools, universities, churches, etc., and build relationships with office staff, principals, facilities managers, and the like. I wanted to be memorable between visits, emails, or calls, they would remember me and would continue building rapport. An older sales rep for the company in a different region used to wear bow ties to stand out but that was not happening.
A 5-minute drive from my house there's a Krispy Kreme location whose glowing HOT red neon sign is on 20 hours a day practically. Every morning I would pick up a few dozen doughnuts and bring them with me to the schools I visited. I accomplished two things. It sure was memorable. One time I visited without any doughnuts and was attacked with "No doughnuts Elliot?" The other? My car stunk like Krispy Kreme until I turned the lease in.
Harvey Mackay is my oldest mentor coming inat a young 92 years of age. He's also the most friendly and wisest. A little about Harvey:
领英推荐
Mackay is a seven-time, New York Times best-selling author of "Swim With The Sharks Without Being Eaten Alive", and "Beware the Naked Man Who Offers You His Shirt." Both books are among the top 15 inspirational business books of all time, according to the 纽约时报 . In total, Harvey’s books have sold 10 million copies worldwide, translated into 46 languages and sold in 80 countries. Harvey is also a nationally syndicated columnist for United Feature Syndicate. His weekly articles appear in nearly 100 newspapers across the country. Harvey is one of America’s most popular and entertaining business speakers. Toastmasters International named him one of the top five speakers in the world along with Tony Robbins and Governor Mario Cuomo. He has spoken, weekly, to Fortune 1000 companies around the world for more than 30 years.?
He is among the top 30 thought leaders on leadership by the American Management Association. Others on the list include Jack Welch, Sir Richard Branson, and John Maxwell.
My three favorite books of his that have impacted my wife beyond words are in order; "Dig Your Well Before You're Thirsty, Pushing The Envelope, and the most recent The Mackay MBA of Selling?In the Real World.
I'm a big believer in acquiring multiple mentors in your life. Another mentor of mine, a bit younger than me, Gary Vaynerchuck.
It's easy to get lost in the GaryVee persona that has grown over the years. You can allow his enthusiasm and motivation to consume much of your time. In between the boatloads of content is a genius and a really nice guy. Gary is a social media, marketing, and branding trailblazer and continues to be the person I go back to when it comes to anything digital.
He is a student of what he does and continuously works on knowing, understanding, testing, and doing. It's been a few years since we last had an in-person chat as he and his Vayner empire has 20X 'd over the years. I recall schmoozing with him in the Green Room before he took the stage for his keynote. He was painting a picture of what he was building. Back then there was only Vayner Media, Vayner Talent, and The Sasha Group. It's amazing to see VaynerX today and what he stenciled out for me. Vayner Sports was about to be announced shortly after our chat, Vayner Speakers, and the eventual umbrella parent company VaynerX was in the works where Gary was building the foundation of verticals of service and divisions so any brand that became a client could be handled under the same rook while each arm operating individually.
Earlier this year VaynerX opened their Miami location, something I and the wonderful former VaynerMedia employee Whitney Holtzman , now CEO of Social Victories , a social media and marketing agency that caters to athletes and who currently also is an NFL Agent. Think about a player and their individual brand having their personal CMO. That's Whit. Anyhow, I won as #VMFL was being fought over where they would eventually find a home. Tampa or Miami. I win just like the Panthers beat the Lightning.
With mentors, I think it's important to know that it's okay to taste the cool aid without having to feel that you need to drink the entire bottle of cool aid. Over the years I've learned how to do that with the GaryVee persona, on 24/7 Hustle culture. It's not for everyone. But like I have told all my kids, employees, and clients, and G-d willing I'll be around to tell also my Grandchildren; " You can learn anything from anyone. Hopefully, it's only the good things.\"
Without going down the list of the other mentors, I'll pause to give you a current update:
At the end of 2021, the Digital Agency that I was Head of Sales for and led towards record growth, Arora Project , was acquired by Republic a top three regulation equity crowdfunding portal. After raising $50 million in VC funding, Republic used almost all of the funds for acquisitions. Many startups do this to excel in hyper-growth. The downside is at the end of the day Papa and Mama Bear 9Investors) want to see the numbers. At the end of 2022 and the completion of another acquisition, this time of Europe's larger investment portal Seedrs, financial cuts were unsurprisingly made and layoffs were inevitable including the entire Arora Project team.
I learned a good amount from the younger Arora who is a methodical and organized leader and we worked well as a team and hope to do it again in the future. It was there working with Krishan Arora and the people at Wefunder that in fell in love with working with founders.
When a startup was considering raising capital via equity crowdfunding, eventually they found their way to us. Helping 50+ startups raise over $125 million during my brief tenure was fulfilling enough, but what got my juices flowing was the intimate involvement in helping founders craft their narrative in order to tell the story of their vision to investors and customers. I was generally the first point of contact for founders and vetted which startups had the best chance of successfully raising up to $5 million in funds via RegCF. I did not say yes to everyone. There were plenty of companies and founders that were not ready, did not have enough traction, frankly, there were some that I just did not see being a good investment.
For the ones that were a good fit, I was hands-on beyond the campaign design, pitch, and marketing of the raise, and follow through with investors. Helping founders tell their stories a bit differently, from a different perspective, adding in a market they never thought of before, and the development of their GTM strategy was what I loved the most. That was what convinced me to open Growth?listic and continue doing it.
And that brings us to today. Drinking coffee, finishing up this newsletter on LinkedIn, and loving what I do and want to do more of it. I'll leave the link here to Growthlistic 's website for you to do your own research. https://www.growthlistic.com/
So that's it. Not all of it, but good enough for now for this CHO who:
A few hits that you most definitely did not know about me:
Feel free to reach out and connect, chat, and engage. Worst thing I can do is not have time and say no.
Learned something new or enjoy this week? Let me know with a ?? like and a ?? comment!
If you have someone I should follow, posts you found interesting, articles you've read, found something you enjoyed from social media, or seen some crazy profile headlines, please share it in the comments!