Daniel Disney: Mastering LinkedIn for Sales Success

A lot of salespeople, you're right, come straight into a sales role, no experience, and they're sending spammy, non-personalized messages trying to direct sell on LinkedIn, and that isn't working and will never work. Hey, everyone. Welcome back to Make It Happen Mondays, where we talk about sales, business, entrepreneurship, personal growth, mental health, and everything in between with guests who I truly respect and I think make a positive impact on the world around us. Now, today's guest is Daniel Disney, the king of social selling on LinkedIn. Now, if you don't know Daniel, then you're probably not doing much on LinkedIn these days because he is all over it. And I wanted to bring him on the podcast because I'm personally trying to up my LinkedIn game.

I don't know if you've noticed, but I'm trying to do more posts out there. I've tried to update my profile and a few other things. And I wanted to talk with Daniel specifically about his strategies and also his business because this is what he does. So we took an angle here of solopreneurship and what it takes to be successful as an entrepreneur, but also what's going on on LinkedIn right now. And I started by asking him his feedback on a post that I did a while ago that got a few ruffled feathers out there when I said that LinkedIn is not a direct selling platform. It's more of a networking and a, you know, brand building and impression marketing almost in a lot of ways. So we dove into that plus a lot more and got into some tactics as well.

And quite frankly, I'm going to have him on my workshop here for my members to do a very detailed and very tactical program coming up here this week. So if you're not part of the membership, you might want to check it out because you get some really cool content like this and a lot more. So anyways, I hope you enjoy the conversation as much as I did. Let's make it happen. Daniel Disney, welcome to Make It Happen Monday podcast, my friend. How you doing, brother? I am very good, John. I'm so excited to be here chatting with you on your podcast. I think we've kind of known each other digitally for many years now. We've been in this game for a bit of a while, so I love it when we get any chance to chat.

So hopefully this conversation is going to be pretty exciting. Likewise, my friend. I think that's one of the things that's fun about social, right? Like you feel like you get to know people, but you don't know them until then all of a sudden. And it's always refreshing, I find, when you find somebody who is their persona, right? So it's not like they're somebody else. You know, there's that whole adage, you know, you're like, never meet your heroes type of thing. Like if you idolize somebody and then you meet them in person, you're like, oh man, that person sucks. And so all your childhood memories go away. But I think you're pretty true to form on, uh, on your, on your social presence and your real presence, man.

So I appreciate that about you. Well, I think it's, it's harder to try and be someone else than it is to just be yourself. And if you want to do this long-term and be consistent, then the easiest thing you can do is just be you. That's, that's what I keep telling people. You know, it's funny because, you know, a lot of the feedback, I don't know about you, but like, cause you do keynotes and everything else. But you know, when you get off stage, you always want to have that like, oh man, I love your, your message. I loved your story. I loved, you know, and, oh, I love your style. Right. But you always want your style to almost be secondary. You want the message to really be the one that resonates.

But man, recently, you know, three, four or five years, the majority of the feedback that I tend to get is, man, I just love how real you are, like the style, like that type of stuff. And it's almost like, I don't know. I don't understand it because to your point, it's so much easier to be authentic than it is to be full of shit. And why do you think so many, let's, I mean, I want to take this conversation a bunch of different ways, but obviously with LinkedIn, cause we'll get to your background here in a second where you are, but why do you think so many people feel like they have to be somebody different on social than they actually are? Do you know what, John, is because everyone's trying to play the game.

Everyone wants to be an influencer and get all the engagement. So they're all trying to follow what other people are doing. They'll see someone doing on LinkedIn and they'll think, well, okay, I need to do what they do. I need to share those tweet quotes, or I need to share the selfies or the pictures of me looking into the distance and sharing these really deep, but you know, everyone's trying to be someone else because they think that's what's going to work. And it's, it's not easy. I mean, you know, as well as I do, John, building your confidence as a creator and certainly sharing you and your stories is a journey. But again, I think it's the flashy lights that sometimes people see and they think, well, that's what I need to do.

Then I'm just going to copy that. And the problem is if you are trying to be someone else, you will get caught out at some point, whether it's digitally or whether it's in person and you go and work with someone and actually you don't deliver on what you've promised, you've painted this big picture of all these successes, and maybe that's not where you are. And the beauty of it is, I think this is the key to this because we can throw shade at all the people that make those mistakes, but the beauty of it is there is a place on LinkedIn and social for everyone. You could be an SDR with no experience and have so much value just in sharing your journey of successes, failures, learnings, by just being yourself.

If you're an SDR and you try and be a thought leader or an expert and start dictating, that's probably going to be a bigger trap than it will be a success. So I think it's a good opportunity sort of hidden within it. When did you find your voice? So, because I agree with you, I think there's a moment, in sales, I call it catching your sales group, right? Where there's a moment where you just wake up one day and it's just a little bit easier than it was the day before, right? You don't know when that was, but I always say it's when you stop pitching your solutions and you start having conversations about your solutions. You start caring more about what the client needs and what you do about your own commission check, right?

But for you on social, and you know what, let's preface this because I think we jumped ahead and then the audience might even have a good contact. Let's give a little context, Daniel, on your journey, right? And then through that journey, I'd love to learn when you really feel like you, like, forget about what everybody else said, but feel like you found your voice and caught it. So, but before that, let's back all the way to the origin story, my friend, not your work origin. Anybody can read your LinkedIn profile and obviously most people do, but talk to me about growing up as a kid, parents, like what were the influences and then where did you catch that entrepreneurial bug? And then where did you find your voice?

So let's back up there and give the context and dive into some of that. I love it. And I'll try and make this story sort of as efficient as possible. Remember, let me start with this. I am here today to everyone who's watching this, you know, physically, you'll see me in my red t-shirt, hashtag social selling written across it. And, and to your point, John, I didn't wake up like this. This wasn't like I joined LinkedIn, put on this red t-shirt and became the Dan Disney that people might know now. So I'll show exactly at what point that that part of the voice was, was really sort of found. But I mean, pretty standard, not very exciting life pre-work, you know, sort of typical family, mum, dad, I've got a sister, you know, went through school, very shy at school.

I think my parents were worried when I was maybe 12, 13, tried to push me into like drama class just to build some confidence because I was very, very much an introverted child. And that has stuck. I'm quite an introverted person, really don't feel that need to talk, you know, unless I've got something relevant to say, but that was kind of the crux of my school life. Now, when I started to get towards college, business started to interest me. I was always quite a creative person, quite artistic. So there was, and psychology really fascinated me. So there were these sort of ingredients that I think when I went out into the working world and got my first job in sales, it all kind of came together.

And I fell in love with sales from day one, just talking to people, finding out their problems, building solutions, building relationships. There was everything that I loved, the business, the psychology, the helping. And so it all kind of came together. Now, fast forward throughout my corporate sales career, climbed the corporate ladder where the sort of creative artistic side started to come in. First of all, when I started to become a sales leader and I could lead my team's design training programs, find ways to motivate and inspire my team. I started writing newsletters just for my team, not on a network, just an email newsletter to my team to, you know, here's what's working, here's the successes, some motivations and training, you know.

So the creative part started to ooze in and then obviously LinkedIn comes along and here is this professional social network that I can, A, start to use to sell, but equally, I was able to have a bit of a platform to take my experiences, my learnings, my interests and share them with a bigger audience. I was now able to, you know, share my stories and impact salespeople and sales leaders globally. And so that was, I guess, the first part of that voice, you know, voice journey. But again, it was probably maybe two years into that journey that I started to evolve. And it, it was, it was a journey, John, like you're sharing content on a semi-consistent basis. And each post you learn, each comment, you learn each conversation, you learn and you adapt and you start to find what you're most interested in, where you can help the most.

And it eventually started to grow that social selling and LinkedIn was my real passion. And then eventually I bought four t-shirts. One was black, one was blue, one was green, and one was red. And you can see some of those posts of that timeframe. I'm wearing each different one. And I can't really remember the exact three. I mean, I love the color red, but red stuck. And, and that was then the sort of real growth and elevation. But there's a bit of a whistle-stop tour through my career and kind of where the voice came into it. Hey, I hope you're enjoying the conversation so far. I want to take a quick minute to share with you what I'm working on these days with my new JB sales membership. It includes live monthly training delivered by me on my two signature courses, which are filling the funnel and driving a close that cover all aspects of the sales process.

It also includes monthly workshops that'll be running on specific sales skills and different tech skills like ChatGPT and how to leverage AI throughout the entire sales process. Finally, the membership gives you access to my entire online catalog with every course and every tip I've ever done. And as an exclusive offer to my podcast listeners, if you go to jbarrows.com, click on the individual membership link and use coupon code podcast at checkout, you'll get 25% off. Now let's get back to the conversation. I love it. When did you, if you don't mind me how old are you? Uh, so I'm 37, 37. All right. So I'm 48. Um, when did you get on LinkedIn? Like when did, did you get it? Cause I, I got on, I found out my number on 36,541.

So I got on super early, but I also had probably about two to three years of business and networking experience without even knowing what LinkedIn was. So when did you get on and, and how much kind of experience did you have in business before you got on? And I'll tell you the reason I want to ask this question with some context afterwards, but yeah, I think it's a really good question. So I think I joined LinkedIn in, in 2012. And by this point I was quite heavy into my B2B corporate sales career. So I'd spend years door knocking, cold calling, you know, I had a lot of professional networking experience and I think you're right in where you're going to go with this. That was very helpful when I sort of joined LinkedIn.

I started posting consistently around 2015, but that experience definitely carried some weight. And I think I know where you're going to go with this. Yeah. Cause I wrote a post that kind of ruffled a few feathers the other, uh, the other last week or so when I said LinkedIn, I don't believe LinkedIn is a direct selling platform. I think it's a networking platform. I think it's a brand platform. I think it's a marketing platform in a lot of ways, an exposure platform and an education platform, but a direct selling platform. I think if you were to put it on the list of priorities of what LinkedIn is, I think it's, it's towards the bottom. And I got a lot of people pissed off at me about, well, what are you talking about?

And I'm like, hold on a second. I feel fortunate in the sense that before I got on, before I was even introduced to LinkedIn, I was at, to your point, the networking events. I was going to networking groups. I was meeting with people face to face. And I saw like when I would introduce myself and pitch them on my solutions, like how uncomfortable that feeling was their body language there, how they would try to get out of a conversation fast with me and go to meet with somebody else or whatever it is. So I, so I kind of understood the essence of networking, the essence of brand building, even though I didn't really understand it at the time. So when LinkedIn came, it was like very natural for me to use it in that way.

But now that so many reps start their careers in this window that we're looking at right now, right? They, they have no exposure to the, you know, real world of networking or relationships and everything else. I feel like they skip that part of it and they try to just go for the, go for the sale or go for the post that's, and so many reps don't build their brand because there isn't a short term benefit to it. They're like, yeah, yeah, I get it. I should be posting, but I got to close some deals this week. Like if I don't, I'm going to get fired. So is, do you think there is something about the lack of context of how to network that is hurting people who are on LinkedIn right now? And how do you see it as if you were to prioritize what LinkedIn is to you, what would that be?

It's a really good question. And first of all, I just want to identify that the solution to this whole problem that we're kind of alluding to now is down to the sales leaders. I know the pressure sits on the, the sales reps, the SDRs, but ultimately it's the leaders that are setting the KPIs, the metrics, the training and the support. And I think there really needs to be a growth in that. But I, I agree with everything you're saying, John, completely. And I think there's a huge advantage that comes from real sort of almost traditional based sales skills. But I will throw a caveat in that I do, I personally prioritize LinkedIn as a, as a selling platform quite high up when it's done right. I think LinkedIn is a tremendous selling platform because if you can send good messages, it's no different to picking up the phone and speaking to someone, you're just having that conversation on LinkedIn because there are a lot of people that just don't answer the phone anymore.

But again, to your context and the point that I really think we should discuss, which is a lot of salespeople, you're right, come straight into a sales role, no experience, and they're sending spammy, non-personalized messages trying to direct or I say direct sell on LinkedIn. And that isn't working and will never work. And I think if we take some steps back, we need to look at the strategies that sales leaders are putting out there with the training, the KPIs, the metrics, the measurements, all those things. Because if you can teach your salespeople how to use LinkedIn as all the many ways that you can use it and support them and coach them and guide them. And it's not like, for example, John, you've just started your role as an SDR.

We need you to send 50 DMs on LinkedIn every day. Here's a template. Just, you know, that's not going to work. But if we can say, look, try and have five to 10 good conversations, make sure you do some research, personalize those messages, look for the most relevant people that we can help is some examples of companies that we've worked with, some ROI. If you go down that route, well, then you're going to start to unlock the opportunities. No different, again, to picking up the phone or sending some good emails. But, you know, you're right. A lot of salespeople are doing it wrong. And let's be fair, the reason they're doing it wrong is because that's what they're told to do. Yeah. They don't get any guidance to it.

I think that's the problem, right? It's like, I think we, you know, for me at least, I learned a lot through osmosis in the sense of being around other sales professionals, being around other people and just kind of being perceptive, right? Like looking around and saying, okay, I see what works and what doesn't work and whatever. And I don't know whether it's always been there for me, but I've always kind of had that long term play here. It's like, I know there's a short term gain, but if I do that, then it's not going to long term, it's going to be, you know, and I don't know where that came from, probably my parents, but I think that's what my, right now there's so much noise on LinkedIn that people are almost discouraged in a lot of ways.

Like Shelly, she's actually, she's one of my, um, my former trainers and now I work with her and she's just chugging away at LinkedIn and she's just like, she just, and she called me the other day. She's like, I feel like, you know, things have all gone down and I go, this is kind of like the housing market, Shelly. It's like when I bought in my house in 2007, I bought it at the peak of the market and everybody was like, oh my God, like, what are you going to do? The market crashed. Like your house worth half as much. I'm like, I'm in this house for the next 20 fucking years. Like I don't care what the market does next. And I say, I say the same thing about LinkedIn. Like I don't care what the algorithm does next week.

I just look to post consistent stuff and eventually it starts to build. So what do you say to that person who is frustrated right now with the lack of engagement, the lack of, of, of exposure, if you will, that they're, they're just not getting it. And they've been at it for maybe even a year or two and they're still not getting that traction. What do you say to that person outside of taking your course, obviously? Um, what do you say to that person? Do you know what? Look at it like an objection. Like if you get an objection, you're going to do one or two things. You're either going to look at it like a wall and you're going to be stuck. You're going to moan. You're going to see it's a dead end.

Oh, everyone says our product's too expensive. There are two types of people, or you're going to think, how do I get over that wall, around that wall, through that wall, whatever is happening on LinkedIn. And then trust me, what is happening now has been happening forever. It will always, there will always be changes in the algorithm, the trends, what works, doesn't work. You've just got to look for more opportunities. So looking at LinkedIn now, okay, sometimes content engagement is down. So look at other ways you can create opportunities. Maybe now's a good time to focus on your messaging strategy and actually just start directly having more conversations instead of relying on the algorithm to generate you inbound.

Maybe you test different forms of content, post at different times, post about different topics. There's, I think there are again, two types of people, people that will sort of sin, hit a wall and just feel a bit stuck. And if you're in that place, by the way, it's not, I'm not criticizing that. Just take a, take a breath, take a moment and then put your thinking cap on us. We all have it in us to find solutions. And that's what you want to do and approach LinkedIn with is a solution mindset. Okay. Engagement's down on this. What else can I do? How else can I get around it? What is doing well on LinkedIn? Because trust me, every time there are always people doing well, and it's the same in sales, John.

I'll have this as you would have had as a sales leader. Someone will come and complain that, you know, I don't know, can't hit target at the moment. But if you've got at least one person hitting target in your team, then you know, it's doable. So look like you would go and look at that person who is hitting target, find out what they're doing. Look at the people that are succeeding on LinkedIn and look, why are they posting? How are they posting? When are they posting? And learn from the people that are succeeding. Look for the solutions. That'd be my biggest tip. Love it. So what do you say? So I'm seeing a lot of, and it seemed to spike a little bit. Now it's not as much, or I'm sure you're seeing it too, as the advent of the AI comments on LinkedIn, right?

These like AI bots. And my philosophy on AI is let it do most of the heavy lifting, get it all the way there. But right before you hit send, right before you, you know, hit comment, just make sure you humanize it. And so I see the value in some of these auto generating LinkedIn comment things in the, because I do believe that a lot of people just don't know what to say, right? It's like, oh, that's an interesting post, but outside of a like or a fire or whatever it is, good posts, like how can I make a post that is somewhat meaningful and, you know, add some value. And I think a lot of people struggle with that. So I think these AI bots, okay, cool. Look at that post, write something for me, but that should give me the ideation.

That should give me something that I say, okay, cool. Now let me really make this my own. But just like everything, you know, when used the right way, yeah, thumbs up when used like 99% of people use it, it's a fucking spam problem and it's going to kill the platform. So A, where are you on the AI component of this? And B, let's talk about how you think about creating content for somebody not like you and me, right? Like you and I, I think we've learned this game. We have a, we have a unique perspective. We have a voice. We tell our journeys. But there's that 22, 23, even 55 year olds who is just like, what the fuck am I supposed to put out there? So A, what are your thoughts on any AI stuff?

And B, regardless of AI, what do you suggest people start talking about when they don't know? I think we share a lot of the same thoughts around AI. I think it's a tremendous tool when used appropriately. I'm very much the same as you, John, where it's great for ideas or even like structures of posts, but you have to, or even comments, you have to humanize it. I think the risk we have, and there are a lot of examples flooding LinkedIn at the moment of people that are posting content. And then you've got five, six people writing the exact same comment. And it's not only a very terribly written comment, but it's the fact that there are the same comments several times. It doesn't look good for you as a creator.

And maybe, maybe it's not your fault. Maybe you, you physically can't control it, but I, I bought this up. I was in LinkedIn's office in New York a few weeks back. And I bought this up with them and they're just as sort of shocked and struggling to understand it and what to do about it. I think as much as, as the users are, I think the bend, the only benefit it offers people are busy and the more senior you are, the more busy you're going to be. So spend time commenting and to spend time commenting as much as you need to really get value. It's just too much time that people don't have. So if you can automate it through a tool, I understand the temptation. And what scares me, I think the most with all of this is the AI will learn.

So how long John, before the AI is able to generate better comments than even you and I could generate? Probably not long. How long would it take to actually, for an AI to actually read a consumer post and put a constructive comment? It, we're not that far from that happening. What scares me is when that time comes, we'll probably be the same time that AI starts to create good content as well. Well, then you've got a situation where, okay, you know, and I, I started asking my audience about this. How would you feel if you were following a creator, you really liked their content, but then you found out that that content was created, not by the creator, but by AI. And it really mixed, you know, the reviews that people had.

Some people said, oh, it's fine because someone has to come up with the idea. Okay. Other people were like, well, no, they cheated. Like it's, it's not them. And I think we're heading into a very interesting time. And I personally, I'm probably more anti AI than pro AI in that context. I think if, if LinkedIn starts to become dominated by creators that very much are either completely using AI, it, it, it, it doesn't matter if you've come up with some ideas, you're not doing the work. And so if you're getting results and engagement, it seems very much artificial. And I, I can't see a world where LinkedIn would want to encourage that. I think at some point they will control it, limit it. So it'd be, it's interesting to see, I think.

Yeah. I think it's, I think it is concerning too. It's just, it depends. Again, it goes to the laziness factor. I, I think the, the, the answer quite frankly is, is something attuned to the, the blue check mark, right? Where you have to sign off on some type of thing that says any posts I do, I'm not using AI. Right. Or it, well, it's the same thing. And I'm sure you probably get this too, you know, from a sponsor standpoint. Right. Like, Hey, do a LinkedIn post for 2,500 bucks for five grand or something like that. And at first I was like, Holy shit, like just for a post. Yeah. And then I'm like, Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Wait a minute. Like, first of all, A, I don't want to be a NASCAR logo.

B, I don't know these products. Like I've never used this product. So I can't be authentic in saying something about it. And so I think the, it, we have to let people know, let's put it that way. I think if I know. Well, you can on LinkedIn now, can't you? So you can actually highlight it as a sponsored post. And I love that idea, John, to have this, this is an AI post. I mean, it's interesting that you would disclose it. And what would that mean for the algorithm or for the engagement of the interaction? So it's a good idea. I think we're into very interesting times. And it's, I think people are mixed in their opinions for us. Some people don't mind. Some people do mind. And I think we're still defining what is right and wrong in this space, but I do agree there should be disclosure.

But again, some people will be honest about it. Some people won't. And, you know, is there a way of finding out? Bigger challenges. Like if they were all good actors, were they great? Right. But there's going to always be the bad actors. And I, I, I make their, you know, analogy to, to when drift came out, right? I think drift was the first one, right? So there was chatbots. And when the chatbots first came out, I don't know if you remember, but they, they pretended to be real. So you would get like, you jump on somebody's website and you'd be like, Oh my God, this is the most like responsive person I've ever liked to have in my life. This is incredible. And then about like two or three chats, like, you know, threads in, and you'd be like, wait a minute, this isn't.

And as soon as you feel duped, I don't care what the value is. You discredit it. Yeah. And so drift was the first one to raise their hand and say, Hey, I am not a human. I just want to let you know, I am not a human, but let's get started here and see how far I can take you. And then if you need a human, I'll make that connection. And I think the same is true for what I'm trying to do. And I'm curious, like what you are doing with AI, because I'm moving down the path of creating an AI version of me, a coach and all the other stuff. And I am going to be very clear that the AI John wrote this or the AI John is this, and this is not John Barrows, but it's all my IP. It's all my insights. It's all my content.

So you should be able to trust it because I'm putting my stamp of approval on it versus an open-ended chat GPT who knows where the hell that content's coming from. So where are you going with, like for you personally, are you dabbin' into the AI's world at all as far as Daniel Disney and how you're leveraging it for your business? Yeah, I'm doing the same as you, John. And I think what's very interesting about that is it is no different to you hiring someone and training someone. It's just you're hiring and training essentially a bot, but it's the same principle. And I think as long as you are transparent about it, as long as you do it the right way, then I do think it's the smartest way to do it.

I think it's the people that either try and deceive or, you know, use it to do all the work or create all the content. That's going to be a losing strategy. But I think you're right. When you use AI the right way, if you go into chat GPT and you say, oh, write me a LinkedIn post about sales management, and then you look at it, you change the intro, you change the outro, you add a couple of your own points in, you know, that's where it works. The same for like a sales email or a sales message, you know, that's where AI can be really helpful. It's the people that put in a prompt, copy paste, put it out onto LinkedIn, you know, that probably doesn't have a long shelf life, I think. But I'm with you creating sort of AI versions to, like you say, with the chat bots that take people so far into the journey where you then touch point.

That's just being smart. That's just efficient. That's efficient use of the technology that is available. Are you afraid that AI, like, so I guess when it comes to that, are you afraid or encouraged about where it's headed? In the sense that you're right, man, like this shit's already smarter than us. This shit's already better than us in so many ways. And I think to the mass market, that's the challenge I always have. It's like the 80-20 rule, right? The people that know, know. And I always, I always think about that group because I'm like, oh, fuck. Like, if I do this as an AI post, Daniel's going to know that this is an AI post, right? And so I look at that group. But the problem is the masses don't.

Like the other 80% just look at a good post. So that was a good post. I don't know who the fuck John is, but that was a good post from John. So there's such a temptation to just basically put it on autopilot because this stuff is getting that much better. Are you in the mindset of the 80-20 that it's actually going to, you know, it's going to help the 20% that figure it out and smoke the 80%? Or do you have hope in the 80% that somehow this is going to be able to get them to be better? There's so much opportunity. What scares me and where I think somewhere a line is going to be drawn is that where are we going to end up, John? We're going to end up in a world where AI is creating the comment and engaging in the content.

And so we just end up in this situation where it's just AI talking to AI. And it would be the same with, you know, a chat box or an email or a message or even cold calling systems where an AI calls, but decision makers put in AI gatekeepers. And, you know, at what point do we draw the line and say, okay, this is pointless. We're just creating this vicious cycle. So I hope we draw that line before we get to that point. And I think, okay, it's fun now. It's new. I mean, it's growing so fast and people are so excited and scared at the same time. I hope we're smart enough to control it because that is where it's heading. And that's a pretty scary place because no one wins in that scenario. No, no.

I mean, that's why you bring the matrix into the equation, you bring in, you know, iRobot and all that fun stuff. Let's switch gears here though, to the business, right? So your business, I mean, we're both kind of solopreneurs here. We were talking before we got on here of, you know, kind of charting your own path. Why did you decide to go out on your own? So I was working as a sales leader, uh, six, seven years ago now, and sort of had been using LinkedIn heavily for several years. And my audience was growing. I was starting to find my voice and build my personal brand. And the tipping point came where people started to ask me to train them on how to use LinkedIn and, you know, did the first couple for free.

And then it was like, okay, people keep asking, you know, I'm, I'm achieving some really good results and there is a value there. So you start to charge a little. And, you know, I had at the time, a much younger family, you know, I've got two sons and a wife. So it wasn't like I could just jump ship and start a business. I had to build some levels of sort of foundation, but once the scales tipped enough, then it was like, okay, do you know what? I'm building enough momentum. There's enough demand. Let's go and take this, you know, full on and, you know, really try and grow this. And it's been such an amazing journey since, but for me, it was just, I knew I had something I could help people with.

You know, I was lucky as you say, sort of right time, right place, got into LinkedIn at the early point, was able to learn it, leverage it and get results from it. And now I get to help companies do the same and, you know, we'll grow with it and adapt with the platform as it, as it changes. But for me, it was that ability to help and finding that point where, okay, there is enough business momentum that I can, I can take this full on. What were some of the kind of learning lessons of you going off on your own that, that, you know, cause you hear the e-myth, right? Have you read the e-myth or the e-myth you visited, right? Where you think, oh, I'm an entrepreneur. Fuck it. You know, the entrepreneurial myth, I can do this.

And then all of a sudden you realize, oh my God, I got to sell, I got to train, I got to do this. I got to finance and everything else. What were some of the kind of realizations for you of like, all right, cause it sounds like you had a similar journey. Well, first quick question, did your existing employer, were they cool with you doing that side hustle stuff? I love that question. Cause I think side hustles are amazing. And the one reason that my employers were cool with it is because I never let it in any way negatively impact my full-time job. I always had that at the top. That was my bread. I didn't butter. That was my earnings. So I always did everything to achieve and overachieve within my, my full-time job.

My side hustle was just that it was a side hustle. I've seen a lot of people when, and even people in my teams over the years that had let their side hustle overtake their priorities. And that's when you start to go into, into gray areas. So yeah, my employees were fired, but it was because it never had a negative impact on my work. Cool. And I think that's that transition that you look for. I was, you know, you probably advise a lot of people who are thinking about going off on their own and what do I do? And I say like, unless you have a six to 12 month cushion of income that you don't have to sweat it, then go off and do whatever you want. But if you don't use your existing company as almost like a testing case for you, whatever you want to do, prove it out, prove the model, do a couple of side hustles along the way, just to make sure it's not just, you know, yours.

And then once you get that traction, go. So for you though, it's like, all right, you, you eased into it. You had a nice little base there, I guess for, and when was that? When did you actually formally go off on your own? Uh, 2018 was the first year. So, okay. So a couple of years before the, the chaos ensued. Um, what, what was the outside of like the big kick you in the fucking teeth stuff? Uh, you know, with COVID and, and the beginning of 2023, um, what were some of the bigger things that kind of, you were like, Ooh shit, what's expecting that when it came to entrepreneurship and going off on your own? I think the biggest thing I'm grateful for before I highlight those was working in sales as a sales leader.

I think those skills were just such a huge advantage. When I look at all the people I've men worked with over the years that have started their own businesses, the ones that don't have that sales experience, usually the ones that struggle the most. And so having the understanding of the sales process, how to sell pipelines, you know, sales processes, the whole thing really, really helped. I guess what was the hardest part were the holes in that whole routine and journey that I didn't know. So things like, you know, actually invoicing everyone, managing invoices, taxes, accountants, and even again, as a salesperson, I'd built my brand a bit on LinkedIn, but then becoming a full-time marketer and you know, all those little gaps that I had were always the hardest parts, but that's where probably the biggest lesson I learned early on and the value that I soon adapted was, you know, it's not what you know, it's who you know.

So making sure you surround yourself with the people that do know how to fill those gaps, working with the right people, getting the right advice, that was really critical in the early stages, but it wasn't without mistakes, John, like it wasn't, like it was a smooth journey. The first two years were, well, the first two years were the scariest and then we went into 2020 and that was a big curveball. But again, you've just got to learn, adapt and just be proactive. I think the point you made, which was exactly what I did, have six to 12 months runway. So you have breathing space. Again, the people that don't do that and jump straight in, they already have too much pressure. So they can't, when you're dealing with all those things, you don't know, it's even harder.

But if you have some level of security that allows you to be a bit more flexible and, you know, a bit more able to adapt and overcome. Yeah. I mean, yeah, you end up chasing bad money. I was, you know, tell people when they get into business, don't take revenue. Revenue is not, all revenue is not a created equal, right? If you take it from a bad customer or somebody who's going to hold, you know, basically something that you're not great at just because you need the money, then it's going to suck you away from doing business from people you are going to be great at and you're going to get buried in, it's probably going to bury you. So you got to have that runway. So with that, you know, I guess with your, how did, how did COVID affect you?

Like, was that a, cause for me, it stopped dead for about two months, but then it blew up, right? Cause we're in the SaaS world and everything. So what, with your keynotes and everything else, kind of how did that hit you and how fast did that hit you? And what did you do to pivot or did you pivot? I was the same as you, John. So I came from being 99% in person, training, speaking, everything was traveling and, and, you know, doing it in real life. So as soon as COVID hit, that was it. Wiped, gone. And back then, okay, we might've done a little bit of virtual stuff, but it wasn't a lot. So luckily, I mean, two, there were two weeks that were scary. Soon as everything shut off and my sort of pipeline disappeared, two weeks were like, wow, what the hell is happening?

Where is this going? But I didn't let it dominate me too much. And it was very quick to adapt to be like, okay, let's, we need to change this up. We need to go virtual. We need to, you know, have a consumer account and have good equipment. And I moved quickly. And so this similar to you, it actually became a very profitable year because actually I was now able to train more people more effectively, more quickly, more efficiently through zoom. Uh, and obviously back then everyone was stuck. So people needed it. It was just, it kind of worked out well, luckily for, for my business, but it was very scary at the front. And even the whole process of adapting was stressful and hard and just pivoting so much and so drastically and so quickly was a very intense experience, but it's, it transformed my business and, you know, virtual is now still a big part of, of, of what I do, but it was scary.

I think it was scary for everyone. And the worst, worst thing for me, I'm very grateful for the luck I had and, you know, the positive choices I made. The worst part was seeing people I know lose businesses and struggle. And that was hard to see people that were doing really well. And, you know, you were enjoying sharing the journey with them and to see them, some of them lose their businesses completely and all the negatives that came from it. That was really tough. And I didn't, that was the worst part of it for me. I agree. I think it was, it was some of the most inspiring stuff for me as well, in the sense that I would see some businesses that you would expect to go under, right. And all of a sudden they figured out how to pivot and get through it.

You know, my local gym guy, like he's a boxer, right. And it's a boxing gym. It's right behind my house. And obviously nobody was going to the gyms at that point. Right. Like that was like no way. So this dude, like literally he, he has a Jeep and he put a, he retrofitted his Jeep to put one of those big heavy bags on the, on the back of it. And he drove around to all his, you know, members houses and would run, you know, sessions in their garage or in their driveway. And it was just one of those. And then he started making, cause he was really handy. He started making glasses and face gear and all this other stuff. And it was just, I, you know, you saw a lot of good and a lot of drive, uh, from people and creativity and agility.

But then to your point, there was just some people that through no fault of their own, they just couldn't, you know, they were either carrying too much or, you know, they're, you know, they didn't get the brakes, you know what I mean? And you, you brought up luck. What's your stance on luck? Like, do you believe in it? Um, and, and, and, and the variations of luck in the sense of pure luck, like, you know, hit the lottery, holy shit to make your own luck. And you kind of, you're, you're dictating, where are you on the luck scale? I'm with you on the make your own luck. I was thinking about this just the other day, John, in that I was thinking, because I feel lucky. I've been very successful to an extent of achieved a lot over the last sort of period of time.

And I meet a lot of people that do sort of say, oh, you're so lucky, or, you know, you were lucky to get a LinkedIn when you did, or you were lucky to do this and, you know, yes. Okay. Right place, right time. But the one thing I think about with certainly people that come at you with those sort of comments is how many opportunities for luck did you miss because you weren't looking or you didn't act quick enough or you didn't adapt or take advantage. And so, yes, I was lucky, but it, it wasn't luck. Luck might've been that I spotted the, but it was the work I put in, the choices I made, the sacrifices I made, you know, that made that luck into success. So I think, yes, luck has some level to it, but a lot of people pass luck.

A lot of people, luck is literally dangled in front of them at several different times in their life, but because they're not looking or they're distracted or they're focused on negative things or whatever it may be, they might miss those opportunities. So yeah, I think, you know, there is some luck to it, but without the work, then luck doesn't turn into anything. Well, I agree with that. And it's, it's kind of the, there's a, and I'm not a religious person, but there's that, I don't know if it's a joke or whatever, where the guy's too drowning. Right. And he's in a boat comes by, he's like, Hey man, come in. And the guy's like, no, God's God will save me. And then didn't guy goes, okay, nevermind.

Then the next book, another boat comes over and says, Hey man, jump in the boat. And he's like, I'll save you. He's like, no, no, no. God will save me. And then the third guy, the same thing, like three guys. And then the guy eventually dies and he goes up to heaven. He's looking at God and he's like, God, why didn't you save me? He's like, I sent you three boats. So it's one of those opportunistic lens. If, if you were to say you had a superpower right outside of LinkedIn, obviously in your abilities there, what would it be? Cause you know, the, I look at it as I have an opportunity. I think I have an opportunistic lens where I don't overanalyze things and I can kind of look at two or three data points and pivot fast and usually make okay decisions.

I've made plenty of bad ones before, but you know, I think it's served me more than it's hurt me in a lot of ways. So if you were to say for you personally, if you boil it down, right, what, what would be like the superpower that you have that has allowed you to be where you are right now? It's a really good question. I can, I can think of three. I think number one, uh, I'm quite business minded and I have been since I was a kid, I fell in love with business really, really early on as a kid throughout school. And I just love and really work hard to understand how businesses work. So when it comes to working in sales and even running my own business, I really, you know, have a passion for, for, for business.

I love solving problems. So whether it's professional or personal, you know, if someone has a problem, I love trying to solve it. And now again, that helps with sales, it helps with growing a business. And, you know, it comes into with my kids and friends and family, you know, if there's a problem, I want to try and try and help. I think the last one is, and I always refer to this as almost being a translator. I'm quite good. And I really enjoy it. Understanding what people are trying to say, whether it's to me, whether it's to someone else, if I'm sitting next to in a conversation and you can see two people struggling to understand each other, I can usually identify what one is trying to say to the other.

And again, that has translated to sales and understanding what my customers want and need and, you know, how to help them. And, and same with running a business. So kind of trying to understand what people want or need, or trying to say that sort of communication ability is definitely something I think I've got a level of strength in that I think has helped. Well, did you catch it? And when you say you cut that business book, what would I, I missed it. What did your parents do? What were their, what were their careers? Do you know what? Completely nothing relevant. My mom was a teaching assistant throughout my childhood and my dad was sort of a network engineer. So kind of worked with, you know, hardware within companies, but again, both employed, sort of very low aspirations.

And I don't mean that in a disrespectful way, which is the very sort of set ceiling as to what they were going to achieve. So I couldn't really pinpoint where my interest in business came from, but I think it was always that drive to have more or provide more than what, and again, love my parents, love my childhood. There's no negative feelings there. But for whatever reason, it definitely sparked a fire to want more. And that's definitely been a big driving force for me. And business was luckily the catalyst for it. Yeah. I think that, I think there's my, cause I tried to find it out from my mom too. I, both my mom, both my parents were entrepreneurs without being entrepreneurs. Cause they didn't call it back then.

Like my mom, you know, she quit her job and, and stayed at home when she had me and started her own consultancy shop so that she could stay at home with me. So my, like her office was our living room. So I kind of, that was, I got that look and feel basically coming home. Always mom was there, but it was her office. And then dad was a consultant for the FAA and she, you know, worked out of the house too. So he was a mechanical engineer, electrical engineer. So I kind of had this entrepreneurial bug, but I just didn't know where it came from. And my, I think my mom always said that I was very money motivated. And I think it, I, if I look back, it wasn't really money motivated. I was, I was what I wanted motivated in the sense that if I wanted something, I wasn't going to just wait for it.

I wasn't going to just, you know, expect somebody else to give it to me. I was going to go work my ass off to go make the money to do whatever it was to get that thing. So I could have it. And if you were to say with that, you know, from a value standpoint, right. I don't know if you've gone through the value exercise or the Y exercise or anything like that, what's the, what are the kind of your core values? Uh, if you really to boil them down that drive you to, to do what you do at the heart of it, I just want to do good things, John. Like I'm so motivated by helping people, you know, doing good is, is, is at the core of everything I do. So yeah, I'm money motivated too. I want to provide for my kids.

I want to be the best I can be. I'm competitive, but none of it alleviates from the fact that I want to do good. I won't, I can't achieve any of those things in a bad way. I'm not going to manipulate someone or rip someone off to achieve those goals. Doing good is always at the heart of it. So if I can sell something, I'm going to sell it to someone who needs it, that is going to help them solve a problem. I want them to win either at least equal to me or definitely more than me. So I can, I feel good about what I'm doing. So yeah, doing good is always been at the high. I am like a, as a kid, I was always the, the, the good boy. I wanted to do good things, never going to ruffle feathers or, you know, be naughty.

I just want to do good. And again, that's, I think helped heavily in sales and running a business and will always be at the heart of what I do and teach my kids. It's go and do good things, be aspirational, be motivated. You could be hungry. You could want to succeed, but make sure, you know, you do it in a, in a good way. That's funny. Uh, so you know, guy Kawasaki. Yeah. Right. So I'm actually, he's coming on the podcast next week, which he's freaking out about. Cause I'm like, Holy shit. He said yes, but he has got his new book called, uh, think remarkable. And it's funny. You should read this based on that comment alone. You should read it because it's about he, I do, you know, I'm going to, I'm going to start the podcast by thanking him because I've always struggled with success in, in, in other, like in seeing who is quote unquote successful.

And I know success is a different definition for everybody, but it just seems like, you know, the people who are uber successful, like at the highest levels, right. Money wise, they all seem to be fucking raging assholes. You know what I mean? Like raging assholes, like Steve jobs, love him. Right. Right. And, and guy Kawasaki was right next to him along the way, raging asshole though. And so, but he writes about the different types of assholes, which are really interesting. He's like, there's the asshole who's just the asshole, but then there's the asshole who's in pursuit of greatness, who is in pursuit of something that is noble. So Steve jobs was not, he wasn't trying to make a billion dollars for himself.

He was trying to really revolutionize an entire industry. He was trying to help people and give them the power and take it, you know, and all these different things. So yes, he was a raging asshole, but he was raging asshole for a purpose. Yeah. Yeah. And that made me feel a lot better about success, right? Because there's still plenty of raging assholes out there. No question about it. And, and they do, you know, step on people and fuck people over and whatever it is to get to that level. You know, the Grant Cardones of the world, the, those types of things who are, again, you know, my least favorite people out there when it represents sales. But then there's a lot of people who are do good things.

You know what I mean? Who are genuinely out there trying to do good things. And I think on that note, like for you, optimist, pessimist, realist. Realist all the way. Although, you know, realist followed by optimist. I like to be positive. I struggle with negative. I struggle with people that maybe are too heavily in a victim mindset. You know, for me, it's, if you've got a problem, solve it and look for the opportunity, keep positive, keep motivated, but very much an understanding of like life is a game. Business is a game. I'm here to play that game as best I can be as realistic as possible, but I'm looking to, to do it in the most positive way. Love it, man. Um, we need to catch up. I would love to just learn a little bit more about how you're structuring your business in general, because I'm going through a whole revamp myself here and try to reset on, uh, kind of what I'm trying to do.

I got five, I think I got about five more years left in me, man. Uh, I'm pushing this hard again. I'm, I'm 10 years older than you. So, uh, but, uh, what, what excites you? Uh, let's finish on this. You know, what do you got coming up next, uh, for you and what are you excited about outside of the cool shit you're doing with LinkedIn and working with customers and those types of things where, you know, in the next five years for you, what are you excited about? Do you know what? I love what I do, John. I love the books that I write. I love the content I create. I love the companies I get to consult and teach and speak every part of my job. This whole business I've created, I love. So I love a, that I've created it and I get to do travel the world and meet great people, work with great people and do a job that I genuinely love.

So for me, for the next five years, I want to keep doing this and I want to keep growing it and adapting and change it and just doing everything I can to align to all the core values I have. So I think I'm very grateful for everything I get to do. I'm grateful. I have so much to offer and help people with, and I just want to keep doing it. I want to keep helping more and more people, but to your point, you know, there, there is a life cycle to everything I teach and I'll have to continue to grow, you know, grow and build different parts of the business, but I love the journey. And I think conversations like this just remind me how lucky I am that I get to speak to amazing people like you. And, you know, we get to work with so many amazing teams and, and companies.

So for me, I'm just going to keep doing what I'm doing at the moment, LinkedIn and social selling, you know, so many people are struggling with it. So I'm going to do everything I can to help as many people as possible until it becomes, you know, taught internally for every business as a norm. And then of course I will grow and adapt to whatever the sales world needs beyond that. But right now the sales world needs social selling help. And that's what I'll continue to give. Well, I love it, man. Yeah. I think that's, I think the world needs a lot just of, of selling help of just being, I think going back to what we talked about in the beginning, you know, the authenticity component, like how to do this the right way.

You know, I always say that sales is the greatest profession in the world when done right, but it's the worst when done wrong, you know, and just trying to get people to do it right. So that this is a profession that, uh, that makes a difference for other people. So I think on the social side of the house and the brand building and everything else, that's why it's not one or the other anymore. It's not, you're a sales rep, you're a social person, you know, marketer, whatever it is. You, I think every single one of us needs to be all of it, right? We all need to sell. We all need a brand. We all need to post. We all need to share content and help in every way, shape or form because those, the, the bots, you know, actually, let me ask you this.

Just a last question. I promise is, um, do you, how much do you think brand will matter moving forward? Going back to the kind of the AI conversation? My contention is like, Hey, that's all I got. You know what I mean? The knowledge is the knowledge it's out there and it can be in a bot and you can ask it. But the only thing I personally have is John Barrows, right? But that said, we're coming into a world where you might not recognize that this is a AI version of me. And so is it, is it a good thing or a bad thing from a brand standpoint right now with where AI is going? And is that going to be our defense against it? Or is that going to be taken away from us? I mean, it depends how much of our brand becomes AI created to our conversation earlier, but I do think your brand and the ability to be a human being, or at least connect as a human being, whether it's through social channels or any other medium is going to be incredibly valuable because especially in B2B sales and, you know, high value B2B sales, the sort of personal component to that is always going to be valuable.

Yes, people get more and more comfortable buying things online, but for B2B complex, which is always going to be a big part of the sales industry, I think it's going to be heavily reliant on human to human interaction. So if you can build a brand and get people to follow your journey and get to know you as a credible person in your industry, that's always going to have a value regardless. And if anything, more valuable when all this bot created generic contents going out there, you need to stand out, be creative, be authentic, be genuine, because that's the only way. In the same way in sales, if you want to compete with the bots, you need to write better emails, you need to learn to become better at making calls and researching and all those skills, we just, the bar is just rising.

You've got the AI bar is pushing the human bar higher and higher. So if you want to compete, whatever you're doing, you just need to become, you know, better in every capacity. I call it the give a shit factor, right? Like the one thing that AI can't do is give a shit. It can pretend to give a shit. It can sound like it gives a shit, but it can't actually give a shit. And I think that's the one thing that I always encourage reps to do is like, is, is the give a shit factor. It's like, do you, when, when, for instance, when you identify your ICP and your tier one accounts or whatever it is, I tell my team that before you go, like, tell me who your top 25 are based on the demographics and all that other stuff.

Fine. But before you actually start reaching out to them, I want you to come back and tell me why you personally want to work with that company. Like, what about that company? Do you forget about us and what we can do for them? Why do you, is it their values? Is your product's awesome? Is it their leadership's cool? Is like, what is it about them that you can make that connection to? Because once you make that connection that you like actually give a shit and you want to work with that company for other reasons outside, just they fit our ICP, the messaging starts to come a lot easier. It's all, it becomes a lot more authentic. It becomes more interesting, but when you're pushing buttons, you're going to get replaced by the bots pretty damn fast.

Do you know what? I'll add one more layer to that. It's something I learned massively a few weeks ago. I flew out to New York. I did a ton of work. I was at a load of conferences and I met so many people. And the one thing I realized from that week alone is the, I mean, I'm talking a 100 X value on in-person meetings. And that is the one thing that you'll never be able to replicate. And okay, you can, I can go as far as saying you can do the same through zoom and things like that, but that human to human connection that you can build again, you can't automate it. You can't artificially create it. So yeah, to your give a shit point, you just need to level up and show that you care and be a real person who actually wants to do good and help people.

That's the advantage we have. And that is what the top percentage of salespeople already do. It's just now that, you know, AI is competing up against some of the lower levels of the sales industry. Everyone now needs to start to raise their game. But I agree, John, just give a shit. Just care for your customers. Yeah. Just give a shit, man. Again, I'm going to recommend you definitely resonate with almost every aspect of this book because he talks about how remarkable people, um, they don't set out to be remarkable. They just set out to do good things. You know what I mean? They, they, it's not like I set out to build a business to sell it for a billion dollars. It's like I set out all this problem to do good work, to try to make a difference.

And it just ends up turning into something remarkable. Uh, so it's, uh, it's going to be a fun conversation, but this was a fantastic one, Daniel. I'm looking forward to actually, and I'm, I'm really looking forward to coming on the workshops for the membership here so that we can kind of darkness more of the tactics and everything else. Um, cause I've, I've been trying to up my LinkedIn game recently with my whole header and the landing page and content and how I'm writing and everything else. So I'm using some of your content and I appreciate that, but, uh, we're going to try to help the audience here, get into it in a little bit more detail. So that'll be in a couple of days here, but I appreciate you coming on, man.

Thank you. And, uh, No, I've enjoyed this chat, John. Let's do it again soon. Absolutely. So where can people find out more about like, first of all, did you have, is there a new book out, right? Or it's relatively new? There is. Yeah. Literally just come out 500 LinkedIn content ideas. We kind of talked about this earlier, but people that are struggling to know what to post, how to, but this whole book is there to help everyone who's posting content, but I'm on LinkedIn, John look for Daniel Disney. I'm the man with a red t-shirt hashtag social selling. Uh, you can find all my information then. And I try and post as much value as I'm sure you've hopefully learned in this episode. All I want to do is, is help people.

So I hope to see you on LinkedIn very soon. Awesome, Daniel. Thanks again for coming on, man. I really appreciate it. And everybody else. Thank you for listening. As always, like I always say at the end of all these podcasts, go out there and make somebody smile today. Because no matter how bad your day is going, or you think it's gone, you can make somebody smile and you know you had a good day and the world needs a lot more of that right now. So thank you all very much. And I will see you on the other side. Hey, everyone. I hope you enjoyed that conversation as much as I did. With your support and our incredible guests, we're one of the top sales podcasts out there right now, and I can't thank you enough.

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