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Do Good Work is not a label but a way of living.
It is the constant and diligent effort to achieve a new level of excellence in one’s own life.
It is the hidden inner beauty behind the struggle to achieve excellence.
It is not perfect but imperfect.
It is the effort, discipline and focus that often goes unnoticed.
The goal of this podcast is to highlight that drive.
The guests I have on this show emulate this drive in their own special way. You’ll be able to apply new ideas into your own life by learning from them.
We will also have 1on1 episodes with me where we’ll dive into my own experiences with entrepreneurship and leadership.
Every episode is designed to provide you with ideas that you can apply and grow in excellence in all areas of your life, business and career.
Do Good Work,
Raul
INTRO
PODCAST
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449:
Clear messaging isn't.
It's haptic.
It's actually a strategy and you don't
have to yell louder to get notice what
we're seeing now in the marketplace.
People are yelling louder, sending
hundreds, if not thousands of
emails to try to get through.
But what really this boils down
to is having a clear, specific
message that has your client.
At the center of it.
And you'd be surprised.
You think that we're talking
about brand strategy, messaging,
strategy, and positioning.
We're not, we're actually
talking about prospecting.
We're talking about getting
you pipeline in here.
Richard is going to chat with me
through his experience on diving
into the messaging strategy.
Richard, how you doing, man?
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: Excellent.
How you doing, man?
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449:
Doing pretty good.
I'm excited to have you on.
Our conversation has been
teed up for quite a while now.
So this has been brewing
in the back of my mind.
For everyone here listening though,
can you tell us a little bit more
about who you are, what you're up
to and why you're doing what you do?
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: Yes.
So my name is Rich.
I run a growth agency.
I should call it provoke agency,
this for about five years.
I'm a proud father of four kids, happily
married and based out of Montreal.
I got my feet wet in the outreach world.
after a 15 year long job selling
IT consulting services and really
pitching people old school.
when I saw that there was a cool way to do
it via email, I jumped on the bandwagon.
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449:
And yeah, it's amazing, right?
I remember in my parallel and the direct
response marketing space, you would launch
an ad, send people to a webinar that has
a 2, 000 to 3, 000 course people bought.
And you might get an
amazing return on ad spend.
And those used to be quote unquote, the
heyday, the easy days, of course, there's
nothing easy, but same thing with email.
You send a hundred emails, certain
percentage gets clicked, maybe 5, 10%.
And from there you get appointments.
And then it was a volume game.
That's all shifted dramatically.
And I think for the good, cause
now you actually have to be.
A strategist or a thinker
to actually get results.
So what are some of the changes
and things that you're seeing in
the market, how you're adopting
and just implementing that?
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447:
It's an excellent question.
Yeah.
I mean, the first thing that comes
to my mind is like these funny
messages that I get pitched on.
They're all the same.
They're like, Rich, can you handle seven
to 11 new clients or something like that?
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: Oh
yeah.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447:
they changed the numbers.
So I have fun with these guys.
I'm like, no, actually I'm looking for 13.
If you would have said 13,
we would have had a deal.
So now obviously it's not a
stupid messaging because it peaks
the curiosity and it worked.
It obviously worked.
The problem is, is that
when something works.
It has a lifeline.
It has a life cycle.
And if you copy and paste what other
people are doing, it's not that it's
bad, it could work for you to a certain
degree, but at some point, it dies.
That type of messaging, I think, is dead.
I mean, people who are using that
messaging on LinkedIn, and even
on email, this idea that I'll
put you in front of this amount
of clients, it's a bit overdone.
Today, when I think about messaging, I
think about the shortest message possible.
And it's a word that I like to
use, but I think of messaging
as the less friction possible.
The easiest way to get a yes.
So I'm no longer, you know, kind of
working with my clients to get them
booked calls, working with my clients
to get as much engagement as possible.
I want conversation.
I want little yeses.
So if I'm creating the sequence with
my team, every single line has to
be like, well, what's in it for me?
What's in it for me?
I'm thinking of how the
recipient is receiving it, right?
Well, what's in it for you?
What's in it for me?
And if the end of that email
is like, sure, why not?
Like, yeah, I got nothing to lose.
Sure.
This is interesting.
it's got to be short.
It's got to be frictionless.
Which means if I'm asking for a
meeting the first message, it's
like, who are you that I'm going
to,
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: too much.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: worked
very well as you said in the beginning
years of cold email and outreach today,
even when it's like, can I send you
this paper or that paper or whatever it
may be, it's really got to make sense.
it's got to have a very specific,
I think, first liner to the person.
And it has to build enough
curiosity for them to be like, yes,
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: I started
my first company off of cold email and
I think you're hitting it on the head,
like for me to book those appointments,
it was now looking back at it easy.
Even direct mail.
I got calls from direct mail.
I got 2 percent a call rate.
I think what you're hitting on too is,
so I'm going to actually read out, and
this is me going off script here, but
I'm reviewing some of the things that
even I look at or when I'm doing strategy
and this parallel surprisingly well
with what I've done in paid ads, like on
the paid ads front, like you got your.
So there's, there's two dynamics, right?
You got your top of funnel,
middle funnel, bottom of funnel.
You got your problem aware, unaware,
solution aware, unaware, et cetera.
And I think what you're hitting at
here, if we're hitting up a cold
audience, like either you built the ICP
list, I don't care what tool you use.
I mean, we can talk about that
later, but you build out the list,
you get those people coming through
and they're cold, literally cold.
You don't know their buying cycle.
You don't know their intent.
You have no clue.
If there's a signal in the market that
they're buying, then you lead with like a
lighter ask of, Hey, I got this resource.
Is this something that you
want, or like a lead magnet?
That's my thinking around is that
you lead with a low friction, high,
high impact lead magnet or some sort
of value video in the beginning.
And then from there, turn
that into a conversation.
That conversation I think is.
the actual human aspect of it.
And then from there asking for
the call, are you seeing the same
with what you're doing on your
end?
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: exactly that.
And in fact, you know, there's a
trend on LinkedIn that is also going
to have its cycle, but it's kind
of like the guy with the video.
And he's like showing something that's
like obviously amazing and there's like
400 comments and everybody wants that.
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: Oh yeah.
Give me the guide.
Hey, I'm running ads to that.
Anytime I need communications,
I just run ads and I got it.
And I kept
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: yeah.
and it works because it's like,
a version of storytelling.
It's like, you look at that,
you understand that that could
be for you and you want that.
And then the guy says, well, if you want
that, just type this in the comments.
Okay.
It's the same principle
for the email as well.
Yeah.
It's like if you can tell a success
story about a client that's in the
recipient's industry that they know
about and there's a tangible result,
the natural thing that people do is
they say, well, that could be me too.
So, yes, I'm interested.
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449:
let's pair that because I want
to get your thoughts on this.
And this is again, why I've been
looking forward to our conversation
because like a live strategy
session, just two dudes jamming.
Like I get this, like, Hey,
I looked at your profile.
I have to say I'm impressed
with what you've accomplished.
Okay.
Curious.
Have you ever considered turning
your content into a book?
So this is different
because it's poking at.
Hey, are you interested
in doing this thing?
Like I've never thought
about or done about it.
If they actually looked at my profile,
they see that they're like three books,
but that's a different conversation.
So I think that doesn't land as well
versus actually offering something of
value to what you're saying, because
this one is more like testing the
market of what they're interested in.
But this, in my opinion, is going to have
a higher spam rate and a significantly
lower conversion rate because it's like,
okay, well, it's a binary question.
Do you want this thing or not?
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: yeah, it's,
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449:
Versus do you want
this lead magnet
that's valuable,
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447:
haven't seen that one.
I mean, turning my content into a book.
Wow.
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: Yeah,
they've done, I've gotten this exact
message from like 15 other people.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: I haven't
gotten that one yet, but I will tell
you that my first impression of that,
don't forget as agency owners, we're
a lot more stricter than other people.
we have an affinity for messaging and we
can kind of read between the lines because
a lot of times I have these very similar
conversations with other business folks.
And they were like, Oh, I didn't
see it as deep as you did Rich.
So when you're constantly working on
messaging and other people try to pitch
you, you kind of see it right away.
You kind of see where they're, but
your average Joe doesn't necessarily.
So I'd be interested in that.
it's an interesting pitch,
but I agree with you.
It's a yes or no.
It's like, no, I haven't
thought about making a book.
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: Yeah.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447:
I want to make a book?
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: Yeah.
that was my point too.
And I wanted to get your live
reaction to that because that is very
similar to what we just talked about.
Like you give a value piece, like,
here's something that I, like
planning to run or just doing as well,
like, Hey, we're doing X, Y and Z.
Would you like me to show you
how we're getting this kind of
result or what we're doing here?
It's like a simple thing, but
it's relevant to the person
versus are you considering adding
this a significant amount of
friction, which is writing a book?
So there has to be that parallel
between exertion of effort.
Friction for them to implement
whatever you're giving
them and the impact that it delivers
to them because if you're giving them
a video a guide or even like with
people like right now my linkedin
ads people are commenting send me the
training or some people are like kind
of funny like hey show me what you got
like challenging me it's fun it's low
friction high impact and i think there's
there's like that dynamic and i kind
of want to know how do you think about
that when you're writing messaging
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: to that
exact example, let's say the guy
pitched and said, Hey, rich, I took
a look at your last 40 LinkedIn posts
and I wrote five pages of a potential
book we could put together for you.
Can I send it your way?
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: that's
gold.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: that's cool
because even if I didn't want to write
a book, you just piqued my interest.
That's pretty cool.
You know, when people buy a book of
LinkedIn posts that I put together, if
I market it properly, maybe it just out
of the curiosity, it's interesting, you
know, mind you, the messaging is easy.
Now, the execution for that guy, I
don't know how we'd ever dream of
doing that, but, but it's like, yeah.
It's for marketers like ourselves.
It's like first come up with the offer
and then figure out how to do it after.
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449:
No, I liked that.
And that was really good.
How you came up with that in the fly.
How do you look at that too?
Like when you're looking to scale,
do you usually start things manually
and then find what works and then
scale it up through automation?
Like what's your process for that?
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: So my
process for messaging, and I think
we discussed this the first time we
connected, I'm a big Donald Miller fan.
I really, I love the story run framework.
I use it all the time.
I use it for every single
strategy session that I do.
I don't try to jump in right
away, try to play super dumb.
Like, what do you do?
Who are you?
Who's your hero?
What's the problem?
You know, then I think, okay, if I was
marketing for myself, how would I do this?
So I let the client talk.
We have a whole strategy
session just on story brand.
I don't try to do any writing
right away with the client.
Then I record everything, of course.
And then I always do copywriting
with my VP of operations, Ilya.
To have a person to bounce, I
never try to do it by myself.
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: Interesting.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447:
Yeah, I used to.
What I used to do is procrastinate
it, like record this and be
like, Okay, well, and then, you
know, you wait a week, forget it.
All of your ideas are gone.
It's
hard.
I gotta re listen to the thing.
It's annoying.
So I really try to do the copywriting
literally after the session.
I wait till it's recorded.
Then, of course, I leverage AI.
I take the whole transcript.
I have a very special
AI, what do you call it?
Like an AI chat GPT thing that we
train specifically on certain roles.
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: Yeah.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: I upload
the whole chat and it breaks down
the story brand and then it breaks
it down per some of the rules.
You know, I want my emails to be short.
I want it to be pattern breaking.
Okay.
I want it to be thought provoking
and sometimes I'll even use humor and
then I try different combinations.
Until I read it through and I
bounce it off Ilya and Ilya says,
yeah, but what's in it for the guy?
Oh, you're right and then we make
it easier and easier until we just
kind of get like this internal
fire We're like, yeah, that's hot.
We test.
Yeah, we test it about one week two
weeks with the client We see the
response rate and that's how we do it
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: Is it a volume
game that you're testing in the beginning?
So two weeks is a time frame versus
like sending 10, 15 emails a day.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: Yeah,
it's a time and a volume thing.
So depending on the client, how many
domains that we buy for them and emails
that we're sending it usually should
give us an indication if that type of
messaging is going to work.
I won't hide from the fact that recently
we did this over the vacation period.
We switched the whole different things
with email deliverability and different
providers we were using because you could
do the best messaging in the world if
you're not landing into the dang inbox.
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: And the inbox
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447:
You're screwed.
It's really, it really became a
mess to figure out how to do this.
I had multiple conversations
with so called email experts.
I went on a search.
I went on Upwork.
I spoke to people at
Instantly, at SmartLead, at
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: Oh, wow.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: yeah.
And when I came to the conclusion, it's
one blind guy leading the other blind guy.
I promise you, I don't, think
today that anybody clearly has
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449:
That's solution.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: all of
the information very well understood
to explain an agency owner why this and
this is happening, what they, some of the
best guys they do, there are some experts
out there, they have recommendations,
but they cannot pinpoint it.
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: Exactly.
Why?
It's almost like an algorithm, right?
Like I remember in the Facebook side,
people would come to me and this is
because, we retrain and I've helped.
some interesting names, some good
names in the internet marketing space.
You don't know the nature of the
piece, in my opinion, you just know
this is what's happening, but I
don't know how the algorithm works.
I don't know what's going on.
I don't know what the
changes are internally.
I mean, that's to my extent.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: and
I'm not like I follow people that
I believe are successful and I
follow their LinkedIn post and
then we test into everything I do.
I try to test on myself first.
How does
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: Yeah.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: If it works
for provoke, okay, let's try it on this
client before we roll that out fully.
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449:
So what's your setup now?
Like dedicated servers
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: Yes.
so right now we have like three,
we got a little bit of mail reef.
We got a little bit of
scaled mail cheap in boxes.
Okay.
And then there's
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: Cause
with that, you're sending like, how
much volume are you doing today?
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: otherwise
it's, if Ilya was here, you would
tell me it's I'm not a numbers guy.
I hate numbers.
In fact, I think that was the first,
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449:
that's incredible, right?
you're in the numbers game,
but you're more creative.
that's the thing that I love
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: don't.
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: Like
you're creative and story first.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447:
I'm sure We're sending in the
millions.
Yeah, but the way it is now is like each
little email, he can only send like two
or three emails, which was ridiculous
because before in the earlier years, you
could do like 50, 75, you know what I
mean?
My platforms that I'm using are instantly.
I'm using Expandy for LinkedIn,
although LinkedIn very recently has
been having some, they did a crackdown
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: Yeah.
I'll chat with you off
recording about that.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447:
Yeah, it's in that.
So I've been playing around with that.
And trying to, but the emails, it's
like two or three emails per mailbox.
It's nothing.
So you end up with these massive,
like email boxes that need to
be maintained and organized.
Okay.
So that setup is a nightmare.
I think for most companies that
try to do this on their own, they
don't want to even, Consider that.
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: That's
a, it's a whole value add in itself.
Just getting those set up.
And then I mean, I'm obviously
not running a cold email agency.
I just know about.
The game, but like you have to have
its own dedicated account to inbox
and the ratio has to be right.
It's its own little science experiment.
It's very synonymous with the nuances
with advertising and ad spend.
But going back to the messaging and the
offer, I mean, when people, cause most
of the people that I talk to, and just
to be completely transparent with you, we
don't need to send a hundred emails a day.
Frankly, we don't even need
to send 20 emails a day.
It's like five to 15
because the numbers that we're
playing with are like I mean,
you've probably seen this, right?
Like the deals that they're closing,
they're like larger deals and it's
relationship sales and the sales cycle is
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447:
Well, that's more account based.
Yeah.
It's more account based.
How do they call it?
Accounts based selling when it's
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449:
it could be ABM.
it's still synonymous to what
you were talking about here.
Like outreach, cold outreach,
base signals, et cetera,
warm follow up, et cetera.
But the reason I say that is I
think sometimes right now the
hype is to automate too quickly.
The hype is to just dive into let's dive
from the beginning because you're manually
writing that copy in the beginning.
That's something that's super important
that I want to resonate here is that
you're not just throwing it to some sort
of agent, like leveling up Anthropic,
and then from there, it's implementing
it like you're writing it
yourself, you're testing it,
you're iterating it.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: have not
played around with like AI written
emails that I haven't even looked at.
No, no.
The only AI stuff that I think you saw
recently on a post that I did is we
brought on a client recently called phone
call dot bot, which I'm very fond of.
I think they have one of
the most hyper realistic.
A.
I.
Calling agents.
Now I'm starting to incorporate that
in my campaigns and from my clients,
not A.
I.
Selling agent, but as a caller that
just simply provides additional
support or scheduling or confirmations.
Manual tasks and it's it's wonderful.
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: That's amazing.
We need to talk about that
in a second, but I think the
original point is just like,
don't automate too quickly is
kind of like the forewarning sign.
Like we still have to be thinking
and you're, I mean, frankly,
you're the authority here.
You're sending millions of emails and
you're not automating the first email.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447:
No, you definitely have to
have a thinking strategic.
That's one of the things that I
felt like a lot of my experience
in the tech world brought me.
just my work experience in general is
that I always felt like if you're not
going to do face to face with the client
you're not going to really take the time
to talk to them, understand their issues.
There's even some very small things that
I've noticed working with clients that
I could have automated and streamlined,
but decided not to because I needed
to, like, I have some clients that hate
when I send them the calendar link.
They hate
it and in the beginning,
I'm like, you know what?
I'm going to try to talk this guy
out of it because it's so stupid.
And I realized that it's
worthless to do that.
So it's like, Hey, you know,
Tim, do you want to do Tuesday
at two or I'll do it with him.
Coming back to not automating too quickly.
the strategy sessions that we have, our
clients are crucial and it gives them,
I think, the feeling that we understand
it and then we can put it into play.
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: Yeah.
And I mean, you can automate the
follow up and I understand that.
But even just like what my major
point is, like, I think we're getting
too caught up in the technology
to start like the overhype.
And there's some great tools out
there, like an incredible suite
of tools, and I pay for them.
But I think what you're mentioning for
start with a human, like, I know, like
in the end tech, like you mentioned,
You met a client in person with a
discounted service and you took a bet.
Can you talk about that?
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: Oh,
yes.
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449:
don't know what's going
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: Yes.
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: Hmm.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447:
that was a great, experience.
And I have a couple more lined up, but
yeah ever since I started the agency what,
99 percent of all of my opportunities
came in through the email was a call like
this where I'm seeing the, the prospect.
And the only thing going through
my mind is, Rich, this is like,
you got to pitch this, like you
got to close this, that here's your
opportunity, he's in front of you.
This call is to close the opportunity.
So it's kind of very focused.
It's like, Hey, we have 15
minutes or we have half an hour.
And then in my mind, I had like
all these steps that I would go
after to make sure I close it.
So in the majority, when I started the
agency, that's how I built the agency.
It really did work.
Once I had this, this client that
managed to negotiate with me a
really good deal, almost too good
for my liking, I accepted it.
And then because he was Montreal based
he said, Rich, why don't you come by
the office and like, You know, let's
have a coffee and like, we'll talk.
And my first reaction was like, dude.
Like, why would I kill easily half a day.
half a day, gone.
The car, the traffic, the
parking the chit chat , like,
I'm like, it's a weekly review.
I said, you know what,
let's give it a shot.
I decided to do it, and effectively
it was a three, four hour thing.
I went down, I met him.
When I met him, he introduced
me to another guy that I knew
from the local community.
I'm like, Oh, I didn't know
you worked with guys together.
That led to something.
Then throughout our conversation, after
we had our meeting, he got up, he knocked
on a couple of doors in that building
and made additional introductions,
which got me additional business.
and that's exactly to your point
that you're bringing up is that these
face to face meetings, Oh my God.
It's like, I could have never imagined
that that could have out of that.
And that came out because I think I broke
that little box that I was in that was
just, okay, you got to be efficient,
it's got to be straight to the point
and we've got to go to the next one.
And ever since I did that, I said
for my local clients, I will make
the effort to go see them because
other things can explore from that.
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: Yeah.
And I think that's like what we're
talking about earlier too, like leveling
up technology wise is great, but never
forget the aspect of the human, like
forgetting the aspect of the initial
message, forgetting the aspect of this.
I still have clients
manual, like I forced them.
We're not automating your first message.
You have manually have
to go through the grind.
It's five emails, dude.
It's not that hard.
Life is not that hard.
Cause I focus a lot on like the
offer creation, the sales con,
like the conversion point, right?
And then when they come in and
scaling up, but it's not that hard
to do five to 10 emails a day.
Like it's not that difficult.
You can automate the follow up.
Sure.
But I think the human aspect.
There's just something that
we just can't yet artificially
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447:
No, you'll never.
It's where the magic is.
It's really where
the magic is.
It's, it's quantity versus quality.
And it seems that the divine is in
the quality, not in the quantity.
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: Yeah.
And that comes, I mean, you're
sending millions of emails.
that's saying something, dude.
I know very few people that do.
But what else are you seeing?
Like, what's piquing your interest?
So you got the AI calling,
which I think is fascinating.
Like, what else is piquing
your interest that you're
like, wow, this is fascinating.
Let me lean into it.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: Well,
there's a lot of things that pique my
interest that go down the rabbit's hole,
but like I fall for like all of these,
like these little LinkedIn posts with
like the This is how I'm doing this.
I like, and then I throw it to my
people and like, like analyze this.
So I have like 50 of them that
I haven't like checked out yet.
I get all the links and stuff like that.
I'm to your point, I think a lot of
us have fell into like, An information
trap where the more information that
I have, let's call it, there's an
insight that I might be more successful.
And I think it's false.
I think it's false.
I think we're being pitched
so much information that
it's,
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449:
we just have to do, yeah,
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447:
overwhelming us, overwhelming us
with the amount of tools and I
sometimes I think I even explained
this to you when we first connected.
Sometimes I sit in front of my desk.
I don't know where to go.
I don't know where to start.
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: Hmm.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: And then
I think to myself, if I had an AI
tool that could tell me what I should
prioritize, that would be great.
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: Oh, yep.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447:
know what I mean?
my focus.
so these days what I do, I literally
make a list, I write down a list of
things that I want to do on paper, you
know, I hardwire it in my ADHD brain.
And then I kind of glance at it, you
know, and then you got to go with the flow
because this guy rings and your wife calls
you and the slack goes off and then the
text and then somebody comes in the house.
So You got to keep it
balanced, but
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449:
keep it balanced.
Yeah.
That's the key thing.
And your kids, you got the kids.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: that's right.
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: Oh, that's fun.
Oh man.
No, but I appreciate you keeping it real.
Cause even though you're using cutting
edge tech, even though you're sending
millions of emails, you're still
keeping it pretty, pretty focused on
how can I improve as a human first?
And how can I.
Substantially add value through
my own thinking, leverage
the tool to execute that.
And I think this is a, you know,
an episode that I'm going to
share with clients just to like,
revisit, like this dude's millions.
We're only like five a day.
And like, you can do five a day.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: Yes,
even when I use ChatGPT, for example,
I have something recently I came
across, it's called NVC, it's
called Non Violent Communication.
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: yeah.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447:
Hey, you ever hear about this?
So, somebody spoke to me about it, I said,
that's a fascinating idea, I did research
on it, and I said, wow, I love this.
I noticed that when clients don't
respond the way I want, or clients
don't pay on time, it's fascinating.
My initial reaction is to be mean
to them and to be like, what?
Like, so what I do is I write
my mean email as I feel it,
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: That's good.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: I go
through the NVC and then I say,
wow, I could get across the exact
same thing by being nicer and so
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: Yeah, I'm
going to totally make that about now.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447:
no, but we'll look for it.
It's called Go find NVC it's on chat, GPT.
Okay.
It's a really great one.
And it helps me.
So now when I write my emails
manually, I've almost like
kind of trained myself, rich.
You don't got to be mean
to get what you want.
You know, you don't got to be like
violent in your communication to
like, cause you're frustrated, right?
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: Yeah.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447:
You want to let the other guy
know that you're frustrated.
So you're hoping that he sees that you're
frustrated so that he gives you what
you want, but it doesn't work like that.
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: Yeah.
It's just, how do you
communicate effectively?
And that's, that's the crux
also with team members.
I had a team that I met up in person
and they were talking about how they
have an issue, the sales with the
marketing guy, they had an issue
whenever the communication and I had
them do a personality profile before.
And they're like, they shared that
they swapped as like, Oh, that's why
I'm not coming across well with you.
Cause they just read the
other person's personality.
But very, very few teams actually do that.
So that's a pretty cool,
it's a pretty cool hack.
And again, going back to the human,
we still need to push the buttons.
We still need to develop the AI.
Like there, we still need
the human in the loop.
In your case too, you need
Ilya to bounce off the idea.
That's brilliant.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447:
even, you know, over the vacation
time, it was the first time that I
decided to do a zoom holiday party.
Okay.
I said,
I got guys working in Serbia.
I got guys working in Bangladesh.
I have another one in Ontario.
Like I can't see these people,
I can't see them face to face.
I can't connect with them.
So I'll give them a budget.
They bought pizza.
I was on vacation, but
I connected on zoom.
We sat down.
We had a normal conversation.
Nothing business.
I said, guys, talk to me about your lives.
and they all started telling
me incredible things.
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: Yeah.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: That's how
we built more of a human connection.
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: Yeah.
And the work quality will
probably follow with that too.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: Yeah.
you know, before when I used to go in the
office at my tech job my boss would come
up and he'd literally be this close to
me and be like, Rich, what's wrong, man?
like, I could see it on your face.
what's up today.
You know,
and then my, yeah, my kid is sick.
I have to bring him here
to da da, all of that.
You lose man in the digital world.
You lose that.
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: Yeah.
And I think we need that.
I was talking to a practitioner.
she focuses on coaching now, but she
also does go to market, but she came from
AWS and Google, so you know who you are.
We had an awesome conversation.
But she talked about how in that space,
when you're in the tech scene and you're
growing in hyper growth companies, it's
almost like you lose yourself, your sense
of being, because you're caught up to it.
You just focus on your KPI.
You're focusing on the next big thing.
And the way that it structures
that you're siloed versus you don't
know the end outcome of the work.
That you're doing.
And for her, she created a shared space
where people just go in and chat and vent.
It's a free thing, but it's fascinating
to me that no matter how advanced we get
with the technology, we still need that.
And the turning point, hopefully it
doesn't have to be a difficult one.
Hopefully just an awareness
or a conversation like this.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: Yeah.
I recently experienced also just
working on a community project.
You know, especially when you work
for these non-profit community
projects and people are volunteers,
you should see the level of stories
that go through people's minds.
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: Well,
Rich, I appreciate you being on.
Where's the best place for people
to Thank you for being on and to
learn more about what you're up to.
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447:
you can catch me on Facebook.
Catch me on LinkedIn.
I guess LinkedIn is
probably the easiest one.
Connect with me on LinkedIn.
Say hi.
Say bye.
Ask me a question on a cold email.
I'll be happy to help you out.
And yeah, that's about it.
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449: Well, you
know, the hack now to get to his email.
So you just got to create the content
first and then send it over to
richard_1_01-09-2025_140447: That's right.
raul-_1_01-09-2025_110449:
Rich, thanks for being on man.
And we'll go from here.
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