it's really really hard to be a good
salesperson and people like that are
unbelievably rare and they're
unbelievably valuable and nothing wrong
with it and it doesn't make you a bad
person you're not selling your soul
what's also it's also how are you going
to generate revenue and without those
economy even money we're going to move
in an economy well the other thing that
happens with the artistic and maybe the
entrepreneurial types too is that they
they end up with contempt for the
business end of the process and that's a
real mistake you know in one of the
things that I tell people who are
artistically oriented let's say so
they're in the entrepreneurial category
is look it's virtually impossible for
you to monetize your product that's the
first thing you have to understand so
maybe you'll get lucky and you'll figure
out a strategy but if you add contempt
for the sales and marketing process to
that impossibility you can be bloody
well sure that all you're going to do is
starve so so you better drop your
contempt for the sales and marketing end
of this if you if you want to sustain
yourself through your life and that's
gonna be a prerequisite for your
creative endeavor yeah and so in art
schools and and and establishments like
that do an absolutely dreadful job of
well they don't teach you know I was an
artist I was an artist I went to art
school yeah they don't teach you know
never once no I know no and it's it's
and I mean are you gonna commercialize
your venture how are you gonna pay for
your mortgage mm-hmm what are you gonna
buy food yeah with of just a paintbrush
and a count Jesus and well an artist's
earned particularly dire position
because as a visual artist for example
you're not only competing with all the
visual artists that now exist and
there's plenty of them but you're also
competing with all the dead artists who
were way who already have an established
reputation and a body of work that
that's being what's still being
exchanged in the marketplace and so you
don't want to add contempt for the sales
and marketing process to that and you
also probably have to understand that if
you want to be an artist that you're
also going to have to have have to have
another job yeah because it's just
unless you want to bang your head
against the wall until it's bleeding
it's so hard and I mean I've known some
people who are outstanding artists and
known very very few I don't know if I've
ever met anyone who was able to make a
living from the outset of their career
as a as a non-commercial visual artist
brutally difficult so and adding
contempt to that is not helpful you
should be very thankful that sales and
marketing people exist even though I
know there's that what would you call it
the mercantilist commercial element to
it that is sort of in some sense you can
consider it distasteful from the
perspective of higher aesthetics but
don't confuse your ignorance of
something important
sales and marketing with your moral
purity that's a big mistake it's a big
ethical mistake and you will pay for
that yeah so so I think there's some
simple solutions I was like what I sort
of summarized this part so far I've
always enjoyed selling straight to
consumer yeah I'm not too business yeah
I like that thank you I think that
you've got more customers you're always
at the decision maker
sometimes it's the husband or the wife
who owns the credit card streams but
other than that you're always at the
decision maker you learn very
intuitively and quickly you get a quick
feedback loop yeah whereas like you said
if you're dealing with the managers got
their own motives and then the company
has got different motives they're not
going to tell you the truth you've got
an unwrapped or they don't even know
what that is necessarily because they
can't represent their business because
they do well they're doing embody it
yeah so straight to consumer is number
one I think the second thing is I think
probably it is fair to say that sales
and marketing can be learned but I think
it's also fair to say that sales and
marketing are more likely to succeed in
certain personality traits well you need
to be extroverted for sure yeah yeah and
and assertive yeah it also helps to be
emotionally stable because what's your
failure rate as a salesperson like the
one it's like you have to be you have to
have a constitution of bloody iron to
tolerate that you know because the
what's the default answer to do you want
to buy something out of me no no it's no
go away right it's worse than no it's
like no and you're bothering me
yeah and then even if the best you get
is well
that's where that's worse than now I'll
think about it the middle grounds yeah
well at least with a no you can move on
that's right you drown and that's right
well that's the problem with was trying
to sell the big companies yeah it's like
it's never enough
maybe maybe we'll do this it's like win
well maybe in the next six months to a
year which will be delayed absolutely
100%
yeah we've found selling direct to
consumer way less way less stressful
yeah and and you know the funny thing I
more rewarding so I will reward a
rewarding because you can actually
change an individual's life yes it's a
good product yes exactly
yeah well the thing about you know you
kind of have this idea that you could
you could let's go for a big company a
couple of contracts and we're set it's
like yeah but you'll die in the interim
waiting for the contracts yeah so and it
is so interesting to think about that in
terms of the the error of Marxist
criticisms of capitalism because the
Marxist criticism was something like
capital will accrue in the hands of a
smaller and smaller number of
individuals which it does but the
individuals rotate that's the thing that
Marx got wrong now with big companies
you think that well the big companies
absorb all the capital but the thing is
they fail yeah the reason they fail is
because they get so large they're so
ponderous that they they move so slowly
that eventually they make themselves
extinct and you experience that when
you're trying to sell to them it's like
oh you have this rule oh you have this
rule oh he also have this rule well this
rule means we have to completely rewrite
our software yeah you know and then then
then well and and these special
adaptations have to be made then there's
20 people to clear that with and yeah
yeah it's it's brutally difficult