Latest / Founder Unfiltered - What Founders Think But Never Say / The Mistake I Made at Uber That Taught Me Everything About Sales

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The Mistake I Made at Uber That Taught Me Everything About Sales · Founder Unfiltered - What Founders Think But Never Say

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  Welcome back to Founder Unfiltered, the show that gets
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  into the stuff founders never actually talk about, but need
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  to. I'm Bradley Jacobs, your host
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  and the founder and CEO of Mylance.
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  A quick note on what we're building up Mylance if you're AB
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  to B founder who's wants to use LinkedIn to actually attract
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  your clients and customers to have it really be an engine for
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  you without sounding self promoting or cringy, that's
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  exactly what we built. Go check it out, mylands.co.
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  We have a free version that you can use with that.
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  Let's jump right in. Today's episode is where I
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  frankly unknowingly learn to sell by making mistakes along
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  the way. I'm going to share the stories
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  and what I learned and how it's helped me become a founder who
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  truly feels comfortable and confident in selling.
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  And it's been a journey and I'm going to share with you how I've
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  gotten here. So when I was at Uber, for those
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  of you who don't know me, I spent four years at Uber from
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  2014 to 2018 in the growth scale, hectic years.
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  And two years into my operations role at the company, they
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  essentially asked me if I would go launch Uber Eats in Miami.
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  And it kind of came out of nowhere, but it was really
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  exciting. And I, I absolutely said yes.
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  And the launch went super well. And right after they asked me if
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  I wanted to interview for the GM role and I said yes.
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  But I said one thing. I said don't disqualify me based
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  on my resume because I was 26 years old at the time.
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  I knew I didn't have that much experience and this was a multi
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  $1,000,000 market. I was interviewing to basically
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  run myself. Long story short, the interviews
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  went great and they disqualified me because I didn't have an MBA.
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  And I was frustrated. I was so frustrated.
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  And So what I did is after I calmed down, I was like, OK,
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  maybe I can go be the GM of a smaller market, something like
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  Raleigh or Charlotte or Nashville.
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  And I essentially went around to different GMs and I was
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  basically like, Hey, like, let me be the GM of these different
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  cities. And one by one by one, I just
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  got no after no after no after no.
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  And I was kind of shocked. I was like, I just had this
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  really successful launch. I had had two years at the
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  company with a great track record, got promoted, everything
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  was was great, my resume at the company, but I still were
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  getting rejected right, left and center.
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  And I and I kind of went back to myself and my old boss and I was
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  like, what, what the hell is going on here?
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  Like, why am I not getting this opportunity that I feel like I
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  should get? And even as I say it out loud, I
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  wonder if you are tracking what was not working.
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  Because what was not working in hindsight was I was asking all
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  about me. I was like, I deserve this.
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  I want this. It was me, me, me.
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  And so the first lesson I learned here was it can't be
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  about me. It has to be about what's in it
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  for them. It has to be beneficial to the
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  company, the company's goals, outcomes, the company wants to
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  create. It can't be about me.
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  No one frankly gives a shit about me right Like my boss
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  does. They care about my well-being.
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  But the company as a whole, I am a cog in their machine.
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  No matter like how big shot I thought I was.
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  And I'm frankly not that big, but I'm just a person and I
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  don't really make that much of a difference, all things
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  considered, to this huge company.
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  I mean, even back in the day where we already were starting
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  to have thousands of employees. And so, and regardless, it
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  doesn't matter if we had a thousands or 10, it has to
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  benefit the company. So I started looking around at
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  what the company was doing, what its goals were, and I basically
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  realized that the company's goals were to launch Uber Eats
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  all over the world as quickly as possible.
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  And I realized I was one of very few people at the company that
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  had launch experience. It was a brand new product at
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  that time, as this is back in 2016.
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  And so I was one of those few people.
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  So how could I leverage the experience I already had to help
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  Uber accomplish its goals in launching in new cities?
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  And so I basically saw that we were launching all over Europe
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  and I basically said, let me help you, just do this.
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  And it doesn't matter what my title is or compensation or
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  anything, but secretly I'm thinking, I want to go, I'm
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  going to go work in Europe. That sounds freaking fun.
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  And Uber wants that to happen. And I have a good track record
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  with launch specifically. So like, let me use that
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  experience. And I literally on the phone
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  with a recruiter and then another regional general
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  manager, they were like, get on a plane to Amsterdam.
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  We'll figure it out. Like literally put your stuff in
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  storage, drop everything and get over to Amsterdam.
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  And it's amazing what a difference was from my first
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  approach, which is like, I deserve to be GM to, oh, you
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  guys need this done. I can help you.
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  I have a good track record in this specific thing, so let me
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  help you. And they're like absolutely get
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  on a plane, right? So there's the lesson literally
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  performed from, you know, a few months later where instead of
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  pitching my needs and my problem, I am speaking
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  specifically to their problem in a way that I can support them.
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  So I LED with their problem. I hope you're like, see the dots
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  I'm connecting here about how I'm not, this is not a secret,
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  right? How does this end up in you
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  being successful in sales to grow your business?
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  So we're going to Fast forward because two years later I was
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  running the Uber Freight business on an operations role.
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  I was running a team and I eventually quit Uber.
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  I was like, you know what, I'm done building businesses for
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  somebody else. I'm ready to go out on my own
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  and I don't quite know what business I want to build yet.
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  So let me just take some time off and let me, I just had this
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  idea like let me see if I can go get a part time consulting
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  client. I don't even know what
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  consulting was in this way, but let me just go see if I can make
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  some money on the side. I don't want to work full time,
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  but let me go see what happens if I just put my name out there.
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  And I reached out to 12 companies.
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  I just found them online. Some of them had already DM Ed
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  me on LinkedIn about a, a job, a full time job.
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  And I was like, maybe I can pivot a full time job offer or
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  not. There was an offers like kind of
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  a Hey, are you interested in applying to Hey, I have this
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  really great experience, I think at Uber and you know, let me see
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  if I can help you. And eleven of those companies
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  either ignored me or said no. And then one was a Series A
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  company. They were self driving and they
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  were like, you know what, let's talk.
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  Like we think we want you full time, but let's talk.
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  And so I faintly spent that first conversation asking them a
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  ton of questions. And I didn't know what I didn't
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  know, but I knew that if they want, if they're going to bring
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  me on in a role that I want, I've learned enough to know I
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  have to be solving a problem for them.
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  So let me find out what their problems are.
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  And I basically found this one thing is that they were looking
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  to launch a food delivery marketplace that their next
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  round of funding frankly depended on it going well.
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  They didn't have anybody with with this experience.
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  I had this direct experience like perfectly so.
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  So I was literally the perfect person for them and I knew it.
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  And I had nothing to lose because I didn't even know if I
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  really like wanted this. This wasn't like the business I
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  went out to start. I was going to go start a tech
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  company, right? That's what I knew from my Uber
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  world. And so I threw together a
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  proposal. It was a PowerPoint
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  presentation, which I've never done again, but it did work.
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  And I basically said for 25 KA month, I'll work part time, I'll
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  work 20 to 25 hours a week. These are the things I'll do.
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  I put together a business plan, a model for how the business
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  would grow. I put together like everything
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  they need to be thinking about. And I didn't give them all the
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  answers, but I told them how I would come up with those answers
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  and that I've done this before. So it's basically like, here's
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  your problem. Here's how I'm going to think
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  about it. Here's how you're going to pay
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  me. And all you need to do is say
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  yes. And frankly, they said yes.
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  And I was like, holy shit. But the lesson specifically
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  applied to this company was, I'm not selling you anything.
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  I'm solving a problem you already have.
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  And the stakes are really high. They had raised a bunch of money
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  in their Series A, and they were trying to raise a Series B.
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  We're talking 10s of millions of dollars.
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  Paying me 25 grand a month feels like a lot to me.
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  I was like, holy crap, this is cool.
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  But for them, it was kind of a drop in the bucket because the
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  stakes were so high for them raising that next round.
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  And so this whole thing never really felt like a sales pitch.
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  It all felt like, you have a problem.
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  I can solve your problem. I just need to show you that I
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  can. And all of a sudden we're in
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  business and I'm making more money than I made at Uber
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  working less than half the time because you bet your ass I
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  worked more than 40 hours at Uber and everybody's winning
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  here. And I end up having that client
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  for nine months. But it was so much more than the
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  client because it taught me the lesson of one, you don't get
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  what you want unless you ask for it, 2.
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  You get it when you solve a clear problem.
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  And three, it doesn't hurt to go big.
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  I thought I was going big. I thought I was going really
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  big. And they would say no.
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  And then we, you know, settle somewhere in the middle.
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  I didn't really expect them to just say yes, but they did.
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  And part of why I'm also sharing this is because in that
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  presentation, I gave them a lot of value.
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  Like they could have easily said no, taken my presentation and
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  been like, OK, we have the makings here of what we need to
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  do, but the makings here of what we need to do is a very
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  different thing than actually going to do it.
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  And that's why they hired me and paid me good money anyway.
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  So how you can apply that to content, which of course I'm a
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  big believer in because content is a way of building this one to
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  many relationship that allows you to legitimize yourself in
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  front of all of these eyes at one time.
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  It's as if I create this proposal and I send it out to
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  like 1000 people and they all review it from a standpoint of
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  one, what can I learn? And along the way, realizing
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  that Bradley knows what he's talking about, that he's been
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  there, that he's done that, that he's legitimate.
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  He's not some, you know, random idiot just blowing smoke up
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  everyone's ass. Like this is real, right?
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  So that's the value of content. And you can think about it, or
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  how I think about it at least is I think of OK, so like if it, if
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  the Series A company is struggling with how do we launch
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  a food marketplace without making a ton of mistakes?
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  Basically, my content can be hitting on every mistake that
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  they could make and sharing what I would do instead, right?
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  Here's how you should think about this.
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  Here's a common mistake here. Here's a mistake I made here
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  maybe at the Uber Eats, Miami Lodge or Milan Lodge, right?
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  I can share my own experiences that are value add to them that
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  help them learn and all while I'm legitimizing myself but it
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  but I don't even think about necessarily a sale or the
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  legitimacy. All I think about, and this is
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  what I want your one take away from this episode to be the one
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  thing is I'm adding value. I am teaching something that
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  they actually want to know, but not from a preachy way of like,
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  this is how you go launch a food delivery marketplace.
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  It's like, no, these are the things I've learned.
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  These are the experiences I've had with the lens of what can I
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  share for my personal anecdotal experience that's going to be a
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  genuine value add, whether they buy from me, work with me or
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  not. So with Mylans and this podcast
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  and everything we do here, it is all about value add.
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  It's all about just giving and giving and giving and giving
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  'cause frankly, I could tell you a million ways that you can use
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  LinkedIn to attract clients, but at the end of the day, you still
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  gotta go do it. So I'm gonna bet that 90% of you
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  are not gonna go do it without my software.
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  You're gonna still come use my software because I'm telling you
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  the practice, but now you want to actually execute it.
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  You want to do it well, you want to save time.
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  So instead of like reinventing the wheel, you can just come use
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  our software that has all the best practices built in.
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  Like that's the bet I'm making. It's the same bet I made with
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  the Series A company and that ended up being my first client
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  because I end up getting more, many more clients after that
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  following the exact same strategy of let me give, let me
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  give, let me give. And by the way, one of the ways
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  that you can give, and this is one of the most powerful ways,
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  especially on the phone with someone, you can give by asking
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  good questions. When you ask the right
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  questions, you're actually getting them to think in a way
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  they may not have previously thought.
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  And you're giving value in like this question is important and
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  I'll give you an example because it might not make sense based on
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  that. I had a lot of clients in the
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  freight space because I was part of the Uber freight team for two
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  years. And there's, there's a
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  relatively rare combination of technology expertise and freight
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  expertise in the world that I had.
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  And so I would ask all the time, like, how do you plan to scale
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  your freight marketplace without adding tons of people?
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  Because that was the strategy for decades and decades and
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  decades was you just throw people at the problem.
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  It's a very antiquated world until the last, you know, 5-10
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  years. So that got them thinking, what
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  is the role of technology, a product, a process in what I'm
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  normally doing is throwing people at the problem.
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  And now they might have had an answer, but it's it usually
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  wasn't very well baked. They didn't know what software's
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  they should be using. They didn't know what software
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  was really capable of, how much they could replace, how like
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  they just didn't know. So even by me asking the
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  question and creating the dialogue around the problem that
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  they're facing, I'm establishing my expertise and I'm adding
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  value. It's all about adding value.
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  So what I do now with my content is 90% of it is just value add
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  value, add value add value like give everything away.
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  I tell you all of my quote UN quote secrets because they're
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  not secrets. The secrets really is in the in
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  the execution, right. The secret is not in telling you
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  what works. Anybody can go do that.
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  You can get the best SEO guides in the world.
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  Does that mean your SE OS automatically up level?
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  No, you need somebody to go do it for you, right?
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  Or you got to do it yourself and spend the time energy.
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  So give, give, give. And then 10% of the time I'll
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  ask. And I really try and make my
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  asks still a value at. So even though I'm asking for
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  something, I'm asking for an e-mail, I'm asking for some
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  time, I'm asking for some energy, I'm asking for
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  something, but I'm really giving in something that's value to
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  you. So the example could be give me
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  your e-mail and I'll add you to our newsletter.
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  It could be book a book time with me and I will give you 15
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  minutes of strategy for your LinkedIn.
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  It could be, you know, some a lead magnet of sort, right?
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  I'm going to give you this like strategy analysis I did on the
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  top 100 performing LinkedIn post over the last six months.
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  And here's what they all had in common.
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  So I'm asking for an e-mail, but I'm still giving you something
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  of value. And that's the best way to have
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  a really high conversion rate in those asks.
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  In summary, this is all about what's in it for your buyer.
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  It's about solving their problem.
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  It's about asking good questions.
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  It's about sharing as much as you can, like share the farm and
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  then eventually ask and ask in a way that you are actually giving
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  something and learn from my mistakes, like learn the lessons
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  that I'm sharing with you so you don't have to make them
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  yourself. With that, I'm signing off.
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  Come check us out my lands.co. Our products really being really
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  been incredible lately. Our, our customers are loving
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  it. They're showing up
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  authentically, they're attracting clients like it's,
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  it's such a win. So come check it out.
• 15:46
  We do have a free version of it now, which we didn't used to,
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  which is really, really exciting.
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  So, and also, if you got value out of this podcast, share it
• 15:52
  with a friend, subscribe. Those ratings mean a lot.
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  They really do either mean more than I realize.
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  So if you could really take a second and go like our show, if
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  you got value out of it, that would mean so much to me.
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  And obviously it's not free to create this.
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  And with that, have an amazing rest of your day and I will talk
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  to you soon.