Produced By - Selling Without the Ick: How to Help Instead of Convince | 145: Dean Seddon

Episode Date: March 30, 2026

This episode with Dean Seddon was recorded using Riverside. If you want studio quality audio and video for remote podcasts or interviews, this is the platform I use to record Produced By: Try it here: https://creators.riverside.com/TomasLoucky Dean Seddon is a social selling coach, author, speaker and founder with more than 17 years of experience helping individuals, teams and global organisations turn LinkedIn into a reliable source of real conversations, clients and revenue. He is known for his calm, systems led approach to selling, focused on removing pressure, gimmicks and burnout. Dean prioritises human behaviour, trust and simplicity, and stays deeply hands on with the platform he teaches, building repeatable processes that value relationships over vanity metrics and consistency over hype. In this episode, Dean shares how he became the number one social selling coach despite hating sales at the start of his career. He talks about the motivations that kept him going and the mindset shift that made the difference. You will hear practical advice on selling on social media by focusing on quality over quantity, alongside a reminder that it is possible to build a successful business, show up consistently without burning out, enjoy your life, and create a recognisable personal brand that feels clear, positive and human, often helped by Dean’s now iconic shirts.Connect with Dean:https://www.linkedin.com/in/socialsellingdean/https://www.deanseddon.io/Timestamps: 00:00 – Selling starts with the buyer’s problem 01:10 – Introduction and Dean’s iconic shirts 02:00 – The story behind the bright shirts 05:16 – Did Dean always want a career in sales 07:05 – The mindset shift that changed everything 08:53 – Early career struggles and motivation 10:31 – Discovering social selling through Facebook 12:07 – Seventeen years of social selling experience 13:59 – Why Dean switched from Facebook to LinkedIn 16:01 – What LinkedIn was like in the early days 18:15 – The reality of selling on LinkedIn today 20:20 – Why big numbers do not mean real success 21:50 – Dean’s outreach strategy and booking calls 22:55 – Mid-roll: Recording podcasts with Riverside 23:25 – Selling advice most people forget 25:25 – Attention spans and the nine-word hook 26:33 – Automation mistakes to avoid 30:11 – Handling rejection and awkward moments 31:52 – The automation mistake Dean will never repeat 34:29 – Building a recognisable personal brand 37:12 – Why Dean chose pink branding 38:11 – Staying consistent across multiple platforms 39:40 – Hobbies, Star Trek and writing 43:30 – Books that influenced Dean 45:54 – Writing the next book 47:15 – Where to find Dean online 48:05 – The question Dean wishes people asked 49:14 – How to find your niche 50:26 – Final thoughts and closing Connect with Tomas:X: https://x.com/TomasLoucky⁠⁠⁠Stan: https://stan.store/TommenLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tomasloucky/⁠⁠Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thisistommen/⁠⁠Unproduced:Newsletter: https://unproduced.substack.comYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@unproducednotesSpotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/033Ddo8ibDlLYoaP7FFLIWMore:Links: https://linktr.ee/produced_by⁠⁠⁠Newsletter: ⁠⁠⁠⁠https://producednewsletter.substack.com/⁠The Podcast Club: https://www.linkedin.com/groups/25420030/Tools & gear that support the show:Metricool: https://f.mtr.cool/HRJBZKRiverside: https://riverside.sjv.io/vDnDodFavikon: https://www.favikon.com?fpr=tommenRa Optics: https://ra-optics.myshopify.com/discount/TOMMEN?rfsn=8803777.591d19JamX: https://jamx.ai/podcasters-offer?ref_id=e02d48af-ef66-4e76-b804-c2e8d282a8bfSome links are affiliate links, which means I may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. If you find them useful, using these links helps keep the podcast running. Thank you!  Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

People don't buy what you do. They buy what it does for them. Prospects do not care about Dean, about his products, about his services. They care about there's a goal and I'm stuck here. How do I get there? How do I get out of where I am into there? Understanding that, that's your message. Whether that's an outreach message, your content, your profile, your message is, hey, if you're here, I've got a way to get you there. And that's fundamentally the core of it. Too many people are saying, hey, this is what I do and aren't I wonderful? And really it's about, hey, where do you want to be? Where are you stuck? So it's biocentric. We've got to think about it and make everything about our buyer. That's number one, fundamental. Number two, the more personal you make it, the more conversational

you make it, the more it feels like you understand them, the better. And then the other bit I would say is in outreach or in content, you've only got maybe nine words to hook. them. Before we dive into today's episode, please hit that subscribe button. Your support helps us grow and inspire more people on their journeys. Thank you. Hello, Dean. Thank you for join us today and welcome to the show. Hi, Thomas and thank you for having me. And I'm color coordinated with your background as well. I should have changed for the pink one for your branding actually. Yeah. Yeah, Neller. It's great to be on. Thank you. I appreciate it. And just a side note, I was going to say that I like your branding with your cool shirts because I seen it across

many pictures and I think it stands out and it's pretty cool. Yeah, and today I normally, I'll tell you a funny, we get time, I'll tell you the funny story of the shirts. But in the UK right now, it is absolutely freezing. So I am breaking my brand rules and keeping warm. But actually, is it like a coincidence that you like to wear it or did you start using it as part of your brand? So I'd love to say it was strategic decision, but it'll become clear why it wasn't.

I went to Miami about three years ago, and it was really warm, and I bought all of these tropical shirts whilst I was there. And I came home, and the UK was having a real hot summer, I think it was, I think it was a heat wave. And so I thought, I'll wear them in the office. So I did. and I noticed that whenever I wore a bright-colored shirt, my post did better. So I decided to wear the shirts all the time.

But it gets horrific in the winter when you're sat in the UK in, you know, even the office is, the heating in this office has been on forever and it's just about pushing nice room temperature now. And it's nearly the end of the day. so I'm not brave enough to stick to own my brand in the winter. But I hope that it doesn't bring bad luck to this episode since you're not wearing that. Well, weirdly, when I don't do it, somebody usually comments and says, what happened to the shirts.

So either way I get engagement, whether I wear it or I don't now. Yeah. But it's actually a funny one because I saw the recent post that you shared, the kind of automated DM, when someone mentioned your share, shirt. It was like, well, although it's such a bad message, it's actually nice that the person highlighted the shirt. So it was quite cool. Yeah, I mean, the only thing, I mean, I did do a post about that, but the reason why I get or was, it's clever that they mentioned the shirt, but then in the second half of it, they said, and you look interesting. So it's kind of like,

I'm going to be really specific and then immediately follow it with something quite generic. Yeah, that is true. And the shirt bit isn't as clever as you might think because the post I did a couple of days before that was me talking specifically about a shirt. So if it had been anybody else, it may have looked really, really personal. But because it was the way it worked, it was. easy to detect. And it was like, the funniest bit of it was, Dean, I'll, I'll help you sell. It was a cold DM and they said to me, do you want to get clients without cold DMs? So it's like, you just, why can't you practice what you preach? And I think it was really funny that they sent

the DM to someone like you, like do some homework. Why would you pitch social selling calls? coach such a deal. But anyway, it was just a lazy sales navigator search that they'd search for coaches and not done any filters, any, you know, exclusion or anything. And it picked me up, which a lot of people do. I've been, you know, I'll never, I'll never kind of shame a person. But if their message is bad, I will use it and show people what goes wrong. Yeah, as an example. I agree. And then, before we dive into your expertise, I wanted to ask you, if you can tell us, if you are someone who's always been interested in selling and in this area, because I feel like that too many people, it's maybe like a topic that they

struggle with or find uncomfortable to sell to other people. So what was it like for you if you've been interested in it or how did you discover passion for it? I actually hated sales, really hated sales. And I don't know when I got comfortable with it, but I guess it was when I started to think about it differently of, I can help solve people's problem. And when you think about it like that, that changes it a little bit because the mentality of I've got to sell something, I've got to convince somebody to buy my stuff, that feels icky. But if I go, well, hang on a minute, all I'm doing is looking for people with a problem I can help them with. I don't know if somebody has that problem. And so suddenly I'm just trying to discover if there's a fit. And I know that

words overused. But if there's no fit, there's no sale. And if there is a fit, there's a sale. And I think the more you just think about it is having a conversation with people and seeing if they have a problem that you can solve and you take all the pressure off yourself, the easier it gets. I think the pressure, you know, that kind of, we call it sweaty palm behavior when you're so eager, your palms are sweaty. If you get into that state, you will do things that are just weird, basically. So for me, it was the reframe of,

I can't sell to anybody, but I can help try and find people with a problem. It's really smart, but at the same time, then how did you get to such a reframe? Someone advised you, helped you, or was it natural progression? It was actually many, many years,

of doing unsuccessful outreach. And going, actually, if people aren't motivated, I've got no chance of buying anything. They've got no chance. They're not going to buy anything just because I can twist their arm. So I've got to find people who have a problem. So I need to just speak to their problem, understand it. And it was really, it was really probably my second sales job.

that I really figured this out. My first sales job, it was kind of I marketed the sale. Maybe we'd talk about that at some point. I just heavily marketed and got sales. My second sales job, I had to find people with a problem and I was far more forensic about how I approached it looking for what were the kind of telltale signs that somebody would have this problem. And then I could speak to that in my outreach and my messaging. And so I got really tight on the pain points and challenges that people would have and talked about them. Whereas my first sales job, I just went, hey, look how good we are. Look how great we are. Look at this. We can do this. We can do this. But I did it so much. I mean, in crazy levels that it paid off. But my second sales job,

I thought about what are the telltale signs they need our help and they need what we've got to offer. And I focused on that. And actually, in two years there, I did. two and a half million in new business. Oh, wow. And yeah, in my job before, it took me four years to do two and a half million. So I did it in double the time with less prospects and less convincing.

That's impressive. And if you don't mind me asking, if you, like the beginnings were kind of challenging or harder, what was it that kept you like in such a job? Because if that was like the career that you, wanted to do because I assume that many people would give up if they don't see success or if it's not working. But for you, was it like maybe like a dream career or something that you always wanted to do? I'll be honest. My first attempt at business failed. So I had to get a job.

So it was money. The first job was money. Yeah. I just needed money. And then when I realized I was starting to be successful at this, I wanted more money. And when I got to that company, I saw that was just a bigger company, bigger organization, more sophisticated in the way they did things. And so I realized I had to change the way I did it. So, so it was, it was money that kept me there and debt, basically. After my first business, it didn't go bust, but it nearly did. And I, I was in a black hole in my, I was a 21, think about this for a birthday present, 21 years old and a quarter of a million in debt. Yeah, I'm sorry to hear that, yeah.

I needed money. So that's what got me in it, and that's what, and the debt kept me there until I could pay it off. Yeah, yeah, that's the reality. And then if you saw such a success, like with your new approach and how it was working, what was the progress from there? Because I assume or I can imagine that it helped you, like, with the confidence, with the skills.

So did company try to promote you? Did you see it like as a way how to work for yourself or share knowledge with the others or what were next steps? Yeah. So around about the time, I was working for other people, but around at the time that Facebook started to become like mainstream. So like 2009, 2010, I started to use it and go, this is interesting. And at that time, a lot of the sales work. was driving to meetings all over the country or calling people and a bit of email but nowhere near like today. So there was a lot of travel. There was a lot of kind of cold calling.

I hated cold calling. Absolutely hated it. I felt like an idiot doing it. And so I saw Facebook as a potential opportunity to be able to sell things. And so I jumped ship and you, used basically social media as a way to build a business. I guess that is smart, yeah? Yeah, if you hate cold calling and then this way of doing things without cold calling comes along, you just go for it. And by that point, I've made quite a bit of money, so I was in a better financial position. So it was like, let's take the risk, let's do it.

Yeah. And now, Dean, as you mentioned, it was around 2009 and time around that. can you just for the audience, maybe if they haven't heard of you before, because I feel like that these days there are a lot of coaches, people train to sell it on LinkedIn, but I just want to show or mention your experience because I saw on LinkedIn how many years actually of the selling you've got of experience.

So can you just briefly like say so that there is some kind of context that you are actually someone with real experience? So, yeah, I've been teaching, doing, implementing social selling for 17 years of a fashion. It's an impressive number, honestly. Yeah, it's morphed quite a bit, and I've changed platforms in that time. I was originally a Facebook person

and became a LinkedIn person about halfway in about eight years ago, eight, nine years ago, flipped to LinkedIn. But, I mean, fundamentally, you know, platforms are platforms, to really get good at social selling, which is what I'm a big advocate for,

is actually understanding the humans on social platforms and how you engage with them one to one. So I've been doing it for 17 years. Mavericks existed for that time. It's morphed quite a bit. It was me on my own and it's now 30 plus people in the team. You'll probably see me talking to a lot of small business owners on the platform, but actually our corporate team will be training salespeople, sales teams.

kind of all around the world. But my baby, my focus is basically helping people like me when I got started in business. Yeah, that is impressive track record. I've seen the number of people that you help with. I believe you've got it on LinkedIn. And I saw even a number of reviews. So I think it speaks for itself. Cool. Yeah. I love it. And before, as you said, you were on Facebook, which is a while ago. But what was like the shift to change the platform? I know that you've got a strength presence on LinkedIn, but I don't know if you maybe still use other platforms to sell as well or we are fully focused on LinkedIn. When I switched to LinkedIn, I pretty much ditched all the other channels, which in hindsight

was probably a mistake. But at the time, I didn't have the bandwidth to look after all the channels. So why did I switch from Facebook to LinkedIn? I think the big one was not being able to find the right people. If you look at Facebook, even today, it's very difficult to find exactly the right people. So, you know, you can't tell whether they're a CEO of a company

or they're the CEO of their bedroom. You know, and also, kind of LinkedIn is seen as business. Some people even now feel like if you try and connect or friend request somebody on Facebook, it can be a bit weird if you don't know them. So there was that kind of weirdness of on LinkedIn, people expect to be connecting with people they don't know.

On Facebook is a bit weird. The accuracy of the people, not knowing who you're talking to or, you know, whether they're the right fit, whether the right industries, all of those kind of things. And also the massive, change in the way Facebook worked.

It's actually better now than it was. So Facebook's a decent opportunity now, I know that sounds strange me saying that, but it's actually a decent platform for business now. But it went through a phase where it wasn't. So I thought, let's make the jump to LinkedIn. And I'm happy I did. I just regret letting the other platforms go.

Yeah, yeah. I understand those are valid points. And for some context, can you mention again when did you join LinkedIn? Because I always like to remind to people and to the audience, for example, how long you've been showing up? Because I believe that, or it seems like that people look for shortcuts when I want to see quick results,

so just to give some kind of context that you've been there for a while. I've been there since 2011. Oh, wow. That's a while, yeah. Yeah. I think I had an account before that, but I can't remember what I did with it. So I merged, I think I merged my accounts, but the account I've got now is from 2011.

I know that it's a long time, but can you do some kind of comparison, such as what was people? So, LinkedIn in 2000, I can remember 2012, 2013 really well. So LinkedIn in 2012, you could post something. and your connections actually saw it. You could post links to your blogs on your website and people would actually see it and click it. You could send messages to people and you were pretty much guaranteed a reply.

And attention spans were decent. But it was a small group of people. Today, 2026, we got 1.2 billion users, I think it is now. but the attention there's far more activity people are on the platform more but attention spans are shorter so you have to be more creative in how you grab people's attentions and everybody's overwhelmed with DMs from irrelevant people and so you have to be more smart in how you approach people if you want more replies and more conversations so it was kind of like old school you could just go at it and it all kind of work out

now you have to really, really thoughtful and planned in what you're doing. You can't just show up and hope for the best. But there's a much bigger opportunity on LinkedIn today than there was back then. I obviously don't have such experience like you do from before, but from my experience and point of view now, I agree with what you said. It seems like that as well to me. And if we focus on specifically on your area of expertise, such as selling,

what is the landscape like? Do you feel like, I assume that more people emerged, as there are more people, more opportunities, but from your experience, do you feel like that the competition is growing, maybe quantity over quality or still quality? What is it like? Do you mean competition for what I do? Or do you mean just competition generally? No, what you do, like such as people selling us? Oh, oh, I have one man in his dog is a LinkedIn expert these days. Like anybody who was a salesperson who gets fired becomes a LinkedIn expert.

It's like, you know, I think there's a couple of parts to LinkedIn, really, when you think about it. There's DMs, there's messages and a whole load of other features. And what I'm trying to do is say to people that it's features are good, content's good, messages are good, but it's how you use them to get a result that matters. And I think there's a group of people on LinkedIn right now who are obsessed with metrics that don't mean anything. So like, likes, comments, impressions. And there's also a group who are doing large volume outreach. And both groups are on the belief that if I get more, I'll be more successful. And 15 years, nearly of doing this, I can tell you, more does not mean more success. You'll have had this,

Thomas, you will have had conversations with people and you look at their numbers, you look at their impressions, you look at all that stuff and you go, oh my God, I would love to have their numbers. And then they tell you how much they're making and you go, maybe not. That is, that is a good point. So the numbers don't necessarily mean success. And so what I'm focused on first, and it's not ignore metrics, it's not ignore engagement, it's not ignore all that. It's number one, let's make sure you have a plan to get ROI, irrespective of whether you get 10,000 followers or any of that, how can we get you success with the smallest number

of people? Because if you get that, it will scale. But going the other way around, going numbers and hoping it will convert is dangerous. I'll give you an example of this, right? If you require lots and lots of engagement or lots and lots of followers or lots and lots of messages to get even a low-level ROI, yeah, barely, you know, baseline ROI, if you need lots of that, you have to continually scale. That means more and more prospects, more and more and more engagement. More, more, more, more, more, more, more.

Well, here's the catch. Are you familiar with EasyJet? Yes, the airline. EasyJet, the airline? Yeah, yeah. Right. You know how EasyJet has got standard boarding and speedy boarding. So standard boarding, speedy boarding.

You pay a little bit extra and you can go into a queue that gets on the plane first. What happens if EasyJet lets everybody have speedy boarding? it becomes quicker in the standard queue. And that is my point. If you think about the people on LinkedIn in your network as people, and you go, how do I engage that one person and you do that? And I'll give you an example in my outreach in a second.

If you think about profiles as people and really zero in on that, you'll get a higher conversion than the volume. I'll give you an example of that. I send five outreach messages a day and I'll book at least one call a day sometimes two. Oh, every day. Nice. Yeah. Five a day.

Every day. You really say five a day keeps the doctor away. Yeah. Five a day. Really focused, really personal. And I'll book one call sometimes two. If you go to a cold email specialist or a cold outreach specialist and said, can I get a 22% meeting booking rate from that?

go, no, it's not possible. In the early days, every part of podcasting felt like a separate task. I was jumping between tabs, chasing files, and doing everything manually. Once I started using Riverside, it all got way easier. I record, edit, cut clips and add captions all in one place. It's helped me stay consistent without getting overwhelmed. If you want to make podcasting easier, check out the link in the description. it really made a difference for me.

I would regret not asking you, Dean. I'm sure that we could have the whole master class and everything, but can you share then maybe some tips? You probably kind of answer it already, but in case there is still something for people who are struggling or kind of starting, maybe tips for the beginners, like a mistake that you see that people do, you know, like some kind of advice.

So I'll start with the basic one or the simplest one that people forget. People don't buy what you do. They buy what it does for them. Prospects do not care about Dean. They do not care about his products. They do not care about his services. They do not care about Dean.

They care about there's a goal. And I'm stuck here. How do I get there? How do I get out of where I am and to there? And understanding that is your, that's your message. Whether that's an outreach message, your content, your profile, your message is, hey, if you're here, I've got a way to get you there. And that's fundamentally the core of it.

Too many people are saying, hey, this is what I do and aren't I wonderful? And really it's about, hey, where do you want to be? Where are you stuck? So it's buyer-centric. We've got to think about it and make everything about our buyer. That's number one, fundamental. Number two, the more personal you make it, the more conversation. you make it, the more it feels like you understand them, the better.

Yeah. And then the other bit I would say is in outreach or in content, you've only got maybe nine words to hook them and then they're gone. If you don't catch, resonate with them, if you don't provoke interest with them within the first nine words in DMs or content, they're gone. attention spans are shocking. It comes back to what we discussed before that we are bombarded with the content and so much stuff around there, so it really needs to hood people.

So they're the bigies. And then the other thing I would say is, I see this doing a lot. And I'm going to play a middle of the road approach here. If you are going to automate, right, if you are going to automate, I don't recommend automating outreach. But if you are, and so many people do, salespeople. people the works. Two things. At least test the messages first so you know what works. Don't just go, hey, I've drafted a lot of message. Let's fire it out. That's number one. And number two,

segment your data. Like, if you're going to outreach to 50 people with one message, make sure they're all the same type of persona because you want the message to be as personal and as relevant as possible. Now, I advocate for one-by-one messaging, but not everybody's going to want to do that, but the closer you get to one-to-one messaging, the more, the better the response rate will be. Yep. So great advice. I think some people often forget how many messages you receive. So, for example, so many people pitch you and honestly it gets annoying after some time, especially if it's like a super generic one. So I like it. Don't be lazy with that. Customize it. Make it sound human, not those terrible AI ones. And that really makes a difference. I agree. Yeah. Real good

tip for whenever you're sending a message is read it out to yourself. And if it sounds weird, don't send it. I would recommend people do it even when commenting on someone's posts. Yeah. I mean, like if we were chatting now in real life and I went, oh, Thomas, I saw your profile. look interesting. You'd be waiting for me to tell you, to say, what was interesting. Yeah. But on LinkedIn, for some reason, we just go, interesting. Like, that's the answer.

And I don't know if it's interesting, like, or am I weird or what is interesting about me? Interesting. Yeah. The other one is, I came across your profile. Why? I don't know what to say. I've seen such a spell. It's funny.

And then when it comes to content and DMs, what's your preference or what's like the maybe ratio that you would recommend people, whether to focus more on one or the other one, test both? So I'll give you two answers. So my brain chemistry wants to do content. Like I really want to do content. Like I'm addicted.

If I could post every hour, I would. Right. So there is a, there is a bias, human bias, to want to share your voice with the world. That's a human bias. Messaging is the least pleasant because you're more likely to feel rejection. But if you post and just wait for people to come to you, you are handing all of your pipeline, all of your business, to an algorithm that owes you nothing.

And it could work brilliantly today. It could work brilliantly tomorrow. And then it's gone. So I would say to people, yes, post content, 100%. I love posting content. But predictability will not come from just posting and putting things out into the ether in terms of, you know where your next client's coming from. Because it might work tomorrow.

or it might not. So outreach gives you more control, but obviously emotionally has the biggest negative consequences of rejection and all that kind of stuff. And you just have to grow up here for that, really. Having said that, I've been doing it such a long time. I've had very few negative experiences. Yeah, so it's not as bad as it sounds. Content gives you the best feeling, the best, all that stuff. And when leads do come in from content, it's fantastic. but I don't know when they're coming I even I don't know when they're coming I honestly find it relatable and I would

feel the same and as you said like with obviously some kind of resistance or maybe it's like a step out of a comfort zone obviously when you're sending DMs after so many years of experience do you still feel it or not anymore yes you do you do it's not as dramatic it's not

as emotional. You know, I can remember, I can't remember the exact scenario, but maybe a few years ago. I'll tell you a funny story about my experiment with automation as well, but a few years ago, and we're talking maybe five, six years ago, I sent a message to somebody and they reacted horrifically. It was me writing the message. It wasn't a robot. It was me writing the message. but one person took offense to me sending them a message, not just the message, just the act of sending them a message. That's terrible.

Yeah, it's like, that's not okay and all this kind of stuff. And it just, it did shake me a little bit, and I did feel horrible for it. And then it was like, really, really? And since then, that person has asked for my help, which was quite funny. So the more risk, the biggest embarrassment for me actually is, and it's never happened since, but I'll tell you about my automation mistake. It's never happened since, but the biggest embarrassment for me would be a professional

embarrassment of hitting up a competitor trying to sell them. That post that we talked about earlier is exactly that. If I did that to somebody else, it would be more embarrassing for me. to go, oh, what an idiot. Because, you know, a competitor knows what I'm doing, and it's like, you just look like an idiot in front of somebody else. So I think that's the biggest one for me. But do you want to hear my mistake?

Yes, of course. So before commenting was a thing, like outbound commenting to get reach, I decided to use, this is like maybe six years ago, a tool whereby you could have a super, of generic comments. And it would put comments out on people's post for you. The idea of I'm commenting a lot, it'll turn up a lot of stuff and it'll all come back to me. So I set up this automated.

It was before AI. So I had these six or seven generic comments and it would randomly throw them out, right? I hope it was a good post, insightful. It was. It was. But it was before they were a. negative. It was new back then. Okay, okay. But it'd be saying great post name or inspirational name and I was just running it

every day. Now, I'm going to tell you the story. It's career ending potentially, but I've told a few other people. So you're getting an exclusive. Somebody announced that their child had terminal cancer and I put great posts, thanks for sharing. Oh. Yeah, sorry to hear that. That's why I say to people, be careful with automation. Because I was more than an idiot. I was an insensitive, God knows what.

I deleted it, thankfully, before anybody saw it. I think anybody saw it. But that is the dangers of doing things blind. And if you don't mind me asking, how did you basically discuss? cover? Did someone comment? Did you check it later or? Basically, a colleague of mine spotted me doing it and was looking and went, oh, you literally two minutes ago, you want to take it down. I don't think anybody saw it. It was such a long time ago that LinkedIn wasn't as busy as it was now, that you had loads of creators

on the platform. So, commenting wasn't as big a deal back then. But I learned my lesson. I hope that it serves as a lesson to people too out there because let's be honest that automated comment in sometimes feels like it's becoming like a regular thing. So people listen to the sense and try to learn from it. Yeah. Yeah. It's crazy. Yeah. And Dean, I could be asking you so many questions when it comes to selling because I know you have experience, but I want to ask you also about your branding. Because before we discussed branding when it comes to your shirt and I also like your pink branding as well. But in your selling and whether it's presents on Facebook or then on LinkedIn, when did you actually start to build in your personal brand as well?

I don't know when I started. I guess everybody's doing it, aren't they're all building a personal brand? I guess the question is, when did I start building it with intention? So I seriously started in 2018, 2019. But to be honest with you, one of the challenges I had was I didn't want to be known as a LinkedIn social selling person. And so I had to wrestle with the fact that I was like, okay, this bit of my, what I do, this bit of my expertise has kind of taken off and it's doing well and I'm making money. But I was so unhappy that the other bits,

I didn't take off for the other bits. And so it felt like there was this struggle for like a few years of, yeah, I do this LinkedIn thing, but I don't want the label because I'm good at email, I'm good at this and do that. It was like, eh. So it was only really in 2020 when I went, just, we're going in on this. Yeah, we're going all in. And that's when I accepted that I'm a LinkedIn person. But for two and a bit years, I couldn't do it.

I couldn't settle on it. So that's when it went with intention. And my model is a little different to a lot of other LinkedIn people in that we do implementation programs. So rather than courses, it's implementation. So the journey was, what do I want to be known by wrestling with? What could I accept to be known by? Because that's a different story.

And then the branding, the color schemes and everything, I've actually chopped and changed my color schemes, but I started in 2018 with pink because every other color was taken and everybody goes linked in blue. So I went to pink, played around with a few color schemes for a while and then went, no, no, no, I'm going back to pink. And the shirts, the shirts really are just that kind of like, it just symbolizes this shouldn't be stressful. This shouldn't be overcomplicated. you can actually enjoy this when you make it straightforward. I honestly like it because although we've never really spoken before or interacted much, but my impression, thanks to those shirts and even Pink Brad did was like,

he's someone positive, enthusiastic, and I just had like a good wipe. So I can confirm that it works. I think it was a good idea. Yeah, I also like a good cocktail, but I'm not allowed to share them on LinkedIn because I can get in trouble. I need to check out other platforms for that content. Yeah. And I saw, Dean, they two are present across other platforms as well,

whether it's YouTube, Spotify, Instagram, and others, which it's impressive even with the consistency and the quality. So maybe the question is, how do you like manage everything? Because before the recording, as we are recording now beginning of February, we discussed that you went for holidays. And you got back from holidays and you keep posting

quality consistency. You're doing great. So what is your secret? Well, what's the secret? I can't let my posting take an hour. So I have a 10 minute rule. Yeah. And the 10 minute rule is if I can't post something into whatever I've done in 10 minutes is going up. Because otherwise it's unscalable. It's not repeatable. So that's the first thing. Even to this day, I do have a team, social media team. They do more of the video editing and stuff like that. and they'll manage some of the things like podcasts and stuff like that. But the posting is coming from me for LinkedIn. And then what they'll do is they'll take what I've shared and they'll put it out in different formats and different places for me.

But LinkedIn I own myself. So when I replied to you this morning, it was actually me. Thank you. I didn't want to chase you, but I appreciate it. But that sometimes means I'm a little slow. but because I teach the platform, I have to be able to do the platform myself, otherwise I will just lose touch of what works.

So I do my own outreach, do my own content, do my own canvas stuff because I want to keep in touch with how it works. I honestly like the mindset, and of course I appreciate it, especially considering how much work you do and there is around everything. So thank you.

And Dean, just to be aware of time, I like to ask kind of lighter questions by the end of the recording. So what are some of your hobbies or what is it that you like to do in your free time? Oh, this is embarrassing. So I am a massive Star Trek buff. That's pretty cool.

Well, no, Star Wars is the cool one. Star Trek is the nerdy one. So I don't dress up as Mr. Spock or anything, but I don't know you can see it here. But in my office, I have all the replica spaceships. So that's a big thing. What else do I do in my hobbies? I actually like writing, believe it or not.

So I do this. This is separate to my personal profile, but I love writing blogs and articles. I know that's pretty old school now. So I write about three of them a day, and I really enjoy doing that. And it's really, it's actually quite productive for me because I don't know, when you post and you share,

do you find that actually the act of sharing it actually increases your clarity on the topic? I think so because it makes you actually to go through it again. Often when writing or creating the content, sometimes we discover something that you didn't know before and requires maybe some additional research. So I think so. Yeah. So I think I enjoy that kind of what do I really think and trying to work

out how to express that. So I do write a lot of blogs, probably far too many blogs, but I think content generally is like, or if you want to get the best out of the content, it's not just about what sharing what will perform. It's about sharing what matters for you. So I see content posts as part of my hobbies as well because it's like creative expression in some senses. actually like that you mention it because it's honestly not easy like to be consistent maybe every day keep posting but if it's something that you enjoy that maybe you are excited about or that you just like doing it just makes it easier to do doesn't it yeah and literally just before this call we went upstairs to look at some stuff

we got a team upstairs here and there's a whole load of stuff going on in the news and it was like, oh, I'll just talk about that on TikTok today. And it's just like, it's fluid. And I also think, I think getting those ideas out is quite rewarding. Expressing yourself is quite rewarding. But also that ability, I think we're going off topic of hobbies here, but I think more and more social media is looking for that, what do people really think and who is this person really,

that kind of human bit. And I think that's just because we've had an era of like Instagram perfection. We've now got the AI which makes incredible stuff. And I love it. I think there is that element of, I want to know the person, not just their content. Yep.

Such as maybe more human and more personalised who's actually behind it. Yeah. Yeah. Like connection. I think even though LinkedIn is a, platform and it's social, people want deeper connections. And I think that's going to be a real kind of facet of the next decade as we grapple with where AI sits, where we sit, that people will crave more deeper relationships and connection. I agree and I see it the same way. I was just about

to add when you mentioned that you like to write articles or blogs that you write on a substack and LinkedIn newsletter as well. So for people who are interested, definitely make sure to check it out. Thank you. Free promo. Thanks. And Dean, what about the books? Do you read books? And if so, have you got any recommendations? Yes. So I actually like 48 laws of power. That's a real, real good book. From Robert Green, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I don't necessarily agree with everything he shares, but I find the book really interesting. I have it.

It's a copy of it by the side of my bed and try and just read a little bit of it. Another good book that I've read, and it's real old school, is sales letters that sizzle. Haven't heard of that one, honestly. It's really old, right? And it's an old school book

about how they wrote letters for post and how they would persuade you to sign up for that credit card or buy that thing or tear off that coupon and send it back. And I think even though the world's moved on, the fundamentals of how do we persuade or help people see the value in doing something or engaging with us is the same. It's just the medium of how we do it. It's digital now. It was on paper. But the principles are the same. So I do, it's an old school book.

It's hard to get hold of. But I've got, I bought about five copies when I found them on eBay. and it's just rich of stuff that will help you see this is what we do. So that's probably my go-to. And then the other one is the subtle art of not giving a fuck by Mark Manson. Oh yeah, that's a great one. I like Mark. Yeah. Yeah, he's done a follow-up one, which I haven't read to it, read yet, with a red cover, I think,

but I've not read that one yet. I believe that the what you mentioned is orange and maybe the new one, I would dismiss maybe like a light blue if I'm not mistaken, but I cannot remember. Yeah, I'm just a lot of not giving a fox in orange, but I'm sure it's either. It might be blue, but there's, I've seen a red one by him as well. Maybe it's a different book, different author. I might be wrong. I don't, I don't remember.

But it's a great. And I will make sure to check out the second one. Thank you for that. And Dean, I know that you achieved the rot already a lot on your plate, but still, are there any plans or goals or anything that you would be willing. to share for the audience, maybe to wait for or to be excited about. Oh, what's the big goal? Oh, I'm actually working on my second book. So I published a book last year. It went out with Wiley. And it was my first book writing experience. And so this year, I'm going to be putting out another book, hopefully before the end of the year, which I'm really

excited about. And I think my first book went into a lot of ideas about social selling and building a business online. But I feel like my second book will go further into that because I feel like a lot of the challenges we have are not about online. They're about us online. The way we think, our mindset, our emotions, our mentality, all of those things. And you'll have seen it as well, Tom. that people, like, you have to really understand yourself and understand your customer to really do well. And that what do they say? If you understand psychology, you understand marketing and you understand sales. Psychology is pretty key to like achieving anything because you're trying to understand other people's perspective. So my second book is actually going to be more about that

stuff, whereas the first one was quite tactical. I'm excited for that. Yeah, that's a big goal and we'll be excited as well. So hope it goes well. And then, Dean, we discussed it already, but can you please summarize where people can find you, follow you and promote any of your services? Yeah. So my main presence is obviously LinkedIn.

So you can find my LinkedIn profile, Dean said in there. And then the big one is my substack newsletter, which is Signal newsletter. and my podcast is expert in demand, which is all about interviewing and helping people position themselves so that you have more demand and supply. I will, as always, add any links to the show notes. And as I know, Dean, you've been to many podcasts, but is there like a question that you wish someone asked you,

but did not ask yet? Oh, oh, is there a question? that somebody's not asked me but I'd love them to ask hmm do you know it would probably be it would probably be something really basic and it would be how do I find my niche that's a good one and the reason I say that one

is because I meet a lot of people who are in multiple minds about who their target audience is. And I see them going round and round in circles where they can't quite decide one, then flip to another. And I'd love to chat to them more and say, well, let's think about that in more detail because until you settle that question, it's going to be hard.

I know that I want to be respectful of time and it will take a while to dive into it. But have you got maybe faster answer or want to leave it for the next person who's going to interview completely up to? The fast answer is if you observe what I found that my niche was already inside me. I know that sounds a bit woo-woo. I already knew it, but my head would not let me change. choose it. It was already there. I already knew who it was. Every time I wrote something, it automatically all my spite autopilot pivoted to that group. And instead of just going with it, my brain was trying to be the, you know, the accountant going, well, don't close that door because you might make more money.

So I think most people know what their niche is already. If they look at who they've worked with, they look at who they enjoy working with, they look at where they deliver the most value. it's just more of what they're already doing. But the act of not noticing that and not settling that puts them in a holding pattern that makes it hit and miss or yo-yo roller coaster revenue and pipe. Yeah. That's well explained.

And I hope that the next person who's doing the podcast with you will address this earlier so that there is more time to actually leave diaper into it. And so then, Dean, I think, We can finish. I want to say big thank you because not only I appreciate your time. And despite your experience and strong presence, I appreciate that you were willing even to talk about things that doesn't mean only success, such as even like a less polished things that some people don't really discuss. And you are open, willing to talk about it. Appreciate all the insight and value you brought. Of course, we could spend much more time talking about it. But once again, thank you

much. I will leave any links in the show notes for people to check it out. So thank you for time and I will be happy to catch up any time in the future again. So thank you very much. Thank you for having me, Thomas. I really appreciate it. Thanks for listening to Produce By with Tumann. Check the show notes for all the links. And don't forget to subscribe, like and share your feedback. Speak soon.