The Game with Alex Hormozi - 🤯🤬🤬Ingrained Intolerance Part II = How To Manipulate Your Environment To Suit You | Ep 94

Episode Date: December 29, 2018

"Labeling as a great way of manipulating positive behavior." Today, Alex (@AlexHormozi) discusses using positive labeling to manipulate others into creating the environment you want. He also talks about the negative effects of labeling oneself with a disorder and encourages listeners to view their supposed weaknesses as strengths.Welcome to The Game w/Alex Hormozi, hosted by entrepreneur, founder, investor, author, public speaker, and content creator Alex Hormozi. On this podcast you’ll hear how to get more customers, make more profit per customer, how to keep them longer, and the many failures and lessons Alex has learned on his path from $100M to $1B in net worth.Timestamps:(0:41) - Difference between manipulation and help is intention.(2:50) - Labeling: Give positive attributes, influence behavior, reinforce positive labels.(6:30) - Create value discrepancy early to sell high-priced items successfully.(9:43) - Addiction covers up underlying issues, focus on root causes.(12:13) - Labeling can be empowering or crippling, depending on how it's embraced.(15:01) - Be aware of labeling used against you and use it positively.Follow Alex Hormozi’s Socials:LinkedIn | Instagram | Facebook | YouTube | Twitter | Acquisition

What is going on, everyone? I wanted to make a sequel to, I guess, probably one of the most popular podcast, video podcast that I've made in a little bit. The last one about success equals ingrained intolerance. I had more people reach out to me individually after that one than I think I've had in a long time. And so I think I touched a little bit of a vein there. And so I wanted to do a little bit of a follow-up.

But instead of having the topic be how to be on the defensive, which is sort of what the last one was about, kind of like. basically controlling your space, both, you know, like physically and mentally and making sure that no one that's in there speaks over you, puts things on you that are not what you want. This one is about how to use that same concept on the offensive, how to manipulate others into creating the environment that you want. And I want to tell three very short stories that should illustrate the concept. And just a quick thing before I get into it, the difference between manipulation and help is intention. If you are manipulating someone, and I purposely use a negative thing because it's more salient as a headline, but manipulating is where you want someone, you're trying to get someone to do something that has a negative outcome for that. Whereas helping them is getting someone to do something that has a positive outcome for them, right? Sales and helping should be the same thing, right?

Now, now that we've made that definition clear, there's a story, it's a Middle Eastern parable, so maybe some of the Americans in the crowd haven't heard of it. But there was a mullah named Moolin Ashtraene. He's kind of like the jokester that a lot of the children's parables are about. And one of them was, Will & Ashton and Afton He goes to a restaurant, right? And he goes there and he gets horrible service, right? And he's not dressed very well. He's just dressed in plain clothes. And the guy just totally dismisses him and treats him horribly.

He's late, he's rude, all that kind of stuff, right? And so then the guy, so then he leaves a huge tip for the guy, right? And he comes back like two or three days later. And the same guy is at the restaurant, the same waiter, right? And he greets him at the door. But this time, he greets him with a huge smile. And he's like, oh, my gosh. Like, how is it going, sir?

Let me seat you to your table, blah, blah, blah, blah, right? And so he gives him five-star outstanding service, right? And then at the very end of this meal, he gives him, like, a terrible tip, right? And the guy finds him after the meal, and it's like, hey, what the heck, man? Like, I give you affordable service the first time. And you gave me a huge double, you know, double the bill tip. and today you gave me nothing. Like, how does it make, that makes no sense, like, what's wrong with you?

And Muldashton he's like, well, I tipped you this time for the service I got last time, and last time I gave me the tip for the service you gave today. And so I think that is a really good illustration of the concept of how I like to use labeling as a great way of manipulating positive behavior. It's also a really ninja way of getting people to do things from a selling perspective. If you want to talk like more advanced influence, this is definitely a very good way. this is definitely it. So one of the ways that I use this,

and basically what it is when I say labeling is you give someone a positive attribute that you want them to live up to by giving it as an affirmative compliment that as though they have already done it. So an example was when I assumed being treasurer in my little fraternity back in the day, I know, but I still had $120,000 every semester

that I had to go collect. I literally had to go get these, my buddies to give the money that they said they were going to pay, right? Like, there was some swaviveness that was kind of required. And Nick Nash was one of the guys who would never, or at least was renowned for not paying, right? And I liked Nick, but he had a reputation for not having paid the last few treasurers. And the guy before me was like, he'll never pay.

Like, don't even bother with him. Blah, blah, blah, right? And you're kind of calling your names and all this stuff, right? And so I was like, well, hounding him and calling him in negative names is probably not going to work since that's that. That's what everyone else has done up to this point. And so as soon as I became treasurer, I called him up. And I was like, hey, man, just want to let you know.

I'm treasurer now. And I know that you owe dues. And I am not going to bother you at all about it because I know that you're a trustworthy guy and you're honest. And so I'm not going to follow up with you all. I know you're good for it. The next day, he showed up at my room with the entire amount for the whole semester and paid him full up front because he had a positive label that he did not want to break. Right.

So when someone says, wow, you're so great at this, right? You want to not make that true. And so then you act in accordance with the positive label that someone gave you, right? Now, here's how you can use this in business. So I tend to have very good vendor relationships. And what I mean by that is that, like, the people who help us, who, you know, help us develop things, whether that's on the tech side or whether that's we're sourcing materials or whatever it is, right?

We have really good relationships with them. And it's because one of the things that I do early on in the first. relationship is I set a precedent. And so as soon as they, I mean, let's say they hop on the phone on time, right? I will go above and beyond in our first few calls saying, you know what I really appreciate about you guys? I just want to say this. Like, you guys are so timely. You're so professional. And you're just butted up. Like, you're just, everything's dialed in with you guys. And I just can't tell you how many times we've gone to people and they haven't had that. So I just want let you know that I super appreciate it. Just the level of dedication, the work ethic, your turnaround time

has been phenomenal. Like, you guys are so. super responsive and I just want you to know that I really appreciate it. Like it goes a long way to show how great of a company you are and how good you are what you do. And when I set that tone, what happens is everyone all of a sudden becomes really professional, really on top of it, great turnaround times. They're on top. They're buttoned up. They always get everything back to us before the deadline. And then what happens is you get this flywheel, you get this virtuous cycle of I keep praising them. I praised them before they. they did the activity, just like Moolin Asherdine tipped before he got the good service and then got the good service, right?

It's the same thing. And it's just interesting because like it almost works the same thing, same way within value letters, right? Like if I want to sell someone something that's really expensive, I need to create a value discrepancy early on in the relationship so that when I sell you a $16,000 thing like gym launch, it delivers 20 times the value so that when I say, hey, do you want the next thing? You say, of course, right? because the value was so high that a discrepancy was already there, already reinforced the first transaction. So what's really interesting about labeling, right, is that it works even if you know it's happening to you.

So even if Layla decides to say, Alex, you're just, you know, you're just, I love how clean you are. She probably wouldn't say that. I wouldn't believe it. But like, what you have to say can't be like crazy under the mistake. You know what I mean? But like if you're like one or two shades away from what you're trying to,

or the person is one or two shades away from the activity or just did something that could be indicative of a character trait that is positive, you can label them with it, and then they will want, because think about it. So if Layla said, you know, Alex, you're trying to think of the positive that you should give me.

You're so complimentary. You know, I just really appreciate how much you compliment you. I'm not going to try and prove her wrong and stop complimenting her, right? Like even if I know what she's doing, I'm still going to want to fulfill that. There's just like this little child inside of all of us that wants to fulfill the things that people speak over us,

which is why you have to be so mindful of the things that people do speak over you and to make sure that those things are serving you aren't aligned with the identity that you want to have. Right. But you can use that as a good person and give people positive attributes that they can live up to that then improve your relationship with them and their ability to serve you, right, from a vendor standpoint, et cetera. right like if they serve us all we're going to continue to do business with them it's good for both of us right now here's something that i'm going to speak out against that i probably would have brought up in the last one that was in my notes that i didn't get a chance to bring up because i was just flow and doing my thing hey if you're a return listener and you have not rated or reviewed the show i want you to know that you should feel

absolutely terrible about yourself and everything else in the world i'm kidding um but it would mean the absolute word to me if you guys would go ahead and do that you don't even have to pause the show you keep listening and you can just do it with your thumb right now it'll take you less than 60 seconds and like i said The only way that podcast grows through word of mouth and this is you joining hands with me and helping as many entrepreneurs as we possibly can because no one is coming to save us. It's just us. All right. So please go do that now. And let's get back to the show.

Was one of the reasons that I'm not for AA. And now I know that there's probably a lot of people who have had a lot of positive experience with it and that's phenomenal. And I'm not in any way decrying that. I'm not going against that in any way. I will not discount the success that the programs have for a lot of people. That being said, one of the things that I do not like is that the daily affirmation that they begin every single meeting with is, hi, my name is so and so, and I'm an addict, or hi, my name, so and so, I'm an alcoholic.

I don't even like saying it. Like, it literally bothers me as I'm saying it, even though I'm using as an example. And so they insist that people speak over themselves over and over and over again, that they marry themselves to this identity that they no longer want to have, right? And so I think it just further perpetuates this issue, this issue of addiction because we keep telling ourselves that we're addicted to this thing rather than eventually dealing with all the other things that are the main root of the thing that we're trying to shove down, right? Because it's like you're addicted to a substance. It's usually because it's covering up something or allowing you to be aware in the moment because it can cover up all of the noise in your life, right?

Because if you have stress at work, stress with your family, stress with your kids, stress with their parents, stress with your wife, whatever it is, right? It's easier to just drink something in the moment immediately be there because you can wash away that noise, right? And the issue is that when you stop doing it, life gets loud and noisy and you didn't develop the capabilities to go deal with those issues, right? And the longer you stay addicted, and I'm using quotes here, the more difficult it is because the more skills that you need to require, because the more of those issues have stacked up. So it's like you're even weaker because the longer you stay addicted and the louder your life has stacked up with all these issues as time

goes by which is why it's so hard for a lot of people right to get to get off and so but the thing is at the end of the day you still you need to like I mean it's just like that's the fact is you need to and the way you do it is by confronting each of these micro things and going successfully bigger and bigger and bigger problems so that you can gain momentum from them so you can re-access the attention and the willpower to be able to break through those one at a time and in my opinion starting day by saying, hey, I am an addict is not a good way to do it because then you couple yourself with that identity, you chain yourself to it. And so I would love it if they started by saying, like, I'm a champion, you know what I mean? Or whatever, like, whatever you want to speak over yourself,

like, and I will, and I will overcome. And I will be able to handle, I'm just, you know what I mean? Like, that would be, not that I'm the A expert, so I'm sure that I'll catch some flak for saying this, but this is just my opinion in terms of the things that have helped me break through some of the issues that I've had. Now, the last point that I wanted to talk on was something that someone commented on. I think it was Dathan. It was talking about ADD. Now, it's super common for entrepreneurs to be diagnosed, right, with ADD. You can even name it, attention deficit disorder, right? It's a disorder. You're already giving you something that's bad. And what's interesting is that your perception of what ADD means to you, right, will dictate

whether it's a positive thing in your life or a negative one. And so the example that I wanted to give is that my mother is diagnosed, you know, with ADD, and it was something that was super traumatic for her. Like it was extremely traumatic emotionally for her. It's probably 15, maybe 20 years ago, I think she was diagnosed, right? And obviously we've learned a lot since then, blah, blah, blah, right? But in that time, it was crippling for her, for her identity because she now had this disorder, right? and and she gave all of her power over to it 100%.

And it's one of the lasting stripes that we have in our relationship is that I'm like, you continue to give power to this thing that you've named, right? I am ADD as hell, right? And so are a lot of you guys because you're entrepreneurs, right? And even just using the term, it's like it doesn't even have the negative connotation sometimes in our sphere as entrepreneurs as it does in the normal world because for us like ADD also if you didn't know this has the flip side if you read up on it periods of hyper elevated attention for extended periods of time like most people can only focus for

45 minute periods and they have to take a break right whereas people who have this disorder can concentrate all like without relenting for 10 12 15 straight hours at a time and sometimes weeks at a time meaning you you don't need as much sleep for some extended periods of time because you're so focused on something that has stimulated your attention, right? And so to me, that doesn't sound like a disorder at all. That sounds like a superpower. And so I never saw it as a disorder, right? I saw it as a super power.

I saw it not as crippling, but something that is a nameless, something that gave me an edge on my competition on anyone else who wanted to compete in our world, right? But my mother, on the flip side, saw it as a debilitating, crippling, disease and her life has never been the same since and this is something that she and I will talk endlessly about and that she had it has crippled her and I will say this she knows she listens to the podcast it has crippled her when it really doesn't need to have because it is purely how you choose to identify that label for yourself I mean and

furthermore if you didn't want to even call an attention deficit disorder right and just called a personality trait like I am someone who tends to be more creative and so I can jump from thought to thought a little bit more quickly, which allows me to connect dots a little bit more out of the box than most people can, which allows us to innovate at a faster rate, right? And then when we catch onto an innovation or two dots that connect together, then we go all in and we take 10, 15 out, you know, straight hours, just crushing it. And then maybe that means a few weeks at a time, we're like, I just can't think of anything but this one thing that I want to get done, right? I'm sure some of you guys have experienced hyper-elevated attention.

right and it's an entrepreneurial trait it's a good thing right or least as i see it but all because of the connotation that she put on the label that she was given because she did not control her space the way we talked about in the last one she didn't control her surroundings and the labels that were put on her she became a victim to it and so um i guess to wrap up today in a little bow in great intelligence part two how to manipulate your environment to suit you um one be aware of labeling when it's being used against you, when it's being used in ways to do not serve you. Two, use labeling in a way that does not manipulate people, but helps them, right? It helps them help you, so you can teach them how to treat you by giving them a positive

label that's in alignment with how you want to be treated, right? And you'll have really, really good relations with your vendors, better relationships with your kids, better relationship with your spouse, because you continue to applaud them to success. You continue to compliment them all the way until the new behavior has changed, as long as. it's in alignment with what they want and what you guys want, et cetera, right? And the last one is just, if any of you guys do have ADD, think about what that means to you. And I wouldn't even, I would just call it entrepreneur personality type not EDD.

But think about if there's ever been a time where it has had a negative connotation for you. And then think about the times that it has given you a superpower that has enabled you to do things that no one else can do. And then I would ask you or to teach you to consider thinking of it as a superpower instead of something that's crippling. And then maybe, just maybe the way that you see yourself and how much you can do and what gifts you've been given will change. So anyways, you guys are awesome. Thank you for giving me a little bit of attention. But anyways, lots of love.

And we'll chase your dreams.