Mastering the Art of Conversation in Network Marketing with Big Al Schreiter

Listen to the podcast here

Watch the episode here

Dive into the world of network marketing with Big Al Schreiter, a seasoned pro with over five decades of experience. In this episode of “Beyond the Network Marketing Dream,” Big Al shares his journey from a shy, nerdy engineer to a renowned author and speaker, offering invaluable insights into the power of words and personal connection. Learn how to navigate the industry with ease, from starting conversations to fostering deep relationships that lead to sustainable growth. Whether you’re a veteran or new to network marketing, Big Al’s strategies will transform your approach and set you on the path to success.

---

Patrick (03:21.622)

Welcome, Big Al Schreiter. I am super excited to have you on Beyond the Network Marketing Dream. You are an icon in the network marketing industry. And I’m excited to dive in a little bit and hear a couple stories. But great to be with. Thank you for being with us today.

Big Al (03:33.494)

Okay.

Big Al (03:43.207)

So let’s get started.

Patrick (03:45.338)

You’re in Bangkok, and so I think people would find that fascinating and how you ended up there. But how many years in the industry now? What was your start? What company? How did you get into it? What’s the brief on that?

Big Al (03:59.814)

I started with vitamins 50 some years ago and back then you had to be an anti-government communist hippie to think of a side gig and nobody believed in vitamins. So yeah, it wasn’t a great choice on my part on how to get started, but you know, that’s what happened.

Patrick (04:09.314)

Hahaha

Patrick (04:21.43)

And how many years were you in the industry? How many different companies before you transitioned into the coaching space? Because that’s what you’re known for, at least in my world, but you can correct me. But you’re known for being a coach in the space. When did that transition happen?

Big Al (04:30.638)

Thanks for watching!

Big Al (04:39.526)

Not yet, I don’t think. I tell people, you know, I’ve done networking until I retired a few years ago and I just put out a free newsletter for people to get tips and you know, I volunteer on a few calls but now I leave the coaching to the full-time coaches. They’re probably better trained on being a coach.

Patrick (05:01.686)

Well, I didn’t realize that. I mean, that’s incredible. So, but you’ve written 50 books on the industry and building in the industry, correct?

Big Al (05:12.906)

Yeah.

Patrick (05:14.366)

And so what was that? Just the passion on this side? I mean, you don’t consider, it sounds like you don’t consider yourself, you consider yourself less of a coach in the industry and more of a builder.

Big Al (05:27.03)

I just wrote down what to say and what to do. I’m not the big picture guy, just the micro guy. I said, you know, everybody says, you know, be a leader, sponsor people, bring guests, get appointments, talk to people. And I was always frustrated because nobody said, well, how to do it. And I got thinking, well, that’s a problem I have because when I got started, I was shy, nerdy.

Patrick (05:35.892)

Okay, yeah.

Patrick (05:47.054)

Mm-hmm.

Big Al (05:55.714)

personality-free, charisma bypassed, socially challenged engineer, should not be let out in public. And they said, just go out and talk to people. And I’m thinking, what were they thinking? I mean, I destroyed people on demand everywhere I went. It was pretty ugly. And it took me, I think a year and 10 months before I finally figured out that, I didn’t figure it out, somebody told me. They said, hey.

Do other people in Chicago where I was living at the time sponsor people? I says, yeah. And so, uh, what about you? And I says, well, I can’t because the weather’s bad. The economy is bad. Uh, people don’t have jobs. Uh, there’s snow on the ground and they say, well, those other people are sponsoring. And I got thinking that’s pretty cruel. And they said, uh, do you think maybe they say something different? I said, well,

Never looked at it that way. I was just blaming prospects. But I did find out from that point on that I’m thinking, well, if other people are sponsoring people and they only say something different, maybe I should start figuring out what to say. And that’s what happened. So I started figuring out what to say. And then people started saying, well, there’s this really nerdy guy. He just has words to say and people join. And so they started asking me to speak all around the world. And they say, don’t worry that he’s a bad speaker.

They just want to know the words to say and I learned that if we say better words We do a better job, you know, it’s a whole lot better when we talk to folks So big picture goals leadership You know, I have the tiger vision of an eagle walk across coals. That’s not me I’m just the micro guy

Patrick (07:32.578)

That’s awesome.

Patrick (07:44.062)

You literally focused on the language, the words that people needed to use to make it easier to build a business.

Big Al (07:52.254)

Yeah, because I didn’t know any of them. So all I did was started writing them down and did it for my downline, made some books, other people said what the books and, uh, you know, I put all the most, all of the books are on Amazon’s and people can, you know, um, I think blow about five bucks on it, you know, an hour and a half of their life to read it and figure out what to say and do them for the different skills.

Patrick (08:11.806)

Yeah.

Patrick (08:20.857)

And what company are you with now?

Big Al (08:24.602)

Um, I’m retired. I ended up, um, owning, uh, a company and part of the sale of it was a non-compete. So now I just, uh, volunteer with a few people say, could you do a free zoom call with my team or something like that? And I spend, you know, 30 or 40 minutes, give them something to say. So they get better results and that’s, that’s enough to keep me busy and out of trouble.

Patrick (08:49.246)

And you were with most of your career with the same company?

Big Al (08:52.654)

Most of the time I just, yeah, I like nutrition because I don’t exercise. I got to do something for my health.

Patrick (09:01.371)

And can you tell me, do you mind sharing what company you were with?

Big Al (09:05.65)

I started with a company called Shackley and did that for about seven years and then made some money and moved to Texas because it’s warm because Chicago is pretty cold. And so after moving to Texas, I had to start over again because back then there was no UPS and stuff like that. So did it again. And once you figure out how it works, it’s not that hard to restart. So I just tell people.

Patrick (09:33.387)

Mm-hmm.

Big Al (09:36.338)

The company isn’t going to make you rich because if that was true, everybody would be successful in the company and every company has people doing well and people doing bad. So that’s probably not the key. So people spend all their time looking for the best company and I’m thinking, man, if you don’t know how to talk to people, it’s still going to be bad.

Patrick (09:57.414)

And Tom, how have you seen the industry evolve? Like, I mean, there’s so many changes, but I mean specifically in terms of the words to use and how you prospect and follow up, have you seen an evolution from where you would just call people on the phone? Is that still the method today that you primarily would suggest people focus on or with the advent of all the social or…

Kind of how has that changed? Are you helping them with the words through pre-written text messages now? Or are you still telling them, suggesting that they call people? Can you walk us through a little bit of that?

Big Al (10:37.818)

The first thing I do is try to help them believe that changing the words will make a difference. And I say, imagine I go on a date and I say to the lady, how old are you? How much do you weigh? Are those your real teeth? What color do you dye your hair? And I say, how many dates am I going to get? And I say, the lady could have been the best prospect in the world, but my words killed it.

Patrick (10:54.147)

Hehehe

Big Al (11:06.614)

I said, so do you think words make a difference? And they said, well, yeah. So, so let’s just figure out how to say better words. So I look at people and I say, okay, uh, there’s all kinds of auto responders. There’s all kinds of trainings and companies and walking across coals and everything. But the bottom line is when we talk to people, I sell them, there’s about six levels of communication.

And we want to just pick the highest level to give us more odds. So first level, you know, a text or email, and that’s just one way communication. There’s no way you can reply to that. It’s just a one way being thrown out. And the problem with text is easily misunderstood. I said, OK, so level two would be like a website and it has a company video and, you know, little action on it, but still one way communication. I say, well, level three would be actually talking to somebody over the phone.

Patrick (11:39.644)

Mm-hmm.

Big Al (12:06.366)

Or on messenger and I says then you can hear like their tone of voice It kind of pick up a few hints there and that’s actually where the two-way communication starts So I said no matter what you do try to be the highest level as possible I mean if all you have is a messenger address. Well, you’re gonna do a text. I Sound a newsletter to 30 some thousand people. I don’t call them all and you know, they just get a text as best I can do He’s out case. Oh level three is

Patrick (12:07.86)

Mm-hmm.

Big Al (12:35.102)

an audio call. So if I had a choice, yeah, level four would be a video call. You can see people roll their eyes or fall asleep as you talk. You see if they have tortured their animals in the back. They say, okay, so that’ll give me better communication for sure. And level five is meeting somebody in person and you go to the conventions and everybody’s, ah, man, I’ve heard you on the phone all this time. And now we’re at the convention. I get to meet you in person. It’s so special. And.

Here’s the part that’s a little bit irritating. And that is as a leader, we see it, a distributor meet somebody in person level five and say, well, let me give you my website and send you back to a level two communication regressing, going backwards. He just makes you want to pound your head against the wall. It should go the other way. You want to have a message and have an actual conversation and level six communication is the highest form. It’s the only one I did because.

Patrick (13:13.845)

Okay.

Patrick (13:17.824)

Yeah.

Big Al (13:33.374)

I’m energy efficient. How’s that? so Here’s why I did it. I had lunch with somebody and I had dinner with somebody when I was on the road And level six is meeting somebody in person over food and nobody ever gets upset over food There’s never any rejection. You got to eat anyway And why everybody else was out, you know beat the bushes and doing a million things I just met somebody for lunch and somebody for dinner and

And they said, that’s just so simple because I say what we offer is always going to be better than what they have right now. So there’s no reason to sell them. They’re pre sold. So all we have to do is allow them to volunteer if the time is right. So there’s nothing to sell. People are pre sold.

Patrick (14:23.49)

So, you know, and there’s a difference between recruiting and sponsoring, right? And that relationship, that level six communication is it allows you to truly sponsor somebody, like to slow down, to speed up. And I say this, and I’m curious about your thoughts on it. You see so many people that are recruiting in mass now, like they’re recruiting

Patrick (14:53.698)

They’re using digital marketing to do it, but they are frustrated because they can’t get any duplication. Is that part of why you’re saying what you’re saying is that level six communication is so much better at sponsoring versus just recruiting them and throwing them against the wall?

Big Al (15:14.99)

Yeah, if you look at people with teams, they don’t build a very good network of people. It’s kind of like, I sponsored you. Okay. I’m off for the next one. I’m not going to teach you any of the basic skills. It’s a little bit sad, but the example I like to give them, I says, so let’s say your company sells this product and they can spend a fortune advertising billboards everywhere or

Patrick (15:22.318)

Mm-hmm.

Big Al (15:44.002)

bribe your grandmother who’s going to have more power than the grandmother. So you say, well, that’s the deal. Every company in the world would like to have what we have a purse to person contact with somebody. It’s super powerful. And yet, even though we have it, a lot of people say, I want to give that up and make it digital with, I’ll buy a list of 10,000 people I can text or something. And they just kind of.

Miss the point. You got to connect with people. You don’t need that many people in network marketing. You just have to Say, all right You’re pre-sold here. It is it’s going to improve your life and now’s the right time great volunteer. If not, no problem That’s not very difficult. Once we kind of get the idea of how it works

Patrick (16:11.254)

Yeah.

Patrick (16:28.862)

And then it’s about the, and then it’s, I mean, you started with the relationship and you continue that to really build a sticky team that can actually duplicate. Right. Talk to me about that word, duplication, because I, I personally think we’ve lost that ability, um, to create duplication and network marketing. It’s no longer as simple as it used to be. And people are using all these very complex and confusing tools and they’re having a hard.

Big Al (16:33.302)

Mm-hmm.

Big Al (16:39.618)

Yeah.

Patrick (16:58.284)

teaching the business. Would you agree with that sentiment?

Big Al (17:06.186)

Um, so a little bit of a long answer. Are you okay with that? Okay. Um, people say duplication all the time. Don’t do it unless it’s duplicatable. Duplicate this. It’s the only way it’s going to multiply. And what we have to duplicate is, um, getting customers and sponsoring people. I believe that’s what we’re. So we might want to duplicate that, but the way of getting there, we don’t have to duplicate.

Patrick (17:08.88)

Yes, yes.

Big Al (17:35.798)

And that’s where people get confused. I think the way I got there, uh, has to be duplicated in my group. And I said, all right, so we go to an opportunity meeting. You get psyched up on the way home. Uh, you’re not paying attention cause you’re psyched and your rear in the car in front of you and the driver gets out and holds his neck. And you say, I got this vitamin for it. And so I’ll try it. And then he’s cured. He says the best vitamin in the world. Wow. I want to join your business. And I know exactly how to find great.

Prospects all I have to do is just ruin the cars. I’m going to teach that to my downline They say Yeah, maybe you don’t want to duplicate everything Okay, so What’s another problem with duplication? says well, I sponsor you and your Small business owner and you have 300 people come through your store every day and you want to talk to him I say no that’s not duplicatable. No, no

Patrick (18:14.056)

Yeah.

Big Al (18:34.438)

Not everybody’s going to have 300 people, so don’t do that. And you’re going to be pretty mad at me. So, so the point is, um, there’s so many ways to build and sponsor. We’re going to pick a way that’s right for the person. The thing we want to duplicate is to build a business and build, you know, people make them successful. That’s what we’re going to duplicate, but they get so tied up because I did it this way, I found the one way and I’m going to force on everybody on my team.

Patrick (18:40.289)

Yeah.

Big Al (19:03.342)

I think they lose the script somewhere along the line. So we say, okay, we all wanna be there. What’s the best way for you to do it? And you say, well, I don’t want to travel from Thailand to the US to start sponsoring. So I’ll do it differently. And I said, well, that makes sense. So it’s not rocket science. All we have to do is duplicate the result and don’t worry about duplicating how people got there.

Patrick (19:30.102)

Do you find it, and I appreciate the very direct and honest conversation. So what I’m seeing is, I’m seeing situations where there’s somebody who has found a unique way. Maybe they’re an influencer, they’re a digital marketer, as an example. And they have a relatively complex strategy that the person working five to seven, 10 hours a week,

Big Al (19:36.43)

Thanks for watching!

Patrick (19:59.87)

simply can’t model, but we put that person on the stage to then teach their, I’m going to rear end you strategy that is fraught with all kind of problems. Instead of putting the person on the stage that even if they have a unique way, it’s a way that other people could go, oh, I can relate to that. I could do that, right?

So shouldn’t there be some guarding of who we use as examples to teach, to make sure that those things can be duplicated, they can be taught? I mean, where’s the fine line in there?

Big Al (20:47.942)

I just like say they were successful doing it this way works for them. They have a special background. And you know, if you happen to have the same background, the same influencer contacts and the same experience, you could might want to model it, but you know what? There’s a thousand different ways to locate people. You got to pick the one that’s comfortable for you. That’s within your comfort zone and what you can do. So for example,

We could talk to somebody who’s not computer literate and say, well, I guess you are not allowed to join our business because you won’t be able to follow this. Well, that’s kind of, I don’t know, biased or prejudiced. That’s not good, but yeah, we should celebrate that some people say, well, you know, I just happen to be a famous athlete and I have 50,000 fans. Oh no, don’t do that. Cause it’s not duplicatable. They’re going to be upset.

So what we have to do is say, yeah, it was good for them, but it may not be your way. You gotta find the way that works for you. And of course, people are always looking for the way of no rejection, no work. It’s a free, I don’t have to talk to people. They just sign up online and go to work. I think they can all dream, why not?

Patrick (22:11.347)

Yeah, so kind of what you’re saying is the duplication part is non-judgment, right? Be open-minded, different people building it different ways.

Big Al (22:23.522)

All right, all your leaders are probably going to be doing it different than you. And most leaders really hate that as a hit to their ego, but all the leaders I had certainly didn’t want to have lunch and dinner with everybody like I did. Because I say, I’ll be in fact like you. I didn’t mind at all.

Patrick (22:41.782)

Isn’t there some level of complexity though, when we get somebody started in a company, is if we don’t give them a path, like you want to give them the words to use, which I really like. Personally, I think it’s important. But the average person that comes in, they’re not truly an entrepreneur yet. Now, many of them become entrepreneurs because so many of the skills that are necessary to

entrepreneurial skills. You got to manage your time and you got to get out of your comfort zone and you have to do these things. But isn’t there a danger in not giving them a clear path and not saying, hey, well, you just do it your way. You figure it out. Like, don’t we have to have some structure for the masses to succeed?

Big Al (23:31.998)

Maybe a good question to start with is, how do you like to meet and talk to people?

Patrick (23:38.164)

Mm-hmm.

Big Al (23:39.554)

And they say, oh, only on Facebook, on Messenger. Okay, that might be the place we start or I’m not comfortable online, all that techy stuff. Oh, okay. I like going to, you know, events. Yeah, so maybe B&I breakfast or something is good for them. Or, or, so we have to give them some options, but a lot of times if you ask people, how are you most comfortable? And I like the…

idea of comfortable because if they go out of their comfort zone.

The reason they have a comfort zone is because they want to stay comfortable. So when they go out of their comfort zone, they stop. So you have to say how far to the edge I can go, but everybody’s going to have a way that they’d like. For me to use the telephone. No way. I don’t think I’d co-call anybody. I’ve tried it. I’ve taught it to the downline and I just hate it. So no matter how much money I’d make, I’d probably quit just because it’s a bad experience. So everybody has some natural talents or ways of connecting.

Patrick (24:18.285)

Yes.

Patrick (24:22.303)

Right.

Big Al (24:43.295)

We should probably give them some options if they can’t think of any, but most people know how they like to talk to people.

Patrick (24:48.786)

Yeah, no, that makes sense. Were you a guy that tended towards, or is it falling into that same category for you, lead with the product or the opportunity? Sell to recruit, recruit to sell, yeah.

Big Al (25:02.214)

Oh, yeah, I hear that a lot. Uh, you, uh, you lead by starting to listen. You listen for the problem, the purpose of business is to solve problems. So the first thing we do is listen for the problem. So if somebody says, well, better the doctor says I have 10 days to live. And I says, well, we have this really great meeting where there’s doctors coming to you next month and you know, you might want to, it’s too late. You’re out of sync with them.

Patrick (25:30.123)

Yeah.

Big Al (25:32.302)

or he says, oh, my health is really bad. And I say, oh, we have a new part of our compensation plan. That’s just we’re out of sync. Conversely, people say, well, I’m getting laid off of my job and things are terrible. And you say, check out this antioxidant. We’re just totally out of sync. So we lead with. Solving that person’s problem.

There’s no reason for them to even engage with us unless we’re going to be able to solve a problem for them.

Patrick (26:04.182)

And how do you, you know, you’re so good with the words. How do you take a brand new recruit and do you make that part of your training or part of your onboarding to talk to them about how to talk to people? Or do you do sit behinds? Like in your heyday of building, how would you go about the sponsoring process?

Big Al (26:31.986)

Here’s an example. I’m doing a workshop in Belgium several years ago. And there’s a man from Belgium who’s a leader. He’s really going well. He says, well, how do you talk to people? So we’re at lunch, we sit down. He says, see that waiter over there? How are we going to approach that person? So I said, all right, just watch. So the person comes over, he’s a waiter there, it’s on a Saturday. And…

takes her order and I asked, you know, I’m just curious. So are you married to your job or are you open-minded? And the waiter says, I hate this job. Of course I’m open-minded. I don’t wanna do this the rest of my life. I gotta work overtime tonight because the other guy’s supposed to come in at four o’clock and so I’m gonna blow out a whole weekend, blah, blah. And I said, oh, here’s the words. Then we should talk. Instant appointment.

The man says, okay, yeah, yeah. Uh, as soon as I get off the shift, I have a little break and we can talk, you know, at four o’clock. He says, yeah, then we can talk. So later on in the afternoon, we have a break around two o’clock and we see the waiter way down on the other end of the restaurant. He’s keep looking at looking at us and finally comes over and says, you’re not going to leave, are you? You know, I need to talk to you at four. And, um, it’s just a simple thing that’s non-invasive and solves a problem.

Patrick (28:00.214)

Mm-hmm.

Big Al (28:00.31)

And the person couldn’t wait to talk to us. So it wasn’t like, uh, I got this thing. I want to sell you, uh, network market is if you have a problem and most people have a problem, everybody has problems. Uh, if you ever talk to new people, as soon as they possibly can, after the, you know, hi, what’s your name? You know, where do you live and where do you work after that?

They immediately dive into how hard it was to be there at the event today. Uh, all the pain that they have to go through, uh, how difficult it was. And the human program here is, uh, people complain in the hope that we will love them more because they’re suffering so much. All humans have this. Some have it more than others, obviously, but all humans have it. So if you are shy, you got this thing nailed. All you have to do is just listen.

And people will start telling you all their problems. You listen to all their problems and say, all right, is there any of those that I can solve? There you go. Well, yeah, I can solve that one. So that’s the one you’re gonna talk about. They say, well, how hard is that in real life? And I says, well, all you need is two sentences.

Patrick (29:13.943)

Mm-hmm.

Big Al (29:25.686)

The first sentence is you’re going to confirm to have the problem. You’re going to say, do you have this problem?

Big Al (29:33.862)

And the second sentence is, do you want to fix it?

Big Al (29:41.87)

I said, that’s not rocket surgery. So how would that work in real life? And I said, okay. So somebody complained about their community and say, well, do you hate commuting? Yeah. You want to fix it? Yeah. And then we’re going to say, well, then we should talk. I mean, I’m at work tomorrow and I hate my job like everybody else there. And then they’re complaining.

I say, do you hate this job as much as I do? Yeah. Would you like to fix it? Yeah. Then we should talk.

Patrick (30:18.791)

Mm-hmm.

Big Al (30:19.418)

Not difficult. People make this whole thing about calling for appointments and stuff. It’s they make it mind-blowingly difficult. So here’s an example I give nutrition people. Once you figure out how this works, it’s like a license to print money. So anybody sells supplements. Well, I’m going to look for sick people, but what if they what if they don’t? I said, all right, so let’s do a little analysis here. Micro.

Patrick (30:38.722)

Mm-hmm.

Big Al (30:46.678)

Who who has more health problems young people are old people old people Who has more money to spend on them young people old people old people? All right, so we should talk to old people over 30, right? Yeah. Yeah people over 30 This is all right. So here’s what we’re gonna do. We’re gonna go to a party old people over 30. There’s 20 couples there And after the high how are you? How’s the weather blah blah?

Patrick (30:51.205)

All to you.

Patrick (30:54.664)

Oh, people.

Big Al (31:12.642)

They’re going to start talking when it’s your turn to talk. If you talk to them, they really like that because they are their most favorite subject and you could ask this one question. It’s a license to print money. You just say, what are your two biggest health problems?

Big Al (31:31.562)

Now there’s a reason, neuroscience reason for asking to versus whatever else. That’s not important right now, but here’s what happens. You say, what are your two biggest health problems? And they think, man, uh, my coworkers don’t want to listen to it anymore. My kids are, uh, sick of me doing it. You’re going to listen to me. Oh man. Instant report. I’d love you, man, cause you’re going to listen to me complain. And here’s what they say. They said, well, my ankles hurt. My knees hurt. My hips hurt. My back hurts. I have neck pain, uh, migraine headaches.

acid reflux. That’s the disease. Now, you know, I have five known diseases, four unknown diseases, the three diseases they haven’t discovered yet. When they finally take a breath, you’re going to say, uh, do you want to fix it? You would like to do something about it.

Big Al (32:19.998)

If they don’t, no problem. Say what else bothers you? If they do, then we should talk. And so when we talk now or, uh, you know, Saturday or whatever, it’s not too difficult. So instead of.

Patrick (32:22.102)

Yeah.

Patrick (32:35.338)

Tom, how did you figure out who to work with? So, you know, it is simple, right? It’s a simple business and activity will win the day, especially if they’re using the right words. How did you discern where to spend your time with different team members?

Big Al (32:57.07)

There’s two things we need.

Patrick (32:59.458)

Mm-hmm.

Big Al (33:02.459)

We need to have a good mindset to be motivated And we need skills and you need them both And people said now if you’re motivated you will figure out a way and I’m thinking you’re out of your mind You’re motivated and you say man, I’m motivated I have goals I have a vision board I want to be a pilot and I’m gonna do it by trial and error. I’m thinking fly once

Patrick (33:06.21)

Mm-hmm.

Big Al (33:30.498)

and it’s going to be over. I said, you’re going to need some skills. No matter how motivated you are, eventually you’re going to have to say something. I mean, you could be levitating all the way up to the prospect, but at some point you’ll still have to say words.

Patrick (33:34.678)

Mm-hmm.

Patrick (33:45.518)

Mm-hmm.

Big Al (33:46.614)

So who to work with? You have to ask ourselves, what is harder to do? To teach somebody word for word the skills or to teach them how to have a good attitude and mindset? And the answer is, of course, teaching them to have a good attitude and mindset is a mind boggling difficulty. You know, you change their whole belief system. Skills are easy. You say, read this, say this, you’re done.

Patrick (34:12.107)

Yeah, yeah.

Big Al (34:16.118)

So once you see that, you say, all right, now I know who to work with. Uh, I know who to sponsor. So if you go out sponsoring, you’re going to say, I don’t care about their skill level, I just care about their mindset. So the best people look for are people that are dissatisfied and want to change. Those are self-motivated people trying to motivate people’s like.

Patrick (34:43.87)

Right, that’s a good point.

Big Al (34:45.878)

I haven’t been able to do that in 50 some years, but if I ever find out, I’ll pass it on. But so you find motivated people and give them the skills. And there’s so many people who have the skills, but no motivation, that’s not going to work. So you say you just need both. So if you’re out there,

Patrick (34:55.404)

Yeah.

Patrick (35:03.222)

What happens when you run, you know, the person that talks a good game, they sound motivated, but they’re not doing the work. Did you do anything in your career to figure out who is that person? Like how do I always said, the shallow brook runs the loudest, you know, they talk a really good game. But but and it and it took me a while to kind of ask a few questions and not assume that they were actually doing what they said they do. Did you have any?

Big Al (35:15.923)

Yeah.

Patrick (35:32.022)

You know, did you have any secrets there?

Big Al (35:35.37)

Yeah.

Big Al (35:38.958)

When I started, I had a friend who said, I see you work with people and I’d work with them for six months at a time, you know, join at the hip. We’d travel everywhere together. And he says, how many become a leader? And I said, well, sometimes they do, sometimes you don’t. And he said, well, you know, you’re an idiot. And I thought, God, thank you. Well, at least he’s accurate. So I should probably listen to him. And he says, before you work with these people, you should give them a test.

So I said, uh, well, that makes sense. Uh, what kind of tests? The obvious question. And he said, give them a book, tell them to read the book and you’ll get back with them in three days. And if you call them three days later and say, well, you know, uh, I had to watch something on TV and overtime. It’s just, they’re not bad people. It’s just not their time yet. And.

If they call you after one day, say I already read it already, I’m wired, let’s get together earlier. That might be a hint. You don’t get a lot of those, but that is a really strong hint. So you don’t have to give them a book. You could give them an audio. You could send them to the store for milk and cookies. You give them an assignment to see if they follow through and do something. So the first thing to do is give them a test to see if they pass the test. And once they do that, well, then you know who to work with.

Patrick (37:02.21)

Hmm, that is super interesting. It’s almost like if you had a meter, then you could measure the desire of every person that joined the organization. And you could go down through the group. Technology is allowing us, there are ways to do some of that anyway. That’s another story, but that’s kind of interesting. I like that. Just a little bit of a test to figure out who’s hungry.

Big Al (37:25.582)

So I was looking, I just read a little bit on your webpage about your software, but it would say, if you looked at that and saw like a whole bunch of people in your group that made a lot of presentations, didn’t sign anybody up. You say, well, they’re kind of motivated. What are they missing here? Maybe they don’t know how to start a conversation with somebody. They don’t, or they’re saying the wrong words. That’s killing them. You say, well, that’s a skill thing. And then you look at a whole bunch of people haven’t called on anybody. You’re thinking,

Patrick (37:41.768)

Yeah, yeah.

Patrick (37:47.317)

Right.

Big Al (37:54.754)

They could at least talk to their brother. That would be kind of a hint.

Patrick (37:58.67)

That’s exactly right. Yeah, you picked it up. I mean, because when you’re telling me this story, I didn’t want to bore you with all that, but I’m sitting there thinking, man, we could set up a desire meter. Like we could literally, because one of the things I do is I look at the, I look at the genealogy of the organization and I’m like, well, who is this person six levels deep that just prospected 50 new people? They haven’t rank advanced one level, but that’s desire. Like,

I can manually go look at it. I almost want to put a meter and we just tell you exactly who in your organization’s doing the most activity with the least result. Because that’s probably somebody I need to help. They have a competency issue, but they’re hungry, right? But that’s almost easier to fix, as you already said, that’s almost easier to fix than the person that is really good at converting.

Big Al (38:42.326)

Yeah, they do.

Patrick (38:56.13)

but you can only get them to talk to four people a month. And they get one to join and you’re like, that’s incredible, there’s 25%. But they’re not all that hungry, but they’re very skilled. Well, I’d almost rather bet on the person that’s making 50 exposures a month and just help them with the skills.

Big Al (39:18.35)

they’re saying something pretty bad because I don’t know if this sounds bad but you think about it everybody we talk to is pre-sold and people say no I said all right you’re selling health products let’s do a survey or ask 100 people do you want to live longer or die quicker live longer do you want more money in your life or less money more I think you know past math

Patrick (39:40.481)

Yeah.

Big Al (39:47.882)

Everybody’s pre-sold. You don’t have to sell. You don’t have to do that big presentation thing. If everybody’s pre-sold and they’re all saying, no, must be something we said or did, huh? Yeah. We’re pretty professional at our incompetence in that area. And, you know, we have to learn a little bit at a time and hopefully people figure this out without being embarrassed. Like I was after two years when somebody says, don’t you think other people.

Patrick (40:01.218)

Right.

Big Al (40:16.366)

Talk to the same people you do and they sign them up and you don’t? That’s, that’s pretty bad.

Patrick (40:21.002)

Yeah, no, it’s great. It goes back to you can’t say the right thing to the wrong person.

Right?

Big Al (40:30.547)

Let me see. You can’t say the wrong thing to the right person. Let me think here. I’ve said the wrong thing to the right person for the first part of my career. That’s for sure. I destroyed them. You can’t say the right thing to the wrong person. Your odds are pretty long on that, but if we don’t say something good, they’re not doomed

Patrick (40:30.921)

You know.

Patrick (40:34.314)

right thing to the-

Patrick (40:44.215)

Right, right.

Patrick (40:48.97)

right thing to the wrong person.

Big Al (40:58.606)

We should at least give them a chance. But yeah, taking people with the mindset who already have it and are working, that’s just so much better. So much easier. Yeah.

Patrick (41:07.626)

Right. I mean, you know, if you find the right person, right, you probably can mess it up if you find the right person. Well, listen, Tom, it’s been awesome spending some time with you. I appreciate your time. Where can people find your books? Do you just go on Amazon or do you have a website or how can they how can they get access to your information? And I have started.

Big Al (41:15.145)

Oh yeah, I’ve done that. I’ve done that pro level.

Big Al (41:29.809)

No.

Patrick (41:36.134)

getting your newsletter, which I find myself reading and there’s some incredible content in it. How would people get access to that as well?

Big Al (41:44.974)

Uh, we have this, uh, websites and the website’s called big L books. You say, wow, how did you come up with that one? So I say, well, just go to big L books.com and, um, probably click on books or click on free newsletter, you know, whatever you want from it and, uh, start reading the tips. I mean, we do tips, you know, a couple of times a week for people and they, um, they kind of like it because they say, I could say this now and get a result.

Patrick (41:53.57)

Ha ha.

Big Al (42:15.914)

right now. Hey, that looks pretty familiar.

Patrick (42:19.055)

That’s you, that’s you, Al. The magic words for prospecting. Big Al Books.

Big Al (42:24.45)

Yeah, even an audio, that’s pretty cool. I need to visit the site more.

Patrick (42:28.986)

I love it. That is fantastic. So there’s lots of content there. Fantastic. Well, thank you. Thank you so much, my friend. We really enjoyed the time today.

Big Al (42:40.19)

Okay, well, we’ll talk to everybody later. And meanwhile, just good luck saying better words and stop blaming the prospects like I did. And we’ll just say better things to all these pre-souled people. So thank you for inviting me.

Patrick (42:55.074)

Thank you. Great being with you.

Important Links

• https://bigalbooks.com/

About Tom “Big Al” Schreiter