Today's episode looks at the Law of Influence - what it means to truly have influence over other people, how it can lead to greater professional and personal success, and the way it evolves over time as you continue to build your business. Having influence comes down to how abundantly you place other people's interests first. Matt and Garrett discuss how you can build influence with others by asking questions, expressing empathy, and truly caring for them. Having this genuine connection creates trust, and people pay more attention to your suggestions or advice once you have this relationship. From there, success is inevitable!
Social media can give the illusion of having influence, but our hosts explain that real influence isn't about the number of followers you have - it's about the quality of your one-to-one connections and how you use a given platform to create relationships. Matt and Garrett talk about making the most of your Sphere of Influence, even if it's only a small group, and Garrett shares his thoughts on whether technology has actually improved the way we create influence. They discuss the importance of scaling influence, being pure and genuine with people, and giving to others without sacrificing your own goals. Matt breaks down Bob Burg and John David Mann's Five Secrets of Genuine Influence from their book, The Go-Giver Influencer: A Little Story About A Most Persuasive Idea, and they end by encouraging us to embrace a core of caring in all our interactions to become a true person of influence, the foundation for any good Ninja.
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Episode Highlights:
- Go Giver's definition of influence - how abundantly you place other people's interests first
- Influence can change over time
- Sphere of Influence - a group of people (or sphere) that you have influence over regularly
- Trying to grow the group of people you have influence over, and how this can yield success and results
- Examples of local businesses that have taken care of Matt and Garrett beyond simply doing a job (Meyer Crane and Passion Heating and Air)
- Influence begins with asking questions, expressing empathy, taking care of clients' needs
- People pay more attention to your suggestions and trust your advice when you have influence over them
- Scaled influence
- Number of followers on social media does not necessarily translate to having influence
- Revisiting Luca Alboretti's visit to the podcast and his ability to build connections by truly caring about people
- The Go-Giver Influencer and the Five Secrets of Genuine Influence
- True influence starts with a core of caring
Quotes:
"Do people really understand what influence means? And the level that this can go to?"
"Your influence is determined by how abundantly you place other people's interest first."
"Influence can be situational and occupational as well. So I believe you can have influence over someone as their trusted real estate advisor, but you may not have influence over someone when it comes to other things."
"Real, true influence is when you put the other people first. It has nothing to do with you building your business… Truly being an influence in their life, and connecting with them, and knowing what's important to them, and knowing what makes their world light up - that's where I think influence becomes really amazing to watch. And when you start to get into those roles with people, success is inevitable."
"If you have influence over me because you paid attention or you had great customer service when I called your company… All of a sudden, I'll pay attention to other things because now I trust you."
"Well, who am I going to pay attention to? Obviously the people who have influence over me are going to take a higher priority."
"I think that's where a lot of people get confused, too, they think influence has to do with the numbers, right. There is scaled influence. You can scale your influence, and you can have a massive audience that you have influence over without necessarily having one-to-one interactions. But influence always starts with the one-to-one interactions because when you scale it, you can have interactions that scale, that help you change your message or deliver your message."
"It doesn't matter how many people follow you on social media. It doesn't matter how many people you have in your database. Start with the people that are there. If you can develop influence over them, which, like you said, it's not a switch you can flip, but it is something that you can start practicing right now and you can start going after it."
"It's how you show up to use and create influence in those venues."
"Sometimes we look at all these cool pieces of technology and we go, Well this is the answer. Now I get to do this. But really, what I find, is the most successful people that I'm around take that time to shake the hands, kiss the babies, be involved with people's lives, understand what's really affecting them, really get into that."
"That was the catalyst that allowed the relationship to create the influence." "This is a very important point because a lot of people say, Well I place other people's interests first all the time, but sometimes are doing that, never thinking about themselves, which is okay. But then the relationship just becomes kind of like a martyrdom… It's okay to have your own motivations. It's okay to have your own goals."
"But when you really care, that's when it gets crazy. That's when that influence really starts to set in, and it's like a fire hydrant that you're drinking out of all of a sudden. It's like, Where did all this business come from? It's that core that you created - this caring and influence, that makes it just go to insane levels.
"Influence isn't determined by what happens in your business, it's who you are. And so when you're at the grocery store, when you're driving down the road, whatever it is - practice these secrets: Breathe, listen, smile, be gracious, trust. Think about how you are being a person of influence, and really, how abundantly are you placing other people's interests first?"
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The Go-Giver Influencer: A Little Story About A Most Persuasive Idea by Bob Burg and John David Mann