How to Scale Through Connections, Not Complexity: Expert Networking with Michael Whitehouse

Welcome to the Scalable Expert, the podcast where we unlock the secrets to building a business that grows with you, not around you. I'm your host, Tara Bryan, business strategist, mentor, and creator of the Infinite Scale Method. If you're a coach, consultant, or service provider who's maxed out with one-on-one work. Overwhelmed by the grind and ready to scale your expertise into a business that works for you, then you are in the right place. Each week I'll share actionable tips, inspiring success stories, and proven strategies to help you reclaim your time, grow your income, and create a business that delivers results without sacrificing quality. Let's dive in and make your business infinitely scalable. Hey everybody, welcome to the podcast. I am so excited to introduce you to Michael Whitehouse today. Michael, thank you so much for joining us. To get started, tell us a little bit about yourself and, a little bit about your business.

Sure. Great to be here. So I am Michael Whitehouse. I am known to some as the guy who knows a guy because that's what I tell them to call me and it all started actually exactly 11 years ago today. March 13th is the anniversary of my business when I walked into my first networking event here in Southeast Connecticut with nothing. I had no job, no business, nothing to sell, arguably no marketable skills. I thought I had some, but in retrospect, probably not and not even an apartment. I would move into my apartment the next day because we were moving to a new area and so someone had said hey you should visit Eastern Connecticut Chamber of Commerce. They have great events. So I said, okay, let's go and the only thing I had the only asset I had was a desire to serve and the only thing I could serve with was with other people I'd met. So once I met one person I knew one person when I met a second person I had one person I could introduce them to. The third person, I had two people I could introduce them to. The fourth, three. And on and on. And this is when I discovered that you can have a remarkably small network and still deliver value. Because even at the first event, by the end of the two hours, I'd met, I don't know, eight, ten people. I'd say, well, who are you looking to meet? And they'd say, I'm looking to meet a real estate agent. So I was like, oh, I just met a real estate agent. Do you know that guy over there? No? Oh, let me introduce you. And within six months I was connecting with mayors, and chairmans, and CEOs, and executive directors, and people with all kinds of fancy titles. Because in the local community, people are relatively accessible if you get out there and meet them. And, I discovered that I was doing something that no one else was doing. And, it wasn't rocket science how to do it. It's just, I had the benefit of starting with nothing and knowing I had nothing. Most people don't think they have nothing. Well, I know people. I don't need to do too much. When you know you know no one, you're like, hey, how do I meet people? Right? That's why being underemployed is worse than being unemployed. When you're unemployed, you know you don't have a job you've got to start searching for one. When you've got a crappy job, you're like, what? Well, I've got a job. It's okay. So, I was able to leverage that, and that's how I became The Guy Who Knows A Guy. And in 2017, I wrote this book, The Guy Who Knows A Guy. And,

Okay, that's good.

2020, exactly six years and a day later, they shut down the state, the world, and said, Go to the internet! And I said, okay! And I said, hey, this internet's global. I'm not limited to my little corner of the world. I can meet people everywhere. This is pretty cool. So the next five years, we're connecting with multi million dollar entrepreneurs and people in, I should count how many countries, it's probably more than 20, definitely on all six continents. I've met with thousands of people over the last five years, and that's where the next book, which I just published, which is The Guy Who Knows The Guy's Guide To Networking came from, cause this is more of a step by step guide of how to do all that, but so that's the short version of the story. There's a longer version because it's 11 years long, but that's the short version.

Right, right. I love it. So, I love hearing stories about people who have a superpower, a gift, an expertise, and have been able to monetize it and it sounds like that is exactly what you have done, is not only are you a connector, but you are able to sort of take that gift that you have, like, a lot of people don't like to talk to people, they don't like to network, they don't like to meet people, and oh my gosh, don't put me in front of people, right? So that was obviously something that you were very comfortable with so you can help other people with that, which is your superpower and your expertise. And so how, how did you, I mean, it sounds like it was just sort of an organic, natural thing for you to connect, to do connections, and start to kind of think about how do you connect people together, but how did you go from that to creating it into a business?

So in the first phase, in the pre pandemic phase, I leveraged my networking to generate about half a million dollars in sales for a local magazine, paper magazine, that I was publishing. And that magazine is actually still there. A lot of people think, oh, everything's digital. Which is easy to think because everything that's at hand is digital. You spend a lot of time on your phone and whatnot. But most people don't spend an hour on their phone and say, I feel so much happier having done that. Whereas people do spend an hour reading a book and say, I feel so much happier having read a book. So people like magazines, they like paper, they like hands on things. But so that's what I did in that first phase. And at that point, I was very proud of myself, because you know, half a million dollars in sales from networking. I was effectively doing what I call network prospecting. I was finding my customers in networking spaces. So it was very low level, but you know, half a million dollars, then when things went to the virtual space, I was able to connect with better and better people. And I, to me, I didn't know what I didn't know. I didn't know what I did know. I didn't know much. I had just as little when I entered the virtual space as I did when I entered the live space six years earlier. And, from there, I was able to generate a lot of revenue from it through affiliate partnerships.

Hmm.

Then there's two parts to that. One is building trust in an audience, and then the other part is finding good partners and promoting quality stuff to them. Emphasis on quality stuff to them. That's where a lot of people get it wrong. It's not about just, you know, buying Facebook ads and generating a list, then driving traffic to it for whatever pays commissions. It is about building relationships at scale. And, again, like most things, I stumbled into it blindly and tripped over doing the right thing. I was networking, I was meeting over 20 people a week. And I said, I cannot follow up with 20 people a week. Because next week I'm going to meet 20 more people. And then 20 more, and 20 more, I'm meeting 1, 000 people a year. I can't follow up with 20 people a year, let alone 1, 000 people a year. That's too much. Well, there's this email marketing concept. What if I created an email list and shared valuable stuff with everyone I'm meeting with? And it's always with the mindset of what would everyone I've networked with be interested in seeing? Maybe not fascinated by, but saying this isn't bad. I'm not going to unsubscribe. And I always started from that perspective of this is an audience of my community, I call my email community, not my email list. This is an audience of my community, my friends. My, at least, acquaintances and what can I share with them that they will say this is valuable and then possibly this is valuable I'd like more and then through my network I meet some really good people and some of those people have really good offers so I can then say hey in addition to what I got have you met Penelope? She's got a really great program coming out you should check it out. Have you met Orly? She has an awesome master class. You'll love it you should totally go there and because I've developed trust and because I don't abuse that trust by promoting junk, they say, oh, that's something I need. You're telling me that what you're promoting is valuable. I'm willing to invest an hour or a day or three days on your recommendation. And from that I've generated, I think actually at this point, more than half my revenues comes from affiliate partnerships. Because it's, it's really. It's leveraging my network to my network and connecting them as opposed to just saying, hey, Tara, have you met Bob? You guys should connect. It's hey, 3000 audience members. Have you met Tara? You might like what she's doing.

Yeah, that's awesome. And, and again, such a natural transition sounded like it was just sort of like, how do I do this? How do I monetize this? How do I connect with more people? And then affiliate. Is that's a great, a great sort of parallel track to, to that, you know, what your gift is. So then, so you did that, you have your community, you're growing your list. You're connecting people with different, offers. So how did that translate to a book?

Well, so the first book, was because I wanted to be an author. I was a salesman working for a print shop printing company at the time. And so people saw me as like the business card order taker guy. And I had, even at that point, a lot of experience having a previous business about marketing, about kind of guerrilla style marketing, social media, which wasn't as well known at the time. It still isn't that well known now. And so I had all this knowledge. Nobody cared because I was just the business card salesman. And I said, if I could get the title of author, author outrank salesman, I'll then be an author. So I said, what I know, I know networking. I'll write a book about it. Never found out if it worked because I got a new job before I got the book out. So that's where the first one came out. The next book, which is, The View From The Deck. Thoughts on Values, Vision and Gratitude. I just started writing. There was, I had some ideas. I started writing them, and then I had a book sitting on Google Drive and I said, this is probably better on Amazon than Google, so let me publish it. And it goes.

Yeah.

about networking, but isn't, if you don't know how to do it at all, it's not a how-to guide, right? It'd be like if you've never cooked before. And, you know, you read a book and it was talking about the, value of gas stoves over electric stoves or why you might want to have it at 425 instead of 400 in the oven and you're like, but what in the oven? How long? What are we talking about? So, I put out a book that is like you, you're an alien. You just arrived on earth and you want to meet people. How do you do it? Well, this is the guide to networking and as you want to touch on one point you made earlier, You said for people who don't have the gift of talking to people, The gift I had was that I could blunder into it not knowing how and I could succeed because for me it was enjoyable just to be around people, so failing at networking was still fun, Because failing at networking is still socializing unless it's a really bad group. If you're an introvert, failing at networking is consuming energy, it's exhausting, it's worrying. But that just allowed me to discover how to do it. If you know how to do it, anyone can do it. And the idea that you have to be outgoing and you have to be an extrovert, and you have to be... that's all a myth. In fact, introverts make better networkers than extroverts. Because introverts don't do what I did. What I did was I said, I want to keep meeting more people. I can't follow that many people. I don't know, I'll figure out some way to follow them all at once. An introvert would be like, I can't follow up with 20 people a week. I'm only going to meet 5 people a week. But I'm going to have really good relationships with those 5. And I'm going to take notes. And I'm going to remember their birthday. And I'm going to send them cards. And I'm going to send them a nice note. And so you know, that person who really pays attention to you and really knows you well, that's probably an introvert. Because they don't want to meet 20 people. That's too much. If they could meet one person a week, then they'd be really happy. So introverts are better networkers, technically, tactically.

Once they get out

yeah, once they start doing it, yes.

Yeah,

and, and so, you know, once they learn a technique. But the reason people think they're bad at networking is they're taught to do it the wrong way, and most events are terrible. So, if you're taught the wrong technique and you're doing it in the wrong space, You're gonna have a pretty bad time. You know, if you I love using analogies of things I don't know how to do. Skiing, for example. If, you know, you're given bad equipment, you're told how to do it wrong, and then you're sent out on a slope where the snow is all like slushy and goopy, that's bad, I think, right? That's what I've heard.

yep,

then you're gonna be like, Ugh, I suck at skiing. Maybe you don't, maybe your skis are in bad condition, and the ground's in bad condition, and we have no idea if you're any good at skiing. So, if you go into a room, and the format is everyone has two minutes to talk about themselves, and then it's done, that's a really hard environment to operate in, right? You need to know exactly what you're doing, you need to know exactly what you're looking for, because you are filtering in real time. And taking notes on who you're going to follow up with in real time. And then you have to say something that magically would make other people pay attention. And 70 percent of them can't even parse what they're hearing. Because it's rapid fire, one after another after another. And they just can't even keep, doesn't matter what you say, you need to be at an A level to say words that'll snap them out of the reverie they're in hearing all these things. Impossible environment to operate in. Another mistake is virtual events where they'll send you a breakout room, but they'll give you an unrelated topic. You know, hey, go into a room with a bunch of strangers and, what's your favorite vacation destination? I don't care. If you're at a live event and that's how you open it, but you're gonna have follow up? Okay, cool. That's how you get to know and get to know those people. If you have one seven minute breakout room, you shouldn't be talking about vacation destinations. You need to be talking about if this is the person you need to meet. But so, so many of these events, they're structured in a way that makes them really hard to operate in. And then, we're all taught, you know, the introduction formats that I hear people taught are gibberish. Because the way that our brains work is we think of problems and solutions. So, and yet you see that in good copywriting. You know, I think of any infomercial you've seen. Are you tired of never being able to find the storage containers when you need them? Buy StorageMax, right? Problem, solution. And yet the introductions we're taught are, I help blah to blah because blah. And it usually comes out because no one knows exactly what the demographics are. I help entrepreneurs to make more money by improving their messaging, because they're tired of being the best kept secret. I don't know what you do. That sounds like probably 25 percent of the people you hear in a breakout room, right? So, we're all taught to sound the same. So, you know, you're using a bad intro in bad spaces, and then you end up having a lot of really awkward meetings because you don't know who you're meeting with. And you don't know what you're trying to get. So, yeah. Networking's gonna come out pretty badly there. Would you like me to share? The introduction format that I recommend that actually hooks people's attention.

Well, of course.

All right. So I call it the eight second intro. It is in The Guy Who Knows The Guy's Guide to Networking. Clearly shouldn't keep those right next to me because I keep picking them up. I'm really excited about that book. It's the first thing because I figure if it's the only thing you read in the book, it'll be the most impactful. It's very simple. It is a two sentence introduction. The first sentence starts with you know how. And the second sentence starts with, what I do is. So, for me, for example, you know how many people are frustrated with networking and not getting good results. What I do is teach them effective simple strategies to network. Profitably and have fun doing it.

Mmm.

So,

I love that. That's really good. Okay, everybody, listen to what he just said, and then write it down. Rewind. Write it down. That was really good. Because I think you're right. I mean, that's one of the biggest challenges that people have, even in talking about what they do, right? It's this long and my favorite is the entrepreneur who has like 12 businesses and then they spend the next like 20 minutes talking about all their businesses at a networking event and you're like, okay, just really needed the soundbite and that my friend is the soundbite.

yeah, the worst one is the one who talks about their last business. I heard that. Yeah. So I trained as a chiropractor and I did that for 17 years. I really enjoyed it. I really enjoyed helping people, but then I discovered AI based social media and that was really effective. And now I'm teaching that and I'm like, wait, what? I thought you were a chiropractor because you remember the first thing you hear. So if you open with, I used to be a chiropractor. You're the chiropractor. You now need to erase what's in my brain and put something else in. And my brain's probably not going to put enough energy in to actually erase it. You're the chiropractor.

Right?

Yeah, so the other thing you'll notice is in that format, I didn't say how I do it. I didn't necessarily say who I do it for. I didn't say what it costs. I didn't say how long I've been doing it, who I, anything. I said, you know how this problem exists? What I do is solve it. And then, you may be thinking, well, how do you solve it? Because you're used to a two minute intro. And I just did that in about eight seconds. Well, how do you solve it? Who do you do that for? Is this in groups? Do you have a book? So if you do this at a live networking event or in a breakout room that's more open flowing, people are expecting more and you're just like, that's it! Then they're gonna say, well, who do you help? Oh, I help these people. Well, how do you do it? Well, I do it in these formats. Do you have a book? I do Now you're being interviewed. So instead of you trying to monologue at them for two minutes, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, they are interviewing you. So if someone's curious, technically that other person's monopolizing the conversation, asking you questions. You're not monopolizing the conversation by talking about yourself. Fun fact.

Yeah.

neurologically

And that's where you want to be.

and the more you talk the less people remember so when you do that eight sec two lines People are gonna remember all of it because their brains like going back and forth over it. Did I miss it? Did I miss whose audiences he didn't say it? I got they're trying to figure it out they're missing something whereas if you start going into and I do this I help these people and blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah but by the end of it if you were to ask someone, what did I say? Like I don't know you're a chiropractor because your brain is trying to keep track of the information and eventually it just goes, and throws their hands, throws his little brain hands in the air and gives up and waits for the next person to talk. So the less you say, the more people will remember about you. And the more curious they are, the more they'll ask and the more they'll want to know about you. And this is extremely important in commoditized industries. So, you know the industry where every BNI meeting you go to has the same people? Or every chamber event has the same people? And they say, I'm a financial advisor! And you say, what makes you different? And their answer is the same as everyone else? Well, we like to customize our suggestions to the exact needs of the client. I'm more like a coach than a financial advisor. Says every financial advisor when you ask them how they're different. So, instead of saying the exact same thing as everyone else and answering the question of how you're different the same as everyone else. How about this? You know how many people know they need to be saving more, but are afraid to make mistakes. What I do is guide people like a Sherpa through the confusing world of finance. Oh, well, I want to work with that guy. That guy guides me like a Sherpa. I mean, most financial advisors who are worth their salt do that, but they don't say it that way. So when you say it that way, and some differentiate, like, you know, there's a zillion realtors, you know, 1 percent of, of Americans have a real estate license. But some of them are fixated on the deal, right? They're gonna squeeze every penny out of it. And some of them are more about people. They're gonna make it easy. They're gonna be like, I'll take care of you. So they'd have different intros. One of them's gonna say, you know how buying a house is the largest financial transaction you'll ever perform. What I do is make sure my clients get top dollar when selling their house leaving, you know, no penny left unturned. Versus, you know how buying a house could be one of the most stressful experiences of a person's life. But what I do is I make it easy and smooth, take care of all the complications and let my clients worry about their dream house and nothing else. Very different referrals for each of those people.

Yeah, totally, totally. Okay this is, this is amazing. So, okay, now I got a whole different set of questions for you. Alright, so, this is sort of your expertise right here.

You could say that.

This is, this is another zone of genius right here. So, do you have this part of your expertise monetized? Like, do you help people come up with their messaging?

I have not managed to productize it yet. So...

Mmm, we gotta talk. You've got to productize that because that's amazing.

Maybe it could be a thing. Yeah. So I do have, that's always been the challenge with selling networking training is, people either think they know how to network, in which case they don't want to buy it, or think they hate networking, in which case they don't want to buy it. And so it's always been a messaging challenge of how do I sell, you know, the most powerful tool in the world. And so, so that's

Well you know Michael you look at it as like the problem to the solution and then you start with there oh, there's the mug look at that. He is like going to the moon.

I got this from the Kennedy Space Center down in Florida, when I was down there for a, uh,

That is,

a mastermind. Um, yeah, well, and that's

Okay. So yeah, so I want to hear about that.

Yeah, honestly, my big challenge is, you know, I'm a multi passionate, which is a nice way of saying I'm into a lot of stuff. So I know a lot of different things and that's, that's of course one of the challenges a lot of entrepreneurs face. One thing I have created is something I call the Opportunity Growth Academy Inner Circle. The Inner Circle is a sub segment of Opportunity Growth Academy. And so it's a weekly open coaching call because I know, I've met over 3,000 entrepreneurs. I am rarely stumped by a question. So, it's an open call where the members can come in. They pay a modest membership, 100 a month. And they come in and ask anything. You know, how do I set up my email list? Or how do I improve my open rates? Or how do I run a summit? Or I want to get affiliate partners. How should I structure things? Whatever it is they need to know, I teach that. And that, I built that because I said, I've got a lot of value I can share. Let me focus on sharing that first. I'll worry about figuring out how to optimize and monetize and turn this from a three figure program to a four figure program to a five. Let me start by helping people. Because the more I'm getting in front of actual business owners and helping them and sharing knowledge with them, the more I'm hearing back from them. The more I'm getting feedback. That worked. That didn't work. I understand it, but I can't do it. You know, those kinds of things. And so learning where there might be that opportunity. And, one area I'm, I'm currently exploring. I don't know how well this is going to age. This being a podcast, it'll be up there forever. What I encourage exploring is the idea of, using being a super connector as a lead generation tool. Because if you are known as a guy who knows a guy, you can't be the guy who knows a guy. That's me. But if you're a guy who knows a guy, then people will reach out because they need something. So imagine a bank branch manager or a mortgage originator, or Realtor financial advisor who's known as a connector in the community and is known that anyone can give them a call, walk into their office, say, Hey, I'm looking for anyone in town and they'll have someone to refer them to. That's a powerful lead generation tool, especially for someone like a banker, because most refer about. Probably half the major referrals people are looking for are for their house, which means it's something expensive. So if someone goes to their bank branch manager, goes to a banker or whatever and says, Hey, yeah, I'm looking for someone who can pave my driveway. I mean, it's weird to ask a bank branch manager, but I'm told you know everyone in town. So, they'll be like, yes, actually, yeah, I know two of them. I'll, I'll, here's, here's their contact info. And by the way, driveways tend to cost 10 to 50 thousand dollars, do you have a thought about how you're going to be financing that when you do it? Oh, I haven't thought about that. All right. Well, once you talk to these guys, if you need financing, we're a bank. So as opposed to, you could put up signs all over town, you know, home improvement loans and blah, blah, blah. It won't necessarily start that conversation the way that providing that kind of value does. And so that's, I actually have a book which is written, but not published. On exactly that topic. So I'm working on that. Yes, there's a lot, a lot of areas that are exploring another, thing that I use, I run an event called JV connect. And JV Connect was built to be, it's designed to be the best networking event on the internet. And the reason I feel like that's attainable is most networking events are not altruistic. Most networking events are built to sell something else. Networking groups, the like one hour a week, one hour a month, whatever, those are often the product. But if you, if you're seeing a one day or two day networking event, it is almost always designed to sell something else. Well, you can only focus on one thing at a time. So if you're working on building the best sales platform for the 10k program, you are not working to build the best networking event. You're working to build the best networking event that can sell a 10k program. JV Connect, I as a networking geek who went to all kinds of events and said, I like this, but I don't like that, that could be better. After going to a couple hundred events, I said, you know, what if I got rid of all the stuff I didn't like, just put in all the stuff I do like, and built that event. So I now run JVConnect. It is a quarterly event, and it is built around taking everything I've learned from hundreds of events to design an event that is networking on easy mode. The shy introvert who doesn't know how to network can walk into this event and leave with good connections. And

That's awesome.

Yeah. Yeah. And I do that by creating a structure where you basically can't screw it up unless you try to. And that's simply putting people into breakout rooms for 23 minutes, 11 to 15 people. They all do that 8 second introduction that I already shared with you. And then from there, the room flows naturally, which means the quieter people will sit back and watch. It's kind of like watching a parade of networking happening in front of them. They get to be like, Hey, Tara, I liked what you said there. You want to get on the call? The more outgoing people will grab the mic. Someone grabs a baton and starts leading the room. And it works really, really well because there's enough time and space for things to evolve organically. I had one person tell me she made $20,000 within three weeks of the event from connections she made. Some people, I think the most I heard of someone made like 29 meetings off the two days.

Wow, that's

that's like three months worth of networking. Yeah.

Yeah, yeah, that's awesome. Okay, so I love all of the things that you're doing. You and I could probably talk all day about all of the things. So I want to bring it back up, to kind of how do you do all of the things that you're so passionate about doing that you have expertise in and still have time to live your life. One of the things that we talk about a lot as a scalable expert is how do you scale past all, the things that require your time. So talk to us a little bit about how you've done that knowing that you have, all these things that you're working on or building or helping or, and all of the things.

So some of it is eliminating the things I don't like doing either by delegating or minimizing or eliminating those things, because it's understanding that there's a lot of things you don't necessarily need to do. So, one of the most valuable things I do is write my email list. My email, you know, the messages to my email community. Because that's, I'm a pretty good writer if I do say so myself. And actually other people say it, so I don't have to say it myself. And so by writing to my email list, that's a high value activity. It's also really fun. People are like, oh, how do you discipline yourself to write every day? It's like, no, no. How do I discipline myself to only send one a day? That's the challenge I have. Sometimes I'll be a week out and I'll be like, something else I want to write and I can't send two emails today, this has to wait till next week. So it's figuring out ways to find what I'm excited to do, like the things that like, if I'm tired and I'm not feeling great, but I was still say, but I can still write an email, how to make those the profitable activities and build that. So that's a lot of it. It's focusing on making the things I like doing. the things that are most effective and then partnering with the things that I don't like doing or not that effective at. So for example, earlier today I had a call with someone about having them design and manage the JVConnect website. Because I can make a website. I understand the principles. But just to understand the principles doesn't mean I actually make it look good and convert. So I have somebody else do it who knows what they're doing. So I can focus on the stuff that I'm good at. So that's the key thing is, eliminating or delegating the stuff that you don't like. And then, leaning into the stuff you do like. And then you get to the point where the fun things in your life are the things you're doing for business. You know, I went on a cruise earlier this year. It was the marketers cruise. It was 450 entrepreneurs for nine days on a ship. I can't think of a better vacation. There's nowhere else I'd rather go than a cruise ship with 450 entrepreneurs. You know, I don't want to sit on a beach. I want to hang out with people like me I can talk to. So technically that was business, but, it was the coolest vacation I've ever had. So, it's combining those and finding that overlap, and then, you know, finding ways that you can combine that. My ultimate goal in my business, not ultimate, there'll be one after it, but currently, my highest goal is to get to the point where my wife can quit her job and work with me. Because she's smarter than me and better than me at most things as most good wives are. And if I can bring her onto my team, that would be a huge force multiplier. But also we would then be spending more time together. Our relationship, we've worked together before. Some people like, are you sure? You're like, yes, we've worked together before. It was very good. So, you know, when we work together, the relationships better. And then I, as my daughter grows up, I want to find a way to get her into my business.

Yeah,

you know, it's not about that like, you know, work life balance, finding time to take off. It's more about finding ways to make the things that make money fun and make the things that are fun

right.

make money.

Yeah. Oh, I love that. That's awesome. Okay, we're going to use that quote. We're going to put that in the show notes because that's so powerful right there. What you just said. I love it. Okay. So what's one tool resource or, book or whatever that you can't live without in your business?

Just one. So, I mean, my go to, and this probably sounds cliche at this point, but ChatGPT. I go back to that for a lot of things. Especially when overwhelmed is really handy. Because those times when you're like, brain, not brain, the brain thing. You can babble at ChatGPT and be like, oh, you mean this, buh, like, I don't know how you got that from the words. I just fell out of my mouth, but great. Thank you. So, you know, that, that is a tremendous tool. One book that I read that was, I think I'd call it life changing. There have been a number of life changing books, but one of the most powerful is a book called The Game of Life and How to Play It. And,

hm, I haven't heard that one.

it is 100 years old. It's from 1925. I'm blanking on the name of the author, it's three words and they're all hard to spell. But it's The Game of Life and How to Play It. It is actually old enough that it's out of copyright. Which is cool because it means after you read it and say it's amazing, you can then run your own Game of Life and How to Play It summit and nobody can sue you. But it is

Hmm.

an amazing book because it talks about concepts that we think of as law of attraction, universal law, that kind of stuff. Seventy years before anyone else was talking about it. And with a Biblical foundation. So I always just think of it as like, yeah, this is Law of Attraction, woo woo stuff. There's Judeo Christian religious stuff, and like, Never the Two Shall Meet. And, she's explaining these concepts, and she's like, and the Bible says this right here! And it's all there, and I was like, phew! So once I started putting that all together, I was like, it's all one thing! And my ability to manifest, and tap into my intuition, and all that after reading that book, just leapt up. And once you can tap into the universal wisdom, that unlocks a few different things cause the entire universe is a little bit smarter than each of us.

A little.

Yeah.

Yeah. All right. That's a good one. We're going to put that in the show notes. All right, Michael. Thank you so much for joining us. What is the final word? What other wisdom do you have to impart on my audience today?

I think the most important thing is that networking is not a unique and special skill that only some people have. It is quite simple. It's about being a good person and wanting to give value. And if you're a good person who wants to help the people around you, then it's a couple of techniques and a couple of strategies to be a networker. So don't assume I'm not X unless you're not a good person, then you can't be a good networker. But otherwise, if you're a good person and you like to make people's lives better you're already most of the way to being a good networker. Get out there, do that. The rest is just detail. And if you want those details, you can find them in the guy who knows a guy's guide

I was going to say

to networking

yeah,

available on Amazon.

I was going to say you better put that book back up. All right, for those of you who are listening and not actually, looking at the screen right now, Michael, just put his book back up, which you will find in the show notes. So thank you for sharing that a number of times with us today. I'm definitely going to check that out because I think that everyone can always use really solid tips and strategies for how to be a better networker when you go to events, especially like, to your point, the events that are poorly, poorly facilitated. And so you sort of have to navigate through that, along with meeting people and, and connecting. So thank you for sharing that. All right, so where can we find out more about you, as we dive more into networking and all of the

So my main website is guywhoknowsaguy.com. There's no the or a at the beginning of it. It's just guywhoknowsaguy.com. And from there you can find links out to JV Connect, and my summits and my books and all the other good stuff. Amazing. All right, thank you so much, Michael, for being on today. And in the meantime, everyone else have a great week. Thank you.