How to Influence People to Buy
with Will Laurenson

DESCRIPTION:

Shaahin Cheyene tells about his fascinating story starting with the beginnings of raves in the 90’s, and progressing to an Amazon Master today.

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

people, amazon, fucking, social proof, buy, product, influence, reciprocity, selling, sell, review, elements, called, money, teach, book, weed, podcast, good, pay

SPEAKERS

Shaahin Cheyene, Will Laurenson

Will Laurenson  00:00

My guest today is Shaahin Cheyene. He's an Amazon expert. He's sold billions of dollars of product through Amazon. He's got podcasts, courses, a book, even a film on the way. This guy knows his stuff when it comes to selling. But instead of me just picking him up, let's get him on to explain the key elements of influence. I Shane, thanks for joining me today to give a bit of an introduction to yourself, your background, and kind of how you've got to where you are today.

Shaahin Cheyene  00:24

Yeah, sure. My name is Shaahin Cheyene, I am a Amazon expert, my firm accelerated intelligence and Amazon mastery. We teach people how to create predictable recurring revenue streams by selling on the Amazon platform and beyond through to e commerce. And that's what I've been specialized in since 2008. Since Jeff Bezos 2008 2009, since Bezos opened up Seller Central to being able to allow third party sellers to sell on the Amazon platform. And we got very lucky because are we were an early seller, you know, I'll tell you an interesting story. So I, you know, I started a company when I was in my teens. And I've written about it, I've got a podcast now called billion how I became king of the thrill pill called, it's an upcoming book as well, in case anybody wants to check it out. The book will be out in August, and we just met with a film production studio last night. So it'll eventually become a major motion picture as well. But, you know, yeah, it's pretty fun. And so basically, I mentioned this crazy drug in the 1990s. That was illegal drug, it hit the rave scene. by storm, we created a billion dollars in revenue while I was still in my teens pre internet. And I learned very quickly how you need to be able to speak the language of your customer and of the marketplace, in order to be able to influence. And so I've been focused on the science of influence and the science of persuasion, through marketing, and through e commerce, specifically on the Amazon platform for the last 11 years. And I remember the day where, where Bezos opened up the marketplace to third party sellers. And I had a new nootropic brain supplement called XL roll, that I decided I was going to sell and was looking for an avenue of distribution. And I was like, Hmm, this Amazon thing looks kind of interesting. Why don't I give it a shot? So I listed it. And it was an expensive supplement. Well, it was, you know, $120 a month. And, you know, it was it was a really high quality supplement, you know, we do still sell it. And it worked really well. But you know, we were trying to figure out how we're going to get it distributed. So I was like, Hey, you know what, let me throw it up on Amazon, see what happens, who cares, you know, didn't cost me anything. So I put it up on there woke up the next morning to hundreds and hundreds, almost 1000s of sales. And I thought to myself, holy crap, there's something to Amazon. So I dropped everything. And I said this is that this is going to be the future. Let's focus all our energy on how we're going to tell this brand story on Amazon. And what's the language we need to be able to speak in order to get buyers to convert them, what we learned was really interesting there was there was a couple really essential learnings. The first thing is that at that time, and now, people were searching in a myriad of different ways. The primary way people were searching was through Google, right. And so SEO was a huge thing back in the day, if you remember, because everybody wanted to optimize, because that was the only way you would get things. Now Amazon, SEO and Amazon offices. Translation is a big thing. Because what is Amazon, Amazon is a search engine. But But the people that are on there have are at the bottom of the research funnel, they're not at the top, when you get people through Google through SEO through Google pay per click. That's why it's so crappy. And the conversion rates are so low on Google paperclay, for most things, is because those people might be doing research. So if I want to buy this nootropic, I might be searching on Google for what's the best nootropic and I might be taken to your product and I'll research it. But if I'm on Amazon, well, I'm looking to buy. So the language the you need to speak to somebody at the bottom of the funnel, which is where the amazon customer starts and the Google customer ends is a very different and that's what we learned. We learned this very specific art and algorithm of how you get somebody to convert when they're already in there to buy and that was one of the central learnings and you know I've spent the last 11 years teaching people like you and me. You know stay at home moms engineers looking for side hustles Milan Nils, I've got people from my course that are 16 that are learning how to do this. Unbelievable. And you know, learning how to create these recurring revenue streams. And Amazon is so fucking awesome because they pick pack and ship the product for you from anywhere in the world where you're at. So I've got people from Nigeria, I've got people from United Kingdom, I've got people from South Africa, who are taking our course joining the mastermind and learning how to sell on the Amazon platform. Cool. So

Will Laurenson  05:32

what are some that without giving away too much? Because you've obviously got a cost for it? What are some of the key things people have to consider? Are some, I guess, some of the key differences between an Amazon listing for products and maybe your your own e-commerce website where you aren't getting that traffic through organic search and PPC and a lot more of its going to be that research focused?

Shaahin Cheyene  06:01

Yeah, okay. So first and foremost, there's nothing that's off topic, and there's nothing that I'm not happy to share. I've made my money my company produced over a billion dollars in its time, a lot of that I've held on to, so I don't do what I do for money. And in fact, for your listeners and viewers, and wherever this is sold, well, I'm happy to share my $200 one-hour crash course for free. And I will provide that to them for zero just so you guys know, you don't have to spend any money to start selling on Amazon and and the course is from A to Z, it costs nothing. And I'm happy to share any of those things with you. Because at the end of the day, you know, well, what people will discover is there's a ton of gurus out there, right? Just like dick bags that are out there. Look at my Lambo look at these like chicks on this yacht. And I can jacuzzi and this is all fucking great. And you can get this if you just pay me 20 grand or 50 grand, right? We all know that's bullshit. But they sell the dream and people are happy to buy the dream and never realize that what I'm about is teaching people how do you realize it? Right? I've made that money. And it's it's documented. I don't live a big flashy life and you know, showing people my Lamborghinis and my Porsches and all that stuff. But what I do have that I'm very proud of the students that have done this. So to answer your question, I will tell you this. The first thing that you have to do is understand that there are five elements of influence. So there's a professor, have you have you heard of Professor Cal Dini Robert Cal Dinis work? I don't.

Will Laurenson  07:32

Yeah, I've read. I've read a couple of the books. Fantastic. persuasion was really good. Really? dope,

Shaahin Cheyene  07:38

dope. Oh, yeah. Persuasion, I think his latest one, which is great. And his Cannon which came before that is influence and there's a lot of overlap, Cal Dini talks about these five elements of influence, he's added a sixth, which is reciprocity, right? So the first thing you focus on is social proof, right? I don't fucking believe you will. Why? Because you're trying to fucking sell me something. Right. And all your listeners and viewers should know this guy's nobody fucking believes the company anymore. We come from 50 years of American disruption, marketing of Western disruption marketing, as you know, Seth Godin puts it, you know, one of my favorite authors in in all of his books that, you know, you're watching a football game, right. And I think a football game is going on right now in your country, right.

Will Laurenson  08:26

We have one last night. No zeros. It's the euros. Okay, so euro. We had England, England last night England won. And then so you were there in the final on Sunday versus Italy?

Shaahin Cheyene  08:38

That's why you're in a good mood today. Yeah. Yeah.

Will Laurenson  08:42

It's been a good day. It's it's been a slightly subdued day, I suppose is a good way of putting it when you've had a late, late game. But yeah, yeah. It's our first England's first major final for 50 years. 55 years? I think. So yeah. It's quite a big deal for us here.

Shaahin Cheyene  09:03

There you go. Manchester United. So okay, look. So you got to have these elements of influence, right. And so when people come to the listing on Google, it doesn't matter that much, right? Because if you're bringing people through marketing, through, you know, your own website, or some of this other stuff, it's fine. But people don't fucking believe us anymore as marketers, right? Because we come from this this history of disruption, marketing. So we're watching the football game on TV. Hey, buddy, you want to buy a course you want to buy a Budweiser? You're like, No, man. I'm just trying to watch the fucking game. Okay, cool. Hey, you want to cook colo? Well, you want a fucking coke cola? Come on, I'm gonna shove it down your fucking throat. So nobody believes the companies anymore? Nobody. So where does that put us? Right That puts to the rise of these big companies like Amazon. Right? But what is the secret sauce? Take a guess.

Will Laurenson  09:56

Well, I think you mentioned social proof at the start. So views.

Shaahin Cheyene  10:01

That's right, social proof ratings reviews, how do you get them so we teach that and there's lots of different methods where you could do it Amazon wants to think that everybody is buying products and joyfully leaving reviews but it's a fucking pain in the ass to get reviews, it's less than half a percent to 1% of people who buy merchandise, leave reviews. So, you know, we we have a tendency to think hey, we're going to just present our sales offering and hope that people buy from us and you can't do that anymore. You have to pre swayed them. So the first pillar of influence for us selling on Amazon is going to be social proof you need to plan how are you going to architect so that when they get to your listing, you have good social proof and not just written social proof, you need pictures, you need videos, you need attractive people who are nice to look at and soft on the eyes that you can have on there. The second element is likability. Right? And this there's some overlap here with traditional marketing, where you know, you don't want to right this is the P 6321. A thing and it has a 3.3 gig capacity for your you know, for your anus, whatever the fuck it is, right? It's nobody wants to hear that shit. Right when you're on Amazon just told me the fucking thing I want to hear and tell it to me the way that my best friend would tell to me right if me and you were mates, and we're hanging out at the pub, having a beer and you're like, dude, Shaahin I just got this fuckin thing for my computer. I mean, it's fucking awesome, right? maybe wouldn't use as many curse words as I would use. But it's, it's gonna I'm going to believe you a lot more eight because you're my friend God social proof. And be because you're likable, right? You're talking to me like a normal human being it doesn't feel like you're trying to sell me anything. Right? So likability, third element authority. Okay, let's assume you're selling a supplement. Right? Who would be a good authority for a supplement? Like a nutritionist, suppose, right? So we depend on the supplement, right? If it's a weight loss, one, possibly nutrition, possibly a celebrity, right? Maybe maybe Oprah she lost a bunch of weight, she would be the ultimate influencer if you could get her, right. And so if she is like, Hey, I took this pill, and it made me lose weight, you're getting social proof, you're getting authority, and you're getting a mega influencer. So and everywhere down the line, right. You can get doctors you can get whoever it is in that field, right? We make one of the best first aid kits in the world. And we got a you know, we posted an ad for on Craigslist locally, to find a and we teach this hack. We found multiple paramedics for a few 100 bucks who were willing to come over, we gave him a free first aid kit. They took pictures, they made videos, and it was spectacular, right? And now our product stands out from all the other first aid kits out there, even though they're all very similar. And we can charge a couple dollars more to because we've got Joe, who's a certified paramedic, who says that this is a good kit. Right? And scarcity, right? quantities are limited, the quality is very good. So we don't know when we're going to get it, again, limited time offers and those types of things. So we may have missed one, did we miss one element of influence? I don't know. But received? reciprocity, right. So once they buy the product, we give them something back. So you know, we will be sending him an email, giving them something for free, and make them feel obligated to leave us a review, even though we're not allowed to make them feel obligated. We send them something for free. And then human beings feel guilty. And they want to reciprocate because it closes that feedback loop. Which is actually yeah, so I've

Will Laurenson  13:36

just done that, you know, I've had it with with other products where I've received just something in then no messages at all. So there's no kind of, Oh, go and do this and, and we'll give you 500 credit or reward or anything and there's no mention or review. But when you get these extra little bits in the in that unboxing experience, it's just another thing, which makes you feel good about that brand. It's like a nice little surprise, that is gonna make you far more likely to go and leave that positive review. Yeah, even if you were like completely happy anyway, I found that these little extra things are what triggers that person who wouldn't normally leave a review, even if they're happy to go Actually, I like this brand. Because you've done something extra for me, I like you and therefore I am going to go leave a review. It's true. It's true. You know, it's funny.

Shaahin Cheyene  14:30

So I was one of the pioneers in the vaporizer space. Right I patented and developed majority of the vaporization technology that you see today digital vaporization technology, I should say, okay, and you know that that company that I had was one of the first vaporizer companies to go public and went public somewhere around 2007. And it was a big deal. It was multimillion dollar company. You know, when we built the forerunner for all the E cigs and all that stuff that came out here now I made the crucial critical mistake of going to a cannabis show before cannabis was legalized in California. So we were like, Hey, you know, people will be really fucking into this device that we have at a cannabis show. And you know, we're just gonna go and it'll be spectacular people will be buying our ship because they're into weed. People use, you know, vapes to smoke weed. This is marriage made in heaven. Pre legalization in California. So we did the show, we got a big booth, and we went in there, and it was fucking crickets. Because we realized that all these people wanted was wheat. And they had no interest in anything. And so people would come up and they'd be like, what is that and we'd be like, hey, it's an all natural way you can get the cannabinoids or the THC, no smoke, no tar, no carbon monoxide, this is going to change and revolutionize the world. I'm the inventor, whatever, they'd be like, you have any weed, we're like, no, we're like a legit company, we can't give you weed. And it would just be walking off. And after a couple of days of this, I was like, let's fucking pack up and go, right cuz I'm, I'm a pro at trade shows like, I'm really fucking good at selling and my team is great. And we haven't sold the single thing. So I say, you know what, go on the truck, pull out all the T shirts that we have. Okay, and the goal was we were going to give a T shirt with each unit or units were $400 by the way, they cost me $20 to make at the time, we were selling them for $400. And not a single sale, not a single sale. And so we got all the T shirts. I said, What else do we have back there? We had some DVDs. And we had some, you know, CDs and a bunch of stuff. This was like early 2000s. And as people came to the booth, I said, Hey, good to see you. They'd be like, do you have weed? I'd be like, no, I got something better come here. And I'd give him a T shirt. And then I give him a DVD. And I just load them up with free shit. No Obligation. They'd be like, What's all this for? I'd be like, I just want us to give you something. And you know what happened? Well, to depart from us there, and then we'll do their part. Yeah, yeah, they came back to the booth and started giving me their credit card. They say, you know what, this looks interesting. Why don't I try it, I was I was going to be smoking weed and spending all my money on weed. But now this seems like a more helpful way to do it, they were selling me. And we sold out of those units for $100 a piece, they cost me $20 a piece we did, you know, 10s of 1000s of dollars at that show. And plus afterwards, we got lots of orders. So that the critical difference in marketing there for us, and I teach this in my course in to my students, is it was that element of reciprocity. And a lot of this stuff is trial and error. Right? So our message was right, it was wrong for the place where we were at, because obviously those people were just looking for wheat. But our message was right. Our branding was right, our story was great, but nobody gave a fuck because they weren't looking for them. So you got to remember this, right? So when when that happened, we were able to pivot, right and utilize a different element of influence in all marketing. Well, regardless of if you're selling online, if you're selling in brick and mortar, if you're selling through any of these other avenues comes down to that it comes down to the ability of being able to pivot and make tiny tweaks until you get it right. So the most common mistake that people make people that are beginning is they think that it's a fucking roulette game, right? They think, hey, let me roll this fucking ball throwing that thing and have a go round. And you know, it'll land on my I'm gonna bet on two numbers in Atlanta on those numbers. And then invariably it doesn't because the odds are stacked against you. And they go fuck, man, let me do it again. And they do it again. And it still doesn't land on their number. And they're like, Ah, this doesn't work, and they quit. It's the wrong attitude. Those are the people who don't make it. It doesn't work that way. Right? It might land a little bit on your number, that's more what it would look like, right? And then you tweak and you make it land on your number, right? And you build a different paradigm and you keep tweaking and you keep making changes, and you keep changing the story and the tactics that you use in the elements of influence. You turn one up, maybe you need more social proof, maybe any more authority, you change those things, and you make it work. It's interesting. You know, I always ask my students this. You've got a new baby. And it's just learning to walk. Are you dad? Well, you gotta you got any kids? I'm not No. Okay, so let's assume that you knocked someone up and you got a new baby, right? And the baby is learning to walk. Let me ask you a question. How many chances Do you give that baby to walk before you give up on it was many as it takes, I guess they know. And that's the trick those those that is the difference will between the people who succeed in any kind of business, specifically e commerce but any kind of business and the people who fail, right, the people who succeed have the attitude that you I don't fucking care how many times it takes, I'm going to fall on stand up. And this is one of the key reasons why you need to be capitalized. I use an example of a guy who called me the other day, who's like Shaahin, I really want to take your course. And I said, you know, buddy, I'll give you the $200 courts, I'll just give you that for free, just like I'm gonna do for your listeners. But you're not ready for my mastermind in my other course, he's like, What do you mean, I've got a credit card, I'll pay for it. I'm ready to do it. I said, How much money do you have in the bank? Oh, well, you know, I got like, $2,000 in the bank. So all the money in the world that you have is $2,000. The Yeah, yeah. So where does your groceries and that stuff come from? Well, you know, my salary. But you know, I take some from now. And I said, buddy, you don't need my Amazon course, you need fucking Uber to what I said, Yeah, you need to get your ass out there and start hustling till you have $10,000 in the bank 5000 to $10,000 in the bank that you can burn, that you can just fuckin lose tomorrow, and still be okay, how that had no effect on your life. Well, why? Well, the reason why is because that relieves a whole amount of stress and gives you space to make the mistakes that you need to make, it gives you space to fall down as many times as you need to, before you can get up and do it right and start generating this recurring Predictable Revenue. Day after day after day.

Will Laurenson  21:26

I've heard like similar advice from some people, and they say, you know, they're looking at just a purchase, whatever it is, it could be something personal, it could be I don't know, like a car, redoing the kitchen, whatever. So you know, a reasonably big purchase, but but not not an income generating thing. And what a lot of people will do is, they will save up month by month, until they've got enough for it, or they either finance it. But what they were saying or what these people say is, like, go out and like kind of just what you said, like, go out and earn that money, like change something, take some action to actually go and earn that $10,000 or whatever you need. So then you can just buy it and spend it. Right. Otherwise, you're gonna wait maybe a year, because you're gonna put money aside every month, and that money is coming out your salary. So therefore, it's actually kind of coming out of what you've currently got anyway. And the alternative is find a way to earn that extra 10,000 really quickly, and then just and then you're done. And then it's not touching your kind of your salary. So you're you're living, your standard of living stays the same, you can still pay for groceries you rent. And that's just extra money that you've then spent on what you want. That's right, yeah, you got to think you know, well, you got to think foundationally. And you know, what's interesting, I think, is that there's different ways to look at these things. And so much nuance has been lost. And in times like now, where we're also polarized, and people are looking for hard and fast rules for things. And it pays on these shows for these, like financial people to give you this, like financial advice that's like, this is the rule for this. And this is the rule for that you don't want if you've got the cash, and getting yourself that Porsche and every time you sit in that fucking seat and you smell those leather seats, it lights a fire under your ass to do better. I'm not gonna tell you not to get it. Right, of course, if it impedes on your ability to survive, to feed your family to feed yourself, and it puts you under pressure and then don't do it. But if that thing sitting in your driveway is an affirmation to you, of who you will become and who you are becoming, and you can do it, I'm not going to tell you not to that's a personal decision. And I think it's different from every single person. So it's gonna be different for you than the next guy than for the other guy. Right? If maybe buying that watch, you need that Rolex on your wrist to look at it every time you're about to get on the phone with that sales call, fucking do it. And stop thinking about it. Just go out there and fucking buy it and do it. And if you're smart, you can make money on that stuff, too. So there's a there's, there's a way to do those things smartly, you can buy the car under market so that if you do need to sell it, you're able to do it at a slight profit. I've been buying and selling cars at a profit all my life. I never pay for exotic cars that I drive. People look at me and they're like, dude, you drive a late model Porsche. That's fucking insane. You know? It's $150,000 car. I can't afford that. And I'm like, Well, what do you drive? They're like, well, I drive a four year old Toyota. I'm like, That's way more expensive. How much are you paying? Oh, $200 a month. I'm like, yeah, you know how much I paid for mine. It pays me when I sell this car. I'm gonna make another 15 grand on it because I bought it so well. I can't afford to drive that Toyota. And it comes to one of my points that I tell people. And this kind of falls a little bit off the topic of what we're talking about. The worst injustice that you can do to yourself in America or Europe is to be poor. It is so expensive to be poor, the rich pay less taxes, they pay less for things, they get more quality, more options, more opportunity. It's much more affordable guys to be wealthy than to be poor, to be poor is a great injustice. And you know, my wife is a is a big human rights person. And she hates it when I talk about this. Sometimes I wear a capitalism shirt, and that drives her even more nuts, right? But the fact is, these things aren't nice to say, people will be like, oh, what about those people who don't have opportunities who grew up in, you know, poverty or whatever. I'm like, dude, I've got a buddy. He's got no fucking arms and legs. And he made it on American Idol. And right now he's one of the top selling musical artists of all time, Emmanuel, Kelly's incredible guy, no fucking arms and legs. But his his parents, his birth parents left him and his twin brother in a box in Iraq for dad. And he was rescued by a lady he was brought out, you know, to the United States, eventually, I think to Australia originally. And then to United States, this guy's got no arms and legs, he comes over to my house, he's got a platinum record, and he's doing push ups on one stub doesn't get much worse than that being left for debt. So there is opportunity for everybody. And yeah, we can look at people and feel sorry for them. And I get that and I have compassion, we donate to charity. And we have our philanthropic organizations that we support and our foundations and all that stuff. But at the end of the day, anybody who's listening to this, just by merit of you listening to this podcast, you have the ability, the capacity to work through any of these restrictions that you have. And you know, me myself, I came from pretty poor means, you know, we came from Iran in the 1970s revolution came here with really just the clothes on our back, my dad worked at a crappy pizza shop, and then a dry cleaners for 30 years making no money. And, you know, I left school at 15 in the 90s, with no money, no friends, nowhere to go nothing. and created a billion dollars in revenue from nothing with a learning disability at that, which I recently learned I have. So you know, if if you think you can do it? Or if you think you can't, you're probably right. Yeah,I think it comes down to a lot of like, a bit of motivation, but also discipline, right? Even when you get that motivation, there, you still need the discipline to actually keep going. Because the motivation, so easy to disappear, especially if like, like we say, you know, if you play roulette, you lose, your motivation goes away. So you need that discipline to work out how to make it better, how to increase your odds, how to improve and, and how to do better. I just want to come back to the the influence stuff, particularly around around giving stuff away for free. So obviously, your example was giving away stuff in advance of the sale, and then getting those people to come back and actually buy the buy the product. Are there any ways you can do that on Amazon? So obviously, you can use it to to incentivize the review? That's right, have you got examples or of how that would work? giving something away for free the beginning to didn't get them on to the the actual purchase?

Shaahin Cheyene  28:41

 Totally man, you know, there's giveaway sites, where you can give the product away, there's all kinds of hack algorithms that we use, where we can give the product away at a discount in exchange for their honest review. There's, there's all kinds of tactics that you can do on the Amazon platform to get that done. And actually, most of the reviews that are left on for a lot of these sellers come through the principle of reciprocity, they have websites that you can go to, and I'm happy to share this with your listeners, if you guys want to reach out to me, I can share links with people. But there's websites where you can go to where they offer you the products for 70 to 90% off. And they don't ask that you write a review, because that's against Terms of Service. But it's expected because they're giving you the product at way below their cost, even below what it costs for them just to ship it. And you're like, Hey, man, I got these cool, like the school phone case for like 23 cents, you know, I'll leave them a review. That'll that'll make things even in the world. And so you could do that. Yeah, so these are

Will Laurenson  29:43

the idea here is what to build up those first couple 100 reviews. Dependent social proof. Yeah, it depends. So

Shaahin Cheyene  29:50

again, you know, it's foundational thinking it's elements of influence. There's a lot of stuff that goes into selling on Amazon and you know, again, I'm happy to share the or $200 course for free with any of your listeners and we go through the system of how you do it, you got to build good copy, you got to build good images. But the story has to be told in a very specific way, you got to fill it with keywords, make sure those keywords have rich good bullet points, make sure it's discoverable, then what you do is you run a little PPC make sure that PPC works, make sure your a costs which is your cost in relation to your profit is for for for the ads that you're running is good so that you know you're making a good amount of profit with your ads, you're not losing money. And then you optimize to optimize organically and their systems and tactics that we teach, where you can learn how to optimize very easily and at a very low cost all organically without without ever spending a penny on their PPC after that point.

Will Laurenson  30:52

Was the PPC is more like a kickoff, like a Kickstarter. Yeah, we use it.

Shaahin Cheyene  30:58

Yeah, we use it as a diagnostic tool. So initially, since we don't know, you get a lot of rich data from your PPC. So we use PPC, more as a diagnostic to find out, hey, what keywords are people paying the most for? And why? And what keywords are converting most for our particular listing? Got it? Okay.

Will Laurenson  31:22

So you've kind of talked about a lot of things people can do to actually make money and sell what are what are some of the things you see that people are doing badly? Some or some of the common mistakes people make? And I don't mean in terms of like, you know, giving up early or whatever, but with the actual listings themselves and the approach to selling. Yeah, again,

Shaahin Cheyene  31:43

up early is definitely not a mistake. You ever see this guy, Jocko will Nick, he's like this fucking navy seal, like just a killer, literally a killer. And his posts on Instagram are always his watch showing what time he's been up as, like 413. I'm like, Fuck that, like 413. You know, he's up for 13 hitting the weights. So I don't think that kind of discipline is needed. I'll tell you the biggest mistake that people make his thinking backwards. And I'll tell you why. Most people think Hey, man, I really want to get involved in selling on Amazon. But I can't do it because I don't have a product. And I'll tell you, at the moment, we've probably launched over three 400 different companies on Amazon, over 100 students who've launched products. By the time you know, you guys are listening to this. And the ones that succeed are the ones that have no product. Why? Because their cup is empty. Do you know the parable of the guy that goes to the teacher and he's like, teacher, please teach me and the teacher is pouring some tea for him. And the tea goes in the cup, and then it spills over and it goes all on the table and makes a mess. And the students freaking eyes like Teacher, what are you doing? What are you doing? He's like, you said, you want a tea? He's like, Yeah, but you know, it's spilling everywhere. And he said, Yeah, just like you. He's like your mind, you know, your cup is full, you're coming to me with a full cup. And it's going to spill over like that and make a mess, right? Come back when you have an empty cup. So with products on Amazon, that parable holds true. Because the way to do it is to find the distribution first and I talked about this in my book billion in that the way that you want to do and the way that I did it. So in the 1990s with herbal ecstasy, basically the way that I did it was, you know, most of the ecstasy that was coming out at the time was coming from England. And London in particular, is very difficult drug to synthesize and the Americans hadn't figured it out. And you know, it was coming from Holland and the UK were the two places where MDMA, ecstasy, or Molly was coming out. And the supply dried out because the government stopped it. The there was problems in in Europe in getting it out. So the supply dried up. And I was there at the right time at the right place. I went to the drug dealers, and I said, Hey, no, sell something different. It'll legitimize you in two years, you'll have a business worth millions, and you've got no risk of going to jail. And they say yes. And there my distribution was found to Why am I telling you this? The reason why and then we expanded we got into brick and mortar, we got into stores 30,000 stores fast forward a couple years later, I'm sitting in my office, I get the news that we broke a billion dollars in sales. And just then I realized well, but I didn't fucking know how much a billion dollars was. I literally didn't know I was like, throwing books around you screaming at people in my office to try to figure out how much a billion dollars was before I had to go on the news. So what why am I telling you this? The reason is that you have to think distribution first. That's the biggest lesson that I teach. And by that I mean don't build a better mousetrap and hope that the world will beat its way to your door rather fun The market, find the distribution, find what it needs, then see how you can tell a better story. And then just feed the market what it needs. It's so easy. Feed the market, what it needs. I teach it to people all the time, come join us, I'll teach you how to do it. You don't teach any students how to do this, I do it every day. You just find what the market needs. You do it a little better you find vulnerabilities weaknesses in your opponents. And then like a fucking lion, you jump, right? Like the lion is patient like you were talking about discipline. You wait, right? The game for the line isn't the jumping, right? That's easy, we have all the tools for that I could teach you how to do that in an hour, you'll learn that from the one hour course, the trick is the waiting. Right? blinds are master stalkers, I talked about this in my book, they know how to wait and seek out that perfect opportunity. And that's the art of being a fucking lion. And that's the art of being the lion in marketing and e commerce. You have to know the art of suspenseful stocking of being able to find that opportunity, and then feed the market what it needs and do it a little better. And then the market will feed you.

Will Laurenson  36:14

Yeah. So I guess, very, basically, find out what people are buying loads of on Amazon, find out what sells really well. I guess identify your legs and weaknesses. So you know, there's nothing special. If all these listings are just nothing special. They're literally just, you know, the standard thing says what the product is, it's got a few images, it's got it's got some reviews, there's a great opportunity for you to say, Well, I can sell this product better, because I can write a story about it. And I can put better images in here. And I can get better testimonials and reviews. But essentially just just taking what's there and saying, Well, I'm going to do it better than you. Sure if you want to put it in terms that people will understand. Absolutely. actually sounds sounding pretty good. Actually. might might have to look at getting into Amazon myself. Yeah, come on board, we'll get you on, I'll send you the course check it out. Yeah, but not definitely, if you send me your link I can share.

Shaahin Cheyene  37:17

Yeah, totally let me I'll share that with you. in the show notes, I'm gonna share the course. So we have a mastermind, and of course, a full Platinum course, you have to take the one hour course before you're eligible for that. And we'll share for your listeners, like I said, I'm not looking to make money on that, I'm happy to share that with them for free, I'm going to give you my email, all they have to do is mention your podcast customer should click so guys mentioned customers who click, you've got my email right there. That's my direct email, I respond to everybody directly. Once you take the one hour course, one of my co workers or employees will call you. And I will schedule a 15 minute call with any of your people for free to give them a little bit of strategy on how they can move forward with their Amazon work and Amazon business and try to create these predictable streams of revenue. I also want to, if it's okay with you, to invite your listeners to check out the hack and Grow Rich podcast wherever podcasts are found, I'd love to have you on as well, well. So we'll be in touch with you about that next month. And hacking Grow Rich is the name of the podcast, we've got over 104,000 subscribers now, we'll be also sharing this with your permission on that feed as well. So if you guys are listening to this, make sure to check out customers who click and it's really been a pleasure and an honor to be on your show. Well,

Will Laurenson  38:48

 yeah, this has been really, really interesting. I mean, I know we've talked about Amazon, but all those principles about you know, persuasion and influence, or just apply anywhere. So, you know, hopefully listeners aren't just thinking, right? This only works for Amazon. You know, it's definitely something you can apply anywhere really, you know, particularly like, as you said, Well, one thing I did want to ask before we finish. So do you do you still see those, like trade show? Giving away stuff? You know, does that still work? Because it has it everywhere now, like you know, it's almost the expectation is you go to a trade show, almost just to come away with a massive bag of stuff that you've picked up from everywhere.

Shaahin Cheyene  39:33

Yeah, so giving it cold does not write samples and that kind of stuff. I don't believe in sampling. I never sampled our products ever except for our tea tea. I like sharing tea with anybody who wants to no strings attached. So we make one of the best green teas in the world called matcha DNA. And if somebody comes to our booth where we're serving tea, we will serve them tea. I don't care who you are. I don't care if you're the security guard or the janitor or anybody will share a cup of tea with you. Cuz we truly care about you in that way. But as far as, you know, sampling products, I don't think it works. I think you got to establish a relationship. So if you want to do that, then you do that. It's kind of like, you know, where do you remember like the old days guys used to, like, try to pick up girls at bars? And there was like, the gentleman over there, the other end sent you a drink, right? Why the flux, that dude spending money to send you a drink? Right? Because he wants to get in your pants, right? It's kind of obvious. And it's, it's just by sheer reciprocity, right? That's, that's pure principle of reciprocity at play there. Right? So we really want to want to think about these principles as life principles, right? The principle of reciprocity works that has worked for, you know, probably 1000s of years, I'm sure there were some Viking who was like, you know, send that made and these horns filled with me. You know, it's just the maidens like, Oh, fuck, now I gotta go sit with you know, for the grade over there on the other side, right, because she's got him and she feels bad, this reciprocity, all these elements of influence, work throughout the ages, across platforms across categories, it doesn't matter what you're doing. If you're dating, if you're selling product, if you're selling door to door if it's, it's all the same. But what I'm trying to impress on people in this particular language, is that every single market that you sell in has a different language. And you have to be able to speak that language just like you're going to a foreign country, in order to be able to sell what you want.

Will Laurenson  41:31

Loads of really great, honest and actionable advice there from Shane. And it's not limited to Amazon. Of course, there's all ideas and elements that you can apply to your own day to day websites. Social proof and reciprocation, are just two examples of how you can influence someone's decision and very powerful methods as well. At the end of the day, it's all about making the customer believe that not only is this product right for them, you're also the right business for them to buy from. If you've got any questions for Shane, head over to LinkedIn or Twitter to join the conversation there. We'll put this course in the show notes as well. Any other podcast questions feedback guest requests, send them over to will our Customerswhoclick.com or tweet me at Will Laurenson

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About - Shaahin Cheyene -

Hi, my name is Shaahin Cheyene and I help individuals and owners transform average sales into extraordinary income using my predictable sales system that never fails. Whether you have zero online sales, want to start on Amazon, or have products that just need a push, I can show you how to do it. If you're interested in getting more sales with predictability, watch my FREE CASE STUDY Now!

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