What if you did the exact opposite?

challenge assumptions

My last job was selling software to school districts. For the first 3 months, I made 80 calls and sent 60 emails every day. I didn't use LinkedIn. I didn’t land a single client. The activity took a toll on my physical, emotional, and mental health.

I was putting in 80-hour weeks. According to the "playbook", I was doing everything right.

Wrong. I was wasting my time and being incredibly inefficient.

So, I thought, what if I did the opposite? Here's what I did:

• Made 20 high effort calls

• Stopped sending templated messages

• Focused on personalized LinkedIn messages

I landed 12 clients in the next 5 months.

Working hard will only take you so far.

Tim Ferris sold mass data storage in his first job out of college. He followed the company playbook. Call prospects between 9am and 5pm and use any leftover time to send cold emails.

His prospects were CEOs and CTOs with executive assistants. During the regular workday assistants answered the phones and told Tim their bosses were busy.

One day he thought. What if I do the opposite of every other rep?

He started calling his prospects before 7am and after 5pm. He used the time between 9am-5pm to craft cold emails.

It worked. Why?

Gatekeepers came into the offices at 9am and left at 5pm. The same phone calls intercepted by gatekeepers went straight to the CEOs and CTOs.

By doing the exact opposite of his previous strategy, he became the top salesperson in his region.

Ryan Holiday recommends creators give their work away for free

Creators spend years creating a masterpiece. They dedicate their lives to the craft. Giving it away for free is insulting.

The thing is nothing is free. Discovery costs people time and money. Read reviews and articles. Download it. Wait for it to arrive.

Think about all the free stuff you turn down. Concerts, blog posts, samples (excluding Costco samples). Getting people’s attention is hard. Here’s how top creators got people’s attention.

• Derek Vincent Smith (aka Pretty Lights) gives away every piece of music for free.

• Soulja Boy released his first songs for free

• The author Paulo Coelho celebrates people who pirate his work.

Opposite action is alpha

When conventional wisdom swings too far down one lane, the other lane opens up. Opposite action is the alpha.

If you are struggling with something in your life right now ask yourself, what’s the exact opposite action? Try it for a week. See what happens