047: Tim Ferriss – Everything That Works in Sales

“Everything that works in sales has been done already. Just keep track of the crap that you buy, or the awesome stuff that you buy, and decide what was the trigger, and then just sell to people like you. It’s really that easy – and that’s what I do.” – Tim Ferriss

This was drawn by A. Kelly. Check out his work at his blog.

Timothy (Tim) Ferriss has been mentioned in this blog a few times before. He wrote the book, 4 Hour Workweek, that is now the staple book for entrepreneurs everywhere. I highly recommended it. The ideas in that book are very helpful and practical. Maybe the methods and ideas in his book were invented by someone else, but Ferriss puts it in a way that make them very actionable. This is evidenced in the book by showing you how he has used these ideas before. Not to mention, he was the one who popularised the idea of digital nomads.

His quote really strikes home. I’ve heard the bible quote, “there’s nothing new under the sun”, many times. And of course, the world of sales and marketing apply to this quote as well. Everything in sales that you see online, like SEO marketing, content marketing, and social media marketing, etc. are really based on old techniques brought forth into the 21st century. Marketing is really based on human nature, and human nature hasn’t changed for the past 2 millennia.

Another point he makes is also, learning from others. As an entrepreneur, you might not have gone to business school. You might not have learnt marketing techniques formally. But just by observing what works in the real world, is a good way to learn how to do it yourself. I would extend his quote not to just learning how others have ‘sold’ to you, but to how others have failed to sell to you. That will show you the wrong way to do things, and you should avoid that. If you hate ads, do you think ads are really going to work on other people?

Personally, I have applied this quote in the area of avoiding ads. Instead, I believe in marketing by giving people freebies. You probably enjoy at least some of the comics here at Rational Comics. The weekly comics are freebies, and hopefully you will all feel grateful for getting to see our stuff for free. (Oh you better be grateful.) So, these freebies attract readers such as yourself, and you might think it’s so good that you will tell a friend. Thus, more people coming to the site. Also, in the future, if I do ask for anything, I’d hope that I’ve given you so much value, you’ll feel happy to help me back in some way.

If anyone has heard of this quote being applied in real life, do let me know in the comments below. I want to see how you all work.

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