Feb. 12, 2023
"Empower Neurodiversity in the Workplace: Chris Bogue Shares His Experiences Selling with Video Content"
Sandy welcomes Chris Bogue, a sketch comedian and business guy from Chicago. Chris has been doing comedy since he was a kid, and has done shows at Chicago's Second City and various other experimental theaters in the city.
The conversation then moves to Sandy praising Chris' comedy show from the previous week. Chris explains that he has loved Whose Line Is It Anyway since he was a kid, and he and his friends used to perform the games themselves. This eventually led to Chris performing musicals, sitcoms, and full-length plays.
Finally, Sandy mentions that he worked on a script this weekend in order to lighten the mood. The Neurodivergent Selling Podcast is dedicated to empowering and celebrating neurodiversity in the workplace, and they hope to showcase the strengths and abilities of neurodivergent sales professionals by hearing from experts, thought leaders, and neurodivergent salespeople.
Chris and Sandy have a conversation about the importance of being authentic on social media and creating content that resonates with an audience. Chris explains that he has found that there is a large audience for content related to neurodiversity, and that it is important to talk to the audience from their point of view. He also explains his approach to content creation, which is to start with one audience member and build out from there, while understanding that the audience is more important than the performer. Finally, he shares his experience with improv, where the audience is an integral part of the show and the performer must continuously go to the audience to get suggestions and incorporate them into the show. Ultimately, he encourages content creators to be authentic and connect with their audience in an honest and meaningful way.
Chris and Sandy discussed how to be successful in content creation, specifically video content. Chris mentioned that to build trust and a following, content creators should make their audience the star and talk about things they wish other people would talk about. Sandy then shifted the conversation to sales and discussed how to make the customer the hero of the story. He also asked Chris about his video course, which is a complete guide to selling on video. Sandy then shared his experience with making videos, expressing that it can be scary and makes him feel naked, but that he has found success by imagining he is having a conversation with someone and making eye contact. The conversation concluded with both noting that although video is a powerful opportunity, few people take advantage of it.
Chris and Sandy discuss how video can be a powerful tool for salespeople to make more effective and convincing pitches. Chris argues that videos are a more effective way to make a good first and last impression and allows salespeople to control the conversation better than cold calls and emails. He also notes that videos allow him to introduce himself on his own terms, demonstrate respect, and keep the door open for further conversations. He also uses a variety of content such as instructional, educational, motivational, and entertaining videos to fuel his sales strategies. Chris emphasizes that people often don’t like salespeople because of the pressure they are under and that videos allow salespeople to handle objections in their content.qqaZ5RV16eQ1Tl37S2sr
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Transcript
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[00:13] SANDY: Welcome to the Neurodeversion Selling Podcast, where we explore unique perspectives and experiences of neurodiversion individuals and sales. Our mission is to empower and celebrate neurodiversity in the workplace by showcasing the strengths and abilities of neurodivergent sales professionals. Each week, we'll hear from experts, thought leaders, and neurodevergent salespeople as they share their stories, strategies, and insights on how they've succeeded in sales despite the challenges they've faced. From overcoming common misconceptions to finding the right workplace environment, we'll dive into the topic of neurodevergent selling in a way that's both informative and inspiring. So whether you're envy yourself an ally or just interested in learning more about diversity and inclusion in the workplace, tune in to the Nord Divergent Selling podcast and join the conversation. Hey, I want to welcome Chris Bow. Thanks for joining us today, Chris. Chris is a sketch comedian turned business guy. He's out of Chicago, and he teaches salespeople and, well, sales leaders and their teams how to use mercifully short video content that will really drive revenue. So welcome, Chris. All right, so again, thank you so much for coming on the show. I've enjoyed watching your comedy show on Thursday nights. Last week was awesome. The show that you all did on Improv thought it was a great show.
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[01:42] CHRIS: I've been doing it ever since I was a little kid. I would watch Whose Line Is It Anyway? I love that show. Yeah. And I just wanted to do it, so my friends and I would just kind of start doing the games ourselves. I did it in college. We got really into that. I started doing kind of more complex stuff, provided musicals and provides sitcoms and provides full length plays. And then I was born and raised in the city of Chicago, so I've done a lot of the comedy here. I did shows at Chicago's Second City Theater, which is where a lot of SNL came from. Yeah. And I've also done a lot of weird kind of experimental theater throughout the city. So I've done a lot of being on stage. I've done a lot of performing something.
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[02:32] SANDY: That I worked on a script this weekend just to try to lighten the mood, if you will, a little bit. And I'm not sure that I didn't go too far. I guess I'll find out when I start using it. It's a little irreverent in some places, but that might be good.
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[02:51] CHRIS: That's in right now. And my whole thing is like LinkedIn is famous for being cringe. It's famous for having really low quality, self serving content, so it's not that hard to exceed expectations. And we're talking about neurodiversity. I have found that there are a lot of people in this world who are neuro diverse and who see the world a different way, and most of the conversation has not been from their point of view. So if you go and you start talking straight to the audience about what it's like to have ADHD or to be autistic or to be dyslexic or to be deaf or to be colorblind. I deal with a lot of different content creators. We come from a lot of different angles. Sometimes it's funny, sometimes it's emotional, sometimes it's instructional. But yeah, if you just go out there as a real person and talk about what it's really like, you'll be surprised at how big of an audience there is for that.
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[04:00] SANDY: It seems like the people that are really true to themselves, in other words, they're not putting on errors. They're just behaving as their true self, seem to really connect better with people generally because anytime you're authentic, that's half the battle. I feel like when you are showing your true self to the world in whatever you're doing, whether it's work or personal or not, sometimes it seems scary, but I think it's a much more likelihood that you're going to actually connect and get into some sort of conversation that is valuable to everybody.
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[04:45] CHRIS: Yeah, well, we can get deeper into this too, Sandy, because my whole approach is like, you start with one audience member and you build out from there. And my whole thing is like when I'm teaching people to create content, I'm teaching them usually to go online, find the people who are already talking about your topic and just kind of start talking to them. It's this weird balance where on the one hand, you've got to be authentic and it's about who are you really? But on the other hand, it's more about the audience than the performer. I think there's a lot of fear that people have about putting their image out there, putting their likeness out there. I don't want to create video content because what if somebody's going to make fun of me? But honestly, the audience isn't really thinking about you, they're thinking about themselves. So if you're out there and you start talking about something that's relevant to them or you start talking from a point of view that's familiar to them, that they've not heard many people talking about, you'll have their undivided attention, not because of who you are, but because you're talking about something that's really important to them. And I come from an improv background where the audience is part of the show. It's not like theater where you go there and you sit and you clap and then you get out and leave. And there's this partition between you and the actors. You are constantly going to the audience. You're getting suggestions from them, you're incorporating them into the show. And that's my approach to content. And yeah, I have found numerous instances throughout my career where it's like, see other content creators doing this too, where it's like you kind of make your audience the star and you talk about the things that they wish other people would talk about. And yeah, that's how you build how you build trust, how you build your following.
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[06:55] SANDY: Well, one of the things that we talk about in sales is make the customer the hero of the story, which is kind of related to what you just said. I got a question for you about your video. What's the name of it again? I know it's short videos. The course that you've got?
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[07:19] CHRIS: Yeah, my course is a complete guide to selling on video. That's another thing I teach that's a different thing from video content is I teach video prospecting for sales. So how do you make these little short videos that people are actually going to respond to?
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[07:37] SANDY: Well, I have been doing videos now for the last few months and it's like you said, it's scary. It makes cold calling seem like it's for amateurs and that's scary for Rose people, but it's not scary for me. But video, I feel naked. I feel like I'm exposed and vulnerable. But I know in this going back and forth, having a conversation is very comfortable for me. So what I've been doing on video is trying to imagine that I'm actually having a conversation and I'm just, like you say, connect with an audience. Just pretend that I'm making eye contact with somebody and do it that way because that's made it a lot more comfortable and a lot more natural feeling. And I hear of so many people that know that video is an opportunity right now because it's very powerful, but very few people do it for the reasons we just stated. So if you can help people become comfortable doing it, that's probably half the battle. Right?
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[08:46] CHRIS: Well, it's funny that you mentioned that because for me, I'm so much more comfortable talking to my phone than cold calling someone. My whole belief about video is there's a lot that sales people don't have control over, but two things you do have control over is your first impression and your last impression.
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[09:12] SANDY: Right.
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[09:13] CHRIS: When I send a video out, I can't guarantee that someone is going to react to it the way that I want, but I can make sure that I'm showing up and I'm professional and I'm curious and I'm interested, I'm relevant. And it's like when I get done with a sales meeting, all those decision makers I was talking to, they're going to go off into a room and fight with each other and I'm not going to be there. But I can send a video after the meeting saying like, hey, here's a summary, here's the three key takeaways of value that I think I can bring here. And it's like as long as you can control those two, that's a lot more control than you have over, say, a cold call where you're interrupting somebody. And it's one thing to connect and get the right person, which is hard enough. You have to do this really complicated little tango where they are angry and distrustful of you and you have to reset them and get them having a conversation with you. Whereas I feel like if I send that video, even if you don't watch it, maybe you don't watch it, you just see it come through. If I do pick up the phone and call you tomorrow. I'm not, hey, I'm some stranger interrupting your day. It's like, hey, I'm the guy who made a video for you. Do you have a second to chat about that? And I can always demonstrate respect. I can always introduce myself on my terms. And I was taught in sales, your job is not to sell everybody at all times. Your job is to open the door and keep it open. Whereas with cold calls, with cold emails, people shut you down. People chew you out. They say do not call. They unsubscribe. At the very least with the video, I can usually get them to open up to me. And maybe they're not ready to buy from me now. Maybe they're going to buy from me four months from now. That's fine. My thing is just when they are deciding I want to be in the room and I want to have a chance to make my case.
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[11:37] SANDY: Okay, so you've initiated, they know who you are at this point. They're not ready. Do you continue to on your outreach, do you continue to use video up to the next time you talk to them? And are you using other channels as well or just video?
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[11:55] CHRIS: I use all channels. If I got to reach somebody, I'll reach whatever way is good for them. Again, we talk about like neurodiversity. Not everybody is cool with video. Not everybody likes that, right? But I'll do something. Like sometimes I'll send out the video and then whoever doesn't respond a couple of days from then, I send them an email and I say, hey, I just realized maybe it's not convenient for you to watch a video. Here's the transcript.
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[12:25] SANDY: Right? Great idea. You should send some music videos. That's what I think you should do.
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[12:31] CHRIS: Well, it's funny because I do a lot of comedy. And this is the other thing too, where it's like I do a lot of video based content. I do long form video, I do live streams and podcasts. I do short form video and I do a variety of short form videos. So some of that is instructional, some of it is entertaining, some of it is educational, some of it is motivational. But that's all part of my marketing. And sales strategies are fueled together. So if somebody goes on one of my meetings but they're still interacting with the content, they're still showing up to the live events, I know I'm not out completely and I always say the best place to handle objections is in your content. People hate salespeople because they hate pressure and they hate being in a situation they never want to be in a situation where they're trying to tell someone, I don't want to do this and someone's trying to talk them into something against their will. And so I find it can be very hard to quote, unquote, objection handle on a sales call, because it's like you're almost trying to outsmart each other. You're trying to outwit each other and with the content. There's not that if somebody watches a video of me talking about something, they can agree with me or they can disagree with me, but they don't have to defend themselves against me. Even if they think I'm wrong, they can watch it and go, oh, well, I didn't agree with that. Whatever. They're actually in a better position to listen fully than when they've got me in a conversation and they're like, oh, ****, I got to get this guy off the phone. What am I going to tell him?
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[14:16] SANDY: Well, I think when you talk about that, you solve objections in the process. There's concerns and objections along the whole way so that by the time, if they want to do a call at the end, they're already pretty much pre sold. And that doesn't happen in a lot of other arenas. And it would probably be a worthwhile endeavor for someone to try to figure out how to do that for business to business, because that's mostly business in B to B. So I'm surprised that at least I'm not aware of anybody really doing it, though.
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[14:51] CHRIS: Yes, some of them are starting to do it. Some of them are starting to learn b to B companies don't change until they've done everything else first, and then they'll change my thing. And I get into arguments with sales leaders all the time about this stuff, but I just tell them, look at what the future holds. Look at Google clamping down on spam email. Look at Apple blocking shady numbers. It's getting to the point where if you're not a trusted number, the phone doesn't even ring anymore. And I get these sales leaders who, like, they're not comfortable getting on video. They're not comfortable doing anything other than dialing the phones. And I say, hey, that's fine for you, but take a look at who's graduating college. Take a look at who's populating these SDR teams. In a lot of cases, people who grew up on YouTube. And it's like the phone is very unusual for them. The phone gives them anxiety.
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[15:54] SANDY: Will never answer the phone. I don't care. Like you said, it's a generational thing I'm so comfortable with. I grew up with the phone, right? I grew up having a fight with my siblings to use the phone, right? So it was like a cool thing or whatever. My son would sooner lick the floor than answer the phone.
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[16:13] CHRIS: But you can see why. You can see why when you were young, it was a thing you looked forward to. It was like, the phone's ringing. Maybe it's my friends. We don't have that anymore. If your phone rings, it's probably a scam trying to talk to you about some garbage, about your car's warranty. And it's the same thing, too, with email can be very powerful for sales, but I don't really use it for nurturing. I use the content for nurturing, and basically, it's like they spend less time in the pipeline, but the velocity of the deal is much faster in a lot of ways. Really what I'm doing is I'm just changing the order of the traditional sales process. The traditional sales process was you email and call a bunch of strangers, you get them into a meeting, you do your opening pitch or whatever, and then you start nurturing. Then you start sending them educational content and case studies and all this. I just moved that nurturing state to before they get into the pipeline, I'm putting stuff out there. It's thoughtful stuff. It's educational stuff. It's about the problems that I can help them solve, and I just start looking for cues. I call it consent based selling, but it's like there are people who are already talking about the problems I'm trying to solve. So if people are talking about video or sales or content or whatever, I'll find where my prospects like to hang out. Maybe that's LinkedIn. Maybe that's Twitter. Maybe that's forever. And I just get into conversations with them. I get in on the conversations that are already happening. We get some good interactions, and they hit the like button. I send them a connection request and say, hey, Danny really enjoyed our interactions. There hope we can connect. And then I just let them sit for a few weeks. I go out there. I engage with their content. If I see cool stuff popping up, I'm putting my content out there every day. I'm doing live events, and then it's like, yeah, if I know somebody, they know me. They've been qualified because they fit my ICP. I see there on the guest list coming up for a show, I'll make a 32nd video. Just being like, hey, glad to see you on the RSVP list for Thursday. I know your company is using vidyard right now. That's actually what I coach, because I find that most teams are actually making, like, fewer than ten vidyards per up. And my thing is, you should be able to make five in an hour, so I hope you enjoy the show. Let me know if you'd want to chat, and then I make it super easy if they want to meet with me. But now it's like, again, maybe they don't respond to that video, but if I call them on Friday, the day after the event, and it's like, hey, it's Chris. I said to the video, I saw you're coming. They're not going to scream at me and tell me to never come. Of course they're going to talk to me, even if the answer is like, hey, I'm not ready for this right now. My whole thing as a seller is I just need them open to me. I can't have them hiding from me and ghosting me and too afraid to tell me what they actually think.
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[19:19] SANDY: Well, timing is a big part of success in sales now. The more you're out there and in the market, if you will, in the marketplace, the more likely it is that you're going to run into opportunities. That is the right timing, obviously, but too many sellers are so insistent that buyers work on their timeline. That's just not the way it works. You've got to dance with them. They're not dancing with you. Pretty much.
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[19:54] CHRIS: Yeah. There is a franticness we make people frantic. Well, it's like we put all this false pressure on them.
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[20:02] SANDY: Yeah. It's analogous to dating, I think, in a lot of ways. You can come across as creepy, you can come across as desperate, you can come across as just, I don't want anything to do with this person. Would they please stop calling me? Right. And you know, that's happening in B to B sales too, and I've been doing it for long enough that I can usually sense if somebody is telling me something because they want to get me off the phone and they want to try to be as polite as possible or if it's a true objection. And sometimes the classic one is, oh, just send me some information. 99% of the time that they just, they're not interested and that's fine, but, you know, and I'll say, look, hey, it's if, if you're not interested, that's fine. You can just, you can tell me. I'm a big boy. You know, if, if you really do want me to send you something, then what? What's going to be relevant? That sounds like a normal conversation instead of like, oh, well, whatever we might say now. I was thinking back to something you said, though, about this. I'm fascinated with the videos, by the way, because I know how powerful they are. I've sort of used them, overcome some fear. They're still not at the level of not professionalism level of comfort that I want them to be because I feel like the more comfortable I am, the better the connection is going to be, the more that they're going to be able to relate to it. So I know, like, for example, I first heard about you from Tom Slocom and Tom was singing your praises and I don't remember, like, I know his videos weren't that good before. He was using what you taught him. What's the number one thing that you can think of off the top of your head that helps create a level of comfort so that people are going to actually send videos on a consistent basis and not just send one off and then, oh, this is too hard or this is too scary.
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[21:58] CHRIS: Yes. I mean, it's going to sound too simple, but looking at the lens is a big part of it. Everybody makes this mistake, including me when I started. People will record a video and they'll look at themselves. They'll make eye contact with themselves on.
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[22:17] SANDY: Screen studios about this, by the way, because I look for them.
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[22:21] CHRIS: Yeah, you always want to look straight into the lens, and it's this weird trick because it feels unnatural, because it is. But let's say you're a leader, you're a manager or something, and one of your direct reports is telling you something very vulnerable. You want to look at them to pick up their visual cues. But actually, if you want to make them feel supported, you got to look into the little green light, not at their image. And again, it's not a thing people realize, but if you're looking at your image, you're going to get these little micro movements in your eyes, and that reads as nervousness. Whereas if you're looking into the lens the entire time, it just looks so confident. Especially a lot of times, people don't have the camera at the right point. So it's like you want your camera at eye level. You want to simulate one on one conversation. And I have just seen I mean, it sounds crazy, but I've seen people who they don't look confident, they look insecure, they look whatever, and then they just move the camera up a little bit and look straight into the lens, and they look like a completely different person.
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[23:35] SANDY: Okay. Yeah, I wish I could remember. There was a woman that teaches she's got a consulting business for media, and she was a newscaster before, in a small market, maybe, but she recommends that you put a sign up. Right now I'm looking right now on my screen, which is, I know now I'm looking in your eyes. Probably in reality, it's hard. I knew that. It's also very distracting, too, because you don't think somebody's connecting with you. If it was a real life conversation and that was the angle they were looking at, you think, well, this person is completely disconnected from us or from me right now. Just a little sign. I've got another sign over here for pace because I start talking too fast, and there's the stereotypical fast talking salesperson. So I really want also, if you slow your pace down ordinarily I think the octave level goes up and you don't want to sound screechy. Put it this way, if you can find a video about it on YouTube about how to look at the camera so you're looking at the person, then you know it's an issue for a lot of people. What else is important from the standpoint of length and message? Because I've heard that the sweetest spot is between, what, 30 and 45 seconds? Probably.
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[25:11] CHRIS: Yeah. So shorter is better. The shorter the message is, more likely it's going to come across. There's a couple of things I do differently with video than B to B does. Number one, I train people to talk to the camera differently. I don't know. I feel like b to B companies almost. They're teaching you talk like it's this presentation, whereas I talk to the camera like it's a friend. I talk to it like it's another person that's just, like, sitting in the room with me. So that's the difference, too. I always say, I'm not on, I'm neutral, I'm open. That is what I'm going for here. And I've seen people send me all sorts of interesting Prospecting videos where they're like, look, I was doing gymnastics and hanging from the ceiling, and I did the video upside down. I got this to end. It's like, hey, that's awesome. That was clearly a lot of work. I'm not surprised you got the demo, but actually, you might have gotten the demo by just sitting there talking conversationally to them for 30 seconds, too. And I feel like, especially in sales, we get in our heads because a person will be worth a lot of money to our book of business, and that causes us to talk to them differently, right? Like, they're up here and we're down here now. I'm coaching people. I'm coaching executives, I'm coaching sales leaders. My last sales job, I was selling education, technology, so I was mostly selling the PhDs. And yeah, this is what taught me. Just because somebody has more money than you and more prestige than you, and they graduated from an Ivy League school or whatever, there's still power in talking to them like an equal. And it's like, I feel like oftentimes sellers talk about the meeting like it's a prize they're expecting to be given, whereas I talk about it kind of like it's this party that's going on. I call it the green room effect, where it's just like, hey, I'm reaching out to you. I'm interested in you. Here's this thing that I have access to that I think you might want to check out. Let me know if you want to like me to lift up the velvet rope and you can come check it out sometime. I know I'm rambling here, but one more thought.
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[27:39] SANDY: I have a question about what you're saying. I'm not going to interrupt you, though, so go ahead.
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[27:42] CHRIS: Okay, go ahead. The last thing I'll mention here, too, is I write the words UU down a lot. And when I have one on one coaching, this is the thing I find all the time with people who are new to videos. They'll make a video and they'll say, hey, I want to talk about this. Our company did this. We raised this much funding. We did this. And my thing is, it's about your audience member. You talk about their values, you talk about their goals, you talk about something about them. But it's like most of the video is me noticing them, observing something about them. And then my little thing is at the end about what I do, kind of just to create curiosity it is a video about them, not my company.
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[28:37] SANDY: What I'm hearing, and let me just make sure I'm on point here, is that it doesn't matter, the seller doesn't matter, the buyers who matters. And if you are clear about a problem that buyers typically have in the space they're in, which is kind of the direction you're pointing out, I think. So if I know that people that are making video are scared, and I'm selling an anti fear formula you see what I'm saying? Look, I know that making videos are scary, so I'll get these pills that will solve your fear, but you might be interested in them and let me know. No big deal either way kind of thing. Is that right?
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[29:22] CHRIS: Kind of. So there's a couple of things I would change on that slightly. The elephant in the room problem is one thing I talk about. I talk about goals and values a lot too. Because the problem with starting with the problem is sometimes people aren't ready to admit they have a problem.
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[29:42] SANDY: Okay?
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[29:44] CHRIS: One thing I've noticed is a lot of the times the people that need the most help learning about video don't realize they're bad at it yet. And I never want to come in assuming I already know their problems. I've always got this kind of air of curiosity about me, but the goals and values you can find pretty easily. This is stuff you can find in press releases or social media posts or mission statements. Again, this is a thing where it's like, those things don't happen out of nowhere. These companies spend all this time, they paint their value statements on the wall, they beat it home into their employees heads. So if you just come in there already knowing what that value statement is, and using an ad is the reason why you reached out to them, you're just one step ahead of all the rest of the sellers. What I do with my business, with my training, with my content on LinkedIn is decidedly non political. Right. I don't touch politics with a ten foot pole. But I was heavily influenced by a political study. So I had read a study about the 2020 election. It was a group of researchers, and they were trying to figure out what kind of ads change a swing voter's mind. This is a very small group of people, people who voted for one party in 2016, and they voted for the opposite party in 2020. Super small, but super consequential segment of the population. So they studied what kind of ads work on people like this, and they found that it did not matter if they were a Biden voter or if they were a Trump voter. The ads that were overly produced did not work. If it was a lot of swirling special effects and celebrities and whatever, they didn't trust it. But when it was a person talking straight to the camera who was. Like, hey, I'm a Trump voter, and here's why. Hey, I'm in Florida. I'm a farmer. I'm voting for Joe Biden. Here's why. That's what people found was trustworthy. And once I heard that, I started looking through my feed, and you could see it yourself. All these billion dollar brands, they're all doing ads where they're like, whoa, we're just, like, hanging out. What's going on? And they're trying to look like a regular person because that's what people trust right now.
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[32:10] SANDY: Well, the first time I ever remember any ads like that go back to a long time ago with Howard Stern. He was like the first guy that I can think of who was reading his own ads, and they were brilliant, and it was just him talking. It wasn't salesy. It was just like, hey, you know, blah, blah, blah. And it was Howard Stern. He's got this great voice, and that's kind of what what you're talking about, right? I mean, it's not Howard Stern the persona talking. It's Howard Stern, just a regular guy talking.
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[32:43] CHRIS: Yeah. And it's one of those things where I wish people Googled stuff more often that would make life easier. But it's like, you can go out there and talk about something, and your audience's response is not going to be to immediately doubt you and be like, prove to me you're qualified to talk about this. If you go start talking about something that's relevant to them, they're probably just going to think, oh, this guy sounds pretty smart. He's talking about the real stuff that's out there. And again, I tell people, I don't care if you're selling to a millionaire. I don't care if you're selling to somebody who went to Stanford or whatever. They're thinking about how they got to sell their rental property because it's losing money. And they're thinking about this new initiative at work that failed, and they're thinking about their doctor told them to cut back on red meat, or they're thinking about all these things with their own life. They're really not sitting there looking for your flaws.
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[33:49] SANDY: You're absolutely right. I think my son is 18, and he's always been a little bit self conscious, like just teenagers are. They want you to think they're supremely confident, but they're usually overcompensating. And I've tried to tell him, look, these people are not concerned about you. They're worried about their own selves, and are they fitting in? Are they comfortable? So you're going to be okay. Don't worry. I think that naturally we all focus inward when outward is probably where we're going to learn more. It's not easy. On the other hand, when I was a kid and I think this actually has something to do with ADHD because I'm comfortable in almost every situation. I can relate to people no matter what color they are, what sex, what sexual orientation, their economic situation. I've always just been able to connect with people pretty well, and apparently that's one of our superpowers, we can be chameleons, although that sounds a little bit disingenuous. I'm always sincere, but I'm always interested in people and kind of what's going on with them. I already know what's going on with me. I don't care about that. Right. It is interesting whether you're a fan of this guy or not. I mean, I was watching it, and this was from a couple of years ago, but I happened to see it the other day. It was Joe Rogan interviewing Kanye West. Right. And apparently I could tell from the interview that they spent time in conversation before. This was not the first time they talked. And Joe Rogan said, one thing I've noticed about you is your brain works differently than most people. Like, you think different about stuff. And it sounds crazy in a way, but Kanye West said, look, when I'm thinking about stuff, there's at least three dimensions in my head sometimes. More than that, I see things differently than I guess most other people do, from what I can tell from conversations. And I know that he's ADHD. I do know that. And I think he's on the spectrum probably also, from what I understand. And he's definitely got some challenges with that stuff, but he also has superpowers that other people don't have.
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[36:12] CHRIS: Yeah, I mean, he's going through a rough time right now, and he's said some things that I certainly don't agree with. But I guess my whole thing that I come from is, like, the human experience. There's a lot of variety in it. And my whole thing with LinkedIn and I pick on LinkedIn a lot. Everyone picks on LinkedIn a lot because it's either, like, the super, like, hey, I make six figures a month, here's my routine, or It's the Crying CEO, where it's like this super dramatic quest for attention. And my whole thing and my thing as a comedian, too, is like, there's a million emotions out there besides just extreme joy and extreme sadness. And if you lean into any of them, it can be very interesting. When's the time where you were particularly curious, what's something that makes you feel, I don't know, confused. But there are different things. There's all these emotions that you can lean into that are so there's just so much there. We're kind of exiting this phase where it was all about having the right answer. I feel like that's what the rise of Google was throughout my life. It's like, oh, cool, now there's this place we can go to find the right answer to every question. And once we had that, it wasn't enough anymore. And I think you're seeing this too, with the new generation, there's less onus on being perfect and having the quote unquote correct answer about everything and more curiosity about just like, what does it mean to be a human being?
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[38:14] SANDY: Right, yeah, I think that's true. Growing up, we didn't have Google, obviously. So if I wanted to learn about something. Like if something was interesting to me, I would have to write it down. And we went to the library once a week and then I could try to learn about stuff with Google. You could just punch it in the level of trust that we gave Google and like, Wikipedia. As a matter of fact, I saw an entry in Wikipedia today that was regarding a friend of mine. It's absolutely incorrect, but unless you knew, you wouldn't know, right? So it's like, how do we fact check all that stuff? You've got to be cognizant of the fact that there are people that just put stuff out there that's false. I don't know what they want to get out of it other than chaos, but it's too bad that we have to worry about stuff like that. Let me ask you one other thing, though, about this whole idea of the six figure a month guy that you just mentioned. It seems like stories are one thing that we relate to a lot. And the story of the person who struggled and overcame these struggles and speed bumps and then became in other words, they weren't always this certain way. I think that those stories are compelling because they're more relatable for most people. If all you do is talk about how great you are and it's true, then a lot of people have trouble relating with that story. Related to that, some of the best posts that I've read and they were sincere, were people that truly made themselves vulnerable and said, look, this is my story. And it's interesting how we as humans respond to when someone makes himself vulnerable in that kind of forum. It can be very powerful, but if it's bullshit, then it's going to do a lot more destruction to you than it would have been if it had been true in video. How do you make yourself vulnerable in 15 seconds or 30 seconds when you've only got that little space to work in what you want to educate or you want to inform? How do you choose, for lack of a better word, how do you do that? There's enough information in 15 seconds real, in other words, that there's going to be value on the other end.
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[41:09] CHRIS: Yeah. So I do that in a few ways. One, it's like some of my stuff is just straight to camera, and some of it is quite serious. I talked about I did a video once about gifted kids and about how that can kind of screw you up. It was just one take to the camera about how people hear the word gifted and they think privileged. But actually, gifted kids are across all walks of life. And if you don't have the right support system, your intelligence doesn't help you. At some point your mind becomes a prison that you can't escape and you stop trying to use your mind for good and you start trying to shut it off. And it's one of these things where it was like just talking about that in very blunt and real terms. There's a vulnerability in that. I also use vulnerability for my comedy a lot. I have discovered I used to be writing and directing shows for other people. Now I'm the entire ensemble, and I will often do characters and really kind of multi camera, multi shot sketches where I'm playing multiple people. And oftentimes my videos will have me in some kind of difficult situation. And I'm also playing my boss who's chewing me out or whatever, but just the fact that I am sitting there just kind of absorbing the abuse, the audience can identify with that. And I believe that comedy comes from, like, opposing energies. And one of my favorite comedians of all time was Chris Farley. I grew up I was a huge Chris Farley fan second City guy. And, yeah, he always had this thing where he was on one hand, he would be this very sweet, vulnerable, childlike person, and then he would be this raving lunatic, and he would kind of switch back and forth. And the more vulnerable and real he was when he was being soft, the greater license he got to be a lunatic when he would tap into his crazy lunatic side. And this is what I try to do in my comedy and try to do my business content where it's like, look, as long as the video ends with me at the desk, like explaining the less than if that explanation part is really professional and really thoughtful and really strategic, that gives me greater license to go crazy with the comedy. And the vulnerability is the same thing. The more I demonstrate to the audience that I don't think I'm above them, that I'm not making fun of them, I don't think they're stupid. The more that I'm just trying to show them this is a real thing that I've experienced, the greater license I have to go out there as a ridiculous character and turn up the absurdity because they know it's grounded in something real.
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[44:31] SANDY: Well, listen, I really appreciate you coming on the show today. It was a real pleasure talking to you. If people want to get in touch with you, you've got a couple of different offerings that can be a huge benefit to companies. You've got your video stuff. You've also got I think you've got one on one coaching and then corporate coaching for a group. Tell us a little bit about that, and then tell us how we can get in touch with you, how we can reach out to you and find you.
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[44:55] CHRIS: Yeah, so you can look for me on LinkedIn. Chris Bogue the easiest way is ring my bell. Follow me on LinkedIn. I post new content all the time. I also do coaching, so I do one on one coaching for individuals. I do team training for both Video Prospecting and for content creation. You can find my course. I have a course on video prospecting. You can purchase that at chrisbog IO.
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[45:21] SANDY: B-O-G-U-E. Correct.
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[45:23] CHRIS: Yes. C-H-R-I-S-B-O-G-U-E IO. And yeah, that's anybody who wants to get started on Video Prospecting, I break it down across six modules. It's on camera performance, sales Strategy and LinkedIn growth, script writing, editing, and then outbound. So by the end of it, you'll have your 1st 25 videos shot, ready, delivered with thumbnails and subject lines, captioned delivered on LinkedIn and Gmail to your pipeline. Because the first 25 is the hardest that it gets a lot easier. There really hasn't been a lot of scholarship about this yet, so that's why I am out there teaching it myself, so you can check that out. And I'm also a friendly guy, so if anybody wants a DM me or chat with me or send me a Prospecting video, feel free to reach out to me on LinkedIn and send me a connection request.
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[46:19] SANDY: Alright, well, listen, thank you so much. I think we're going to have to do this again at some point. There are so many different things going through my head. Oh, yeah, we went way over.
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[46:30] CHRIS: Hey, thanks for having me on the show. It was a great day.
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[46:33] SANDY: That was a lot of fun. I appreciate it. And I will see you, I think you're with Jen Allen this Thursday night, is that right?
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[46:39] CHRIS: Next Thursday? Yes.
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[46:40] SANDY: Okay, very good. Okay, awesome. I look forward to that. Thank you so much, Chris. All right. Facebook, LinkedIn, TikTok, I'll have all that information in the show notes, the contact information. Please subscribe to the Neuro Divergent selling podcast, wherever you listen to podcasts and we'll look forward to seeing you next week. Have a great rest of your week.
Chris Bogue
Owner
Chris Bogue is a writer and comedian in Chicago who coaches people to create mercifully short video content for their business.