Steve Sims’ clients often ask the impossible. And he provides, whether it’s a marriage ceremony in the Vatican or a private concert from Andrea Bocelli.

How does he do it? He reveals at least some of his secrets, including the first step to making any connection that can advance your business or career in a big way. Steve says that most people go about networking all wrong and fail miserably at self-promotion. 

But it doesn’t have to be that way, says Steve. In fact, he maintains anybody can do the “impossible” if they are willing to put in the work.

He reveals the things you should be doing right now to make it happen, as well as…                                     

• Why he still considers himself a massive failure – and embraces it
• A surprising reason many businesses should avoid high net worth clients
• The power of positioning yourself as a solution – not someone who sells something
• The “sell nothing” strategy that gets him the best customers
• A “less is more” take on self-promotion

Listen now…

Mentioned in this episode:

• https://www.stevedsims.com
• www.simsdistillery.com
• https://www.facebook.com/groups/stevedsims/?innovabuzz

Transcript

Doug Hall: Hi, everybody. This is Doug Hall, your host of the Go for Growth podcast. And today I am delighted to have a special guest with us. Steve D Sims is a published author, a legitimate entrepreneur and even better, he’s a Brit. So you’re going to love listening to him. And he’s a Brit that lives in LA. So he’s in Los Angeles today. 

I’ve caught him before he starts a big trip. And I’m delighted to pick the brain of Steve D Sims, the founder of Sims Distillery, and you’ll find his wisdom there. And even better the author of Bluefishing, a best selling book you put out a couple years ago and I recommend it to you. And we’re going to hear some things from Bluefishing today. So Steve, amazed to have you on my podcast. Thanks for being here.

Steve Sims: It’s an absolute pleasure. Thanks for having me.

Doug: I would start with this sort of thing of where the heck did you come from? What are your or, what’s your origin story? And then take us through sort of the encapsulated version of what got you here. So from there to here, so go. 

Paving the Road to Success, Brick by Brick

Steve: Well, East London boy born into a bricklaying family started bricklaying like every entrepreneur. I knew more where I didn’t fit them where I did actually fit. I tried for every kind of job out there trying to find somebody that would engage, satisfy, consume me. Couldn’t find anything. Ended up applying for a job in Hong Kong because it was the furthest place I could think of from England. 

And I got the job but was fired after one day because they realized I was absolutely useless. Ended up working on the door of nightclubs throwing parties, so I would events. I started off as a party promoter than a party planner, then started working for other people’s events from the Monaco Grand Prix to the New York Fashion Week. 

And I turned into this experiential concierge firm. They did everything from drum lessons with Guns and Roses closing down a museum in Florence and sending people up to the edge of space to sending them backstage of a concert and even speaking them on stage to sing what our favorite star. So I became the man that can. Someone once referred to me as the Make A Wish Foundation for people with really big checkbooks. 

And two years ago, as you mentioned, I released a little book that I didn’t think would be much. And as of today, funny enough, I got a copy of the Thai version sent to me. So it’s now been released in Thai, Mandarin Vietnamese, Korean, Japanese and is now being published in Russian. So to say that it’s an international bestseller, bit of an understatement and also a bit of a bloody great surprise. 

Doug: Awesome. That’s amazing. And what Steve just gave you to everybody is a snapshot of what’s fully explained in Bluefishing, the book which I strongly recommend to you. So that’s your homework after this intro to Steve D Sims. So Steve, that’s amazing, thank you. And the most important part of this for my audience is you are an entrepreneur, you are running a business. 

And for a few minutes, I want to pick your brain on the lessons you’ve learned and what you can pass on to other business owners to help them avoid the school of hard knocks, right? We all go to the school of hard knocks, and we’d like to learn from other people’s hard knocks. So I know you’re, I’ve seen a lot of that in Bluefishing and I can’t wait to hear some of the nuggets that you share with us today. 

Fail All the Way to the Top

Steve: You know, I’m not sure I want to help you too much there. And I know that sounds really I, you know, I know that sounds a little bit rude and maybe selfish but I am a massive failure. And I have failed a ton. And the funny thing is, every time I failed at something, I may have kind of like, you know, scuffed me knees, ruined the bank account or something like that, but he’s made me stronger for the next time. 

So I’m a great believer in dealing with people and working with people that have done a lot. It does help you a bit. But if any entrepreneur or wantrepreneur, those newbie entrepreneurs out there thinking, well, I listened to this guy because it will save me all the pain. Now, I’ll save you a little pain in a few areas, but you’ll get pain in others. So it never gets rid of the pain. It just basically brings up different scenarios. I believe our greatest failures are our greatest education and therefore our greatest growth. 

Doug: And, folks, that’s nugget number one and I totally agree with you, Steve. And I’m glad you said that. If you’re not failing, you’re not progressing. 

Steve: Yep, yep, exactly. 

Doug: When you talk to a business owner, when somebody comes up to you and throws a challenge at you, what do they usually, what do you hear them usually saying? What’s the most common, I mean you give talks and, you know, you’ve promoted your book. What’s the most common question you think you hear from entrepreneurs or wantrepreneurs? 

Steve: Probably the most misguided because people know that I work with quite simply, and no underestimate here, the richest people on the planet. You know, I’ve got royalty. I’ve got royalty, superstars, movie stars, but then I’ve also got richer people that own things like countries. And people come up to me and they’re like, Oh, you know, how do I get to deal with the rich and famous. I’m gonna tell you straight off the bat, working with the rich and famous is a headache. It’s a problem. You want to work with the rich and done now. You want to work with not necessarily the billionaires. 

Like I got billionaire clients to drive around in 10-year-old Corollas because they just don’t care. And I got guys that are making a couple of million bucks and they’re always in the latest Ferrari’s. So you want to, first of all, analyze what is your product or service you’re selling? Who is your avatar client, and go after them. Don’t go after the rich people. Don’t chase the checkbook. Chase the problem in which you sold. You want a nugget? I will tell you quite clearly, never sell anything, solve everything. 

Doug: There’s a nugget, never sell anything solve everything. 

Steve: I literally will go up to a client who I’ve heard is interested in, I don’t know travel or go into an event or meeting a superstar or jump in the fund list of somebody, and I’ll go up to him and I’ll say, Hey, I believe you’re looking at doing this. Would it be of interest if I can actually help you get over that? Would it be of interest if I could actually help plan that for you so you don’t have to worry about it? How would it satisfy you and solve your situation if I was to actually take that off your plate? 

And so that’s the way I position myself. I position myself every single time as a solution. And then people like Yeah, get it. Do it. Get on with it. Get it off my plate. Because I’m a great believer, if you know what you’re talking about you are, you know, nine-tenths of an expert. I don’t believe wherever we’ve been. We never know everything. But the point is, the client doesn’t know what they don’t know. That’s your job. So when a client comes along and goes, Hey, I want to do this, my first few strategies, my first infrastructure is for me to nod and go Oh, that sounds great. 

That sounds brilliant. Oh, that’s awesome. But then my next question is, why? Why is this so important for you to do? And there’s a friend of mine, Chris Voss, who’s an FBI negotiator. He talks about getting into his midnight radio voice. And he says if you’ve all amped up, and you’re talking to someone like this, you’re going too fast. So you dial it down you go, so how can I help you? And you really bring that tone down. He’s really good at doing it when he does it.

Doug: He is brilliant. I heard him do that. I’ve heard him do that live. You’re right. He’s amazing at that.

Steve: The midnight radio voice. And so if you talk to the client, and you go all that brilliant. And you’re on his level of pace, okay? But then what you do is you put it that much and you go, Well, why? Tell me why that’s important to you. And you get a sense of it’s a pattern interrupts, and they’re like, well, and the funny thing is, they want to give you the answer that makes them sound intellectual. They want to give and you can ask all your friends Say, Hey, if you won $10 million this weekend, what would you do? 

And they would go I’d get all the Victoria’s Secrets models and I’d have a hot tub party. You know, they say something. But they would say something stupid like that. Oh, you’re by a mega yacht. And I’d sail around the world and you go oh, that’s great. In four weekend’s time, what would you do with the money now? And you suddenly start getting that Well, my school was never had computers. So I’m going to furnish my old school with computers to help them. I’m going to pay off all the student loans to my local college. I’m going to start focusing on adoption homes for dogs because I care about them. 

All of a sudden the real core comes out. And so what I’m talking to clients, it’s always a case of why do you want to do that? I’ve had clients and they go, Oh, I want to meet Elton John. You go Oh, that’s fantastic. He’s brilliant. I love his music. But why is it important to you? And the next statement may still be all He’s iconic. He is one of the best artists on the planet. Yeah, I agree with you. But why is he important to you? This is a true story. 

And the guy then starts telling me about how his dad used to go driving in the mornings with him to school. And they always used to play Elton John because they always used to sing along to the tunes, because they only had a couple of cassettes in the car. And he said them, and the funny thing is, my dad passed away years ago, but I can never, ever hear a tune by Elton John, without thinking of my dad sat next to me in the car singing. 

And there’s the core. There’s the reason. It’s that trigger. So that’s the one and whether it be a branding client, whether it be a consulting client, whether it be someone for the concierge firm, whoever’s talking to me, I’ll nod on the first question. I’ll nod on the first statement, but then I’m going to use my inner Sherlock to find out what’s controlling in that question? Why is important to you and what’s got to be the outcome that’s going to put you in a state of shock that you achieved,

Doug: Because that’s what your business delivers to people is that experience that they can’t get any other way.

Delivering Personalized Experiences

Steve: And I’m glad you say my business because it is my business. Whatever industry you’re in, I don’t care. I had some guy contact me the other day, literally is a baker. He makes cakes here in Hollywood. And he said, he took me on as a consultant, like, I want to start doing this, I want to start working for rich people. And I said, again, don’t chase the checkbook. You know, don’t worry about that. I said, focus on what it is you’re actually doing. And he said to me, we had this example a guy walks into his bakers, and says, I want a red cake. 

Interview the guy and he said, Well, we can be very busy. I said, Well, deal with less clients, but put more into each client. And so we spoke about it. And I said to him, the guy that came in, you know, I want a red cake. So that’s fantastic. Yeah, we can give you a red cake. What shade of red? Oh, this shade of red. Okay. Why? Why did you decide on a red cake? And he did that when you, funny enough, we joked about that example. And a guy came in and said he wanted a red cake. He phoned me up on excited and it was like, Steve couldn’t believe it. 

He said at first I thought it was a friend of yours. It was a setup. But he said to him, he said, I went into my midnight voice and I went, why a red cake? The cake you’re asking for today? And then guy kind of like, you know, stopped and look to me. And he went, well, it is my dad’s birthday. He’s like, ok? Again, pause. And he loves Ferarri. I went Oh, so you’re looking for us to match the cake to the color of the Ferarri. He’s like, yeah, yeah, I’d love that. 

He said well what age is he? And he was like, I don’t know, 50s or something like that. And he said well how about if we actually got a few little toy cars, a few little models of that era, and put them around the base of the car, and even had the Catalina horse on the top of the cake? And he goes, like, That’s amazing. Yes. Do that. And he said I’ll be happy to. And he said it cost the guy like an extra five bucks or something just for these little toy cars and stuff. 

But it transformed itself from a cake to an engagement, to an experience, to a trigger. And that’s what we could do in anything we do. I don’t care if you’re selling cakes. I don’t care if you’re pouring concrete for someone’s backyard barbecue. I don’t care if you’re planning to travel itinerary or designing a brand for someone. You need to listen to what’s said, ignore it and find out why it’s important. 

Doug: You built a business, talking about that a minute ago. Tell me about what you experienced as you went from Steve Sims, the individual solution guy, to scaling your business to whatever degree. How did that work? How did you fail forward? What are some of the lessons you experienced as you did that? 

Steve: Well, all the usual lessons. Scaling is a pig. You’ve got to kind of find many replicas of you. Hiring, you know, I can get more clients and I can hire staff. And that’s always been the case. And so finding the staff that don’t get bedazzled, because they’re dealing with royalty, or they’re dealing with someone that owns something, that’s tough. So you want to find, and I don’t want to upset my team, but you want to find almost anti-social cynical outcasts. Those people that don’t kind of get all jumped up, but they do rise to the challenge. 

And my team probably would look better in a skate shop or biker bar than they would as leading a marketing and branding corporation. They’re focused on the results, not on who they’re dealing with. So scaling the company, the higher impact is always going to be your bottleneck. And so David Jameson always says to me, like, hire slow fire fast. And that’s one of the main things I look to do. When I, when someone’s going to work with me, we give them so many stress tests. You know, can you get this up at four o’clock? How you’re going to do this? How would you overcome this problem? 

I’m a great believer that you only get to see the true color of someone when things aren’t going to plan. I want to see how you react. Not how you present, not how you prepare, not how you plan because no one ever plans to get smacked in the mouth. It just happens. So I want to know how you handle yourself in that situation. So scaling a business is tough. But the two things I focused on was quality. I always want to make sure that I have less people with more quality. 

So I do that with my consulting clients, with my marketing with my concierge. I always take on clients as slow as I take on staff. And then I focus on them. And I focus on what I can do for them. I focus on the problem and build up the loyalty. In fact, I’ve got three companies. Two of them a travel-related, one of them is my marketing and branding company under stevedsims.com, none of them have a phone number. Not one of them. 

And it’s funny because all of my, all of my consulting clients, they go, Well, you know, you want to talk to me about branding and marketing their company and I had trouble even getting hold of you. And I said yes but you earned the right to talk to me didn’t you? You actually had to try and find how to get me. I already had you. You had worked hard to get to me. And that’s a great filter. I don’t want people just picking up the phone guys, hey, how much is this? 

I won’t talk to you, you know. I want you to earn it. I want you to work for the right to be able to contact me. And there’s a lot of people out there that say to themselves, oh, I have a referral-based business. Well here’s the thing. I always say to them, do you have a phone number and contact details on your website? They go Yes, I do. And I said well, you’re not a referral-based business. You’re actually just a company that gets a lot of referrals. Now my business, I’m all about the referrals because especially in my concierge is you can’t even contact us.

Doug: So your business model is to be hidden.

Keeping it Exclusive

Steve: Not necessarily hidden but definitely working on a more elusive and an elite basis. I don’t do anything cheap, you know. Funny enough now get a video and I stuck it on Sims Distillery the other day. Sims Distillery is my course. And what I do is every time things happen to me during the week that I’ve learned from, I will actually record a little video, and then I will post it on the Sims Distillery website. 

So the dark thing is it started off as a 16 step course, it has now got like about 70 videos and courses and training material on it. And I just use it as a constant library. So you don’t have to buy a new course, you buy that and I just keep populating it. But I had someone contact me the other day and he literally said to me, hey, I’ve heard of you and you can help my business. Are you free to 15 minutes? And I said, No, I’m not. I’m $750 for 30 minutes. And on my website, you can actually book a call with me and I am $750 for 30 minutes. 

And I’ve said to people, how many times that people try to use what you know, without paying you? And I’m a great believer if they don’t pay, they don’t pay attention. People aren’t paying you, because they like you. I hate to break it to you, they’re you because of what you know, who you know and how many months or years can you save them in the information that you’ve actually earned and learned. And so for that reason, I charge accordingly.

Doug: And I think you’re Sims Distillery is a great deal.

Steve: I really love it. It’s one of these things that I just had fun with. And we wanted people to grow. Let me be really arrogant and obnoxious for a second. I’m living here up in the hills in Los Angeles. I’m actually speaking to you now from a garage. I got a collection of motorcycles. I’m all right. You know, if I don’t sell a course, if I don’t sell a book, if I don’t take on a new consulting client, if I don’t take on any more clients, I’m actually okay. So it’s not one of these things where you’re out there going, Oh, yeah, you’ve got to buy my book. 

My book. I think I make 20 cents per book. So you’re going to buy like, 400 before you can even afford me a drink. Yeah, I don’t care. I care that it benefits you. I care that it helps you. When the book came out, and I don’t want to digress so tell me to shut up and I will, but when I was approached, it was because everybody of that level knew the people I was dealing with and I was approached by the publishing house and they said, Hey, we want you to write a book, naming names, what they do what they spend their money on. 

And I said no. If I did, I’d be dead by content an hour. And I say and but then I was doing a lot of speeches at the time because, again, as we said at the beginning, I’m a bricklayer that left school at 15 years old. I still ride around with a black t-shirt, tattoos, earrings, eyebrow piercing, yet I’m dealing with the most affluent people in the world. If a bricklayer can be doing this, you’ve got no excuses. So I started speaking a lot more in the entrepreneurial circuit. And then they came to me and they said, Hey, instead of us doing the book on who, you know, can we do the book on what you know? How you do these things? 

So I said to him, I said yes, but it’s got to be my book. You know if I’m going to do it, for one, I want a lot of money. I got the money. So I’ve already been paid pretty much upfront. That’s why I only get like about 20 cents a book. Yeah, I said but I have to write the book that I want to write. And they were really good about it. And they said, Yes. So I wrote the book at the age of 53 years old. I’m a great believer that we’re putting value into stuff that has no value. 

We’re listening to people of no substance. We’re far too much into the shiny object syndrome. And I’m a great believer at the moment that I think there’ll be a reset. You know, it’s a case of add water pop instant guru and this insta-perfect world. And it’s pissing me off. So I wrote the book because I wanted to tell people, hey, before you start focusing on $60,000, a new CRM tracking and funnel process to your company, but at $2 go focus on your client. 

Buy them a cup of coffee. Make a frickin phone call. So I did this book, not expected it to get anywhere but expecting it or praying that it would shake up two people to go, Hey, I’m looking at the wrong things. I’m looking for salvation in the wrong products. You know, I should be looking for it in my clients, in my brand, in my word, in my identity. And so when the book came out, I honestly thought that’s it. You know, the book’s out, I’ll sell 10 copies. My mom actually bought three

Doug: Seven more to go.

Steve: Yes, seven more. And it was literally like that, you know, she phoned me. She’s like, I bought three son. And I was like, great mom, that’ll help me get the best seller. Thank you. And I just thought that was it. And the first month, I don’t know how many did it wasn’t very much. In fact, the second month was less. And when I phoned up the publishing house I got a kind of, yeah, it’s not going too well, Steve. And I was like, oops. You know? 

Yeah, I was thinking to myself, I’ve just got paid really well. And the good thing about it is I didn’t have to pay it back. So I’m thinking, Oh, gorgeous is money and I don’t have to pay it back. But the book’s not going very well but it was in the hundreds. And then all of a sudden, I think the following month, it was like 14,000 in one month. And then poof, it just took off. And I’ve done over 300 podcasts, I launched the course and I want to solve. 

I want people to get out of their own way. Nine times out of 10 the biggest problem in your business, your relationships, and the way you communicate is staring at you in the mirror. And I’m there to turn around and go look, you know, you’re focusing on the wrong shit. You should be focusing on you. Focus wants on impactful, not expensive. Like if I come up to you, and I buy you a $30,000 watch and I give it to you. Are you going to be happy? 

Doug: You know, it’s nice. 

Steve: It’s nice, but it’s a bit suspicious, isn’t it?

Doug: Yeah. Like why are you giving me this watch Steve?

Steve: Yeah. Let me say I met you in the street and I went, hey, hey, I love doing the polka. Hey, do you mind if I buy you a beer? And bought you a beer. And I had a conversation with you to 20 minutes before I had to shoot off. Would that be more fun? 

Doug: That would be great. 

Personalized, Not Expensive

Steve; And there’s the impact. Then it so I do and that would cost me a beer. So I’m a great believer and I’ve always focused. I went to a client’s party and the client, every time I met the client, he would have these new pair of shoes. And there was some shoe, I don’t even know what you call it, but some shoe tailor that would make him these shoes and send him swatches. And he was always buy new shoes in this like Venetian leather that he loved. He had a birthday party and went I went along to his party, I actually gift-wrapped a shoehorn. 

And when I got there, it was a bone shoehorn, not metal, bone, but I gave it to him. And it was like I think I got two for $8 off of Amazon. I gave him one of them and he was, he opened it up and it was like this is cool. And I said look, I know you love shoes but I also know when you go to the metal detector at the airport and you probably got a metal one. Yeah, I have got a metal one.  I went probably sets the alarm off, he said I’ve lost so many because they hold onto them. The bone won’t set off the metal detector but it will look after your shoes. He was over the moon. It cost me less than five bucks. 

Doug: That’s amazing. So I think if people will listen to what you’re saying you gave them the keys to business success. So folks, you need to pick these nuggets out. Steve gave you from his experience his very best. So Steve, thanks for telling us and pointing us to both the king fishing book, or the Bluefishing book. And tell folks how to find more. What’s, where’s the best place to find information about you and about the story. 

Steve: So maybe if you go over to stevedsims.com, that’s one m on Sims, stevedsims.com, you can find, you can subscribe to the newsletter. That gives you a whole bunch of free stuff. You know, you have to put up with my rants and things. It tells you about the course called Sims Distillery. It also shows you my events that I’m speaking at. It also tells you of my speakeasy events. I run these private workshops in these really kind of cool dysfunctional places with a maximum of 40 top-level entrepreneurs, predominantly all over America, Mexico and Canada. 

But I am traveling to Europe next year with those. But basically, that’s my hub that tells you everything about what’s going on. You can also find out about the book there. My Facebook group, An Entrepreneurs Advantage by Steve Sims, that’s free of charge. Podcast, they are making things happen, but it all comes from that website. So if you hit stevedsims.com you can find out about everything from the podcast, the book, the course, speaking engagements, the whole works. It’s all there. 

Doug: Perfect. Thank you. That’s great. Folks, go there. Find Steve’s stuff. Subscribe to his newsletter. I did that the other day. And he’s right, you get an instant download some great stuff. So, I love your chug test. That’s what he told you about having a beer on the street. So the chug test is important. You gotta go that’s your homework everybody. Go study that. So Steve, amazing. Thanks for being on my podcast. Thanks for the nuggets.

Steve: Appreciate that mate.

Doug: I wish you the best in your travels over the next month or so. And thanks everybody for listening in for Doug Hall’s Go for Growth. And Steve D Sims, amazing. You guys go off and conquer the world. See you later.