Choose Yourself

by James Altucher

STAY IN TOUCH. It’s hard for me to not burn bridges. I tend to do it too much. But I’ve found great success when I’ve not fallen into the bridge-burning pattern I often succumb to. Example: I once tried to sell an early company I started to Omnicom, the big ad agency. I met with the woman who made these decisions for Omnicom. She felt we weren’t ready yet. Every month I sent her an update: new clients, new sales numbers, number of employees. I also offered to help any of the agencies that Omnicom had. One time I called her on behalf of one of my clients to see if she could recommend any agencies within the Omnicom family to help one of my clients. In other words, I offered her real value. After about a year of me doing this every month, she rallied three of the agencies within Omnicom to come over and check out my company. All three made offers. Did I accept any? No, but I was able to leverage those offers into a better offer from someone who came completely out of the blue.