To every business; We ARE dying to throw our credit cards at ya!

Entire point explained in one video: YOU are the show! The fans, YOUR fans, are appreciating you, whatever it is you think you are selling. And yet you might be there beating yourself up for all that went wrong, or why what you re selling wasn’t or isn’t good enough.

Audience at Bon Jovi, Ahoy, Rotterdam, Netherlands, 21st November 1988. (photo Niels van Iperen – click image for more + source)

What if I told you we’re all in the same business?
All of us. From the king to the gardeners. Even people who are dependent on an allowance/ welfare are in this business.
Because if they fail to do this, be “in” this business, even though they should still get their money and everybody in theory thinks it should be regardless of who you are because it’s a human right;
Even though all of those things?

If they fail to be “in” this business?
They’ll lose that right.

Everyone who has ever been treated unfairly, or who has ever suffered bad service in a restaurant, or who feels they’re under some kind of social threat all of the time?
It’s because they have failed or are resisting, to do this work and do it seriously each and every time they come into contact with another human being. *

[* for a lot of people, society is highly unfair and makes it practically impossible to get by without knowing this skill. This is why, in my opinion, learning the skill from this article, should be priority skill number one for economic equality ]

We’re all in the same business. But because of that, we have started diversifying based on the aspects of our lives (usually calling them “jobs”) that are not the same.
Because if (or “since”) we’re all in the same business, how else would we identify but by pretending that the second characteristic of what it is we do or are, the second key factor that determines how successful we are or what our identity is as perceived by others;
What else can we do than to pretend that secondary thing about what it is we do, is the primary one?

This article is too short to go too deeply into that, and how there are also communities that identify based on what family/ tribe you belong to, or what special interest you have, but the most important takeaway from this piece is this:
We really ARE in the same business.
The people business.

And we all do the same work:
The work of making people feel good.

Even people who play with money as a way to make money, are ultimately in the people business.
Although money definitely buys you a ton of hall cards not to have to do this work; At the end of the day, even Mark Zuckerberg, even the bitcoin trader, have to do it.

At the end of every line there is a person you have to please to get to the next level (if you’re privileged), or to get your money (if you’re dependent).

Now don’t get depressed, because all of this is actually super good news and it will make your life very easy and make you a lot of money, the throwing credit cards at you from the title is real.
But allow me to harp on for just a sec.

So with all of us being in the making-people-feel-good business, the only thing that differs between jobs and between lives, are things like:

difference: How many people you encounter and therefor how often you have to do this work.

In general the higher paying your job is, the fewer times you “have to” do this work, but also the fewer the times you can do this work.
Which can lead to a feeling of loneliness and meaninglessness.
Even superstars, who know they make people happy from afar, can suffer from the lack of direct human connection. In particular if their line of work (f.e. a movie star) doesn’t have a component of direct connection.

difference: The extend to which this work is explicit or hidden

In the entertainment industry, the work of making people feel good, is explicit.
In medicine it is hidden (but good luck getting a patient healthy with a specialist without social skills)

difference: The type of job or relationship this work piggy-backs on.

For employees making their boss and their colleagues feel appreciated, is implicit.

But for a small business or independent service provider, and now we get to the point where people will want to pay you;
Because for a small business or independent service provider this work is literally
THE ONLY WORK THEY EVER HAVE TO DO

There. I said it.

I don’t care if you are an independent physiotherapist, or an art painter, or if you sell glutenfree cookies;
Your ONLY work?
Is to make people feel good.

I know so many people who have amazing things to sell, so the product does actually contribute to the overall value;
And who also have such great client relationships, people would give good money to be in their presence and call them a business partner, or their teacher, or service provider. And if they could buy physical things, for example takeaway food or drinks!, it is even better because the physical products have a comforting “cloak” of normalcy.

Yet these entrepreneurs or independents, are not aware their social skills are offering a magnetic power, and also not (if you get uncomfortable being in the spotlight) they miss the deep craving their clients have for human connection.

People are waiting to be invited as a paying client, or to step up the relationship you have with them, but they can’t if you don’t offer it.

They can’t create this whole relationship by themselves.
YOU are the provider, the supplyer, the professional;
You have to lead the way.

What products will sell?
What does the market want?
How are we going to survive the Covid crisis?
Stop thinking like that!
No one can connect with you or pay you, if you stay in your own head.

I’m not going to elaborate on that, because I m already way over the “serious shit people do not want to read about” quota. Which, by the way, is a direct violation to making people feel good!

Don’t talk serious shit people don’t want to hear about if you want people to feel good, hence, pay you!

And if you do;
Cushion it, compensate, make up for it.
For example by delivering something that will make them millions.
Which is what I am going to do right now.

Because;
What if, today, right at this moment, you decided that whatever it is you thought was making you money, is not actually what is making you money;
And focused SOLELY on making people feel good.

Connecting, smiling, taking an interest, being human.

Showing yourself the way Jon Bon Jovi showed himself on that stage 21 November 1988, as I illustrated with the picture.

The YouTube video I used at the top of this blogpost is from a documentary about Bon Jovi, Access All Areas. The opening scene is shot early November 1988, three weeks before they were in the Netherlands.
It was a show in Dublin.

It switches between shots taken in the dressing room right after the show. With cursing band members, because as Jon later recalls in an interview,
“Everything that could did go wrong.”
And shots that were taken outside, right after the same show.
With fans raving about how good it was, and what an absolutely amazing experience they had.

The fans were on a total high, and the show had delivered to them a brilliant experience.
It was worth every penny.

So you see?
Even Jon Bon Jovi in 1988 did not know what he no doubt learned very shortly after.
That it’s not about what you sell.
It’s about how you make people feel.

We’re all in the same business:
The business of making people feel good.

Now go rock that!

Suzanne L. Beenackers