Welcome to Episode 12 of the Bandhive Podcast.

All right. It is the Bandhive Podcast Episode 12 My name is James Cross and I again have with me Matt Hoos from Alive in Barcelona. It's early over there where you are, Matt.

It is very early, nice and early, nice and cold. We've got snow covered grounds, and it's probably a nice, warm 25 degrees. Yeah, and for all those listeners, you're probably thinking cheese. These guys talk about snow every single time. Well, we recorded Episode eight yesterday, and now we're recording episode 12, so that gives you an idea of how much the weather hasn't changed in 24 hours. Part of that, of course, is because we have the wonderful Aaron jingles from suburban samurai on alternating episodes, so there will be other episodes in between these two, but we are trying to hammer out as many of these podcasts as we can because we want to get that quality content to your ear holes as soon as possible.

On that note, if anybody has a request or idea for a podcast topic or a question about something we talked about hit us up support at Band I've dot rocks and we will get back to you. That being said, we have a fun topic today. Fun for us. Maybe some harsh reality for you guys. Who knows? All depends on what you are like as a human being. Hopefully you're good human beings. I like to think our listeners are, and I'm sure you all are at heart. So we're gonna talk about two things today.

First, we're gonna talk about gratitude and why it's so important to show gratitude to the people you work with. And then we're going to talk about the go giver attitude, which you can learn about in a book called The Go Giver. Matt, I think you're also gonna have some input from another book that I just started reading called How to Win Friends and Influence People, which is not nearly is scummy as it sounds, that title actually sounds ridiculously awful. It does in the modern day of political correctness.

You know, winning friends definitely seems like you're playing a game for them. But you know that as a book, that it's incredible. One of the best and influencing people is like manipulating almost, You know, that's what it makes it sound like. But anyway, that book has been around since the thirties, written by Dale Carnegie, and that is just a classic, classic book that many business people read and as a reminder. Bands are businesses. So to get things started, we're going to talk about how gratitude plays into building a strong relationship.

And this is a relationship of any kind that, you know, ah, professional relationship, a friend relationship, a romantic relationship, anything like that. Gratitude is so important because it makes people feel appreciated. I can think of some examples where personally I felt like people should have thanked me, and it felt weird that they didn't and I can also think of examples where I just kind of did something that felt natural to me and people thank me. I'm like, Why are you thanking me like this is what I do, you know, at the same time, it made me feel good about that.

And I have one specific story about an interaction I had with someone. But before we get to that, do you think there's ever a time where it's not appropriate to thank someone met? Because I have the feeling that even if somebody doesn't do exactly what you want, it's still good to thank them just to show appreciation. And even if you're saying like hey, you know, this isn't exactly what I wanted. For example, if you hire someone to do something, you could still thank them say, like, Hey, thank you so much for taking a shot at this.

But can you try it more like this? That's how I feel. I don't know what your take on this is. I think that's a good rule of thumb. I mean, the bottom line is, we're already here in the Christmas spirit, in the spirit of giving as it's the 12th of December. But thanking people goes a really long way. There's a lot of very simple social cues that are overlooked, you know, looking somebody in the eye saying Thank you shaking their hand, these air, little forms of gratitude and, uh, in a sense of vulnerability, that air saying, You know, these are things that I appreciate and like you said, even if it's not necessarily exactly what you what you wanted, you may find that something like saying thank you is the difference between burning a bridge and not burning a bridge.

And in the business world, I think the best practice is to never burn any bridges. Because if we're working alongside of somebody who isn't able to deliver for us today, there's no saying that six months down the road they haven't gotten way better and you're gonna use their services now. And so the beauty of it is in nurturing a relationship. We all know that relationships are very important things to nurture. We are part of them every day. That's what our friendships are. It's what are our family lives are, you know.

And so the importance of nurturing that relationship is incredibly important in the business world. You know, it's not what you know. It's who you know, and so you only know you only know people through a quality relationship. Yeah, I agree, and That's something that many people overlook. And I'm not gonna pick on any specific demographic because I really think it's all over the place. It's millennials, it's baby boomers. It's everyone like sometimes people get caught up in the moment. And don't think about being thankful or don't think about reciprocating well wishes or something like that.

Like yesterday, I I held a door open for a lady and she thanked me, which was nice, and I said, Oh, happy holidays. And she thanked me for that, too. I'm like, Okay, cool. But she didn't say happy holidays back to me, and I'm sure she didn't mean as any slight or insult. She was just like, Oh, thanks and kept going like she wasn't thinking about Oh, I should probably say happy holidays to Sometimes People just don't realize that I'm sure I've I'm guilty of the same thing.

I've probably done that many times. I did want to tell a story, though, and I'll make this quick because it has nothing to do with music. It's about a cat tree and that you probably saw this on the outline, and you're like, Why does it say cat tree? I'm just let you go with it. Basically, About a year ago, my fiance and I moved across country with our cat and we could not bring his cat tree with us about eight or nine months after moving, I saw a cat tree listed for free online.

So I'm like, Oh, sick, like, free cat tree. He'll finally have one again. And we went and picked it up and there was a really nice lady said, Yeah, you know, my cats too old. She doesn't use it anymore. So we thanked her and took off with the cat tree. And after a couple of days of our cat getting used to the cat tree, I e mailed the lady and said, Hey, you know, I just wanted to say thank you again. Our cat loves it. He's been sitting up on it every day.

He had no problem that it smelled like another cat. He loves it. She emailed me back and said that she's given away a bunch of stuff to people online, and I was the first person who emailed her after the fact to say thank you, and obviously other people had said thank you when they pick the stuff up, but she was just so amazed that somebody had actually reached out to her afterwards to say thank you in writing. And it was just a email. It's not getting Senator a letter or anything was an email took me two minutes, and that just astounded me, because to me, I'm always going to send people to follow up and say Thank you.

In a way, I guess a lot of people think that just saying thank you in person is enough and it obviously that's great. But letting people know that you haven't for gotten their generosity or their kindness, or even just their effort on something, I think that's really important. Absolutely. That's the first part of this episode, and to me this is just a quick side note. Before we go on to talk about the go giver and how to win friends and influence people, do you have anything to add to this gratitude section before we move on?

I think you hit the nail right on the head. You know, people love to be validated for what they're doing. You know, even when you take something to goodwill, you get a little piece of paper that says, Hey, like you donated now you can use this is a tax write off like, of course, there's a small benefit to you. But the things that you know the things that feel better is is like when you as an individual, are able to satisfy and need. And a lot of people give things away because it's gonna be convenient for them.

But that icing on the cake, that is where you're really starting to nourish a relationship. So I really like the story that you told thank you. Yeah, Z, I hope that more people think that lady because it seemed like she had more stuff to give and nothing that I've needed so far from what I've seen online. But I hope that people start to show appreciation for things and that just to me it means a lot, you know? Absolutely. Yeah, so moving on, though the go giver is essentially a book about being a good person, because being a good person will give you more opportunities.

And a lot of people, in my view, see business as a bad thing. And they're like, Oh, capitalism and capitalism has its loss. Don't get me wrong, but you as an artist in a band or a solo artist, that is a business, and you have to run it as a business. You can do that without being a bad person. You can run a business and be, Ah, great person. I was talking to a friend yesterday or the day before, and he's talking about how in his town, all the local businesses have a great sense of community.

So, for example, one business stepped up and, uh, donated a bunch of led lights for the town's Christmas tree, and I'm sure they'll get the lights back after the Christmas season. But those were lights that for the next three weeks they can't run out to anyone else. You know, they're taking a hit on this, probably a big one, because from what I understand, it's a massive tree. It's like a 25 or 30 ft tree that they lit up completely. That's huge. Yeah, it's insane. He was saying that in that community, all the local businesses step up like that, and they have a great sense of like this is our town.

It's a very small town so they don't really have a budget. We're going to step up and donate whatever we can to make other people happy, because this is our neighbors were talking about. So that's kind of how the music industry is, too, because you're going to run into people over and over again. It's a small community, and everyone really knows everyone else, like the music industry. Seems big, but it's not as big as you think. Yeah, especially at the d I Y level. Everybody knows everybody.

One example would be keep flying. Everybody knows. Keep flying. I think at least in the Northeast here, one of the most common things all here is like, Oh, keep flying. Oh, you know Henry. Yeah, I know Henry. And they're from, like, six hours away from here. But everyone knows Henry Menzel from keep flying. Formerly. Oh, jeez. What was there? Do you know who I'm talking about? I don't actually. It's one of the one of the people. I don't know. Survey says that's how it used to be.

Okay, that sounds a little more. They did warped tour a couple times. That name rings a bell, so Yeah, everyone knows. Henry from survey says, or keep flying. And that's just a thing here on the East Coast, at least in the pop, punk and, uh, rock scene. And that's because he's genuinely a good dude. And when he's down on his luck, people help him out because he's helped other people out. That's how it goes. But I can guarantee you that if he had never lifted a finger for anyone, they would not lift a finger for him a T East most people wouldn't.

But that's why this go give. Her attitude is so important in the book, which is by Bob Berg and John David Mann, there are five laws that you should follow. The first one is the law of value, which basically says whatever value you give should exceed what you take in payment, and that's what you are worth. So if you give somebody something, some piece of work that's worth $5000 but you get 2000 for it, you're worth is that $3000? Because you have given them something that is worth far more than what they paid.

Essentially here we're talking about quality over quantity, which is a bit of a different comparison here. But think about the quality of work versus the quantity of money that you get. You want to make sure that people get a quality product that outweighs what you get in the turn. Absolutely. And to kind of further on that what you're adding to their life is value. You know, value is in the in the eye of the consumer. If I walk up to your merch table and I see a $5 CD and you're gonna give me a free water bottle at this hot venue where I haven't had anything to drink the line, you know, the water fountains broken, the bathroom doors were ripped off.

We've all been to those venues, you know, the merch table says, Oh, yeah, If you buy my c d, you're gonna get a free water bottle. You know, you're increasing the value of what you're giving them and you know, even mawr if you do it without it being a bundle deal. You know, if you didn't market that you're giving away a free bottle of water and you could just tell that somebody is thirsty, they buy your CD and you give them a water. Those are the little things that you do as a band to increase your value in their eyes.

Yeah, exactly. That's actually. Years ago, when I was doing radio stuff, I was interviewing a band and they knew me relatively well because that interviewed them before. I was just looking at their merch table on their drummer. Walked over like here, take this bag of pins and, like, it was like a $6 bag of pins or something. And he told me not to tell the merch guy. But it's like here, just take this, have fun, you know, like, but you'll always remember that. Yeah, exactly. And he recognized that I was helping spread the word about them because I had done multiple radio interviews.

I had played their music on my radio show. Ah, lot. So I was trying to spread that band, and I remember that that was 2012. I want to say so. That was seven years ago, almost eight, and I still remember that I remember specifically who it waas because he added value to my life. He said, Here, you know, here's a little trinket from the show, you know so that's really something that he probably didn't realize what he was doing at that point, but it made a difference. It also incentivized you to continue playing their music and continue spreading their brand.

Not only did it give you that great feeling, but it was like, Man, I have this great memory. I have a good taste in my mouth from my experience with them and on top of that, like I already liked their music. So now I have multiple good thoughts surrounding this, like the value has increased exponentially since the very first time that you just heard of them before it was just, you know, I like their music. And then you thought, I'm going to give unconditionally and support these guys, which then in turn, turned them to say, I'm going to give unconditionally, which probably got them more exposure than if they had sold each and every one of those pins for however much they were going to sell them for three.

Increase in value in people's life is far more than the value of the dollars in quarters. You're going to make it your merch table. You can really improve the overall quality of somebody's life by what you're doing. Then you're going to make a lifelong fan. Absolutely. On that note, I think that is a great segue into the second law, because that's the law of compensation. This is all from the go giver, and basically that says that how well you serve people and how many people you serve.

That is what determines how much money you make. Think about it. If this band had given everybody at that show, which was about a 200 cap venue, a little bag of pins that cost them to 50 probably to make, because it was, I think five or six pins and they were selling for $6 if they had given everybody their who bought a ticket like, Oh, hey, you bought a ticket, Here's a bag of pins. They probably would have now had at least a quarter of those 200 people at the show converted toe lifelong fans.

Now this is a band that the fan base was already pretty dedicated, so maybe they didn't have to do that specifically because these could have been already fans who are very dedicated to that band and our lifelong fans. But for a D. I y band who's just starting out and you're getting to, you know, the 102 100 cap room size, that could be a really good strategy to just add something cool to a person's life. And, you know, you don't have to give it to every single person, but at least everybody who expresses interest and I think that's probably one of the key things there.

I know we're kind of going back to the law of value and moving away from the law of compensation. But I also want to say we're not going to into depth on these laws because we can't explain it as well as the book can. Absolutely, the book is operable. It's a story, so we're telling you information. But you will learn it so much better if you read the book because it's a story that reinforces thes ideas and to kind of clarify. Now when we're talking about the law of value in the law of compensation, you know it's easy to think like we're talking about giving away your products.

That's not what we want to suggest, even because we're basically just using those as examples. Value can be seen in any form. You might see a band on the side of the road changing a tire while you're on tour. You know you're a band. You understand what it's like. Maybe you stop and help them out. Maybe there's a band that's on tour, and those guys just want to stay in a home for that night and you have the space to facilitate. Maybe you don't have the space to facilitate, but you have a laundry room that you're like, Hey, guys, you probably have a bunch of dirty clothes.

Would you like somebody toe wash your clothes for you? There's so many different ways that you can add value to your life that are way, way, way more personal than you know, giving away a piece of your merch. And in the end, you know, sometimes you give away merch and people come to your merch table on buy more merch. Sometimes you give away merch and you lose money. The idea is not that we want to tell you to give up your revenue stream. Don't go give out a bunch of free CDs because that is your product and you still need to make money off your product.

However, if you focus on how you add value to your lives, then you will be compensated. Now that might be monetary. That might be Maybe next time you're touring across the country and you run into one of those guys that you let's stay at your house. Well, now, maybe you have a place to stay that evening. Maybe you have a warm cooked meal. Maybe you have a place to wash your clothes. They're simple little things that air in my opinion, as you know, after years and years of touring that are much more valuable than a $5 CD purchase, sometimes it's like, Oh my goodness, I haven't eaten a home cooked meal in three weeks.

You know, we've been living off of either dollar menu food or a cup of noodles that we've made in the bus. Or, you know, this that peanut butter sandwiches, you know, and then you get to something. They're like, Oh, yeah, like, here's some chicken breast and you're just like holy cow, you know, and maybe the difference between, you know, killing one of your bandmates or not because you've been living in a cubicle with them for, you know, for an extended period of time. If you increase the value in other people's lives, it comes full circle.

You end up being compensated and you're not compensated necessarily with what you're always expecting. Your compensated with value. Absolutely. I agree with that 100%. It doesn't have to be financial. It could be literally anything that makes a person feel better about themselves or makes a person happy. And one thing that I might push back on slightly is the CDs thing. Obviously don't give away like the actual CDs you sell. But a while ago I saw a band live and they were opening and they had burned CDs. And it was like a sampler written in Sharpie, which looks totally amateur but was really cool to It was five songs off the last couple records.

At the end of their set, they threw out about 10 or 15 of these in paper sleeves into the crowd like Frisbees, and I caught one. I didn't really care about the band at that point. They put on a good live show, but I walked back and I took a look at that emerged table. I saw what they have is like, Okay, like they actually are a really band, that they have actual merch. They have really CDs. This is just like their promo material. And on the way home I listened to it in the car is like thes guys air Amazing.

Well, guess what? That turned into me. Buying their music, playing them on the radio, doing an interview with them and that essentially random gift because they literally just through 10 or 15 of these burn CDs into the crowd, it gave them some opportunities. They added value into your life. Definitely. And who knows what the other people who caught those CDs did with those CD's, I'm sure Probably 10 out of the 15 people did nothing with them, but the other five probably treasure that memory being like, Hey, this band was like on a big tour and they gave me a free CD that they made themselves, you know, and to me, that's almost more special.

And what does that cost them, like 30 cents a C. D. S. O. They spent maybe $5 to throw out those 15 or so CDs that did not cost them much. In that case, I don't think it really is, Ah, financial item, either because it's not a piece of murder or something like that. It's like here, check out my band. Here's some free songs, just like how Maney bands do the classic Go sign up for our mailing list and you get a free song stuff like that. That kind of ties into the third Law, which is the law of influence.

And basically that says that if you put other people's interest first, that will affect and increase positively your influence on those people giving out these CDs. They are basically saying, We think you like this music, Check it out for free. So that's them saying to me, We care about what you think you know. And in the long run, this is also like eight years ago. I'm still a fan of that band. I still listen to that band. Ironically, that sampler is my favorite thing by that ban, but that's probably because that was the first thing I heard.

You know, that has the good memories of driving home from that show. Listening to that CD in the car on the way home, and it was a three hour drive with five songs. So it's like we listen to that a lot not gonna lie. That's for now all I have for the love influence. Aside from go read the book like it's totally worth it. Moving on to the Fourth Law, The Law of Authenticity The most valuable gift you have to offer is yourself, and that's kind of what you were saying earlier about helping somebody else out.

If you see a band on the side of the road with a flat tire, that is this exact law that's saying, Hey, we've been here. We're gonna help you out. What can we dio? That's exactly what this law is. Another term that I would even use for this law is the law of empathy. And that is, you know, take 30 seconds. Put yourself in their shoes. A lot of the time we've all been in those crappy situations, and, you know, they say, misery loves company. There is nothing more wonderful than when there's two people changing a tire rather than one.

You know, there's nothing more. One like you can't really fit. Two sets of hands in there to change the tire. It's a one person job, But even if you're there to hold the bolts, if it's nighttime, hold the flashlight. You know, if it's, you know, just just just keeping things a little bit more orderly, you know, so that one person isn't taking on the sole responsibility. These air, simple little ways that you know you can authenticate who you are. You really hit changing tires. That's fine. You don't have to pull over to help change their tire, but maybe you can pull over and have a conversation with them.

You know, if they're out of gas, maybe you could be the band that goes drive over and fills up a gas can and brings it back to them. There's so many different ways, so many different scenarios that you could be put in that have a different response. The point is, you empathize, and then you take action again. You're making yourself vulnerable to these people, and vulnerability is an invitation in, and invitations in are always the best place to start 100% and I think as part of all this we'll have to tie it to the fifth Law, which is the law of receptivity, which basically is saying that once you've given to someone, you need to be open to receiving from them, and so that's the kind of thing it's like.

I don't want to say pay it back, but it's almost pay it forward. For example, if you help someone out, even if they can't directly help you back, they might send some kind of opportunity your way or send someone your way to help you. Like if they're just, for example, if you help a band change a tire and then somebody sends them a show offer for, like, a corporate gig or something like a private event, it's like Oh, like, you know, 4000 bucks for a gig, Okay, like Private Show for X Y Z Company, like I'm down.

Except that band already has a show that night and they can't do it. They might say, Well, you know what? We're really sorry, but hit up those guys, you know they're chill. Maybe they'll take it and then X y Z corporate company or whoever is booking the show for them, for that corporate event is going to call up and say, Hey, so, uh, yeah, we wanted blah, blah, blah. But they said they can't do it and recommended you Are you available on April 17th? And that's the kind of thing where, even though they're not directly giving something to you, you are in their mind, is having helped them.

So they're gonna help you, and that's what brings it full circle and how the go giver attitude can positively impact your life. And like you were saying that these are all examples. So there are so many different ways that this could play out. But the main thing is, be a good person. That's all we're saying, because people will like you more and they will be more willing to help you. Absolutely. And that's not all. It will make you feel better now. I just wanted to take one second to talk about how to win friends and influence people.

You know, this book really hits on a lot of the same exact points as the go giver does. It doesn't put things into laws or so neatly categorized as the go giver does, which is why I highly recommend both of these books to you. They basically your books that are going to teach you the principle of investing in other people. That's a great way to put it. The business world is the world of investments about how much money you put into your brand is how successful your business will be now.

Investment in people, in my opinion, is exponentially stronger because while you're investing with a monetary resource into your band, if you are investing, your personal resource is into other people. There is the added benefit of them, possibly investing monetarily into your business for me. I have worked with a printing company for Ah Long, while called city to city apparel that is based out of South Jersey. Now the guy who runs the company, Dan, is amazing person, period. He's first rule is that he cares about people. Business comes second.

People come first and because dance had this business model for a long time, Whenever people come to me about who they do, they're printing through. I send them to him because for starters, he gives me a discount and not just for me, for the people that I send to him. If I refer anybody to him. Dan gives them a discount, and that's not in any way, shape or form required. He's a business, you know, If somebody referred me to Apple, Apple would not give me a discount if somebody referred me toe Walmart.

Walmart would not give me a discount on this guy. Does a majority of the work himself? He's the one that's on the other end of the text message or the email or, you know, when you need. In order of 40 shirts printed and shipped overnight, he's the one that stays up all night to make sure that your product is done correctly. He takes pride in his work, but he takes pride in his relationships. He does payment plans. He's trusting. He'll send you products before he's received money for them.

And that's because his first rule is trust. His first rule is if you give people the opportunity to be wonderful, then they will take it. If you take away from people and don't give them the opportunity to be wonderful, then they will not take it. And that's the community. And I think that's the essence of what we're kind of trying to teach here is that it's not about the bottom line. If you spend one year sacrificing and serving other people, you might not make very much money that first year.

But now you have 20 other people that are all backing your brand that are all supporting you, that when it comes time for you toe release a music video. Who knows they might be. Sharing it to their audience is, well, it increases your potential for reach. It increases your potential for good business, but most importantly, it improves value in the lives of yourself and of the people that you're working with. Everything we were hitting home is value value is different than cost. You know something like I could go pay $5 for something.

And the reason I'm willing to pay $5 for it is because it adds more value to my life than the $5 did. Well, that's why I'm willing to make that exchange. If you can harness away to add value in the lives of people around you, rather than adding value to your own life, you'll get further 10 times faster. Yeah, I agree with that, and I love how you put it with trust, saying that if you trust people and expect them to do wonderful things, that's what will happen. That's really a great way to put it.

Elon Musk has one of my favorite quotes says. I believe people can choose to be extraordinary, and I think that he's absolutely right. You know, people have this choice that they could make to be extraordinary and ah, lot of the time, those scenarios air created, they're not created without opportunity. So when you give somebody the opportunity to stand and deliver and you trust in them that they will and you add value into their life, those people don't want to let you down. Exactly. One piece of advice that I would give that I think kind of sums up both of these books is give with the hope that you will get another chance to give.

Thank you so much for listening to the podcast this week and every week we really appreciate you listening. And of course, we want you to be able to learn about running your band as a business in a smart, effective and efficient way. So next week, stay tuned for our episode, which will be all about show advances and how you can make your show's run more smoothly. The night of that will be right here in your favorite podcast app, starting at 6 a.m. Eastern time next Tuesday. Thanks so much for listening.

Once again. I hope you have an awesome week and keep rocking.