I had a conversation with a very close friend recently whom I’ve known for 19 years.
This person works in Realty, and has been struggling in her beloved industry of choice.
“In the last year,” she told me five days ago, with a heavy heart and a foreboding voice tinged with sadness, “84% of Realtors have only made one sale in the current housing market.”
This happens to coincide with the fact that my friend has entered this industry a year ago! She feels as if her prospects are looking pretty grim.
I’ve been thinking about this conversation all week.
And I’ve been comparing it in my mind to two things.
I’ve been comparing it to my ten years of experience working just about every job you can imagine under the sun, both White Collar and Blue Collar alike.
And I’ve been comparing it to my preparation for the Tap Out Cancer BJJ Open 2026 Tournament happening on October 10, 2026 outside of Chicago, Illinois.
THE COMBAT SPORTS CONNECTION
Today, I spoke with my friend again, having considered her situation, and wondering just how my experiences in life could help her.
What “lessons learned” have I gathered over the years could be of use…and furthermore, how are Sales and Combat Sports the same?
This is something I’ve thought about for a long time.
For example, I don’t think it’s any coincidence that the great Matt Furey was a Division I Wrestler under Dan Gable, the only American to win the Gold Medal in the Olympics for Full Contact Kung Fu, and was given the high honor of being one of the greatest Sales Letter Copywriters of all time…
An honor given to him by none other than Dan Kennedy himself, who is universally considered the greatest Sales Letter Copywriter of all time!
It was with all this in mind that I came to today’s conversation with my friend.
After our conversation ended she said: “Richard, you need to write everything you’ve told me in an article, so I can go over it again.”
So that is just what I have decided to do!
HERE’S THE DEAL
The first thing you’ve got to figure out when it comes to sales is…what does the person I’m talking to really want?
Not what they say they want, but what they really want.
And once you’ve figured that out, then you’ve got to connect what you’ve got to the thing that they want.
Because here’s the deal: if you can’t connect what you’ve got to what they want, they won’t take what you’ve got.
You can’t change what they want either…that’s something a lotta people get wrong.
They think the mark of a true salesman is to be able to sell something to somebody that they don’t really want…the “Ice to Eskimos” school of sales.
Anybody who’s ever actually sold anything knows that you can’t do that.
WHERE THE MAGIC HAPPENS
At the end of the day, it’s always about them…the customer and what they want.
And if you can’t connect your thing to what they want, you’re not going to sell them anything.
Now some people…what they want is incompatible with what you’ve got. So with them, you just need to cut bait and move on, and find somebody else who’s want is compatible with what you’ve got.
But just because it’s compatible, doesn’t mean that you’ve got the sale.
Not by a long-shot.
You as the salesman have got to link what you’ve got to their wants with your words and actions.
And that is where the Magic happens.
But you can’t do that unless you know what they really want first!
WHERE THE REAL WANT LIES
What people tell you what they want is 9 times out of 10 not what they really want.
There is a simple reason for this that most people don’t understand.
You see, what most people say they want is the material…
“I want the cheapest insurance” or “I want the best quality house” or “I want the newest car”.
And yes, they are technically right.
But that is not all that they want.
They think that’s all they want because they have been raised in a 20th and 21st Century paradigm of Materialism and Efficiency.
But deep down inside, they are not robots…
And deep down inside, that is where their real wants lie.
CATEGORIES GALORE
Now you can organize the real wants a few different ways. Here are the categories I like to use myself:
- Class
- Gender
- Age
- Sub-Culture
- Race
- Nationality
- Religion
- Life Experience
- Personality Types
- Zodiac Signs
Now here’s the deal…you have to understand the different wants of different groups within each category.
And you have to know them before you talk to them…and you have to communicate that you know this silently, almost as if through telepathy.
And then, you have to communicate that you know this through your choice of words, words that are selected to make the group within the category you are dealing with feel comfortable.
Now you may be thinking: “Gee! But I don’t know this stuff…how do I find out?”
Well, there is a bedding in period, where you can only find out these things through observation and listening.
But the trick is: observe the behavior and listen to the words of people in each category above, and classify it on a spread sheet or voice notes or old school pen and paper.
Here is what I mean…
THE GENERATION GAP
Let’s take a look at the category of Age.
Old folks want you to commiserate with them about how good it was back in the good old days and how bad it is in the bad new days, thereby positioning you as one of the “good ones who still gets it.”
People in their late 20s and early 30s want you to reassure them that you understand how hard things are financially now, and that you are right there in that boat with them and don’t judge them for it.
They know that economic woes make it harder for their dreams to come true, and they feel ashamed they have not made it yet despite doing the best they can.
They want to know you understand that, don’t judge them for not having reached them dreams, and respect their day-in and day-out hard work.
Middle Age people in their 40s and 50s are all about maintaining all the wonderful things they have accumulated and want to make sure you are safe and won’t rock the boat.
They also want to know that you can give them a few extras that the competition can’t, thereby “sweetening the deal” to make them feel special, while in the process of keeping them safe in their perfect social status they are terrified of losing.
KISS THE RING ON THE CHAIN GANG
The next thing you need to know is how to learn from Management and Formal Training.
Let’s be honest: Management lies, and Formal Training is often useless.
Management lies to you, not always outrightly, but always by omission.
See, they will tell you stuff, but not give you the key context to actually make sense of it.
Formal Training is the exact same way.
That is because the goal of the interaction is not to educate and enlighten you, but to show how powerful they are and low on the totem pole you are.
They know as you are nodding along blindly and that you have no idea what they are talking about.
And they know that you know you don’t what they are talking about…
And they like it that way.
The whole thing is a kiss the ring ritual so that, just like the old prisoner on the chain gang, you “know your place, boy!”
Sure, they may dress it up with false smiles and passive-aggressive fakery of “We’re all a family here! You can ask me anything…”
But no matter how many layers of deception they put on it, it is always the same BS.
But there is a way that you can circumvent this, however!
TWO STEPS THAT WILL SAVE YOU
If you go in listening to Management or doing Formal Training thinking you’re actually going to learn something, you’ll be sorely disappointed.
Doing so will only cause you to waste your energy trying to win an unwinnable game, leaving you in a tailspin of confusion and bitterness.
To prevent this, you’ve got to do two simple things.
First, go in knowing that they are lying by omission, and with each statement they make, ask yourself:
“What is the context they are hiding from me? What kind of context would make this un-cipherable statement make sense?”
Second, look for throw-away comments Management and Formal Training makes.
Because while the main body of the presentation is a kiss the ring ritual, the throw-away comments are the real the truth.
You need to look for these like a hawk and hoard them like gold, because they are often partial pieces of the context that you desperately need to understand what is going on.
And once you have them, you can use these individual gold nuggets to build out your understanding of the greater context that Management and Formal Training left out of the main body presentation.
At the end of the day, Management and Formal Training are not there to help you, so don’t expect this from them.
They are only potential sources of very, very partial information that you will have to bend over backwards to get.
Nothing more, and nothing less.
And as a bonus, this technique for dealing with Management and Formal Training is vital for learning about the real wants of your customers as well!
Look for their throwaway statements, and you will be in business!
THE ALMIGHTY DOLLAR
At the end of the day in business, your goal is to take as much money out of their pocket and put it into your pocket.
Anything else is charity.
Yes, you do it with Honesty and Honor .
Yes, you don’t rip people off.
And yes, you only do it for people who can pay.
But if you are not trying to take as much money out of their pocket and put it into your pocket, you are not doing business.
You are doing something else.
And that is ok…not everything in life is supposed to be business.
There are bonds of Blood and Honor and Loyalty that go far beyond the supposed “Almighty Dollar”. That’s why there are some activities that I don’t let money touch.
But when it comes to business, the “Almighty Dollar” is the name of the game.
And I’m not letting it stay in the client’s pocket.
WHAT UNCLE SAM KNEW
I like to think of it like this:
My Dad worked for the Federal Government for many years.
Now the Federal Government took as much money out of the pockets of the rich as possible and put it into Uncle Sam’s pocket.
And then, Uncle Sam gave some of that money to my Dad as his salary and pension.
My goal is to do the same…take as much money out of the pockets of the rich as possible to put in my pocket.
I’m just cutting out Uncle Sam as the middle man, and doing the damn thing myself.
Pulp Fiction Power to you, my friends!
Sincerely,
Richard Barrett
08-23-2026
Written at 3:00 PM, somewhere in the USA…
PULP FICTION RENAISSANCE 