I was twenty-two years old, standing in a mall parking lot, terrified.
My upline had just dropped me off with a simple instruction: "Go talk to people. Don't come back until you've had ten conversations."
This was my introduction to cold prospecting. And while the context was network marketing—a world I've long since moved on from—the lessons I learned in those early days have shaped every business I've built since.
The Fear That Holds Everyone Back
Let me be honest about something: I was terrible at this.
My first attempt at approaching a stranger ended with me pretending to tie my shoe for three minutes while they walked away.
But here's what I learned: everyone feels this fear. The difference between those who succeed and those who don't isn't the absence of fear. It's the willingness to act despite it.
The Fundamentals I Learned
Lead with Genuine Curiosity
The worst cold approaches are the ones that feel like cold approaches. What works is genuine curiosity—actually being interested in the person in front of you.
Create Value Before Asking for Anything
Nobody owes you their time or attention. If you want someone to engage with you, you need to offer something valuable first.
Embrace Rejection as Data
Here's a reframe that changed everything: rejection isn't failure. It's data. Each rejection was information I could use to improve.
Play the Numbers Game (But Not Mindlessly)
Cold prospecting is, at some level, a numbers game. But it's not about maximizing quantity at the expense of quality.
What This Taught Me About Business
Comfort with discomfort. Building anything meaningful requires doing things that feel uncomfortable.
Resilience in the face of rejection. I've been rejected thousands of times since those mall parking lot days. Each rejection stings less because I've been training for it.
The ability to connect quickly. When you've had thousands of conversations with strangers, you develop an intuition for how to build rapport fast.
Those early days of cold prospecting were some of the hardest of my entrepreneurial journey. They were also some of the most formative.
