The Impact of a Mentor
Who do you consider your greatest mentor?
I’ve had a lot of mentors. But in no way can I choose one who brought the most impact in my life.
One particular mentor, however, has taught me marketing in the shortest time possible as well as basic life skills such as picking a great piece of furniture.
In this article, I want to share with you three pieces out of the dozen pieces of advice I’m grateful to have received from him.
First, he taught me how to sell a pen.
Turns out everything you need to learn about marketing could be found in the movie “The Wolf of wall street”.
There’s this scene where Leonardo tries to teach his colleagues how to sell a pen in order to con dozens of men into buying cheap penny stocks with HUGE upside potential in the middle of THE silicon valley.
Working with my mentor in the past 8 months had a profound effect on me.
If I were to risk all my savings and built a business a year ago, I would have failed.
I would have wasted all my time on the useless stuff, get zero sleep and still get zero customers a year later because then I did not know that in selling something you needed three things: a need, a benefit, and urgency.
You can’t sell anything without having all three criteria.
When you sell anything even it’s a pen, you need to establish that there’s a need for the pen. And that’s when you point out the one benefit that would satisfy the need. And then lastly, you’ll need to find someone who needs a pen right NOW. If he doesn’t need it now, he won’t buy it even if your pen works in outerspace.
Second, he taught me that God is in the details
Within 8 months I’ve seen this phrase a hundred times.
In social media, for example, our staff would design this awesome photo to upload but turns out the positioning of the text is wrong.
Or maybe there’s something wrong with the colors.
Or that maybe the content is not relevant right now.
Turns out God IS actually in the details. There are little things that could make a good script, article or design sell BETTER to customers.
Developing this eye for details would bring you more customers.
Lastly, he taught/showed me how to work on the weekends
How do you work during the weekends?
Previously as a full-time developer, we would work non-stop even during the weekends.
Any tourist would have gone to more places in Cebu in three days than I had in my three years in Cebu.
Out of the many beaches in Cebu, I’ve only been to Moalboal, and God knows the sights I would have seen in the northern part of Cebu.
Compare that with the two weeks my mentor was in Dipolog.
He’s dined in ALL the bars and restaurants in the city,
Met more locals than we had in our 1 year in Dipolog,
Went to the remote beaches and even went snorkeling!
All with just a rented semi-automatic scooter.
Sometimes the best mentors are the ones who get on your nerve. Like your parents.
I never really realized the impact my mentor has on me until I’ve realized I’ve taken on the liking for elegant wooden furniture. And I realized it came from my mentor and that I’ve got so much more from him than being able to appreciate a good piece of furniture.
My mentor has taught me that selling is more important, and selling the same way Leonardo sells a pen would get you better results.
That in everything you do, even if it’s a script, an article or a photo, there are little details that make it better because God is in the details.
And lastly, for God’s sake, weekends are for fun.
Tonight I’ve realized why most people say their greatest mentors are their parents.
It’s because we never really think of our parents, the same way I did with my mentor, as mentors.
But when we grow up or mature, or in my case, when I realized my love for furniture, only do we realize that we are what we are today because of the influences they’ve had on us.
Tonight I’m grateful for all the mentors that have come into my life. I wouldn’t be who I am today if it weren’t for all the influences you’ve had on me.
I can’t think of a better ending but a big resounding, thank you.
