People Buy from People | Brian Sexton, MBA, Author

Transcript Disclaimer: This transcript is generated using speech-to-text technology and may contain errors or inaccuracies.

Mike Koelzer, Host: [00:00:00] Brian for those who haven't come across you online, introduce yourself and tell our listeners what we're talking about today. 

Brian Sexton, MBA: Well, it all started in 1971. When two people fell in love and a year later they had a bouncing baby boy. Now I've been active on LinkedIn and other social media platforms for several years, but really in the last year and a half to two years, I noticed that there was a lot of expertise being shared, but there was no encouragement being shared.

And the reason that I jumped on the platform as heavily as I did back in 2017, I went through a pretty, pretty Savage job loss. And so I was six months. Searching for a new position. And I was really using LinkedIn to try to network and, and try to, to see if I could land something. And I did land something through LinkedIn, but I kept seeing all this expertise and I'm like, wait a minute.

What about people like me out there that really needed encouragement? When people go through things, the last thing they need is expertise, but encouragement is universal. I thought, let me just get back and let me see if I can become LinkedIn's intentional encourager. 

Mike Koelzer, Host: You were in a pharmacy job of some sort back in like 2017.

Brian Sexton, MBA: Yeah. Yeah. So, so I'll, I'll, I'll kind of for those in the pharmacy business, I'll kind of give you my journey. I started out 26, almost 26 years ago in food service, you know, and, and got up to about 330 pounds because I like to eat a lot of the things that I sold. Wow. What do you know? Uh, about two 70s and my heavy stuff was 360 1.

No kidding. I'm a little beefy. This, this COVID, you know, this COVID thing I, I put on about 20, so yeah, 

Mike Koelzer, Host: joined the club, but no, 

Brian Sexton, MBA: I came to pharmacy kinda late, late in, in, in life. So to speak, I spent 15 years in the food service industry working for the two biggest food service distributors in the United States, and also worked for the two largest food service brokerage companies in Kentucky and west Kentucky and Western Pennsylvania.

And then you had 

Mike Koelzer, Host: clients, you called on restaurants or 

Brian Sexton, MBA: I did. Yeah, I, I did. I called on restaurants, hospitals, nursing homes, schools. When I was a broker, Mike, I, I, I got my first job in food at 22 years old and I got hired with this company and I said, well, the main line you're gonna represent is Sarah. Mm.

I thought to myself, I have died and gone to heaven here. right. I was like, yes. Yes, indeed. Man. It was, it was fun. You know, you always get let in the door, when you had that red bag and you had samples for people, they always let you come with samples. Yeah. They'd always let you in the door. That was fun.

Nice. And so I got to represent some cool lines in that side of the business. I represented Nestle and Sarah Lee and 

Mike Koelzer, Host: was that cold calling and just supporting a business, 

Brian Sexton, MBA: You know, when I worked for the distributor, um, that was my job was territory management and cold calling and things like that.

When I worked for a broker, I worked with distributors to go into these customers and sell new menus. I left that business in 2009, after I had weight loss surgery, I just wanted to kind of do a whole different, different thing. And I ended up in higher education for about three years. And in fact, the college that I worked for Mike, um, while I was there, they started a farm tech program.

And, so we were recruiting students for farm tech. And so then I transitioned in 2012, got the opportunity to work with my late father. Uh, my dad called me one day and said, we'd love for you to come to work with me and, you know, thought about it, prayed about it. And I was like, you know, there's, I mean, I got this opportunity and we had some really long-term goals, and we worked together for 10 months and then he passed away on the road.

And so what field was that in Mike? That's the interesting thing that was in heavy duty rotating electrics. So the layman's terms are starters and alternators and the component parts. I am the least technical guy you would ever wanna meet. did that for about three or four years. And here's how I got into pharmacy.

I was sitting in a school bus show. I was sitting in a national school bus show in Richmond, Virginia. My son had just started his freshman year of high school and my wife called me and she said, Bryce made the basketball team look fantastic. But Mike, I was traveling. I was on the road three nights a week, covering six states from Memphis, Tennessee to Charleston, South Carolina.

And I had a big decision to make. I was like, do I want to be a dad that his wife FaceTimes B for ball games during the week? Or do I wanna be home? [00:05:00] And so, you know, I was really struggling because my dad wasn't there. And I said, what do I do? And so I called my mom and I said, Dad got me into this industry, but I, I, I, I, I don't want to disappoint him and she said, you need to do what you've gotta do.

And so that's how I, I saw an ad for a retail pharmacy chain here knew the former CFO. And this is a cool part of the story Mike, I called. And I said, Hey, I see this ad indeed. And, and I'm interested. I'm trying to find this person. And, and the, the administrative assistant said, well, he doesn't work here anymore.

And I said, well, the reason I called was this. And she said, if you'll send me your email directly, I'll make sure you get into the stack. I mean, it was literally right at the cutoff. And so when I got the job, she told me, she said, you know, I never answer the phone. You just happened to call the day I answered the phone.

And so that's how I jumped into the world of pharmacy. Was that one pharmacy? Yes. It was a 30 store retail pharmacy chain. And so they, you know, were presented with an opportunity, Mike, to get into the specialty pharmacy game because. A lot of the drugs that they were doing were open distribution drugs.

And so, you know, they got an opportunity to get into that, um, through a, through a certain business model where they would have a third party that would do their prior a and, and, and, you know, do that service for, for an office. And so my job was to walk in and go, Hey, you know, we know there's a certain percentage of scripts that you are, that you're sending out to mail order pharmacies.

We can fill those here locally. All of this 

Mike Koelzer, Host: gives credence to your book title, because you've been in food. You've been in college recruiting. You've been in, you know, a car and big machinery you've been in prescription. 

Brian Sexton, MBA: I kind of feel like Forrest Gump, Mike . I, I probably, instead of writing the book, people buy from people, it should have been tied to life as like a box of chocolates.

Mike Koelzer, Host: You've been in so many things. And so your 

Brian Sexton, MBA: book, I didn't play running back at Alabama. I'll just say 

Mike Koelzer, Host: that. I always tell people I'll just do it very nonchalantly. I'll say I played because my dad got a scholarship to Purdue in football, but he only played back. Then they had JV teams, like they didn't know they had JV teams and he heard his shoulder never was able to continue.

He kept his scholarship. In fact, you remember Len Dawson. Oh, very 

Brian Sexton, MBA: well great Kansas city, chief quarterback. Lenny 

Mike Koelzer, Host: I call him Lenny. Like I knew him, but yeah, he came into my dad's fraternity ATO when my dad was still at Purdue. So in other words, my dad might have been a, I don't know, a junior and Len came in as a freshman.

By that time, my dad wasn't playing, but they lived together and that's all I knew of the story I actually tried 

Brian Sexton, MBA: to. And he wasn't Lynn Dawson, the hall of fame quarterback for the Kansas city chiefs. No, he was just 

Mike Koelzer, Host: Len Dossett just to, you know, I actually tried to re-reach out to him about a dozen years ago with Twitter or something like that, but never did.

But what I'll tell people is I'll say back when I played football at Purdue, you know, and some, just let it go and some stopped me and I'm like, well, yeah, I didn't, I just played out in the out in the field with some of my friends toss a football, or I never said I was on produced football team. You know what, 

Brian Sexton, MBA: Mike, that reminds me of the story.

So 1970, um, the school that I went to Marshall university had a plane crash that took out the, the, the, the entire football team. Right. So. My dad was a senior in high school in 1970. And my dad being the youngest of 12 kids, there was a program that the local school system had where kids in the community that didn't have a lot of money and were, were underprivileged could, could work in the community.

The community would have jobs for them. My dad ended up working at Marshall university around the football team. So the summer of 1970, he was down at Golic and hall where they would work out, play basketball, keep himself in shape over the summer, they'd watch uniforms. They would get things ready for the start of the season.

And then on game days, because he was 17, he could only work home games into the fall. And so, um, you know, he would go down for home games, he'd go behind the goal post and, and throw the ball back to the, to the place kicker. And, and again, that part of the story is relevant because he was 17 years old. Had he been just a few months older, the plane crash happened November 14th, 1970.

My dad, my dad turned 18 on August the eighth, 1970, or April 8th, 1971. So about five and a half months had my dad been about five and a half months older. He would've been 18. And having it been entrenched, probably would've been at a freshman at Marshall, then he likely could have been on that plane that went down.

That was so infamous. And so, but because he was 17 and still in high school, they couldn't travel until he, he couldn't travel until he was 18. And so he and my mom were on a date that night [00:10:00] and, and turned on the radio and, and heard about the plane crash. Wow. 

Mike Koelzer, Host: You wonder how many of those things are like that in life?

You know? Yeah. And, and 

Brian Sexton, MBA: you know, when the movie came. My dad and I went to see it. And what was that? 

Mike Koelzer, Host: We are Marshall 

Brian Sexton, MBA: or something like that, or? Yeah, the movie was called. We are Marshall. Absolutely. I remember that. Yeah. Yeah. I have a friend of mine that I worked with in the newspaper business. I've known the guy for 30, almost 35 years.

He was a freshman on that. He was a red shirt freshman on that 70 team. And to your point freshman back then were ineligible to play varsity football. So, yeah. Um, he was there on campus as part of the football team, but couldn't play because he was ineligible. So being ineligible wasn't there wasn't anything for him to travel.

Wow. And so, uh, yeah, I've known Dave probably 35 years and, and, uh, red Dawson have met red Dawson a couple times. He's featured in the movie. He was an assistant coach that was supposed to be on the plane. Wow. And gave his seat up to an older assistant coach because the older assistant coach had to get back to Huntington for his granddaughter's piano recital.

You know, the 50th anniversary was a few months back. and, and man, the, the, the emotional scars are still there for a lot of people in this, in this region. And, um, it's really something, the folks can't see the audio, but behind me is a Marshall football helmet. I've got my Marshall class ring on.

And so, yeah, you know, when everybody talks about the movie, we are Marshall, the scene that Matthew McConaughey plays, where he takes the guys up to spring hill cemetery, that they, they actually film that in Huntington, at spring hill cemetery. 

Mike Koelzer, Host: Wow. 

Brian Sexton, MBA: In front of the monument to the six unidentified football players that died in the, in the plane crash.

Mike Koelzer, Host: Wow. 

That's something, 

Brian Sexton, MBA: yeah. That's a, 

That's a real place. Yeah. If anybody's listening to this podcast, they come to Huntington. Look me up. I'll take you up to spring hill cemetery and show you, yeah. The marker up. 

there 

Mike Koelzer, Host: Boy, you're a bundle of joy. No, I'm just kidding. um, Hey, 

Brian Sexton, MBA: see, I don't have people that break me on my podcast, but you, you know, uh, you know, I, I just, uh, you know, I, I have a tendency to break people, but that's good, Mike.

Yeah. Thanks man. 

Mike Koelzer, Host: So, 

so, you've been in all these professions and 

Brian Sexton, MBA: yeah, we've established, I've kind of job off a little bit. 

Mike Koelzer, Host: What I love about that. I think that's really cool. It proves the point of your book, entitled people buy from people mm-hmm because you probably never imagine that you'd be selling, you know, parts for heavy industrial equipment and so on, but you have no clue.

Yeah. You knew that you would be selling people. Now the average listener of this program. And it's varied, but I think a lot of our listeners, I know a lot of 'em are independent pharmacy 

Brian Sexton, MBA: owners. Yeah. And, and by the way, the forgotten people in healthcare too, you know, I hear a lot of people talk about healthcare workers and things like that.

Right. My hat's off to those independent pharmacy owners, because again, you know, um, let me step off here for just a second, you know, in our industry, as you well know, a lot of pharmacies are, you know, a lot of, a lot of insurance companies mandate they're, they're mandating the independent pharmacies out of, of these, of these things.

And my hat's off to those folks that continue to fight the good fight for those patients and continue to build relationships with those patients. Yeah. Continue just to, to understand. More intuitively the needs of their patients. And so, um, if you're listening, you're an independent pharmacy owner, my hat's off to you.

Thank you. And thank you. Well, thank you for what you do in the, in the community. Well, 

Mike Koelzer, Host: on behalf of my listeners, I thank you for that acknowledgement. So my point is most pharmacy owners don't think of themselves as selling because they're like people come to us, we don't sell, we just know people and we sell mm-hmm their needs, you know?

So if a patient comes in, I'm not trying to sell 'em this and that. I'm just trying to. Serve them. I know their family, you know, it's people and it's like, yeah, that's what Brian's talking about here. That's what sales is about pharmacists. Yeah. Are they the best sales people there are? And they don't realize that because the salesperson does not, this what's the word swarming.

Is that the word? Well, 

Brian Sexton, MBA: Here's the thing, Mike. I love where you're going with this conversation because yeah. The pharmacist has always been a trusted source in the community because people feel like they can ask questions to their pharmacist that they're not really comfortable asking their doctor. Hmm.

And, and so, you know, the pharmacist is available when it's 6: 30, 7: 30, 8: 30 at. and they're taking something and it's the first time they've taken it. And maybe they're taking something with that particular medication or they, [00:15:00] you know, they've got a little cough or sniffle or something like that, you know, not everything is COVID 19.

Mm-hmm , you know, you do get a little cough or 

Mike Koelzer, Host: sniffle. Are you saying there's still other illnesses out there? Uh, yeah. I mean, I don't believe it, Brian. Yeah. I should have wore 

Brian Sexton, MBA: mask for this. I thought 

Mike Koelzer, Host: all other illnesses just stopped. There's no flu or anything anymore. People don't die 

Brian Sexton, MBA: from that. Exactly.

But you know, Mike, here's the thing. The pharmacist has always been a trusted source and there's a comfort level because here's the thing. My wife will do this. If my wife is unsure about something, she'll be like, well, I need to call a pharmacist. Hmm. Shouldn't call her family doctor. And so again, man, I think that the independent pharmacy owner is in a great position right now to really be impactful.

And so stepping back to people, buy from people. The first thing you'll find in that book is that I make a statement that says that people buy connections before they ever make a transaction. And so again, if, if you're that independent pharmacy owner, if, if I'm in your shoes, I'm connecting with everybody that comes through the door.

I'm not just greeting them. I'm trying to connect with them. I wanna have a five minute conversation where I can find a piece of information out about you that connects you and I, and so the next time you come into my pharmacy, I want to ask you about that piece of information. I wanna file that away and build, continue to build connection with 

Mike Koelzer, Host: you, Brian, when you say file mm-hmm are you being figurative or would you ever take as a pharmacist owner and physically file that summer?

Would you ever write that stuff down? 

Brian Sexton, MBA: Well, let me give you a good example. Um, when I do the intentional courage or podcast yeah. In a conversation, I will say something. That someone says, and it could have been three, four minutes back, you know, could have been three or four minutes back. I'll go. And I'll say, Hey, let me, let me come back to that for just a second.

I think a good independent pharmacist can file that away mentally. And, if you need a, a cheat sheet or something to write that down with, I, I don't think that there's nothing there's anything wrong with that, because that, that patient, that customer doesn't know what you did. They, they don't know.

Listen, fans, fans in the stands don't care how much time and effort somebody put in the weight. Or in the film room to get ready for the game. All they care about is what's happening on the field 

Mike Koelzer, Host: or on the court. If you look at Harvey McKay, swim with the sharks, mm-hmm, , you know, he talks about McKay 66 of writing these things down.

I've I've always thought it'd be cool to have a spot in our computer system. Mine's just memory, you know, and if I'm there more, I can remember it. Yeah. For our listeners, he would say to his salespeople that they had to get this list of 66 things filled out where they went to college or favorite food, you know, their anniversary.

It was a list of 66 things. I just wonder if any pharmacists, uh, these days write stuff down. I probably should. Once in a while, I think about putting something in the patient profile, like they went to Florida for their anniversary, you know, in February, you know what I mean? Just to have that, 

Brian Sexton, MBA: But here's the thing: what's better is hanging onto the stuff that people throw away.

Mm. So, a throwaway comment. Okay. So, let's think about this for a second. You talk about Harvey McKay 66 things. Yeah. If I am a good connector, I'll remember the core things. I should know the core things. If I'm a great connector, I'll remember the things you don't think. I think about it, I like to hang on to throw away comments, because again, somebody says something in a conversation and they say it just, just throwing it out there.

It's like, oh, I'm just gonna throw this out here. And, and again, it goes back to the old adage. Mike, one man's junk is another man's treasure. Yeah. And, and so again, I wanna hang on to this stuff that you didn't think I caught. Give me an example of that. We're recording this. You and I can see each other on video.

Yeah. I'm noticing behind you. There's a guitar. It looks like an acoustic four stringing base. It is. Okay. But if I'm focused straight ahead, And I say, well, yeah, Mike's got on a black t-shirt and he's got a microphone and he is got, he's got headphones. 

Mike Koelzer, Host: Don't tell people about my pajama bottoms. That was in confidence before we started recording.

Brian Sexton, MBA: Never, never you, but I, I will not forget that. I will not forget that. 

Mike Koelzer, Host: Okay. So you see my bass 

Brian Sexton, MBA: guitar, but I see that four string acoustic, right? So I've played bass for about 25 years. I taught myself how to play, with a little help from a guy I went to church with, I taught myself how to play a four string bass guitar.

So I have a Washburn. I have a Washburn bass. That's about 30 years old with fender flat wound strings. [00:20:00] And, and so picking up in the back to you, that's something that's just sitting there, thrown away, right? To me, it's like, ah, that's a, that's a four string acoustic bass. And so now you're looking at me and you're going, yeah.

That's right. Well, Mike, tell me a little bit more about. When did you start playing? When did you start playing bass? And, and then when I can go, Hey, you know what? I kind of picked the bass up and a guy in my church who played guitar, taught me the threats. Yeah. And I went from there and I, I just started learning how to play bass.

And so now, now it's a deeper connection because now I noticed something you didn't think I picked up on, but it's all about again, it's honing back in on you. Mm-hmm and, and, and you're going, yeah, man, let me tell you about that bass. I do that all the time. When people come on my podcast, I just kinda look around.

And so that was one of the chapters in the book. People are observant, you know, all you gotta do is watch. All you gotta do is look, I couldn't help, but notice, Hey, I, you know, tell me about that. Hey, tell me about your hat that you got on. Or, and, and those conversations might, don't have to be two hours long, right?

But that pharmacist can. Hey, um, saw your son here the other day. Right? Man. Kids getting tall. Hey, I noticed he was wearing a baseball jacket. Is he playing baseball this summer? You know, and now you're going, because let me tell you something, I've been married for almost 25 years. My wife is happiest when I notice something that needs to be done and she doesn't have to tell me to do it.

And so again, by, by observing, by watching. You get that sense of deeper connection, deeper connection, deeper connection. 

Mike Koelzer, Host: Sometimes people can almost stab themselves in the, but by writing something down because I'll have a salesperson, you know, they'll come in like two years later, you know? And they'll say, how was Drew's baptism?

It's like, come on, I don't hold this against you, but I know you wrote that down because I hardly even remember. I have a son named Drew, much less remembering when his baptism was. And so that's good, more power to him, but I know they wrote some of that stuff down. 

Brian Sexton, MBA: You know, what a great salesperson does.

You know what salespeople don't, don't forget. What's that, Mike? Hey, I saw your daughter come in last week. I know she lives out of town. How's she doing? How's it? How's she doing? Right. You know, or I'll tell you this. And I wrote about it and people buy from people. It's not the happy moments.

and those are good. It's not the happy moments that bonds and cement relationships. It's walking in the door. I had a customer, I walked in the door one Thursday morning and I walked in and I bounced in there like I do every Thursday morning. And I noticed the girl that I was calling on a little small hotel and the girl I usually talk to, she goes, she's wiping tears away from her eyes.

And she said, I lost my brother last night. Mm. My brother choked to death. He was in Arizona, his apartment. And so you go to the funeral home and, or, you know, you, you, you walk, you go. And, I had a little sandwich shop in a little town called Oak hill, Ohio, and a little sandwich shop there. And I go there on Mondays and.

Nobody's there. You're trying frantically to get ahold of him and you get ahold of the owner and said, yeah, our son got killed in a four Wheeler last night. Mm. Those are the moments. You better be a connector. Those are the moments you better remember the right things to do. And say, because the, the, the happy moments are easy.

Right. You know, Drew's baptism, that's, that's easy. It's those hard moments that really separate the, the good connectors from great 

connectors. 

Mike Koelzer, Host: A lot of people don't wanna bring that stuff up unless they're told, unless they're given permission by someone like you, they don't think that those are appropriate, but they are right.

Brian Sexton, MBA: Oh, a hundred percent. And, Mike, I'm, I'm a Christian. So, I would go in, I would go in, to see customers. And I would say, can I pray for you? If I noticed they were. Not, I had a lot of customers that just said, yeah, I, I really wish you would. In fact, even to this day, I, I, I was CA I was talking to a, to a, an account and she told me when I called her the other day, she said I really needed, I was just calling to check in, I that's what I've been doing since the, the pandemic.

And I've been working from home and she said, I just needed [00:25:00] to talk to you today. Mm. Just needed to talk to you today. And so that's when you know, you're doing something right. And again, it's not that, that, that, the big pharmacy chains don't have those people that can connect, but, but we're talking to independent pharmacy owners.

If you're doing things that your competition is not doing, you're going to connect with patients and customers, because they're not doing it. Focus on connection. If you focus on connecting first with your customers, You're gonna get things. You're, you're gonna reap the benefits from that. And, and so Mike, that, that's the, that's the biggest takeaway from people buy from people.

It's not a sales book. Yeah. Don't buy it. If you want a sales book, it's not a sales book, but if you say to yourself, man, I'd really love to connect with people deeper, better, and stronger. Uh, when you read chapter one and chapter one is people by consistency. I think you'll figure it out pretty quick. And in chapter 10 is people buying memories and, and so you figure out pretty quickly they buy authenticity, uniqueness, motivation, meekness, um, some other chapters there.

I wrote the book. I can't remember what I wrote. so I mean, good grief. And I worked on the second book. I, I already real, I guess I could cheat. I 

Mike Koelzer, Host: could, I could pull it. Wait a minute. I've got 'em here. I've got, I've got people 

by 

Brian Sexton, MBA: consistency, engagement, thankfulness, authenticity, empathy, uniqueness, meekness, motivation, observation, and memory.

So if, if you, uh, but Mike, I'll tell you, I'll tell you where that quote came from. It was a quote from my dad. My dad told me before I got my first sales job, he said, never forget. Some people buy from people. And I really thought my dad was teaching me about sales, but my dad, I, I was halfway through the book writing it and I had a V8 moment and I was like, my dad's not teaching me about sales.

He's teaching me about connection. and, and, and so, yeah, and, and, and again, I can't ex I can't express it enough. If, if you wanna do two things differently, then your competition's doing, yeah, this is, this is a freebie for your listeners. You, you don't even have to have to buy the book to get this. You wanna do things that your competitors are not doing.

Here's two things you need to start doing, encourage your customers and connect with your customers. You do those two things, cuz I promise you, the big boys are not doing that. It gets you in, gets you out, buys stuff, right. Have a nice day, right. Or else they wouldn't need to do some of the things that they're doing to attract customers.

If you're an independent pharmacy owner and you want to, to attract new customers, here you go. Encourage your customers to come back, encourage your customers and don't sell. Encourage 'em and say, Hey, you know what? We have a lot of customers that use this product for this reason. I believe it'll help you, but you know what, Hey, if it's not for you, don't worry about it.

I just wanted to encourage you to keep yourself healthy, you know, encourage your customers. And then the second thing is connect with 

Mike Koelzer, Host: them. All right, Brian devil's advocate. I grew up in my dad's pharmacy. Like maybe a lot of our listeners. Well, probably not in my dad's pharmacy, but in their own, in their own dad's pharmacy or mom's pharmacy.

Yeah. Yeah. For me it seems like second nature. Mm-hmm and I bet a lot of people say that growing up with their dad as good sales people, good fathers and good sales people. And, and this is not a, well, yeah, it is. This is like false humility. Basically. I'm saying Brian, don't you think that this is so natural for everybody?

And then you'll say to me, And if you don't say it, I'll splice it in, you'll say, well, Mike, it's natural for you. 

Brian Sexton, MBA: well, Mike, my initials are BS. So you put two and two together. Okay. You can splice that in if you want to. I I'm 

Mike Koelzer, Host: good with that. It seems like it is natural for everybody. Is it? I mean, does every pharmacist already have someone who opens an independent pharmacy or is it not so natural?

Brian Sexton, MBA: Yeah, so, so, uh, what, what I wrote in the book in the chapter on thankfulness, I said this, I said, what if you started thanking people proactively instead of reactively, kind of to your point about it being second nature. And let's think about that concept for just a second. Mike, when, whenever, you know, so the independent pharmacy owner that's out there, you know, they're when they're doing customer service training or they're training somebody on a front register or something like that, you know, wanna greet the customer, smile, thank them for their business, all those things that are reactive.

So it's reactive. When that customer walks in the door, we go, oh, hi, welcome to hometown pharmacy. Thanks for coming. Or, you know, if they're back at the pharmacy counter, they're picking up that prescription and they're, and, and the pharmacist or the farm tech, or whoever's back there [00:30:00] working days, oh, well, well, thank you.

You know, have a nice day, you know, be well, whatever it is, stay healthy, whatever it's all reactive. And so my thought in people buying from people is what if we turned that to proactive? What if we started thanking people proactively before they ever made a transaction or before they ever made a connection or before any relationship was established, we started proactive things.

How much different would you be in the marketplace if you were proactive? With thankfulness. So to your point about it being second nature, it's second nature because it's reactive. It's what we're taught and what we're trained to do. My dad always said this to my sisters and I, he always said, if somebody does something for you, you thank them for it, but we don't do that proactively.

It's, give it give, get it first. And then we're like, oh, thank you. You know, that's, that's thoughtful of you. You know, what if, what if we could say, and, and, and, and sometimes these customer appreciation, bull crap promotions that happen in the marketplace, it's like, well, customer appreciation. Um, we're gonna give away a six pack of Coke 

Mike Koelzer, Host: if you make it bud light.

You got a deal though. 

Brian Sexton, MBA: Yeah. I mean, but, but why that's not a customer appre a true customer appreciation is, look, we wouldn't be in business without you. We're grateful to you and everybody that comes in today, no matter what they purchase, we're gonna give you 20% off just because you don't have to buy a minimum.

You don't have to do this or that. We just wanna say, thank you. And oh, by the way, um, we're gonna kick an extra 10% in here and we may do a big raffle, or we may just give away cake or something like that. Just because, or just say, Hey, it's Thursday, we're gonna give, we're gonna give candy bars to the kids.

Or if you come in and you say, Hey, you know, it's Thursday. Why don't you? Why don't you 

Mike Koelzer, Host: take candy bar? All right, Brian, here's my counter argument to that. A good friend comes to you and says, Brian, I appreciate you. You've been there. You've been a friend, you've listened to me. This kind of stuff, Brian. I'm gonna give you a shiny new coffee mug.

You see what I'm saying? They wouldn't do that because it would cheapen it. So when can you cheapen appreciation? Like I think if I ever called you up someday and I said, Brian boy, it was sure, nice meeting you. And I appreciate your, um, talking to me. I appreciate that. You prayed for me, Brian, I'm gonna give you $5.

You know, it's like, Aw, you ruined it, Mike. I would've loved it if you would've just called me and said, thanks for being a good guy. Goodbye. Now that you put $5 on it, you've just cheapened everything. So when does that cheapen stuff, when you appreciate people, 

Brian Sexton, MBA: because there is a vast difference between appreciation and value, here's what I'm talking about.

Tell me more about that. Here's what, here's what I'm talking about. All right. If you gave me that coffee mug and you said, Brian man, I was, I was here. I was thinking about our relationship. and listen, I know you love hot tea. In fact, I'm drinking one now. I know you love hot tea and, uh, man, you know, I, I don't know if you like these mugs or not, but yeah, man, I was just thinking about you and I know you love hot tea and listen, I, I, this cannot tell you what I value about you most.

Gotcha. But, man, you're a Reds fan. And so man, I just, I wanted to pick this up because I just wanted to show you. Mm. I just wanted to show you that, that I value our friendship and, and, and your, your friendship means a ton to me that would be valuable to me. I would, you, you, I wouldn't throw that away for anything.

And, and here's why I say there's a vast difference between value and appreciation. Mike, I want you to think about something here. Here is an analogy. If your house is on fire tonight and I pray it's not. if your house is on fire, you're gonna grab some things that you can't replace. Sure. And so I've got them here in my, where I am.

I've got a suit that belonged to my dad. I've got a couple of hats. Yeah. I'm gonna grab a watch that belongs to him. So what we're gonna grab are things we can't easily replace wallet's cell phone yeah. Stuff that we have to have. Right. Right. And so think about those relationships with your customers and understand independent pharmacy owners. When you value that customer and you do the extra things to keep that customer, you are showing [00:35:00] far more than appreciation to them.

You're showing them that they're valued. Hmm. And it's not just, well, a dear valued customer. No, I don't feel valued when I get a dear John letter saying dear valued customer. Right. If you really valued me, you'd say, dear Brian, We wanted to send you a letter just because we value your business. And here's why see, most of the time, Mike, we don't put the why behind us, why we value people.

We don't put the why behind it. And so here's the thing I, I, and, and I'll share this with your audience. I had somebody reach out to me the other day, wanting to be on the intentional encouragement podcast. And I love that. Thank you. That's, that's, that's humbling, but they didn't tell me why. They just said why.

I think this person would be good for your podcast. And so I sent a voice message back on LinkedIn, and I said, okay, tell me why. If, if you came across and then the person said I came across your podcast, I think my business partner would be good. I said, okay, thank you. Tell me why. Because all you did was reach out and said, I, I think, and here's the thing to take, I think out of your vocabulary, nobody cares what you think.

Replace it with, I believe. beliefs are a lot harder to challenge than thoughts. Everybody has thoughts. It's much harder to challenge beliefs and beliefs come from a deeper place. Right? When you believe something, you've put a lot of thought into it. It's thought driven. It's been tested. That's how it becomes a belief versus thinking like, for me, I know what medications work for me because I've tested them.

I've proven them. And so I believe in those medications. And so when my doctor says, well, I think we should do this, I would say, okay, well then tell me why. Why do you think this way? Or do you believe it? Because if you believe it, then you're gonna be resolute in moving forward with it. If I tell my right, if I tell my wife, I think I love you.

And I think so after 24 and a half, I think I love you that it's not gonna fly, but if I tell her, Hey, look. I believe that I am more in love with you now than I've ever been in my life. And here's why you put that. Why behind that belief, man, that's a hard combination to beat. All 

Mike Koelzer, Host: right, Brian, let me go back on this though.

So my point is valid though, of saying, if you tell everybody you value them and then you say, we're gonna give 20% off, you have cheapened that. What if you took that 20%? And I know you're saying this, but what if you took that 20% and you said, we're gonna take our top 200 customers and we're gonna try to find out what's valuable to them.

And we're, and instead of spending, let's say 10 bucks across the board, we're gonna make that 10 bucks talk with either a Red's coffee mug, someone else we're gonna, you know, give them this or that. I know that's hard, but I'm giving that 20% off. Is that speaking of value or is that cheapening? It, because to your point, it'd be like, what if I said, Brian, here's this mug with Cincinnati on it, but then you found out that I gave one to your brother and to everybody else too.

Right? 

Brian Sexton, MBA: Well, but here's, here's the counter argument to that. So what if you have a customer that's trying you for the first time that doesn't feel valued somewhere else. Mm. And you have extended that hand, that right. Hand of fellowship. And you said, you know, well, if you don't mind me asking, you know, we, we know a lot of our customers that come into our pharmacy.

Do you mind me asking what brought you in today? Yeah. I, I saw your 20% off and my pharmacy doesn't do that for me. And so now you have the opportunity to really build some value and say, well, yeah, that, that our, we do that for our customers quite often because of gotcha. We want them to understand that this independent pharmacy is different.

You know, here's the thing, Mike, a lot of people are looking for ways to feel valued as customers. And, and if you want to keep me as a customer, that coffee mug that you give me, if it's something that connects with me, I'm probably gonna go. I don't care who you give it to. I like that. Thank 

Mike Koelzer, Host: you.

Gotcha. You know, if I find something that is universal, that connects with everybody more power to me, and sometimes that is just a cash or a discount. 

Brian Sexton, MBA: So why do you think giveaway promotions are still effective with, with some of these things? Because, because a lot of times people can see some value in that they go, well, yeah, that's worth five bucks.

You know, five bucks is five bucks. And so, right. You know, and, and, and again, if, if we're gonna distinguish ourselves as, as independent pharmacy owners, we're gonna distinguish ourselves in the marketplace, then we've gotta do what, what our [00:40:00] competition is not doing. Listen, Mike, I try to do everything for the most part.

Intentionally I have always 90% of the time there's intention behind what I say and do, because again, we've got a society of too many throwaway lines. And we've got a society of sound bites instead of, instead of substance, right? So we, we, we want, we wanna talk in sound bites instead of, instead of substance, if I wanna connect with you, Mike, I want to have a substantive conversation because the best relationships and, and I want you, I want, I want your audience to hear this professionally personally, with customers, the greatest relationships are always cultivated in common ground.

The greatest relationships that you have are always cultivated in common ground. Don't worry about what you don't agree on. 

Mike Koelzer, Host: Common ground. 

Brian Sexton, MBA: Look for that place, that that customer is looking to go and go there with them. Hmm. Walk that journey with it. Give an example of that, Brian. Well, here's the thing. In sales, a lot of people are taught to lead.

You know, they're, they're taught to, you know, you gotta pull that customer in. You gotta, you, you know, push your product. Mm-hmm . And I was telling a friend of mine that I invented a product. I said, your problem is you're pushing your product. When you push you do this, you, you push your, you push your hands out when you pull somebody in, you bring them to you.

And, and so again, we wanna pull that customer to us. We wanna pull them toward us. And, and, and the way that we should be doing sales is walking arm in arm, shoulder to shoulder with a customer and saying, show me what you see in this buying process. Yeah. Show me where you are. And then, because here's the thing.

If we're leading them, we're out in front. Right. And we see something totally different than what they see. Don't lead your customer to that buying process. Walk with them. I have 

Mike Koelzer, Host: to, I gotta share this story with you, Brian. I know a lot. Yeah, please. I know a lot of this. This is figurative that you're talking about, you know, but, so I used to have this pharmacist.

He was always pretty contentious with people. It could have been something pretty small, but he was contentious. Tempers would get up and stuff. So I said to myself back then, I said, if I ever get into a situation, that's pretty contentious like that. I'm gonna go and physically stand on the same side of the counter with this person, you know?

So figuratively, at least we were looking well. Not just figuratively, but we're actually looking in the same direction, you know, going forward. Yeah. So , this was about six months ago. Well, why 

Brian Sexton, MBA: wouldn't, why wouldn't you stand in the same spot? They are to see what they see. Yeah. Let me tell you why , 

Mike Koelzer, Host: because it was about six months ago and this is after I'd been away from the store for about five years.

I hadn't, I'd only end once in a while. So I'm finally there and I go in, and this lady's just pissed. She's pissed at everybody, you know? So I said, okay, I'm gonna practice. I'm gonna go stay on the same side. And I'm gonna say, look, I know you're pissed, but I've said, you know, these damn insurance companies, you know, they're, they do this and that to us and I can see where you're coming from and all this kind of stuff.

Yeah. So I can get over there to her side. And she looks at me and I swear there was smoke coming from her ears. And she said, . She said to me, " I'm only gonna say this one time. She said, get. Away from me. It's not like I was in her lap. I mean, I was a foot or two firm, but I thought, well, there goes that idea.

Brian Sexton, MBA: Mike, I love what you said there. I had to learn how to control myself in conflict, cuz I was always, when I was young in sales, I would run from conflict and I look back and I think to myself, I should have stood my ground. A lot of people walk on me. I might have said to that lady, man, respectfully, I'm trying to help you.

And you're not, you're not doing a very good job of letting me try to help you. I, I, I understand. I truly understand why you're upset. I, I, I think if you calm down, you know, I believe if you calm down for just a second, we could get to some common ground. But if you want me to get away, that's fine. But, I can't help you from away.

Yeah. Right. I, I can't do anything for you from away. And sometimes I have to tell my wife that she'll be like, well, I'm gonna call and I'm gonna call and light somebody up. I'm like, okay, understand that you may or may not be wasting good breath. So if you're, if you're okay with that, if you tell me to get away, I can't help you in any way can't help her then.

And, and again, [00:45:00] I'll say this, Mike, the most sensitive mechanism in the world is a customer, but the customer is not always right. There are a lot of times a customer wants you to do things that are either that are, that are unethical or if it were their money, you know, if it were their money, they would go, well, that's not a smart decision.

Okay. Well then understand. It's not a smart decision for me as well, because it is my money as the independent pharmacy owner. It's my money. Everything that I have is tied up in this place for someone who's saying 

Mike Koelzer, Host: this is all intuitive. And you mentioned one about, you know, thanking someone in advance and so on.

What other things can you think of besides your book? And that's fascinating stuff I read 'em, you've got 10 interesting chapters and each of those has a half dozen points under each 

Brian Sexton, MBA: chapter. Yeah. It's the blind squirrel theory and full effect. I mean, you know, blind squirrel finds, not every once in a while, so thank you.

I appreciate 

Mike Koelzer, Host: that. There's a ton of good stuff in there. Thank you. Out of those there, out of the 10 chapters and let's say six sub out of the 60 things. Yeah. What else in there do you think is maybe not as intuitive for someone who's cocky like me and says, well, I've seen it all and I, you know, and I know how to deal with customers and things.

What are the things in there maybe aren't as intuitive that you would share with the listeners who. Or maybe in my position, people by meekness meekness. Tell me more about that. You mean? So when I say I'm cocky that one go over, well, 

Brian Sexton, MBA: most alpha males are most alpha, most salespeople are. I was. Yeah. And, and so, you know, when you have a modicum of success, you have that confidence.

Hmm. And, and so what, what you don't wanna do is you don't want to, you don't want to, to stray over to arrogance. Mm. You know, you can be confident and not arrogant. Yeah. And so what happens, Mike is, is meekness the term meekness as I was researching it for the book, the term meekness means to be humbly docile or patient.

Hm. And so again, patience is a hard thing for me. And, and again, I think it's, it's becoming harder and harder for most people because of the speed and, and, and everything that we have at our fingertips. Yeah. Right. You know, for a pharmacy owner, if they're running, if they're running a claim or they have to, they have to get a PA submitted for, um, for a medication to get approved.

Yeah. If it's not turned around in 10 minutes, they're like, man, what's going on at the insurance company. I mean, they, you know, they, they are busy today or, you know, they're out to lunch or something like that. Yeah. And, and, and so again, I think people by meekness, that's gonna be the one thing. That's the one thing that, that I would say that's surprising is because we don't teach maintenance in sales.

We don't teach meekness in management and leadership, but sometimes we need to be a little more docile. We need to just kind of step back and go, let me wait five minutes for this thing. To, to, to stay and, and, and for, for a salesperson, their role is to be the, the, the driver or the, the leader is the, the driver, the store owner is the driver.

And sometimes it's best to just sit back and just go, let, give, let me, let me take five minutes and really survey this situation. Hmm. And let me see what's best, the best way to connect in this situation instead of being the driver and, and just going, let me, let me, let me step back here.

And, and I said this in the book, weakness, never confuse weakness for weakness. Hmm. The old adage is patience is a virtue. Right. And so why wouldn't we step back even for two or three minutes in those two or three minutes and just say, okay, let me step back. Take a deep breath and then decide, okay. And, and Mike, here's the thing, great decisions are never made in a hurry.

Mm-hmm even, even great leaders give themselves, even in a snap decision. Yeah. Great leaders still have that internal clock where they give themselves a moment to process. And so again, that's that humbly docile that, that, that patience that, that we're talking about, that's probably the, one of the surprising things that people read the book, they're gonna say, well, how do people buy meekness?

We have to understand that people, in some cases, if they're getting ready to make a big decision, what's the one that will let me think this over. Right. They're asking for a little bit of patience. Mm. And [00:50:00] so, and, and so by naturally, and proactively giving them that patience and that room, you actually create greater connection.

And you say, well, you know, I, I totally understand that, you know what? Let's all step back and take a moment and be patient. And it's a powerful connecting tool to really get you. And that person is the same, in the same vein. Because a lot of people want to push. They're like, oh, let's form, let's build relationships, let's connect, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Be patient sometimes be, be, be, be meek. Cuz I'm telling you people, people today, bite ness, they really do. 

Mike Koelzer, Host: I think the value in what you're saying there, Brian, and that's a cool example and I know there's a ton of other ones of anybody who's read a sales book over the years has been told. The opposite of that without even knowing, because what the book will say is yes, agree with them, tell them that you understand and this and that.

And then the book always says, well, and then here's how you fight that you say to them, well, Mrs. Smith, if I were to show you this and that, would there be any reason you wouldn't be able to make a decision? You know, they give you all this stuff without just stopping where you are and just saying there's value.

Brian Sexton, MBA: Apparently you have some reason for feeling this way, mask what it is. I remember that old, old sales stuff. 

Mike Koelzer, Host: Yeah. There's true value in just meekness. So 

Brian Sexton, MBA: Here's the thing, Mike. So why would, so why, if you have decided to become an independent pharmacy owner, why would you want to think like Walgreens, right?

Or why would you want to think like, like name your, your big box pharmacy? Yeah. You've chosen to do something on your own because you believe. in what you do and how you do it, and the way you can serve patients in your community. So why would you want to replicate what those folks are doing? It, it, the, the biggest disruptors in any industry really don't care what everybody else is doing.

And in sales, I was a lot that way. I didn't want to play in everybody else's sandboxes. 

Mike Koelzer, Host: Well, and that's a beautiful thing. I love independent pharmacies. One of the things is that I'm still getting payoff from something that my grandpa did 50 years ago, by not pushing too hard on a sale, you know, by spending an hour with somebody and saying, you know, just, just go home and put your hand in cold water, you know, whatever.

Brian Sexton, MBA: And, you know, Mike, here's the thing you get to decide through, through having a conversation with the marketplace, you get to decide. What you have in your pharmacy that connects with your customers. You don't have to be beholden to what somebody in a corporate office, 700 miles away that has never been to your community, thinks you should have in your, in your pharmacy.

You had the ability to yeah. To have that, that intimate conversation with the marketplace, where your customers feel like that they are being heard day in and day out your 

Mike Koelzer, Host: podcast and your book coming up, intentional encouragement. Tell me what non-intentional encouragement is. 

Brian Sexton, MBA: You know what, my, you know what?

My 20 year old told me it was coming in the house one day and, and he said, dad, he said, I'm gonna start a podcast. Cool son. That's great. He said it's gonna be called unintentional discouraging. 

Mike Koelzer, Host: I mean, that's what I thought about too, Brian, cuz I know your podcast is good, but I'm gonna be a guest on your show coming up later in the week and yeah, I'm not sure who line this was, but I don't think I'd ever listen to a podcast that would have someone like me as 

Brian Sexton, MBA: a guest on it.

The first thing is whenever you feel or think that you should encourage somebody to do it, then do it, do it, do it right then. And so I'm gonna walk you. What, what a piece of intentional encouragement might, might look like. Mike, if I shot you a text, I might say Mike hedge on my mind today. I just want you to know that I value our friendship and Hey man, I, I, you know, I think that.

Things are gonna be looking up for you and your pharmacy. I just wanted you to be specific. Okay. Don't ever send anybody a, you know, just like, Hey man, just, you know, checking in today. If you do always start with somebody's name, right. Because I could copy and paste the text and send it to a hundred people and then be like, oh, I got a text from Sexton.

And it's like, what's the same text I sent to for sure, a hundred different people. If I wanted to be a [00:55:00] volume encourager, that's what I would do, but I don't wanna do that. I wanna be specific with it. And I want to have a message of encouragement. There needs to be a message there and it needs to be targeted.

It needs to be tailored to that person that you're encouraging and, and you don't have to go. You, you don't have to pontificate. For 10 minutes. I'll tell you what I do. Sometimes. I, I I've got a new, I, I I've got a relatively new smartphone and a good friend of mine, Chris and Sherry said, she said, I send voice texts to people.

I'm like, that's brilliant. So now I can actually speak encouragement in a text. And I can say, Mike, man, today's gonna be a good day. Let me tell you why. And I just felt like I needed to tell you that because I just kind of got the sense or I see a post that maybe you, you were going through something and I'll check in and I'll say, Hey man, are you doing okay?

You know, I saw your post. I, I just wanna make sure you're okay. And if you need to talk, I've got some time. Let's talk or I'll just pick up the phone and call somebody and say, Hey, I saw this. I just wanted to check on you. You okay? You're doing okay. I had a friend of mine that, a couple weeks ago, had a, uh, an emergency appendectomy.

I picked up the phone and called him and said, man, just checking on you. I had an appendectomy when I was eight. I know those things are not fun. Just wanna make sure you're doing okay. 

Mike Koelzer, Host: I suck at that. I wish I was more like that probably. And, maybe it's from growing up thinking that I would be a burden on somebody by getting in a conversation and they weren't ready for it, or they weren't, you know, they had stuff going on, but that's really, that's a cool skill.

Yeah. But 

Brian Sexton, MBA: you know what? We talked about filing that away. Let me tell you something. Even in that moment, when they're not ready to receive it, you would be blown away. Mike, to people that have come back to me and go, man, I got your text a few days ago and it really helped me. I'm sorry.

I didn't get back to you, but man, it really, it really helped me. Yeah. Texting I'm okay 

Mike Koelzer, Host: on. But I suck at calling people 

Brian Sexton, MBA: like that. Well, you never know what you're gonna be able to say to 'em to be able to help. Yeah. And, and so again, listen, the reason people don't do more intentional encouragement is simple.

You have to give way more than you receive and people are not wired that way. Now we're used to being a give, give, give, give, give, you know, like retweets. You know, followers, things like that. We're caught up in numbers and, and the way you build relationships is, is not, it's not a numbers game. The only number that counts in building relationships is one.

Yeah. It's one at a time it's, it's, it's one step at a time in building a great relationship. And so, you know, that's why, and again, that's why I'm so purposeful. I hate the word passion. Hate it because I'm not passionate every day about intentional encouragement when I get up. Yeah. You know, I may have, you know, well, last night I, I, you know, I woke up last night, my left hip started hurting.

I was like, reaching for some Biofreeze that I keep near the bed. So I could just go back to sleep, be like, ah, soothing relief. I'm not doing a commercial for Biofreeze, but what I'm saying is, when I got up, when the alarm went off, at six 20 this morning, Mike, I wasn't really passionate about getting out of bed.

but I was purposeful. I knew what I wanted to do for that morning and wanted to get it off to a good start. And so, yeah. You know, and, and so again, um, and trust me, when I saw my son today, I was like, dude, you should have gone to what, what were you thinking? I Woke up at 2:00 AM this morning, go to bed. Yeah.

you know, you left like yeah. When you got up and shut the door, I knew it was like, I should have had to get up and shut the door. 

Mike Koelzer, Host: that's what sons are good 

Brian Sexton, MBA: for. Oh man. I am. I have morphed into my dad. I know we haven't, if you take the contact lenses out in the beard, I become, I become my dad. And, and so, and it's like, it, it, it was God saying all the, those years you were resistant.

Here you go. Big boy. Here you go. Well, Brian, thanks for being on, man. This has been a fun conversation. Thank you. Well, listen, I hope that your audience listens to this. Reach out, connect with me. I'm on LinkedIn at Brian Sexton, MBA. It's B R I a N. My last name is S E X T O N. And I've got the, the, uh, I have an MBA.

So, you know, reach out to me. If you search the intentional encouragement podcast, Mike is gonna be on the intentional encouragement podcast, but we tell a ton of great stories. If you just want a conversation where you hear people's stories and you go, man, that really resonates. I think the intentional encouragement or podcast is for you.

So subscribe where you get podcasts. And if you hear this conversation, when Mike releases it, you hear this conversation, you go, I wanna know more about connection. Reach out to me. We'll we'll, we'll do a zoom call or we'll do a call like we're doing today. And I'm more than happy to help you. People buy from people and it is available on Amazon.

You can buy it there. I'm getting ready to order some more author copies. So I'll have author copies available [01:00:00] that people can get from me. They can buy 'em from me and I'll sign it. But Mike man, this has been so much fun. Thank you for, for having me. We're 

Mike Koelzer, Host: talking on a Monday afternoon now. I think we're talking Thursday morning, right?

Brian Sexton, MBA: We are talking Thursday morning. Yeah, I get 

Mike Koelzer, Host: my second COVID shot. And I forget if it's before or after you. And I talk, I think it's afterwards, 

Brian Sexton, MBA: I'm open to get the vaccine Mike, so I can get some kind of superpowers or at least a half a brain, you know, that's, that would be fantastic for me, but man, what a great time I've had talking with you and a again, I just hope that we brought some value to some folks today, some independent pharmacy owners and, and got them thinking about things in a little different way.

So thank you man. From the bottom of my heart. I appreciate the opportunity. 

Mike Koelzer, Host: Thank you, Brian. Thanks for all you do. And I'm gonna put a link to your book there. I just got it. At least to the Kindle part where you can download the first few pages. And I did that before we talked here, just looking at those chapters and sub chapters.

It's good 

Brian Sexton, MBA: stuff. And if you buy the book and, and you've got some feedback, please reach out. I would, I would dearly love to, to hear from folks that get the book, even if you don't like it, you can still message me and go if it sucks. It's pretty terrible. And I'd probably go, yeah, I, I probably owe you one, you know, you'd say like 

Mike Koelzer, Host: that lady, you'd say I'm gonna tell you as peacefully as I can get away 

Brian Sexton, MBA: from me.

Well, let me leave you with this piece of advice. Okay. Yeah. A pat on the back is merely 18 inches from kicking the butt. So, I mean, again, you know, pretty close. 

Mike Koelzer, Host: I just left it there. Pretty close. All right, Brian. 

Brian Sexton, MBA: Thanks. Thank you, Mike. I appreciate it. Talk to you 

Mike Koelzer, Host: soon. Bye-bye.