Resume Builder: Instant MBA

This is not Eminem

James Altucher is a writer, trader, investor, and entrepreneur. He's founded more than 20 companies, written 11 books, runs a hedge fund and a venture capital firm, and blogs relentlessly and fearlessly about his failures, his successes, and his opinions about work, money, and life, which are many.

He's also offering a free MBA. Courtesy of Eminem.

More specifically, Altucher believes that the climactic scene in '8 Mile' is a masters course in sales and marketing. In fact, he says, "Eminem is a genius at sales and competition and he shows it in one scene in the movie."

Altucher proceeds to offer 12 lessons on sales and marketing from the movie's final rap battle. For example:

8) Basic Direct Marketing: List The Objections Up Front

Any direct marketer or salesperson knows the next technique Eminem uses.

When you are selling a product, or yourself, or even going on a debate or convincing your kids to clean up their room, the person or group you are selling to is going to have easy objections.
They know those objections and you know those objections. If you don’t bring them up and they don’t bring them up then they will not buy your product.

If they bring it up before you, then it looks like you were hiding something and you just wasted a little of their time by forcing them to bring it up. So a great sales technique is to address all of the objections in advance.

Eminem’s next set of lines does this brilliantly.

He says, “I know everything he’s got to say against me.”

And then he just lists them one by one:

“I am white”
“I am a fuckin bum”
“I do live in a trailer with my mom”
“My boy, Future, is an Uncle Tom”
“I do have a dumb friend named Cheddar Bob who shot himself with his own gun”.
“I did get jumped by all six of you chumps”
And so on. He lists several more.

But at the end of the list, there’s no more criticism you can make of him. He’s addressed everything and dismissed them. In a rap battle, (or a sales pitch), if you address everything your opponent can say, he’s left with nothing to say.

When he has nothing to say, the audience, or the sales prospect, your date, your kids, whoever, will buy from you or listen to what you have to say.

Look at direct marketing letters you get in email. They all spend pages and pages addressing your concerns. This is one of the most important techniques in direct marketing.

Check out the scene below, and then go read the text from Altucher. Just think of G:TB when you get that richly deserved promotion.