James Malinchak and his partner Ed stood in front of a mastermind group for the first time and threw out their goals. People around the table jumped in fast. You should do this. You should do that.

Three, maybe five minutes in, Bill Glazer put his hand up.

Malinchak tells this story in all his seminars now. He says he stood there dumbfounded because it seemed so simple. His words:

Everybody else was throwing out great suggestions. Bill saw right through all of it and got back to foundations.

So they focused on doubling the list and the results followed.

Something similar happened to me last week...

A men's suit wholesaler in LA got referred to me by his brother. The pitch that landed in his ear was "this guy is good with AI, he can help you get customers." So that's what he asked me for on our first call.

"Give me AI to get customers."

He told me about his actual business. $3 million of inventory at cost and about 1/3 of it sitting "dead" on hangers. He does two trade shows a year that bring in almost all his new accounts.

Halfway through our call, one of his best buyers walked into the warehouse to pick up more suits, so he stepped away from the Zoom to handle it.

His best customer was standing in the doorway while he asked me about AI.

I ended the call there and sent him eleven questions.

His answers held everything I needed.

• The tradeshows cost $50k a year and bring in 10 to 15 new store accounts.
• A good account buys $50-80k of product in its first year
• He'd happily clear a dead suit at $40 to anyone who would buy it.

Nobody had ever put those three numbers next to each other.

$50k in tradeshow fees for 10 to 15 accounts means he already pays $3,300 to $5,000 for every new account he lands.

Now, let's look at this from another angle.

At his own $40 floor, a bundle of 25 to 50 dead suits costs him $1,000 to $2,000.

What if he offered that bundle as a signing bonus and a new account, costing him less than half of what the shows charge, paid in stock he was about to dump anyway.

His dead inventory is a customer-acquisition budget stored on hangers.

• Ship bonus suits with every new account's first order
• Put consignment racks of the dead styles into the 200 stores that already buy from him
• Thank his ten biggest buyers for referrals in suits instead of cash

(Can you tell Jay Abraham is rubbing off on me?)

The plan I sent him had six ideas. Zero of them had anything to do with AI.

That's not to say AI wasn't involved at all... I used it a ton. Research agents dug through marketplace fees, closeout broker networks, and the reasons his old $80k ad spend never had a chance.

If you're reading this, you know I love AI. My entire business is built around it. But that doesn't mean AI is the silver bullet for every problem.

Before you go rushing off to put an agent in charge of every problem you have, first figure out what problem you are actually solving. And then always remember...

Strategy first. Then tactics.

Stay Curious,