Build Roots

THE SIMPLE NEWSLETTER - ISSUE # 034

This week, I want to share why business has never been about tricks, funnels, or clever pitches for me—it’s always been about genuine relationships. By focusing on retention instead of just attraction, I’ve built connections that have lasted for decades and created a real impact. In this edition, I’ll talk about how service, empathy, and authenticity lay the foundation for growth—both for you and for the people you serve.

ADAM'S THOUGHTS

You don’t need tricks to get people to do things. Yet that’s what almost everybody’s doing. 

Funnels, content, sales pitches—it’s all become a bag of tricks. Whatever happened to being genuine and authentic, and simply allowing the people who truly need you to gravitate toward you? 

For 25 years, I built businesses that were optimized not for attraction, but for retention. And while some may question that strategy, I know this: I still have clients who’ve been with me since before their kids were born—and now those kids are graduating high school. 

One of my favorite clients today started as someone I helped for months—for free—with zero intention of turning him into a client. Two years later, he’s in his second year of a $45,000 annual retainer. Another client said to me recently, “Hey, hold on… how much fun has working together been this past year?” He wasn’t talking about the results. He was talking about the relationship. By the end, he asked, “When are we just getting together to hang out?”—despite us living on opposite coasts. 

That’s what retention really looks like. 

ADAM'S LESSONS

You don’t need tricks. You don’t need to convince people. 

You build genuine relationships. You deepen them—or you let them fade away. That’s real. That’s what makes people value what you do, and what makes you value doing it for them. 

It’s about: 

• Listening, not just hearing. 

• Caring, not just solving. 

• Showing empathy and compassion—because you care about them, not because you’re trying to secure a result for yourself. 

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This is the service mindset. It’s one of the core ideas in our book, The Atomic Game Changer. In the chapter called Grit, we wrote about this shift: realizing it’s not about you. It’s about the mission, and the people that mission is meant to serve. 

So, let’s stop with all the tricks. Let’s commit to being the best version of who we are today for the people who need us most. Because when you do that, they’ll grow. You’ll grow. And together, you’ll discover a whole new group of people you can serve at an even higher level. 

And here’s the best part: when you’re truly in it together, it’s incredibly hard to walk away from each other. That’s the foundation of retention.

CLOSING THOUGHTS

If you believe and you behave that way—you will become. 

So keep behaving in alignment with what you believe. 

-Adam

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