Entrepreneurs’ Organization Edmonton (EO) celebrated entrepreneurship last month with keynote speaker Cameron Herald—former COO and co-founder of 1-800-GOT-JUNK. I’m always skeptical about whether or not I’ll get value from speakers in a seminar format, but I’ve developed this habit where I try to take one thing from every speaker I listen to and, so far, I’ve had good success. To my delight, I got a whole pile of “things” from Herald.

Herald’s talk wasn’t about how to build an empire (it certainly could have been). Instead, he focused his discussion around a rollercoaster analogy. The idea is that every entrepreneurial-minded individual is “on the track” and, like it or not, there will be significant highs and lows and the journey will be tough. Herald shared some strategies around how to get through the highs (what he called uninformed optimism) and the lows. It was simple—and profound. I identified with every stage.

After his talk, I had an opportunity to chat with him. I asked him about success, and he immediately pointed to the strategies he used to build relationships.

Cameron: “We had over 5,000 (yup, 3 zeros!) media hits in the first 5 years of our company’s life.”

Me: “What was the secret?”

Cameron: “Well, I can tell you that it wasn’t really due to our successes, it was more about how we built relationships.”

Me: “Tell me more.”

Cameron: “I’ve always bypassed the reporters and gone straight to the writers, the camera operators, and the field staff. I’m still friends with a writer who I called up once. We ended up meeting and sharing a Manhattan—I gave him some perspective, and helped him with our story angle—the guy was thrilled to be talking to the source! Ever since, he’s become a huge ambassador for us. It’s pretty simple, treat people with respect and find a way to help them out—and big things come your way.”

Cameron: “We had an employee once who was struggling with his work so I asked him what his dreams were. He indicated that he had always wanted to sit in the box with the Vancouver Canucks during a hockey game. Turns out the writer I mentioned had some connections so I called in a favour and next thing I knew, my employee was at the game in the box with the coaching staff and players of the Canucks! The players liked him and took him out for beers afterwards…he doesn’t work for me anymore but, to this day, he’d break down walls for me.”

“How can I help?” versus “What can I get?” Five thousand media articles (and a globally recognized business) later and Cameron Herald’s riding the wave.