Sales without the costume.
Sell By Being Human is a warm interview show about selling without the fake polish. Alex Smith talks with people from sales, customer experience, broadcasting, design, and community-building about confidence, connection, decisions, and trust.
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Sell By Being Human approaches sales from the side door. It is not built around tricks, pressure lines, or the idea that every conversation needs to become a close. Alex Smith hosts conversational interviews with people who sell, influence, persuade, support, lead, speak, design, and connect for a living. The show’s central belief is steady and simple: sales makes more sense when it is treated as human connection. That idea gets tested through a wide mix of guests. A revenue leader talks about decisions, accountability, control, and the trust required to let teams work without being managed too tightly. A Sales Collective founder argues against scripts and manipulation, pushing instead toward self-knowledge, respect, and genuine connection. A communications coach brings military background, executive coaching, philanthropy, and public speaking into the same frame. A product designer explains how a good cold video message, useful website work, and solopreneur selling can feel personal without feeling needy. Customer-service and customer-success guests widen the lens further, connecting sales to loyalty, support, churn, and the everyday frustration of needing help from a company. The show is at its best when it lets small scenes carry the lesson. A LinkedIn post, a cold outreach video, a sideline reporting career, a cocktail party in Bucharest, or a hard leadership decision becomes evidence for a larger point about trust. Smith’s interviewing style is generous and lightly guided. He tends to name what feels human in a guest’s story, then asks for the next concrete example. The pacing is measured, with room for repetition, reflection, and the occasional sharp opinion from a guest. It sounds more like someone thinking alongside practitioners than a polished sales seminar. The useful parts are often practical, but they rarely arrive as tidy formulas. Instead, the show circles back to confidence, self-awareness, communication, and making people feel less handled. For listeners tired of aggressive sales advice, that restraint is the appeal. Sell By Being Human makes selling feel less like a costume and more like a skill built from ordinary, decent conversations.
Made for: For salespeople, founders, customer leaders, consultants, and communicators who want to influence without sounding manufactured. It especially suits listeners who prefer stories, examples, and practical judgment over rigid sales formulas.
What sets it apart: The show pulls sales lessons from a broad cast of practitioners, not just sales trainers. Broadcasters, designers, customer-success leaders, researchers, speakers, and community builders all become evidence for the same grounded argument: trust beats pressure.
This is where human connection and sales meet. You may be someone whose success depends on influence, negotiation, and your ability to create change, but you may reject aggressive sales tactics. Maybe you feel stuck in corporate "autopilot," knowing your best asset is your genuine personality, but you struggle to use it to get what you want. Then this channel is for you. It will teach you how to close the gap between wanting to be ethical and feeling pressured to sell aggressively. You’ll also learn actionable strategies for translating emotional intelligence into high-trust results. Join Alex and top gu...
Based on 5 episodes we listened to · September 2026
Alex Smith connects ethical selling to creative identity through practical interviews about trust, relationships and presenting one's work.
Alex Smith treats selling as a human practice, using guest interviews to examine trust, self-knowledge and the choices behind working relationships.
A gifted portrait can teach you more about trust than another sales acronym ever will.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
A sales conversation about human connection, trust, and the balance between control and creativity.
Alex Smith frames the episode around human connection in selling, while Mark Casaglo keeps it rooted in experience: selling old toys as a kid, telemarketing, then revenue leadership at Docebo and Outreach. The most interesting thread is control as a leadership problem.
Sales works better here as human connection than as a script.
Sell By Being Human keeps returning to one plain idea: sales works better when it feels like human connection, not a script or a magic acronym.
A thoughtful case for fit, trust, and selling without making people feel sold to.
This episode treats B2B sales as a question of fit, patience, and plain old problem solving. Dr. Ryan O'Sullivan draws on research and account leadership experience to make a simple point: the best business relationships do not feel forced.
A sales story about generosity, connection, and showing appreciation.
Robert Timmons turns a sales interview into a story about connection and generosity. He talks about painting portraits and sketches for mentors who shaped him, and that gesture gives the piece its clearest point: effort can matter more than polish when it comes from the right…
Rob Walling on bootstrapped SaaS growth, plateaus, and exits — with founders who lived them.
Abbey Ashley's playbook for turning your job skills into a virtual assistant business.
Naval Ravikant on epistemology, startups, and crypto, from David Deutsch to Vitalik Buterin.
Alex Theuma interviews SaaS founders and investors on scaling to $10M-plus ARR.
Guy Raz traces founders' origin stories and fields live advice-line calls from entrepreneurs.
Alex Blumberg interviews guests like Megan Phelps-Roper and Shane McAnally about failure and reinvention.
Mark starts with toys and telemarketing, then the episode settles into the real point: good selling and good leadership help people make decisions without draining all the life out of them.
Steve Haru rejects sales theater.
Natasha Hemingway leads with heart, not hustle.
This episode features an interview with Amos Balongo, a keynote speaker and communications coach, discussing how human connection and his diverse background in the military, philanthropy, and coaching relate to sales and audience engagement.
This episode features an interview with Marc MacDougall, a product designer who discusses selling through human connection and optimizing websites for software companies.
This episode features an interview with Rich DeLisi, a researcher and author, discussing how AI and digital tools can enhance human-centered customer service and loyalty.
Host Alex Smith interviews Eric Melchor about building human connections in sales and business.
Host Alex Smith interviews sideline reporter Jen Mueller about communication skills and ethical sales techniques.
Host Alex Smith interviews Jared Cook, a customer experience veteran, about reducing churn through human connection in sales.
Host Alex Smith interviews Kevin Yates about sales through human connection, covering his background in L&D and his nonprofit work.
Host Alex Smith interviews friendship expert and clinical psychologist Miriam Kiermaier about human connection in sales.
Dr.
This episode features an interview with John Barrows, a top sales trainer and CEO, discussing how to maintain human connection in sales amidst increasing AI integration.
Robert Timmons starts with giving.
Host Alex Smith interviews former top seller Casey Jaycox about using human skills like vulnerability and curiosity in sales.
Host Alex Smith interviews a former jewelry salesman turned VP of sales who shares lessons from surviving a mass shooting and how it shaped his ethical sales approach.
Host Alex Smith interviews former kayak guide turned global account director Samantha Price about ethical sales and human connection.
Host Alex Smith interviews executive leadership coach Sarin Silva about her background in digital media and her approach to ethical sales and human connection.
Host Alex Smith interviews Pablo Gonzalez about building communities and driving business through ethical, human-centered sales approaches.
Host Alex Smith interviews executive business coach Dan Gordon about ethical sales strategies and overcoming discomfort with pricing.
Host Alex Smith interviews sales expert Mike Simmons about ethical sales techniques and the importance of human connection.
Host Alex Smith interviews executive leadership coach Lindsay Dowd about her career in sales and her approach to ethical, human-centered selling.
Host Alex Smith interviews former magician Brian Miller about using magic principles to build human connection and improve sales.
Host Alex Smith interviews Eddie Popp and Lisa Hamilton about The Sugar Shack, a unique music experience, exploring how human connection drives their success.
Host Alex Smith interviews sales leader Dee Acosta about his journey and ethical sales approaches.
This episode features an interview with Scott Macgregor, CEO of Something New and founder of The Outlier Project, discussing how to become a super connector by building meaningful relationships in business and life.
This episode features an interview with Francisco Oller Garcia, a solutions architect at Medidata, discussing how to make asking for help a strength in sales and professional contexts.
This episode features an interview with Bethany Stachenfeld, co-founder and CEO of Sendspark, discussing how to create human connection through personalized videos at scale for sales, marketing, and customer success.
Host Alex Smith interviews Keith Daw about bringing humanity into sales and business.
Host Alex Smith interviews Erika Keswin about bringing humanity to work and sales through relationships.
Host Alex Smith interviews Dan Pink about the new ABCs of selling and ethical influence.
Host Alex Smith interviews Suchi Mandhal, a VP of L&D, about her transition from learning and development to sales, emphasizing human connection in selling.