I was sitting in my office staring at my computer screen – again. I looked down at my abruptly vibrating phone. I admired the sleek design of my new iPhone 4. I was finally able to afford an iPhone, and I couldn’t be happier with it. “Hello?” It was Christy, my ex-girlfriend.
“Hi Ryan. One of my friends called me because her neighbor had to leave their house due to the recent flooding in the area, and they left their dog behind. My friend said that she found him in the empty house on top of the furniture, because there was water covering the floor. I guess this dog has been there by himself for days. My friend called me because she knows I love dogs, and thought I may be able to take care of him, but because I don’t have anywhere to take a dog right now, I thought of you. Do you think you could watch this dog, his name is Max, for a few days until his owners get back? I am not sure how old he is. He looks a little mangy right now, because he has been in muddy water for the last few days, but we can clean him up. He is a small dog, a little bigger than Kip, but they should get along just fine.”
She was speaking to me in a friendly, but distant manner. We had been going through a period where we had been apart, and hadn’t spoken much in the last month or so. I assumed she had a boyfriend, I don’t know, I didn’t ask. When she was single, she would usually come around more often and hang out at my house. When she was seeing someone, I didn’t see too much of her.
Upstate New York recently had an unprecedented series of storms that completely flooded the surrounding area. It was the worst flooding in the last fifty years. Apparently, Max’s owners had to leave because their house flooded, and they chose to leave Max behind. I would never leave a dog behind, and I could feel the incipient anger begin to boil within me. “Yeah, I can watch him. Just let me know when his owners get back.”
“Ok, thank you! I am going to go pick him up and I will drop Max off in a little bit,” Christy responded. I just hoped he was friendly with Kip. I had been thinking of getting another dog to keep Kip company, and I suppose this would be a good test to see if I could handle a second dog.
My attention quickly diverted back to what I was doing prior to the phone call from Christy. On the iSteroids forum, I had been given my own source section under BDSupplements. Here, people could acquire my contact information, leave reviews regarding my service and products, and there was a chat feature where people could ask questions or make comments about my business. This chat feature was similar to a blog, where questions, comments, and responses were authored by myself or from others in the iSteroids community. It was important to stay on top of this chat feature, because this section was frequented by potential clients interested in ordering, or clients who had questions about orders recently placed. This section is where clients were gained, and clients were retained. Therefore, the way in which I managed the audience in this chat feature presented important branding implications for my business.
The BDSupplements board had begun to bustle with activity. Psycho and Juiceman had left positive reviews in the review section. In the chat section, I had left a soliloquy proclaiming my promise to provide quality service and products. Psycho and Juiceman had followed that with positive remarks regarding my service and products. The latest remark in the chat section was from someone I did not recognize. It was received from someone with the username Waldonova, and stated: “I received my order, shipped Priority, in three days, for no extra charge. The price was right. The products are already working great. What else could you want in a source?” This was the first unsolicited positive public remark about my products and service, and it was big deal. It meant that my strategy and business model were working.
Because steroids are illegal, but in high demand, the government has unwittingly created an unregulated black market monopolized by a few risk takers that possess no appreciable skillset to do anything else except sell steroids. The anabolic steroid industry is not saturated with business owners that have graduated from top business schools. When there is a high demand for a product, such as steroids, in an underserved market, the businesses in the underserved market can succeed even when using poor business practices. Therefore, when I entered this market and implemented some relatively simple good business practices such as free Priority shipping, good customer service, and high-quality products – I was able to stand out above the rest. Most other sources charged for shipping. Most other sources, due to long processing and shipping times, took one to two weeks before orders were delivered. Most other sources took days to complete orders and answer questions. Most other sources were rude to their customers. On the contrary, I boasted free Priority shipping with a shipping time of two-three days. I completed orders and responded to questions in a very short period of time. I was very friendly to my customers, and made sure everyone was happy.
iSteroids has an algorithm that rates steroid sources based on number of reviews and the average rating on a one to ten rating scale. iSteroids is a worldwide site, and sources from all over the world vie for position. The sources in the highest positions were inundated with orders, the level of inundation being proportional to higher positions on the list. Curiously, although some mainstays were a fixture at the top of the list, many moved in and out of the top 10. I frequently researched the top sources to understand what they were doing correctly, and what they were doing incorrectly. The sources that seemed to disappear usually did not disappear due to arrest, although that did happen on occasion, sources tended to disappear when their order volume was too frenetic and their business practices became sloppy, i.e., processing and shipping took too long or were never received, emails and messages went unanswered, etc. Some of the sources that moved down the list due to poor performance were met with the familiar comment, “If you become a source on this site, you had better be prepared for the iSteroids bump.” I understood the general concept of being prepared for an influx of orders, but I did not fully understand what that meant…
Adding to my marketing campaign on iSteroids, more people were posting pictures of my products that had been received in the “Gear Pics” section. I had recently reposted the photo of my tower-o-roids with the current days newspaper in the picture to prove that the display of my full inventory was up to date. On that photo thread, someone had asked me to post a pic of one of the vials up close, so they could get a good view of the product and label. I obliged and posted a close-up picture of my fingers holding one of the vials. I went to this thread to answer any questions or respond to any comments regarding this picture. My face screwed up as I read one of the latest comments: “This may sound weird, but I can tell by the corded muscles in your fingers, that you must be very muscular and well defined.” What?! Did this guy just compliment my fingers, and from my sinewy fingers, deduce that I must be a large well-muscled man? Another community member on the thread called out this comment, and debased the commentor for being a brown-noser. The commentor further attempted to defend his position, but it wasn’t working. In order to defuse the embarrassing situation, I thanked the gentleman for making the comment, informed him that I used a lot of my own products and they were working very well for me; then I subsequently changed the subject.
Humans evolved to be social creatures. We evolved this way because humans preserve their species better when they work in concert to help each other survive. Moreover, humans evolved some biochemical reactions to reinforce prosocial behaviors. When a human does something to help another human, the person being helped issues a D.O.S.E. (Dopamine, Oxytocin, Serotonin, Endorphin) response. This D.O.S.E. response, issued from the person being helped creates a feeling of respect and admiration for the person who helped them. The degree of the D.O.S.E. response, or the amount of respect and admiration felt, is proportional to the degree of help received. An action mildly helpful will yield a mild D.O.S.E. response, or a mild amount of respect and admiration, and an action that is positively life changing will yield a massive D.O.S.E. response, and hence, a massive amount of respect and admiration.
When a benefactor who performs a helpful action receives a display of respect and admiration, the benefactor also issues a D.O.S.E. response. This D.O.S.E. response, consisting primarily of dopamine, is a reward pathway for the prosocial behavior of helping a fellow human. The dopamine narrows focus, and creates motivation to repeat the action that caused the D.O.S.E response, in this case, helping a fellow human. When a human helps another human, and the benefactor’s actions manifest respect and admiration from the person whom was helped, it motivates the benefactor to want to help more. This cycle ensures the survival of our species by creating reward pathways for helping each other.
When I was able to provide my clients with a product that dramatically improves their lives, as testosterone and its derivatives do for most people, it triggers a D.O.S.E. response that makes customers want to show me respect, admiration, and appreciation. Because of the degree to which my products help my clients, their desire to show me respect, admiration, and appreciation can reach sycophantic and servile levels. This phenomenon rings true for all source-client relationships, and in a broader sense, all helper-helpee relationships. An industry in which this can often be seen is with actors. Movies and TV shows help us forget the trials, tribulations, and existential dilemmas of our lives, and hence, cause us elicit a massive D.O.S.E. response. Therefore, popular actors are often the recipients of sycophantic behavior.
Where humans have to be careful, is when the D.O.S.E. response becomes too great, and the dopamine level rises too high. When this occurs, humans can become manic. Manic behavior, especially when mixed with drugs or alcohol, can make people believe they are God-like, leading to megalomania. Megalomania can create embarrassing behavior, one of the most popular of such episodes being Charlie Sheen, regarding his outbursts in defiance of his boss, about being a “rockstar from mars”, and “winning”. I could also see this behavior manifesting in Black Stone, the source from Phantom Gym that was rude to his customers. Actors have Public Relations Representatives that teach them how to deal with this and remain humble in the public eye. I would have to recognize and deal with this phenomenon on my own.
Next >> Episode 14 (Gene the Drug Dealer)
Memoirs of a Steroid Kingpin (Table of Contents)
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