Molly Bloom ran the most exclusive high-stakes poker games in the world. Just her, a room full of billionaires and A-list celebrities, and determination to make it work. She started with a poker-themed playlist, a store-bought cheese plate and cookie tray, and an extremely limited knowledge of poker. At her peak, Bloom was making millions of dollars, and some of the most powerful and wealthy people were begging for a seat at her table.
In the end, it all came crashing down. Even though she lost everything, Bloom was resilient and made the most of every opportunity. She wrote a book. Her story became an Oscar-nominated film. Now she shares how she built and ran a business in a market she had no right to win.
Bloom spoke at TMT Producers Club event, offering up the lessons she learned while building her business, watching it all crumble around her and rebuilding her life once again. She is proof that you get more than one opportunity, more than one chance to succeed, if you are willing to take them.
“I see a room full of entrepreneurs,” she stated at the beginning of her speech. “I see a room full of people who want to make their life work, who want to take care of people they love and who want to be proud at the end of the day, at the end of life, about who they were.”
Find the Real Problem First
When Bloom decided to move to New York in 2008 and build the most exclusive poker game in the world, she had no connections, no network and no clients. The games in NYC had been played in the same places with the same people for years. So, she did what she did best: talk to people.
She spent her first weeks talking to different poker players. Not pitching, just listening. She listened to their concerns about the games they’d been playing. What were their biggest issues? What problems were they facing? What needed solving?
Turns out, the answer to all the questions was trust. Players couldn’t trust the game runners. So, she decided to find the solution. She became the official bank, which meant playing as the house. Within months, she started the most sought-after game in New York.
“So, that’s when I knew that [trust] was my disruption,” she said, “I started a $250,000 buy-in-game.”
This same approach can be taken when running an MSP. Talk to people. Listen to people. Go to where your ideal customers are and pay attention to their concerns. In a market full of MSPs making the same promises, the one who focuses on client problems, frustrations and fears, and then builds around that, wins.
People Remember How You Made Them Feel
Early in her career, when Bloom was fixated on what she could get from the powerful people in her orbit, her mother offered her a bit of advice via a Maya Angelou quote: “I’ve learned that people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you make them feel.”
Bloom took this to heart and started practicing it in small ways during her games. The success of this led Bloom to investigate the science behind it. Utilizing affective presence allows you to bring out positive emotions and disarm the negative ones. It helps people feel that they can trust you. Most importantly, it allows you to better understand how people make decisions.
During her research, Bloom found a study that claimed if you try to read someone’s interior state by watching their face, you are wrong 60% of the time. This not only reinforced the idea of affective presence for Bloom but also changed how she approached every room she walked into. Instead of reading the room, she managed it.
“Give someone your full presence,” she explained. “Pick out something they said that’s authentically interesting and pull that thread. Because now the part of the brain that’s always scanning for danger is disarmed.”
In a sales meeting, the goal isn’t to deliver a pitch. Instead, the goal should be to make the prospect feel that they have agency in the exchange, that they can trust you aren’t just trying to scam them, and that you genuinely see them and address their concerns. It’s to make the prospect’s nervous system relax.
The Details Aren’t the Extra. They Are the Product.
When she started building her own game, Bloom looked at what Steve Wynn did in Las Vegas. He treated every sensory input as a business lever. Wynn even went as far as commissioning research on which scents made people feel most optimistic. Bloom started applying the same attention to detail in her poker games.
Bloom’s attention to detail ranged from game location to food orders to the personality types of the players. The first thing Bloom did was move her game from the basement of the Viper House to a penthouse at the Four Seasons Hotel. She upgraded her playlist, knew everyone’s favorite drink, knew the names of their kids, and she even helped them get reservations at restaurants in town. Even changes as small as swapped-out flower arrangements were recognized by players.
All of this turned her poker table into a community where players indulged in the escapism and adrenaline of the game.
“The details matter,” she said. “And they all come together to comprise the emotional imprint you leave on the world.”
That imprint is what clients are buying when they choose to work with you. Not technology. Not the ticket resolution time. The details show up in everything you do, from your proposals to how QBRs are run to how technicians act. Clients are buying the feeling that they’re taken care of, that you pay attention and that their experience of working with you is different from everyone else’s.
Make Them Feel Like Getting in Is an Opportunity
Bloom’s game had nine seats that she was very strategic about filling. When she made her pitch to high-profile prospects, it wasn’t a pitch as much as a brag. She’d describe the game, including the caliber of players, the structure and the experience she’d built. Then, instead of closing with an offer, she’d say something unexpected.
“I don’t always have a seat,” she’d say. “But hit me up.”
Bloom figured out early that by making her games seem exclusive and difficult to get into, the more people would want to play. She always managed to turn a pitch meeting from her pitching to the client to the client pitching themselves to her.
MSPs that are presented as available to anyone, at any price, for any situation communicate the opposite of confidence. Communicating clear standards, such as who you work best with, what you stand behind and where you’re genuinely different, changes the conversation from “why should I hire you” to “how do I get in.”
You Get as Many Chances as You’re Brave Enough to Take
At 35, Bloom was a convicted felon with no money, no network willing to help her and a book that sold roughly ten copies. But she didn’t let any of her failures stop her. Instead, she started working toward her next chance – a film.
She managed to get a meeting with director Aaron Sorkin, best known for A Few Good Men and The West Wing. He had just finished a movie about Steve Jobs, and Bloom was about to pitch him her story.
“You are millions of dollars in debt. You live with your mom. Your book sold 10 copies,” she said to herself. “What are you thinking?”
Bloom almost turned around and left before the meeting even started. Instead, she broke down the overwhelming task of pitching Aaron Sorkin into what she calls “20 seconds of courage.” Her theory, you need only 20 seconds of courage because it is enough to get started.
She practiced her 20 seconds and took a chance. After all, what was the worst that could happen? Sorkin made the film. It was nominated for an Academy Award.
“I used to think you got one shot, one opportunity to make it or blow it,” she said. “I know now, you get as many chances as you’re brave enough to take.”
Molly Bloom built one of the most coveted poker games in the world without a license, a building or a brand. She did it by solving the right problem, creating an experience no one else was creating and persevering even when it cost her everything.
For more insight into building client trust and exclusivity, check out 9 Genius “Customer Experiece” Touches that Cost Almost Nothing.
