Category: BRANDING

Ep 266: How To Leverage Business Experience to Build Your Personal Brand with Tiffany Taylor & Leon Chen

AJV (00:02):
Hey everybody. Welcome to another episode on the influential personal brand. This is one of your co-host AJ Vaden here. I am so excited to have two newer friends on the show today that are about to head into a very se, a very busy season of launching their first book together. But I’ll, before I formally introduce these individuals, here’s a couple of things that you need to know and why you need to stick around to the very end of the show today. First thing is that this is a married couple in business, and as we all know, that brings lots of wonderful benefits and lots of challenges. And so we’re gonna get to learn a little bit about that, but this particular couple their business idea started from an accidental nohow on a first date. So we’re gonna talk about how a business opportunity can really come from anywhere.
AJV (00:56):
If your eyes are open to it and then not last, but definitely not least. They are writing their first book. They have been insanely successful well into the nine figures with their business, which started with some warm cookies because of a no-show on a date to a healthy nine figure business. Now they’re building their personal brands, launching their first book. So we’re gonna learn about how do you go from being these incredible entrepreneurs, being married together, raising a together, and now also writing a book and starting this new journey of their lives, sot and Leon, welcome to the show.
TT (01:30):
Thank you. Thanks
LC (01:31):
An intro. Yeah. Thanks for having us. We gotta have you introduce us everywhere.
AJV (01:36):
Well, I we’re so excited and I was such a treat to learn that we had some mutual friends in common behind the scenes, and I love learning your story. And I loved also getting to like peruse through the book. And I think you guys have really done it uniquely well in the way that you’ve like outlined these business practices and cookie recipes and all these things that you’ve intertwined. That’s just really true to who you guys are. But before we get into the book, we wanna talk a little bit of business, right? So for everyone who does not know you, so you guys are the owners and founders of Tiff’s treats, which is now a incredibly successful business. You guys have almost 70 locations across the United States. I was telling Leon right before we started that there’s one right down the street from our house here in Nashville, Tennessee, we get Tiff’s treats deliveries all the time. The cookies are spectacular, highly recommend them. My kids love ’em. My husband loves ’em way too much. But you guys have done all these amazing things, but the way you started is quite unique. And so towel everyone actually, how did this business come about?
LC (02:43):
Yeah, it’s quite simple. She was not super nice and stood me up on a date is how it really started.
TT (02:49):
Well, we were sophomores at the university of Texas in Austin, and I did stand him up on a date. But I did apologize. And the way I did that was to bake him a set of cookies. And I drove him over to his house and they just so happened to be warm when I got there, the cookies and he took one bite and immediately thought, Hey, we should do this as a business. Now keep in mind. We were 19 years old and we were going to college
LC (03:12):
And, and this was
TT (03:15):
19 99, 19 99. And so he said, we should, you know, instead of pizza delivery, it’ll be warm cookie delivery. We’ll bake the cookies when people order them and deliver them to their houses. And so I immediately didn’t wanna do that. And I said, no, thank you. But then we got to talking the rest of that afternoon and he convinced me to at least think about it. And I ended up at the grocery store pricing out. What, what do we, how much does it cost to make cookies? And what other kinds of cookies besides chocolate chip could we offer? And we spent the next couple weeks just researching the basics, you know, what, what would be the basics that we would do? And then two weeks later, we opened right out of his college apartment
LC (03:52):
And, and waited three days and didn’t get a single order for three days too. So right off the bat, I already felt like it was gonna be a failure and maybe even the relationship too.
AJV (04:02):
So I think part of this is so fascinating to me because how many people honestly get stood up on a date and one even have the courage to go and apologize much less, bring some sort of consolation gift. But then more than that, who has the idea after this no-show date to go, you know what? We should go in business together. This is an amazing idea. So I’m really fascinated to go to know, how did you guys go from, sorry, I no-showed you, I I’m really, I feel bad about this. I’ve brought you some cookies to actually, I think there’s a business here and here’s why this is so interesting to me, because to me it proves the point that there is an idea in every single situation, there’s an opportunity to be creative and to do something. And no matter what happens, good, bad or whatever, and think most of us don’t see it, but you guys did. So how did that happen?
LC (05:00):
You, you know, I think the easy answer for that is we were 19 and you need to be a little bit naive. We call our, we call it, we call it young, dumb and naive. You know, you don’t know what you don’t know. And I think as we age that the 25 year old version of ourselves, would’ve said, no, like that’s too insane of an idea, but when you’re that naive, you just have no idea the hardships and the difficulty. And you don’t think in terms of why we shouldn’t do something, you, you, you’re just thinking the world is your oyster. And I think that that was weirdly our biggest advantage is that you, we just were just naive.
AJV (05:41):
I love that. So I’m curious Tiffany, why did you take him cookies? Like why even go back and apologize? Like you could have just easily been like, oh, I’ll probably never run into him again up.
TT (05:54):
So I should clarify. We were dating at the time.
AJV (05:58):
There
TT (05:58):
Wasn’t a random, because that would be bizarre to just nohow and then apologize and then go into business. So we were dating and cookies was my thing. So I used to all through high school, I would, and even junior high before then it was just my hobby to bake cookies. And so when I needed to apologize, it came naturally, this is something nice I can do for him to say, I’m sorry about this. And I certainly always expected to see him after that. I did not think we would be going into business together or
LC (06:27):
Getting married
TT (06:28):
Or that happens way later. So yeah.
AJV (06:32):
Well that does make a lot more sense reading this. Cause it did say an accent, dental nohow in your bio. And I was thinking, I dunno what accidental means, but I do know what nohow means. So I’m curious though, just something that you said now, you guys have two kids. How old are they?
TT (06:50):
Seven
AJV (06:50):
They’re seven. So I have a two and a four year old. Oh
LC (06:53):
Yeah, you’re
AJV (06:54):
In. And so, yeah, we’re in the thick of it. But I’m curious new knowing this about yourselves of going, Hey, when we were 19 thinking that the world is our oyster and it’s more about what we can do, not what we can’t do. And even saying that maybe our 25 year old selves would’ve said, no, I’m curious to know. It’s like hindsight 20/20 with all the success that you guys have had and all that you challenges that you’ve overcome. What would you want to instill in your kids about keeping this kind of, what is possible mentality versus can’t do it mentality?
LC (07:29):
It’s funny cuz when it comes to our kids, we’d probably be like, just be in accountant, just go into something safe. Like we, you know, we, you
TT (07:38):
Can definitely, I see why parents do that. Yeah. Right. Cause the looking back on it, the odds of it going poorly were so much more in favor than the odds of it going the way it did ultimately go. And there’s so many chances along the way, one tiny tweak and it wouldn’t have gone this way at all. And so I think as an older person, you see that you can see the whole playing field for your kids. So it’s scary for you to even want them to have their eyes quite open. Yeah. But you should. I mean, yes you, I think you’re right. You, we should absolutely in, in instill that in them to, to have that dream. And I think that’s that’s to us to knowing better not to crush in anyway.
LC (08:16):
Yeah. And it might even be harder for us to, to say, go ahead, do it because we know what that really means. We know the hard we used to, we used to joke about the things that we had to go through to make this business work. You wouldn’t wish it on your worst enemy, you know, it’s that stressful. It’s that intense. And so it is hard to hard to think that man, our kids might go through this, but again, you definitely want them to realize their dreams that’s for sure.
AJV (08:43):
Yeah. Well I would say it’s being on the entrepreneurial journey in our own business, that’s like, yeah, there’s lots of ups and downs. And I can’t remember who said this, but someone said being an entrepreneur is like jumping off of a cliff and building the parachute as you plummet down to the ground. Right. That’s exactly it. And you guys clearly have figured this out. You guys are 500 million. You’ve got famous people all across, you know, you’ve mark Cuban, you’ve got Brooklyn, Decker, Kendra, Scott, all these people advocating what you guys are doing. You built an incredible brand and for those of you who don’t know, it’s like T streets have cookies. They deliver them warm, they’re cooked and delivered within an hour of them being baked. We get them as appreciation gifts all the time from vendors and clients. And I’m, I’m curious to know, it’s like at what point did you guys go, okay, I think this is gonna work. Like, was there a moment that you’re like, I think we’re gonna make it here.
LC (09:44):
Well, before I answer that, I, I need to clarify. I don’t, I do not believe mark Cuban is an investor. We have Navitzky of the Mavericks. Mark has been gracious to give us some good advice and everything that we have Derek and Kendra and, and rod Brooklyn Decker. But yeah, maybe mark, you shouldn’t invest if you’re listening to this,
AJV (10:02):
Your chance.
LC (10:03):
Yes. but to, to answer your question, I don’t feel like we still feel like we have it, I think, and you know, that maybe part of I’m I’m, maybe we’re afraid to feel that way because for the longest time that kind of is what kept us going. And so you know, we need a, we do need to stop the smell of roses, so to speak more often.
TT (10:26):
Yeah. I mean, when your goals are bigger than where you are, then you never feel like I’ve done it or it’s going to work or certainly never we’ve made it. We’ve never won once for one second, felt that the whole way through, I think there were times when we could see that perhaps one store was viable in the beginning. It took a while, but I would say five years in what we had always said is we were busy in certain chunks of the day. And then we were not busy in other chunks of the day. And we had said, if we can just get this busy during this time period, then we’ll know we’ve done it. And eventually we did that. And I, I think that was the starting point of thinking, well, okay, at least th this would work. I mean, they, but we always had dreams of expansion.
TT (11:12):
And so I think we go into it in the book a little bit that as soon as we got some, our footing under us a little bit, then we would take a next bite, which would then make what we had done now completely at risk. So we never were in a position where, okay, great. We could buy a house and pay those payments and we’d be fine because we always have this, whatever, because whatever next step we did completely could have put out of business already, what we, but that’s kind of the only way to grow.
LC (11:40):
Yeah. The, the, the margin is in the risk. Right. And so that’s the way we look at it. Now we are trying to keep things in perspective on really stressful days. I, I do, I do think back and say like, look, we’re so fortunate to be where we are today. And if, if you know, you told 19 year old me, we’d be at this stage. And I would just say, okay, I take it. You know, but when you’re in the moment, it’s hard to keep things in perspective.
AJV (12:06):
What would you guys tell someone who is wants to venture out and start their own BI business, whatever kind of business it is. Like if there was one entrepreneurial lesson that you would wanna impart on someone else just getting started. Do you guys have any idea of what it would be?
TT (12:24):
My, what comes to mind for me is don’t do it unless it can be your number one priority or your number one focus, because if it’s purely a side gig and there are several other things that are legitimately more important to you, it’s not that you can’t do that, but it’s gonna be very, very difficult to make that a smashing success.
LC (12:44):
Yeah. Now you could start as a side gig, but know that if you want to make that next step, it, it might mean making some really difficult life choices. For me, when it comes to tactical strategic of the business, it’s along the lines of focus to one of the mistakes that we probably were best at not making that it’s harder to make the bigger we grow. And we see a lot of businesses of all different sizes make, is focusing on being absolutely great at a very narrow niche. And especially as you become more successful as a business, there’s more and more opportunities and different opportunities. And I I’ve, we’ve seen businesses really falter by trying to get into doing too much instead of focusing on that niche.
AJV (13:31):
Oh my gosh. I’m so happy that you guys said that, cuz that’s like one of the things that we talk about all the time to our audience here at brand builders group is you know, my husband has this saying the more specific, the more terrific, right. It’s like that is right. But it’s like there’s power and being known for one thing. Yep. And then doing that exceptionally well, which to your point, Tiffany, it takes a lot of focus and intention and you can’t often achieve excellence if you have divided attention. Right. But it’s really focusing in on what is it that we really wanna be known for. And so for you guys, what do you guys wanna be known for when you think about T’s treats and then your own personal as individuals, what do you guys wanna be known for?
TT (14:19):
Well, it started and, and still is being best in the world at, on demand, warm cookie delivery. And we feel that, you know, we have been able to do that. And then we’re sort of opening up now a little bit to being best in the world at, on demand gifting know with, with warm cookie as the base. But what we realized it’s really about that giftable moment, that moment of connection between people more so than it is really just about the cookie, but we started with the cookie.
LC (14:47):
Yeah. Well, we’re what we realized on a, almost on accident that we’re very good at is making sure that there’s this incredible moment, the intended moment, whether it’s you’re at the office and you just need some downtime and you and your coworkers order some cookies. And for that brief 10 minutes of your day, it’s awesome. And you’re talking or across the country and your best friend have a tra has a tragedy or something or they’re sick or something’s going on. And you’re able to go online and send them a box of warm cookies with a message that’s super meaningful. We’re very good at making sure that those moments are, are intact. And that’s what we want to be known for what we call it, connecting people through warm moments.
AJV (15:36):
Yeah. I love that. And I think the, to me, it’s like the ultimate uniqueness in all of that is this on demand component. Right? It’s, it’s so easy to have great intentions with really poor execution cuz you miss this window of opportunity. And you guys provide this real, really unique opportunity to do it in the moment. And it’s, to me, it’s like with the cookies at least, right? It’s like, it really means something to have warm, fresh cookies come and it’s like, oh man, like these are fresh. Right. It’s like, yes. And it makes you wanna eat them right then. Right.
LC (16:10):
And for the like, I’ll give you you an example that we put in the book, just a quick story. We started to realize how powerful these moments could mean when early on we had someone from a downtown office, an admin call to place an order. And she was talking to our manager who was taking the order manager was like, oh, what’s going on? How are you doing today? And she’s like, oh, you know what? We’re ordering these for my boss. And it’s raining today outside. And whenever it rained, my boss always loved to tell us a story about when he was a little kid, his mom would bake him cookies every time it was raining at school. So he knew when he came home from school, there’d be a batch of warm cookies on a rainy day. And she went on to say, well, this is the first day. It’s rained since his mother passed away. And so we’re here in the office, we’re all gonna celebrate and order some cookies. And so we realized right then and there in the, on demand nature, we were able to get cookies to the office while it was still raining and the whole company had a moment together for their boss. And so that’s the kind of power we see in these moments.
AJV (17:11):
Oh, I love that. Y’all and I think some of, of this what I love is like the, the way speaking of the book, right? The way that you’ve outlined this book I think is so interesting. As you look at all the chapters, clearly there’s business principles and there’s all these things, but then also you have incorporated recipes for every chapter. So this has been on my mind ever since I was fortunate enough to get a gal copy of your upcoming book, are the recipes somehow directly connected to all the lessons in each chapter?
TT (17:44):
Not directly, we started with chocolate chip because that’s the base. And that’s, you know, you gotta have chocolate chip. So we knew we had to have that one first. And then we sort of grouped them based on cookie. And then we’ve got kind of a grouping of bars. We’ve got some truffles. And so they’re kind of grouped based on category a little bit more than, than story related.
AJV (18:05):
Oh my gosh, this is so funny cuz in my mind I’m like, what’s this secret message behind yeah. For each of these chapters. And so OK. Well there’s one chapter in particular that I think is going to be really relevant to our audience as we kind of talk about building a business, building a brand and you guys have a chapter chapter four called building a brand and I would love to know like what, what is your philosophy on building a brand?
TT (18:34):
Yeah, I think gosh, building a brand is so delicate and I think that’s the biggest takeaway for us is that when we started, we were building a service and we weren’t considering building a brand and kind of what that afforded us was the ability for some breath space to let customers tell us what was meaningful to them. And we were able to sort of shape the brand in reverse. Not us saying here’s what we are. I hope you like it. But we sort of started with the service and then shaped along the way. And then some of the things that happened during that were really, you know, the warm was the, was the biggest shaping piece, realizing why people were using us not just what they were buying or when they were buying, but what it was meaning to them. And that’s the piece of the brand puzzle.
TT (19:25):
I think that’s so important to us and we’re the two ambassadors of the brand. We’re the protectors of the brand. And there’s tons of other people here that are as well. But then there’s always gonna be a along your journey, other people that are protectors of the bottom line, other people that are protectors of the expenses, people that are protectors of, you know, are the legal yeah. And some of that can be at odds with what you want for the brand. And so sometimes it can be challenging, especially if you get to, let’s say the board of directors level because they’re not there every day and really that that’s not their role, but it is your role because to us, at least without the brand, you have nothing. And so sometimes you have to really fiercely protect, say, listen, I know by doing whatever this program, if you wanna put in place, we will make more money or we will save more money or we will, whatever it is. But I’m also telling you that that is not right for the brand. It’s either not right for the customer experience. It’s not right for the overall our connection with our customers. It doesn’t speak to us and what we believe in and you have to stand up and say, we’re gonna make choices that sometimes don’t make financial sense, but that do make sense for, for our brand.
LC (20:35):
Yeah. We always think of it opposite from financially, but cash and revenue today is less important than cash and revenue tomorrow next week, next month, next year, that’s not true when it comes to financial world, but when it comes to building a brand, your, the, the more important cash is what is gonna come in later. And so we delay a lot of revenue. We delay a lot of sales. We could, you know, we’re at 75 locations. Now we could be at 200 locations right now, if all we cared about was revenue, but it’s equality experience that we care about. And that makes our brand special is the white glove service. And so for us, that’s delaying a lot of things that a lot of businesses, it takes a lot of what am I trying to say, willpower willpower. Yeah. To, to go at the pace that is best for the brand. And so that’s really something that we have to remind ourselves the, the kind of the bigger we get.
AJV (21:34):
Well, yeah. And I would say that’s quite rare, right? It’s easy to be tempted into grow quickly, right? Double revenues, double locations. Yes. But growth doesn’t always mean scale. But I think that’s good. So I, I have three follow up questions to this. So Tiffany, you mentioned we really let our clients kind of tell us, so for anyone out there, who’s listening to this episode going, well, how do you do that? So how did you get that information from your clients?
TT (22:07):
So in the, the beginning, you know, we were taking all of our orders by phone. So you actually have a phone conversation with people. So, you know, that’s not relevant today, but truly you could hear why they were ordering. And especially, let’s say when we started, we were focusing on the university. And so we had a lot of parents calling in and I’ll tell you, they want to tell you everything about why they’re are ordering. You’ll be on the phone 15 minutes because they’re ordering it for their college age child. And there’s nothing more exciting and, and more fun for them to chat with you about. So a lot of times customers do want to chat, but in a more modern way it’s social media comments and, and people are very free about emailing in. They will email you, they will live chat.
TT (22:47):
You, they will put comments on social media. You just have to read them and listen to them. And, you know, I don’t know if this is surprising or not, but we get so many positive stories coming in out of the blue and just say, Hey, I just wanted to let you know that I, I did an order and this is why. And it was so meaningful me to me because of X, Y, and Z. And we get that a lot. It’s, it’s a fun place to, to see all this neat humanity, right. That’s there. And sometimes you, not, everybody gets to see it,
LC (23:16):
Especially these days. Right. We get to,
AJV (23:19):
I mean, that’s the good stuff, right? It’s like but I love that. And it’s, I think for everyone listening, like the takeaway is create opportunities to actually hear the stories of your customers, right. If thing is, how quick can we do it? How can we get you in and get you out? It’s like, you’re gonna miss the humanity, the actual reasons why you’re doing this. And let those help shape and form how the business grows. And I love that. The second thing that you kind of both alluded to a little bit is this idea of being protectors of the brand. And I love that so much because I like one of the things that we believe in really strongly at our company brand builders group, is that the individuals, right? The owners of the company, it’s like your reputation is the most important thing.
AJV (24:04):
Same thing as a company, it’s like the reputation is the most important thing that you can have. And so to consider yourselves as the brand protectors is a really incredible concept. And so I’m curious, what would you tell other business owners out there when it comes to, Hey, it’s like many people will have different roles, but there needs to be a brand protector, someone who’s going to, you know, create garner, establish, and then protect the reputation that you’ve worked so hard to build and other people’s opinions start to come into play. Any tips, insights, advice you would give to someone on how to do that.
TT (24:44):
Yeah. I’m gonna start really quickly. Then I’ll hand it off to Leon. But one of our values that we have up on the wall is we protect the brand. Hmm. And so I think part of it too, is it doesn’t have to be just the two of us. So we’ve got an army of people that believe in what we’re doing and believe in those values on the wall and know that we protect the brand is one of them and are there to help catch you when you are tempted or you are making, you know, if, if you have an environment where you’ve got people close to you, that can do things like that. We recently, well, a couple of years ago had a big decision to make. And we had people come to us and say, look, the answer is we protect the brand. And there’s only one choice between these choices. There’s only one of these two things that protects the brand. So while it’s gonna cost us $20,000, how are you gonna make any other decision besides that? And so it’s really helpful to have people buy
LC (25:37):
Into it. Yeah. When you set your own, when you set values for your brand, that you truly believe in and your team believes in, they hold you accountable, as much as you hold them accountable. And specifically what she’s talking about is on our milk bottles, we have brand new, beautiful milk packaging. Somehow some way we let it slip. And the word pasteurized was misspelled very small somewhere there. And it was so tempting. We’re like, oh, we could just send it out and let someone call us. And, and, and we, you know, we know, and our team was like adamant, no, I know it’s $20,000, but you know, we protect the brand. We protect the brand and, and, and part of that, you have to get really good at being okay with saying no to a lot of ideas and a lot of thoughts distinguishing, just because an idea is good. Doesn’t mean that it deserves a yes. Oh, that’s good. You say saying no to good ideas all day long. And that’s really hard for a lot of people to, to, to understand because they’ll they’ll think, man, my idea was good. I don’t understand. But if you say no to every good, I there’s millions of good ideas, you gotta really hold out for those monumental great ideas.
AJV (26:50):
Oh man. I think that is such a good reminder and lesson for not just people in business, just humans, it’s a learning what to say yes to and what you need to say. No. Oh, to that’s really good. Y’all, I’m so excited for this book to come out. This is your first book together. What on God’s green earth made you guys decide to write a book and do it together? I’m so curious, like what instigated all of this?
LC (27:19):
Well, what
TT (27:20):
Instigated, I mean, we’ve been part of it is just kind of getting our story down because we’ve been doing this for a long time. Now this is our 23rd year of business. And so we have a lot of stories and at a certain point we wanted to kind of get those on paper. We, yeah,
LC (27:37):
We do. From time to time, we do speaking events, corporate speaking events, and we go speak to some university classes and stuff and we get a lot of interest. So every chapter in the book is based on what do we get asked the most people wanna know? And that’s why it ranges the, you know, from business to building a brand, to working together with your spouse and having kids and raising kids it’s because people are the most curious about that. So we kind of just said, let’s put in one book what everyone is most curious about. And so it’s from our experience in talking to people really what we wanted to write about.
AJV (28:13):
Mm that’s good. How has it been? So so many of the people in our audience are on the journey of publishing a book, want to publish a book, how’s it been?
TT (28:23):
It’s, you know, it’s so interesting because it’s a totally new industry and you’re learning it. And there’s so many facets to it that I feel like if there were a second book, then you kind of know everything. Yes. And there’s just so many small things that I would do differently only because I didn’t understand the process. You know, and I’m like, don’t hard. Well, it’s too late now. I can’t change X, Y, or Z, but if we ever wrote another book, then now I know here, you know, here are the things I, I would’ve, I would tweak. But it’s fun. And, you know, it’s fun to, to do something.
AJV (28:59):
If there was one thing that you could go back and do differently for you, what would it be?
TT (29:05):
You know, the thing that comes to mind to me is understanding the editing process better and sort of curating that initial draft in a different way than, than what we did and what we ended up doing was turning in something more rough than I would’ve. And, and then kind of the editing process got sort of squished to the end and then in a rush because it had to go to print at a certain time. Yeah. So I would maybe almost like do an internal editing, more internal editing before turning a draft.
LC (29:38):
Cause our editor was awesome, but we misunderstood that process, how it would run and,
TT (29:45):
And the timing of it too. Yeah. The timing, you know, so yeah. We misunderstood sort of the timing of when do those edits happen at what cadence do they happen? And so it ended up being more truncated in terms of timeline than I thought it would be, but you know, all came out great. It just wasn’t wasn’t I didn’t realize the, the, the timing.
AJV (30:05):
Oh yeah. I remember when we wrote our first book, which we celebrated 10 years ago in February. So just last month. I remember we turned in, I don’t remember how, like how many thousand words it was like, you know, 80,000 and like they came back and gave us like 50 and we’re like, that’s like a third of the book. Like you read a third of the book and it was like such a aha moment of you just never know. And it’s like, we wrote it as if like this is going to print.
LC (30:36):
Right, right.
AJV (30:37):
Yeah. It’s like, indeed, no, like a third of that is going to print. We will help rewrite the other half. And we did
TT (30:45):
The opposite opposite. Yeah. Where we turned in, what we thought we knew our, our word limit. So we turned in about 10,000 extra words to that, that way we’ve got buffer cuz we knew stuff was gonna get cut. And we thought it was just gonna get torn apart, ripped to shreds, put back together and we were ready for that. And then didn’t and so that’s the thing that we were like, oh shoot, we should have turned in something a little bit more ready to go.
AJV (31:09):
Oh interesting. Yeah. We went through reverse. And it was a very eye opening experience.
TT (31:14):
That would be tough. That what we
AJV (31:17):
Very and very wordy and we needed to
TT (31:23):
Yeah, you gotta yeah. Truncate what your, you don’t need 10 words to say one thing. Yeah.
LC (31:27):
That’s my problem. I, I, I went too crazy with the extra words and comas and run ons and stuff.
AJV (31:34):
So since so many people in our audience are on this path to publishing a book, I’m curious if you guys were to write another book and you could have different answers on this. My husband and I often disagree. It’s a beautiful part of being married. Lots of disagreements. Would you guys self-publish, would you want to traditionally publish again or do something in the middle and why?
LC (31:57):
You know, I, since we don’t know what self-publishing entails, it’s hard to kind of say we liked having are handheld a little bit for sure. Yeah. With, with the publisher I, I really wouldn’t be able to know.
TT (32:12):
Yeah. And also since we haven’t really, yeah. We haven’t gone through the full cycle, but I think I would go publish again to Leon’s point to have somebody to handhold. And, and, you know, especially, even from the printing end and all of
AJV (32:23):
That. Oh yeah. Just a guide through the process. Right. I love that. All right. Well, I know that we are approaching the end of our time here. But I want for you guys to have a chance to tell everyone who’s listening, what this book is all about, who it was really written for and why everyone needs to go grab a copy.
TT (32:44):
Well, the book is all about our story, our journey, and I would say number one, our failures we’re pretty open about the failures that we’ve had along the way, and some of the mishaps and hoping to give other people some not tips, but just inspiration and, and get a little bit out of that of, of maybe what not to do or, or maybe just inspiration that it happens to other people too. And then of course, gosh, the recipes are really fun and they’re very easy. So you don’t need to be a baker to pick this up and get some really great results out of the book. And anybody’s, who’s a also interested in sort of peeking behind the curtain of what a husband and wife team looks like. We tried to be as honest as possible. So
LC (33:25):
I too honest,
TT (33:27):
Too honest,
LC (33:28):
And it’s a beautiful, full color book. It’s a great coffee table book. The pictures are the, the baked goods, pictures are beautiful in there. So it makes a great gift as well. We wanted to have just something that people would be proud to have sitting on their coffee table. But also with substance beyond just pictures.
AJV (33:47):
Ah, I love that. Who do you think is the ideal target for this book?
TT (33:53):
I think anybody who ha I don’t think you have to have a strong interest in business, but anybody who’s a little bit curious about business and really just wants to see sort of the honest side of what goes on behind the curtain.
AJV (34:08):
I love that. Well, I know from even just spending the little bit of time getting to know you both and then even in the interview today, I think one of the reasons that everyone should go and check out this book is the fact that you guys created an entire business off of an apology effort and creating those opportunities in everyday life to go, there is an opportunity in everything that happens if we are just willing to keep an eye out for it. And then I think the best part of all of this is that you guys are so transparent and honest to about, it’s not easy, let’s not kid ourselves. But at the end of the day, it’s worth it. It’s worth it. Yeah. Yeah. We’re so excited. This book comes out. What’s the official launch date,
TT (34:55):
April 5th,
AJV (34:56):
April 5th. So I mean, we’re here. It’s like right now. So I, I would encourage everyone. We’ll put this in the show notes, but go to cookie delivery.com/vaden. That’s our last name? V a D E N. So cookie delivery.com/vaden. They have given us some awesome discount codes. You can get 20% off actually ordering some tips treats. There’s also a link right there to go and buy the a book y’all need to do it. Learn some, learn from people who have been on this journey, who are doing the thing. They’re building their business, growing a family. Now they’re launching a book Tiffany, Leon, thank you guys so much for being on the show. This was awesome.
TT (35:36):
Thank you so much, AJ.
LC (35:37):
Thanks for having us. This is awesome.
AJV (35:39):
All right, everyone, we’ll catch you next time on the influential personal brand.

Ep 265: Finding an Aligned Business Model with Jesse Terranova | Recap Episode

RV (00:02):
What a blast getting to talk to Jesse Terranova, one of our very own brand builders. You know, we actually have a lot of our clients come on the show. And you know, this one was interesting a lot of times cuz we knew them before, you know, and were aware of their work before. And then, you know, they become a client because we’re helping them on some piece of their business, something. But with Jesse, you know, specifically he won the chance to come on, which was really fun. We gave us away. You know, we did this as a, as a drawing AJ, it was AJ’s idea for the 12 days of Christmas that you could win a chance to come up here on the episode and to get to hear Jesse and see, you know, his powerful, personal story. Such a great example of someone who’s taking their own pain and, you know, turning it into something beautiful for other people.
RV (00:51):
And, and just a living example of everything that we talk about, like with, with someone who’s a brand builder is realizing you’re most powerfully positioned to serve the person you once were. We say that all the time and see story is a great example of that. And so to see that happening and get to talk to someone who’s like earlier in their stage, but also when he was on his retreat, getting his, his, his first customers, you know, delivering to his first customers. So, so wonderful. And it reminded me, you know, we got a chance to also do some live coaching. This is something that we’ve thought about. A few times is going, I wonder if we should do more live coaching on these for our podcast so that you get a chance to sort of like listen to us, coach you know, people who have questions about, about their personal brand.
RV (01:44):
So, you know, let us know what you think about that. It’s just, you know, send me a leave me a comment on my Instagram or shoot me a DM. You could always write in info brand builders, group.com or something, but like, I would love to hear your feedback on on that if, if, if to say, would you like to hear more that were live coaching where we just did like live coaching with guests. So in this case, Jesse is already a client. So there’s already a little bit of a background, a lot of, bit of background of, you know, some of our framework and content. But anyways, that’s what we’re thinking about. So all right. My biggest takeaways here. So first of all, with, with Jesse and for, in something we are often referencing and telling people all the time is once you figure out the, the, who, everything becomes clearer, like once you know, who is the actual other person that’s listening on the other side of your microphone or on the other side of the camera, if, if you’re talking about social media, the other side of the pen, if you’re a book things really become clear.
RV (02:51):
And yet a lot of our, our members, a lot of our clients struggle to narrow down exactly who they wanna talk to. Right? And they go, I wanna help everybody. Well, it’s not only, it’s not only a bad strategy from a marketing standpoint, but it also, it, it makes your content very weak. It dilutes your content because you can’t, you can’t speak directly and powerfully in, in a deep. And so, you know, here’s, here’s the, the big lesson that I think is a, is a good reminder and takeaway. And I think, you know, Jesse in many ways is doing this well, is choose the audience that you can serve in the deepest way, choose the audience you can serve in the deepest way. That is the, the fastest place to start. That’s the most obvious place to start. It’s the, the best place to start.
RV (03:40):
It ties in with what we’re always saying. You’re most powerfully positioned to serve the person you once work, right? So if you don’t know what, where should I start? Like that is a place to start because that’s where you can get traction and you can get momentum and leverage, you know, unless for some reason you just really, really don’t wanna do it. Then there’s, there’s maybe some tertiary or tangent, tangential you know, topic that we would pursue, but it’s, you’re always going to, to be able to speak most directly to that person. So think about that. The, the, the second big takeaway, which is related to that is design your, your business model around the, the actual needs of your clients, design your business model around the actual needs of your business clients. So, or of your actual clients. So what a lot of people do is they say, you know, they kind of come up with a, a medium like mechanism.
RV (04:42):
They’re like, oh, I wanna write a, I wanna write a book or I wanna release a speech, or I wanna have a video course or a membership site. And that’s fine. Like it’s not bad or wrong to like, pursue that. But even in the context of pursuing that, or in the, especially in the absence of clarity about how you should structure your offer or how you should structure your program, or like what you should include, make it less about what do other people do, like other people in your space, or just other personal brands in general and orient it. And, and, and also, I would say less even about what you think it should be like, what you just do and orient it more specifically around what do my clients actually need in order to succeed. Like, what is the, the best way to organize the delivery of the information, the continuity of the experience, the, the connection in the collaboration, the feedback, the accountability like between, and, and, and really make that the primary focal point.
RV (05:53):
And because if you can orient to that, they’re gonna succeed faster and you’re gonna succeed faster because they’re gonna get results. And they’re gonna tell people, and you’re gonna have great case studies and testimonials. And so too often, we just go, you know, like we’re scrolling on Facebook and we see an ad that says, yeah, you know, how do I make a million dollars coaching people? Or how, you know, how, how do I make a million dollars doing Facebook groups? What, like, whatever the thing is. And, and they’re not, they’re not bad. They’re all, they’re all good. They’re all workable. They’re all, they all can contribute, but it’s, it’s more, it’s less of that. And it’s more of just orienting yourself based upon the person you’re trying to serve, orienting your entire brand, your entire perspective, your, your consideration of the type of content you create, the, the amount of money you charge, the, the deliverables, the frequency in which you communicate with them, the, the, the environment of, in which you communicate with them, you know, can it, some of it be virtual or all of it be virtual, or can it be in person?
RV (06:54):
Does it need to be live? Can it just be broadcast? How much of it needs to be communal, like all of these decisions go into a business model. It’s not just like, oh, wanna launch a podcast. So that’s what we’re gonna do. You know, it’s more about actually assessing what is the what is the best and highest use of your time for your clients? Again, it goes back to what we were saying earlier, choose the audience that you can serve in the deepest way. That’s where you’re gonna get the most momentum, because you know that person, how do you know that person? Because you were that person. So nobody is gonna be better suited to serve that person than you, because you were them, you know exactly what it is. This is why brand builders group exists. Right. We know what it’s like to be an aspiring author or right.
RV (07:44):
And go how do you go from, I don’t even know what the difference is between a self-published book and a New York times bestselling book to, to being a New York times bestselling author. I know what it’s like to sit in an audience and go, how do you get to be the person on stage in front of 10,000 people? And then getting to do that. We know what it’s like to go, am I capable of creating a coaching program and then turning that into an eight figure business? Like, so that is just, these are the things that we know about, or building a, you know, the building, a personal brand in general, that’s, you know, a social media following the podcast and all these things that we’ve done. It’s because we know you, like, if that is you, like, we know you, we know exactly what you need and people go, oh my gosh, your curriculum is amazing.
RV (08:27):
Like, it’s exactly what I needed. Yeah, of course it is why, cause it’s what we needed. Like, it’s what we wished we had. So that’s the same way that you would wanna design things for your pro aspects and for your clients. And you’re, you’re, you’re most able to do that. And it’s most efficient for you to do that around and in the cases of people that are the people who you once were, or people who, you know, really, really, really, really well. So design your business model around the needs of your clients. And, and the question is not so much, what’s the easiest way to make a lot of money. This is another distinction here, right? People go, oh, what’s the easiest way to make a lot of money. That’s the wrong question. The right question is to how can I serve my audience in the most meaningful way? Not how can I make money the fastest? How can I serve my audience in the most meaningful way?
RV (09:25):
It’s not wrong to also consider what would be profitable. And, and it’s definitely not wrong to structure. How do I need to structure this in order for it to profitable? Because if you’re not profitable, then there’s not gonna be any sustainability to your business, which means you’re not gonna be able to serve anyone. So it’s, it’s not that we’re against money or profit by any means. It’s just going the lead decision shapes, the trajectory like of the whole future. If your business is just going, like, how can I make a lot of money that sets you on a course of a whole series of decisions that we believe are going to lead you off track it, it, because you’re gonna burn out or people are gonna sense it, or you’re gonna get tired or bored. That’s totally different than going. Who do I wanna dedicate my life to serving?
RV (10:17):
What are they really struggling with and what do they need? And how could I put that together for them that send you on a completely different path? It it’s a whole, it’s a, it’s, it’s two different trajectories. Ironically, that is the one that will lead to the most scalable long-term income. The problem. Sometimes it’s not always the most immediate short term income. And so you sometimes have to balance some of that and do some things in the short term to make it all work. But if you just chase the money, it’s gonna break down, you’re gonna break down. You’re gonna burn out. You’re gonna go. Like, you’re gonna look up in three years, maybe sooner, maybe a little bit longer and just go, like, I don’t even enjoy what I’m doing anymore because it’s not aligned. It’s not aligned, right? This is about finding an aligned business model.
RV (11:06):
And it’s, it’s not the same as what the person next to you would do, or the other person in the industry or what the legends have done. It is all about your uniqueness. When we say exploit your uniqueness in the service of others, a huge part of that is, and selecting, and then deploying the proper business model strategy that is life giving to you, life giving to your clients and profitable enough that it is sustainable. For every, for you to continue doing that work and to continue providing careers for other people and advancement for them and to support them and their families. But it’s not just going, how do I get my hands into people’s pockets? How do I get money out of them? What’s the fastest way to just like, take their cash. And, and I think, you know, Jesse’s a great example of somebody that’s that, right?
RV (11:53):
He’s going, what’s the problem. He solves loneliness. He had such clarity about that. And it was so powerful when, you know, when he said loneliness is a greater killer than stress or obesity. Like, I mean, that really rings powerful right now that, you know, I don’t know if it’s statistically true or not. How would you measure it? But in a COVID world where people are isolated and the mental health is, is just like at all time, like really devastating level, you go, yeah. Loneliness is a big deal. So, so how did Jesse construct his business model? It’s about bringing people together. That makes sense, right? It makes sense that he would do that and not go, let’s launch a video core about how to overcome loneliness, that you’re gonna sit and watch, you know, in your room late at night, when you’re all by yourself, like, what do they need?
RV (12:41):
And, and, and if you’ve been that person, you’re gonna know what they need, and you’re gonna know because you’re gonna, it’s gonna be what you wish you would’ve had. And then finally, the, the last little, you know, thing or big thing that we talked about there with Jesse, which I find this becoming more and more, a part of our regular conversation with our brand builders members like your next client. Like if you’re earlier in your brand, your personal brand journey. And again, we, we define personal brand is the digitization of reputation, the digitization of reputation. So you have a reputation, but your personal brand might be early, meaning you don’t have a lot of online strategy or digital representation of your reputation going on. So if you’re, if you’re earlier in your personal brand journey, let me talk to you specific. But I would say early could be 10 years.
RV (13:40):
Like it could certainly be three to five years, but if you are in that mode, there’s something that you wanna realize, because this is different from the facade that you see in the world. And from what most of the people who are online, who have established personal brands will teach you. And, and that is this, your next client is not going to come from strangers on the internet. Your next client is much more likely to come out of the cell phone of your current customer. Your next client is not likely to be a stranger from the internet. Are next clients live in the cell phones of your current clients. Let me break that down. What am I talking about there? I’m saying that we’re all so consumed with finding strangers on the internet to like us follow us, share us and buy from us.
RV (14:33):
But that’s like walking down the street, like being in New York city and, and to it’s like walking in times square and just yelling out like with a megaphone and thinking that people are gonna gravitate to you and buy. It’s not that it can’t happen. And over time you end up owning your own little kind of corner of the street. And you’ve got a lot of people there listening. And so people do come and buy. But, but in the beginning, it’s gonna happen through relationships, right? You revenue happens through relationships, revenue, customers, transactions are about trust and trust often takes time or trust is transferred from other relationships. So your, your, your fastest path to cash, like if we wanna talk about that and go, what is the fastest way to make money? It’s likely not posting on social media and starting a blog and a podcast.
RV (15:30):
And, you know, building funnels and doing all of those things. That’s probably not the fastest path to short term cash. Now, long term, those are very scalable things. Those are things that push personal brands to a whole nother stratosphere. Those things can completely change your life. They can change everything, but they take a long time to develop some. They take a long time to build. They take a long time to develop. They take a long time to develop trust and, and for money to actually start to show up. So start on those as soon as you can. I mean, if you’re a brand builder, you’re going through our process, we’ll teach you exactly the order and the sequence of, of when this should happen. But like, it’s, it’s a little bit different for everybody. So you wanna start building those things. Those are good things, but they’re not the things that are gonna make you millions of dollars overnight.
RV (16:22):
I mean, it’s the law of AJ, right? AJ Vaden, you don’t need millions of D millions of followers to make millions of dollars. You don’t, you only need a couple. I mean, for most of us, we only need like a thousand customer and that would be a huge amount of money, right? You might not even be able to handle a thousand customers. You might not even be able hundred 50 customers, like depends on what your, what your business model is. But like, those people are, are likely to come faster through referrals and recommendations and introductions and, and relationships of people, you know? And so don’t step over all of your past client. I mean, here’s a question when’s the last time you talked to all your past clients, like how often do you talk to your past clients? How often do you touch base with them?
RV (17:08):
How often do you ask ’em what’s going on? You say hi. And if you don’t, if today is your first day in the company and you go, I don’t have any past clients. Great. How long has it been since you you’ve talked to all of your past friends and your past family members and your relationships, the people who trust you, cuz that’s where you’re gonna start. Like you don’t try to sell to the people who know you, you ask the people who know you for referrals and introductions, and that’s how you start. And you, you build the snowball, you build, you know, you build out from there. So I just want to make sure that if you’re anywhere early in your journey and honestly, even later, I mean, most of our clients right now come from either our current clients or they come from longtime friends and longtime colleagues, right.
RV (17:58):
They, they, they do, do we get clients who have never heard of us and stumble across this podcast? Of course we do, but it’s way less than you would think. And it, it usually takes a really long time, right? Like they have to listen to, I don’t know. I mean, I don’t know what the number is. It’s different for everybody, but often they gotta listen to 10, 20, maybe 50 episodes before they really develop that trust. Right. Or they have to like go to YouTube and watch all our YouTube videos or go to Roy vain, blog.com. And they, they watch, you know, these tra these in depth trainings. And at some point they cross the threshold that go, okay, I trust you. Now. It takes a long time though, because they’ve never met us in real life. And they don’t, they don’t really know anybody who has met us.
RV (18:45):
If they, if, if you found us as a stranger on the internet, right. It doesn’t mean you’re or less valuable to us by any means. We, we love everybody, but it’s, it, it typically means it takes you longer to buy from us because you’re still getting to know us. Versus if we go on a podcast like, you know, whoever Lewis, how Sean Cannel Shalene Johnson, Donald Miller, any of these, you know, a lot of our top affiliates are our friends and relationships, right? Because we go on there. And when those people say, here’s the experience that I had with brand builders group, you’ve spent time trusting them. And then that trust transfers to us. Or if your, you know, your friend, your sister, your brother-in-law, your best friend said, Hey, you gotta check out brand builders group. And they said, you know, go to free brand call.com/podcast request a free call.
RV (19:39):
If your friend was like, dude, you have to do this right now. These people are incredible. Go to free brand call.com/podcast, which is our, our real URL, right. Go there and do a call with these people because you wanna build your platform. You’re trying to become more well known. You wanna make more impact in the world. You you’re trying to figure out what the system is to, to you know, manage all of your content and social media and technology and, and books and speaking, and using all of those things to drive your business. And these guys are the math, right? Like if someone told you that, that, you know, you would do it in a heartbeat and, or, or, you know, and so that’s what happens. And that’s part of why you go, we, you know, you go do interviews on other, other places, but even now those clients come from existing relationships that we have.
RV (20:29):
And a lot of those relationships are developed offline. Even if it’s a podcast we’re on. Most of that relationship happens in real life, not through comments and DMS and shares it. It happens through real life conversations, real life work we’re doing with people, or we’re doing work with someone they know, or, or, or someone they respect is one of our clients. Your next client is not likely to come from strangers on the internet. It is way more likely to come from the cell phones of your current customers. They’re the people who already trust you. So are you talking to ’em? Are you, and are you asked and are you letting them know what you do and that you’re available? And then you’d love to be introduced to some of their friends or friends of their friends. Anyways, couple big ideas applicable, you know, good reminders for myself, hopefully for you, hopefully most for Jesse, right?
RV (21:26):
And, and a great is to talk through and, and thank you Jesse, for coming on and letting us dig in a little bit to your business model and seeing where you’re at on your journey. We look forward to following you and continuing to pour into you and to see where you end up here over the next few years. It is our honor to work with you as all of our brand builders members and our honor to have you listening to our show every single week. If you do wanna request a call, go to free brand call.com/podcast, talk to one of our strategists, let us earn your trust. I promise we are really, really good at what we do. And what that is, is helping you find your uniqueness so that you can exploit it in the service of others as Larry Wingett says. So keep coming back in the meantime, we’ll be here. We can week out on the influential personal brand podcast.

Ep 264: Finding an Aligned Business Model with Jesse Terranova

RV (00:02):
Well, if you’ve listened to this show for a while, you’ve probably picked up the theme that the influential personal brand podcast is all about sharing the stories of people who are influential personal brands and how they got that way. And so, you know, we interview New York times bestselling authors and seven figure entrepreneurs and people with millions of followers. And I, and, and then we’re trying to glean the wisdom that we can. Well, one of the things that my wife, my co-host, our CEO, my business partner, AJ did over Christmas was she did this thing called the 12 days of BBG Christmas. And it was filled with lots of bad singing for me and her. And, you know, some mediocre prize is of brand builders, group swag. But one of the things that we thought would be cool was to highlight one of our real life clients who is on the journey right now of building their personal brand.
RV (00:56):
Since, you know, so many times you hear the story of somebody who like, you know, made it so to speak, but, but we Don have that many folks that are going I’m, I’m living it, I’m working it right now. And so that’s how we got to meet Jesse Terranova, who you’re about to meet. He’s an awesome guy. We’ve been working together for a few months at this point, I guess several months you could say, and we’re just gonna talk to Jesse. You’re going to hear a little bit about his story. And I think my hope is that you’ll be encouraged as you hear the, the path that Jesse has been on and maybe it will help highlight some things for yourself on your own path. So Jesse, welcome to the show, man.
JT (01:40):
R it’s a pleasure. Thanks for having me here.
RV (01:43):
So I wanna start with how you, you heard about us because that I’m always, you know, the marketing person in me is always like, okay, what are we doing? That’s working. How are people finding out about us? And, and then, you know, I just love the, almost like the spiritual side of me loves looking at how our intersect with people and what relationships that we have bring us to, to, to people. So how did you first, how did you first find brand builder’s group?
JT (02:16):
Yeah, that’s great. Well, actually from Louis, which I know Louis House which I know is a big big kind of yours, a good friend of yours. And so, yeah, I believe it was back to in 2017. I first was introduced to Lewis, listening to his podcast, reading a couple of his books and he absolutely transformed my life.
RV (02:36):
Wow. So you, you were, you had never heard of him before that. And then what does a friend send you like his podcast or a book, or do you even remember?
JT (02:45):
Yeah, well, I’ve always, I’ve been a very curious person by nature. And so I’ve, I’m big into self betterment and improving my life and, and I’ve always kind of been that way. And so when I started looking into podcasts Lewis’ came up pretty much at the top. At that time. He was he’s he’s, you know, been, been the game since the beginning, as you know. And so I started listening to it and, you know, he was always inspiring, but it’s always the guests that he brings on that, that really helped to you know, bring it all together and, and helped to transform a lot of people’s lives. I know I’m not the only one.
RV (03:20):
Yeah. Yeah, for sure. Well, so yeah, so I was one of those guests, I guess. Okay. You
JT (03:25):
Were, you, you were,
RV (03:26):
You had, so had you, you had never heard, like never had heard of me or brand builders group, like just, you were listening to Lewis’ show and then you’re just like, whatever, whatever one’s next in the playlist. And, and up by up, I come, right.
JT (03:39):
You, yeah, I had not. You, you just came up and a lot of the things that you had said at the time really resonated with me because I think, you know, for me personally it, it’s interesting because you, you help people turn their reputation into revenue, right. And so that’s why I think it was a great match, but, you know, I had, without even knowing it in the past five years had been creating a personal brand on my social media, you know, without a call to action without a monetization strategy. And that’s why you came into my life at a really good time. Cause I said, well, I have all of this these amazing people in my life, these amazing connections, but I guess I just needed more of a direct path to get me to where I wanted to go. And I’m a big believer in proponent in coaching and mentoring. So this was just a relationship way to happen.
RV (04:25):
Yeah. It’s, it’s funny that you mentioned that because one of the things that AJ talks about all the time is how, you know, people think of personal brand as like, oh, it’s social media, or it’s a course, or it’s like, you know, followers, et cetera, but really the way that we define it, it is the digitization and the monetization of reputation that it, all of us have a reputation and, you know, personal branding is basically just digitizing that it becomes visible and then making the conscious choice to say, I wanna, I wanna monetize this. I wanna, I wanna, I wanna do something. So, so you said that there was like five years that you were basically just on social giving, giving out stuff. The you know, like just, were you, were you sharing advice of any kind or were you just sort of like sharing your life?
JT (05:18):
Yeah, I was sharing my life. I, I was sharing my experiences with, with individuals. I mean, I feel like your experiences are deeply etched into your being and your soul. And so it depends on what you do with those experiences. Right. And so I’ve lived a very adventurous life. I’ve traveled to over 40 countries you know, over five continents. And so I’ve just wanted to share what’s possible for people in terms of my story. And I just found it difficult, I guess, with all the noise around us, these days with wanting to do too many different things and, and, you know, understanding now that you need to break through the wall with one niche, with one specific you know, path before you can go ahead and do multiple things,
RV (06:03):
You know, you’re, you’re, you’re spoken like a true brand builder’s member with like the focus and breaking through the wall. Is that, is that, what is that, what jumped out at you most? And that, and that kind of first interview was just how, you know, we always talk about, if you have diluted focus, you get diluted results and, or, or what were, what were some of the things that kind of like you IME you kind of latched onto that was like, ah, I, I think maybe there’s something here for me.
JT (06:31):
Well, man. Yeah, definitely that, but it was more to that. I think, you know, when you hear people speak the words they use sometimes, you know God speaks through other people to you directly. And so I felt at that time, for me personally, you know, you were kind of speaking to me and directly to me on the podcast on a lot of things you were saying in terms of the impact and the meaning. And so, you know, I, I I’ve felt this for a long time. I, I, I believe the meaning of life is to find your gift and the purpose of life is to give it. And so, you know, it’s interesting how, you know, you are leading a group of mission driven messengers essentially on that path to, to greatness and, you know, that’s, Lewis’s uniqueness, that’s who it resonates with me so much, but you know, that is Lewis asked on this podcast after every, you know, episode is how do you define greatness? Right. And so that is the ultimate goal for me. And that’s kind of been, and that’s why I Lewis has changed my life.
RV (07:32):
Yeah. That’s awesome. So what, when you first came, okay, so when we start working together, so you kind gonna have this, you know, realization of going, ah, I’ve been sharing my experiences, my travels, you know, these adventures I’ve been on, I think there’s an opportunity to maybe turn this into a business or like make this a more formal kind of part of my, my life, my career. And then what, what were some of the things that you were still struggling with early on in, in, in terms of where you said, Hey, I think, I think brand builders can maybe help me.
JT (08:07):
Yeah. You know, I was going through a really difficult time when I was introduced to Louis originally. I believe it was, it was back 2017, 2018. I had been living in San Diego, I’m originally from the Northeast New Jersey. And, you know, I just, I just think that was lost RO I think that you know, I was just lonely because I had made that relocation out to the other side of the country and I deprived myself, you know, I deprived myself because I, I didn’t create connection in the relationship with myself, others in the world around me. And so I had to learn the hard way, you know? It’s, it’s interesting. It, it took me you know, for, for an evening when I was driving and, and, you know, came to a red light and I was lost.
JT (08:52):
I was confused. I look up and I see you know, a, a big sign right above me near the red light. And it says, you know, Terranova drive. And, and so I’m like, okay, like, that’s interesting. I, I looked to the right and looked to the left and there’s a road that leads up to the left and sure enough, I’m like, okay, I’ll play along. So I drive up the road and then I look on my GPS and as Terranova park. And so, you know, I make a left into this development that leads me to Terranova park. I’m like, this is really interesting. This place is really familiar and uncanny. Like, I feel like I’ve been here before. Right. It was just this really interesting moment. And as I got to the park, R I, I parked there, looked around, it looked very familiar.
JT (09:36):
It was something that I’ve, that I’ve seen before, but I couldn’t quite put my finger on it. And I looked to my left across the park. That’s a development. And it says Parkside port, and for your audience that is, you know, where I grew up. That’s my parents still live in the development Parkside. And so, you know, in, in the madness you know, there’s meaning. And so you’re, you know, through the breakdowns, you know, that creates breakthroughs. And it took me to hit rock bottom in this time of my life to really understand how important connection is. I was robbing people from the opportunity of helping me. And so part of what I’m doing now is, is trying to cure my loneliness through the years. And I know that’s a problem for a lot of people, you know, and so connection is the cure. And so that’s how, that’s why I feel that what I’m doing right now in the work that I’m in is impactful and is meaningful. Cause it it’s a big problem in, in the world right now.
RV (10:38):
So to, so to use brand builders speak. And for those of you that aren’t aren’t members or aren’t yet members like the, the you know, we, the brand positioning statement is sort of like the, the core foundational work of our first you know, event of we’ve got 14 events, like at 14 parts to our whole journey, but the brand positioning statement is just getting super clear on what is your uniqueness and what problem were you uniquely created to solve in the world. So is loneliness the, the problem of your brand positioning statement?
JT (11:15):
It is.
RV (11:17):
I love that. So, so interesting to hear you talk this out in a, in a public format, you know, like usually when we’re working with clients, it’s very private and going, I love the connect. Like the, I love the alignment of that between, you know, your life and your story of what you’re talking about is like, in this moment, and, and we are always talk, we are always saying how you’re most powerfully positioned to serve the person you once were. And so there you are in San Diego feeling totally alone, isolated. And now several years later looking back, realizing there’s a lot of people that feel that way. And so, and then is connection your uniqueness. That’s kind of like what you you’re called to, to bring to the world.
JT (12:00):
Exactly. Yes. The brand is the connection creation.
RV (12:07):
So I got it. So, and, and you said that Parkside court was like the name of the street you grew up up on, back in the Northeast,
JT (12:16):
Roy, it’s the entire development that I grew up in. Oh, it’s an unexplainable event in my life. I love asking people this question, you know, is there something that’s unexplainable that has happened to you? And for me, that is the most unexplainable thing cuz it’s just it doesn’t make much sense that that would happen, but it did, you know, all the way across the country.
RV (12:37):
Yeah. So then talk to us about, so you got clear on your positioning, the brand positioning statement. You go, this is the problem I wanna dedicate my life to, to helping people solve loneliness. Connection is my vehicle or my mechanism or the term we use. My uniqueness are helping them solve the problem. And then how did you talk to me about the monetization strategy that you came up with or, or have come up with is still fairly early, right? Because you’ve only, you’ve only been with us for what? A few months. Six months it’s
JT (13:08):
Yeah, it’s been about six months now, Roy. Yeah.
RV (13:10):
Okay. So then what’s the monetization strategy that you started with or, or are doing like, has it, have you, has it pivoted, has it like, are you still trying to figure it out?
JT (13:21):
No, I, I have a pretty good grasp on it, but it’s funny to individuals who are interested in BBG brand builders group or who are going through the journey right now as you say, in a lot of the, the speakings and recordings, it’s, you know, what we’re trying to do is a lifetime’s work. And so it’s, you know, condensing maybe 15, 20 years for some into, you know, a couple sentences. And so it’s really difficult. And so, you know, when you go through that journey, just have patience with yourself and, you know, it’s, it’s similar to really any journey you go on. It’s just to have patience with yourself and kind break it down. But, you know, in terms of our monetization strategy what I’ve really noticed in the marketplace is obviously, you know, the problem of loneliness, but you know, through all of my travels the main problem that I’ve, that I’ve, that I’ve noticed is, you know, when we are traveling, we’re, you know, more inclined to take, to step to our comfort zone, to meet new people, to try new things, to live our true, authentic selves.
JT (14:22):
And then unfortunately we come home, we gain all this amazing momentum and we take our experiences and we sometimes put them in the closet. We shove ’em away and we don’t integrate anything that we learned into our everyday life. We kind of go back into that rut. And so something that it is we’re looking to create and that we are creating is an experience for individuals in a group travel style, where we bring people together and we show them what’s possible. And it’s really interesting and unique because we’re actually on our first experience right now. It’s interesting as the, the podcast date lined up with, with where we are now, we’re right now, that’s
RV (14:59):
Crazy right now, where, where are, where are so, so you’re so wait a minute. So this is, I just wanna make sure I understand this. So you sign up with us, you join, you decide you’re are gonna lead these kind of like small group experiences, these destination experiences. And then you are at your first one with your first group of clients today, which is the time of this is the recording, right? This will air, but like you’re actually recording from a, the destination.
JT (15:28):
You can’t make it up. I am literally here with eight clients. Wow. and so it’s, it’s a really incredible moment and a really amazing experience for all of us. And like right now, like I chartered a yacht for them. We’re we’re on St. John and the Caribbean the us Virgin islands. And so they’re out on the boat right now. I’m gonna pick them up in a little while, but so it’s, it’s it’s interesting that, wait a
RV (15:51):
Minute, you pat a step on a, a yacht trip
JT (15:53):
To
RV (15:53):
Record a, to record a short podcast. What are you thinking? You’re
JT (15:58):
Crazy. Well, something about me is I also, I worked on a 18 million super yacht for a year and a half, so I I’ve had enough full time. So I’ve done that. I’ve been there, done that, but I just want everybody to enjoy their experience. Of course, someone like yourself, I’m just so excited to be here and chat with you. So, you know, it’s hard to pass up.
RV (16:18):
Well, so well, I can’t resist the opportunity to, to, to you know, work with you on like, so, so what are you, what are you working? Like, what are you working on right now? Like, is there anything that I can help or like we can sort of talk through cuz so you seem like you have a very clear brand positioning statement. So I love, I love, I mean, the problem of loneliness is very clear. It’s widespread. There’s a lot of people out there who are struggling with that. You have an aligned business model that aligned with your brand positioning statement. So if connection is the uniqueness, you know, and for those of you that are listening, one of the, like the way that we do monetization is not like what’s the easiest way to make money. That is that’s not how we teach it the way we teach it is going what does your audience need from you the most and how can you serve them in the deepest way?
RV (17:18):
What does your audience need the most and how can you serve them in the deepest way? So instead of going like, oh, I wanna, you know, I wanna create this or that. You get really, really clear on who you’re trying to serve. And as you get clear on who they are, you get clear on what they need. And as you get clear on what they need, that helps you, that informs your decision to instruct and architect an offering for them. And, and so a lot of times when people don’t make money, it’s, it’s because there’s this breakdown of like, they wanna sell this thing, but it’s not actually the format or the modality that sort of serves the people that they’re with. And, and you gotta, you know, the magic is sort of syncing that up. Well, when I think of Jesse here. So when I think about you, Jesse, you’ve actually got a great alignment there that your, your business model is literally pulling people together in these groups, creating connection, which helps, you know, remove loneliness. It also does all the things that you believe. And clearly you spent a ton of time traveling, whatever you said, 40 countries like, and, and so it aligns with your uniqueness and you’re, you’re teaching people to do things that you’ve done. So, so I love all that. So that feels totally aligned to me.
JT (18:33):
Yeah, absolutely. And, and my message is to create meaning in the relationships with yourself, others, and the world around you. And so this, the journey that I’ve been on, I want to share with others, and that’s why I’m very vocal and open with my story. I feel like it’s transformed my life and, and it is a bit of a testimonial when I do share it with people. They’re impacted by it. And so, you know, it’s not, it’s not about, you know, for me, per se the monetization strategy in terms of Mo monetizing monetizing it. I know that’s very important component of it, but for me, it’s impacting lives and touching lives and serving people and, you know, helping individuals. Cause I know, like I said, after these past two years, you know, I miss the smiling faces of people. I miss the laughter. I miss the connection. I miss the, the experiences that people have and what I’d like to do is, and you know, in the past five years I have worked in travel and, and Toros and design. And so I have design experiences for people itineraries, things like this, and, you know, people, people are looking for something like this. I think that the demand is there. I just think the awareness is missing. I think people aren’t really aware that this is something that is possible for them.
RV (19:47):
So what do you think is the biggest challenge that you’re like struggling with right now in your personal brand, where you go, like, I, I got this clear brand positioning statement, you know, it aligns with my uniqueness, I’ve got a business model you got here, you are in real life in the flesh, like living it, it came true six months, you know, later this dream is a reality, you’re on your first experience, which I love. And you know, I’m proud of you. It’s kind of a weird thing to say, but like, I’m, I’m so proud to like
JT (20:16):
Thank you or living
RV (20:17):
That. So what’s the biggest challenge you think you’re having with your personal brand right now?
JT (20:23):
Well, I think going forward now in, in terms of scalability it’s something that I’ve been putting a lot of thought in, cuz there’s a lot of directions I can go. And for me personally, when I, you know, know joined BBG and this journey I like to, you know, incorporate my own thoughtfulness into the experience that I want to create for others. And so when people arrive, they will receive two books. One is a, a book by Sarah Samuel called mindful traveling. Another book is a journal that people will, will write in and you know, kind of capture their experiences. So when they go home and they’re feeling a little off one day, they can kind of go back and revisit that. But to answer your question, the problem is like I had said a awareness and, and showing people that, you know, Roy, I just think there’s so much fear right now in the world.
JT (21:13):
You know, whether it be people who are, who are not in traveling because of the COVID restrictions because of, they they’ve been, you know, trapped, stuck in their house, you know, loneliness is a bigger killer than obesity and smoking, you know, so it’s interesting how a lot of people are feeling stagnation and, and limited in where they want to go and, and who they want to be. And so, you know, travel can be used in that fashion, in that manner to help people transform their lives. And you know, when people arrive home there’s, you know, this incredible amount of value that I want to add to their lives in terms of courses, in terms of blogs in terms of coaching programs, I mean, that’s kind of why this took a little longer than I wanted it to cause I wanted to, you know, build out a coaching program for myself, but I also wanted to do these experiences and I said, well, which one can I do first? And so I broke it down through your process in the S Asian strategy of which one, not made more sense, but you know, where is, you know, your uniqueness lies at the intersection of who you were me to be, who you, your intersection lies, your uniqueness, lies the intersection of who you were designed to be and who the world needs you to be. And once you find that out,
RV (22:30):
I love it. Jesse. You’re like a, you’re like a, you’re like a brand builder’s fortune cookie, dude. I, you, I love it. Like you, you, I could tell you’re like watching the stuff and you’re doing it. Yes. So I’ll, I’ll I love that. So, so the yeah, if you, if y’all didn’t catch that, so you’re unique to, at the intersection of who you were created to be and who the world needs you to be like the, so, so is it just awareness, like, is that the biggest problem that you’re having is sort of you, you mentioned scalability and then also just like awareness, like drawing more people to it.
JT (23:06):
Yeah, absolutely. I think when people see the word retreat it can means something different for everyone. I like to use the word experience. And so it’s just, you know, depending on how I build it out in terms of the experiences, do I have entrepreneurs come on the experience, do I have people who are really struggling who, you know, may not be able or willing to take that leap and book the flight tomorrow, you know, for the experiences to start now, I, I have, you know, eight people who I shared the experience and they booked their flight in a day. And so those are the people that I like, those people who are spontaneous, who see the vision, who see the value in what it is that I’m trying to create. And, and, and they see the alignment there that I do. But yeah, I think, you know, just, you know, as the, the COVID restrictions start to dwindle away and people get back out there I think it’s a really good time right now to launch this type of business and this type of model because I think it’s very desirable.
JT (23:59):
But it’s just proof of concept and getting the experiences under my belt, leading them, learning you know, as I’m leading them, I’m also, you know, bringing people together. And so that’s basically all I’m really doing other than leading orchestrating and facilitating these experiences with the questions I ask with the different activities that we do. You know, but I think at the end of the day, it will be a bit of a challenge to to show that in the beginning. But, you know, we have some amazing content creators right now on the experience with us. Like they got their drones up in the air and they’re doing some really cool stuff, Roy. So we’re excited to see these promotional videos that we’ll create and all the amazing content that, that we’re creating. So I think we’re gonna be in good shape.
RV (24:43):
Well, yeah, so that’s, that’s great. Well, so one thing that just sort of like pop, pop, pops up for me as you, as you were talking about this, because there are, there are a lot of our members who, you know, when you go through, so phase one, so we, yeah, I mentioned we’ve got these like 14 part processes broken up into four phases. Phase one is really about your branding and positioning. It’s really understanding your identity, who are you defining your uniqueness, clarifying your business model, creating your content, your intellectual IP. And then when you get to phase two, you, we that’s like the marketing phase, which is kind of going out and telling the world that you’re there, which is sort of like where you’re at Jesse. So one, I, I feel compelled to sort of share with you and with you listening and I’ve been talking a lot about this is that for some reason, the default that everybody has right now is thinking that their next customer is go, gonna come from social media, they think, or they think that like their next customer is gonna come from, you know, online or something like that.
RV (26:02):
In reality, almost always when you’re a small business, your next customer doesn’t come from being online, it comes from offline. It comes from the relationships of the people, you know, in real life. Like we spend too much time being consumed with trying to make strangers fall in love, like strangers on the internet. We want strangers on the internet to fall in love with us and follow us. And then like, like all of our stuff and then pull out their credit card and give us five grand or 10 or 20 grand, or like whatever the number is. Meanwhile, the, the, the common misconception, the, the common thing that people overlook is that they’re, they ignore a lifetime full of real life, meaningful, trusted relationships that they have developed with people offline. And so, you know, I’m sharing this to Jesse just because he’s here.
RV (27:10):
But I’m really talking to, to everybody that if I am Jesse, the first place I am looking for my next eight clients is from my current eight clients. It is not strangers on the internet. It is. So, and this is, we actually teach this in pressure free persuasion, which technically is a phase three event, but it’s, it is how we do one-on-one selling. And it is the referrals from the people who have actually experienced the thing that you have done. They are, they are the best forms of marketing, like a changed life. The best form of marketing is a changed life, a transformed life. You know, like we talked about Lewis house, cuz that’s how you, how we met you, right Jesse. But like that was an all offline relationship I met, I met Lewis in real life. We became friends. I helped him.
RV (28:11):
We helped him with some offline stuff that was going on. And then he reached out to us a few years later, asked if we could help. We said we could, he came, we had an in-person experience, you know, here at our house. And then we had a transformed life and, and then he went and told a bunch of people, right. And he just happened to have access to a lot of people. So, you know sure. That’s the other, the other tip is, you know, have Lewis house as your first client, if you can, is a good, a good thing, but it’s well,
JT (28:44):
There you go. RO, there you go. I know that, I know, I know the residual you’re earning is, is off the charts from him. So congratulations there.
RV (28:51):
Well, yeah, no, it’s the, it’s the opposite. It’s the residual that he is earning. But there is you know, the, the point is it was a real life convers, a real life thing. And so it is the, your next customer, the contact information for your next customer is not owned by Facebook and YouTube and Twitter and TikTok the, the contact information for your next customer lives in the cell phone of your current customer. The contact information for your next customer does not, is not owned by Facebook or Instagram or social media. It lives inside the cell phone of your current customer. Your current customers know who your next customers should be. They know better than anyone, including you, your current customers know who’s a, who’s a better fit for your program, even then you, because they are that person. You are not that person.
RV (30:01):
You know, you might have been that person five years ago. But so I, I just wanna make sure that everybody knows that, you know, we call it the law of AJ because she’s, she’s the one always talking about this. You don’t need millions of followers to make millions of dollars, your, it, it comes from your real life relationship. So anyways, don’t know what your plan is, Jesse. But like, when I think about if I were in your spot and I was, I was, you know, doing this business model the way that you were doing it. And I, and I go, okay, I need to, I need to increase my awareness. And you know, and my, my scalability, I would start with the people who are there. And I would, you know, at some point like before they leave, may maybe even before they leave, I would say, you know, you just, I go around the room and just say, what has been your favorite highlight from the last three days?
RV (31:00):
Right. And people will say it was this, and it was this and was this. And then you just kind of simply say, you know, this has been amazing for me. And you share what your highlight is. And you say, if there’s anybody in your life that you think would benefit from having an experience, like the one that we just had, would you be open to introducing them to me? And I would love to just get to know them. If they’re a friend of yours, I’d love to just do a call with them and get to know them. And when you couch it in that way, which is really how it is, they’re going, it’s not, can you refer someone to me so I can sell them? Like, so you can do the work of selling them for me and I can close them and take their money.
RV (31:49):
It’s going, if you truly believe that what you just experienced was amazing. If it Tru, if you truly believe it was incredible, is there someone else in your life you would like to, you know, give, give that, that same gift to, and, and that is one of the things that I think is really missing from the marketplace. And so I know you haven’t been through pressure free persuasion yet because you haven’t, you haven’t, you haven’t been in the program long enough, but that’s, that’s where we’re taking you and that, but, but since you’re in that moment right now, so
JT (32:26):
Precursor, thank you,
RV (32:28):
Pre sure. I would be thinking, I would be thinking about that if you’re, if you’re not sure.
JT (32:32):
Sure.
RV (32:34):
Absolutely. So the, the other thing, so that in terms of awareness, so the other thing, like one of the other things that we have people do is we call it the fast 50 is you know, we, we tell ’em to make a list of 50 people they know in real life, right? So 50 people, you know, in real life. And then what you do is you just call ’em and you just, you, we call it the check in method. But you, you just calling, you check in with them and you say, Hey, how’s, how’s it going? What’s going on? And then you tell ’em what you’re doing. You say, Hey, I know we haven’t talked in a while, but I wanna let you know an update. And the update is that I am now doing blank. And the, the, the little elevator pitch formula that we teach is I help blank to blank.
RV (33:24):
I help blank to blank. So I help insert your avatar to insert your payoff. So you, you know, let’s say Jesse and I were friends, I’d say, Hey, Jesse, I know we have, you know, I know we haven’t talked a while. I wanted to give you a little bit of an update. Like my wife and I started this new business and we are now helping experts to become more well known. And then this is the key don’t try to sell to the person you’re talking to, because these are 50 people that are like, you know, ’em in real life. These are your friends, this is your family. This is like, you know, your, your, your, your roommate from college, don’t try to sell to the people that, you know, that will feel weird for you. You’ll find yourself reluctant to do it. And they will feel reluctant.
RV (34:07):
They, they, they can sometimes feel weird too. So the key is don’t sell to the people, you know, ask the people, you know, for referrals. So what you would do is you say, you know, Jesse my wife and I now started a business. We’re helping experts to become more well known. Is there anybody, you know, who is trying to, you know, anybody, you know, who is a coach? Is there anyone, you know, who is a speaker or an aspiring speaker? And then you ask them and, and another little key is don’t ask to be introduced to people who need what you have ask to be introduced to the type of people you do it for, right? For us, it’s coaches, speakers, authors, consultants, trainers, professional service providers, anybody whose face is attached with their business. Right. But it’s like, we’re actually not typically trying to meet fortune 500 CEOs.
RV (34:57):
We’re typically trying to meet more like small business owners. So you say, is there anyone that you, who is a coach and Jesse would, would immediately go, he wouldn’t have a hundred people. He knows, but he might have three, which is even better. Actually, it’s better for them to not have an overwhelming number. They just go, oh, there’s one specific person that I know. And you go awesome. If I sent you a little note that you could copy and paste, would you be in minded to introducing us? And that’s it. And for most of us, that is, it, it, that is where your first revenue is gonna come from, not from launching a huge podcast or getting a book deal or, you know, going viral on, on social media.
JT (35:43):
Worry. That’s, that’s something that really resonates with me. And, and it’s been coming into my life more. So in terms of my intuition, like, look for the answers from within, right? And it also can branch off and say, look for the answers within your own network and the people that you do know, and the relationships that you have cultivated over time. Cause that’s where, that’s where the value is. Those are the people who know you best. Like you said, people, those people know you better than you know yourself sometimes. And it’s definitely interesting to hear you say that, cuz you know, when you lean into that people will come to your aid and I’ve experienced that in the last couple weeks and months, you know, people have been, I’ve been sharing my story and people are coming, coming to help me out and, and helping to inspire me and to, to, to help propel me forward. And it’s, it’s been a really great journey thus far.
RV (36:27):
Yeah. I love that. And it’s like lean on the people who already trust you versus trying to create trust with strangers on the internet, 60 seconds at a time when only 1% of ’em are gonna see the thing that you’re putting up anyways. So I think, you know, that’s where awareness for everybody. The, the other thing about scalability so scale scalability is also something that we’ve always spent a lot, a lot of time thinking about and studying. And it’s, it’s, it’s actually something that we’ve, we’ve been fairly successful at. You know, that’s one of the, of things, a lot of personal brand struggle is to get to, you know, seven, especially multi seven figures and very few ever get to eight figures. But you know, whenever you think in terms of scalability, the key there is just realizing that custom custom fails standard scales, custom fails standard fails.
RV (37:21):
It’s not so much that custom fails, but custom fails to scale any. And if you just think like conceptually the more customized something is and has to be the less, it is able to be, you know, routine and rhythmic and process oriented. I mean, if you think about manufacturing plot, the they’re they’re mass producing, how are they mass producing they’re mass producing because they do everything the same way every time. So if you wanna, if you want to scale your business and, and scaling your business, isn’t always a good answer. You know, sometimes people think growth just for the sake of growth, but oftentimes it’s like, no, how, what do you, how much do you really, they need to be happy, but if you do wanna scale, you gotta think in terms of, okay, custom fails, but standard scales. So when I think of like your business, Jesse, and I go, okay, what does standardization look like in my business?
RV (38:12):
That’s basically, you know, the way a, a more narrow question of scale is not so much, how do I scale as much as what does standardization look like in my business? So, you know, to me, it’s going, you would either, you would either take kind of like the same group of people you already have. And so you already have the customers taken care of and you go, let me design a new experience for them because then, you know, there’s, there’s like two parts. There’s getting the customers and then delivering the thing. And if you can standardize one part of it, it automatically is gonna scale faster. So you go, okay, well, if I already have the customers, let me rate a new experience. And that thing is for them. The other thing would be to go, let me keep the experience exactly the same and then bring in new people where it gets dicey is if you’re a small, if you’re small and you’re trying to scale is to go, I wanna get a whole new group of people and do a whole different experience. That is just, it’s not that it’s impossible, but it’s gonna be difficult because you have, it’s difficult. It’s difficult. So yeah, you know, and if you have a great, if you have a great location and you have a yacht contr, like if you have, you know, where all the restaurants are and you go, we can just keep running trips back here. You, you have the perfect agenda. Now you can train someone else to facilitate and, you know, et cetera, et cetera,
JT (39:39):
You got it. That’s the idea, you know, over time in, in terms of scaling it out, something that I have in my mind, and I don’t know if it will come to fruition, but it is a vision of mine is to hire other trip, experience leaders around me to go ahead and lead their own experiences. And so once I have each destination one, my, my favorite parts of creating an itinerary, putting, putting experience together is, you know, speaking with the people on site and putting it together, the people at the Villa or the hotel, the torque company, the cars, like all of
RV (40:09):
Design, you used that term early. Yeah. That’s
JT (40:11):
So good. That’s me. Yeah. Yeah. That’s, you know, I’ve worked in design, I’ve worked in design, traveling tourisms and design the last five years and it’s been amazing. And all of my experiences that I have in the past have brought me to this place that I’m at right now. I’ve worked you know, as, as a recruiter for a couple years. And I don’t know if you, I don’t know if you attest to this, but in my opinion, you know, recruiting is one of the most difficult sales jobs in the world because you’re selling people and what’s more, what’s more, you know, what’s, people are more unpredictable than the stock market. And so it’s really difficult, you know, in those relationships. And, you know, I, I actually have a similar similar beginning point similar origin. I, I was an accountant as well. I wasn’t as great in in Excel as you were, but
RV (40:55):
Well, I I’m decent at Excel, but I, I was not a great accountant. It was actually the worst grade that I ever got in school was accounting in college. So, but that’s funny. So you, you, but, but that the you’re like an architect. I mean, you are designing this experiential, this experience for people and, you know, know, and I, I think, I, I think that’s, I think that’s awesome, Jesse, and I would go getting other people to lead. It becomes even easier once you’ve done it five times, and this is the agenda, here’s the exercises. And here, it’s just, you can run that. You can run on a autopilot. It’s,
JT (41:35):
It’s a proof of concept. Exactly. It’s, you know, hiring those individuals and having a built out framework with my values with the things that I want to spread, you know, in, in my experiences. And so once we have that all figured out people will go ahead and, and run those experiences under my philosophy under my framework, under my values. And, you know, for example, this is called experience St. John. And so I’ve, I lived on St. John 2019 and 2020. I know the islands really well. I have some amazing contacts here. And then, you know, who’s to say in, in, you know, a couple years, you know, I can’t be running it for my laptop. Right. Or, you know, I want to year, but there are other destinations that I wanna also build out. Like I live in Portugal now. I moved there last November, so there’s gonna be an experience Portugal. And so it’s just really exciting to see how things are, are going.
RV (42:27):
Yeah, that’s great, man. I, I, I love that. I, and I love that for you. And it’s like, I think if you’re, if you’re drawing in a energy from that, and that’s what you’re passionate about, that’s totally unique. Like how many people are there in the world that do tourism design, you know, in this kind of way, like versus, you know, I mean, there’s a lot of courses. Like there’s a lot of people that make courses, for sure. I think this, this can really be magical and unique. And if you make it unique, right? Like if you focus on this thing and you go, how can I make this extraordinary? How can I make it life changing? Mm. What, what can, how can I serve my audience in the deepest way? They will have a transformed life and then they will go do the marketing for you, right?
RV (43:14):
Like they will help tell people, versus if you’re always having to create new things, you’re it, you’re when you have diluted focus, you get diluted results. Like you become spread across so much stuff versus just going, what would make this over the top life changing transformational to where they went back and they had to tell everybody, I just had the most unbelievable three days of my life. That’s what Tony Robbins did when people walked on fire, that’s exactly what he did with the whole fire walking thing. It was like, it was remarkable, worth remarking about it. And you, and if you, you dedicate some time, you know, to that, by having, you know, fewer, fewer things, then you, it it’ll, it’ll spread and do everything you need, man. So I love it. I love, I love this idea, tourism design. I think, I mean, Jesse, you’re so warm and, and humble and uplifting and encouraging. And man, I, I, I feel like there’s, there’s no doubt, like you’re on such a great path. Congratulations on your first experience that you’re leading. Although I, the only thing I don’t understand is why you would miss out on the yacht just to talk to us,
JT (44:28):
But we,
RV (44:30):
We are, we’re so grateful for you, man. We’re so grateful.
JT (44:34):
Thank you, Ru it’s a, it’s a pleasure to be here and it’s been amazing connecting with you and and thanks for all of the tips and advice. I I appreciate it and I value it.
RV (44:44):
Yeah, well we, we we’re excited to continue following your journey and being a part of your journey and, and you know, if somebody is out there right now, Jesse, and they’ve kind of been listening to the podcast and they’re going, eh, I don’t know about if BBG is for me, like, is there anything that you would say that you would go, ah, here’s, here’s how, you know, this is for you, or like, here’s, here’s, you’re looking to get blank. This is what I’ve really, that I think would help.
JT (45:14):
Yeah. I think, like I had mentioned with travel we find that travel is an accelerator in the connection process. You’re more inclined to take those risks to step outside your comfort zone and live your true, authentic self while you’re traveling. And so, you know, it’s, it’s difficult to hop on a plane for the first time, eight hours across the world, not be terrified. Cause of course I was when I first did that. Right. So you can always start out you know, going to the city that you live in right now over the weekend doing a quick trip to walk around in different restaurants, different areas that you’ve never been to, you know, taking advantage of the weekends. But you know, it’s interesting because people are scared right now and they’re fearful. So all I say is, you know, for me personally, it’s been really difficult in terms of my journey. But there’s a reason why planes take off against the wind and not with the wind. So I’m excited to continue to take off and, and thanks for all your help and, and with BBG, I’m just so blessed to be a part of it.
RV (46:10):
Yeah. All right. My friend, well, we wish you the best and we’ll stay in touch. We’ll talk to you soon.
JT (46:18):
Worry. Thank you again. Talk soon.

Ep 256: How to Build Your Own Audience with Dr. John DeMartini

RV (00:00:08):
Hey, my, my new friend, mark, Victor Hansen introduced me to somebody that you are about to meet Dr. John Demartini and mark and crystal who we had on the show several months ago, said you gotta have Dr. De martini on. He is incredible. They’ve known each other for 38 years. But Dr. Demartini is one of a, a world renowned specialist in human behavior. So he’s a researcher, he’s an author. He studied over 30,000 books, which I was pretty amazing. That’s just a, a wide on, on a number of topics, but that’s a bunch of books. He’s been on Larry King live, he regularly contributes to magazine and I’ve been just following him online here, recently tuning into to what he’s up to and getting to know one another. So anyways, Dr. Demartini, welcome to the show.
JD (00:01:04):
Well, thank you for having me. I’ve been looking forward to it. Thank you.
RV (00:01:07):
Yeah. So, so tell us a little bit about how you got started. I mean, you and I were just kind of rapping that you’ve known mark Victor Hansen for 38 years. So you you’ve been around the industry for a while. Would love to just kinda hear how you get started and then kind of like, what is your business model? How, and how is your business model, you know, did it begin and how has it evolved over the years in terms of like, you know, the different revenue streams that you focused on?
JD (00:01:39):
Okay. I had an arm and leg deformity when I was a child and speech impediment and went to a speech pathologist and specialist for that in first grade, I was told that I would never be able to read or write or communicate effectively, probably wouldn’t go very far in life for amount to much had to wear a dunk cap back in 19 0 59 60. I made it through elementary school by asking kids questions. What did they learn from the book? What did they learn from the class? And if they told me stuff, I would get enough to kind of, sort of pass.
JD (00:02:25):
When I turned 12, my parents moved from Houston, Texas to Richmond, Texas. We went to a low socioeconomic country area. They weren’t a bunch of smart scholarly kids. I didn’t have a team to help me. I failed, I dropped outta school and I lived on the streets, but I was okay in standing on a surfboard. I started doing that at nine, but Texas was not the surf capital. I didn’t wait for a hurricane to get new waves. So I made my way out. 14. I hitchhiked out to California and lived in Huntington beach for part of the summer, and then hitchhiked down to New Mexico and surfed California in Mexico. At 15, I left there and got enough money panhandling to go and fly to Hawaii. I lived under a command may highway, sunset bridge. Then I lived in EAI beach park under a park bench, then in a bathroom abandoned car. And finally a tent kept social climbing. I was riding waves and got pretty good at it. Got to hang out with some of the top surfers, got in a few magazines and me movies and books. And then I nearly dock at 17.
JD (00:03:45):
At 17, I was in the recovery of that. I was led to a little health food store and then eventually to a yoga class to try to overcome my neuromuscular problem that I had there. One night I met Paul Bragg and one night, one hour, this man who was inspired and a very enthusiastic man spoke and talked about what we can do with our lives. He talked about, we had a body of mind and a soul and a body must be directed by the mind. And mind must be guided by the soul in order to maximize our, our life.
JD (00:04:21):
When you spoke that night, he said that we need to set goals for ourself, our family, our community, our city, our date, our nation, our world, for and beyond for a hundred, 120 years, nobody ever talked to me like this and I could understand. And he was simple. And he, and he said that what you think about what you visualize, what you affirm, what you feel, what you, what you do and what you write, determines your destiny. And so that night was the first time in my life. I thought maybe I could overcome my learning problems. And I thought I could someday become intelligent.
JD (00:05:02):
And that with his inspiration at night, I set out on a quest to try to overcome my learning problems. I, I eventually left to Hawaii and I flew to LA and I hitchhiked back, Texas. And I prepared for a G E D and passed GEDs, a high school equivalency. I passed that and I tried to go back to college and I failed and I was distraught sitting on my living room floor and my mom and dad, you know, we’re encouraging. But my mom said to me that morning, that, that day when I failed son, whether you become a great teacher, like you dream about cuz at night I met Paul Bragg. I had a vision that I would overcome my learning and learn how to speak properly and be able to teach.
JD (00:05:51):
He said, whether you become a great teacher and travel the world, like you dream, whether you return to Hawaiian ride giant waves, or whether you go to the streets again, just wanna let you know that your father and I are gonna love you. No matter what. When she said that my hand went into a fist, I looked up and I said to myself, I’m gonna mass this thing called reading and studying and learning. I’m gonna master this thing called teaching, and I’m gonna do whatever it takes. I’m gonna travel, whatever it is since I’m gonna pay, whatever price to give sort was love across the plant. I’m not gonna let any human being or myself stop me now. And I got up and hugged my mom and went in my room and I got a dictionary out and I started memorizing 30 words a day and she would test me on 30 words a day until my vocabulary was strong enough to learn and pass school.
JD (00:06:40):
And I, I did and I eventually started to Excel and I’m now 18 and slowly but surely people started asking me questions, cuz I started to Excel in school and I started to have students asking me questions, mentoring. And it went from one to two to about 15. By the time I finished my first little two years in school, I went to the university of Houston. I started having a hundred, 150, sometimes 400 people a day under the trees and I would do my yoga and they would ask questions and I’d have a, a following of students. Wow. When I went on to professional school, I started doing classes seven nights a week. I would speed read books of by then. I was learning how speed reading it. But I was speed reading, read four to four to seven books in the morning and then do a presentation that night.
JD (00:07:33):
And that’s how I had paid my way through college in professional school. When I got outta school and I still opened up my practice. I was teaching every single night and I generated patience from doing talks and everywhere and anywhere I could find a place from breakfast clubs, luncheon clubs, you name it anywhere where there was a speaker might be used. I went to go and offered my speaking services and I generated patients from that. That led me to have a TV show on channel 20 on health, Dr. De Martinez health ends. And then I started doing that in my office. They’d film it live for my audience and we would talk about patients and care. And then I started doing more. And then I, and I figured out how to grow. My practice went from a little 970 square foot office to 5,000 square foot office from one assistant to five doctors and 12 a and people want to know what the heck did you do?
JD (00:08:34):
And all I did is I prioritized things and delegated things and stuck to what I did best, which was being a man on a mission with a message and speaking, and then engaging people. And then doing clinical work. And I prioritized my patients and got the doctors to do certain ones. And I did the most info and 10 folded my income. And then in different professions, they started asking me to speak on clinical practice and growing practices and things and mindset. And I was studying everything and anything I could get my hands on any possible thing that might help maximize human awareness potential. I was devouring and that reading, you know, sometimes 20 books a weekend, I was just devouring and devouring and devouring and learning everything I could. And speaking as every single time I could. Cause when you’re told, you’ll never be able to read and write or speak and then you find out you can, it’s pretty inspiring.
RV (00:09:34):
And what was your practice? So you, your Clear clinical psychologist.
JD (00:09:37):
I, I was a car. I, I was a chiropractor. I was a chiropractor.
RV (00:09:40):
Ah,
JD (00:09:41):
That’s where I met. That’s where I met mark Victor Hanson at a chiropractic convention in Las Vegas. There were about, I don’t know, 6,000 doctors there and I was a speaker there and that’s where he and I hooked up. And then we end up doing some things together. We created a, an Al them of what they called audio cassette album back in those days, how to build a, your practice. And that led me to speak into other health professionals and then other businesses. And then and I was, I started writing books at 23. So my first book was at age 23, I’ve written over, I don’t know, 200 book books now. And I call it, most of ’em are big textbooks that are going to different specialties, but a lot of ’em are, I got probably four of ’em. They’re about to do 10 more new books that are coming out. Publisher just did a 10 book deal. And so I write, I research, I teach every day of my life and you know, I, I just, it started to grow and I started to go from United States throughout all the states, all but two states I’ve gotten to speak in and then it went into Canada. Then it went into France and Spain and Italy and it started going to Europe and it just kept growing. And I, I, I kept getting opportunities and I
RV (00:10:56):
In the beginning. So in the beginning you were, you were, you started speaking, but you were making money from being a chiropractor. So you were speaking for free.
JD (00:11:05):
No, I, I, I, no, no, no. I, I, my first money that came from speaking started at the university of Houston. Okay. I started doing tutoring and I got paid very small amount. And then when I went to professional, I started to, I, I tried this love donation bit, you know, you put a bowl out and whatever you wanna pay kind of thing. Nobody loved me. So I, I decided to pay 20, make ’em pay $20. And the second I valued myself, so did the group and it grew, I started charging $20 for little evening talk and that kept growing. I just spread the throughout the city. And
RV (00:11:44):
So you’re
JD (00:11:44):
Over a hundred,
RV (00:11:45):
A public seminar model at that point. You’re like in professional school selling tickets.
JD (00:11:50):
Yeah. And I did I did over a hundred thousand dollars a year at 23 years old doing talks, which is pretty good back then and paid my school and I didn’t have debt and I could buy all the books I wanted cuz I just, all I cared about is buying books. I wanted to catch up and read and, and study. I wanted to study the greatest teachings on the planet. And so that I, my teaching model, I was paid from 23 on and I, I, I got paid even when I was in practice, I got paid to speak and then I got generated patients from it. So I got double paid and then I, they buy books and they buy, I made audio cassette tapes. I, I had, I had 900 audio cassette tapes by the time I was 20, probably about 29 30.
JD (00:12:32):
I had 900 to audio cassette tapes on different topics of health and and, and growth and personal development and made albums out of it. So I had tons of albums and things that was going on. And I just, every time I talk, I recorded it and people wanted a copy of it. I had a Mira recorder and I had a duplicating machine, two of them. So I could create six duplicating machines at the back of the room and they would get a live presentation. And then that was my advertisement. As I spoke, they would get copies of that. They’d tell it and I’d give ’em to the friends. And then I had the backlogs of all these other talks and they’d buy a bunch of those. So I had a, a revenue model and then they were coming in as a patient. So I had a good revenue model
RV (00:13:15):
And then
JD (00:13:16):
Expression.
RV (00:13:17):
So you were selling tickets to come to the event event, and then you are selling tapes at the back of the room and then you’re getting clients out of there for your practice.
JD (00:13:27):
And then I was doing consulting too
RV (00:13:29):
For
JD (00:13:30):
Companies. I was getting clients from that to consulting. Yeah, I was doing, I did a lot of the, you know, oil companies in Houston, Texas where we started and I did presentations to them on ergonomics and health, health, reducing healthcare costs and things. And then that was generating business too. Plus they buy products cuz I had I had a bunch of books by then and tapes and they were buying those and they didn’t have to pay me if I could sell. They had to, had to pay or they’d do a product sale, either one, I was prepared and that I never stopped that I still did that. And then in those days, you know, there was no internet and there’s no fax and all that stuff. And we just did, we, we sent out these little cards to notify these little mail cards.
JD (00:14:16):
We’d stamp these little mass mailing cards out and the people would come, we’d have, you know, hundreds of people coming to programs. And then I, I had other conferences once I had products, conferences could have me come on and speak cuz then they could do a revenue share and they didn’t the fees. They could afford the fees, cuz I’d have a fees and then they would split the revenues on the product and they’d get their feedback. So they, they liked me because I could, I could you know, make it cost effective. They didn’t really have to pay anything and they made money off me. So they, they didn’t mind me speaking. And I just kept those opportunities growing. I didn’t have any slick marketing. I just, I just made sure my dad said if I, if I deliver more than people expect, I, I won’t worry about business.
JD (00:15:02):
And I found that to be true. If I, if I deliver something that’s unique and present something that’s inspiring and meaningful and practical that they can use immediately to generate opportunities or money or a business or more fulfillment, then there’s always business. So I, I just found that that I’ve never been a slick marketer. I don’t really know all that stuff. I’ve hired people. I, all I do is research, write, travel, teach to this day. I, I live on my ship and I basically research write, travel, teach and do podcast all day webinars and write books so, and travel. So I, I never stopped that model. I just kept doing it. And I’ve spoken in 163 countries now and millions and millions of people. So I, I, I had a dream to travel and step foot in every country on the face of the earth. I still got a few more countries to reach and I I’ve held a vision of that since for 49 years, I’m going on my 50th year. This will be the 50th year of speaking.
RV (00:16:00):
I mean, this is just so, so wonderful. And it’s, it’s amazing to see so much of the path cause this would be so I’m in like, I mean the first time I got paid for a speech was like 2005. That’s kind of crazy to think. I’m not even in year 20. I, I started speaking for free when I was in high school, right. Coming outta high school, which was like 2000, 2000 2001. But the first time I got $5,000 for speech like really paid I think was 2004, 2005, something like that in. And you know, so I I’ve been in 15 years coming on 20. And so many of these concepts apply exactly the same. You’re speaking for free. And then you are selling at the back of the room and then you, you know, you know, people are hearing about you and I think it’s, it’s really amazing.
RV (00:16:53):
So talk to us a little bit about your business changed. I do wanna hear about the boat, cause I think that’s super interesting. You’re on a boat right now. If y’all, didn’t pick that up. Dr. D Martinez’s been on a boat for a long time, actually here the last couple years. So I wanna hear about that, but how did your business change or not change? So, so that happens, you know, in the eighties, the nineties, and then 2000 hits, the web comes out 2005, social media podcasting starts to come on the scene. Did you basically just like transition what you were doing to those platforms? And you know, it’s kinda like, oh, I was doing tapes and then I did CDs and then I didn’t B three downloads. And then I did learning management system or like tell us a little bit about how life evolved at post 2000.
JD (00:17:46):
Well, CDs in the nineties, CDs came in, audio cassettes, still sold. I still had some audio cassettes, but the CDs started coming in and then we converted to CDs. But you know, I learned at age 27, not to do anything, but what my core competence is, which is research, right. Travel teach. So I don’t do anything else. I haven’t driven a car in 32 years. I haven’t cooked since I was 24. I haven’t done administrator written checks or done any, you know, hiring or firing or managing, or I, I learned it to age 27 after reading the time trap by Ella McKinsey, not to do anything other than what is absolutely most inspiring to you if you want inspiring life. So I delegate everything and I’ll hire people that know what, what they’re doing to do that. And so if it’s time to go to CDs, I find somebody that takes care of all that.
JD (00:18:35):
And I just put them in place and I, to this day, still stick to that model. I don’t, I, so I haven’t really done anything except teach research right. And travel since 27, I’m 67 now 68 going on 68. So, so 40 years, that’s all I’ve done. I don’t do the other, I, I, my day consists of reading, writing, teaching, or doing interviews or movies or something. That’s, that’s it. I don’t do the, I don’t do anything else. I don’t make those other decisions. I learn that from Warren buffet and I, I don’t, I don’t, I do what I do my core competent. I know what it is. I stick to it. I don’t waiver from it. And but I surrounded myself with people. So if somebody, if we, if we need to go to CDs, we get some of the packages and organizes and does that.
JD (00:19:23):
If we’re going now to internet marketing, and then I get somebody to do that, but I don’t sit there and try to do my learning curve and do all that. I, I just hire people around me to do that. So to this day, I couldn’t tell you how it’s all being done behind the scenes. I just know I have competent people that take care of that for me. And my objective is to do as many podcasts and do as many webinars and do as many speakings and as many as many books and share as many insights as I can on this planet. That’s, that’s all I, I care about and travel the world.
RV (00:19:54):
I love it. So you’re now you’re living on a boat though, so you’re not, you’re clearly not doing in-person speaking events. You’re
JD (00:20:02):
Well, I, I did until I, I I’ve been living on this ship for 20 years, so I, I, I got this in 2001. So oh, so I, I, after nine 11, I was living in truck tower in New York, right underneath the Donald there. And we were up in the top of the building and, and but when nine 11 occurred, my wife said, no, this I don’t wanna be here in New York. Right now. We had some homes in Australia also. So we, she got a helicopter in the street and got out of there real quick. And and we, we got to Australia, but I told her, I said, look, I’m not scheduled to be in Australia, but four times, if you’re gonna live there, we need to come up with plan B. So I found out about the, the world, the ship called the world and which is a private condominium luxury condominium that, that sails around the world to all the countries.
JD (00:20:51):
And I, that matched my belief system, cuz I’ve said, the universe is my playground. The world is my home. Every country’s a room house. Every city’s a platform to sharer my heart and soul since I was 20, I’ve been internal dialogue. So it matched. So I, I bought that as an anniversary presence. We lived on here until she passed and I’ve been on here, but I’ve been traveling by, by flights. I still did 350 plus speeches a year by still flying and shipping. So if I’m on my ship, then I will go places. If not, I fly. So I’ll get on and off. But since COVID the flying has, and so I’m now just full time on the ship, just going place to place and doing much of it on zoom. So, or on these other mediums.
RV (00:21:36):
Well, and you’re not, but you’re not seeing you’re. I mean, clearly at some point the chiropractor patients stopped. And
JD (00:21:44):
Well, I sold, I sold the practice. I sold the first practice to two of my docs at the five. Gotcha. And I became financially independent at that time. And then I opened up another part-time consulting and practice. I did only for very special patients. I still did a little bit of practice by 1990 I, 89. I was not time practice. I was full-time speaking and consulting. And still to this day, I still consult. I still do consulting as it comes in. I don’t go out promoting it. Don’t do any marketing for it. Really. I just, it it’s on the website if people want to do it, but I still do coaching consulting. I don’t like to call it coaching, but just consulting with executives and various types of people, entrepreneurs, students. But I don’t, I don’t drive that. It just happens. You know, I I’ve done, I can do 300 in a year or I can do 200 a year something maybe, maybe more. But I, I don’t, that’s not my main business. I may do it and a half to that, on that,
RV (00:22:47):
On consulting.
JD (00:22:50):
But
RV (00:22:50):
Your, so your revenue streams now from, from the, you know, the ship for the last couple years is people will hire you to speak. You do virtual keynotes, you, you have private coaching slash consulting clients and then are, and then, and then what else? Like book deal like you, you know,
JD (00:23:10):
Web webinars, I have webinars. Most of my income still webinars. I have 80 different courses that I teach that I do pretty regularly. The one the break to experience, which is my CIG program. I’ve done 1,140 times. So I, I do that consistently. Donald told me that he says you, if you’re gonna do something brand and do it, build momentum, incremental momentum by doing it and over and over and over again until the people recognize it. So I’ve done that one. That’s my signature program. But I have a series of programs that are multi-day programs that I still do. That’s primary generation. I definitely have book royalties, but they’re not, that’s not, you know, major it’s, that’s secondary, that’s just added, but I I’m getting ready to do 10 more books. That’re in the making now. And then but most of it’s webinars, you know, the live webinars that I do or live. And that when yous that I do
RV (00:24:04):
Think is so is, so this is just so fascinating. So when you say a webinar, you’re saying people are buying an individual seat at a virtual event that you’re hosting and leading.
JD (00:24:19):
Yes. Yes.
RV (00:24:20):
So it, the same thing you were doing at the university of Houston under tree, people were paying money to come get tutored. They’re just paying 20 bucks per whatever. You’re still doing that more or less, just virtually someone buys a ticket comes to your event.
JD (00:24:36):
Yeah. But they’re not $20 anymore.
RV (00:24:38):
Yeah. Yeah. Well, yeah, that, that’s the awesome part is the price just keeps going. It just goes up over time. But, but the, the part that’s fascinating to me is that, like you basically said, I’m gonna do these four things. And for the most part, your core model, it sounds like has been public seminar. What I would call public seminars. It’s it’s anybody from the public can buy a ticket and come, you know, you started doing it for free. You are mentoring a couple students. Then it comes to, into, you know, hundreds of people. Then it’s 20 bucks ahead. And now it’s whatever it is a price for, but, but your people are buying a ticket and then they’re coming to an event and anyone can pay their own admission to come and, and just learn from what you, you have learned. And that, that hasn’t really changed. That’s been the core through your whole career. And then out of that, you’ve gotten keynotes and consulting and you’ve sold some products. And you also had your practice that you sold off, but like just basically hosting public educational events. You basically, it’s been your main business, the whole career.
JD (00:25:43):
Yeah. I think I’ve made about a quarter of a billion dollars doing that. So I think that that’s been a good model, but I think
RV (00:25:51):
I would say, so you, I mean, that’s, that’s, that’s not nothing a quarter of a million dollars is that’s a pretty good bit of coin.
JD (00:26:00):
Yeah. The, the thing is the, the speaking, you know, I, because I had a speech impediment speaking is probably the most inspiring thing I get to do. And because I had learning problem learning and delivering something that’s novel and unique to people, you know, it’s original information. It’s not something that’s canned from somebody else. I don’t copy people. I create original ideas that serve people and and synthesize and Ize information. So I’ve, I’ve, I’ve done a lot of reading to try to make, distinguish that from just anybody out there it’s solid information. So that, that’s my core thing. I just do it every single day so that you, you, somebody, I have people sometimes coming back to a program multiple times because they, they want, they know there’s something new every time that’s that’s part of my model is just to continue. Even if I do the same program, it’s I keep refining and adding and building and, and educating myself. That’s my responsibility.
RV (00:27:03):
Huh. Yeah. I’ve always kind of thought of myself as almost like a Civ, right? Like as the reason people pay me is not for the time with me, they’re paying me for the time I’ve spent condensing information from other places and, and, and exactly. It seems very much like how, how, how you view yourself, how do you get people to come? I mean, at this point, I guess you’ve had the email list and social media for years and word of mouth, but like, but like literally, how do you get people to come? Do you just have a team that says, Hey, you know, create an online page and we send email blasts and drive ads to
JD (00:27:38):
It. I don’t, I don’t, I have no idea. I don’t say that I don’t do that. I just research right. Travel, teach their job is to help me spread my message across the world. That’s their, I hire people whose vision and mission are congruent with what I’m intending. And I tell them, and I inspire them to what my vision is and help me do it. Let’s go, go make it happen. So I couldn’t tell you everything that goes behind the scenes on social media. I know we’re in all those things, but I don’t do all that. I, I, all I do is if they want me to do a message on some sort of social media, they send me a link on a zoom and they tell me this is the topic or whatever. And I just do a dissertation on it. And then they take care of all that I don’t. No, I couldn’t tell you I’m I didn’t even have a cell phone till last year. I don’t deal with that.
RV (00:28:31):
I love it. Are these people, employees or contracts, like vendors that you hire or does it matter?
JD (00:28:38):
There are some that I guess you would classify as contract. I think there’s a little of all that, cuz there’s somebody that’s kind of does management and does things and they hire people and I don’t even know all the people cause I have a south African office and I’ve got for a while there, we had people in Tokyo and Sydney and South Africa and the states and London and, and so I don’t even know all the different people until I get there. And then I recognize them and I say hi to ’em, but I don’t, I don’t, I Don manage. So I don’t do all that. All I’m all I do is write, travel, teach depend. Yeah. I don’t know all the different prices.
RV (00:29:16):
Yeah, yeah, no, that’s okay. But I, I, I, I, I just, I paused the recording here. Y’all for a second. Cuz I wanted to ask, ask Dr. D Martin, if he’s comfortable sharing the prices, cuz I wondered, you know, how much char these and you know, it’s, it’s really, you’ve stayed so true to just doing your thing. But it’s fascinating because you know, identifying that through line is that you’re a teacher you’re doing exactly what you said you would, but you’re the teacher in your own classroom, you created your own school, your own events, people used to pay or they started out paying $20 per seat to come. How much do they pay now?
JD (00:29:54):
It depends. I mean, sometimes there’s just little webinars, a little simple webinar, they still pay small amounts. And then there’s sometimes one and two and three and five and 10 day seminars, two week seminars. It depends on what we do. And each of those go up in price, they could range from oh $1,200. I’d say a thousand to $1,200 up to $7,000. It depends on what we’re doing. And the, and the things now, since zoom has come down, we’ve been able to bring prices down because we don’t have the logistics of the flights and the venues and all that. So we’ve been able to keep those prices down. But so some of the higher prices are down a bit closer to the five, 5,006,000. But, but that’s, you know, it depends on the logistics and what we, we, we just take what I, what I have is my fee. And then we find out all the cost and we put those together and we calculate that and we pass that on.
RV (00:30:47):
Interesting. So that’s a interesting way of figuring out the pricing. So you basically take your speaking fee. Plus you take the cost of the event. You add ’em together. You figure out how many seats are available, divide it, take the total cost divided by the number of seats. And there’s your, there’s your price. But with zoom, you’re able to bring, bring that. And I just, I, I, I, I, I love this. There’s so many reasons that I love this, but your whole story is one of just being told you, you know, you can’t do it. You’re not gonna be able to do it. You’re not good enough to do it. And, and then you basically take into your own hands and completely defy that. And I know a lot of people that are listening to this show, Dr. D martini, they feel that way in the industry, right?
RV (00:31:32):
Somebody, they, they maybe aren’t struggling with a speech impediment or you know, the, the kinds of things that you were, but somebody is saying, you know, you’ll never be a great speaker. Like you’ll never get booked to speak on a stage. You’ll get a book deal. Like my company will never hire someone like you. And I think there’s so much of this industry that people go, Ooh, I got a book deal from a publisher. Or I got a company that hired me to do a consulting engagement, or I got a speaker’s bureau that decided I was good enough to pitch me to their client. And I got a, a speaking engagement through the, these third parties. We forget how much of the world is available to us directly. And when you look at mark Victor Hansen and Jack Canfield, my personal mentor was one of ’em was Zig Ziegler.
RV (00:32:18):
You look at Dave Ramsey, you look, you look at Tony Robbins, you look at Tom Hopkins and Brian, Tracy, and, and, and it, all of these people and your story syncs up with that is going, you can find your own clients. You can hire yourself for your own speeches. You can, you can be your own publisher just by adding value to people’s lives. And whether it’s on a cassette tape or it’s in a venue or it’s on zoom, I just it’s, it’s inspiring to me as, you know, at least in this case, usually I’m starting to be the older guy in the room, but you’ve got many years on me in this industry inspiring to go that has worked. And it will always, it will always work
JD (00:33:00):
Well when the whys big enough, the house take care of themselves. As the old proverb says, when you have a big enough reason to get a message out into the planet. If the publisher I got rejected by publishers, I got night and gal KOAC rejected me three times. Now, they’re, they’re putting in products out. You know, that that rejection just means refinement. It doesn’t mean anything else. It just means, you know, they’re either not resonant or it’s time to refine what you’re doing, or just keep going and publish yourself. So I published many books on my own before I did the others. I didn’t let any of that. Stop me from my mission. My mission was to, I wanted to reach billions of people on the planet. And so we do so that’s we, but that means I may do find podcasts 10 podcast in a day, or, or go sit at the BBC and do 21 radio shows in a day.
JD (00:33:46):
I mean, I don’t, I don’t care. I don’t care what it takes. I just on a mission to get it done. That’s that’s, if you, if you have a, an attitude that there’s no option, we’re going forward, we’re making this thing happen. How do we do? And you’ll, you’ll, you’ll find the way you’ll find the people, the people, places, things, ideas and events will synchronize in your life and show up in your life. If you’re just committed to the outcome. All I wanted to do is study the greatest teachings on the face of the earth, by the greatest minds I ever lived, summarize synthesize Ize that gather that information devour, synthesize it, come up with something original out of it by the, a transcend awareness and deliver that in such a way that inspired people to go out and do exactly what they would love to do and show them how they can do it. I, I was told I couldn’t, I, I found out I could and they, they may think they can. And if they, if they all of a sudden follow some basic principles, they absolutely can. I, I, I, there’s no doubt in my mind that people can do something extraordinary their life. If they decide to do, it’s just, I’m just gonna pass the torch from what I’ve learned. That’s all.
RV (00:34:52):
I love it. That is so inspiring. Dr. D martini, where do you want people to go to connect with you? If they wanna like, stay in touch with what you’re up to or find out, find out more about your work.
JD (00:35:03):
All they have to do is go to Dr. D martini.com, D R D E M a R T I i.com Dr. D martin.com. They could spend the rest of their life on that, that website, cuz there’s so many interviews and YouTubes and things to read. And it’s an educational website. You know, people always said, you know, this is how you make it a sales website and stuff. And people buy stuff on there. But that wasn’t my intention. My intention was an educational website. So I get told that’s not how you’re supposed to do it. And I said, you don’t understand your mission is a sales before content I’m as content before sales, sales comes, take takes care of itself. If I do something that’s a value. So it’s an education and you’d almost have to believe in Buddhist reincarnation, cuz you’re gonna need a bunch of lives to probably be able to absorb what’s on there. There’s a lot of on there. So you’re gonna have to come back again.
RV (00:35:54):
Well I know, I know you are, but then it’s it’s like what your dad said, right? I mean, it was that idea. If your dad said it, basically if you over deliver, you’ll never have to worry about business. And that’s
JD (00:36:08):
My dad was correct. And I thank him for that. I had a, you know, my dad was an engineer and he had background in philosophy and he, he always, he’d never figured out how he could make a living on philosophy. And he said, but son, you figured out how to study the sciences and religions and philosophies of the world and psychologies and stuff. And you, you were able to do it. So he kind of, he used to come to my class and both, both my, the whole family used to come to the class and it was inspiring to see my dad and mom there. It was just lovely.
RV (00:36:37):
That’s so cool. Well thanks for sharing your, your, some of your personal story and your family and the background. It, it really is inspiring. And but your,
JD (00:36:48):
Can I share one more story? Can I say one more thing?
RV (00:36:51):
Yeah. I, I know
JD (00:36:52):
Where to go. When met Paul, when I met Paul brag in 1972, he had daughter named Patricia brag, a controversial background on that, but there’s, but that’s his daughter that took on and she took over the business when he passed. Well, it was interesting. I was speaking in Honolulu at Waikiki, the Hyat and I was doing my breakthrough experience program and in the back of the room in walks, Patricia brag. And after I, I, I took a break and, and at the break, she came up to me and she’s four foot seven. She comes up to me with this pink outfit on this hat and she comes up to me and she says, that was inspiring. And I said, thank you. And I knew who she was because I, I recognized her from Paul Bragg’s books and her books. And she said, you remind me of my father.
RV (00:37:46):
Amazing.
JD (00:37:46):
That meant a lot. And she then with my daughter, she sat with my daughter and she said, if you ever have an opportunity and you have an inspiration and it feels natural for you to want to carry on the work that your father’s doing. Just know it was inspiring for me to be able to do that with my dad. Well, my daughter is now teaching and doing insulting and doing this and doing and taking over. So she says, step aside, pop on taking over. So I’m still gonna be around for another 10,000 years, but I’m gonna be doing program. I’m gonna doing seminars with Wei boards in the afterlife. So that’s okay. I’ll, I’ll, I’ll be selling Wei de Martin Wei boards probably that they can tap into. That’s
RV (00:38:27):
A joke. That’s that’s funny.
JD (00:38:29):
My daughter, my daughter is definitely up and coming and she’s, she’s on the, on the ball now.
RV (00:38:36):
Yeah, well that is, that is so cool. And you know, I, I, I feel very much connected to that lineage of just all the personal development teachers that have come before. And it’s, it’s, it almost just feels like an honor to sit, sit in that stream and that, that stream of consciousness as it flows from one generation to the next. And obviously at brand builders group, we serve mission driven messengers. And so we very much feel like this podcast is mentoring. Those who, you know, are, are where I was 20 years ago going, how do you become a New York times best seller. And how do you get in the hall of fame of public speaking and how do you make this your full-time business and how do you speak in front of thousands of people? And it’s just like, it just passes from one generation to the next and it’s, it’s, it’s an honor to just be able to carry some, some small part of that torch for some number of years was really, really, really great.
JD (00:39:33):
It, it’s a, it’s a great industry and there’s some, you know, some great people in there that have left great marks. I was chatting, we did a little thing with Dennis Waitley recently, you know, we did a, his I dunno you saw, I saw pictures or two ago when
RV (00:39:48):
I did, because Darren Hardy, I think Darren wasn’t Darren Hardy there too.
JD (00:39:52):
I don’t remember who all was there, cuz I just did an hour with him and and that’s fantastic. I think he may be trying to meet us up in, in Tahiti next week, this coming week. So I don’t know. I’m gonna see if I he’s gonna come on, try to hang on out on
RV (00:40:05):
This. Well, I saw pictures of an event and I recognized of course I recognized Dennis Waitley and then I recognized several people that were in the room and it was like, wow, that, that was a, was, it was a room full of legends. So that’s really cool. Yeah.
JD (00:40:20):
Well, I, I went to, I went to zigs class when I was 20 and I went and I went to Dennis Wheatley’s class back when I was about that age. So I, I remember him, I, we met way back then we, I spoke with Dennis Waitley in 1984 together in Chicago and also Wayne Dyer and you know, Deepak and all the characters.
RV (00:40:40):
Yeah.
JD (00:40:41):
And so I got, I had, I be, I’ve been blessed to meet a lot of great people along the way and yeah, they all add a little piece to the puzzle along the way we all do. Yeah.
RV (00:40:48):
Yeah. You know, that’s the other thing about this industry that’s really amazing is just, I mean, I guess it’s probably true for most industries, but it’s like, if you hang around long enough, you end up meeting all these people like it, there it’s, you know, you end up being at the parties, you’re sharing the stage with them. You’re in the green room. You’re, you’re on the TV shows you have book launches at the same time. You, you know, you’re on each other’s podcast these days or whatever. It’s it’s really fulfilling. Well, thank you for sharing part of that legacy and, and that history with us today and such, such an inspiring story. And I, I, I know that there are people listening right now who will go, yeah, I can just do this. I can just find people to help and love on and I can be in charge of my own destiny and put on my own events and just pour into their lives. And if I over deliver, I I’ll never have to worry about business. So we wish you the best Dr. John, and you know, make sure you hit Dr. D martini.com. If you get him, if you get a chance and, and go over there and check out some more about him and what he’s up to and, and his, and we just, we look forward to staying in touch and, and all the best.
JD (00:41:57):
Thank you so much for having me on your show and for asking questions and appreciate it very much. Thank you.
Speaker 3 (00:42:03):
Hey, brand builder, Rory Vaden here. Thank you so much for taking the time to check out this interview as always, it’s our honor to provide it to you for free and wanted to let you know there’s no big sales pitch or anything coming at the end. However, if you are someone who is looking to build and monetize your personal brand, we would love to talk to you and get to know you a little bit and hear about some of your dreams and visions and share with you a little bit about what we’re up to to see if we might be a fit. So if you’re in interested in a free strategy call with someone from our team, we would love to hear from you. You can do that at brand builders, group.com/pod call brand builders, group.com/pod call. We hope to talk to you soon.
RV (00:42:50):
I had no idea that I was going to love the interview that I did with Dr. John D martini. As much as I did that interview was inspiring. It was informative. It was instructional. Like I thought that was so cool and awesome. And I mean, there are so many great lessons from that, and I’m gonna draw out just, just like always, I’m gonna share with you sort of like my, my top takeaways, my top highlights for you and how I’m gonna apply them to my life and how I think you might be able to apply them to yours and to your business. But the, the very first one here is the story of how he started his business. What was it? 40 years ago? 40 years ago, he spoke for free to generate clients for his practice. He spoke for free. Then he started charging $20 a seat.
RV (00:43:48):
And now today he charges $7,000 per seat. This is always the model like this is the model. And it’s like from 40 years ago to, to 30 years ago, to 10 years ago, to five years ago to two years ago, you gotta speak for free. You gotta you’re you’re you gotta get out there. I mean, we call this chicken on a stick in inside of our, our membership community. It’s like, you’re walking through whole foods and they give you chicken on a stick, or you go through the food court. They give you chicken on a stick. Why? Because people need to sample. They need to get a taste of what you’re about. They need to get an opportunity to know a little bit about who you are and to experience a little bit of benefit enough to where they go. That was fabulous. I want more.
RV (00:44:33):
And so that, that principle has never changed and it never will change, right? Like it’s the fastest way to take someone from a stranger, right? Why do they spend money giving out samples and stores? Because you know, I don’t know your brand. And, and it’s like, you rarely see it with big brands, right? Like if Doritos launches some new chip, they’re not given away tons of samples across the nation, typically because it’s Doritos. Everyone is like, yeah, I know Doritos. I’ll try it. Like I like, if you like Doritos, I don’t. But like, if you like Doritos, you go, okay, I’m gonna try this. Cuz I recognize the brand. But especially the newer brand, the younger, the brand, the, the, the more lesser known the brand is the more important it is for the sample. Right? And you go, I’ve never heard of this type of chicken, but you know, or this season, but you put it in your mouth and you go, oh my gosh, that’s incredible.
RV (00:45:25):
And in that case, it’s like, the product is selling itself, not the brand. And, and when you, when you’re just starting out as a personal brand, your product, your expertise, your content, like it is your content that people are buying. They’re buying the solution to per, to their problem. They’re buying your methodology. They’re, they’re buying the idea that you are an expert later, when you break through Shehan, while they’re buying you, they’re buying you because it’s you, right. That’s what everybody did with Gary. Vaynerchuck’s NFT thing with V friends, right? Half the people who bought it didn’t even understand it. They don’t even know what the heck it is. Like they still probably don’t understand it, cuz it’s like new and pretty complicated. But you go, why did they buy it? Because it’s Gary V because they trust him. But in the, but, but, but millions of people are sampling him every day and have been for 15 years.
RV (00:46:17):
What are you doing for people to sample you? They have to sample you. They have to have a free chapter, a free download a podcast, a a, a video of you, several videos on social, your blog, right? Like everything that we do in the relationship engine ecosystem is about creating these little mini assets where people can sample you. They are basically chicken on a stick and they occur as tweets and LinkedIn pulse and blog posts and medium posts and YouTube videos and Instagram videos. Of course, we use the content diamond, which ties that all together from, from just one main video a week that we repurpose. There’s a video on my blog, by the way, if you have, if you’re not familiar with the content diamond, if you’ve never heard me talk about that term, just go to Roy vain, blog.com and then search for content diamond.
RV (00:47:08):
And it will, it’ll, it’ll pop up. But like the point is you have to put self out there, not even yourself. Like you have to put your content out there, your expertise out there in a way that people can sample it because they’ve never heard of you. But if they like your content, it’ll override it, right? Like just cuz I’ve never heard of this type of seasoning. If, if I taste it and put it in my mouth and go, that was amazing. Like, or I’ve never eaten at this restaurant. If I taste it, I’m like, yeah, I’m gonna, I’m gonna eat at this spot in the food court. That that’s how it’s done. And, and Dr. Demar has been doing this for years and it’s just another example of this timeless principle. And so, you know, don’t get lost in the tactics and the like, you know, I don’t, I don’t know if this is working and I don’t like this platform and I’m not like it doesn’t even matter really where it happens.
RV (00:47:58):
It can be a speech, it can be a podcast, it can be a video, it can be an article. It can be a tweet. It can be any of these things, but you’ve gotta put your expertise out there. You’ve got to add value and solve problems for people and answer questions for them so that they can sample you and build trust. That is why we do. I mean, that’s our whole content marketing strategy. That’s it. The second takeaway from Dr. D martini, which was interesting, cuz I’ve done this and heard a lot of this, but never thought about it quite in this way, which I, it was super sharp was he said, you know, I started speaking for free and then I had a fee and people would pay me. And then as my fee got higher, less and less people could afford me. But what several of the audiences did is they would do a revenue share with me.
RV (00:48:49):
And, and that is how the conference could afford me. That was how I could get my speaker fee. And, and that’s a really important way to think about it. I mean, especially if you’re beginning, you should be taking every gig you get, like you should be taking every opportunity to practice and hone your craft and, and get out there and, and, you know, rehearse your content, do that and build your email list and all those things. But the other thing is going, if you can make an offer from stage and you can sell something. And typically what we’re gonna say is, I mean, in world class presentation craft, which is our phase one course, three of our curriculum, we teach about the mechanics of what to say you to sell from on stage. And we talk about firm offers like our not firm offers, sorry full offers and soft offers a full offers.
RV (00:49:42):
When you’re asking for a credit card, a soft offers, when you’re just like offering people a free call or a free download when you’re first starting out, you, if you’re making a full offer, you, I would, I would say you probably wanna keep it under $200. Because it, it takes quite a bit of skill to sell to a room full of people, something north of $200 and not like, you know, turn a bunch of people off. But most of what our clients do and what we do is when we speak, we do soft offers. We don’t sell anything. We give away free calls. And then we do one on one calls and we do the selling there. And that, that is the way to do it. And, and even to this day, there are some events that I will speak at because they don’t have my fee, but they will allow me to do an, an offer.
RV (00:50:26):
And they will allow me to follow up after the event and get emails and do all this stuff. And we can, we can make our feedback in, in other ways, if it’s the right audience, if they’re, you know, perfect for us. So the revenue share from the sales that come at the events is another way that, that you can get your fee or maybe you don’t even have to do a revenue share with the event. Host. Maybe the deal is you go speak for free, but you get to keep, you get to make an offer and you get to keep all the money at the back. I mean, all of that is kind of like part of the normal negotiation, but don’t just turn away an event because they don’t have your fee, especially if they really want you, like, if they’re really your fans, they’re really your people.
RV (00:51:05):
They love your stuff. Hopefully, you know, and if you’ve been in our community, hopefully you’re learning ways to monetize. I mean, I know you’re learning the ways cuz we teach ’em to you, but like you have other ways to monetize other than just your speaking fee. And that also opens up a lot more opportunity for places that you can speak. Because even if you don’t get your speaking fee, you can, you can make the same or more by what comes at the back of the room or from free calls after or from getting people on your email list. And then you, you sell, you know, after the event is over and that’s huge. And, and again, part of why I love this conversation is one that’s sharp and kind of like a new way of, you know, just a really clear way of thinking about it, but the other is it shows you that this idea, this is a principle that has been around since the beginning of personal brands like that, that you speak for free, and then you’re selling at the back, and that is how you make your living.
RV (00:52:02):
And that is how I made my first dollars as a personal brand. I spoke for free and I sold myself published book at the back of the room. And then after that, I spoke for free and I sold tickets to a half day event at the back of the room. And then, you know, from there it evolved and evolved. And then, you know, one, we sold, we sold CD sets for a while, and then we sold courses and then we sold the expensive live event tickets. And then we sold coaching programs. And then you nowadays, we just drive free calls and then we talk to people and then we sell ’em whatever they need. And some of the stuff we sell is 99 bucks. We have, we have stuff that’s 25 bucks, 99 bucks. Most of the stuff we do is obviously our membership program. And we’ve got different tiers of that, that fit sort of every budget. So you can do it. People have done it. Dr. John D. Martinez has built this whole. We are doing it. It has worked, it does work. It will work revenue share from the back of the room. And then the third thing was something was when he was talking about what his dad said, and this is so simple, right? But it’s just so good. He said, son, if you always over deliver, you’ll never have to worry about having enough business.
RV (00:53:18):
If you always over deliver, you will never have to worry about having enough business that is so strong and clear and simple and profound and true and was true, is true and will be true to come. Like if you always over deliver, if you always give people more than they are expecting, if you always give people more than what they paid for, if you always deliver above and beyond what they need or what they deserve, like what, whatever the transaction is, if you exceed that, you’re never gonna have to worry about business because you’re gonna have advocates out there. I did. I did a reel on this, on my Instagram my handles at Rory Vaden. And I did a reel on this, about how to, how to select the right price. And, you know, my whole, my whole point is going. It doesn’t so matter.
RV (00:54:16):
It doesn’t so much matter what you charge. It doesn’t so matter. It doesn’t so much matter what your price is. What matters is that you always deliver more than the price that you’re charging for, right? You always deliver more than the price you’re charging for. So it could be a hundred million and you, as long as you’re delivering a billion dollars of value, it’s worth it, right? If it’s $10. And so we use the something that we call the rule of 10, which is price it at one 10th of what it’s actually worth, right? So, you know, if, if our goal, if we’re gonna, you know, let’s say it was $10,000, we wanna deliver a hundred thousand dollars of value that we go. Like, we really believe this is worth a hundred thousand dollars. This will, you will make a hundred thousand dollars from what you’ve learned here.
RV (00:55:02):
And we’re gonna charge 10,000. That gives you a lot of conviction that gives you a, a lot of strength that gives you a lot of enthusiasm when you’re sharing the price and talking about your program. And you don’t have fear because you’re going, this is, you’d be crazy not to do this, which is how I feel about brand builders. I’m just like, y’all, we are the cheapest, most insanely valuable education. There is. I mean, what we give to our members for what they pay is are tens of millions of dollars. Like we have proven it. Like we have made millions of dollars from these things that we’ve had to learn from 7,900 different sources and pull it together and give it to you step by step. And just going, if you haven’t requested a call with our team, like request a call, like go, go to free brand.
RV (00:55:54):
What do we say? Pod, pod call, whatever, whatever the advertisement is, you can go to free call.ro vain.com. I know that one works or whatever the ad is that we place on here. But like, if you’re liking this and you’ve been listening to this for a minute, you should request a call, right? Like it costs some money to do, to work with us, but it is extraordinary what people get and the experience and the results that people are having. And the, and the other people in the community alone. Like if you learn nothing, just being around the other members of our community is insane. Like our community is epic. I mean, you’re at an event sitting next to New York times, wrestling, authors and hall of fame speakers, and eight figure entrepreneurs and billionaires and people who’ve sold their, their companies for hundreds of millions dollars and people who are multi seven figure, you know, direct sales or network marketing people.
RV (00:56:46):
And you know, the top of their profession or their industry. And maybe you’ve never heard of ’em, but they just crush their industry. Like they’re the most well known in their thing. And they’re all just sitting. We’re like all in the same space. It blows me away. Like our members, our clients are the most amazing people, actors and actresses on TV. Obviously the, the author thing, there’s former pro athletes, tons of people with like hundreds of thousands of followers or tens of thousands of followers. And there’s like sitting right next to you at, I mean, our, our events are crazy. So, and that’s how we design it. Right. And it’s, it’s because of exactly what Dr. DM, our teen’s dad told him. And then he did. And so many, you know, Zig Ziegler was one of our mentors and he did it. And like overdeliver, overdeliver give people more than they expect more than they deserve more than they paid for.
RV (00:57:37):
And watch it come back to you, watch it, change your life, watch it, change your business, watch it radically flood your bank account. Like just do it for a while. Go, how can, what are people expecting? And how can I give ’em more than that? How can I constantly be pushing the envelope of adding value, adding value? And our team is doing this. Like our team is awesome. You know, I’ll, I’ll log into like our members portal and be like, oh my gosh, that’s so cool. Like, where did that feature come from? Because our, our team is just doing it and you wanna create that culture. And even if it didn’t pay off somehow in money, it, it, I mean, it always does, but like, it, it, it pays off an impact. It, it, it pays off in purpose. It, it pays off in this feeling that you’re contributing to the world and that what you’re doing is good and that you’re adding value to people’s lives.
RV (00:58:28):
And it gives you the conviction that other people should buy from you. And that is worth a lot. It’s worth a lot to you, especially if you have call reluctance and sales reluctance, like I’ve had for so much of my career, cuz I don’t wanna annoy people and I don’t wanna be pushy and I don’t wanna be aggressive. And so you gotta be convicted the value of, of what you do. And, and so use the rule of 10, use the rule of 10. It’s just make sure that the, the value you deliver far exceeds the price that you charge. That’s it make sure the value you deliver far exceeds the price that you charge. Because as Dr D Martin’s dad says, if you, you over deliver, if you always over deliver, you will never have to worry about having enough business. And I hope that you feel loved on as a listener of this show.
RV (00:59:19):
We would love to talk to you. So hopefully you, at some point, you know, request a call with our team or just keep tuning in like, and, and just keep tuning in or just keep tuning in. We’re here for you. It literally fills us up to know that you are on the other end every week, listening to this show. Like even if we never ever have any financial exchange, it is the greatest like honor and privilege to know that you’re gifting us your attention and your time, and you’re willing to allow us and our guests to be an influence in your life. And it’s just an honor. I mean, and we absolutely love it. So I hope we get to meet you in person at some point. But thank you for tuning in. Thank you for sharing this with your friends. Thank you for leaving your comments and your reviews on iTunes and telling people about this. And just please keep coming back and know that our heart is to overdeliver. And Hey, if you don’t think we’re overdelivering or if you have ideas about how we could leave that as a comment on iTunes, let us know because that’s, that’s the desire of our heart is to, is to really serve you in that way. That’s it for this version of the influential personal brand podcast, Roy Vaden out.

Ep 251: Trends in Personal Branding National Research Study by Brand Builders Group | Recap Episode

RV (00:07):
Hey brand builder, Rory Vaden here. Thank you so much for taking the time to check out this interview as always, it’s our honor to provide it to you for free and wanted to let you know there’s no big sales pitcor anything coming at the end. However, if you are someone who is looking to build and monetize your personal brand, we would love to talk to you and get to know you a little bit and hear about some of your dreams and visions and share with you a little bit about what we’re up to to see if we might be a fit. So if you’re interested in a free strategy call with someone from our team, we would love to hear from you. You can do that at brand builders, group.com/podcall, brand builders, group.com/podcall. We hope to talk to you soon.
RV (00:53):
Welcome to a very special recap edition of the influential personal brand podcast. I am about you break down the interview that just happened between me and AJ Vaden, who at this point you probably know is the CEO and co-founder my co-founder at brand builders group. She’s our CEO. She’s also my wife and has been my business partner for a long time. My best friend, just the, the most brilliant woman, like I just love being in business with AJ, obviously doing life together and raising a family and all that, but I, I love being in business with her. And so I’m gonna break down the recap of, of some of the things that I just learned from this interview. And I’m gonna give you my top three takeaways from from, from the inner view with AJ and the first, I mean, the first kind of key takeaway, just to make sure you got it is that this moment is the demarcation line for a change in the format of this podcast.
RV (01:58):
So I don’t know how long you’ve been listening, but what we have been doing is typically. I will do an interview every week, and that is like the first episode that comes out in a week. And then AJ and I do a recap, basically sharing our takeaways from that interview as the second episode every week. And we are changing that. So as of, of now going forward, what is happening is that every week I will do an interview and then I will do the debrief recap of that interview all as one episode, and then AJ will conduct an interview and she will do the debrief, recap, all of that interview or, or that episode. And so it’ll be, you know, more content, although we’re publishing at the same frequency every single week. So that is part of why we did this very special edition with me and her together as a way to, you know, draw attention also to the change in format.
RV (02:56):
And this podcast is growing tremendously. We are regularly in the top two hundreds of all podcasts in the careers category and across all iTunes and, and in the us and in several countries around the globe. And so we’re just excited about it. We’re putting more resources into this show and into the content that comes, you know, comes out and, and the prep for it and getting guests for it and just working really, really hard to make it more and more valuable to you. So that’s that, you know, related to that, obviously we talked about this a couple times, but this interview was based on a national research study that we can called the trends in personal branding, national research study. And this took us over a year. All in, it was, it was tens of thousands of dollars that we invested into it.
RV (03:49):
It’s been well over a year in the planning phases and the execution, and then creating this and we are giving it away for free right now. If you go to brand builder, group.com/podtrends, brandbuildersgroup.com/podtrends, you can download this entire study, which we believe is changing. The Fu that the future of marketing is personal branding. And that there is this transference, this tip happening where it’s less about companies and products, and it is shifting more towards people in the future, at least, you know, that’s what we’re banking on and, and, and we love, and, and we’re excited to be a part of it. So make sure that you go download that brand builders group.com/pod trends. You want to get your hands on this study. It’s beautiful. It’s really easy to flip through it’s 70 pages or something, but you can flip through the whole thing in probably 10 or 12 minutes, and there’s some extremely powerful insights that come right out of it.
RV (04:50):
So go, go make sure you grab a copy now in terms of the interview that happened. And it’s, it’s fun. I love interviewing my wife. I love learning from my wife. I love learning from her as my wife and my friend, but as our CEO, I mean, she is just extraordinary in her ability to run an organization and understand what an organization needs. You know, she has a lot of experience doing corporate consulting in the life that we used to come from at our former company that we, we started together her back in 2006, and then we exited in 2018 when we sold that company, a huge part of what she did was just do consulting with organizations. And so she understands, you know, big trends and, and how to move, you know, big ships and, and, and, and, and see what’s coming and see the way that things really should be.
RV (05:41):
And so I of learning from her and these are, you know, some of, some of, some of my biggest highlights from, from the from the whole interview. Okay. So the first one is that personal branding and, and this, this is something that you’re gonna wanna understand, and if it wasn’t super clear, make sure you, you grasp this personal branding. Isn’t really something new, personal branding is simply the digital of reputation, the digitization of reputation. And, and we also sometimes say the monetization of reputation. We talk about this as a hypothesis. This is something we tested in our national research report, and that this trends report, this national research study that we did, which is that personal branding is all about reputation. It’s just do people have, what do people know you for? And do they trust you? And what are the behaviors that you can engage in that will build you more trust that will help you become more well known that will help you have a greater impact in the world world.
RV (06:58):
That is reputation. And I love the way that AJ described this. When she talked about her small town, how even in the small town, everybody had a reputation. And it made me think about the, the small town where I grew up in Frederick. It’s not a small these days, but when I went to high school in Frederick, it was so small. We, we, I mean, we, we didn’t have a stoplight and it was like, everybody knew everybody and everybody had a reputation, they were all known for something. They all had certain characteristics. And it was just kind of like you learned the reputations as you went along and, and then you go, well, that’s just a tiny, small kind of farm community. And that is blown up to become what the, the world is is and what the, in like what the internet is and what will one day become the metaverse, which is just this digitization of your reputation is what are you known for?
RV (07:48):
How well are you known? Are you trusted? What do we look to you for? What do we look to you as the, the go to source for blank? And that’s what brand builders group is, is all about. We don’t brand companies, we brand people, we, because a, a, a person is, is, is simple and clear of like, this is you. And what do you want to be known for? What do you believe? What, what are you the expert in? And of course, one of our biggest philosophies that we teach is that you are most power positioned to serve the person you once were, you are most powerfully positioned to solve the problem for someone else that you have already solved for yourself. It’s the digitization of reputation. And so we are here as a company to help you become more well known and seeing the data a have been 74% of Americans are more likely to trust someone with an established personal brand.
RV (08:45):
Of course they are, because it’s just a new word for reputation, personal branding, reputation. They’re the same thing. Personal branding does not mean social media and video courses and bestselling books and podcasts, and, you know, websites and da, da, da, da. Those are just extensions of a reputation. It’s about you, your values, your beliefs what you wanna be known for your expertise, the path that you’ve walked, the lives that you serve, the, the mission that you’ve dedicated yourself to, and your, your, your track record of being able to help people do that. And, and your track record of being able to do that for yourself, that is reputation. All these other things are just extensions of that into sort of a, a digital world, which you know, right now is mostly websites and social media and content. And, you know, something that we see in the future, you know, now be eventually becoming the metaverse, but your reputation will follow you everywhere.
RV (09:45):
Whether you’re in a small town like Frederick, whether you’re in a big corporate company, a big global company, whether you’re online or social media on your website, or one day into the metaverse, your reputation will follow you. And so you have to build it and, and, and manicure it deliberately and professionally and intelligently and, and intentionally, and that is something that we’re here to help you do. So that was just huge, personal branding is the digitization of reputation. The second of thing, which is one of, one of my favorite things that AJ has ever said, and one of my favorite things that she’s ever taught me and one of my favorite things about her that she has done is she believes and has proven that it does not take millions of followers to make millions of dollars. It doesn’t take millions of followers to make millions of dollars.
RV (10:42):
And I think too often, we go, oh, well, you know, I, I can’t monetize my personal brand or personal branding. Doesn’t apply to me cuz I don’t have millions of followers or I don’t care to have millions of followers. I don’t wanna be famous, but that I think is an err in judgment because we all want to be more well known. I mean, we, if, if we wanna make an impact in the world, if we wanna make a difference in the world, if we want our life to count for something, if, if we want to be on our deathbed, looking back and saying, my life mattered, why did my life matter? Because I made a lot of money because I had a lot of followers. No, because I impacted a lot of people because the, the, the, the way I spent my hours in life will have an impact after my death, that, that my life stood for something, it counted for something, because it affected someone.
RV (11:32):
It helped someone, it helped many someones. It helped thousands, hundreds of thousands, millions of people to live a better life, a more enriched life, a healthier life, a more meaningful life, whatever your mission is, but that is why it, it matters. And that the, you don’t have to have millions of followers to, to make money from doing that. The, the, the look, the brand builders, we say that we serve mission driven messengers. The reason we say that is not because we don’t care about money. We do care about money, but it is subservient to the mission. The mission requires money. Money is a, is necessity of growing the mission. It, it takes a lot of people and, and resources and skill sets, and it takes a team to accomplish anything. Great. And so those people typically aren’t available to, to work for free. So you gotta have money.
RV (12:26):
And so money is a, a necessary component that we have to be able to deal with and generate in order to a, a good steward in fiduciary to grow a business and to accelerate our message, but the, but making money, isn’t the number one priority. It’s not the highest focus. The highest focus is, is the mission. It is making an impact. It’s making a difference in the world and you can make a difference in the world without having millions of fun followers. You can look the, the, sometimes you’ll hear people complain about the algorithms, right? Oh, you know, the algorithms is you, you, I, I can’t get enough reach cuz the algorithms are blocking me. Well, yeah. Sometimes that’s frustrating, right? Like if you catch the algorithm, right, it’s gonna expose you to new people. What a blessing, what a, what a tremendous opportunity. But regard, you know what the algorithm can’t stop.
RV (13:16):
It can’t stop you from making a deeper impact with the people that are in front of you right now, whether that’s one or five or 10 or a hundred or a hundred million people, the algorithm doesn’t stop. The impact that you have with the people who do see your content. It might, I prevent you from reaching more people. But here’s the thing. If you focus on serving the people who are seeing your content right now in a deeper way, the algorithm will push you to more people. So if you focus on serving the people in front of you like serve the person you have now serve the one view that you’re getting on your or video, like go all in on going, how can I help these 13 people that are following me? What value can I add to their life? How can I support them?
RV (14:04):
How can I lift them up? And, and what you will find is if you do that, you know, those dozens of followers will become hundreds and thousands. And before you know it, you don’t need million of followers to make millions of dollars. Like the money actually trails much faster than you would think. Like you might think, oh, I gotta have a million or several hundred thousand followers to make money. You don’t like some of the wealthiest people inside of the brand builders group, community. I mean, I’m talking about the people who sell their company for hundreds of millions of dollars, tens of millions of dollars, or they’re, you know, multi seven figure businesses or multi eight figure businesses. Every single year, they’re making real money. They don’t have a ton of followers cuz they’ve spent their life building, building a, a, a, a company building a machine that actually makes money.
RV (14:49):
And they haven’t spent much time building, building their personal brand. So, you know, you, don’t the followers and dollars. It’s not a direct equation. Now we want lots of followers cause we wanna make impact, but you don’t need millions of followers to make millions of dollars. You also don’t need millions of followers to make an impact. Every single person is an opportunity for impact every single click, every single view, every single, you know, share like comment, every person who subscribes, like instead of always being consumed and concerned with how many do I have? What if you became all in consumed infatuated, like just totally concerned with the idea of how do I impact the people that I do have in a deeper way, how do I become more valuable to them? How do I educate them better? How do I inspire them better? How do I coach them better? How do I love on them better? What do they need? How can I help? How can I be of value? How can I be of use to them?
RV (15:55):
And if you do that, you will make millions of dollars, even if you don’t have millions of followers. And so I just love when AJ goes off on that because it’s, it’s such a good reminder that the, the, the thing that we think we need is not the thing that we actually need and it’s not even worth. It’s not even the thing worth chasing. It’s not chasing I, our, our advice to you would be don’t chase followers and don’t chase dollars, chase impact, right? Chase making a difference. Chase mission, mission driven messengers means mission over money. Mission is greater than money. Money is subservient to the mission. Impact is what we’re after. And we believe not just believe we know we’ve lived. It we’ve experienced it. It’s it’s happened in our life over and over again in our friends’ lives. In our clients’ lives. We know 100% without a shadow of a doubt. If you chase impact, the money will come.
RV (17:01):
If you focus on making a difference, you will make money. If you focus on creating fans, you will create customers, chase impact. And so, anyways, that is huge. Inspires me when she talks about it. It, it just lights me up cuz that’s, that’s why we started the company like brand builders group is not even focused on, I mean, we have revenue targets and things, cuz they’re necessary to run the business and like, you know, pay people, a living wage and hopefully create exciting opportunities and incomes for them. But it’s like we’re after impact, we’re chasing impact. We’re not chasing dollars. And that’s how, you know, if you belong here, I mean, seriously, that’s how, you know, if you belong in this community is if you’re someone who goes, yep. I buy in, I will chase. I am chasing impact. I wanna make a difference. I, I, I feel like my life is meant to be used for something.
RV (17:54):
I feel like there is a calling inside of me, a message inside of me that I am supposed to deliver some message to the world, not how do I make, how do I double my income in 60 days? I mean, doesn’t mean we don’t wanna do that. We do wanna do that, but that’s not the focus. That’s the byproduct. That’s the byproduct money is the byproduct of mission. At least that’s our philosophy. And then the last thing, and this is just a quick one, but oh, it was so good when she was talking about the data of which industries do personal brands matter the most. Right? And it’s like, oh, of course. It’s of course it’s like, you would think it’s oh, it’s influencers and it’s authors and it’s musicians and it’s artists like you would think this is who we think of when we think of personal brands.
RV (18:39):
And yet the data says it’s doctors, it’s lawyers, it’s financial advisors, right? It’s it’s accountants, it’s service providers and it is coaches and consultants, but it’s it’s and, and here’s, here’s what the takeaway was. She said the higher level of trust that is required to do your job. The more value having an established personal brand becomes the higher level of trust that is required to do your job. The more having an established personal brand becomes that is so powerful. Right? And, and you go on the one hand, that’s a really interesting statistic. On the other hand, I go, well, no, duh, like of course I have to trust my doctor. Like if this is the person that potentially is gonna take a knife and cut me open, like if my heart’s on the line, like hopefully I, I trust them. Or, you know, the person that I’m taking advice and counsel from for my overall health and wellbeing, it’s like, of course I have to trust that person.
RV (19:41):
If it’s my accountant, it’s like, I have to trust that they know what they’re doing, but also trust that they have my best interest in mind, my financial advisor, I have to trust them, not just their competency, but the fact that they care about me. And that is where the, this differentiation is, is happening. It’s not just about demonstrating that you have competency. It’s about demonstrating that you have compassion. It’s about demonstrating that you care, not just that you’re able, but that you care. And that is why seeing your face on social media or a website or, you know, having a chance to access you is really important. Not just, you know, here’s our company, here’s who we are. There’s power in that too. But the, the evolution is going. I wanna know you, I wanna know the person, the other side of this desk on the other side of this camera, on the other side of this operating table, on the other side of, you know, filling out my taxes, like, who are you?
RV (20:44):
And do I do I believe in you, do we believe the same things? And do you know what you’re doing, but, but do you care about me? Do you understand me? Do you know what I’m struggling with? And can you help me? And that is personal branding. And the more that, the more trust that is required there, the more that the personal brand matters, right? Like the more intimate our relationship is gonna be. The more trust that is necessary, the more having a personal brand matters, not millions of followers, but just this, this authentic, this authentic connection between us, this, this transparent visibility into who you are and what you believe. And, oh, I just, this, having the data to back all of this up is just, I mean, it’s edifying and it is it’s convicting even, even more than we were before. So I hope you love the interview with AJ.
RV (21:37):
You’re gonna love the episodes, right? Like I, I know you’ve probably gotten to hear some of her on the debrief, but hearing more, I mean, she’s so astute and sharp and just the way she sees the world. And so we’re just, I’m personally excited for you to get to know her and really like hear more of her heart and, and see it come out in these interviews that she’s doing. I know you’re just, you’re just, you’re gonna love her more and more and more, the more you get to know her. And, and we wanna get to know you more, right? So I hope we’re seeing you like I mean, we love doing this podcast, love it. The trick is we never see you, right? We, we don’t even get much feedback other than, you know, if you can leave us a review, leave us a review, cuz we see those.
RV (22:17):
But if you follow us on social, you know, I’m most active on Instagram, AJ’s most active on LinkedIn. We’re also picking up our social media presence and, and trying like as more of the company gets more people in place AJ and are trying to like spend more time getting to know you and interacting with you. You know, come leave us comments and, and, and share with us what you’re thinking and what you’re struggling with and, you know, download the study. And also our team wants to get to know you. Like if you think, if you’re wanting to become more well known and make more of an impact request, a free call you know, come over and check us out free brand call dot com. What is it? I don’t know. It’s on every ad I should know off the top of my head, but just go download the study for now brand builders, group.com/pod trends. And if you do that, you’ll get a chance to request a call with us. But keep coming back here. Thanks for your belief. Thanks for your trust. Thanks for the opportunity to, to shape your life. Go check out this data, let the data speak for itself. Just know that we love you. We believe in you, and we’re gonna keep coming back to serve you in a deeper way so that you can go out and serve your audience in a deeper way. We’ll catch you next time. Bye bye.

Ep 250: Trends in Personal Branding National Research Study by Brand Builders Group

RV (00:07):
Hey brand builder, Rory Vaden here. Thank you so much for taking the time to check out this interview as always, it’s our honor to provide it to you for free. And while wanted to let you know there’s no big sales pitch or anything coming at the end. However, if you are someone who is looking to build and monetize your personal brand, we would love to talk to you and get to know you a little bit and hear about some of your dreams and visions and share with you a little bit about what we’re up to to see if we might be a fit. So if you’re interested in a free strategy call, call with someone from our team, we would love to hear from you. You can do that at brand builders, group.com/podcast brand builders, group.com/podcall. We hope to talk to you soon.
RV (00:54):
Oh man, I’m so excited. I cannot, I cannot wait for you to meet Tori Gordon. Tori is someone who has become just one of my favorite people that I met in the last couple years. We met her through brand builders. So she is, she’s a brand builder. She’s one of our clients, but she is extraordinary and she’s been doing huge things long before we ever got a chance to get to know her. In 2021, she actually has been one of tos, top 100 female creators. She has over 800,000 followers on TikTok. She has transitioned that into a fantastic coaching business. Speaking, she’s doing brand deals. There’s a number of things that she’s doing. And her content is really around helping people overcome their suffering and find perspective. And it’s just super inspiring. She is also a trauma informed breathwork facilitator.
RV (01:54):
She’s been featured in outlets like NBC and Fox news and CBSs and Yahoo business insider. And she hosts a podcast called the coachable podcast, which is in the top one and a half percent of all podcasts globally. And it’s fun to see that taking off for her and just so many different things that she’s working on. And obviously she’s an influencer. So she’s, she’s doing brand deals with big companies like can bud and better help, et cetera. And just inspiring a lot of people more than that. We just think she’s cool. And and she’s someone even like so many of our clients, even though she’s a client, it’s like somebody that we look up to and we learn from and just felt like you gotta meet Tori Gordon. And she’s got some awesome stuff to share with us. So anyways, Tori, welcome to the show.
TG (02:41):
Thank you so much for having me that was such a warm intro. And it’s just fun to be here and have this conversation with you. You’re somebody that I very much you and AJ are somebody people that I look up to admire and have learned so much from. So it’s, it’s fun to have this come full circle and get to chat while we record. So I’m excited for the conversation.
RV (03:03):
Yeah. Thank you, buddy. I mean we, we totally believe in you. You’re easy to believe in. I mean you have just built, you know, a, a such a phenomenal and loyal following which we would describe as quickly only because we’ve been around for 20 years. And you know, it’s taken you less time than that, but tell us the story a little bit. I, I mean, I wanna hear, I wanna hear about TikTok and how you’ve built that, but, but before that, tell us a little bit about your personal story. And you, you know, how you got started and how you figured out what, you know, I know that led to how you figured out what type of content you were gonna start producing.
TG (03:48):
Yeah. Yeah. It’s a great place to start. I think for me, I never would’ve anticipated that I would be having this type of conversation or be doing the work that do with clients or online ever if you’d asked me, you know, what, what would my future look like a couple years ago? You know, I’ve, I’ve been doing this full time for less than two and a half years. And before that I was in corporate sales, outside sales, and then I was leading a sales team of about a hundred people in five countries teaching and training them in sales training and onboarding and performance management, and was really kind of growing my, my career in that, that traditional way. And for me, I grew up in Alabama in Tuscaloosa. And so and I grew up in a family of educators and teachers, my mom and dad were both professors at the university level.
TG (04:47):
And so it was really always instilled in me the value of education and learning and being a student of life. And you know, I never really had a clear idea though, growing up of what I wanted to do. And so fell into sales. Like I fell into a lot of things early in my life, looking for other people to tell me who to be and what to do. I got my degree in social work at the time because a friend of mine said, Hey, it’s easy and it’s interesting. Come get this, you know, this degree, it’s an easy a and it was in college that my sister was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia. She’s 21 at the time. So I was for the first time experiencing a lot of upheaval in my life and just felt kind of lost at that season about who I was and what I wanted and felt like I needed to stay close to home to cuz of everything that was going on.
TG (05:43):
And over a couple of years, you know, I lost my sister, lost her battle with cancer. We lived through a massive F four tornado that came through our hometown in Tuscaloosa. And then my mom was diagnosed with stage four ovarian cancer and wow, those losses just kind of piled up on each other to the point where after my mom passed away, 10 days after my 27th birthday, I kind of looked at my life and I looked around this beautiful house that I owned at 26 and the money that I had had made and all of the things, all of the boxes that I had checked that I thought were gonna make me happy and I felt alone. I felt empty. And I didn’t know what if I were to have been the one to, to have died genuinely like would I have left behind?
TG (06:39):
Would anybody care? Like, did I make an impact? Did I, did I have a powerful influence on people in a positive way? And obviously my, my mother and sister did in so many ways, not just on my life, but so many other people. And it put, set me on this path of really trying to figure out what my legacy would be. What did I wanna be remembered for and how did I want to leave the world a better place than I found it. And so that required me to do a lot of personal healing and get to know myself in a whole new way and give myself permission to do things I’d never done before. And so my journey really started from a selfish place of, of really trying to, to figure out my life path and purpose and what I needed. And it, it began with starting a podcast just to talk about the things that I was learning personally in my journey and that evolved very quickly. I actually got a call from my corporate boss and her boss right after I launched my podcast back in 2019 saying the first thing they said was we saw that you launched a podcast and were disappointed.
RV (07:45):
Really.
TG (07:46):
Yeah. And they told me, you know, we, this looks like it takes a lot of time. How do we know you’re not, you know, doing this on the side, we want you to be fully committed to this company and nothing else. And it was very clear that they hadn’t listened to the show because they had no idea what I was talking about on it. And they made a lot of accusations. And so it was clear then I think my life started to open up this natural path of saying, if, if you really want to pursue this, you’re gonna have to have a deep commitment and current to do something new, but you need to learn how to trust yourself. And so after that conversation, I put in my two weeks notice and I started on this entrepreneurial journey that I’ve been doing the last two and a half years, but had no idea was one of those jump out of the plane and build the parachute on the way down kind of thing. Wow.
RV (08:37):
I mean, so I, I wanted to share that story for so many reasons cuz it’s just, it’s such a powerful story. And there’s, I think when people think of like, you know, oh, TikTok or they’re a talker, you know, it’s easy to go, oh, it’s somebody who, you know, just wants fame or just, just, you know, waste their life away in video. Or like we have all these really stupid preconceived notions of like what that means. And we, I think specifically for brand builders and our community of mission driven messengers, I mean obviously we of the things that we say all the time is you’re most powerfully positioned to serve the person you once were, your story is such a beautiful, one of going, you’re just using the tools of the day to help people walk through pain that you have already experienced. And I think it’s really important for people to catch that it’s like, it’s not vanity it’s, it’s not, it’s not even entertainment. It is. You’re, you’re just using a vehicle to reach a lot of people to, to try to help those who are going through something like what you’ve been through. I mean, to lose your mom and your, and have a, a tornado that magnitude all within a few years. I mean, that’s crazy. That’s, that’s crazy Tory.
TG (10:03):
Yeah, it was a lot. And I didn’t, you know, mention the three grandparents and the uncle and all the other people who passed in that time. So there was a lot that was going on. And, and to your point, I think a lot of people do we have these, these ideas in our head about what it means to be on social media. It’s funny. I was having a conversation in a discord channel the other day with a venture capitalist who was asking me about TikTok. And I was saying it would be an amazing opportunity for him to, to get global exposure and just to become kind of known as an expert in his space. Even if you’re not, you’re not selling, you know, your services on, on the platform, you’re just letting people know who you are. And it’s funny that no matter where people are in their journey, there’s all of these ideas that people have about, oh, people would think of me, what he said is people immediately think I’m phony.
TG (10:59):
People would think what he is really saying is people would judge me and I’m afraid of that. And the other piece is how many of us don’t think our, our ideal client is out there. And for me it was really, you know, before I was even thinking about selling to an audience or converting people that watch my content into clients or anything like that, it was just, I have a story and a message that I feel like can help somebody. And if I had had somebody, there were people in my life that I listened to that really encouraged me to, to do the work on myself that I needed at the time. And my, my goal was just to be a voice, you know, that would encourage people to to live a life that they were proud of and to, to stop avoiding things that they were, they were trying to run from.
TG (11:52):
And I think, yeah, practically, it’s just a, a smart strategic move because there’s millions upon millions upon millions of people that are on this platform. And the funny thing is when I got on TikTok, it wasn’t really strategic. It TikTok actually reached out to me and they said, Hey, it was in the middle of the pandemic. It was traditionally known as a young kid’s platform with that. A lot of kids were on dancing and doing trends like that. And they noticed a need in the market that there are so many people that are at home that can’t go anywhere and we wanna educate and inspire people through our platform. So can we bring content creators to create educat inspirational content across all these different industries? And I was one of ’em and then I just, for the first 30 to 40 videos was completely doing something I’d never done before, but it, there was this huge permission slip there because no one I knew was on TikTok at the time. So I just was doing something that was a little bit new and I a little bit fresh and ultimately resonated with people. Mm-Hmm
RV (12:59):
so, so let’s do talk about TikTok a a a, a little bit in terms of why do you think you grew so quickly? What can people learn from that? What do they need to know about it? I mean, obviously, yeah. I mean that, it started as a dance thing that there it’s, it’s still very dance driven. Mm-Hmm there. Music is still very musically driven in, in a lot of cases. And so one of the reasons that I love highlighting your story is you, you don’t do anything close to that. You, your, your videos are moving and profound and deep. Like they, they are, they are, I mean, you’re talking about deep issues to trauma and mental health and like these, these kinds of things. And so, you know, you, your, your profile is evidence of proof that it doesn’t have to be a certain type of content. Right. yet I know that you’ve also put a lot of thought and work into it and probably made a mistake here and there. So can you just like walk us through that a little bit?
TG (14:03):
Yeah. I think definitely early on, I was trying to figure out what my voice was gonna be on this platform, because the thing about TikTok, if you’re coming from Instagram or any other social media platform TikTok at the time, really required me to think differently about how I was gonna share my message. And what I knew was my sweet spot was, was really just talking authentically to the camera. And so I started doing that like on my daily walks during COVID, I would have no makeup on, and I would just like be telling, you know, sharing a, a snippet of, of my day or something that you know, had just listened to in a podcast or something that inspired me. And I think the thing about TikTok is it feels really relatable and raw and real, the it’s built in such a way that you can create content on the fly and really document your real life, as opposed to what we had been traditionally kind of conditioned into, which is perfect feeds and perfect photos.
TG (15:03):
And this highlight real. So people were really hungry for authenticity and, and something that genuine. And so regardless of, of the type of content, I think the thing that helped me was just pulling, allowing myself to like put down any mask I wore on any other platform and just show up as me. The thing that really, really does well with, with audiences on TikTok is feeling like they know the person that they’re watching that you’re part of their life, or you’re part of this journey that they’re going on. And, and just telling a story is of one way to really engage an audience and take them on, you know, that journey. But yeah, we talk about deep topics and, and the thing that I’ve realized is that trauma doesn’t discriminate. You know, everybody has experienced something hard in their life and they’re all seasons that, that we need support in and can relate to.
TG (16:07):
And that’s the kind of content that moves people. It’s either funny, it’s emotional in some way, whether it, it causes you to laugh or to cry or to, to feel something think about all the, the videos you’ve seen of dogs or, or the, you know, pet of the week. And it just like makes you wanna cry. But I just talk about, you know, personal stories. And I, that’s what I encourage other people to do is let people get to know you on a deeper level that they might not see on other platforms.
RV (16:39):
So I, I have that question for you. So clearly that has been your strategy on TikTok. That’s worked really, really well for you. The, you know, and, and if y’all, don’t already follow her, if you don’t know. So if you it’s coach, coach Tory, Gordon is her TikTok handle. You’ve got videos of you crying and on camera and stuff. So do you think that other, do you think that that approach doesn’t work on other platforms? You know, just kind of like the raw authenticity thing, do you think it just especially works on TikTok? Do you think that other platforms are migrating that way now, or they’re not did it, did it really just work cuz you were early to the platform mm-hmm like, do you know just like I guess subjectively what’s your sense of that?
TG (17:34):
Well, I’d say since Instagram has rolled out reels a lot of the, the things that you see do really well on TikTok are starting to do well on Instagram several months later. So I think there’s part, I don’t think it’s necessarily only on TikTok, but for those who’ve been on Instagram for a really long time, there has been a way that we’ve been conditioning used to seeing feeds and content there. So TikTok was for me, the first platform that kind of was this permission slip to be more vulnerable on social media. But I think that’s the way it’s trending in general, across platforms. People want realness. They want to see that they’re, we’re tired of that kind of fabricated airbrushed look all the time. And I think that showing up on Instagram different ways, whether it’s through video content or through other types of posts, but ultimately when, what I’ve experienced in trying to build a personal brand is people want to know you and TikTok makes it super easy to just post you can post a large quantity of content so that people can get to know you quickly as opposed to feeling like I can only post one post a day on Instagram.
TG (18:57):
Right? it it’s sort of like taking your Instagram stories and actually posting it. So it doesn’t go away after 24 hours. So those little snippets into your life that you might post on your, your story, people actually can go back and kind of track your history and see the things that you’ve done or the things that you’ve talked about. And, and there gets to be kind of this, this theme of what is this person’s content about? Is it, am I gonna go there and I’m gonna learn something, am I gonna go there gonna be entertained? Am I gonna go there? And I’m gonna be inspired. Am I gonna laugh? And people start to, to go to your profile cuz they’re looking for a certain type of content. And so the thing I love about TikTok is very quickly O the audience will tell you the, the kind of content that they wanna see more of. That’s just how the algorithm is built. There is so that anybody starting out, even if you have zero followers, you can get organic reach and the TikTok audience will tell you if they like it. And then you can do more create more of, of that kind of content, which is invaluable feedback to get
RV (20:14):
Mm-Hmm . And so the do you think that, like, in terms of the mechanics of the platform, the way the videos are edited, the, you know, like you’re talking a lot about the kind of content and sort of the overall feel mm-hmm in terms of the mechanics of what, you know, functions you need to be using, are there certain things that you would recommend for that? Or is it really just about posting consistently staying, you know, kind of like on a topic, let people see you and, and that, or is, is there also some technical things or strategic things that you go actually, like if you’re gonna do it, here’s some things about how you wanna do it. Mm-Hmm functionally speaking.
TG (21:03):
Yeah. Definitely record in the app. That’s make it native to the platform. It’s a something that they really, really like when it comes to the algorithm, they they’ve built the platform in such a way that it’s easy to record right there in the TikTok app, as opposed to recording you know, with your HD camera and then uploading it. And having this perfectly curated video. It’s, it’s almost better if it’s not a lot of my content has been terribly lit, you know, when I’m walking my dog in the middle of the night or sitting in my car before going to meet a girlfriend for dinner, and it’s just like, I just whipped out my phone and I press record record, and I just started talking. So I wouldn’t over it’s it doesn’t need to be overproduced. The other thing I’ll say practically is, is definitely use the, the text overlay feature because the TikTok algorithm picks up on the text.
TG (22:02):
That’s written through the app and those key words show up show the algorithm who to show that piece of content to. So that’s really helpful. So if you have keywords such as success or motivation or mental health or anxiety that that’s gonna dictate kind of who gets to see your piece of content first, and if they like it and they watch it for a significant amount of time, that population gonna grow getting people’s attention early is another thing. So just practically doing something that kind of hooks people in. And, and this is something that’s talked about on a lot of PR platforms, but especially on TikTok, if you’re just a user of the platform, you’re gonna start to notice the types of that really gets your attention. There’s something that happens in the first couple seconds that makes you intrigued. And that can even just be a shift of, of the camera, like the camera angle that you have or a sound that you make.
TG (23:05):
So using the, the video, like for feature within the app, using the text overlay and using keywords and now I think actually it’s becoming sort of SEO driven and keyword driven. So it’s actually, your videos will show up in Google if you search for certain keywords. So it’s similar to what YouTube has done. When you’re thinking about titles or, or kind of click baby word choices, that’s gonna help people to, to click on your your content. So that’s one thing you can be thinking about, but ultimately I say people really like to be taken on a journey. So if you’re thinking about the type of content, think about either something you can teach or steps to a process something like that even, and it can be around just anything and everything. Whether it’s, Hey here, 10, 10 best things to do on a date or the 10 things you don’t wanna do on a date that can be 10 pieces of content right there, and people will come back for more. Do
RV (24:16):
You, how long does it take you to make a TikTok video?
TG (24:20):
I, the be the shorter, the better traditionally so around, I would say five minutes if you’re editing and everything that I would tell people to do 15 seconds or less, less for a TikTok, if you’re just getting started. But there’s a three minute feature now and I sometimes use that and those have done extremely well, two but ultimately I don’t overproduce my content. I really I try to make it as raw as possible because that’s kind of my, my thing and how people know me, the more edited, the more transitions there are. It actually just doesn’t do as well with my audience. They, they know me for just sitting there and talking to the camera spilling my heart out and then you know, letting that be that be it, I don’t really overthink it when I, oh, it comes to producing the content itself.
RV (25:22):
How do you make money from this? Okay. So this, that, this is a question I think that people have, right? Like you know, you start doing this, you’re incorporating it into your rhythm, even if it only takes five minutes. And of course, when you’re first learning how to use the app, like, what are all the buttons do? It’s there’s, you know, learning curve. Sure. The it’s a lot of time, there’s some risk. I mean, you’re putting yourself out there. I mean, I think to the, to, to the fear of to, to the fear of you know, that VC, that person that you were talking about earlier being judged, I think you will be judged. I mean, you will have haters. Like you will have some people who, who show up, but like, so you, you do all of this. How does it turn into money? So talk to us about that.
TG (26:11):
There’s several ways. One is just creating content on the platform. Once you have reached, I believe it’s still 10,000 followers. You can join the creators fund, which will pay you based on the number of views that you get. And you just get paid simply for creating content that gets viewed. That’s one way you can also
RV (26:39):
That’s really cool by the way, cuz that no one else has none of the other platforms have that. I don’t think of just like mm-hmm we just pay you money based on views alone without an ad running on your video or something. Yep.
TG (26:52):
So that’s and that’s available for any and everybody. So that’s one super easy way. The second is if you have a thousand followers, you can start to use their go live feature. That’s one of the best ways to create a real community, having some kind of cadence and consistency around going live so that you’re really building relationships with people and on your lives, people can pay you so they can pay you through coins. They can tip you just on your videos, on your channel in general, there is an option to add tips. And so people will just, if they like your content, they’ll, it’s basically like being able to support an artist or something that you like, but you can support a creator through tips. So
RV (27:37):
It’s like a band, like a band playing at a bar or something and you just like drop the money into the tip chart.
TG (27:44):
Yep. And it will interesting surprise you the other day. I just actually added that feature and I never thought, you know, anybody would, would do it. And then I looked the other day, somebody had tipped me a hundred dollars and I was like, wow, that’s so amazing. So I really felt compelled to reach out to that person and start a relationship with that person. Just thank them for their generosity. But you’ll be surprised. You know, I think especially as content creators, we forget how much of an impact we really do make on people and how one piece of content can be the thing that inspires someone to quit a job or leave a relationship or start a business or ask for help or whatever it it is. And people feel indebted to you when, when you’ve been kind of that voice, that, that was guiding them in a time that they really needed it and they want to give back and they want to say, thank you in the ways that they can.
TG (28:39):
So whether that’s through lives or tips that’s one way that you can monetize it. Then as you grow, there are so many brands that want to collaborate with content creators on TikTok. It really is. Video is the next, the next thing that’s, that’s really being pushed on social media. We moved from, from photos to, to video and now into whatever the metaverse will be in the future . But right now TikTok is, is the best place for, for small businesses to really grow their audience and their business, but also bigger brands to, to connect and collaborate with, with content creators. So there’s lots of ways you can monetize as a person or as a small business. Just by promoting and talking about your product. If you are a small business, I’ve seen so many people just completely blow up to the point that they can’t fill orders because they started to share about the story behind their business, why they started it, you know, the, the struggles that they were facing, the process of, of creating something as unique as, you know, glass blown ornaments or, or metal work or just whatever your uniqueness is, you get to really show that off and people wanna support what, the types of content that they, they enjoy watching.
RV (30:11):
I love that. That’s, I mean, that’s simple, but that’s, that’s, that’s a lot of different things. I mean, you’ve got the creator fund, you have the tip function, you’ve brand deals, and then you have basically just driving your audience to buy your thing, which is kind of the world that we live in mm-hmm at brand builders group is going like build an audience, add value, develop trust, and then show ’em how you can go to the next level. Right. The to that point. So just real quick, how did you find brand builders group? Like how did you find us? Why did you reach out to us? Like tell us a little bit about that, about that journey?
TG (30:51):
Yeah, well, like, like I said there are people in our lives that kind of point the way and show us, I always look to people who are, are doing the thing I wanted be doing. And as many listeners of the show know like Lewis houses is probably one of those people for many of us who we’ve watched and admired and, and listened to. And I remember hearing you on Lewis’s show and seeing all the things that he has built. I, I wanted to work with somebody who could guide me in terms of all of these opportunities. I was kind of naturally getting anyway. I didn’t know where to focus my attention or my time or my energy. And it had felt like in, in a year and a half or two years of doing this, I had been piece it all together and trying to hire somebody for, you know, a website and hire a branding person and hire somebody to help me with ads or whatever it was.
TG (31:55):
And what I really needed was a mentor. What I really needed was somebody who could, who had done it before and then could provide me with the advice and the, the guidance and the, the network that I needed. And when I heard Lewis talk about it, obviously, I, I checked you guys out, got on a call and it was an immediate yes, for me. I didn’t know any other business model or company like brand builders existed before. And I really don’t think that there are many out there that do that, do it at the level that you guys do it. But it was one of those things. I was like, how quickly can I get involved and start to, to get in be part of this community, because I could see the, the value in it from the start. And it’s only allowed me to accelerate the growth that, that I’d already built up into that point and see a longer term vision for how is this gonna be sustainable over time?
RV (32:59):
Yeah. I love that cuz I think that’s one of the, you know, some people we work with are like brand new in their journey and it’s like, help me get clear on all this. Somebody like Lewis is obviously way far down the path and it’s more of like help me sort out my options. But I think with everybody, we’re always trying to play that long game and go like, how do you make this substantive? Not just viral or, you know, a flash, but like a true sustainable career. You know, when meeting people like you and hearing your story is just, it’s like you, you should be, I mean, there’s such a need for, for what you’re doing. And it’s been, I think, you know, aging, a heart and, and, and mine in our teams like has been the first couple years of brand builders group, I think have been a lot about the, the curriculum.
RV (33:48):
You know, we’re just trying to formalize, like you’re saying like how have we built what we’ve built and helped the people that we have and like turning it into a process that I think the next generation of brand builders is really about . And it, I love when I was chatting with you just before we started. And you’re like, I just saw Hillary and I just saw Anton and like I was trying to connect with you. I was like, I missed you when I was in Atlanta. But like I think that that is potentially, you know, gonna be a big, you know, really where the power is going, going forward. So I think it’s awesome that you’re humble enough to wanna be a part of that. And then to see you reaching out to people, Tori, and like building relationships with the other members has been, has been awesome.
TG (34:32):
Yeah. I mean, when I think about investing now, as opposed to when I was initially investing in coaches or, or mentors or programs early on on the motivation has definitely shifted a bit. Now, obviously I care about the curriculum, but I really care about the people that are in, in the community. Who am I networking with? Who, who can I learn from? Who can I support and how can I collaborate with them? That’s really so much value that you guys bring on top of everything else that you teach is just attracting really powerful purpose driven leaders together. And that when you get people like that together, there’s just synergy. And so many idea is that, that form and how can we do this? And and that’s really exciting for me because as a entrepreneur that has built an online business, it can feel super isolating. And like you’re the only one. And you only get to connect with people, you know, via the internet. And that’s great. And sometimes you, you wanna go deeper and that’s what we get to get to do and what I’ve, I’ve had the opportunity to do with other brand builders, which has been really amazing. I love
RV (35:51):
That. Yeah, that’s that, that fill just fills me up and you know, I’ve, I’ve, I’ve gotten no doubt. Like, you know, if I could buy stock in somebody, I would buy stock in Tory Gordon, because it’s just like the trajectory of where you’re going and, and the people that you’re hanging out with inside our community. It’s like, you, you can, you quickly spot the ones who are willing to do the work and willing to spend the time and get to know each other, speaking of the future, just while I have you. I do wanna, I know we got way over time, but, but you mentioned the metaverse, this is something I’ve started paying attention to a little bit. You know, I was late to the game with Facebook. Definitely missed the boat on Instagram, missed the boat on TikTok. Podcasting was the one thing that I kind of caught the wave early, but then we ended up selling the podcast when we sold the company.
RV (36:39):
And so that disappeared, you know? And so mm-hmm, , we haven’t been in position to kind of catch a wave in a while. And one of the things I’m starting to look at is the metaverse and as much as I’m like, oh, I don’t know if I like this. I don’t, I don’t know if I understand it. I can’t help, but go. I feel like this might be something we need to pay attention to less. We missed the boat again. And so just mm-hmm because you’ve been riding that wave out there. Yeah. Like what do you have any thoughts on what’s ahead and what you think’s coming like a little bit about that?
TG (37:14):
Like you, I have my, my hesitations and my fears around what, what the future holds, but I am also, I have learned to follow where the young people go and I’m not I’m I know I’m still young, but the, the kids are kind of on that cusp of what’s coming and what’s new and it’s, they it’s to crypto and it’s the metaverse and it’s NFTs. And I actually heard an interview that you did with, I think Tom bile talking about NFTs on success of successes page on Instagram. And that kind of got my, my wheels turning. And so I started to do my research and we just invested in our first NFT. And metaverse project over the weekend. I’m really excited about because the truth is I, I do think that’s where we are headed. And like you said, it it’s about getting in early and really adopting the, the technology and just accepting that this is kind of where the future is headed.
TG (38:20):
That the sooner I can accept that and get on board with it, the sooner I can also help to shape it and what that’s gonna look like. And so if we’re gonna be, you know, meeting virtually in the future, then that means I can help to create a safe space for people to do that and to, to connect and engage in a way that is nourishing and is supportive. And that, that’s the things that really excite me is being part of something that’s being built so that I, I can have a hand in part of that conversation. And, and what, what does that look like in the future? And typically in my experience, the, the kids are the ones that are leading the charge on that. And so I’m gonna kind of keep my eye out for where they’re headed and what they’re, what they’re into and do my research. Like everybody else. We, none of us really know, but I’m, I’m learning along with everybody. Just like you
RV (39:21):
Love it. I love it. Well, Tori, that is that’s enlightening and, and just yeah, I mean, that’s how I feel. It’s like, I, I used just for so long, I’ve been, I was always the youngest, the young guy, the young kid, the youngest one in the room and, and, and I look back and go, wow, I’m not that guy anymore. And pretty soon I’m gonna start being the old guy and the oldest person in the room. And and so I just admire how you’re learning and growing and just like, even what you’re saying, looking to the, looking to the young people. And yeah. So thank you for, thank you for your trust. Thanks for the chance of, of an, the opportunity for letting us shape, you know, some of the direction of what you’re up to. We know it’s gonna be huge, huge, even huge than it is . And you know, where do you want people to go to connect with you if they wanna like follow you and say in touch with you and see what you’re up to? Yeah.
TG (40:14):
I’d love to connect with you guys. I’m on social Instagram, TikTok I’m coach Tory Gordon. You can also go to my website, Tory gordon.com. Find out all about me. And we’d love to give you guys access. We’ve been talking about a lot about success and how to get there, but one of the things I really teach a lot about is, is how to make that sustainable long term. And so I’ve got a free training if you guys are in should you can grab that on my site and we’ll, I’m sure we’ll put it in the show notes or something, so you can guys can get access, but to gordon.com is the best way to learn more.
RV (40:48):
I love it. Yeah, we will. We’ll link up. We’ll link up to all of that. We’ll be following you on the TikTok. And maybe looking out for you in the metaverse here at some point hopefully seeing you at a brain builders group event live, we, we got about half our events live in person next year, so that’s good. And we just, no matter what, we’re just know, we’re, we’re, we’re polling for you and praying for you and wish you the best. Thanks so much for sharing your story. Thanks
TG (41:13):
For having me, Rory

Ep 247: How to Get People to Pay Attention with Peter Sheahan | Recap Episode

RV (00:02):
Such an honor and thrill to get to talk to Peter Shehan about a concept that he originated and we adapted and then a memorialized in his name called Shehan wall and man, Peter is just a genius and he’s, he’s been someone who’s been an important mentor for me and just what a great, what a great moment to get, to sit down with him and just, and just have this conversation. Of course, I’m breaking down the recap of that interview here and talking about Shehan on that, if you haven’t listened to the interview yet again, or if, if you haven’t heard us talk about this, this is one of the, one of the, the very first frameworks that we introduce to people. Just even as we’re talking about personal branding, like before we even talk about brand builders group, which is there’s, you know, this simple idea that there’s two groups of people, world, like in any industry in any vertical, there are the unknown.
RV (01:07):
And then there are the known, and there there’s this huge invisible wall between the two where those who are relatively unknown are trying to break through and become known. And what most of us do is we throw a lot of stuff at the wall and we look at the people who are on the other side of the wall and all the stuff they’re doing go, oh, I wanna do all of those things. Right. And a lot of those people, you know, I can think of the rock because he’s, he’s a rapper and he is an actor. And he you know, obviously like now he has a tequila line and he is doing all of these, all of these different, these different things. And you go, gosh, I wanna do all these things. But the problem is when you do too many things at once you bounce off the wall when you have diluted focus, you get diluted results.
RV (01:58):
If you have diluted focus, you get diluted results. It’s that simple. And most of us, most early personal brands try to emulate these, these very experienced, well known, popular personal brands. And don’t realize that these people have large teams and large budgets. And, and, and in some cases, you know, millions and millions of dollars in, in terms of sponsorships and, and these huge platforms behind them, and you can’t break through the wall by trying to be all things to all people, you know, especially, and not in all the places. And so the way to break through the wall is to become known for one thing. And this was a concept, you know, that was originally inspired by Peter, is this, this idea that if you could become, if you ask yourself, what’s the one thing in the world I could be known for and you break through on that, then once you’re on the other exci, once you’re on the other side of the wall, then you can expand into other things.
RV (02:54):
But until you break through the wall, you are, you’re bouncing off the wall, you’re creating noise. You’re part of the noise you’re consumed by the, the noise. There is just this like indelible difference of, of who you are versus everybody else. And so that’s the, that is, I guess my interpretation, as I remember it you know, it was interesting to hear Peter say that it had been years and years and years since he had even really like, thought about that in, in terms of like that concept, especially like specifically in its application to personal brands. I, I think you said if I remember, right, like the last time I talked about it, you know, in the, in the context of personal branding was at the meeting that I heard in that, which is like years ago, but, but still powerful. And, and so that’s what we’re talking about here.
RV (03:41):
And, and I wanna, I wanna couple this concept as we move into the, the recap of like my takeaways, you know, now kind of years later getting a chance to sit down with Peter and have this conversation. Again, I wanna couple this with another concept that if you’ve ever heard me or AJ on podcast, if you’ve been one of our clients, or if you have followed this, our podcast here that we talk about lot, which is from another mentor, which is a, another this is a quote that was not ours. This is from Larry Wingett. And Larry said, the goal is to find your uniqueness and exploit it in the service, us of others, find your uniqueness and exploit it in the service of others. And oftentimes we couple these concepts together when we teach them one, just cuz they’re, they were important moments in like the timeline of our personal brand and like me specifically like my personal history of, but, but they also work together of this idea, you know, Peter and Han’s wall, of course he didn’t name it, that we named it that as we, you know, applied it specifically to like personal brands and the narrow focus of what we do at brand builders group, but we named it after him cuz it’s concept inspired by him.
RV (04:57):
But visually he shows, you know, this kind of trying goal coming to a point right at the wall, which hits the wall in this very narrow way versus this kind of like you know, more diluted way of, of just throwing a lot of stuff at the wall. Well, couple that with Larry wing it’s concept of finding your uniqueness is going, what is that thing? How you know, or your, your uniqueness is that point, we would refer to your uniqueness as the point at which you can break through the wall. It is doing the thing that only you can do finding the thing that nobody else can quite do, just like you can do and owning that and dominating that. And that really, really being the magic. And so I think one of the reasons when we started brand builders group, I, oh I think one of our goals was to go, how do you do that?
RV (05:57):
How do you find your uniqueness? What, how does one person discover that? And that became our brand DNA, which is our flagship. You know, we’ve got, we have 14 different events or courses. And that is our, our flagship curriculum. I guess, you know, we call ’em topics internally that make up, we’ve got 14 different topics that make up our curriculum. And that became our sort of first one and flagship was helping people identify their uniqueness and creating a process to help them discover what is this one point that you can own and you can break through and it, it starts with clarity, right? So first of all, you, you’ve got to get, you have to get clear. And then once you have clarity, then it’s consistency. And so you say over and over and over and over again. And, and I, you know, the example I’d love to use is, is Dave Ramsey.
RV (06:53):
Dave is someone who has changed my life AJ’s life. I mean, they made a huge impact on, on our career, but also personally, before we ever knew Dave, we were students of financial peace university. And Dave has been saying basically the same thing on the air every single day for 30 years, right? Debt is dumb. Cash is king follow these seven baby steps. And he has built this multi nine figure business around consistency. And so if you wanna break through the wall first, you need clarity. Then you need consistency. Then you need velocity, you need to add speed and power. And that is, is how you break through the wall, but it all starts with clarity. And this is where most people get really stuck. Even in, if you understand the concept of Shehan wall, even if you hear the quote from Larry and go find your uniqueness and exploit it in the service of others, I love it.
RV (07:46):
It still leaves the question, okay, how do I do it? How do I, how do I break through? And so getting, you know, to talk to Peter about that was, was really fun and, and kind of circle back on this. And so, you know, in terms of my, I, my three takeaways for this, and we’re gonna talk about how do you find your uniqueness or kind of some of, some of what I gathered from Peter about about he does it, of course, brand builders group. We have our formal brand DNA helix. It’s, it’s six questions that we take every person, every client through. And it’s these initial six questions and all the exercises that go with them that tell us exactly what your uniqueness is. But you know, having Peter speak into that now I had some really great takeaways and here, here was the first one and this applies to me, this applies to so many of our clients.
RV (08:31):
And my guess is this applies to you. He said, don’t try to include every thing you’ve ever done as per part of your story. That’s really, really huge. That’s really, really important because I think, you know, a human is multifaceted. We’re, we’re, we’re complex. We have a lot of ex different experiences. We have a lot of different desires. We have a lot of different you know, interests and skill sets and knowledge. And, and I think when, when you try to kind of create a personal brand, and again, one of the ways that we define personal branding is personal branding is simply the digitization of reputation, the digitization of, and so when you go, when you go through this exercise of saying, I want to codify my personal brand in a digital form and sort of package it up into this commodity that people can see and sort of get their hands around and understand the natural tendency is going okay.
RV (09:33):
I need to tell my entire life story. I need to sort of share every, every part of me. And I think I hesitate to call it a mistake because I don’t think it’s a mistake to share who you are by any means. But I think from a, from a strategic perspective, it, the more like it, it’s almost us, like the more you share the harder it is to understand what your one thing is, right? Like if I only share with you one thing about who I am, you only have the one choice, which is to think of me in, in that one way. That’s all that I’ve made available to you. But as I, as I feel this need to like tell you everything about me and everything I’ve ever done and everything I’ve ever known and everything I like and everything I, you know, do, then all of a sudden it creates this conf this confusion, or just this obscurity in terms of like, okay, well, what’s the one thing you can do for me.
RV (10:29):
Like, what’s the, the, the, what, what are you really an expert on? And if you study like memory training and, you know, memory experts, a lot of times they talk about how the human brain is like a mental filing cabinet. Well, when we talk about exploiting your uniqueness in the service of others or breaking through the wall, it’s about occupying one piece of a, another person’s so that when they have that need, they recall you, they, they, they immediately think of you or when their friend has that need, they, they say, oh, you need to talk to my friend, Rory, a another, you know, great quote from another mentor here is Scott McCain. Once said, mind, share precedes market, share mind, share precedes market share, meaning you have to work in your marketing efforts and in your branding and in your positioning to occupy a space in people’s minds.
RV (11:30):
And the more different spaces you try to occupy the less effectively you occupy any one space. As we say it, if you have diluted focus, you get diluted results, but the clearer you are, the more narrow you are, the more likely you are to recall that space. What’s an example of this, right? It’s like, if I need a plumber, who do you call? If I need a lawyer, who do you call? You know, if I need, I need basketball lessons, who do you, you call, if I, if I want to go, you know, on a camping trip, who, who do I call? If, if I have a question about whatever the Bible or nutrition or what, like, these are all things that happen in the human experience. And it’s like, who’s the name that I recall in that category. Right? And if you’re trying to be a speaker, which was obviously how I built career is like, when there’s a room full of people sitting around going, we should have a speaker at our event.
RV (12:18):
Have any of you seen a good speaker? I need them to go, oh, Roy Vaden, right? Like that is it. Or, you know, these days it’s more of like, when there’s a group of speakers sitting around talking amongst each other, going, how do I get to the next level? We go, oh, brand builders group, or AJ or Roy or whatever authors, or, you know, professional services or whatever. But anyone going, how do I build my personal brand? Oh, brand builders group. We’re working very deliberately to occupy that space. And I think Peter’s permission. And I never really heard anyone say it so clearly. And that’s why it struck me is going, look, you have permission not to share everything about you. And it’s not only permission. I would say from a strategic perspective, it’s an encouragement not to share everything about you, because the more you share the harder it is to, to kind of wrap it in the way that you need to wrap it for, for the, the edible consumption of other people, for them to quickly understand it.
RV (13:20):
Now, you know, as people get to know you, of course, they see more and more. And that’s why I think it’s also interesting with social media, like how this shows up tactically, you know, people always say, well, you know, what about your content strategy? One of the things that I’ve always done and not everybody does this. And I’m, I’m certainly not the, you know, the person with the most followers on social. But one of the things that’s always worked well for me is like on Instagram, for example, my, my, the way I do it is that my feed is what you do. And this is my encouragement. Your feed is what you do. Your stories are who you are. And I mean, the feed function like when someone hits your profile, it’s like basically business as usual, I’m teaching, I’m in coaching. I’m giving you a chance to sample my expertise.
RV (14:04):
If you wanna know who I am as a person, then you go look in the stories and you have to click in that functionality, which is sort of a, a, a more intimate, deeper, you know, portion of the platform and, and of my profile. And that’s where you see pictures of my kids, et cetera. But if you’re a stranger visiting my profile for the first time, and all you see is pictures of my kids, even though they’re really cute, you probably don’t care cuz you don’t know them. And, and they’re not important to you and they don’t add any value to your life. Whereas if you see the professional things that I offer, you can extract value from that and you go, yeah, I’ll follow this person now, before you ever buy, you might go, who is this guy? Like, do I even like this?
RV (14:46):
Like, like I think I like this guy. And then you start clicking on stories and you figure out and you go, oh yeah, I really like who he is. Or maybe you don’t, but, but on the surface, right, I’m, I’m, I’m occupying a slot in the world’s mind and, and I’m working very hard to do that. And for years it was take the stairs. It was, you know, we wanted R’s name to be synonymous with the metaphor of, of take the stairs. That was part of how we broke through the wall, was the success of, to take the stairs book. And you know, that being really like my first keynote and first brand and et cetera, et cetera. So anyways, all of that I say to, to, to say, you don’t have to include every single part of your bio in your life, into your personal brand.
RV (15:31):
Now it can be a part of what you share on social, but like you, your website, your homepage, you know, the, the show notes, your, your professional bio, it doesn’t have to all be in there cause people don’t initially care as much about that. They wanna know what can you do for me? And then they they’ll get to know you after that. The second thing which I thought was really fast was specifically, how do you find your uniqueness? And so, you know, I having a chance to an ask Peter that question, which is really me asking Peter his thoughts on the quote from Larry Wingett to see what, what he would say and to see how it might be similar or dissimilar from how we would answer it and for, or the most part, it was really close. So you know, like when, when somebody comes to, to our brand DNA event to the very, very first, you know, training that we do, we say there’s four things we’re gonna help you get clear on.
RV (16:24):
We’re gonna help you get clear on what problem do you solve in one word who exactly do you solve that problem for? How do you solve that problem in one sentence? And then how do you make money solving that problem? What is your primary business model as we, as we call it? And those are the four things we go, we’re gonna help you get clear on it. And then we take ’em through, you know, these set of six questions to help find their uniqueness. Well, the way that Peter answered that was what is your value like, which to me is kind of close to, what problem do you solve for people? Who, who I want to bring it to, right? Like, so what is my value proposition or what is the value I have? Who do I wanna bring it to?
RV (17:07):
Which is very similar to us, who do I wanna solve that problem for? He said, what is your business model, which we would phrase as how do I make money solving it? And then the only part I think, where we were you know, a little bit different was we, we would add, how do you solve that problem? And he said, what is your modality? Which I think is, you know, kind of related to, to business model. But I thought that was interesting to hear the way that his brain process on finding your uniqueness. And so I guess here’s the salient point from this part too.
RV (17:43):
The great irony of your personal of personal branding is that your personal brand is not about you. Your personal brand has value in the context of what it does for other people. And that’s what people I think get really mixed up and confused on and, and sometimes insecure about like, why would anyone care about me? And like, why should I post pictures of my myself? And it’s like, well, they, they don’t, I, they don’t care about you. They, they care about what you can do for them. And so your personal brand, your personality matters as you put it in context of what you can do for them. What value do you bring to whom and, and how do you, how do you serve them? So the, the sooner you step out of going the, how do I present who I am to the world? And, and, and the sooner you move out of that and into what use do I have in the world?
RV (18:40):
How can I be useful for people? How can I be helpful to people? What knowledge do I have that would make other people’s lives better? Or what talent do I, that would make other people’s lives better? And the sooner you step into that, the sooner you have con more confidence and clarity and direction and momentum, and you can just like move forward, you know, building your quote unquote personal brand, it’s just extending. And this is where I think it’s so connected to your identity, because you’re basically extending the value. You have the experiences that you have, the, the, the insights, the wisdom that you have developed, and you’re making that available to the world. And that is personal branding. It’s the digitization of reputation. It’s this kind of insight out. It is. It is your knowledge and all the stuff that is internal to you, that you spend a lifetime ACU.
RV (19:31):
And then it is extrapolating that and presenting it and serving it on a platter to other people and say, this is, this is what I have to offer you. This is, this is how I think I can be helpful to you. Here’s what I have learned. Here’s the mistakes I’ve made. You know, here’s the insights that I’ve gathered. Here’s the inspiration I have for, you know, here’s the entertainment I have to offer you. And in that context, there’s this very communal exchange that happens where other people go. I like you, you help me, you add value to my life. Therefore I follow you. Trust you, recommend you share your stuff, and then eventually do business with you, right. And, and buy from you. So that is, that is, that is it. And I think, I think, you know, sometimes when people hear that phrase uniqueness, they get lost in like, what is unique about me and that isn’t really how we’re using the phrase.
RV (20:25):
It’s not what is unique about me. It’s going, what unique, what is my unique take on solutions I have for the world? Or what unique expertise do I have to offer you? Or what unique art or what unique talent do I have to offer you? Not so much what makes me different from everyone else? The part that really matters is what do you have to offer to other people? And when you, when you center in that, that is your uniqueness. It’s one of the reasons why we always say your most powerfully positioned to serve the person you once were because to that person, your uniqueness is most relevant, the unique way that you solve that problem is highly relevant to someone else going through who’s going through what you’ve already been through. And, and when you focus on that, you’re not trying to manufacture something that isn’t, there you are, you are literally translating the value of your human experience and existence in the benefit of another person.
RV (21:35):
And that’s tremendously unique. I can’t add value to that. Person’s life in the same way you can, because I haven’t walked the same path that you have walked. That is your uniqueness. It’s not so much what makes you different? Oh, you’ve got a different slogan or a different like, like headline, or you do a different style of videos, or, you know, you look a different way. It’s that you’ve lived a different life. And so the more that you can, you can highlight a and add value to other people’s lives, kind of through the lens of your own. That is your uniqueness, but it’s in the context of serving other people. That’s where all the magic is. So anyways, just a rich, rich, rich conversation. And then the last thing for sure, I mean, this was, this was a quote directly from Peter from the interview.
RV (22:27):
And this is, this might even new quote from Peter Shehan that that really sticks with me is he said, the clearer you are, the easier decision making gets the clearer. You are, the easier that decision making gets. That is so true in every area of your life. Like the clearer you are about what your values are, the easier it is to select who you hang out with and who you hire and who you, whatever, like who you vote for and where you go to eat and where you spend your time. Like, because you’re clear on the values that you have, the, the clearer you are about your goals and your vision and your dreams. Like as soon as you’re clear on you want, and you, you, you capture it and you codify it and you think about it and you go, this is who I want to be.
RV (23:17):
This is what I’m doing. The easier your decision making gets, right? Like you go, I wanna build a personal brand, great brand builders group is the place to be, but you go, I wanna run a marathon. Brand builders group is not the place to be, right? Like, we can’t help you with the that’s that’s, that’s not our uniqueness. So as you get clearer, your decision making gets easier. And then I think the nuance that I would add to what Peter said is the clearer you are, the faster you go, right? Because as part of decision making gets easier, it’s like, it’s faster to make the decision. It’s also faster to take the action and go, yes, I should work with this person. Not this person I should be. I should be reading this book. Not that book. I should spend my resources, you know, building this, not that I should spend my time doing this, not that like, and it all goes faster where people get stuck is there is dilution.
RV (24:12):
They are unclear, right? That the biggest issue is they’re unclear on their uniqueness. They’re unclear on what they want. They’re unclear on how to build their brand or unclear that they even wanna build a brand, or they’re unclear on who they’re serving UN. And so it’s like, get clear. You have to get clear. You have to do that. Work of getting clear, which will ironically feel oftentimes slow and painful. But in reality, that is the fastest, you know, next step is getting clear. And so, you know, I just, I love that is he said that, you know, the, you are the easier decision making gets. And if you go look at all the testimonials on most of our testimonials that we showcase on brand builders, group.com on our website and stuff are from people who came through our very first event, because we show all the testimonials from our later events to people after they come through the first one and they kind of see the whole journey, but you’ll see the Nu number.
RV (25:06):
One thing that people say after that first event is I got clear. I got so much clarity because once you’re clear, then the easier decision making gets and the faster that you go. So do whatever it takes, take the time to get clear, and you will move much faster, put your uniqueness in the context of other people and keep coming back go listen to the episode with Peter, if you haven’t, Hey, if you wouldn’t mind, give Peter some love, like on, on social, share this interview with someone who needs to see it. And you know, just, you know, Peter has made such an impact on our company and our team and my personal career and our clients. And so you know, just let, let, let him know that you appreciate the work that he’s done and, and keep coming back as always, we’ll catch you next time on the influential personal brand podcast.

Ep 246: How to Get People to Pay Attention with Peter Sheahan

RV (00:07):
Hey brand builder Rory Vaden here. Thank you so much for taking the time to check out this interview as always, it’s our honor to provide it to you for free and wanted to let you know there’s no big sales pitch or anything coming, uh, at the end. However, if you are someone who is looking to build and monetize your personal brand, we would love to talk to you and get to know you a little bit and hear about some of your dreams and visions and share with you a little bit about what we’re up to to see if we might be a fit. So if you’re interested in a free strategy call we’ll someone from our team, we would love to hear from you. You can do that at brand builders, group.com/pod call brand builders, group.com/podcall. We hope to talk to you soon.
RV (00:53):
So I am over the top excited to introduce to you someone who I legitimately considered to be one of the smartest people on the planet. Um, in fact, if I were running a very large corporation, or if I had a good friend that was like a fortune 500 executive and they were looking for consulting advice, leadership, I would refer them to Peter Sheahan. He is, uh, when, by the time he was 30 years old, he built not one, but two multimillion dollar companies. He has spoken, uh, more than 2,500 times in 40 plus countries around the globe. And I believe might be the, I think only him and I are two people that joined the professional speakers hall of fame in our thirties. Um, and he’s a hall of fame speaker. He, his client list is, I mean is crazy apple Chick-fil-A at and T.
RV (01:51):
Um, and he’s just absolutely brilliant. I I’ve known him from the speakers world for a while. Um, and the real story here is if you’re a brand builders group member, like one of our clients, or if you’ve ever heard me on someone else’s podcast, you know, that we teach this framework called Sheahan’s Wall and it is named after Peter Shehan. Now he didn’t name it after himself. We named it after him. I saw him speak one time randomly on this. He drew this diagram and then we lost touch. Um, and we just recently reconnected and he told me, he’s like, mate, you know, I wrote a book on the topic of this diagram, which we call Shehan wall. The book is called making it happen. Um, it’s all about turning good ideas into great results. And so I was like, I dude, you gotta come on the podcast, like you’re a celebrity our people are gonna go nuts. So anyways, with all that, welcome to the show, Peter,
PS (02:53):
Hey, SwRI you wanna know my side of that story by the way, tell me, because I got like three random texts one day, all in, probably in this face of a week, actually going, Hey, I heard this, you know, R Vaden guy get interviewed on this podcast. He was talking about you and Sheahan’s wall. And I’m like, what do you mean Sheen’s wall? I’d never heard of this thing. And I’m like, I’m just gonna have to call R and find out what the heck’s going on. And so, um, you know, I often make this joke that I’m more famous for being in other people’s work than I am for my own work. And so I, you know, PR proud to be associated with your brand mate.
RV (03:22):
Well, dude, I, I, um, thank you for that. And, and I it’s been, it’s been awesome to have this book and I wanna talk to you about the original concepts of it and, and going, going through the book, I realized there was something about the way that you presented it to me, where I, I feel like I heard it a little bit different than what you’ve been taught, what you actually, the way you teach it in the actual book. And so I was like, let’s talk about it. Yeah. Um, now, so can you describe what, uh, so for those, the people who don’t know what we’re talking about, if they’ve never heard me or seen, seen Shehan wall, or if they’ve never read your book, can you, can you explain what the diagram is? What it represents? Like how did you put it together originally?
PS (04:06):
Yeah, look, here’s the biggest challenge. Most people who are trying to get a business moving and off the ground are struggling to get the attention of the audience. They most need to influence. Now in my world, that’s a very small group of people who run very large companies in your world. It’s thought leaders and people with a message who are looking to build out their personal brand, you know, insert audience here. But none of those people wake up on any given day, trying to necessarily go looking for you or trying to necessarily, you know, bring attention to your value proposition. You are offer your services. You are literally to interrupt them or get on their radar. Um, and you, and about 4 million other people on any given day. Right? And so the underlying concept of the model that underpin that book is that you are better off being very, very tight and targeted in what you do.
PS (04:58):
And the value proposition you are bringing forward to that market to grab their attention before you try and sell them everything you could possibly do. Right? So, you know, when, think about when you and I got started in our business as well, there were probably 15 things we thought we could do for our clients, maybe 15 things we thought we could do for our members, but trying to sell ’em all 15 on the first date is not a great idea, right? You’re better off picking the one that’s most likely to grab their attention and, and get super, super targeted on that one thing. And the more targeted you get, the better chance you’ve got a piercing, what I would call the mental barrier or the attention barrier. Once you’ve done a piece of work, which
RV (05:37):
Is now formerly what she is named as she heads all, is she
PS (05:40):
Okay? So you get through, she, you get through she well. So I struggle to use my name in the third person, if that’s all right with you, right? So we get through the proverbial, she, and wall. But once you have that trust, there’s almost no limit to what they might allow you to do and the services you might bring. Right? Mm-hmm . And so in my case, you know, I might do a speech and do a really good job of that at a corporate retreat or an executive offsite. And then the CEO will say to me, Hey, we really need help around the topic you talked about. Then I can get into a conversation about selling them consulting. And I mean, I’ve literally turned single speeches into, you know, 50, 60 million, the revenue opportunities over 10 years, right. That all started with one speech. But if I had gone in and just tried to sell the 50 million opportunity, I would never have got, I wouldn’t even got the meeting, let alone the opportunity.
PS (06:28):
Right? And so the point being, here’s a simple metaphor. Let’s say you meet your life partner, the person you wanna make your life partner at a bar, you don’t go up to him or her and ask them to marry you in that first interaction. You go up and say, Hey, do you mind if I buy you a drink or something, you know, something small and easy to say yes to that’s the real underlying premise. Um, there are other pieces to the, to the model, you know, this idea that mental energy is as scarce currency as time. And we can get into some of those as well. But the core idea is that no one got outta bed this morning, thinking about you, you’re trying to get on their mental menu in order to do that. You’re better off being tight, not broad. And then once you have the relationship expand from there. So
RV (07:10):
Yeah, I mean, that’s so good. And, and the visual for those of you that, you know, are, you’re trying to picture this. It’s, it’s sort of like, I guess triangle it, uh, I mean, we kind of think of it as like, you know, it starts broad and then you go narrow and then that’s, that’s how you break through the wall versus bouncing off the wall is being narrow. And then as you’re narrow, you break through the wall and then once you’re on the other side of that wall, then you can expand. So to zero in on the concept a little bit here, what is the wall?Is, is it, is it mental? Is it attention? Is that what the, is that what the wall is? Is, is that what is representative of the line that
PS (07:56):
Separates? I’d primarily say it’s attention and attention can get expressed in time. Attention could get expressed in my level of engagement. Attention could be expressed in the level of research I might be prepared to do about you before I meet you, anything where I’m gonna invest something I have as a currency into understanding you and what you want to do. That’s what’s on the other side, meaning like once you have my attention, I will express it in any of those currencies. Right. And, and here’s the deal like before this podcast, or I had eight back to back calls. I mean, one hour after another, after another, I didn’t have time to be pitched a new idea. I’m not gonna read spam on any given day. And I sure say, I’m not gonna sort of listen to someone that says, Hey, I can do anyone of 4,500 things for you, which of the 4,500 would you like?
PS (08:42):
But if you are targeting me on the right day with the right problem in a very clear value proposition, I might actually give you the time of day. I might say, you know what? I really am struggling with that. Um, let’s take 15 minutes and now you ha now you’re on the other side of my wall, right? You are on the other side of my, you know, you’ve, you’ve broken through the attention barrier. Yeah. And what you do with those five or six minutes is up to you. And I know, or you teach a lot of your members how to position themselves, understand their brand, what the bits about them that are unique. I know you talk to a lot of about how do you converse and engage in a way that’s influential. They’re all super important skills once you’re through the wall. The bit that comes before that, which I know you also teach around positioning is, you know, don’t be kind of so abstract and broad that no one really knows what you do with the value you’re gonna bring, or you never get my attention
RV (09:32):
Uhhuh . And I wanna, I wanna, I do wanna talk about that, cuz I do feel like that’s the, like the, obviously the core of this and it’s, it’s a, it’s amazing to me, you know, I heard you speak, it was at an NSA event that I, I had heard you speak and it was so powerful that it stuck with me and you were drawing, you were drawing it. You probably remember on like a little digital pad. And it was just, you know, it was like a line with two triangles. And I was like, that is so powerful. Um, is it is trust. What is on the other side of the wall? You mentioned that word trust earlier, you know, and like in this microcosm of an example, you go, okay, if you get my intention, you’re on the other side of the wall and you might have like five minutes or 15 minutes, which represents kind of how that triangle builds on the other side, it’s you, it starts, you’re kind of there, but you only, you still only have a little bit of time. Is that, would you think of that side as in general, as sort of like trust,
PS (10:26):
I, I would say trust builds as you move. So let’s assume this is on a left to right model in the walls, in the middle. Um, as you move to the right of the model, you’re at a higher and higher level trust, cause you’ve likely done more and more things together. And if you’ve done them well, you’ve created more and more value over time. But when you are just through the wall, it’s not about trust. It’s about opportunity. You have got for the first time, an opportunity to hook that person’s interest to get them interested in what you might want to do. Next. It could be to attend an event. It could be to join a membership year. It could be to, to do corporate consulting. Like it depends on what you sell. It might be to try your restaurant out, you know? Um, and so no, I would say immediately on the other side of the wall is just an opportunity and it’s probably a very fleeting and short opportunity. So you better know how to position your value in that moment. You better make that interaction memorable. You be incredibly clear what you’re gonna do for that person, that buyer or else you, you’re never gonna get to a place of trust. So trust is further out in my opinion, uh, in terms of on the right side of that wall. Gotcha.
RV (11:31):
Okay. And I, I think, you know, one of the thing that is like the way that you kind of describe it here is in a, is in a singular instance, sort of like a singular encounter with an individual person. We’ve always thought it, we’ve thought we’ve thought about it as more general. Like you, nobody knows who you are. And then breaking through the wall is like, you know, you reach this point of like mass critical mass where it’s like, okay, now you have enough credibility. So it, it, what I hear you saying is it’s like it applies in both the granular and at the high level, um,
PS (12:13):
The way you’re describing it, RS spot on, like I could do my whole career. I could literally map my career on that model. Right? Like I started going into high schools and doing these speeches to kids on how to transition from school to work. I originally hit a brick wall where there was no, no one was willing to gimme a chance. No one was gonna gimme an opportunity. And then I heard about this thing called school to work funding where public schools were given X dollars a year to teach their kids about alternative career paths. And so I massively narrowed the offer of what I was trying to bring into schools, to target school, to work. I used all the buzzword and all the language that were in the funding application schools needed to be allowed to spend the money this, and then I’d start calling a careers advisor.
PS (12:56):
And instead of saying, Hey, do you want motivational speaker in your school? I’d say I have five specific offerings that match the school to work curriculum and framework. Um, and you know, here is what they look like. We’ll do it during a career period. We’ll do it for year 10. And so it’s like so tight, what the offer is now that’s a single interaction, right. But I, you know, after six months had got like six of those after another six months, I had 180, I did 485 speeches in schools in my second year as a public speaker. Right. And so now all of a sudden I could go back to those same buyers and go, Hey, you know, I, I know I was doing this school to work stuff, but I have this whole motivational thing as well. I have these like what we would call HSC Australia might call the S SATs here S a T prep work.
PS (13:40):
And, you know, I would start having kids join an ongoing course. And all of a sudden I’m doing all these other things that I wasn’t able to do before I had credibility and a track record. Now I could do the same model if I step out again, which is the next. So I wrote three books for that market. And then I was writing a book on what we would call the millennials or generation. Y was the, the frame I used back in the day. And I went to my publisher and my publisher was like, well, you know, that’s a, that’s a small market. And I think you should write it on all four generations, cuz there’ll be a much bigger addressable market there. And I’m like, but I don’t know anything about baby boomers or the silent generation or gen X. I know these younger people gen, why are these millennials, let me get really targeted and fo so I did the exact same process.
PS (14:28):
Again, got really tied in my value proposition and what I, what I, and, and by the way, stayed true to my actual expertise, right? Mm-hmm like I was talking about something I truly knew. Now you fast forward five years. And I wasn’t doing a single speech on gen Y and millennials. I was doing speeches on disruption and the impact that had on business models and corporate culture, because what the millennial whole millennial thing was about was not about young people. It was about the fact that there’s a whole new way of interacting with brands of understanding business and from paid media to earn media from you. Tell me what your product’s about to actually I own your brand through the way I interact with it. Like all that was what the millennial change represented, but I couldn’t go, I, after that market, I was 25, 26 years old, you know? So I wrote a book about a really targeted thing. It was a very good book. It sold phenomenally around the world. And with that opportunity I built about
RV (15:21):
Disruption.
PS (15:23):
Um, no, the book was essentially the gen Y book, the millennial book. Oh, you’re
RV (15:26):
Talking about, oh, you’re still
PS (15:27):
Okay. I’m still in the same thing. Yeah. Yeah. And what I was able to that was build multiple companies off the back of that one piece of work, you know? And so yes, it’s an instance, but I actually think I could define my whole career actually using that same model. So
RV (15:44):
What’s fascinating about that is, is, uh, the way I hear you describing it now is not how I’ve actually ever thought about it. Like, um, there’s a, there’s an expression. You probably heard this, we use this in the us get your foot in the door. Yeah. Um, what as I hear you describing that now, like with a company or in an industry, it’s almost like, Hey, I’m using this to kind of get a foot in the door, which is interesting. Cuz visually it repre, it looks like a wedge almost like you would like kind of wedge into something and then once you’re in, then it’s like, okay, now more opens up inside of that company or inside of that industry to do other ancillary, other ancillary work,
PS (16:25):
All, all Rory inside of the entire marketplace, cuz your reputation is established. Yeah.
RV (16:29):
And that’s how I, and that’s how I always processed. It was more like your overall reputation is no one knows who you are to now everybody knows who you are and they want you. And so your fee, your fee goes
PS (16:41):
Up and, and the number of things that you can sell goes up as well.
RV (16:46):
Yes. Um, totally. So I get so, so I, I,
PS (16:50):
We’re just, we’re just talking about it at multiple levels and it’s the same metaphor and the same model for a one-on-one interaction. It’s the same model for a client relationship as it is for the entire trajectory of your personal brand, your co you know, your company brand, depending on what you’re representing and the reputation you now have in the marketplace. Right. And so you’re right. You get it right. Your fee goes up, but here’s what happens to most people worry, they crash against the wall and never get known by anyone. And they’re scrambling and hustling for scraps from people who figured it out, you know? And so you are talking about the right way. It just exists on multiple levels.
RV (17:24):
Yeah. And I think the, you know, what’s, what’s interesting is you, it’s like you’re playing the big game of your reputation always. Yep. But even, you know, you have some number of relationships where you’re already through the wall. There’s some number of people who trust you, there’s other people who’ve never heard of you. And it’s kind of like, you’re, you’re at the beginning of that model kind of like working your way in the door, almost like you could think of content in this way of like somebody is paying you whatever $20,000 a month for a retainer, because you’re on the other side of the wall, someone else is just reading your very first tweet for the first time. And it’s 144 characters and they go, Ooh, I like that tweet. Let me go read their blog post. And now they read a blog post and then they go, oh, let me subscribe to their newsletter.
RV (18:08):
Ah, show up for their one hour webinar and then da, da, da kinda. So it’s like each individual person. So, so here’s the, here is the thing that everybody struggles with. How do I find my thing? Like, you know, the, the whole concept, which is so powerful and brilliant is go be known for one thing. Uh, you, you you’ve described it here as being tight, like be extremely tight in your offer. How do you know which thing to do? Like if you can talk about leadership and you can talk about sales, like, what do you think? How
PS (18:47):
Do you know? Well, this is gonna rub some people the wrong way mate, but you and I have spent our lives surrounded by people who wanna make up the answer to that question. Right? As opposed to the answer should be pretty clear. What are you actually world class at? What are you an expert in where you can bring some unique contribution that other people can’t bring? Where are you capable of creating the most value for another human being? That’s where I would start that conversation. Don’t start that conversation with, well, what do other people want? And then let me see if I can pretend to be an expert in that space or, you know, you can do, you can do that, but it’s gonna be a long journey as you start to build capability. Right. It’ll be like, it’ll be like you reading a survey. Right. Now’s wow. The number one thing on fortune 500 CEO’s mind is alignment of their executive team to accelerate transformation. And you’re be like, right, I’m gonna go sell that. Well, okay. I think speakers
RV (19:41):
Do that all the time, all the time,
PS (19:43):
But you know, the time then, then they go mono or mono with me or Pete Fuda or McKinsey and they get their lunch eaten. In fact, they don’t even get it out of the conversation cuz they don’t have real expertise in that space. Right. And so I would start from a place of authenticity, really like a place of genuine credibility. I have this unique thing, right? So for me, if I go back to my example, I shared for me, it was, I knew young people. I had 300,000 kids on a database. I was able to survey them about their values. What cared about the careers. They’re interested in, why they weren’t interested in others, what they thought of alternative career paths and not going to college. So when I write a book on the millennials, which was basically the first book in the world from a business perspective on the topic, it comes from a place of deep research and deep credibility.
PS (20:27):
Now it just so happened that the market really needed the insight as well. So you do want to give that consideration, right? Which is all right, what are my authentic, true expertise and skill sets. And then where do they meet a need in the market? That’s not being satisfied or not being satisfied in the way I think I can meet that need. And you find the overlap between those two things and now you’ve got magic, right? Better, still find the overlap between those two things and what you really love to do. And now you live in the dream life. I can’t remember. What’s the name of that Japanese model? They’ve got a fourth circle. It, I can’t remember. There’s there’s like ancient models for understanding what we’re talking about right now, guy.
RV (21:06):
Yeah. I think it’s got, I think it’s Ika guy or something. Something like that. Yeah.
PS (21:08):
Yeah. In other words, we didn’t make this up, but um, funny that we stumbled on something that’s, you know, been, uh, in philosophy for thousands of years.
RV (21:17):
So to that, to that question, how did you come up with this model? Like, you know, um, and, and, and what you, what you, what you call it is just the making it, is it, is it the making it happen? Master model? Is that, I mean, that’s how you refer to,
PS (21:32):
I, I don’t know what I call it. I’d have to go back to the book or that was a few years ago, mate. Um, do you know, the last time I spoke about this model was the speech you went to in 2009.
RV (21:41):
It’s so funny. What year was it? What year was that?
PS (21:45):
Oh, it’s gotta be oh, nine, two and 10. Something like that.
RV (21:49):
Oh my gosh. That’s so funny. Yeah. I mean, it was a long time ago and I never, that’s why I never knew you had a book. Like I never, I never heard you talk about it ever again. I had never, I never heard it anywhere else again, but
PS (22:00):
It was just, you know what, there’s a lesson. There’s a lesson in that though. Right? So all my market momentum is with corporation. Right? I wrote this book cuz people were banging my door down on a daily basis going, how did you get breakthrough? What, you know, teach me how to do what you did. And I was like, you know what, I’m gonna write it in a book. This is, this was my recipe. And so as for how I came up with it, I’m sure it, the origin of it is not entirely original. Like it doesn’t seem to me like a ground break idea to teach people, to get tight and focused in what they take to market. So they’re easy to, so not only is it easy to grab attention, but you can be better at it. Right? I’m in the middle of a strategy project right now.
PS (22:39):
And I’m telling you, the business partners are so far on, they are on either sides of the spectrum, right? Like wanting to do everything for everyone, for the rest of humanity. And it’s like, good luck. Like that’s not gonna work. So the, the, the, the underlying disciplines of this, of making it happen are really sound in corporate strategy as well as personal brand strategy. Um, and so there, but the there’s a lesson in the fact that I don’t talk about it. And that’s the, that’s not my space. That’s not where I play. And you know what? I bet you, if you and I sat down and had a beer, we could find 20 other things that you could be world class at on top of what you do now and are already world class at, you could totally build your, you, you could totally build businesses in all these other areas.
PS (23:21):
The problem is you end up spreading, not just your time and energy so thin, but all of a sudden you confuse the market. Like they don’t know what your reputation is for. And so you don’t wanna go too wide. Now, the beautiful thing is once you have a reputation and you have a critical mass, you can go much wider than you started that process with, but not so wide that all of a sudden people dunno what you stand for or what you do. And so I made a really deliberate decision to not build my brand and reputation around making it happen, despite it being a pretty successful book, by the way, um, actually in some countries, not in all in a couple countries, not in most is probably more accurate, um, because I wasn’t gonna speak on it. I didn’t wanna do public seminars. I didn’t want to be selling to individuals. I, I like single buyers that write really big checks. That’s just my preference. I don’t wanna be known by that many people. There’s only about a thousand people in the world that I actually need to know who I am not a hundred thousand or AME, you know? And so it was just not, it was almost an anomaly in my body of work actually.
RV (24:22):
Mm-hmm yeah. Mean, uh, you know, you describe it as discipline. I mean, that was, you know, my first book take the stairs was really about discipline in general. And the, you know, one of the things that we said in the take the stairs book was if you have diluted focus, you get diluted results. We never thought we would shift into personal branding. It was only when we exited our company a few years ago, and then it was like, okay, well, crap, we can’t do sales anymore. We’ve done sales our whole life. What are we gonna do? Like, oh, I guess we’ll do personal branding. We know something about that. And then it was like, the, this, this idea is the same discipline is of going. I’m gonna narrow my message. And what I, what I think is really true. And, and this is probably why you and I, I haven’t touched paths is because we serve different markets. Like you’re saying you want one person who, uh, who writes really big checks. We literally think about it, the opposite. We literally go, we want a whole bunch of people who can write a small, have a small monthly payment, right? Like it is, is totally, totally different. But what I hear in that is that narrowing the market of who you serve is also a part of this in addition to narrowing how you serve them or what you do for them.
PS (25:43):
Yeah. Let’s talk, let’s break it down. Right. I think the real key to narrow first is clearly articulating the value to whomever and whatever market you wanna serve. Right. Like to not be so all over the place with that, that people don’t really get it. You know, like Roy, I don’t really understand what you mean by personal branding. What is that actually gonna do for me? Like, you don’t want that response to your positioning or to your content or to the way people refer you. You want people to refer you, like, I’m gonna put you in touch with my buddy. Rory has a monthly membership. And if you want to accelerate the time to profitability and high revenue on the back of your personal brand and reputation, he’s the guy to talk to. That’s, we’re gonna edit that.
RV (26:26):
We’re gonna edit that clip and put it on the website, make that a testimony. Yeah. The testimonial.
PS (26:30):
But literally it goes all the way down to referral, like how I set you up, determines how successful your conversion would be. Right. Mm-hmm what you don’t want me to say is, Hey, let me introduce my buddy to R I don’t know if it can help you, but I dunno, you guys sort of sound like you want the same thing. Let me make the introduction. That’s the worst introduction in history, right? Like now, once you are clear on the value, then you can start asking yourself the question, well, who do I wanna surf? Right. Um, in my case, it is senior executives and it’s only really senior executives. Right? I get speaking offers all the time to do all hands events. And most of the time I’m like, you know what, I’m probably not your guy. You need someone who’s way more gen like got way more appeal and charisma, and you know, is better at that audience.
PS (27:11):
And I’ll refer them to one of three or four people that I know and trust, you know? And so I am narrow on the audience. And then the second, third question is, and now which you raised, how do I wanna serve them? I don’t do one on one coaching for executives. It doesn’t doesn’t create enough change in my opinion. Right? Not only that there’s thousands of executive coaches. And so they’re driving the price down. I wanna do something way more difficult, which is to drive alignment at a team level, much harder to do than get an executive to realize they’re showing up like a, you know, uh, not person am I allowed to swear
RV (27:47):
In your podcast? You know? I mean, you can.
PS (27:48):
Yeah. But, and so there’s three, but there’s three layers of the clarification process. One is what is the value? I wanna bring two, who do I wanna bring it to? And then three, what’s the mode. Well, what’s the business model that I want with that. And then the fourth is probably what is a of modality, right? So what’s the value who do I wanna serve? What’s the business model. And then what’s the modality. Now the business model is the question. People almost never ask. Right? But you just raise it. You said, you know what? I really want a large number of people writing a, a, a really reasonably priced check for the amount of value they get coming to together that forms a community that I’m a part of, not just leading where it’s self perpetuating a subscription model. I don’t have to start from zero every three months. Like that’s a beautiful business model.
RV (28:36):
Yeah. It’s interesting. We, you know, when we started brand builders group, we actually said in this two, two, as of right now, we’re three years in, we want a thousand me, we want a thousand people who we can, who, who will invest a thousand dollars a month, which would be about, you know, it’s a million dollars a month and that’s a business where we’ve operated a business of that size before. And we are just like, not only we did, we narrow who we wanted to serve. We, we know exactly how many of them we want. Right. We only on a thousand of these people. Um, and yeah, the business model is like, we realize one-on-one coaching is where we can really differentiate. And it’s, it’s interesting to just, even as you talk to go, like, man, if, if, if a, if a, if a, if a senior executive called me and was like, Hey, Roy, I want you to be my coach. I would, I would literally tell them, not your guy like that. If you wanna write your book, I’m your, I mean, I’m your freaking guy. Like, uh, you, you wanna turn your career into a, a, a speaker. You wanna build your following, whatever I’m like. Yeah. But, but if they’re like, Hey, I, I want you to just talk to me one on one
PS (29:41):
About how to structure my company, blah, blah. I’m like, oh my gosh. I’m not your guy. Yeah. And knowing that’s great, by the way, the great irony of this is I, as you know, I, uh, teamed up with Josh ner, Seth Madison, Ryan ESS. And we are now basically building a model, you know, not, not dissimilar to the brand builders model, but with a more targeted audience, specifically, people that wanna speak. Yeah. You know, and, and we, I mean, we have all, we have all the distribution relationships, we know all the buyers, we know what they care about. We can take someone from a 10 year journey and make it two years, you know, and it’s a different model. Now. It’s not a business that I, that, you know, I’m not doing all the oneone coaching or whatever. I still to executives and do that work, you know?
PS (30:23):
And so in some ways I’m gonna have to, I’m gonna be calling you in a few months ago. Tell me exactly how you did that thing at brand builders. Right. Cause I’m used to one, you know, I’m used to large checks. Yeah. Right. Single buyer, complex buying process, sometimes a long buying process, but one large check. And, you know, literally we used to set have this goal, um, which was alright, get your first thousand dollar check, get your first $10,000 check, get your first million dollar check, get your first $10 million check. And the largest single contract over Sams about 57 million. And I was like, right. That’s not bad for one client. You know, that’s a good deal. You know, now that was over, like that was delivery of that work was over a series of three to four years. Right? Like it wasn’t, it wasn’t all in one, three month period, but it feels pretty good to get a check that big, you know, or to get a commitment that big as it doesn’t quite work like that you get the check over time.
PS (31:15):
But the point I’m getting at is that’s a totally different business. You know, for me, it was maximizing the size of the check for you. It was max, the number of people who’d write the check totally different path. Yep. But think about this, Roy and this is, I think is the takeout for your, for your listeners, right? The clearer you are on these answers, the value you bring, who you bring it to the business model, which is the bit we’re talking about now in the modality, you know, things like coaching podcast, that’s a modality in my mind, right? Yep. Totally. The clear you are on those top three things and, and, and the fourth as well, but particularly the top three, the easier decision making gets like, it’s not hard to say, no, that’s not my client. Or, you know, you sit and you listen to this podcast and you’re like, man, you know, Pete had those three great ideas.
PS (32:00):
They might be dumb ideas for you because they don’t match the value you wanna bring. They don’t match a business model. You’re building. Then that’s the audience you wanna serve. Like in my experiences, no such thing as a good idea and a bad idea in our, like in this kind of learning space, there are aligned ideas and misaligned ideas. And that’s how I assess them. Is this a aligned idea for what I’m trying to create? I think what the, one of the most beautiful about the way you serve the, the market made is that you help people get clear and the clearer they get, the easier will be to make decisions. And by the way, the easier will be to get through the metaphorical wall. Right. You all over the map as well. No, I still can’t. Can’t do it in the third person, but yeah.
RV (32:41):
Okay. So, all right. So honest, honest, open thing here. I, I really want your, your wisdom on this. So okay. In our, in our former life, we did one-on-one sales coaching. It was super clear, right? We coach sales people, you know, B to C salespeople, real estate, financial advisors, how to sell. We scaled that was straightforward. Then brand builders group starts. We do personal brand strategy. So we do, you know, we, we coach experts, primarily speakers, authors, coaches, consultants, and then entrepreneurs like professional services, still how to build their personal brand brand builders group, super clear growing. What I personally am struggling with at this very one thing I’m struggling with at this precise moment is we have the Rory Vaden who built his career on self-discipline overcoming procrastination. And that was take the stairs. And then my Ted talk, how to multiply time, which got a couple million views.
RV (33:45):
That was how I built my career as a speaker. Then we built a company on sales coaching, and now we have brand builders group during personal brand strategy. And I’m struggling a little bit with how to tell the whole story, not with what brand builders group to us that’s straight and narrow, but what does Roy Vaden do? And I get calls for speeches, right? Not for, you know, Hey, can you come talk on something random, but it’s more like I saw your Ted talk. Will you come speak on this? But there it’s to an audience that’s not personal brands, which is what our core business, this is focused on now. And so some of that, you know, I’m trying to be like, you know, where does my personal brand sit at this point? And where am I at on Shehan wall? Cuz to, to the point you were talking about earlier about how it works on a granular level, like for an individual relationship.
RV (34:36):
And then also like at an industry or reputation level, we’ve also started to describe it really it’s a series of walls at a high level. So you, you know, you dominate your local market, then your, your, you know, your regional market, national whatever. And so I’m trying to wrestle a little bit with like, what is the story of Rory vain.com at this point in my life? Should I just go, all I care about is personal branding, ignore everything that I’ve done. Just let it go. Or, or is there some way that it all sits, sits together and I’m, I’m genuinely interested in, in uh, free consulting
PS (35:12):
Are we still on the podcast or did you just get 30 grand the coaching for, uh, nothing. Um, I have very two very strong opinions, especially. I agree that, that I didn’t think of it as multiple walls, I think, but the more the wall keeps moving, right? Like you, you’re always looking to get to the next level, the next space. And in some ways, you know, you’re the flavor of the month at one point and then people have had you, they know you they’ve moved on to the next flavor and you have to find a new way to get back on their mental menu. Right. Um, here’s my first piece of advice. Don’t try and include every part of everything you’ve done in your story. People don’t care. Okay. Like I, I, I own a SAS company called educator impact it’s suicide prevention and wellbeing tracking for kids in schools.
PS (35:51):
It also does 360 degree evaluation of teachers. It’s an incredibly successful and business and you’ve never heard me talk about that once. And I’m sure in your researcher didn’t come up. I don’t need it to be part of my story. It just confuses the buyer. I don’t need to confuse the buyer. Right? Like at our peak, we would’ve 40,000 workshops a year before. In fact, this isn’t in the company I sold to Ernston young for 1.2 million people around the world. And it never once was in my buyer because it was about community investment strategy and helping to elevate the reputations of companies in the market. But that’s not what Peter sheen was spending his personal time on. I just haven’t own that company cuz long, long story. But um, it came out of a, a client delivery. I had, I knew how to solve the problem.
PS (36:33):
I built a company around that. I don’t need to confuse my brand positioning with all of that material. Does that make sense? That’s I am great. It’s like, so the, the answer to the question, Rory, the, the easiest answer to the question is what do you want to be talking about? right. Like where do you wanna spend your time? What’s your highest order contribution. What’s the biggest impact you have and then which bits of your story lend credibility to that? You’re the, you are the only one who will be worried about how it all stitches together. Everyone else is just, Hey, I’ve got a problem. I saw your Ted talk and I’ve got 35 grand, 40 grand where you come and do a speech like don’t overcomplicate it. My advice to you, however, is the more aligned RO vaden.com is to brand builders. The, the less spread your personal energy will be.
PS (37:24):
Right? And so, you know, here’s the biggest mistake speakers make in terms of building a company, right? They look at their speaking fee, let’s use easy numbers. Let’s say you’re speaking fees, 15 grand, right? They tell themselves the story, they get paid thousand a day or $15,000 an hour, but they don’t. Cause they only get 50 speeches a year or a hundred of their lucky. And really they’re working like as a low price lawyer at about 500 bucks an hour. You know, you’re not anywhere near as valuable as you think you are. Right. It’s just that your modality is a short burst for a high fee and you don’t get a lot of deliveries. Right. And so I would look back and go, where is the most value gonna get created? Is it in R Vaden doing speeches or is it in R Vaden building the message of brand builders and increasing the subscription model?
PS (38:12):
Because I can tell you now the enterprise value of brand builders is gonna be way substantially higher that the enterprise value of R vaden.com is here’s the, here’s the reason that matters. One, once it gets critical, mass build starts building itself. And it’s less about your personal exertion two, if you ever sold it, not that, that’s what you’re saying. You want to do. You only pay capital gains on that rather than personal income tax. So immediately you’re 25% better off. And when someone buys it, they’ll give you a multiple on future, on your discounted future cash, which means they might buy 13 years of profit off the table at half the tax rate that you pay. Right? Like now I’m not saying that’s what you should do, but there’s, there is a value decision to be made. And so I would start with, what do you want to talk about? I would then put it through the filter of, is this gonna support what I’m really trying to build here? And what’s more important to me. And then I would say your answer shakes out of that and the closer and more aligned, those two things are the more leverage you got get.
RV (39:08):
Yeah, well, and basically what’s happened is for three and a half years, I have just ignored Rory vain personal brand because it’s been all in, on brand builders group because of exactly what you said going, at some point we will get this AJ, my wife, she’s our CEO and we’ve been business partner since 2006. We already know that at some point it will gain enough critical mass. It will start to grow. And now it’s, we’re starting to kind of turn that toward, towards that direction. Yeah. And, and so now this is coming up again and, and to what you’re saying is going, gosh, the, the closer that my personal brand is, um, anyways, that’s awesome. I think it’s super powerful for me, even to just hear don’t feel obligated. Like you have to make sense of everything you’ve ever done and share it all and make sense of it in your story. Like your customer only cares about their problem. You only need to share whatever parts of your story are relevant to solving their problem.
PS (40:08):
Yeah. The only people worry who woke up this morning, thinking about you, AJ, your wife, your two kids, yourself, and the people who are trying to steal your business. That’s a, it, everyone else woke up with their own problem and you either have positioned your value to solve that problem. Or you don’t, you either positioned in a way that appeals to that individual buyer or you didn’t, you either positioned the, the business model to serve that person in a way that they actually, you know, are willing to prescribe to and write checks for. And you’re either doing it in a modality that suits them, or it doesn’t like, it’s really that simple, you know, and that hard at the same time.
RV (40:43):
Yeah. Yeah. Um, man, this is so awesome. So the book y’all making it happen, turning good ideas into great results. She hands wall named by us created by Peter sheen. um, uh, the, a lot more detail in it. And I’ve, uh, I’ve learned a lot today and I, I would say very much there are, there are, there are way there’s, there’s things that have come out of this conversation that were not a part of how I, you know, thought about it. And, um, it really, really is really is cool, man. So, um, what, where should people go if they want to connect with you, Peter, like, um, you know, what would, what would you have people, you know, knowing, knowing that you did this, basically as, as a, as a helpful favor and a buddy to like talk about something you haven’t talked about since 2009, uh, um, but, but
PS (41:33):
Live every day, by the way, but live every day, you know,
RV (41:36):
Live every day. Yeah. What, um, how do you want people to think about you? Where should they find you? What, uh, what should they refer for you, et cetera?
PS (41:47):
Yeah, I would, I hit me up on LinkedIn. That’s probably the, the safest place to stay in touch. Um, you can follow me on Instagram. I’ve posted about once every three years. And so, you know, maybe into 2023, you’ll see a post from, and I get, this is such a, we should actually get at this at some point in
RV (42:04):
Again, different audiences though. Like I don’t hang out on LinkedIn very much. I hang out
PS (42:09):
Instagram, but neither is a CEO of Pepsi. You know, he’s not on Instagram looking for corporate consultants and, you know, someone to facilitate his executive offsite. Like it’s just, it’s different audiences drive different decisions. I would go after LinkedIn is a great way to stay in touch. Um, I would get on free ring, circus.com and maybe join the mailing list there. And you’ll learn more about the work we’re doing in speaking development. And, and yeah,
RV (42:34):
And we had one of your business partners, Josh Linkner. We had him on this show, another world class speaker, one of the very, very best we interviewed him that you guys are business partners in three ring circus. So yeah,
PS (42:45):
Josh is a badass. I mean, that guy is a production machine. Like that guy can market, like he would not believe. And so that’s where I’d go. Um, I think there’s a place on my website, Peter sheen.com to sign up. Um, we don’t communicate to that list a lot, but when we do, but if you’re on it, when we have something interesting, we’ll let you know.
RV (43:03):
Yeah. Um, well, man, I love this and I, I just, I guess I just wanna say like, thank you while I have you, um, you know, some times people kind of make the, the comment like, oh, you, you know, you can’t change a life with a, with a, with a 45 minute keynote. And I would say, I used to think that, and, and I think of it less because of things like you, you know, I haven’t, I haven’t talked to you in 10 years and that one thing that you put up at that one moment hit me in the right way at time, stuck with me, changed my career. And now, you know, we’re trying to pass along your legacy to people and go like, look, this is look at the power of this thing all from a one random talk that you did. Yeah. 10 years ago, you don’t even make money. You don’t even talk to those groups anymore. And it, it’s made a huge impact, man, really, really powerful. And, um, and it’s been not just for me, I mean, definitely for me, but for a lot of the people that we talk to, and I’m glad they’re texting you going like, dude, I , what is she hands wall? Because it’s so impactful.
PS (44:13):
I, I was the one asking them, what’s she hand the wall? Look my you’re firstly, you’re welcome. I appreciate, uh, you saying, thanks. Anyone that underestimates the power of a single presentation to change a life is outside of their mind. 45 minutes with Jim RO transformed my life. And I built a company that worked with millions of kids, you know, on important life skills. I built a corporate consulting company that transforms, you know, we brought Microsoft and apple during there, like turnarounds, like it, that all came from that one day in the Horton perve in Sydney with Jim run on a platform. Right. And you know, I, you, you have other versions of that. I’m sure in your life where you something change the way you saw the world. And so I’m a deep believer in the power of what I call that a catalytic experience. And I’m, I feel honored flattered, and I take it very seriously, the responsibility we get to do that on a daily basis. Wow.
RV (45:04):
Well Shehan, uh, she hands wall, everybody from the source, Peter Shehan go grab the book, making it happen. Let’s see if we can sell some more books for him. uh, you know, read, read about this directly from the source. Um, brother, we just, we wish you the best. Uh, it’s an honor to be a colleague, uh, to be a, a mentee, a student of yours and, uh, really appreciate you carve some time out and, uh, and thanks for the free consulting. You’re you’re welcome to do that. Anytime you want
PS (45:31):
Brother take care.

Ep 243: Building Million Dollar Membership Sites with Alison Lumbatis | Recap Episode

RV (00:01):
Let’s talk about how to build million dollar membership sites. What an interview, Allison Lobas. She was dropping so much bombs, like so many nuggets, so much inspiration, so much tactical information, empirical information about how she has built this seven figure business. And I just feel lucky to have her as a friend and, you know, proud to call her a client. And I just, this lady’s amazing. She’s awesome. And it’s funny, cuz I remember very specifically the first time I met her she impressed me from the moment I saw her. I was like she’s she’s got the gift and uman, just to see what she is doing and uhow she’s growing. She’s awesome. So,uwelcome to the recap edition, influential personal brand podcast. It’s your man, Rory vaden breaking down that interview and you know, normally I share like my top three highlights. UI had to, I couldn’t boil it down to less than four. I had, I had so many,uand I, I got four here for you that are just the things that really stuck out to me that I hope stick out to you. And uthe first one is, man, this is so, so flagship like, so cornerstone, so foundational of what we believe at brand builders. And to hear her say these words verbatim, she said it all started because I created the program that I needed at the time.
RV (01:40):
Bam like that is it. If, if you’ve been around here at all, you’ve heard to say this over and over again, you are most powerfully positioned to serve the person you once were. There is no other avatar in the world that you will understand in a more intimate way than the person that you once were. You are equipped, you are designed, you are prepared, you are educated. You, you, you are, are, are mission driven to serve that person. And to hear her just say that like, so clearly she’s just going. I tried to solve this problem in my own life. And then, you know, I realize other people had this problem. And so I look back and I created something for that. That’s it like that’s that is the shortest path to uniqueness. That’s the fastest way to momentum. Like that’s the, the clearest line to the distinction that is available for a personal brand.
RV (02:41):
And just, you know, to see her doing it and, and all the community that has it has become and people around it. And then her recent book launch and all that, that we, you know, we were excited to be a part of. I mean, it’s just awesome. Just awesome. So who, who were you, right? Like when you’re trying to, when you’re creating your plans for the future and for your business and your personal brand and your content, you go, who was I, what was I struggling with? What did I need that didn’t exist? Or I couldn’t find at the time, what do I know now that I wish I knew then and make that available to people that that’s gonna be visceral going to be real. It’s going to be emotional, compelling. It’s gonna have connection and power and it’s gonna be profound because you’ve been there and you have locked a mile in those shoes, speak to that person, right.
RV (03:33):
Speak to that person. And you’ll, you’ll go far. And Allison great example of this number or two. Okay. Number two, takeaway. So simple. She said in between launches, we were working aggressively on capturing leads and building our newsletter list, right? So she was saying our newsletter list converts at about 10%, just from a, a weekly newsletter, the it she sends. And the, she said, we run a lot of Facebook ads to our freebies. It doesn’t get more simple than that. It doesn’t get like easier than that. It more straightforward than that. And if you’ve been through our relationship engine training, tho those of you that are members of ours, when we take you through the relationship engine, we, we teach you the architecture, the, the infrastructure of a funnel, you know, it starts with something free. Like that’s the lead magnet is what can you give value?
RV (04:31):
How can you give value first, save the best for first? What can you give away for free teach the best of what, you know, package it up in something that is small and concise. The, that is a major quick win and, and deliver the goods right up front. Those become your lead magnets. And then she runs ad to those lead magnets and people download them. And to this day, this is what we do go on brand builders, group.com. And look, you’re gonna see that we are pushing our, our trends and personal branding, national re search study. We spent tens of thousands of dollars on that. Like it, it’s, it’s a beautiful lead magnet. It took us a year to develop over a year, all in to like plan it and put the whole thing together. We give it away for free. And it is this incredibly, it’s just this packed.
RV (05:18):
You know, it’s a PDF though. Like it’s a PDF document. People can scroll the thing in five minutes. And, and now we go out and we do media interviews and we drive people to that and we run YouTube Ads and we drive people to that and we do press releases and, and we drive people to that. It’s the same, same thing, right? She’s doing the same thing. Brandon Bouchard does the same thing. Like it mean, go down, pick your list, pick your influencer. This is how it, it works. And it doesn’t have to be new. The part that makes it special is it’s your stuff. And it’s, it’s whatever you would do and who you would, who, who you would provide that for. So you know, it’s that simple, like drive people to down a freebie, get them on your newsletter list, talk to them once a week and then tell them when you have something available to buy, like you’re building trust, build value, build relationships before you need them.
RV (06:12):
Like that is what you have to do, build relationships before you need them. We talk about out this in pressure, free persuasion with your list. It’s the same thing you have to give value first. And then they will trust you. And then when you have something they’re there, they’re sitting there ready to buy what, whatever your thing is number three, and this was really big for me hearing what she was saying. This is, I think an area of learning for my, myself. This is somewhere where I go, Ooh, I’ve, I’ve missed the boat here. AJ is super passionate about, about this. And, and so she’s moving the company in this direction, thankfully, because this is huge. And it was very edifying when Allison was talking about it is she said, build the community around the program. Know it’s more than just the clothes, right?
RV (07:00):
So, you know, she’s selling outfit formulas, and that’s what her, you know, her membership is all about. And she’s like selling clothes and helping people helping women specifically figure out what to wear. Like that’s the problem that she’s solving, but the, the power becomes the community, the community around found the program. And, you know, ultimately the knowledge is replaceable. You know, or at least kind of has like an expiration date just from the standpoint of like, look, if someone’s in your membership, like look at our, our brand builders, right? So if you’re a member, if you sign up for our, our flagship coaching, like, you know, main coaching program pro quarterly, we immediately give you access to everything to the, to the whole curriculum. Like from day one, you can go through everything as fast as you, as fast as you can consume it.
RV (07:49):
Well, once you’ve learned it, you know, it’s kind of like, well, what’s the reason to pay? Well, you know, there’s a couple things there. It’s like another thing that we talk about all the time, people don’t pay for information, they pay for organization and application, people pay for organization and application. So, you know, they need the information and then they need help applying it. And then, but then the thing that like you can, you never break free of is community. You it’s the communities, the people you’re around our brand builders members are freaking amazing. I mean, Allison is one of our clients. She’s one of the members, right? Like she’s the kind of person that comes to our events and you sit next to her. And then, you know, we’ve got lovey Ajai Jones and she comes to the events and she’s a multi New York times bestselling author, and she’s got a viral Ted talk and we have two, we have two billionaires become clients.
RV (08:40):
This last year. We got, you know, people who are time magazine person of the year, we’ve got lots of 10 millionaires and a hundred millionaires. You know, all these people with millions of followers and hundreds of millions of video views. I mean, our community is insane. Actresses actors like major famous like TV actors, musicians. I mean the brand builders group community is just nuts. You know, we’ve had several clients on the podcast, you know, so you’ve gotten to, to learn from some of them, but the point there is going, you know, from my perspective, and we still started brand builders group. And like, you know, here comes RO like thinking about, you know, content and information and my like nerdy brain, I’m going, we gotta create the world’s greatest curriculum. Right. And, and I think that’s what we did or one of the world’s greatest curriculums.
RV (09:29):
I, I definitely feel confident saying that our content is incredible. And yet the content is like, probably the biggest complaint that we hear from people is like, it’s so much, like there’s so much here. And it’s like, yeah, you know, it, it’s, there’s a lot to learn. It’s a, it’s a college degree that we give people. I mean, legitimately it takes four years for most people to complete the, the full training, like of all of our program. But, but people aren’t staying for the content. They come, maybe for the content, they learn the content, they come for coaching. They, you know, they get the training, they, they, but what they’re really staying for years and years now that have gone by we’re in year four already, holy buckets, we’re in year four already. It’s for the community, it’s for the relationships it’s for the people they’re meeting and the business deals they’re doing and the, you know, the friendships they’re forming and the, the stuff they’re doing outside, but they’re meeting them at our events.
RV (10:25):
And that’s exactly what Allison was saying. And, you know, she obviously saw the light on that much earlier than I did of for our community. But what for your community? How can you, how you facilitate your community coming together without you? One of the features that we just rolled out in our member portal is is an example, just an example of this. So we created this technology in our portal where every member registers themself and there’s a map. And when it shows a pin on a map for where you live, and then you can click on the other pins that are close to you, or if you’re traveling like wherever you’re going so that you can see who the other brand builders are like, where are the other members of the community? I’m so jacked about it, even for me, because I, you know, at this point we have, we have over 500 clients.
RV (11:15):
So like, you know, I’m, I don’t know all of ’em anymore by by name. I know a lot of ’em, but like when I go traveling, I can like see them and meet them and, and you know, get them together and, and they’ll get together. And I just, I’m excited about that. And that’s what Allison is talking about is going, that’s not like a nice to do long term that like becomes the core, like it, the, the, the, the unbreakable bond. And I think you, you move from that role of being like, okay, I’m a teacher to, to more of just like, you know, I’m the, I’m just hosting a, whatever I’m hosting a Bible study, or I’m hosting an event, or I’m, you know, I’m, I’m just, I’m just the, the, the, the gathering spot for people to come to. So that was huge for me.
RV (12:02):
And again, our team and AJ they’ve been working in that direction, which I’m just, I’m just pumped about, cuz our community is incredible. So how can you do that for your community? How can you bring them together? Was huge. And then the fourth thing, which was just another takeaway, which is another thing that I go, this is just such a good reminder. Here’s what she said. She said, my philosophy has always been about continually investing into myself on entrepreneurship really is personal development. I mean, direct sales really is personal development. Professional services really is personal development. Any type of leadership really is personal development. Like that is the job like, and that’s what you’re supposed to do. And it boggles my mind, like literally blows me away. How you know, yeah. AJ and I are junkies about, I mean, we go to the conferences, we go to the groups, we go to the events and I always kind of would assume that it’s like, the person who’s struggling is the person who should be the person who should be in that room.
RV (13:07):
The most is the person who’s struggling the most, right? Like the person who needs the most help, the person who is not making enough money and they need help. And they need someone to coach them and show them what to do. But ironically, that’s never, who’s in the room. The people who are in the room or people like Allison is the people who are crushing it, they’re killing it. It’s like the last people who really need to be, there are always the ones that are the first to sign and they’re on the front row, you know, at the event, they’re the first in, inside the mastermind. They’re, they’re the, the first to buy the book and read it. And that’s why they are crushing. It is because they’re the person doing that. And it, it just took me years to realize that. And, oh my gosh, like Allison is such a bad mam jam.
RV (13:54):
I mean, like you, you heard her story, like what a bad ma pajama this woman is. And her and her team, you know, like always nobody does it alone, but she’s a bad ma pajama. And yet she’s signing up for coaching from us. And from, you know, I met her at an, I met her at another mastermind, like she’s investing into herself and that is why she’s winning. It’s one of the biggest reasons why she’s winning and, and not just investing in herself, but like FA executing, executing. There were actually two parts in the interview. I really, really love. So I love when she said she said we had cold leads in our email list who suddenly started up again for our stuff because of the 15 PS. Now, if you’re not one of our, our members yet you may not have picked up on that.
RV (14:45):
And what are the 15 PS? The 15 PS is our framework that we teach for how to write, how to write sales copy, like on a sales page. So what she was saying there is she has all these old leads that were cold. And, you know, she always, you know, does a broadcast, sends people to a page to sign up? Well, when she came through the training and ha had her team redo the sales page with the 15 piece, all of these old people started signing up that had never signed up. And that was her saying, I learned something. I executed on it and it worked well, of course it works. That’s why we teach it. It, we teach what we do. We teach what our clients do, like what we have learned. So of course it works. The question is, number one, will you learn it?
RV (15:34):
And number two, will you do it? And, and so you gotta be willing to invest in yourself and then you gotta be willing to execute on the thing that you learn. And so she said that, and then she said another one, right after that, she said I followed every single step of the brand builder’s bestseller launch plan. And it worked right. Like she sold thousands of copies of her book on opening week. And she followed a formula. It’s, it’s a formula that we’ve learned. It’s a formula that we teach. It’s a formula that we do. I mean, go back and listen to the like, you know, so that’s part of our curriculum bestseller launch plan. But if you go if you go watch our influential personal brand summit or if you listen to the interview that I did with Gretchen Rubin, Gretchen Rubin talks about how she built her email list and doing lead magnets, right?
RV (16:23):
Allison talks about that. If you, if you go listen to John Gordon, they interview that I did with John Gordon and he talks about how he built a speaking career, going out and speak for free. Like, I, these are all things that, that we teach a formal part of our curriculum, but it’s like, until you hear one of these legends tell you, that’s how they did it. And that’s how they started you. You kind of think there’s some secret maybe that you’re, that you’re missing or you know, that, that, that it, it is like, there’s gotta be more to it than that. And it it’s like, there’s not, it’s just a matter of knowing it and, and executing it. But part of that is being humble enough to go, gosh, I got something to learn. Like I need some, I need to learn from someone who’s done this.
RV (17:05):
I need to learn from somebody who has already accomplished the thing that I’m trying to do. And and, and even, and go, like, in the case of someone like Allison, she’s already crushing it going, yeah, I wanna keep learning. I wanna keep up level, even though I’m, I’m already doing great. And that inspires me. I, I love that. Like that makes me so fired up. And, and, and so many of, of my friends who I’ve kind of grown up in the industry, I they’re the same way. I mean, John, John ACU reads a bunch of books, Lewis house is interviewing all these people like I mean, there’s I mean, Jason Dorsey does all of this research. I mean, so many of my friends are in a, in a mode where they’re constantly learning, are you right? Are you learning? Are you, are you doing it?
RV (17:54):
Are you humble enough to say, you know what, I wanna get help. I wanna get coaching. I’m, I’m willing to take, take a chance to invest in myself and then I’m gonna execute. And if you think we can help you, man, like if you’re trying to do anything around building your personal brand, your speaking career, podcasting, you know, information products, social media, launching courses, membership sites or just using digital marketing to drive awareness for whatever your, your practice is or your, you know, your service based business. Like we can help you. We know a lot this and, and you should, you should go request a call, go to, go to go to free call dot R vain.com free call dot Roy vain.com. Lemme make sure that’s live. I haven’t checked that in a minute. Go to check that out and and request a call with our team and let’s see for, we can help you, but whether it’s us or somebody else, you know, it’s just inspiring to hear people like Allison going, this is how I got there.
RV (18:58):
This is what I do. I, I believe in personal development and I practice it. So you should too. And you know, if nothing else keep coming back to the podcast, right? Like we do this for free. I’m learning a ton. I hope you’re learning a ton. We’re, we’re, we’re trying to give you the goods and, and teach you the best of what our, our friends in our community have to offer. And so, you know, I’m preaching to the choir there a little bit since you’re already here tuning in and listening, but if you haven’t yet taking it to the next level, come with us, right. Like go back and listen. I mean, we have had a bunch of brand builders group clients on, on here, go back and listen to Darcy, Ben and Koa about how she sells her courses, listen to lovey Aja E listen to Louis hows.
RV (19:46):
Like, you know, we’ve had a bunch of clients that have come on here and they’re amazing people. And they’re, these are the people that are hanging around. So if you wanna be like those people you know, you become who your friends are. We’d love to hang out with you. We’d love to have you part of the community. So go to go to free call dot Roy vaden.com. You can request a free call with our team. And let’s talk. Other than that, I hope you’re inspired to just invest in your personal development, that you are willing to create a community around the thing that you’re doing and realize that the community is inherently as valuable as anything else. Especially, and at least as much as the content, building your list, building your new, you know, communicating to your list with a newsletter. And then most of all create the program, create the content that you needed back then your most powerfully positioned to serve the person you once were. We’re here to
Speaker 2 (20:47):
Serve you. Thank you for that opportunity and privilege. We love you. Leave us a review if you can, on iTunes, if you haven’t done that yet, share this podcast with somebody and just keep coming back. We’ll catch you next time on the influential personal brand podcast.

Ep 242: Building Million Dollar Membership Sites with Alison Lumbatis

RV (00:07):
Hey brand builder, Rory Vaden here. Thank you so much for taking the time to check out this interview as always, it’s our honor to provide it to you for free and wanted to let you, you know, there’s no big sales pitch or anything coming at the end. However, if you are someone who is looking to build and monetize your personal brand, we would love to talk to you and get to know you a little bit and hear about some of your dreams and visions and share with you a little bit about what we’re up to to see if we might be a fit. So if you’re interested in a free strategy call with someone from our team, we would love to hear from you. You can do that at brand builders, group.com/podcast, brand builders, group.com/podcast. We hope to talk to you soon.
RV (00:53):
Well, I am honored to introduce you to a friend of mine and AJ’s Allison. Lumbatis, who we have now known for a few years. And I remember meeting her for the very first time I was actually teaching at Lewis Howes mastermind. And I specifically remember when Allison walked in the room and I could immediately tell, I was like, oh, she’s, she’s got the it factor. She’s got it. She’s sharp. She’s funny. She’s social. She’s just awesome. And the more I’ve gotten to know her, the more that I have continued to like her. And you might know her, you, you, you may have seen her online. She runs a very large blog lifestyle blog around fashion called get your pretty on. Her website is highly trafficked. And she has a membership program that’s built around that too. That has had a, to over 100,000 paying members, which is what we’re gonna talk about is how the heck did she do that? And she also just recently released a book the ultimate book of outfit formulas, the ultimate book of outfit formulas became number one on Amazon. And so we just adore her what she’s up to and felt like you need to hear Allison’s story. Plus she’s awesome. So Allison, welcome to the show.
AL (02:09):
Thanks. Rory. The feeling is mutual
RV (02:12):
. So tell us about how you get started. You were, you were an engineer. Yeah. And then suddenly you get into fashion and blogging and it becomes this membership. And now you’ve got this book and like you know, tell us about the early stages of your kind of personal brand journey.
AL (02:33):
Yeah, it’s crazy. I mean, how do you get from engineering to stylist and entrepreneur? It’s, it’s a huge leap, but I basically created the program that I needed at the time. And I had been working from home. I was in corporate America for 14 years, got the opportunity to work from home, which was an amazing blessing, but I realized very quickly within about three months of working from home, but I was never getting out of my yoga pants. I was not fixing my hair. I was not putting on makeup. I think a lot of people can relate to that during the pandemic. A lot of us were working from home for the first time and realized just how quickly things can spiral downhill when you don’t have that built in accountability for getting ready in the morning or having to keep hours or be in an office.
AL (03:15):
So I really started blogging from a place of this. Doesn’t feel good. I’m not motivated to get dressed every day. And it’s affecting not just the way I feel about myself, but so many things in my environment, too. Like the house is getting messier. I’m not doing laundry as much. I don’t feel like going on date nights anymore. I mean, it was literally affecting so many things. And when I sat down and thought about it, the first thing that popped in my head was can get dressed again. Like that’s a super easy, really tangible step I can take in the right direction. And sometimes it’s just about that one small thing that makes a huge difference in every other part of your life. So that’s why I started blogging. I wanted to start sharing what I was learning and blogging felt like an accountability partner to me when I did not have one at the time, I didn’t have that office to go into.
AL (04:00):
So even though I was only getting dressed for me and to feel better about myself and to get into a routine, what ended up happening is that a lot of women found me and the blog grew organically to around 50,000 page views within six months, which was crazy. And I was still working in corporate America at the time, blogging on this side, really to just enjoying this creative outlet that I had. And I really didn’t start out thinking this was gonna be a business at all. I had done little things on the side in the past, I’d done some life in business coaching. I had run a personalized gifts business. So I had dipped a toe into some entrepreneurial ventures, but nothing like this, where it was just true, really a passion project and something that I was doing because I was loving sharing what I was learning throughout the process.
AL (04:48):
It didn’t become a business until about two years later, I took a severance package from corporate and I decided to just really go all in on it and, and throw everything I had into just serving and serving and serving the commute. But what happened is I ended up with three months left in my bank account of my severance oh, wow. We had cut that back drastically. We were a two income family. So my husband and I just really made sacrifices and, and cut back for me to be able to do this. But I finally got to a point where I thought I’ve built this huge audience. I have this community around what I’m doing. I’m not really making any money. And that’s when the idea for outfit formulas was born. I went to my readers, I went to my followers and I said, if I could do something for you that would make your life easier.
AL (05:32):
What would that look like? And there was all of this overlap on those responses that came back to me. My reader said, please just give us a shopping list, tell us what to go out and buy each season and tell me what to friends to add to my closet and then show me ways to pair it up. So I inadvertently created a capsule wardrobe, which I didn’t even know what it was at the time. I’m not a trained stylist. I’ve just learned as I’ve gone on through this process and journey. And I was thinking, I’ll be really excited if 50 women signed up this first time out, the gate 500 women signed up. And I knew right then and there with that first launch that this was going to work and I was going to be able to replace my income. And the rest is history. We’ve, we’ve grown in season over season.
RV (06:13):
Like the first, the first, the first launch, like, you know, because I, I think I mean, obviously you’re familiar with our brand builder community and, you know, personal brands you bump into ’em a lot. And I think, you know, people see whoever Dean Graziosi, Tony Robbins, Jeff Walker, Brandon Behar, they see people launch these huge high dollar offers. Yes. And kind of go, oh, that’s you? That, that’s what it looks like that. But how much was your first, how much were you charging?
AL (06:43):
My very first program was a whopping $10. Bam.
RV (06:47):
10 bucks.
AL (06:48):
yes.
RV (06:49):
Uhhuh, but you had 500 people sign up.
AL (06:53):
I did, yes. And then I think I went to $19 shortly thereafter. I, we played around a bit with pricing between 29 and 39. And I’ve ended at $39, which is where we’re at right now and seems to be that sweet spot. But from the beginning I knew I wanted to democratize personal style and I knew I could look at this membership. One of two ways, either we’re doing the high dollar, you know, appealing to a much smaller niche, or I’m doing something at a lower amount that I’m gonna be able to reach, you know, potentially hundreds of thousands of women. And that’s the path and the route that I decided to go with my pricing. So while we’re at 39, now that seems like such a huge difference between, you know, my $10 launch that I did back in 2014
RV (07:35):
Uhhuh . But that is really huge. And one of the, one of the things that we’re big believers in is that when you’re first starting out with your personal brand, you need customers more than you need revenue. Like you have to have that win. And like you, you had that 500 people bought something. I mean, it was 10 bucks, but they, they bought something. They said, I trust you. I want to take this deeper. I wanna, I want to, I wanna give it another shot. Now at the same time, it kind of freaks me out to go, well, you gotta sell a lot of $10 somethings to replace any type of corporate income that you, you once had. So, so 500 times tens five. And so you did $5,000 in your first launch. How long did it take you to get to where, you know, you you’re making enough money consistently that you could like support yourself on it.
AL (08:31):
In that first launch, I realized a few things, number one, that this was going to be a seasonal launch. So I knew that I was gonna have recurring revenue and I would be able to, you know, basically have new product to sell to the same customers four times per year. Along with that, I also started to play around with creating evergreen programs in the business and, and realizing that, you know, I could upsell them into other programs and have other offerings available to them. And on the back end of that launch, it was actually around a $25,000 launch because the program sales weren’t the only way that we were getting rev or that I was getting revenue at the time. Oh, I was also doing affiliate sales on the back end of that. So every piece of clothing that they purchased through this shopping list in this caps wardrobe, I was earning affiliate commissions from all of the retailers that were on the list too.
AL (09:20):
So that’s always been a really big part of my business model is get, is getting those affiliate sales on the back end. So really just thinking about ways that once you get that customer and you’ve earned their trust, you know, what are some other ways that you can offer, you know, of what they want and be able to continue to bring revenue in, not just from the membership income, although now, you know, nine years down the road that has absolutely overshadowed everything else. But back then I had to get really, really creative when I didn’t have as many customers.
RV (09:52):
Yeah. Well, that’s interesting. So even like a brand builders group, you know, we’re are helping people set their strategy and then they ultimately go, I need execution. I need someone to edit my videos, do my social media posting, like, you know, do my Facebook ads, blah, blah, blah. And we started to step down the path of trying to do it and quickly realize there’s so much here for so many people. And we did the same thing. We said, let’s spend our time curating a vendor list of trusted providers that the whole community can use. And if somebody doesn’t do a good job, like we’ll just stop using them and, and do affiliate fees that way. And that’s been super powerful for us is, is just answering that question. How can I serve my current audience in a deeper way? You know, and it, and it brings business to you. So, all right, so that’s 2014. So today you have a $39. It’s not 39 a month. It’s $39 a season. So it’s really like correct $13 a month, but they pay for a season, a season it’s worth. So like, where are you at? Give us a sense of the scope of where you’re at today?
AL (11:02):
Well, it’s, honestly, you know, we’re, it’s a seven figure brand now, and it’s amazing to think about that. And, and where I came from 2014 to today and, and I have a team of 10 people supporting this and it just keeps growing season over season, year of after year, we grew during a pandemic, you know, it’s, it’s something where I’m able to really meet women where they are, those who are in transition or rebuilding a wardrobe, or just don’t know where to start, or just don’t want the decision fatigue of deciding what to buy each season or, or how to get dressed every day, they get an email or they get a notification on their phone that tells them exactly pair up and how to put it together. So I think that the best part of it though, is
RV (11:43):
Every day for a whole season.
AL (11:44):
Yes, yes. Every day for a whole season.
RV (11:46):
And it’s for three months, you tell ’em what to wear.
AL (11:49):
Yes. And it’s created from pieces on that shopping list and they’re able to shop their closets and, and find items that are on there, check them off and then go out to the stores to fill in the blanks. And the beauty of that is they can either shop my links, which they’re more than welcome to do, or they can shop in their favorite stores. Some women shop exclusively in thrift stores and find everything that they need for the list. Others are going to Neiman’s and finding the things that they need for the list. And as is, they’re able to follow the formula, which is really just a framework of bottoms. Anything you wear on your lower half tops, topper, shoes, and accessories. Those are the five variables. And we mix and match them in different ways to create different looks every single day. That is
RV (12:27):
So cool. And you just had a, so you had a hundred thousand, you’ve recently crossed us a hundred thousand people who have purchased at least one season and they’re all women, right? Yes.
AL (12:38):
Well, we have a men’s wear program as well, but , the women are buying it for the men. So that goes to show you, like, I think for the most part we’re dressing our guys. ,
RV (12:49):
That’s definitely true in the Vaden household. Yeah, that’s so cool. I, I mean to go in, in basically a five year, I mean, five years from zero to a hundred thousand customers, and I just think it’s cool because you, you, you know, you hear always about, oh, the million dollar launch and a multimillion dollar launch, da da, but like to say a hundred thousand customers. Now you have a hundred thousand people that trust you, which will be whatever, you know, that number grows and grows and rose. I think we don’t, we, we underestimate the importance of a customer and we often overestimate the value of just revenue by itself and be like, mm. Having a lot of people buy from you is, is super valuable. So, so let’s talk about the membership model for a second. So you do a I think memberships are one of those things that I, I kind of feel like, especially for personal brands, like so many things, it’s almost like this holy grail of, you know, it’s like this facade of going well, gosh, if, if I had a thousand members that were paying me a thousand dollars a month, that’d be a million dollars, a like, that’d be 12 million a year, but I don’t think people realize how hard it it is for the membership program and like just what it takes.
RV (14:06):
And, and, and that now, do you, do people pay monthly or they only do a, they buy a season at a time.
AL (14:15):
So we have two you different ways that they can sign up. They can either subscribe seasonally by purchasing, purchasing them one off, or we have an annual membership. So at the end of the year, I open up memberships from November through March of the following year for the next year’s membership. And with the annual membership, we offer a lot of perks, bonuses, early access because I really wanna front load the year and get as many people as possible to sign up for that annual membership so that they are locked in that they’re with us for the entire year. We have around an 85% customer retention rate, which is insane and amazing, but I also involve my customers in the process every single season. I allow them to give their input on what I’m creating. What pieces would you like to see repeated in this capsule?
AL (15:01):
What trends are exciting you the most? What did you like the most about the pieces that we had in our capsules this past year? What stores would you like to see? All of, of that data comes back in my team, boils it down, and then we incorporate as much as we possibly can into the next season. And when you’re launching four times a year, you have that ability to just course correct and easily add things in, especially if it’s not gonna be a huge investment, but just really make the program more valuable and keep your customers excited about it. When they’re involved in that process, you better believe when that cart opens. They are the first ones there, ready to sign up. They literally wait up until midnight the night before the people that aren’t annual members and even our annual members, when we open the memberships up, they wait until midnight and they are right there signing up and ready to go. It’s I love
RV (15:50):
It. Like black, black, Friday, Walmart, like knocking people, knocking each other over to say, like, get into your membership. And I’m glad it’s
AL (15:59):
Virtual.
RV (16:00):
I mean, the outfit formula,
AL (16:02):
I want my shopping list.
RV (16:04):
So so you mentioned that you launch, okay, so you, you have the annual, so they don’t really pay monthly. You have, you can basically buy a season at a time or you just pay for the pay for the year. Correct. But you,
AL (16:19):
We do a payment plan option too, for the annual membership. So if they do wanna break it out into payments, they can do that.
RV (16:24):
I gotcha. Okay. And then the four times a year, when you go through a launch, what do you do? Like how do you, you launch this thing and, and, and maybe talk a little bit about how you, how you used to do it. Like when you were first starting and you didn’t, you know, I mean, now you’ve got a hundred thousand of people in your database that are, are buyers. You gotta, you must have way more than that in your, in, you know, just in the, the database. But like, if you have, what are all the steps you would do to, of like sell a season or launch a season? Sure.
AL (16:57):
So our launch cycle is about six weeks. From beginning to our cart opening in the beginning, R it was, it was me I was, I was doing it all. I cobbled together the systems on the back end, I was like copying PayPal code buttons into my browser and, and creating password protected, you know, WordPress pages. It was so rudimentary, but over the course of the second year, that’s when I really invested in technology and learning, you know, what it would take to really just get in a space of being scalable and starting with the end in mind, and being able to say, I wanna be able to serve hundreds of thousands of members. What does that look like? And how can I build a technology now in order to allow that to happen? So I think that was one of the best decisions that I made early on was really just investing in doing that.
AL (17:42):
And then, you know, we work in as sauna. Everything is in a seasonal launch project. So every season, my business manager and I sit down and we look through all of the tasks that are in that project and everything that gets assigned out from tech support to customer support and graphic design, to marketing. And we take a look at it to make sure that everything still makes sense, and we wanna continue doing all of these steps, or if we need to add something else in or, or take something out again, because we’re launching so frequently, we are able to just really course correct and, and fix things as they come up or add things in so that we can be super nimble and, and, and change at the drop of a dime, which we had to do last year. We had, we had to shift and pivot in all those good things.
AL (18:26):
But it takes about six weeks. From the time I start gathering the Intel from our existing customers of what they would like to see included in the capsule to me, really just heading out and doing trend spotting. I go into the malls, I go into stores, I look at items. I go online, I do tons of, you know, online shopping window, shopping to choose items that I feel would work well in the capsule. Then I do my creative part, which is actually creating the capsule. Once that’s done. I hand that off to my team and then everything from that point forward, I’m not necessarily involved in it’s all the downstream stuff from creating the PDFs and the graphic design to loading everything into the membership site, to, you know, really going out and sourcing links from forever, everyone from petites to plus sizes and, and everything in between from budget friendly to higher ends. It’s like everything. We, we try to cover it all just to truly make this as easy of a process for our customers as possible. And then, you know, once all of that is done loaded into the membership site, then the very last thing we do is launch our sales pages, open our cart and, and they sign up it sounds so magical. Right?
RV (19:35):
well, yeah. So when you, you, you launch a sales page, so you say whatever, it’s the fall season, you know, 20, 22, 21 or whatever is this winter season, summer season. And then do you just email your live us? Do you run ads? Do you do webinars? Do you do podcast tours? Do you try to get on TV? Do you like, is it a little bit of all the above?
AL (20:01):
Yes. It’s a little bit of all of the above, but I’ll tell you what works the best. So between launches, we’re really working on capturing as many leads as possible and growing our list because our newsletter list can it’s at about 10%, which is crazy, but that’s the place where I really am able to nurture any of our new leads that come in to really explain the program to them, to give them value. I send them a newsletter on a weekly basis with tons of freestyle resources and advice. And I think that that’s really the key to that really high conversion numbers. So we work really hard on the list. I do, you know, podcasts perform extremely well. So it’s, it’s a lot of different things that are going on in between those launches to really ensure the success whenever we do launch and, and really focusing on those repeat customers too, and getting them into the seasonal programs and then ultimately selling them into the annual memberships at the end of the year as well.
RV (20:55):
So it’s really building the list and sort of building the trust. And then when the launch happens, you basically have just emailing and saying, Hey, it’s, it’s live, it’s open sign up for yes. You know, the, the new season. Exactly. And, and then in terms of, you’re just using whatever lead magnets, PDF downloads, maybe a video training, like whatever you’re using, just normal stuff to get people onto your email list. And then it’s the value every week through the newsletter building the trust in advance. And then just letting ’em know the cart is open.
AL (21:24):
Yes, definitely. We run a lot of Facebook ads to our or freebies too. So that shows us right away, like what’s performing well. And we actually make money on our lead gen, which is crazy, but how, for the most part, they sign up for freebies and then they end up purchasing something from me either, you know, an evergreen program or they end up enrolling into the seasonal program. So although it is really done as a lead magnet, we’re converting on all of those leads that are coming in and making, making money on our ad spend, which is crazy Uhhuh
RV (21:56):
. How do you get 85% customer retention? So what, what does that number mean first of all, and how do you, how do you make that happen?
AL (22:08):
So the 85% customer retention is really our customers that end up continuing to purchase from us and coming back year after year, I have some women who have been with me since 2014 and have done every single season, every single annual membership. I would say the majority of our customers have been here for at least four years. And the beauty of the program is at while some people don’t, they don’t technically graduate out. Sometimes they’ll take a break and take a year off or take a season off or whatever, if they feel like they have enough clothes or, you know, they’re in a good place right now, and they don’t need as much guidance or advice, but then they can jump back in at any time. So that’s why I decided I did want to offer the option that people can sign up on a seasonal basis instead of just getting locked in for the full year.
AL (22:51):
So again, I think that a lot of this has to do with involving the customer in the process, but also building the community around the program. We have an extremely active community. Our Facebook group has hundreds of posts per day. It’s a little bit overwhelming sometimes for the members, but it’s really a space for women into explore style where they feel supported. They don’t feel like they’re intimidated by anything. There are a lot of women in there on this journey that have never felt stylish in their lives that have never just gotten a compliment from a stranger on an outfit that are experiencing this for the first time, or that have a particular body shape. And they’re able to come into the group with thousands of other members and say, I’m struggling to find, you know, a pair of HighEd jeans, that’s flattering for my body type.
AL (23:34):
What are you finding? And, and then there’s tons of immediate feedback that’s coming in through that group. Or they snap selfies in the fitting room and say, which one would you choose this one or this one? And they’re getting that immediate response from people in the community. We’ve had women from Germany and Finland that have flown to the us, like we’ve built up this huge community. They have girls nights out in certain cities around the us. And, and it’s about so much more than the clothes it’s about really just supporting one another and the beauty of female friendships and support and the way that it can be done in the right way. We see so much, you know, so much negativity online and it’s just a space that is so opposite of that. That is truly special, especially in this day and age. And I think that that’s really the secret sauce, something that I never expected to happen. Did you create
RV (24:23):
That on purpose or did that, like, did, did, did it happen just sort of organically or like, how did that happen?
AL (24:30):
I think, you know, I was really intentional about this from day one. I wanted it to be a place where it was kind of a mean girls free zone, where women were giving their opinions, but delivering them with love where honesty was appreciated, but in a way that, you know, it wasn’t critical or hurt anybody’s feelings. And it was really about setting the tone. You know, I was very involved in the Facebook group early on and was in there, you know, trying to get people to engage in setting the tone in so many different ways of this is how we treat each other. This is how we’re kind of supportive to one another. And then it just took off on its own. And kindness spreads just as quickly as negativity does. And we really, in the past, you know, however many years of doing this, I can count on one hand the amount of members that we’ve even had to go to and say, Hey, we can’t, you can’t say that, or that’s not appropriate for this group or whatever, like moderation in this group of thousands of women is not a big deal simply because we do set that tone.
AL (25:29):
And we do have them agree to guidelines for behavior in the group. And I think we just kind of attract that more of that coming in, that when people get in that group and they’re like, oh, wait, this operates differently. This is either a good fit for me or this isn’t a good fit for me, then they stay or they leave and that’s, that’s perfectly fine
RV (25:46):
Is the only, the only the active members are in the, in the Facebook group.
AL (25:51):
Yes. So we start a new Facebook group every season, which is another reason why we feed them into this new group and everybody wants to be in that group with their friends. So I think that this is another key to success for the program is, is closing down the previous seasons group and then starting fresh and new each time we launch a program.
RV (26:09):
Interesting, fascinating. Is there anything that you’ve learned about a membership that like now that you’ve been doing this, you know, cuz cuz you know, like at brand builders group, you know how we talk about the, the paids P I D S and the five ways to make money and there’s, there are information pro is one of ’em and inside of that eye is there’s video courses, assessments, certification programs, membership sites. And I feel like membership sites were really hot for a while. People got to, they, they caught a taste of wow, recurring revenue is a really amazing thing and the community like you’re talking about. But you know, then sometimes it’s like back to the video course because it’s like, well, if I could sell a video course for $500 versus offered as a membership site for 40 bucks a month and they only stay for four months, then I’m not, you I’m losing money. Like what have you learned about membership sites and making them successful that you kind of go, if you’re thinking about starting a membership site, now this is what you should know. Or like, this is what I didn’t know then that I do now.
AL (27:18):
Yeah. So I think, you know, one of the keys to this is really creating something that’s sticky me, meaning you keep them coming back for more. Right. So with a seasonal program, you’re automatically, you’ve got that stickiness built in that keeps them coming back because there are new trends. Every season, there are new ways to wear things, you know, where our wardrobes change seasonally. So that is sort of built into my program and, you know, back early on when I was evaluating this, do I wanna evergreen programs to where I’m just selling people into figuring out, you know, your closet staples or building your wardrobe, or do I wanna do something that I’m going to be launching four times a year because it is a lot, it is a lot of work. It’s a lot for me, it’s a lot for my team. I’ve kept coming back to the stickiness of doing the seasonal model.
AL (28:02):
So if you have something where you can keep people coming back, then absolutely. You’re not, you know, I do have to keep the funnel full. I do have to do all the lead gen. I have to do things between our launches, but I think that this worked out really, really well. You know, stickiness works out well for a membership type model. You also have to generate a little bit of scarcity and that’s sometimes difficult to do when you are working in a membership model. Like how do you create scarcity of something that, you know, people have the opportunity to pay for on a monthly basis? And so I had to look at ways that we could build that into. So, you know, some of the things that I do is we release our shopping list, you know, on the day that it opens to the public, our annual members get the shopping list early.
AL (28:45):
What happens is that we sell out the pieces on that list at almost all of the retailers on there. So say we put a sweater on there from Nordstrom within 24 hours, that sweater usually sells out if that’s the pictured item and the capsule, most of the women want that. So there’s that scarcity there of, I’ve got a sign up early. I wanna get my shopping list to you as possible, cuz I don’t want the pieces on this list to sell out. I wanna be the first one in line. So really just kind of getting creative with ways that we could create a little bit of scarcity with that, especially in something that if you’re not closing cart and you’re keeping it open, which I do, we allow people to sign up throughout the entire season. We eventually discount the seasonal program toward the end.
AL (29:27):
But you know, really just kind of thinking through ways that we can create that little bit of FOMO for, for our customer base has been important. And then again, you know, I always go back to the surveys and the feedback and you know, collecting that information. If you have an audience now, if you have followers, if you’re, if you are out there anywhere on social media or you’re blogging or, or doing whatever, you’d be amazed at how much you, how much you can get from that feedback. If you’re thinking about launching a membership model, you know, it’s great for passive income and a lot of ways, if there’s something that you teach or a course that you do, that you could put into that you can do in a video series or something that you can make sticky or release new content on a regular basis. That’s really what it’s all about. Like how often are you willing to release new content, then you might wanna look at a membership model
RV (30:21):
Mm-Hmm and, and one of the other things that I I, I love about you is you, you are, you invest into yourself a ton, like obviously I met you at Lewis’s mastermind and then through brand builders and everything, like how important has that been along the way? Like, have you always done that? I mean, here you go from starting this kind of random blog about stuff that you not random, but like, it was just kind of like a project, like a hobby. It was like a hobby about, Hey, I’m I’m, I should be dressing up. I don’t have a reason to dress up. And then it turns into like an accountability system for yourself. And then it turns into, you know, this business and then it turns into this whole community and this whole movement that you have now. And so you have really become, I mean, a true powerhouse entrepreneur, like have you always done a lot of personal development and business development or really just in recent years or like it’s, how important has that been in your journey?
AL (31:26):
Honestly, it’s been the thing that’s moved the needle more than anything else, you know, just really continually investing in myself. My, my second year of doing this, I joined my first mastermind, which was on course development. And that’s when I learned about that technology, you know, that I would need for this membership. I, I didn’t know what I was doing and I wanted to get involved in something that would shortcut that process for me. So that was really my first experience in a mastermind. And I’ve enrolled in something every single year since then. And honestly like whenever I feel stuck, that’s when I know I need personal development. I need to be investing in myself. I need to get involved in something and just being a member of brand builders, you know, I’ve, I shared this not too long ago with a friend of mine.
AL (32:08):
I feel almost like everything that I learn in brand builders. It’s about a six month lead time until I’m applying it in my business in some way. Like, I feel like I’m already equipped and I have that knowledge. And even though at the moment, maybe I’m not implementing it immediately, but I’ll be go through the trainings and I’ll, I’ll learn something that’s just completely eye opening in six months down the road, low and behold, I’m implementing it. And just the 15 PS last year in our annual memberships for the first time ever, we had cold leads that had no idea what the program was that were signing up immediately without knowing much about outfit formulas at all. Because we used the 15 piece to do our annual membership sales page, my team, and I sat down and we hammered it out and it was so incredibly effective that we suddenly had a problem we hadn’t prepared for before. And that was when cold leads come in and they don’t really truly understand the program and the education process that we needed to do on the backend of that, cuz they didn’t have that nurture that was happening, that other people were having. So I just am totally a proponent for investing in yourself and continuing entrepreneurship is really a personal development journey, honestly. Like that’s what it is. And that’s what I’ve learned more than anything. And honestly it’s what I enjoy more than anything too.
RV (33:25):
I love that. That’s so cool. Yeah. You know I know Hillary is your strategy. She mentioned that to me about the 15 piece, but I had forgotten about I had totally forgotten about that that I copywriting for those of you just listening, it’s we’re using that we’re using, we’re using jargon 15 pieces, our little like copywriting formula. Well I, I think so one of the things that happened was to that point, you went through our bestseller launch plan. So I re I very much remember like, okay, like here comes Allison through through best on our launch plan. And then you did it like you did this launch and you hit number one on Amazon. Like, so tell us about the book and the book launch and like what worked for you there since it’s just like fresh. I think, you know, for, for that piece of it specifically so if those of you, if you miss said early on, we said, it’s the ultimate book of outfit formulas, the ultimate book of outfit formulas. So get your pretty on is the membership community and, and the kind of like brand, but the ultimate book of outfit formulas was the book. So can you take, tell us about like the launch and like what did, what happened? What did you learn? How did it go? Like what worked, what didn’t work?
AL (34:42):
Honestly, Roy, I just followed every single step of be seller launch plan. And I think, I , I don’t know if it was you or Hillary, but somebody, I, I remember texting and saying it worked like it worked, we hit number one, like immediately we hit, we were instantly number one and in a competitive category, it was in fashion design on Amazon. So honestly the, just implementing every single bit of that strategy and planning at least six months in advance and looking at, okay, what’s the timeline for this launch. If you wait until the very end, you’re not gonna get everything done and it’s gonna be extremely difficult to have everything in place that you need to for the pre-orders and, and getting those pre-order bonuses in place. And all of the, everything that I learned in bestseller launch plan my team and I were able to take that, put it into an Asana project, assign things out as we needed to.
AL (35:32):
I brought on somebody who handled my street team for me, which was a huge weight off my shoulders and it just worked. It, it, it was, it was amazing. I mean, I was not entirely surprised that everything just came together the way that it did, but, you know, just taking those strategies. And I, I think that instantly what we wanna do is push it for our audience first and that’s not necessarily the best thing to do. So I learned like that there is a particular order that we need to do this in and following all of those steps was really key to it hitting that, that bestseller status. And that’s something that we’re always gonna have. So yeah, I’m, I’m really pleased with the way that this book launch went. It was traditionally published book. So I learned a ton this time around that I’m gonna take into, you know, I’m almost done with my second manuscript and I’m already, you know, I’ve got pages of debrief notes and I’m ready to go. I’m I just feel like it’s gonna be even that much more successful this time around.
RV (36:32):
I love that. And you’ve got the, the, you’ve got an asada project already built for it. Like you, yes. Run this
AL (36:39):
Rinse and repeat right. Make it easy, work smarter, not harder.
RV (36:44):
I, I, I love, I, I love this so much. Alison, like you mentioned the your street launch team. Yeah. So this is one of the things that we talk about, you know, a lot of people do this. It’s, it’s basically getting a team of why didn’t you tell us, so what is a street launch team? And then what did you have, how did you find those people? And then what did you have them do?
AL (37:09):
So a street launch team is essentially the people on the street, the word of mouth that are out there sharing about your book, but they’re doing this in a very coordinated and organized way. So you’re providing them with the graph ethics, with the quotes, with all of the assets, to be able to easily share on social media and to talk about your book and generate buzz about it so that when the time comes and, and you’re, I’m sure that anybody who’s kind of observed a launch from the outside has seen all of these big influencers doing this, where it seems like, oh my gosh, everybody’s talking about this book right now. Like what’s going on? Like, I’m excited. I wanna know about this book, right? So this is what your street team is doing for you. They’re creating that buzz in a way. That’s not necessarily these huge influencers that are doing this for you.
AL (37:49):
So so that’s exactly what it is. And I hired somebody to come in and do that for me, who managed my street team for me, who, you know, we had a Facebook group or we were doing contests and having them, you know, submit their, their reviews. I mean, they got early access to the book. They got, you know, a digital preprint of it. So they were able to read the book and really give honest reviews on multiple outlets for it. So it really just creates all of that prework before the book even comes out so that when it does launch, people are able to read reviews on good reads and target and Amazon and all the places and see what this book is all about in the words of people who have actually read it. So I highly recommend it. And if you’re able to have somebody else handle that for you, it takes a lot off the shoulders of the author because you are gonna be involved in so many other things. I did a podcast tour leading up to my launch as well. And that was, you know, that was taking so much of my bandwidth, that I was just really happy that I could turn this over to someone else to handle.
RV (38:52):
I love it. I mean, just so cool. I mean, you execute all this stuff. I mean, you, you execute and that’s what it’s like. So much of it is simple. I mean, people don’t realize it’s like on the one hand, it’s really freaking hard. On the other hand, it’s a pretty straight line. It’s like, okay, you have a lead magnet, you give somebody something of value, add ’em to your email list, give them value every week. You, you know, let ’em know something’s available, have a, have a sales page with the 15, P’s have, have a few bonuses on there. Like, and I just, I just, I love this story so much and it makes me so happy to, to, to see when people like you are, are winning Allison. And if y’all, you know, check out the book, so it’s the ultimate book fit formulas and you know, get your pretty on, obviously is the community and everything. So Alice, Allison, where do you want people to go to learn about you or stay, stay plugged in connected to what you’re doing?
AL (39:49):
Yes, definitely. So you can check me out at Allison Loba on Instagram. If you wanna see all the personal life stuff, my horses in my little mini farm, I live on or you can go to alpha formulas.com if you’re interested in learning more about the program.
RV (40:03):
So cool. We’ll put a link to that in the show notes, as they say. And Allison, thank you for being here. Thank you for just sharing your story. It’s such a great journey. It’s it’s just beautiful, I think, to, to see where it’s gone and you’re just your heart for serving people and helping people with something that you once struggled with. I mean, it, it, it just captures the essence of, you know, we, how we always are talking about your most powerfully positioned to serve the person you once were. Yes. And that’s what you start doing. And then you go, how can I serve my audience in a deeper way? How can I add more value? How can I make this easier? How can I make it easier for them to buy and and then just continue investing in yourself and just, I mean, we feel so lucky to know you and just be your friend and just excited and honored to like see you winning and knowing that you’re like, just getting started. I mean, I it’s, it’s hard to imagine where way you’re gonna be in five or 10 years. So thank you for, for all of this and we wish you all the best. Thank
AL (41:04):
You, Roy. I totally appreciate the influence that you’ve had on my business and, and personal life. I appreciate it.