How to Go Viral & Reach Millions With Your Message + The Power of Story, How to Make Your Marketing Clicky & Sticky With MIT-Educated Physicist, Joseph Romm + 7 Clay Clark Client Success Stories

Audio Transcription

Transcribed with Cockatoo

I want to dedicate today’s show to my good friend, Yon. And I want to remind him that he looks like he smells terrific. And he sounds like he looks tremendous. Yon, this show’s for you. This week on The Thrive Time Show, this Sunday at 9 AM, this Sunday on The Thrive Time Show, we’re going to teach you how to go viral and how to reach millions with your message. Yes, we’re joined by an MIT physicist.

by the name of Joseph Rahm, who’s breaking, he’s broken it down to a science, folks. He’s going to teach you how to go viral and how to reach millions with your message this Sunday at 9 a . m. right here on K .

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And if we have time, I’m going to teach you how to pet your cat backwards. The multimillion dollar businesses, eight kids get ready to enter the Thrive Time show. Welcome back to the conversation. And Dr. Dr. Zoner, today, I am very excited about our guest because we have a guy on the show. Typically, every guest we have is significantly smarter than I am.

But this guy is a legendary MIT graduate who really knows what he’s talking about. Joe, welcome onto the show. How are you, sir?

I am really excited to be here. Thank you so much for having me. Well, we’re going to try to keep today’s show fair and balanced, and we’ll kind of keep it politically right in the middle here. Although if people Google your name, they’re going to find that you are involved in quite a bit of topical politics. And we’re here to have you on the show today to talk about how to go viral and how to reach millions, your new book. My friend, you’ve been blogging for 12 years.

There’s a lot of people out there who have been blogging for 12 years or two years or one year. How do you go about it? If somebody is out there listening, they’re a business owner.

How do they go about making their blog or their content stand out in such a cluttered, as you put it, a Niagara Falls of noise coming from social media? How do our listeners go about making their social media posts stand out? I think the main, my main point is that there are a series of strategies that do work to make your content much more likely to go viral. And I talk about the, you know, the bottom line goal is, look, I think anybody can see that there is a Niagara fall of noise. There’s just a constant volume of content, free content that’s everyone is bombarded with, whether it’s business or politics or or the Kardashians. You know, it’s it’s nonstop.

And so it has gotten considerably harder to break through. And that’s why, you know, and I’ve been fortunate after 12 years of blogging, you really get to learn. You get a lot of feedback on what works and what doesn’t work. you know, I see which headlines work, which gets most Facebook likes, which gets page views, which gets how much time on the page. You know, I have a lot of data at my fingertips now, given the state of the art in, you know, apps and software packages. So, you know, as someone with scientific training, but who’s also a writer, I have tried to merge the two

together. That’s sort of what I talk about in How to Go Viral and Reach Millions. The central thing we’re trying to do to break through is to be clicky and sticky, to use the modern parlance. Clicky, meaning I need to grab your attention. your attention. You have a million things that could potentially distract you.

So I have to grab it. But then it’s not enough just for me to grab your attention. I have to hold on to it and be memorable. So I want to get you to click on my post or click on my Facebook page or or or if it’s a email you know I want you to open the email click open the email and then I want you to stick around stick around long enough to read the content and and ideally at the very least, remember it if I’m trying to sell something. I’d obviously love you to buy it, but oftentimes I’m just trying to brand or get a message out. The goal is, how do I grab your attention?

How do I keep your attention? And there is now a lot of data and a lot of social science and marketing science on what works best. Now, what I would like to do is I’d like to have a very linear dialogue with you. And you feel free to make it nonlinear because you’re the MIT graduate and you’re in charge here. I’m just going to go kind of step by step. And, Chip, I love the strategy.

I’m a very, you know this, I’m very systems -based. based, I love strategic step -by -step. So we’re going to go into email subject lines, okay? When you write an email subject line, so many people see, I’m sure you’ve had this, someone sends you a wall of text and a subject line that is not interesting.

So Joe, if you are trying to get the attention of somebody, if our listeners are trying to get the attention of somebody in an email, I’d like to tap into your wisdom about how to write a headline

in the email subject line that’s going to be clicky and sticky. How do we do it? Absolutely. No, that is absolutely the central thing. And by the way, it is true. If you’re doing a Facebook post, that first line, a tweet, the first few words, a blog post, again, the first line or, you know, a regular print ad or any other kind of ad.

And, you know, there’s in the book, I have a whole chapter on headlines.

And I quote David Ogilvie, you know, some. Yeah, the advertising guru. The advertising guru, some people consider him the father of advertising, he wrote, and this is back in 1963, on the average, five times as many people read the headline as the body copy, and a change of headline can make a difference of 10 to 1 in sales. So yes, the headline, and by that I’m saying you should be spending a lot more time writing your headlines or the subject line of the e -mail. The chances and you know from your own how much e -mail you get right and how much do you delete instantly instantly instantly. So you know the open rate on an e -mail might be 1 percent 2 percent.

You know, if people are really good at it, three or four percent. Now, if it’s your friend, you know, it’s it’s a higher probability. But we’re talking about emails that are either trying to get you business or maybe you’re sending a cold email to a prospect. So you have to grab their attention. And so you have to, first of all, be very clear and blunt right up front. You don’t have time to mess around.

I can just tell you from my experience, I get to see in real time, because we actually test our headlines, that the first few words make a big deal of difference. The way you should approach this, all writing, everything you’re doing online, but even public speaking, is I have to get someone interested in the first few words, and then I have to keep them interested in the next few words, and next, and next, and next. Now, if I wanna draw them in, right, I wanna give them the impression that I’ve got something of value to say to them. and that it’s going to be interesting. That’s the other thing, that I’m a person who can deliver on the headline, because we all have the bad experience of clicking on a link, thinking we’re going to get something interesting, and then it turns out that it was all hype.

It’s just clickbait.

It’s garbage.

Oh, I hate that.

Hey, Joe, this is Dr. Z. Do you prefer Joe or Joseph?

I think Joe is great.

Joe is great. Okay, good. When you, give me some examples, because we love the examples. I mean, you know, in theory you say, hey, you’ve got to write something that really grabs them.

I mean, that’s cool, but give me like one that you tested in real time and you saw that really grabbed it.

Give me some, one or two success stories of headlines that you wrote or you helped write.

We just want a teaser.

We know your book is going to be filled with these things. Give us a little something. Here’s an idea that I often give people. If I’m writing you to remind you about a lunch, don’t just reply to whatever the was original hello memo, you know, put, you know, lunch tomorrow at at 1230 because they may only look. I mean, let’s assume that the only piece of so one lesson to be learned is there’s a very good chance the only thing they’re going to see is the email. headline okay so if you’re trying to communicate a piece of information let’s use that piece of information

If it’s someone you know moderately well, and maybe you’ve, you know, someone you’re trying to do a sale to or something, you’re sending them an email reminder. Don’t bury the lead. That’s, you know, the first, what is the single most important thing that you are trying to communicate? So my father was a newspaper editor for 30 years.

So I sort of heard over and over again, don’t bury the lead.

Don’t bury the single most important thing, thinking you have to build up to it, because nobody’s reading that long anymore.

Good work. You know what I’m going to do? I’m going to do this. And Joe, I’m going to kind of put my foot into the water of politics, and not political show. And then you can just kind of slap me, because you are the MIT graduate. So here we go.

You are a guy who is schooled, you’re a physicist, you’re an author, you’re a blogger, and there are a lot of physicists, authors, and bloggers out there, frankly, there’s a lot of them. The difference between you and them is that you were named by Rolling Stone in 2009 as one of the 100 people who are changing America. Now whether I agree with you about politics or not, or our listeners do, the point is people know your name and they know what you’re working on. You’ve been able to draw attention. to some of the things that you’re working on. Specifically, you have a new project.

You’re not new, but it’s newer.

It’s 2014, so the last four or five years.

Years of Living Dangerously, which is a feature, I believe you can see it on Showtime, if I’m correct.

Showtime. It was originally Showtime. Now it’s National Geographic and Facebook, which is we really transitioned to focusing on online of viral videos. time, and then you can get it on Facebook, you can get it on YouTube, you can get it on Showtime, you can get it on National Geographic. So I guess the non -political thing is you are an expert of climate change, but there’s a lot of guys at the local coffee shops who think they’re an expert on climate change. So you’ve been able to stand out as a result of being able to write good headlines, but then you back it with research.

So let’s get into this headline thing. If you’re going to write a headline for your blog, how is that maybe different from writing a headline of an email or a subject of an email? The subject is the headline of the email. When you write a headline of a blog, how is it different from the subject of an email?

And then talk to me about the importance of backing what you’re saying with research. Because when someone does get to the body of it, it can’t just be hoo -ha. Right. Well, look, I I think of all of them the same. In other words, if it’s important, I’m going to spend a lot of time on the headline and to flesh out a little what I’m saying. You know, I’m trying to stimulate an emotion because that’s what makes things that’s one of the things that makes things go viral.

Right. We’re not we’re not we are creatures who like stories. And we like stories that have compelling characters that stir emotions. Fundamentally, those were the first things that went viral. Those were the great stories, the epic poems by the Bards, Iliad, the Odyssey, the stories in the Bible. These are stories that we come to care about and emotionally connect with.

And ultimately, the goal. So in the headline, if I’m really trying to write a good headline, I want to promise the reader something that is going to be emotionally compelling to them and suggesting to them that what they’re gonna read is an interesting story, not just filled with numbers and facts. And you’re hearing this from a guy with a PhD in physics, but it has taken me 10 years to unlearn what I learned. And I try to make this point wherever I go. And it’s one of the reasons I’m able to understand it, because I had to physically…

This, the higher educational system, this country does not teach people how to communicate effectively. It is, they are teaching based on this model that people are persuaded by facts and numbers and charts and PowerPoints with bullets.

And that’s not true. People have always been persuaded and connected to stories and emotions and the memorable compelling phrases that make up stories, which are called the figures of speech, things like irony and hyperbole and metaphor, as well as repetition and rhyme and puns. So as an example, I want to just tee this up real quick. I’m going to give Mr. Joe here the floor, and I’d like to get a good dialogue going here between you and Joe, because this is good, because Dr. Zellner is an optometrist. There are so many optometrists that will run ads talking about, do you want your cornea? to be healthier?

Do you want your, and they’ll talk about, people go, what’s a cornea? The pupil, do you want your pupil to be, do you want to help your, and people say, I don’t know what that means. And then Dr. Z says, Dr. Robert Zellner and Associates, he’s the leading optometrist in Oklahoma, we’re gonna see you do an exam and your first pair of glasses for $99. That’s the headline. But yet, when you get into your optometry clinic, Z, there’s a lot more to it, there’s a lot more value they offer, there’s a lot more obviously, prescriptions.

There’s tests. It’s more specific than that. But what gets them in is the headline. So for you, Joe, as a climate change expert, give us the headline. If you had to say in like two sentences or less, what’s the headline on your worldview about climate change? I want to get your headline.

If you had to break out of the clutter and you’re going, hey, hey, hey, everybody out there listening, what is your headline or your thesis or what are you trying to tell the tell the world. And as it is you know what’s what’s your headline. The headline is climate change is real. It’s happening now. It’s caused by us. But it’s a solvable problem if we act quickly.

Otherwise it’s the kinds of super storms, super droughts, the Hurricane Harvey, down in your neck of the woods, the kind of deluge, once -in -10 ,000 -year deluge that we’re just remembering the one -year anniversary of hitting Houston, Hurricane Harvey.

These things are becoming more more common. But when I watched your film, Years of Living Dangerously, that you advised on the Emmy award -winning film there that featured Don Cheadle, Harrison Ford, James Cameron was involved, Arnold Schwarzenegger, the film wasn’t just you standing in front of a whiteboard spitting off facts.

No, not at all. I don’t think I make an appearance at all. I was the science advisor, and my job was to help make sure they keep the facts accurate. So why doesn’t that work? Why can’t you just sit there in front of a screen and spit off facts, even though you know that you have done the research behind your facts? And whether some of our listeners or I agree with you or not, you’ve done the research, but why can’t you just hop in front of a blackboard and just bring it?

Why do you have to bring on some celebrities and bring on some Why do you have to do that? Well, there’s no short answer. Let me give you the medium answer to that. Sure. Fundamentally, our brain is the most energy -consuming, you know, part of our body.

It’s like 25 % of our metabolism. And we developed over thousands and tens of thousands of years all these shortcuts so we don’t have to spend a lot of time thinking. in situations like if you and your tribe are out there in the jungle and you got separated from them and all of a sudden you hear some strange noises and everyone in the tribe is running in the opposite direction. Right, so what do you do? Do you stop and analyze the facts? Can I figure out if that noise is getting louder or not?

Is it a dangerous animal or not? Or do I just do what everyone else is doing? So the main shortcuts that people are using to figure out if they believe you or not is, are you in my tribe? Are you one of me, one of us? And number two, do your emotions match your words? truthfully.

And that was the great insight, really, that the Greeks had when they codified rhetoric. And so it turns out that if you can do those two things, you will be persuasive, you will make a sale. That’s why they say to salesmen, the first thing you have to do is sell yourself. If you can convince the customer you are trustworthy and on their side, then they’re going to listen to you. But that’s the first thing. If I just throw a bunch of numbers at you, you know, I quote in the book Dan Kahneman, who won the Nobel

Prize for helping create behavioral economics. He’s the first psychologist ever to do it. He basically told the economic community, hey, people don’t act rationally. And he wrote the book Thinking Fast and Slow, and he just talks about You know, in some situations you have the time to do a lot of deliberate thinking, but most of us have this thing called intuition, our fast thinking process, which is really a pattern matching process. Do I recognize this situation on the basis of something I was in before or someone told me about before? And fundamentally, those shortcuts are the things everybody uses to make decisions.

So look, if I give, I don’t, I don’t even give talks on detailed science talks on the science of climate change anymore because no one in the audience is in a position to adjudicate the science. I try to speak where they are, you know, and, and, and let me give you just a broader example of the, of the change that, that, that smart business people are making. So Jeff Bezos, uh, richest guy, in the world, his company just became the second to hit a trillion dollars in market cap. In his 2018 letter to his shareholders, he says, I just banned PowerPoints at Amazon. In business meetings, no one comes with PowerPoints because that’s not how people learn. It’s not how they retain information with a bunch of bullets.

He switched over to what? narrative memos, you write up a story, because the literature, I mean, it’s just endless amounts of social science that we spent thousands and tens of thousands of years telling stories to each other. And that’s how our brains developed. And so the job one is to package yourself into a story. You know, what is your story?

What is the story of your product?

And how is it connected to a problem the person you’re talking to wants to solve?

And what I’ve tried to do in How to Go Viral and Reach Millions is talk about both the ancient art of storytelling and the modern science of storytelling.

Z, he just gave some knowledge bombs, I’m just trying to sort them out here.

Exploding right now.

It’s powerful. I know and I love your, when you research, when you Google, the thing called the, could be Goggle, I don’t know, could be, apparently it’s a thing. Google, it’s a new thing. It’s how to go viral and reach millions. Top persuasion secrets from social media superstars.

Jesus, Shakespeare, Oprah, and even Donald Trump.

I mean, you’ve either offended everybody in the world, or you’ve turned on everybody in the world with that line, right? That’s awesome, by the way. That’s a good headline. I’ve got kind of a two -part question for you. And you may not know the answers, but I’m hoping you do, because you seem like a really smart guy. So it’s not like an answer challenge, but you know.

Why do you think, number one, why do you think people out there don’t believe your narrative of global warming. That’s the first part. And then the second part is for those who do believe it, the average dude on the street, what can you do about it? Well, I think it’s a great question. I actually just did a post today.

I spent a lot of time talking to people.

Obviously, that question, one of the reasons I became a blogger This is a true story because I was doing clean energy. I had worked at the U . S. Department of Energy, and I worked with the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy. I worked with some of the people who did that. research that led to natural gas fracking.

Texas people actually. Bill White for mayor of Houston. And. I switched from clean energy, how I was doing clean energy consulting. I was consulting with companies like IBM and Johnson & Johnson on how to use renewable energy, how to cut your energy bill, that sort of thing, how to reduce your pollution. And then my brother lost his home in Hurricane Katrina.

He was working at the VA hospital in Biloxi as the head of rehab medicine. And he asked me if he should rebuild his home, because losing your home is a big deal, as I’m sure you know, and you don’t want to do it again. And I started researching the science and talking to scientists and going to lectures. And I realized two things, one of which was the situation was more troublesome than people realize. But secondly, scientists were doing a lousy job of communicating. And so I really have tried to devote the last 12 years to understand what doesn’t work about communications the way scientists traditionally do it.

you know, and what does work. So, you know, the the the shortest possible answer to your question of why large numbers of people don’t believe it is because this issue has shifted from being a science based issue to being a political tribe issue. And it is it is people establish their identity now through politics, right? We don’t have to get into a politics discussion, but I think you know what I’m saying. And once you sign up and you say, I’m with this party, or I’m with this person, or I’m with that party, or I’m with that person, you then buy into their slate of beliefs and you don’t do a lot of your own investigation. And that is why in the show, Years of Living Dangerously, and online at the website, we have switched over to just doing these stories, short form stories or the long form stories.

We did win the Emmy for Outstanding Nonfiction Series in 2014. The guys, the executive producers are James Cameron and Arnold Schwarzenegger. And the line producers were these two former 60 Minutes producers who have 13 Emmys between them. And I’ve learned a lot from them because they know how to do a certain kind of storytelling. And it’s got to be built around interesting people and be emotionally compelling and tell stories along a certain pathway. And that’s one of the things I really want to communicate to your audience because the chapter in the book that has gone the most viral, that the most people have responded to and said, boy, this has really changed the way that I look at writing and writing speeches, is this rule of replacing, this way of a simple strategy for turning any a written item or any speech into something that operates the way an emotionally compelling story does.

And so I’d love to just spend like, you know, literally just a minute and explain that because it is really, it is the simplest thing. But like I said, for instance, I bought my book on Kindle so I could see which are the most marked up passages. And I can tell you all of the most marked up passages in this book are in chapter two. And it’s really quite simple. Literally all that you need to do is to go through, it’s called the rule of replacement. and you just take something you’ve written or a speech that you’ve written out and circle all the word all every use of the word and got it and you’re now going to replace them as often as possible with the word but or equivalent like yet because you’re trying to introduce the kind of conflict and narrative tension we expect in our best stories.

And then you’re gonna replace and with therefore or equivalence like so to introduce the resolution of that conflict and tension. And what you’re trying to do is instead of having a just this happened and this happened and this happened and this happened, which is the height of uninteresting, The story, the basic storyline is, you know, this happened and this happened, but then this happened, and so I was forced to do this. And this is the arc, the setup of all of the great stories. This was invented by Trey Parker, who did the Book of Mormon, you know, monster Broadway hit, and South Park, multi -enemy winning storylines. But I’ve gone through I just looked, for instance, at the most viral speech in all of human history, which is probably the Sermon on the Mount. Since there’s billions of Bibles out there and people have been going to church and hearing this over and over and over again for 2 ,000 years, that speech Again, it has a large number of buts and a large number of therefores, because what Jesus is doing in the Sermon on the Mount is He is describing the way people thought they were being taught, and then He’s saying,

but really, this is what you’re supposed to be doing. If you go through all the great speeches I reference in the book, Oprah’s, the first viral speech 2018, it may seem like a really long time ago, but Oprah’s speech at the Golden Globes, that you may remember people spoke, you know, that really called a lot of attention to her.

It again, it uses this and but therefore trick. And I talk about the Gettysburg Address and what Lincoln does. And fundamentally, Literally, it may seem incredibly simple, but all of the great speeches throughout human history have used this basic formula. All of your titles, all the chapter titles in your book are all going to get people’s attention. I mean, how to be a big winner like Trump without being a big loser like Trump.

How to Tell a Viral Story, Word of Mouth from Jesus to Lincoln to Oprah, Short Words Win, Short Words Sell, Repeat, Repeat, Repeat, Only Memorable Memes Go Viral. I mean, you really, you are the master of headline writing, and you talk a lot about these five rules for going viral online. Can you share a couple of those rules for going viral online? Sure, and what I just, the first rule is, you have to put things in a story form and persuade people that what they’re going to get is an interesting story. Because that’s, you know, I have an 11 -year -old daughter. So for the first 11 years of her life, it’s just story, story, story.

Please tell me another story. Please tell me another story. Can you read that story again? Can I watch the first movie of Harry Potter 30 times in a row? um stories are are we are the story craving animal really and so ruling is you have to tell the emotionally compelling story and use this and but therefore rule of replacing.

Rule number two is to use the figures of speech. Now, you know, when we were in middle school maybe, you heard some figures of speech like metaphor or irony. It’s not really taught that much anymore. But what are the figures of speech? The figures of speech are literally just the memory tricks that were created by the great storytellers of ancient times so that they could memorize a two hour long epic poem and that people could remember them. And it got codified by the ancient Greeks.

And I’ll just tell you the fascinating, you know, 60 second story of why rhetoric was codified by the ancient Greeks and then by the Romans was the Greeks switched from trial by magistrate to trial by jury. And in front of a magistrate, you’d be arguing the law. But these juries were 500 people or more. It was majority vote, and it would decide your entire future. There’s no judge, no rules of evidence. Your accuser spoke for 30 minutes, and you spoke for 30 minutes.

You simply had to persuade a majority of the hundreds of people listening that you were more believable than your accuser. As a result, a group of people arose who would write those speeches for you if you had enough money. And if you didn’t, they would teach you some lessons or you could buy their book. And unsurprisingly, there were lots of books written about how you could be an emotionally compelling and believable speaker. And so that’s and they codified all of these things. And and so why do we use metaphors?

Metaphors are maybe the single most memorable figure speech, because I’m connecting something we know with something we don’t know. And that’s why it’s very common in advertising, you know, Chevy, like a rock, that sort of thing. And so all of these figures of speech, which we don’t teach much, but the modern advertising industry, we discovered, And in fact, most of the marketing literature makes is, you know, how do you write a compelling headline? How do you write a compelling ad? You use the figures of speech.

And literally 80 % of all advertising headlines uses one or more figures of speech, because those are the things that are going to stick in your mind. And it’s why you hear, you know, so much repetition. Repetition is the single most commonly used memory trick.

And if you have a small child, you know how effective simply repeating the same thing over and over can be.

And we see politicians who are good at repetition and politicians who are not so good at repetition.

And I don’t think it’s a surprise that the people who are good at repetition tend to do better.

Now, I don’t want to steal your thunder from the book.

Back to you, back to you. Well, I had a second part to my question. A second part.

A second part, and it went something like this, if I can remember it, Joe.

What can the average person do?

Joe slash average. The proactive listener.

Yeah.

He’s out there listening, going, you know, I believe in climate change, and I don’t want the world to burn up, and I don’t want to die.

What are some steps, what are some just basic things that the average person can do to help with this phenomenon?

With climate change. Correct. Sure. Oxford University Press asked me to write their primer on climate change, what everyone needs to know. That book is also out there. And I think, you know, I tell people, you know, you should get informed because it’s going to, you know, I tell people that the impact of climate change and what we do about it is going to have as big an impact on the world in the next 25 years as the internet did in the last 25 years.

And if you were up to speed, if you were ahead of the curve 25 years ago on the internet and so, you know, the information technology revolution, you were in better shape in terms of your career or what your kids went to school in or choices that you made in the stock market. And the same is exactly true. We’re in the midst of this clean energy revolution. As I say, I was former Acting Assistant Secretary of Energy for Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, so I write a great deal about the clean energy revolution. Whether it is solar power or wind power, these things have come down in price literally by a factor of 100. over the past quarter century or so.

And if you hadn’t looked at it in recent years because you thought it was sort of expensive and clunky, right now there are solar power deals where companies will literally come to you and you don’t have to put any money down. They’ll do a leasing deal where they’re going to lease you the solar panels for less than your current electricity bill. So the entire world of financing has changed. And if you haven’t had an energy audit in your house, the LED lighting, which 10 years ago was just quite expensive and only used in unique situations, you could go into a Sam’s Club or any one of those stores or go on Amazon and you can buy an LED light. bulb for two or three bucks. And this is a light bulb that is basically going to last your lifetime.

And it is going to use so little energy that that it will pay for the extra cost. compared to an incandescent within a year or two. And so there’s been this whole revolution in clean energy. And I think and by the way if you have kids I’m sure they’re nagging you because the kids are you know way ahead of all of us in terms of the use of technology. So you know I think you know my advice always is is is get informed. And we can’t all be expert on everything.

And I don’t ever tell anyone you got to go out and be an expert on every subject. Obviously, you can try to find people that you trust and go by them or find a website that you trust, something like that, the way we do with a movie reviewer, right? I mean, we have a movie reviewer maybe we like.

I mean, obviously, now we go to Rotten Tomatoes. So, you know, I think people should understand it is a serious problem, but there are lots of solutions.

There are lots of things individuals can do. What’s the biggest area that contributes to global warming, in your opinion, in your scientific opinion? What, what’s the, who’s the… The principal cause of the recent global warming is burning fossil fuels. There’s simply, I mean, I don’t, in the scientific community, there’s not, there’s not, you know, any, any question of that. I mean, we’re talking about essentially all of the recent warming is due to the increase of carbon dioxide and some other heat trapping gases into the atmosphere.

That is what has changed. And

you know, I don’t, like I said, I understand I’m not going to be able to persuade everybody. And that’s, you know, I think people need to understand this, because like I said, it’s going to affect your lives and your family’s lives and where you want to live. You know, already we’re seeing, by the way, in on coastal property values, that places that are more prone to flooding are already seeing slower growth in property values than places that aren’t prone to flooding. So let’s just say out there, I’m listening and I say to myself, I’m going, you know what, I agree with your worldview, or someone said they don’t, but either way, they’re a blogger and they want their story to go viral.

My friend, you have, it appears as though you’ve developed super hacks or super moves or strategies for telling viral stories that are now used by Hollywood’s best screenwriters.

So regardless of what side of the political aisle somebody’s on a listener or what kind of worldview they have that seems to be a pretty awesome move to be able to take a worldview that you’ve studied and researched and to be able to tell a viral story that is now used by Hollywood’s best screenwriters.

I mean James Cameron we’re talking Arnold Schwarzenegger. How do you do that. Right. And so, you know, one of the points I want to make is, you know, in the book How to Go Viral and Reach Millions, that book is focused primarily on discussing these secrets. And I think that, and as you can see in the subtitle, Oprah and Donald Trump, they do many of the same things. Maybe you like one, don’t like the other, it doesn’t matter.

Clearly both of them know something about making content go viral, whatever else you think about that. And look, I tell, you know, I’m more on the progressive side. You know, I tell my progressive friends, you can’t, let’s learn from people who know how to do what they do. And if you think that they don’t, you’re not paying attention to what’s going on. So, you know, this, and by the way, Donald Trump, is a complete and total master of using this, using the word but, you know, to create attention and then offer his answer. And a friend of mine, another actually marine biologist who went to USC to study filmmaking, because he also was frustrated at how poorly scientists were communicating, he actually did this analysis.

You can analyze any speech, including one of your own speeches, where you take the text of the speech, and you count up the number of ands, and you count up the number of buts, and you divide the buts into the ands. You’re looking for a ratio, and then you can multiply it by 100, and that will give you a number between zero and 100. But the point is, the people who are really good at storytelling are using a lot of buts.

They’re using, like, For every four ands, they’re using the but.

Or for every three ands, they’re using the but.

The people who are not good at storytelling, they’re just using a lot of ands. I have a but question for you. I just want to say but right now, because I feel like I’m not a good speaker unless I say it. You are an MIT -trained physicist. You’re an author of 10 books.

You have advised a project that was put together by Schwarzenegger and James Cameron. But can you imitate but? Arnold Schwarzenegger? That’s a good butt question.

Come on, Joe.

You can do it.

You know you can, but you won’t. I’ll be back. Okay. Now, I want to ask you, when you were putting together – I will say, I’ve met Arnold a couple times as a result of this.

I’ve been able to go to some shoots where he was, and at the second Season premiere that was at the in New York City.

I was able to interview him.

I actually did the red carpet interviews of And Arnold Schwarzenegger Uh, you know, who else was there was Tom Brady and his wife.

Oh, come on now.

Tom Brady. Yeah, but he brings up Brady. This just did. I had to bring up Brady because, um, his wife, Giselle, is in the, is in, um, the, the, uh, uh, season two. she’s Brazilian and she actually goes to Brazil and and looks at sort of what’s going on with the rain forest, you know that we heard about you know 1520 years ago, but what’s going on what are they doing right what are they doing wrong and she came.

I have a photo someone snapped a photo of me with his L but in the background is Tom he was trying to you know he was totally cool.

He was like this is his wife’s moment. He was like being very low key as low key is as your time. I got a hot question for you.

I got a hot question.

On these shoots, are you shooting animals, or are you shooting… I mean, I’m sure it’s not like people.

No, no, no, no.

I’m sorry.

These are film shoots.

No, I don’t.

Oh!

Oh, okay.

He’s trying to practice that judgment there.

You’re the judge.

I don’t know. You’re out there. You got a gun. I’m thinking you got a… Yeah, no, these are… You know, and one of the things, by the way, I learned is that no matter how amazing and compelling the movie or whatever thing you’re watching is,

the filming of it was really boring right, you know it takes an hour of filming to get like 10 seconds of good footage and I used to go to the shoots because like I get to meet so -and -so you know, and I get to meet so -and -so and that was exciting, but now I’m sitting around and nothing’s happening most of the time. But that’s what you have to do that’s that’s not my job. To make something go viral, the point is, yeah, you have to do a lot of behind -the -scenes work in terms of thinking.

You can’t just do crap off the top of your head and think anyone’s going to be interested.

You know, now, as Joe’s talking, he kind of inserted a little bit of Tom Brady knowledge there. As we’re wrapping up, we’re only going to give him an extra four hours on this interview. Now, he’s mentioning Tom Brady here. But that’s fair. But that’s fair, right. So as we’re wrapping up our final three questions, I want to ask you, Joe, because you’ve spent so much time studying this, what makes a good storyteller?

And when you say the butt, I love the butt ratio.

That’s great. Yeah. So I guess maybe where do you see most people getting it wrong when they tell stories? Because I feel like as I used to travel all around the world doing speaking and Joe, because I was a former disc jockey, people would hire me to teach, you know, how to grow a company because I grew a entertainment company. Sure. And my job was to make, you know, boring events funny.

So that was kind of like my superpower was combining entertainment and education. But I would watch somebody speak before me or after me who is dramatically more educated more intelligent. And they just could not get anybody to pay attention. But they knew all the answers. So talk to us about where we’re getting it wrong as it relates to storytelling. Well I think you know that in higher education, the higher educational system does not teach storytelling.

In fact, it teaches anti -storytelling. I can tell you, I went through a PhD program in science, of course, you’re told, don’t talk about yourself, right? Remove the I, because this is all about, quote, unquote, objective facts. and therefore don’t talk about the troubles you had doing the experiment or why you’re passionate about the science or why you think this problem matters. But I’m quite well aware that it’s not just scientists who get this training.

I think this training occurs on the medical side. I think it’s even in the social sciences, whether economics or art history, this notion that we can reduce things to sort of this Fact. So I think that people have to unlearn that. And that’s, you know, like I said, it took me many years. If people just listen to me and try to do some of these things, it will make a difference. But you are going to have to very consciously catch yourself.

you know, I was fortunate to have a daughter. So, you know, there’s a story I tell at the beginning of the book where she says to me, I’m talking to her at the age of three, and she starts saying to me, blah, blah, blah.

And I’m like, well, you know, and I had this view because she picked up a lot of phrases.

Hey, she could use a phrase if she knew what it meant. So I said, you know, so, Anthony, do you know what blah, blah, blah means? And she pauses and said, It’s when daddy says something that doesn’t matter. So, okay, she got it. She did get it. What I was saying did not matter to her.

And it literally took me years to realize, you know, what I have to do is tell stories. Now, there’s a certain form of a story, talked a bit about that. There are certain phrases and words you want to use like metaphor and irony and repetition. And then of course, there is the most famous story the stories that comprise you know half of all movies which is the hero’s journey that I’m sure you know many people have heard that term that was the term Joseph Campbell studied all the great myths from the great storytellers and figured out that all the great hero stories fall a certain pattern and that book was read by George Lucas. And he created Star Wars Episode 4, 5, and 6 based on that heroic myth called the Monomyth.

And then Bill Moyers did a series of interviews of Joseph Campbell in which he talked about the hero’s journey. And I commend people to one or more of those. And that translated out and then there was this screenwriter who wrote a book called the screenwriters journey basically saying hey, this is the basic story and if you’re wondering why all the superhero stories and all the Disney movies and all the romantic comedies all these movies seem to have the same story arc that’s because this is the story that was the most viral story in human history passed down over thousands of years and and it has become embedded in our culture. And people do need to understand, and I talk about it a bit in the book, what is this hero’s journey? Sometimes it’s called the zero to hero story. You’re explaining why it is someone, at the end of the day, when I’m talking to you, I’m trying to convince you that you have a problem.

that I can solve, right? I mean, if I’m a salesperson, there’s some problem you have I can solve. And my story arc is how I went through this tough time hitting the same roadblock that you did and how I got through that point.

and attain the wisdom to solve this problem that you did. And this story, which is very, you know, it’s the same story, whether we’re talking Luke Skywalker or or or Spider -Man or Harry Potter or or Judy Garland and the Wizard of Oz. It’s always the same arc of the story. It’s always has the same components. And this story I can assure you when someone is getting up to speak and you’ve never met this person before and they’re introducing yourself to them, they are telling you some version of this story. Now, Joe, the final two questions I had for you, I’d like for you to just touch on the three activating emotions that trigger content sharing.

And I’d love it if you could recommend a book for all the listeners out there.

the three activating emotions that trigger the content. If you could just kind of touch on that. And then I’d like if you could recommend a book for all the entrepreneurs out there who are big readers. They like to just devour book recommendations from guys like you. So can you start by talking to us about the three activating emotions? Sure.

So when people study content that goes viral online, let’s say an easy analysis someone did is they looked at 7 ,000 New York Times articles. and see which ones made the most emailed list, right? Because those are the ones that people wanted to share with other people. And they found that what made stuff go viral was something that aroused people emotionally, but it was a certain type of emotions, what they called an activating emotion. So not surprisingly, outrage is something that motivates people to share. And I’m sure we all have plenty of emails text and emails of content that outrage someone.

Another one is anxiety, something that may someone worry, you know like you know those articles on the 3 foods you shouldn’t be eating. You know that sort of. And then the 3rd is the things that that create all you know the things that are like oh this cat can play the piano type of thing or this guy can kick a football.

through any hoop anywhere, if you’ve seen that.

And the fourth element, which I talk about separately, is humor, which is related to irony. We’re trying to show someone something that’s unexpected and therefore makes them laugh. These are the things that people are the most likely to share. And if your headline can sell them on the notion, or the subject line in your email, or your tweet can sell them on the notion that when they click through, or read the email or read the rest of the post, they’re going to get that emotion satisfied, and maybe they’re gonna like it so much, they’re gonna share it, and they’ll get a little social credit with their friends for sort of being, hey, I saw this viral thing that’s amusing or interesting or outrageous first, and I’m sharing it with you. And that’s what, we’re a social animal, and that’s what sharing is all about. So basically, a cat video, kicking a football through a hoop, offensively, but makes you laugh is a no, it’s just a slam dunk.

Right, and there’s a reason why cat videos, why cats are so viral. Cats are not as domesticated as dogs, right? They’re still half, you know, if you look at the history of dogs, they came to humans and, you know, we’ve been breeding them, you know, for tens of thousands of years. Cats are more recent.

They’re much more, hey, they’re coming to us for food or to kill rats and all that stuff.

But the point is, cats are much more unpredictable. much, much less socialized. And that’s why they seem to do things that are so unexpected compared to, you know, your domesticated dog. Not that dog videos aren’t cute. I’m not here to get emails. We’re gonna get a lot of dog lovers now.

And you know, look, to answer your book question, clearly, you know, I was frustrated that I didn’t see a put together in one place the ancient art and modern science of storytelling. And not only that, the reason I wrote How to Go Viral and Reach Millions is also because a lot of the books on communications aren’t actually very readable. And I’m glad you read the headlines, because I spent years figuring out how to, you know, when I write, I have a chapter on irony. but I put in a lot of irony and ironic humor, and I have a chapter on metaphors, and I quote, you know, Lincoln, a house divided against itself cannot stand. The point is the metaphor chapter has metaphors, and it also has modern stuff, you know, and I quote from Seinfeld, one of the most ironic of shows, and I quote from the Big Bang Theory, which again, another very, very heavily ironic show, and you know, I talk about Hamilton, Lin -Manuel Miranda’s masterpiece, which is, You know, I tell people people ask me, what is the single thing I can do to become better at storytelling? And I tell them, download the soundtrack to Hamilton and memorize it.

My daughter did that in three weeks. It was I had taken my mother to see Hamilton because I knew she would love it. I brought the soundtrack home. My nine year old daughter memorized it within three weeks was unbelievable. And then I talked to her friends and other kids.

So many kids out there memorize the score to Hamilton because it is truly a clicky and sticky thing. But it’s also a story told in the form closest to the way the ancient bards did. Coming into town, telling their two -hour epic poem. Either you give them food or a place to stay or money. or they’re a failure.

So needless to say, all of those stories, all those epic poems, they all have in them the masterful tricks of going viral and being memorable. Joseph, I appreciate you for being on the show. Your career is legendary, and I know you have a lot more big projects that you’re working on. I encourage all of our listeners to check out your newest book, How to Go Viral and to Reach Millions, Top Persuasion Secrets from social media superstars, Jesus, Shakespeare, Oprah and even Donald Trump. And I understand there’s an audio book coming out.

When’s the audio book coming out there? The audio, I just got the notice. You can get an audible.

It will be within two or three days.

It will be on Amazon.

I have been promised.

Who’s reading it? Do you know?

Is it just a rando?

Is it Donald Trump? Or is it like… Did you have Donald Trump read it? Did you get Jesus to read it? I mean, that’d be fair.

I mean, he’s on the cover.

Right now, a lot of communicators have been reading it and people who give a lot of speeches.

And I give talks to people on public speaking and that sort of thing. So it is a diverse group. You read the reviews. And by the way, if people buy the book, please write a review because if you want a book to succeed long -term on Amazon, you need to have good number of good reviews that keep growing over time. Yes, absolutely. And real quickly,

I always like to ask this of our authors that we get on the show.

What is your process for writing a book? I mean, you’ve done 10 now, right? And I’m sure you probably have wondered, you’re probably thinking about the next one. What’s your process for doing it? You go to the beach, you get a pina colada kind of guy, or you hole up in a hotel in some swanky part of Manhattan and just do a room service over and over and over? I mean, what’s your move?

Well, for me, I’ve been writing, you know, my father’s a newspaper editor, so writing, you know, when you’re in the newspaper business, you know, or the media business, as you know, you can’t afford to have writers block, right?

You have a deadline.

If you can’t make the deadline, you’re not in the paper. So, you know, I got that ethic, so I, you know, I try to write every day. And I will tell you one secret that I stumbled into by accident. I dictate everything using voice dictation software, using Dragon, naturally speaking, or the version for Mac.

And what I have found, particularly for blogging, but also for writing books, is when you dictate, if you can do that, not everyone, that’s not a process that will work for everyone, but if it will, now you’re being more conversational.

Right. Frankly, most people would be better off if their writing were more like their speaking, if they were more conversational and less, you know, I’ll be blunt, academic. Joseph, I appreciate you for, professionally speaking, being both clicky and sticky on today’s show. Thank you for taking time out of your schedule to be on here.

It’s not funny, Chubb, seriously.

It’s good. This is going to be shared. People are going to share this. We just hit number three on the iTunes podcast charts, and people are going to share this with their friends.

Wow. Thank you for number two, Chubb. Number two. Number two on the iTunes charts. This just in. Joseph, thank you for being here.

Have a blessed day. I heard about it on YouTube. podcast, started listening to the podcast, became a fan, and then figured out about the workshop. I own an insurance and financial services agency, and I was hoping to learn from the workshop systems and processes. I’m big on systems and processes, and always learning better ways to run a business more efficiently. The atmosphere is second to none.

It’s high energy. really cool atmosphere to be around contagious. I would say just something every entrepreneur I think would appreciate and love. I’d say humorous high energy and full of substance which I think is the key. A lot of business coaches or seminars Maybe you’re high on motivation and making you feel good, but don’t have a lot of substance that you could take back and implement, you know, the following Monday, where his does. Man, there’s a lot of valuable things.

I’m gonna say, like, I came to, this is my second workshop. The first workshop I took back, really, the importance of a group interview. I used to spend hours and hours interviewing people, screening resumes, and that saving my time on that part is valuable. It was that and then the sales scripting that have been two major things just so far. Man, I think they’re missing out on, you know, expert advice from somebody who’s been there, done that, built companies, has learned a lot of lessons. You know, that’s what I’m always looking for is somebody that I can learn from that’s ahead of where I am.

And I think if you choose not to come, you’re missing out on a lot of good advice that could help your business. through a mortgage lender here in town who had told me what a great job he had been doing for them. And I actually noticed he was driving a Lamborghini all of a sudden, so I was willing to listen. In my career, I’ve sold a little over $800 million in real estate. So honestly, I thought I kind of knew everything about marketing and homes. And then I met Clay, and my perception of what I knew and what I could do definitely changed.

After doing $800 million in sales over a 15 -year career, I really thought I knew what I was doing. I’ve been managing a large team of salespeople for the last 10 years here with Shaw Homes. And I mean, we’ve been a company that’s been in business for 35 years. We’ve become one of the largest builders in the Tulsa area, and that was without Clay. So when I came to know Clay, I really thought, man, there’s not much more I need to know, but I’m willing to listen. The interesting thing is our internet leads from our website has actually in a four month period of time has gone from somewhere around 10 to 15 leads in a month to 180 internet leads in a month.

Just from the few things that he’s shown us how to implement that I honestly probably never would have come up with on my own. So I got a lot of good things to say about the system that Clay put in place with us. And it’s just been an incredible experience. I am very glad that we met and had the opportunity to work with Clay. So the interaction with the team and with Clay on a weekly basis is honestly very enlightening. One of the things that I love about Clay’s perspective on things is that he doesn’t come from my industry.

He’s not somebody who’s in the home building industry. I’ve listened to all the experts in my field. Our company has paid for me to go to seminars, international builder shows, all kinds of places where I’ve had the opportunity to learn from the experts in my industry. But the thing that I found working with Clay is that he comes from such a broad spectrum of working with so many different types of businesses that he has a perspective that’s difficult for me to gain because I get so entrenched in what I do, I’m not paying attention to what other leading industry experts are doing. And Clay really brings that perspective for me. It is very valuable time every week when I get that hour with him.

From my perspective, the reason that any business owner who’s thinking about hooking up with thrive needs to definitely consider it is because. The results that we’ve gotten in a very short period of time are honestly monumental. It has really exceeded my wildest expectation of what he might be able to do. I came in skeptical because I’m very pragmatic. And as I’ve gone through the process over just a few months, I’ve realized it’s probably one of the best moves we’ve ever made. I think a lot of people probably feel like they don’t need a business or marketing consultant because they maybe are a little bit prideful and like to think they know everything.

I know that’s how I felt coming in. I mean, we’re a big company that’s definitely one of the largest in town. And so we kind of felt like we knew what we were doing. And I think for a lot of people, they let their ego get in the way of listening to somebody that might have a better or different perspective than theirs. I would just really encourage you, if you’re thinking about working with clay, I mean, the thing is, it’s month to month.

Go give it a try and see what happens.

I think in the 35 -year history of Shaw Homes, this is probably the best thing that’s happened to us. And I know if you give them a shot, I think you’ll feel the same way. I know for me, the thing I would have missed out on if I didn’t work with Clay is I would have missed out on literally an 1 ,800 % increase in our internet leads, going from 10 a month to 180 a month. That would have been a huge financial decision to just decide not to give it a shot. I would absolutely recommend Clay Clark to anybody who’s thinking about working with somebody in marketing. I would skip over anybody else you were thinking about, and I would go straight to Clay and his team.

I guarantee you’re not going to regret it, because we sure haven’t. My name is Danielle Sprick, and I am the founder of D. Sprick Realty Group here in Tulsa, Oklahoma. after being a stay at home mom for 12 years and my three kids started school and they were in school full time. I was at a crossroads and trying to decide what what do I want to do. My degree and my background is in education. But after being a mom and staying home and all of that I just didn’t have a passion for it like I once did.

Husband suggested real estate. He’s a home builder. So real estate and home building go hand in hand. And we just rolled with it. I love people. I love working with people.

I love the building relationships. But one thing that was really difficult for me was the business side of things, the processes and the advertising and marketing. I knew that I did not have what I needed to be successful. make that what it should be. So I reached out to Clay at that time and he and his team have been extremely instrumental in helping us build our brand, help market our business, our agents, the homes that we represent. Everything that we do is a direct line from Clay and his team and all that they’ve done for us.

We launched our brokerage our real estate brokerage eight months ago. And in that time we’ve gone from myself and one other agent to just this week we signed on our 16th agent.

We have been blessed with the fact that we right now have just over 10 million in pending transactions. Three years ago, I never would have even imagined that I would be in this role that I’m in today, building a business, having 16 agents. But I have to give credit where credit’s due. And Clay and his team and the business coaching that they’ve offered us has been huge. It’s been instrumental in what we’re doing. Don’t ever limit your vision.

When you dream big, big things happen. I started a business because I couldn’t work for anyone else. I do things my way. I do what I think is in the best interest of the patient. I don’t answer to insurance companies. I don’t answer to large corporate organizations.

I answer to my patient, and that’s it. My thought when I opened my clinic was I can do this all myself. I don’t need additional outside help in many ways. I mean, I went to medical school. I can figure this out. But it was a very, very steep learning curve.

Within the first six months of opening my clinic, I had a $63 ,000 investment. I lost multiple employees. Clay helped us weather the storm of some of the things that are just a lot of people experience, especially in the medical world.

He was instrumental in helping with the specific written business plan. He’s been instrumental in hiring good quality employees, using the processes that he outlines for getting in good talent, which is extremely difficult. He helped me in securing the business loans.

He helped me with web development and search engine optimization.

We’ve been able to really keep a steady stream of clients coming in because they found us on the web. With everything that I encountered, everything that I experienced, I quickly learned it is worth every penny to have someone in your team that can walk you through and even avoid some of the pitfalls that are almost invariable in starting your own business.

I’m Dr. Chad Edwards, and I own Revolution Health and Wellness Clinic. Clay, my honor, my honor to be on your show. And thank you for all you do. I hear the ripple effects from you are good ripple effects. You know what I mean? People rave about what they learn from you.

So congratulations. Expecting maybe $250 ,000 this year.

We’re at $4 ,000 this summer, at $23 ,000. So A &E’s company for years now, this year, too.

So we’re pretty excited about that. just listening to what they have to say their hiring process has just really been incredible as far as finding good quality help and the just the accountability of weekly, such good insight, the resources they have for specific business questions. It’s all been really incredible. It’s been a great experience, so I’d recommend it to anybody. What I’ve seen from Clay and his group at Thrive is they’ll give you a simple system, and it’s the simple systems are the ones that people can wrap their brain around.

They’re the ones that people can work with on a day -to -day basis. Hi there, my name is Stephanie Pipkin. I am 24 years old and I own Black River Falls Cleaning Services. We opened in April of 2019 and it is now mid -June of 2020. So I wanted to talk today about the success and growth I have achieved by implementing the Proven Path with Clay Clark’s team and my business coach, Luke, from Thrive Time. It has been insane, to say the least.

I started working with them in mid -February of this year, so we’re about four months in of working together, and it has completely transformed my business in pretty much every facet. So I’m gonna check my notes here. So in four months, my leads have tripled. I was getting probably like two leads a week, now I’m getting more in the like 10 to 15 leads a week. I have doubled my number of employees. I’m now hitting the highest revenue weeks in the history of the company, week to week it seems like.

We went from about six appointments today as our highest in February to now 14 to 15 appointments a day. And hiring quality employees has become much simpler and less stressful by using their systems for hiring. I typically only get maybe two complaints a month, if that, and everybody shows up to work. I just have really high quality employees now, especially in something people typically consider a high turnover type of work, you know, cleaning houses, cleaning businesses. I have amazing employees now, and I get rid of the ones who are not so amazing and bring on new ones because of, you know, group interviews and interviewing every single week. It’s just been great, and I don’t waste as much time low -quality candidates anymore.

And your coach will hold you accountable, which I love. Again, the tough love is really great. Luke’s like a stern father figure, but he’s also nice, but also stern when he needs to be when I’m being lazy and not doing the things that I know I need to do because I don’t want to do them. So that’s just great. Worth every penny. I’d pay him a million dollars a month if I can, and maybe someday I’ll be able to, but I would just say go for it.

If it seems like a good fit, just go for it. Do what they say, even if you think it’s stupid or ridiculous, just do what they say because it’ll work. You know, people, when they look at my business, you know, people in my town, they think I’m lucky. They think I’m just, you know, things just happen for me. And you know, maybe I am lucky, but it has a lot to do with hard work and, you know, perseverance and, you know, work until you cry sometimes. That’s just being an entrepreneur, which if you’re a business owner, you understand that.

But it’s having these systems in place of, you know, of course I’m going to be successful. It’s an absolute because I have all this stuff in the background happening. And I have Luke and Clay and everybody on their team working really hard to make sure that I’m a success. And I can tell that they are just so excited every single week when I’m having all these wins and things like that.

They’re so excited for me. So it just, it’s the best thing ever. And I would suggest to anybody to work with them. So sorry for the long -winded reply, but I just had so much to say and I could go on for hours. probably about how amazing they are. But thank you to Clay and Luke and the entire team there, everything you guys have done for me, and I am so excited to continue to work with you for years to come.

Thanks so much for watching. My saying is, if it’s important to you, hire a coach. And I think that’s one of the reasons people are not successful is they you know, they eat a cheeseburger instead of hiring a coach, you know what I mean? And so my coach pushes me, they’re younger than me, they push harder, they’re trained. And as my rich dad always said, you know, amateurs don’t have a coach, but professionals always have coaches. So I’ve always had coaches for whatever is important.

My rich dad was one of those persons.

You’re on it, man. You’re on it. You’re on it. Everybody, listen to this guy.

He knows what he’s talking about. You have the macro picture. Very few people have that point of view. Clay, you’re an entrepreneur. I’m an entrepreneur. And as they say in Stoic, the obstacle is the way.

And so if you let these pinheads get in your way, you’re in trouble. Hi, my name is Tim Johnson. I’m the owner of Tuscaloosa Ophthalmology, as well as Southern Eye Consultants, two ophthalmology practices in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. And I’m a client of Clay Clark. He asked me to answer a couple questions. The first question was, how did I hear about Clay Clark?

I am a big fan of business podcasts, and his podcast popped up. as a recommended listening. So I started listening to the podcast. I was a little suspicious or skeptical because I thought there was going to be like an upcharge or an upsell, but the idea of the month -to -month canceling really appealed to me and I kept waiting. for the shoe to drop and for the upsell or for the scam to come in, but it never did. It’s very legitimate.

Since working with Clay, I’ve gotten a much firmer grasp on how business works. Even in medicine, business is business.

I’ve learned a lot about marketing, especially how Google reviews work and how important that is.

And that’s very important even in medicine. At least once a week, if not every day, I get a new patient because somebody Googled eye doctor in Tuscaloosa or ophthalmologist in Tuscaloosa. And you’d be amazed how many patients just look for an eye doctor that way. And so he’s really changed our business. Our business has grown a lot, maybe 15 to 20 % this year. And so, We’re really grateful for the things he’s done for our business and the last question was when did I perfect the the laugh?

I would say that you can never perfect the laugh you just keep working at it and Just keep getting better and better each day, but you got to keep working at it. Thanks Hi, I’m Dr. Mark Moore. I’m a pediatric dentist. Through our new digital marketing plan, we have seen a marked increase in the number of new patients that we’re seeing every month, year over year. One month, for example, we went from 110 new patients the previous year to over 180 new patients in the same month. And overall, our average is running about 40 % to 42 % increase month over month, year over year.

The group of people required to implement our new digital marketing plan is immense, starting with a business coach, videographers, photographers, web designers.

Back when I graduated dental school, in 1985, nobody advertised. The only marketing that was ethically allowed in everybody’s eyes was mouth -to -mouth marketing. By choosing to use the services, you’re choosing to use a proof and turnkey marketing and coaching system that will grow your practice and get you the results that you’re looking for. I went to the University of Oklahoma College of Dentistry. graduated in 1983 and then I did my pediatric dental residency at Baylor College of Dentistry from 1983 to 1985.

I established my practice here in Tulsa in 1985. I started a business because I couldn’t work for anyone else. I do things my way. I do what I think is in the best interest of the patient. I don’t answer to insurance companies. I don’t answer to large corporate organizations.

I answer to my patient and that’s it. My thought when I opened my clinic was I can do this all myself. I don’t need additional outside help in many ways. I mean, I went to medical school. I can figure this out. But it was a very, very steep learning curve.

Within the first six months of opening my clinic, I had a $63 ,000 embezzlement. I lost multiple employees. Clay helped us weather the storm of some of the things that are just a lot of people experience, especially in the medical world. He was instrumental in helping with the specific written business plan.

He’s been instrumental in hiring good quality employees, using the processes that he outlines for getting in good talent, which is extremely difficult. He helped me in securing the business loans. He helped me with web development and search engine optimization. We’ve been able to really keep a steady stream of clients coming in because they found us on the web. With everything that I encountered, everything that I experienced, I quickly learned it is worth every penny. to have someone in your team that can walk you through and even avoid some of the pitfalls that are almost invariable in starting your own business.

I’m Dr. Chad Edwards and I own Revolution Health and Wellness Clinic. Hi, my name is Tim Johnson. I’m the owner of Tuscaloosa Ophthalmology, as well as Southern Eye Consultants, two ophthalmology practices in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. And I’m a client of Clay Clark. He asked me to answer a couple of questions. The first question was, how did I hear about Clay Clark?

I am a big fan of business podcasts, and his podcast popped up. as a recommended listening. So I started listening to the podcast. I was a little suspicious or skeptical because I thought there was going to be like an upcharge or an upsell, but the idea of the month -to -month canceling really appealed to me and I kept waiting for the shoe to drop and for the upsell or for the scam to come in, but it never did. It’s very legitimate. Since working with Clay, I’ve gotten a much firmer grasp on how business works.

Even in medicine, business is business. I’ve learned a lot about marketing, especially how Google reviews work and how important that is. That’s very important, even in medicine. At least once a week, if not every day, I get a new patient because somebody Googled eye doctor in Tuscaloosa. our ophthalmologist in Tuscaloosa. And you’d be amazed how many patients just look for an eye doctor that way.

And so he’s really changed our business. Our business has grown a lot, maybe 15 to 20 percent this year.

And so we’re really grateful for the things he’s done for our business. And the last question was, when did I perfect the laugh? I would say that you can never perfect the laugh. You just keep working at it. And it just keeps getting better and better each day.

But you got to keep working at it. Oh, look at this cute baby. What a great baby. Quality baby. That’s a healthy baby.

Thrive Nation, on today’s show, I’m very excited for you to hear this success story about this wonderful couple that, Sean, I would describe them as they are killing the game in the most nonviolent way possible.

They’re killing the game in the most nonviolent way possible.

They are blowing up in a good way.

Folks, I’m telling you, these folks are really growing their business, and what makes them great is they’re really kind, hardworking, diligent people, and we’re honored to serve them.

We’ve got Jenny and Mike here joining us.

Jenny and Mike, welcome to The Thrive Time Show.

How are you two?

Fine. Thank you. Good. We’re doing well. OK. I’ll start with you, Jenny, because frankly, Sean likes you more. And I’m just kidding.

So how did you first discover us and the business coaching that we provide? Um, so I was listening to different podcasts about business.

I was starting up our business.

Um, and so you were the first one to pop up on, on our podcast on Apple.

I think Apple is what I was on.

And so I started listening to you. I got on your website and I was just a little girl starting a business. And I said, I’m going to, I’m going to ask this guy to be my coach. And I don’t think I’m going to get a shot, but sure enough, within a week, you called me. Now, who is this cute, cute child here, but Micah, who is this cute kid here? That’s Lennon Rose.

She is about to be 10 months old.

I hate to do this to you, but can you kind of hold up the baby to the camera a little bit?

Oh, look at this cute baby.

What a great baby. Quality baby. That’s a healthy baby. So Mike, can you tell us, what’s the name of your website there? I think people want to look you up and verify you’re real people that don’t just happen to have a cute baby. Yeah.

Our website is newconcept . healthcare. newconcept .

healthcare.

So newconcept . healthcare. I’m going to pull it up right now, folks, so we can all verify that they’re not just a couple who’s taking advantage of the cute baby they have to get a podcast here. This is a real couple, because I’m pulling it up here. So this is the website. It’s newconcept .

healthcare. And can you tell our listeners, what services do you guys provide at newconcept . healthcare?

So we offer more functional medicine. So we offer IV therapies.

We offer hormone replacement therapies. We also do acute care. We do pretty much everything, but we’re very much alternative. So we believe in medical freedom, and that’s what we offer. And you guys, you reached out. Do you remember that initial consultation there?

Do you remember, Mike, that initial consultation? Do you remember what that was like? Uh, yeah, it was actually pretty overwhelming that when we started in this business with absolutely nothing and we had the opportunity to work with five times. Well, you know, the one thing I always try to do is, you know, my father, um, great guy, may he rest in peace. Uh, he worked his tail off like so many people do, and there was no real economic, um, Results that was achieved from it. There wasn’t any, you know, he had the college degree.

He’s working two jobs.

I remember he’s late thirties. He’s working at Domino’s delivering pizzas, working at quick trip. He worked at furniture stores.

And I always try to look at every new client we have as though I’m talking to my dad, you know, cause like, what would, what, what would my dad, you know, what could he have learned at the age of 37? That could have changed the financial trajectory of his life.

You know, and I try to look at it that way. And, um, so you guys, I paired you up with Sean. I believe, Sean, since October of 2020. Is that correct, Sean? I think that’s when they started their business. It wasn’t until about April of 2021.

So April of 2021.

And at that point, uh, from, from that point to now, uh, Sean, how much growth have you guys achieved from 2021 to now? Do you know that number? Yeah. I mean, we’re sitting at 2023 revenues were 821 ,000 and they’re in October of 2020.

Like they, they only had a few months. They made about 95 ,000. end of 2020. And then we grew significantly that first year, about 375 % to 588 ,000.

And we continued to grow there ever since, all the way up to where we’re getting close to the million dollar mark at this point here, just like three years in.

Jenny, how would you describe the growth? Would you say you’ve doubled? Are you at five times larger? How would you describe that? Oh, no, I definitely feel the growth. There’s been some growing pains, and you guys have helped us through that, too.

So it’s been amazing. It’s been amazing to help people, because that’s what I’m passionate about.

And you guys have really helped us expand and tell people what we’re about.

So step one here, we do this with all the clients. I’m going to walk people through the steps. We really needed to nail down your branding. And that’s a big thing, because branding is to humans what clothing is. So as an example, you know, you wake up today, folks, if you run around and you’re streaking through life, you’re probably not going to get a lot of conversations started. So we all have to be intentional about, you know, what are we going to wear?

Are we going to wear a tie? Are we going to wear a polo? Are we going to do makeup?

Are we not? So people, they judge us based on our appearance. And so we really had to get a website built. We had to optimize the online brand. Jenny, we do it all included for our clients. So we don’t refer you to another vendor.

We do it all. Can you talk about the impact that that has made on the business? Oh, for sure. Just the website itself, it looks so great.

We would have never been able to make it look that great. The way y ‘all optimize everything and keep us with Google, just amazing. you know, where people search us and we’re the first people that come up. And that’s actually how we’ve established our business and started offering some of the things that we offer is because of the tags that we have. I didn’t originally start off as doing IV therapy, but due to people Googling, you know, healthcare functional medicine, I had three phone calls in a week that said, hey, do you offer IV therapy? And it was very interesting.

And I was like, well, no, but I can. And so it was because of you guys that that kind of snowballed and took effect. So yeah, there’s a lot that you guys have done for us. Now, Sean, we’re working with these wonderful clients here. I’ll pick on Mike here. You always say great things about Mike and Jenny.

What makes them good to work with?

Because I want to make sure for anybody out there, if you go to thrivetimeshow . com, I consistently offer a free 13 -point assessment. I’ve been doing that since 2005. I do it without reservation. There’s no obligation. But there’s usually about two or three one to two knuckleheads a week that will fill out the form and probably 20 really great people that fill out the form.

And then we only take on 160 clients. And so I don’t want anyone to waste their time. What makes Mike so great to work with? Well, Clay, I mean, you, when I first started coaching, you taught me about these, you know, these two types of business owners.

There’s the happy hopers out there, and then there’s the diligent doers. And I think these guys are a great example of the diligent doer. They continually apply effort to work on their business, not just in their business. They consistently show up to their meetings. They track all of the critical numbers of their business, and they are, they’re aware of what’s going on with all of their employees. They’re paying attention to all the little things going on.

They’re keeping all the plates spinning and they asked questions. They actually really do make a great effort consistently to apply our systems and help their business grow. And it’s been working. So step one, we get the branding nailed down.

That’s the website, the print pieces, the logos, the business cards. But then you have to develop that online reputation. Now, that could be a tough thing to do, Jenny. And this isn’t a backhanded compliment. I’m just saying, but for people that are humble, and very kind of which I would put Jenny in that category.

Sometimes asking for reviews is more difficult because you almost feel like you’re self -promoting.

I’ve never had this conversation with you. But when you, has that been difficult for you to ask people to give you video reviews and Google reviews after you provided the service? Or was that easy for you to do? It was not. It’s not easy. It still isn’t easy.

It’s difficult because you feel like you’re begging for something, even though you know you did the right thing. So it’s difficult for me. It’s just my personality type, but we get it done anyways. I’ll find this for the diligent, kind customers we work with. It’s very difficult sometimes to ask for those objective reviews from real customers. And I find that from my clients I’ve worked with that are sort of like self -described barbarians.

I had a guy years ago I worked with. I won’t mention his name or his industry, but I’ll just say he’s obsessed with physical fitness. And he told me, he says, I’m kind of a business barbarian. You tell me what to do and I will slay the dragons. And I’m like, okay, you need to get Google reviews from everybody you’ve ever worked with. And he’s like, oh, I’m on it.

And this guy’s just shamelessly calling through his phone and just lighting people up going, give me a review. Come on, give me a review. Why would you not give me a review? I’m like, go ahead, dial it down a little bit. So again, you guys are humble, diligent doers. You’re the ideal person here.

So I appreciate you sharing that. The next thing we had to do is we had to create a no brainer. Now, a no -brainer is an offer so good, so amazing, that people simply cannot say no to it. Now, I won’t mention the name of the company. but I worked years ago, and I still work with this company. They’re a medical company.

They’re doing well now. And for whatever reason, they put on their website, first initial consult, 497. And he went to one of these, like, borderline spiritual motivational conference things where Jesus isn’t described, but they kind of talk about metaphysical alignment and getting your woosaw, getting in your groove, alignment, no friction. And he came back and he’s like, Clay, I believe in the seventh number of completion.

I go, I agree.

He says, four is a number that’s urgent. I’m like, okay. Not, and I go, what? And he’s like, I don’t, I don’t want tire kickers. So I’m going to do 497 for my first consult. That way I don’t deal with the tire kickers.

And I’m like, doc, I love you so much.

You’re a doctor.

I love it. You don’t have any customers though. That’s why you came to me. You don’t have any customers. So why don’t you do a first free consult? I’m not going to do it.

I’m going to, I’m going to kick out Sean, the tire kicker. So I’m sure you’ve never seen this with a client. Oh, never. And so. Now, what makes it worse is his wife also went to the Metaphysical Alignment Motivational Jackassery Festival. And she was like, 497 is the number.

I had a dream about it.

I’m like, yeah, you probably talked about it all weekend. You probably are subconsciously thinking about it. You’re probably creating a neural pathway related to 497. And so anyway, after about a year, he finally says, OK, I came to your conference. And I saw a person that did the first consult for $1. I’m going to go with that.

And now his business is blowing up. Could you talk about your no -brainer, your first consult for a dollar?

How has that helped you having that no -brainer offer?

Yeah, so it gets people in. And so when we get people in, we know that we’re doing a good job and we know that we’re trustworthy and our health care is superior to most. So just getting people in for that dollar, because a lot of people are, you know, they’re nervous about going to the doctor or they don’t trust health care system. And so they know that they can come in. They’re only going to spend a dollar. They can figure out whether or not they trust us, figure out

whether or not we’re the place for them. And we know 100 % of the time we will be. So it’s really helped us just get people in and get people to trust us more. Now, once somebody fills out the form, folks, again, there’s a linear pathway here. I’m trying to give you a visual here. So you establish your revenue goals.

You figure out your numbers to break even. You figure out how many hours a week you’re willing to work. Even though you have a cute baby, you’ve got to figure out how you’re going to get it done. Step number four is you define your unique value proposition. What makes you unique? That’s something you and Sean have worked on together.

You improve your branding. Now you’re coming in contact with humans.

Business is a contact sport.

I love this part.

That’s when you start marketing. You launch your marketing. You have your online ads. You optimize your website. to come up top in the search results, you start to get leads. Do you remember what it was like, Jenny, when you first got your first online lead?

Do you remember the first one where you’re like, It’s working. Do you remember that moment? Yeah. It was almost like we wanted to, well, we did celebrate because it finally had happened. And then as soon as the first one came in, the second one came in. And like I said, it was, it was almost a growing pain experience.

We’ve had so many leads so fast. Um, so it was great. And we still celebrate every lead that we get. Now, Mike, the next step is you have to make sales scripts.

Uh, we, we, we recommend to every client that the calls are recorded for quality assurance. You have a sales script. Calls are recorded for quality assurance.

You have a one sheet that tracks your pricing. You have pre -written emails. You begin tracking.

Sean’s always bragging about you guys with tracking.

Mike, how has it helped to have tracking in place? How has that helped you? Well, it’s really a good benefit because at the end of the week, you know what your income was. You know what your lead was. So wherever we’re lacking in, we can quickly adjust and make that adjustment to make it work for the next week. Now, if you don’t have tracking, folks, this is a true story.

It’s kind of a sad story. So I’ll speak in generality, Sean. I talked to a guy the other day. This is Sherb Turner. Long -time client. And he got motivated.

He set up a trade show.

He didn’t tell me he was doing it.

It’s fine.

You don’t have to tell me.

But he set up a trade show.

I think he was going to try to surprise me with the fruit of the trade show.

So he set up the trade show. And he gets on the call. His energy is kind of off. And I’m like, are you OK? Yeah. Dude, fine.

What’s wrong? Hi.

I don’t know.

I’m like your lead sheet. We’re getting, you know, 10 to 15 leads a week. It’s very consistent. Revenue looks good. He’s like, yeah, I’m in a tight spot. Well, you’re in a tight spot.

Why are you in a tight spot? He says, I did a trade show.

You did a trade show.

Yeah, I got roped into four. I did a thing where you get the billboard, you get the trade show, you get the magazine ad. And I did the trade show and we got no leads. And I go, what kind of trade show did you do?

And he says, well, I went to the whatever trade show.

And Sean, what I find is that there’s the emotional excitement about being on the billboard, being on the magazine cover.

And he got called probably by one of these kind of scam, I call it a scam mockery or jackassery. They call you and they go, hey, is this Sean? Yeah, this is Sean. Sean, yeah, I noticed that you have an incredible health care company, and we want to honor you by giving you the yada yada of the region award. It’s the yada yada. It’s a regional, prestigious award.

We’d like to meet with you.

Can we meet with you? Yeah.

So now I meet here. Now, Sean, again, I’m not on the phone, but I still like the phone voice here. So now, Sean, so because we’re so honored, you know, we’re inviting you to a plated dinner to honor your just your honor, your honoredness, your greatness, your humbleness. It’s going to be $1 ,000 a plate for you and your wife.

And did you want four seats or eight?

Because most people do eight.

Oh, I guess just four. And that does include a glossy magazine feature in, we’ll just call it Missouri local top doctor Jack Assery. It’s a great magazine.

And you’re also on the cover.

You’ll be on a billboard.

We’ve teamed up with the billboard. It rotates through. You’re going to see your face. Oh, hey. don’t get too excited. And just because we’re honored.

We’re not, you know, again, we’re just honored. Now, did you want to do the four tickets, sir? Yeah, absolutely. Now, the way it works is it’s going to be four payments of $4 ,000 for a total of $16 ,000. And that’s, no, I’m serious. And now they’re in the trade shows.

And he’s going to the trade show. And there ain’t nobody there. There is nobody there. It needs to be technical. Nobody was at this trade show.

I mean, everybody was not at the trade show.

He’s I got photos of like him and his wife and his team in an empty booth and he’s got a magazine and no leads are coming. And he was so excited to tell me, um, I’m sure you’ve never encountered this sort of thing. Uh, Virginia, have you, you know, Jenny, have you ever seen a situation where that sort of shamakari advertising has been entered into your world in some capacity? I’ve been there.

I’ve been exactly where, what you’re talking about.

And I’ve set up everything and paid employees. And I felt like I was nothing more than a free pen show. The only people that were there were people looking for free pens. Oh, I know. And it feels terrible.

And then you kind of have to sell it to yourself all day.

We’re getting our name out there.

Sean, can you pass the megaphone back there? Yeah.

Cause I would tell people to get your name out there.

What you do is you just run outside.

And people go, why are you yelling at me?

I’m trying to shop for my groceries.

Is this effective?

Of course it’s effective.

I’m getting my name out there.

That leads to buying frisbees, branded frisbees, boozies. You know what I’m saying? Branded pens. Yes. All of a sudden, you buy these things. Sean, you know what I’m talking about.

Oh, yeah. OK. So now we have to do it. I’m going to show you. This is kind of the back end of one of my companies, called Elephant in the Room. And you do a search for eitrlounge .

com. And then you go to forward slash staff. I’m not going to give you the password, folks. But you log in. And these are all the systems needed to run the haircut chain.

Now, one thing I thought was very interesting is Truth Social, President Trump’s social media platform, the other day they were disclosing, Newsweek was disclosing the revenue of it. And I just want people to know this because I think, and just full disclosure, I’m a very conservative person, but I just want people to see this. This is just something to look at. Truth Social, they declared in their filing that they did $3 .3 million of revenue and had $49 million of losses, which by the way, That’s very normal for a tech startup company and their users are going up and they’re having an app. There’s like a reaction in the marketplace. People are actually putting more money in there investing the stock prices going up.

But I don’t know anybody that I’ve met in my life. But I’ve never been a client that can afford to bring in three point three million and lose forty nine million. So for my haircut chain, we have five locations. We bring in more than $3 .3 million.

And this just in, we don’t spend $49 million. So we have to, we call it a lean startup. You got to keep that thing lean. And so when you go to EITRLounge . com forward slash staff, every document needed to manage the business is here. So the opening checklist for the manager, you click here, boom.

This is what the manager has to do to start the day.

Everything is documented. And that’s kind of where we’re at right now with Jenny and Mike’s business. We’re in the process of building all those checklists. Yeah. Sean, what kind of checklist have you built so far? Oh, man, we have a whole page.

Their staff page is pretty built out. We’re really getting there. I think more right now, it’s getting, correct me if I’m wrong, we need some managers in there so we can free you guys up from the business. And so we have a lot of the worker level systems. We’re just now working on more of how do we get those manager level systems and find those high quality managers. Now, let me give Jenny a little mentor moment here.

This will be helpful for you.

I’m going to hop on a flight.

in about two and a half hours, three hours to go to Denver. And I got to go to Denver to meet with the founder of Oxifresh . com. This is a brand we’ve worked with and helped them to grow to 550 locations now. 550 locations. And if you type in carpet cleaning quotes, we’re the world’s highest rated and most reviewed company in the world, in the world.

Okay. 274 ,000 reviews. We’ve been holding this idea in our mind for 15 consecutive years. I’ve been working on this for Sean before I met you.

We just were to grind in.

Okay. Yeah. And the biggest challenge that the locations have is managers finding good manager. And I tell people this and it never goes over well, but hopefully eventually it will. I’ll keep refining it, refining the idea, the kind of person that enjoys conflict, but also likes people.

is a good manager.

Let me try that again.

The kind of person that enjoys conflict but also likes people is a good manager.

And I have found it’s not so much trainable as it’s findable. So as an example, where we’re getting ready to head out to Denver, Sean, you know, my personality type, and you know that I have to pack all this stuff to get ready to go. You saw my suitcase out there.

Yep. How many times do you think I followed up with the people involved in the trip so far before leaving? Oh man, it’s, it’s probably on your to -do list and you’ve checked it off like probably at least five times today, I would think. And what kind of things do you think I might’ve put on my checklist to travel to Denver? First off, just making sure that the timing is working, making sure that you have all the stuff that you need, making sure that you have double of the stuff that you need in case something gets broken, making sure that the people who are there know you’re coming and when you’re going to be there and what to expect from you. Do you think I’m checking a bag?

Oh, yeah, you’re probably not checking it back. There it is. Lost. All right.

No.

And am I am I getting a flight a lot earlier than I need to be there? Way earlier.

Yeah.

If I’m having a meeting tomorrow, which I am, I’m leaving today at 1230. Yeah. So this is that’s the sort of thing. that makes management possible. So I have literally called. I said, all right, I’m getting on the 1230 flight.

We’re meeting tomorrow. I should be in by like 4 o ‘clock Denver time. Our meeting’s tomorrow.

If that flight gets delayed and the next one gets delayed and the next one, I’ll still be there. I’ve got backup phone chargers.

I have a rule. Everybody going with me. You cannot check a bag. I want to check a bag.

Can’t check a bag.

Why? Because it could get lost. This is real. I’m completely paranoid. And the paranoia is what makes the businesses run. And I ask my staff every day, guys, elephant in the room, did you guys get a review?

And they say, no. Well, yeah, we got a review. You asked me 10 minutes ago.

OK, I’ll talk to you in four minutes.

You heard me say that. I’ll say, I’ll talk to you in five minutes. Yeah.

And I’ll do it.

And it’s a follow up of, because I have to make sure that the checklists are being followed, the reviews are being followed.

We’re a licensed business.

People don’t know that.

Haircare, you’re licensed by the state.

So we have certain cleanliness standards.

We could have random people from the state show up.

So we got checklists.

And I follow up. And it doesn’t bother me. to follow up with the same adult who’s in their 40s six times within a 50 -minute span of time, it doesn’t bother me. But most people, that bothers them.

And so have you found that, Jenny, that a lot of people don’t like to follow up?

Have you found that? Or is that just something unique to me? Um, I found that they don’t like to follow up. No, people don’t like to follow up. It’s a, almost like an awkward communication thing that people will try to avoid. Yeah.

And it’s not necessarily that you’re being mean or any type of way, but that’s, I feel like that’s probably the way that we feel when we continuously follow up, like we’re having to step on people’s toes, but really we’re not, we’re just getting the job.

My mentorship moment for you is it’s probably the same feeling you have when you ask for reviews. Yeah.

It’s probably the same.

So, and I’m just saying, and then, and if Mike, did you ever play football or a sport of some kind?

Yeah, I used to play soccer. Okay. Soccer.

So like when you came.

position did you play?

Uh, goalkeeper.

Goalkeeper. Okay.

So is a goal.

This is a great, great example. I didn’t know you were a goalkeeper, but when you’re a goalkeeper and someone’s kicking that ball at you fast, I mean, just the balls coming in there. I mean, people can really kick a soccer ball fast. There are certain people that want to be a goalkeeper, but they kind of avoid the ball. They try to hide from it. They flinch.

You know what I’m talking about? But you actually would lunge into it. Am I correct? Right. I mean, you’re aggressive, right?

I mean, you’re like. You had, for some reason you enjoyed it.

Yeah.

Getting a hundred miles an hour fastball.

Have you ever seen somebody who tried to be a goalie? I’m not looking for a name here, but somebody who would kind of hide from the ball. Yeah. This is the same thing for management. I guess the manager, you have to want, like, you have to sort of seek out conflict, but like people. So I I’ll say things like, okay.

It’s eight o ‘clock.

I need to make sure you put out the flags in front of the elephant in the room store today, Mr. Manager.

Put out the flags that draw the attention by the road.

Put out the flags. And I’m going to call you in 10 minutes to follow up. Call him in 10 minutes. Are the flags up? Can you send me a picture? They’re like, do you not trust me?

Absolutely not. I trust nobody.

Go ahead and send him.

And then I’ll call him back 30 minutes later.

Hey, did you get Google reviews? Yeah, we got one Google review.

You know, the quote is 10. Yeah, I’ll call you back in two minutes. You know, call him back. Hey, did you get a review? It’s been two minutes. I know.

Oh, hey, I’ll tell you what.

I’ll call you back in an hour.

And I, my whole day is just following up. And then over time, the culture happens where people go, he’s going to follow up. And now the people that like the follow -up like to work there and it’s become a great thing. And that’s where we’re kind of at right now, I think, is we’re getting into the follow -up phase. Do you have call recording in place there, Mike? Are you, do you have the call recording for quality assurance installed yet?

Yes, we do. And are you learning some things?

Yes.

It is very hard to train people on recording experience. Yeah. That’s something we got to do.

Now we’re just going through the workflow and then the wowing the customers.

What Sean is saying is that your patients are consistently wowed. Now, I don’t know if that’s because Sean is your hype man or if that’s a real thing. but it seems like people are actually wowing, they’re being wowed right now. People, when they come in, this is, if you look at the workflow, they buy something, right here, we have to wow them. You’ve got to create that. wow moment.

And again, if you want to download this diagram, folks, just go to thrivetimeshow . com forward slash millionaire thrivetimeshow . com forward slash millionaire. You can download it from my newest book called a millionaire’s guide to becoming sustainably rich. You got to create that wow moment. I mean, amidst the checklists and the tracking at some point here, you’ve got to create a moment that wows people where they go, wow.

So I’m trying to get everybody’s creative juices flowing here.

So if you have a restaurant, I work with a restaurant in Florida right now, a great restaurant. They say, Welcome in. Is it your first time? They say, yeah, it’s my first time. Oh, well, hey, you get free appetizers on us today and one free adult beverage. Welcome in.

And that every time it’s that, wow. And then when you come back later and ask for a review or, Hey, what entree do you want?

Guess what?

People become generous with how they buy.

Um, another example, I work with an auto auction.

The auto auction says your first time that you buy from the auto auction, you only have to pay a dollar.

more than the actual cost of the vehicle, just to wow people, to get that going.

I happen to work with a carpet cleaning business.

Carpet cleaning business.

And what they do is they say, hey, the first time we clean your carpet, we’ll beat any competitor’s price, and it will be at least half off of our normal price.

And they go, OK, great. You’ve got to have that wow moment. What are you guys doing, Jenny, to wow your customers there? Well, there are things that we do. We will oftentimes give samples of certain things because we know they work.

We have a lot of supplement sales that we do. Again, the dollar consult is a wow moment because we will spend some 10 to 15 minutes explaining how we’re different. And I feel like they’re wowed because of that. Also, our services are so much different. We spend time in the room with our patients. We listen to them.

They’re not just a number. And a lot of times, people have never experienced that. So there’s a lot of wow moments, I think, for all of our patients.

I understand that 59 % of your customers are now from word of mouth. Is that accurate? Yeah. That’s huge. Yeah, well, and with the customer acquisitions cost, too, I’ve heard you say this before, Clay, that if you’re advertising and you’re doing a good job wowing at the same time, they compound each other. And you’ll end up having two to three word of mouth referrals from those patients that are wowed for every one lead you have from advertising.

We measured and tracked that they had this last year. For every dollar they spent on advertising, they were able to bring back in $4 .61. So that’s a 461 % return on their marketing investment. It’s incredible stuff. And well, the great news is as we build these systems, If you guys ever wanted to franchise or license or open up multiple locations, if done properly, you should be able to scale it. It should be very repeatable, very duplicatable.

Other things you guys have done, you’ve implemented a database to keep track of your customers. You’re gathering objective video reviews. You guys are really checking all the boxes. I’d like for you, if you can, Jenny, here, to give a word of encouragement for any of our listeners out there that are a little bit on the fence right now, and they’re going, you know, I have thought about scheduling a free consultation, but I couldn’t get it done.

I don’t know. I hear it’s $1 ,700 a month.

Can you maybe explain your thoughts, what you’d say to anybody who’s a friend of yours or family that asks you about the value about the business consulting?

Oh, well, I would say that The $1 ,700 a month is an excuse not to have someone to mentor you. It’s kind of like being in a gym when you need a trainer.

We’re not always perfect, and business owning is not easy, and you need a mentor. I’ve never missed the $1 ,700 a month, even when I was only six months in when we started with you guys. I’ve never even considered it a loss. It was scary at first to make that, but that was an excuse. knew I needed someone to guide me through this. And you guys have guided us through this, through the entire thing, through employees, through income, through spending, through all of it.

And we come through so many problems. There are a lot of problems that are established when you have a business. I mean, you become very overwhelmed, very fast, and you need somebody that you can call who’s successful. Who’s been there that says, you’re not crazy. This happens to all of us. Here’s what you do about it.

It’s been so hard. the best decision that we’ve made. Final question I have here for you as far as having a turn like a one -stop shop. Years ago I hired a business consultant who was great and he would say things like and I’m not ripping him I’m just telling you what would happen he would say Clay you got to work on your business and not in it. I’m going that’s true. He goes you got to delegate to elevate.

That’s true. Clay your website is not optimized and I’m going this is great fresh perspective. I go Bruce Could you help me optimize? No, I don’t optimize. Could you help me work on it?

No.

Could you help me make a checklist? No. Do you make, do you help me with the print pieces that I need to make? No. Can you make a video? No.

Do you help me with my online ads?

No. Clay, and he would used to, he was kind of an Eastern, he’s an Eastern, Northeastern American guy. And he used to say, Clay baby, let me tell you what, I don’t, I don’t, I don’t make print pieces. What am I a print piece guy? I’m not a web guy. We know what I am.

I’m a work on the business guy. You got to find a good web guy. So every meeting we would have would result in me having to find another vendor to pay another $8 ,000 to, to build the website for 4 ,000 to make the video 5 ,000 to do. So every time you give a recommendation, it would lead to another cost. Can you maybe explain the value of having a flat monthly fee? Yeah, I don’t have to ever worry about it.

I know if I need the website updated, it’s a text away. I know if I’m having trouble with an employee, it’s a text away. I know if I need financial advice, it’s a text away. And again, we meet every single week and all our questions are answered and we’re held accountable to what we need to be held accountable for. So it really works for us. Jenny and Mike, thank you guys for your time so much.

I really do value your time. I appreciate you guys being here today. And on part two of today’s show, we’re going to tee up another success story because we want people to know it is possible, despite the financial jackassery plaguing our nation right now, it is possible to become successful. And you guys are a living example of it. Thank you guys for bringing your baby on the show. We’ll talk to you soon.

Franklin just outside of Nashville and just wanted to record kind of my experience with Thrive over the last 16 months. I think it’s been almost 18 months with these guys. They have really helped me turn my clinic around, my clinics around. I came to Thrive in February 17. I could say 16 months later, I don’t know where we’ve been without these guys, but I know where we’re at now. The system’s in place that make the practices no longer reliant on me being there for them to be successful.

That was a huge goal of mine when I first talked to them.

We’re working towards our financial goals. We’ll be there probably within six months. My stress level has gone down. I’ll be going on vacation next week, not worrying a bit about what’s happening with my two practices because I know the systems that we put in place is gonna make them run as if I was there. I don’t know what else to say, but thank you guys. I love, I look forward to my weekly coaching calls and it’s always something that I get out of those that I can plug in or talk to an employee.

And it’s just the 2%, you know, they talk about 2 % all the time. You gotta improve by 2%, you gotta do it all at once. But that 2 % over the last 16 to 18 months has made a huge difference for my life, my family, our practices, and again just the stress level that we were at compared to now has been life -changing. So thanks guys, really appreciate all you do and look forward to the next 16 to 18 months and beyond. Thanks.

Hey, I just wanted to take a minute to talk about Thrive15 and what they’ve done for me.

My experience with them started with a weekend seminar.

I was just kind of feeling stuck and just needed something to light my creative juices. A friend of mine recommended I go check them out and I did. Certainly nothing short of amazing, just that weekend seminar as far as what it did for me. But based on that, I wanted to learn more about what they could do to help me and there’s no doubt, without their help, I don’t know if I would have got where I want to go and even to the point where I am now. If you are someone who’s looking to start a business or expand your current business, I highly recommend you give these guys a look as they will help you.

at least give you an idea of what it’s going to take to get you from where you are now to where you want to go in the future.

I’m a guy with big vision and I just didn’t quite know how to get from point A to point B and they’re certainly helping me get to that point down the road.

If you look at this board behind you, this is all stuff that they’ve made me think about, if you will.

So yeah, give them a look.

I think it’ll be well worth your time.

Time that I ever met you, Clay, was at that first conference in Tulsa.

And that was an incredible conference. And I was so impressed with just the whole thing, just the professionalism, you as a person, your business, your work. ethic, and really just who you are. And I was very impressed with all of that. And I thought, gosh, this might be someone that I would really consider working with. Maybe he could really help me.

And that’s really what got me interested because I was so impressed with just the professionalism of all of it. And I learned a lot. I come about once a year to a business conference.

And I’d like to come more, but every year I try to come with my marketing girl with me. And we always learn something. We always learn something. And I’m, I think next year I’m going to bring my husband because he really needs to come too. OK, Thrive Nation, on today’s show, I wanted to share with you a story about a good person who’s growing a good business by treating their customers the way they want to be treated. She’s a longtime client.

We’re honored to serve her and help her grow her business. And I want you to hear a great success story. So that being said, Dr. Stephanie, welcome onto The Thrive Time Show. How are you?

Hi, I’m doing great, thank you so much, Clay. Well, first off, I’m gonna pull up your website, so tell all the listeners what’s the name of your website so we can verify that you are, in fact, a real orthodontist.

Okay, my website is smileshollywood .

com.

OK, smileshollywood . com.

Yes.

I’m going to pull this up real quick here. And as I pull this up, I’m going to ask you a little bit about your background, because you’re doing really well. You’re based in McKinney, Texas. When did you have that vision to become an orthodontist? Like, what age were you where you thought, you know what? I want to become an orthodontist?

Well, that had to have been when I was visiting my own orthodontist. Dr. Jim Bowley, who’s retired now, but was an awesome, great orthodontist and one of the greats, really.

But what’s funny is, is that I actually wanted to be a medical doctor first. And I used to go into his office and he’d say, Stephanie, you don’t want to be a medical doctor. You want to be an orthodontist. And I said, no, I don’t, Dr. Bowley. Why are you saying that? And he started telling me all of the great things about dentistry and why it’s so great, because you don’t have to deal with people dying on you.

You don’t have to deal with sick people. You get to make people look amazing and beautiful by straightening their teeth and you leave with happy patients. And, you know, he talked me into it. And I thought, that sounds like a great job. So that’s really how I became an orthodontist. And you’re in McKinney, Texas, right?

So how long have you been an orthodontist in McKinney, Texas? So I’ve been an orthodontist for 26 years, practicing in McKinney. And when you went to medical school, what percentage of the time in medical school or dentistry school, dental school, did they spend teaching you how to market and or grow your own practice? Absolutely zero. Zero marketing skills. OK.

And so one of the great things I love about working with you is we get to help you grow your business, but you get to be more of who you are.

I mean, you get to help more patients and help more people create great smiles. And then we get to do some of the nitty gritty stuff that maybe isn’t your highest and best use. And so I want to focus on some of the things we’ve been able to accomplish together over these few years here. First off, from a branding perspective, I really do feel like your website is first class. And from when I talked to Andrew, the coach who works with you, I’m always hearing that more and more patients are coming in from Google. Could you talk about that?

How much of an impact does it have having maybe a rebranded or updated website and Google leads coming in? It has had a huge difference, absolutely huge difference in our patient load coming in.

And you know, before I really wasn’t tracking really well. And that’s one of the things I learned from Thrive Time Business was how track patients coming in, how to really how to see where they’re coming from. And at the time, I really didn’t know much about Google and, you know, being an orthodontist for 26 years. I didn’t really know a lot of, I kind of went through a time where I went through shock. It was really what I call culture shock because the old ways of marketing were not working anymore.

And because I really didn’t know about online marketing, I really didn’t, I was still doing, you know, phone book ads and magazine ads and all of these things. And so Thrive Time has really helped. I started out with 97 reviews. Now we have almost 600 reviews. And you know, it takes a long time to get those reviews and you have to really work diligently.

And you know, Andrew was amazing.

My, my coach, he’s fantastic. Really, really had to prod me sometimes because, you know, sometimes I was like an old mule and just stuck my feet in and said, no, I don’t want to do that. And he said, trust me, it works. And I just kept going and he kept pushing. And I’ll tell you what, it’s really working. We’re getting a lot of patients from Google and it’s fantastic.

Now, as far as gathering patients from the Google search results, there’s a couple of things that have to happen. I mean, one, you’ve got to have the most content. There’s four variables. One, you have to have the most original HTML content or text. Second, you have to have the most objective reviews from real customers. Third, your website has to be in constant mobile compliance, where we’re updating the website to meet the current updated guidelines of the ever -evolving internet.

And then we’ve got to make sure your website is canonically compliant, where it basically follows all Google Google’s rules. How much has that helped your peace of mind knowing that you have a team that’s helping you update your website every month and that you don’t have to do that? It is a huge relief, an absolute huge relief, because I know that these things are being done. The SEO is being done properly. The back writing under the website is being done properly and increasing and we’re relevant every single day. We’re relevant because I know these things are happening.

And before I actually was trying to do some of these things on my own and you know, I’m not the best writer. And then I realized why am I doing this myself?

Because honestly, I don’t have the time.

And so it’s really a great relief to know that these things are being done and that they’re working. And I saw when I first started with Thrive Time, I was probably 11 or 12. I was working with an SEO company at the time, and I was probably coming up 11 or 12, which is really the second page when somebody brings you up on the computer.

But now I’m, you know, I’m at two, I’m at three, I’m at four, depending on the keywords. So I can’t be more happy. And you know, again, if we do a search for orthodontist in McKinney, Texas, we can find you right there in the top three. Also, after you move past the three -pack or the top three there, we can also find your site in the search results. And again, it’s not a result of luck. It’s not a result of some sort of woo -woo plan.

It’s specific, actionable processes. The next thing I want to talk about is just overall lead tracking and Dream 100 marketing. I think a lot of times people Not you, but other people, entrepreneurs, none of our listeners.

We might market based on feel. So if we feel like we’re not getting enough leads, we might feel the need to go market. And if we feel like we’re overwhelmed with leads, we might feel the need to not market. But one of the things that we try to teach to our wonderful clients, like yourself, is the importance of implementing a consistent and implementable plan, a consistent and practical plan. Could you talk about the importance of tracking your leads, and then also just consistently doing those marketing systems, like the Dream 100, that do produce fruit? So the Dream 100 has really been a great addition.

We were doing something similar to that, but really not with the concerted effort and doing it on a regular basis. We were kind of doing it a little more haphazardly. And I really have noticed a difference because when you are visiting dentist’s office and you’re developing a relationship with them and they are seeing you on a regular basis every week or every two weeks, they, you know, the staff starts to remember you. And so, you know, you never know a patient may come in tomorrow, and you just dropped by their office with a goodie today, you know, and, and then they are going to think of you whenever it’s time to, to refer for an orthodontist. And that that’s really made a big, big change in our practice, too. And we track every single one of those.

So we know how many Dr. X sent over, and we know how many Dr. Y sent over.

So we know our top referrers and we know the ones that we need to kind of get to know better and help them send to us too.

There’s somebody watching this right now who’s a doctor, a dentist, a lawyer, and they’re going, I don’t know if the Dream 100 works. What do you say to that person who’s sitting down with you right now? And they go, yeah, I just don’t know if that works. I say it definitely works. And you definitely do have to get out and meet the dentist yourself. at least one time, even if you just, some of the dentists I couldn’t actually just go meet, you know, to have lunch, they didn’t have lunches.

So I just actually went by the office myself. I took a little goodie with me, you know, a muffin or something, and I’d go by maybe right before lunch and just introduce myself. And then when my gal would come by every week or every other week to deliver things to their office, they at least knew who I was. I had introduced myself.

And we found that we started getting patients that way.

So it definitely helps. Now, next thing I want to talk about is hiring. And I don’t know if you’ve ever felt like this. I’m sure you haven’t. It’s probably just me. But whenever you have a garden that you plant, I’ll pull up a picture of a garden so we can all picture it in our minds.

Whenever you plant a garden, there’s probably some initial excitement. You go, you know what? I’m going to plant these tomatoes. I’m going to do it. I’m going to get after it. This is my year.

I’m going to get the garden going. I’m excited. I’m going organic.

Let’s go.

Well, what happens is over time, people stop pulling the weeds. They stop tending to the garden. And over time, the garden becomes like an overgrown monster garden. The garden starts to become something that looks like a mistake, something that looks like an uh -oh, something where your neighbors say, are you going to mow that thing? And it gets bad. And the same thing is true with employees.

If you have a team of people that work for you on your payroll and you’re a business owner, it turns out that the average American today for whatever reason. I’m going to pull some stats here so people don’t think I’m crazy.

The US Chamber reports that 75 % of employees steal from the workplace. What? That’s the U . S. Chamber reporting that 75 % of employees steal from the workplace. And you might say, really?

Yeah. And 85 % of employees, 85 % of employees lie on resumes, meaning that they just make up some statistic on there and they throw it on their resumes. And 85 % of employees are, again, are lying on their resumes. I’m pulling this up here, folks. But there are there’s a certain group of employees that they just lie on their resumes called 85 % of job applicants lie on their resumes and 75 % of employees steal from the workplace.

So in your business, you have a great staff and you want to keep it that way.

So you can’t hire the thieves. You can’t hire people that lie on their resumes. So that 85 % of the population that lies on the resumes, they can’t work for you. And that 75 % of the population that steals from the workplace, they can’t work for you. because you want to wow your customers. Can you talk about embracing the processes that we teach of the ongoing hiring processes and just always recruiting new people?

Absolutely. So we have taken on really the task of making sure that we have every single day and at any one time there is going to be an ad out there for any position in our office. And, you know, occasionally we’ll have somebody come in and we’ll have them, you know, just do a little affidavit or something. And what’s really interesting is that even my employees, even when I’m not asked, I’m not needing someone, my employees will be like, are we having somebody come in, do a working interview?

You know, and everybody gets really nervous, but it actually also helps them get on their best behavior again. So, But it’s like if you always have someone waiting in the wings, then should you have someone that drops off? Maybe their husband gets transferred and they’re a wonderful employee, but it’s just now they have to move and now you’ve got someone that you can hire. Or if you have someone that’s like what happened in my office where, you know, it was a inventory day and doctors weren’t there and she decided to go work out and hang out with her boyfriend for five hours and then forgot to clock out, you know? So that’s called stealing. Yeah, and recently, and these are just real examples I’m sharing with people.

I’ve had some of my really, really nice employees, two of them decided to have a baby and start a family. And so I’m not going to hold an employee hostage. I’m not mad that they decided to move on, but you get to a place where if you’re not careful, folks, you’re going to find yourself in a kind of a defensive posture where you’re not going to be able to cover the appointments, the obligations, the customers that are reaching out to you. So if you’re out there today, Hiring has got to be a process and not an event. So again, just recapping the branding, the marketing, the search engine optimization, the hiring, the tracking.

I want to talk about retargeting ads. Retargeting ads, whenever somebody goes to your website, We’ve got to have ads that follow people around the internet. So that way, people constantly see Smiles Hollywood, Smiles Hollywood, Smiles Hollywood. And that creates top of mind awareness. Can you talk about how important it is for you to know that you have a team of people thinking about those kind of things so, again, you don’t have to? Absolutely.

And I think just being a Thrivetime customer really makes you feel like you’re taken care of in so many different areas. Because I didn’t even know what those ads were when I when I first became a client. I didn’t even know. I remember thinking, I wonder how you get to have an ad when you’re when you’re going to your bank account. And then all of a sudden, this thing pops up, you know, for some brand of sunglasses that you were just looking at. I thought, how do you get those ads?

You know, how do you even find out about them? And so these are the ads that you guys fix this up with. And they’re fantastic. And I do know that they do bring in patients. Now, coaching is an ongoing process. Every week, Andrew meets with you.

Every week, and this might sound shocking for folks out there, but every single morning, our coaches have to meet with me at six in the morning. And I ask them every morning, I say, How’s your client doing? And I go over all 160 clients. It’s a real thing. I go over 40 clients every single day.

I go over the checklist of all 40 clients every day. And we do that every single morning. So every week, we review the files of all 160 clients to make sure you guys are thriving, you’re growing, you’re not backsliding, everyone’s doing well. Could you talk about the importance of having somebody who, A, helps you track, but also kind of pushes you to be your best? Well, that has been a lifesaver because honestly, well, I kind of learned it on my own. because Andrew was good about pushing me and he would say, okay, well, did you meet with your staff about this or that?

And I said, oh yeah, I didn’t quite do that. And so he was really good about reminding me that I needed to meet with my staff once a week or once a day, whatever it was, depending on the item.

But I found like, for instance, with my front desk girl, She was fantastic, but she was supposed to be following up on leads. She was supposed to have a lead list. And so every week I would call her and say, Hey, how’s that lead list? And I would actually have Andrew on the phone with me and she, and we would talk and she, she kind of would say, Oh yeah, yeah, they’re good. And, you know, and then finally, I think she got it. She realized I need a list.

And so I think she realized Dr. Christ is going to ask me every week and I better get organized here. And so she actually came up with her own lead list in her own little system, which was fantastic, by the way. And it’s helped us tremendously at the front desk. And anytime we go over the lead list, because I have several, I have about three employees that have lead lists, different kinds of lead lists. And she is fantastic. I never have to worry about her lead list.

The other two, I have to check theirs. And that’s the thing is I think you start to really hold your employees accountable. And Andrew helps hold me accountable and make sure that I’m doing everything I’m supposed to be doing. Because let’s face it, life gets busy.

You know, and I mean, I’m a mom and I’m a wife and I have all kinds of other things going on too. And so I want to have a thriving business, but you have to, you have to put the work into your business.

And it’s nice to have someone there prodding me along when I get lazy. Now, you’re one of these wonderful folks where most of our clients, they actually come to the workshops. They also do coaching. And so you’re somebody who’s been to the conferences.

You do the weekly coaching. You’ve seen the whole experience.

I guess some people describe our coaching system as life -changing or they focus on the numbers. How would you describe how the one -on -one

coaching in conjunction with the conferences has impacted maybe you and or your business? Well, the first time that I ever met you, Clay, was at that first conference in Tulsa. And that was an incredible conference. And I was so impressed with just the whole thing, just the professionalism, you as a person. your business, your work ethic, and really just who you are. And I was very impressed with all of that.

And I thought, gosh, you know, this might be someone that I would really consider working with. Like maybe he could really help me. And that’s really what got me interested because I was so impressed with just the professionalism of all of it.

And I learned a lot.

I come about once a year to a business conference and I’d like to come more, but every year I try to come with my marketing girl with me. And we always learn something. We always learn something. And I think next year I’m going to bring my husband because he really needs to come too. And he’s been going along with this with me and he’s thinking, wow, this is really working for you. Maybe I need to come.

So we’ve loved it. So if somebody is watching right now, they’re on the website, they go to thrivetimeshow . com, they’re thinking about scheduling a free consultation, or they’re thinking about coming to a workshop, what do you say to somebody out there that’s on the fence thinking about coming to a conference and or scheduling a free 13 -point assessment?

Well, I say absolutely do it.

Absolutely do it. And I will say that it’s a process. It doesn’t happen overnight, but if you stay the course, you’re going to see results, because I’m absolutely convinced. Dr. Christ, thank you for allowing us to take up some of your valuable time today. I really do appreciate you, and I can’t wait to see you in person here soon. All right.

Thanks so much, Clay. Ladies and gentlemen, a lot of people talk about having success.

by the name of Dr. Mark Sherwood.

My good friend, Aaron Antis, swore by the results of Dr. Sherwood. My good friend, Pastor Craig Hagan, swore by the results of Dr. Sherwood. And we had a chance to team up. And it’s been an honor to team up with his practice and to help him grow his medical practice. And if you’re out there today and you want to grow your business, on today’s show, we’re going to talk about growing your business and what happens when you diligently implement a proven plan. And here to talk about it is Dr. Sherwood.

Welcome to the Thrive Time Show. How are you, sir? Yeah, I’m doing well, Clay. Thanks for having me. And it has been an honor, hasn’t it? What a ride and what a journey it’s been.

Now, without getting into the specific financial numbers, you and I were talking offline. And I believe, since you and I first talked on the phone today, I believe you’re about seven times larger. Is that an accurate number? Am I getting that number wrong in some capacity? No, it’s at least seven, closer to eight. Yeah.

And that’s so many people talk about growing their business by 2 % or 5 % or 12%. I want to give people some real facts here. We’re going to go here to Inc. I’m going to do a search right now on Google. I want everyone to do it with me. Assume I’m making this up. Inc.

Magazine reports that 96 % of businesses fail. That’s according to Inc Magazine. That’s not clayclark . com. 96%. Now, if you go to usdebtclock .

com, which is, by the way, a great way to get depressed. If you go to usdebtclock . org, you’ll see that in America today, we only have 9 million, 9 .3 million self -employed people and a country of 336 million. So just if even 10 % of our country was self -employed, that would be 36 million self -employed people. But we only have 9 million self -employed people. So we’re talking about

it’s like less than 3 % of our population is even self -employed to begin with. And so if less than 3 % of our population is self -employed, and 96 % of businesses fail, by default, folks, you’ve got, you know, I mean, it’s a very, very small percentage chance of being successful by default. And so what I want to focus on is implementing a proven path and a proven system. So step number one, since you and I have connected, I didn’t teach this to you, but you do it. You diligently implement a plan. Can you talk about that?

Because every week, you and I, we connect every week, you know, in this case, There’s a plan that you do, and I won’t get into all the details, but you do it every single week. You do it in the gym. You do it in your business. Talk about implementing a proven routine every day. Well, I think the end of the story of a routine is it produces predictability. And so I look at it like this.

Good habits done consistently over time provides reliability. which gives you consistency, which gives you faithfulness, which gives you trust. Now trust is a big deal. Does that trust mean you trust yourself? I hope so. Does it trust mean that your customers or clientele trust you?

They do because it’s predictable. The thing that people can’t stand, Clay, is unpredictability or chaos or just anxiety that’s driven in businesses. So we facilitate that culture from the top down the bottom up. And as you mentioned, every day I get up and I’m very routine. And so are you. You know, we started working together.

I remember you telling me, you get up at three o ‘clock in the morning, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I do, you know, I probably wake up about an hour after you, boom, boom, boom. But it’s very predictable. People know where we are, what we’re going to do. what we’re about, and it creates an expectation. And I think that, among other things, has been a key element to experiencing, you know, the 800 % growth we’ve had, which is, to me, it wasn’t that hard because it’s a process that works.

Now, next question I want to ask you is, Focus on what you need to do, but then say no to the things you don’t need to do. Again, you have to say no to grow. So yes, you’re diligent and you’re consistent, but you’re also saying no to grow. And now there are billboards, there are magazines, there are yellow pages. Yes, there are still a few yellow pages. There are billboards, there’s magazines, there’s a local cable TV.

There are so many different ways that you could be marketing your business, but you’ve had to say no to grow. focus on, and you and your wife, you guys do books, you do documentaries, you do podcast interviews. You have a proven path, a proven trajectory that you’re on, but you do have to say no to grow. And sometimes you have to say no to good things in order to say yes to great things. Can you talk about the importance of saying no to grow? Yeah, specifically in our job, what we do, which is kind of a wellness -based, optimization of health practice, right?

So the bottom line is I run everything through that filter and our filter is does it bring healing to the person? Does it bring betterment to the person? And there’s all kinds of procedures, gizmos, gadgets and whatnot that I hear that we could get involved in. But I always look at it from this standpoint. It’s got to run through that filter and it’s got to pass the test. Is it going to take us more time?

Is it going to take us more labor? what’s the expense of it going to be originally, and what’s it going to take for us to recoup the expense, if any. And so I run into that filter every single time, and it’s doesn’t hash out, it may be a good thing, but it’s not a good thing for us. And people don’t understand that. But sometimes the greatest answer is no, because it’s a no that protects you from getting hurt.

And you mentioned all that advertising mess out there. Clay, we’ve been approached by, as you know, many, many people to advertise in all kinds of markets. But if you don’t know what kind of person you’re talking to, that you’re after, what is your target demographic, then you can’t just throw spitballs out there at the different sources because you will waste your time and money. And again, in that area, advertising, know to grow is critical. Now the next area I want to focus on is having a linear workflow or a mapped out workflow or a written down process. So many business owners don’t have a written down process.

So let me just give people an example. I’m going to go up to my website, then I’ll go to your website so people can see this. Very predictable. If people go to thrive timeshow . com, which by the way, folks, we have about five to 10 people a day that often reach out looking for help growing their company. Now, I only take on 160 clients.

That’s not a spiritual number. That’s not a reason. I don’t do that for any spiritual reason. It’s just I have found that with my team, I like to not have more than 160 clients so that I can meet all my clients. And those clients, they schedule a free consultation. And in order to do that, I have a kind of a call screener that sets up an appointment.

They hop on the phone. They find out if they’re a good fit for a free consultation. Then my team books the free consultation for me. And because our average client is with us for six years or longer, if you do the math, we have an opening for a new client about every month or so. So if you look at TWA photos, this is one of my longtime clients based in Chicago.

Him, and we’re going to hear his success story on part two of today’s show.

He reached out. he filled out the form, a member of my team called Tim to see if he was a good fit. I then coached Tim on the first call, found out he’s a good fit, did my assessment, found out he’s a good fit, coached him through what we’re gonna do, laid out the proven plan. True story, and you’re gonna hear it on part two of today’s show. Tim went on to build a very, very successful company and he sold his business. Well, when he sold his business for a big time exit, guess what that did?

That created an opening for another client. And so the process we have over and over and over is you go to thriftimeshow . com, you can schedule a free consultation. My call screener vets that person to see if they’re a good fit. If they are a good fit, they do an onboarding with myself. Also, we have conference tickets.

We do a conference every two months, and I’ve been doing this since 2005. So since 2005, I’ve been essentially doing the same process over and over and over. That’s why when you click on testimonials, you will literally see thousands of client success stories, just thousands, not 100, not 50, but thousands. So I want to see if you can walk us through, what does the workflow look like when people go to Sherwood . tv? What does that workflow look like?

It’s fascinating. And again, you know, you and I just kind of hit it off because we think the same way. So we have, you know, we have an opportunity people visit our website and we get, you know, hundreds of visitors every day. And people can fill out a little questionnaire. It’s like a health assessment question. It’s free.

And they get put through a series of, you know, funnel emails to sort of qualify what they want to do. And it sort of kind of vets them at the outset. But if they want to work with us, just like yourself, when we have a free webinar that they can go to. At that point, after attending the webinar, Clay, they then have the opportunity at that point to schedule a one -on -one assessment intake appointment with my wife. and myself. At that appointment, we determine whether or not they’re a good fit.

If they’re a good fit, we develop a plan for those and execute the same plan with the same full minutes. We’re personalized for their lives, much like you personalize that plan with the same general processes for that business, we personalize that plan of the same general processes for their life. Now, when people work with me, with my business, and I’m not a medical business, I have a proven process and a proven system. And so when people go. And they go to thrivetimeshow . com and they look at the different success stories.

We have companies like oxyfresh . com. We’ve helped them to grow now to 570 locations, 570. And I could go on just listing examples all day. We take companies like Shaw Homes, helped them grow from 15 million to $150 million of revenue. And we just have so many success stories.

It truly is epic. And that’s why my parent company is called Make Your Life Epic. That is what we do, Make Your Life Epic. Dr. Sherwood, I would say what he does is very analogous to what we do for business. He does for your body. And so, again, I believe what he does, Dr. Sherwood, Sherwood .

TV, what he does for your body is very analogous to what we do for business. We guide people down a proven path. And we actually tell people before they decide to become a client what the path is. We tell people, this is what we’re going to do to get you from where you are to where you want to be. Now, I know a lot of people, I would say specifically Three people that I see on a weekly basis who have lost over 40 pounds since going to Sherwood . tv.

So three people that I see on a weekly basis have lost over 40 pounds as a result of going to Sherwood . tv, learning about the protocols you offer, and then following those.

You tell people in advance what the protocol’s gonna be.

That’s very different from a lot of other medical programs that kind of hide program or the protocol from the potential customer, from the potential patient. They hide it and they say, once you sign up, then we’ll teach you the protocol. Why are you so transparent with teaching people what your protocol is going to be before they become a patient? I think it produces trustworthiness, Clay, because a lot of times With what we do, transparency is key because my wife and I do it too. Again, I’m not knocking anybody else.

I just know that what you just said is very true. It is analogous to you making someone’s company greater. I want to see their lives get greater. I want to optimize their health, give them the biological aging process of speed that’s optimal so they’re not aging too fast. And so we live it out. We do it.

And then it’s no secret, man. There are some processes that work. And I tell them, you know, if you’re willing to do this, this will work. And they see us doing it every day. We don’t hide our lives and we don’t shield them. We don’t do something.

Tell them do something we’re not doing ourselves. So I think it’s exactly as you said. And to your point, we deal with a lot of entrepreneurs. that have worked with you and do work with you. So the interesting overlap is cool. I can think of a couple of people that we’ve worked with that also are your clients in their business, and I’ve watched their businesses explode as their personal lives explode.

So the synergy there is just astounding to me as I think about that. Now, I want to walk people through this again here, folks. Again, we’re going to walk you through that. How is it that a doctor A medical provider a health facility is able to grow their revenue by eight times within a period of just a few years. How is that possible when 96 percent of businesses are failing?

One is you have to have a proven plan. Two, you have to implement that plan each and every week. And three, you have to measure what you treasure. You just have to measure what you treasure. You have to track or it’s gonna slack. And that’s true with health and it’s true with wealth.

You have to track or it’s gonna slack. And so any area of our lives, if you’re listening right now, you talk about your faith, your family, your finance, your fitness, your friendship, your fun, any area where we are not achieving our optimal performance. It’s probably because we’re not measuring what we’re treasuring. It’s probably we’re not focusing on it. And again, I’m not attacking anybody out there. There’s somebody out there listening right now.

You are phenomenal. a physical shape and financially you’re not in shape. There’s somebody else out there listening, you’re in great financial shape, you’re in great physical shape, but your family’s not in great shape. Somebody else out there, you say you got your family, you got your faith, you got your fitness, you got your friendship, but you’re really, really in a bad spot in another area. So whatever we measure is what we treasure. Talk about that for a second because you have a way of helping your patients and your clients to measure what they treasure and to track.

And I see people all the time coming into my office being excited. They’ve lost four pounds. They lost six pounds. They lost nine pounds. They lost 20. They lost 21 pounds.

They lost 27 pounds. They lost 30. They lost 40. And you see people gaining confidence every week as they begin to take this massive goal they have and they start to see success day after day. Talk about measuring what you treasure. Yeah, one thing I forgot to add to the process, we have quarterly events.

I mean, and I didn’t, you know, have those things too, which are kind of cool. That’s kind of a culmination of stuff that people can celebrate. But when we talk about measurables, we talk about this all the time, you know, physical, emotional, intellectual, spiritual, financial, the five parts of a human experience, you know. And so, and I talk to them, I don’t get into heavy dealing with their debt, though, but I talk to them about eliminating debt and building equity. But I use that same terminology. within health.

I don’t want wellness debt. I want wellness equity. So in other words, if you can’t measure it, don’t do it. I never do a test unless I know what I’m asking, what questions I’m trying to get answered. and why I’m measuring it. I don’t do that.

You mentioned weight loss. We have a unique way to measure that, not just about what the scale says, but I’m measuring their body composition, Clay. I’m measuring their percent body fat. I want to know how much muscle they’ve maintained or grown and how much fat they’ve been able to lose. I want to know their visceral fat level. I want to know their blood pressure.

I want to know all their scores that I can find. We’ve even got tests that can score their biological aging processes and speeds and actualities. It quantifies that into measurable components. And so we’re actually developing right now, and I haven’t got it rolled out yet, a quotient we’re going to call the FMI age, you know, and it’s going to be a little massive thing that we’re going to put together. Because, you know, I think people are aging in a way that is probably too fast, you know, and I think we can probably age better. But to your point, I concur a thousand percent.

If you can’t measure it and it’s not quantifiable, don’t do it because then it becomes a distraction. Now, I want to tap into your wisdom on this, let you kind of show off what you do a little bit here. You know, one of my wonderful clients is called Kola Fitness. Kola Fitness and Charles Kola. He started out doing personal training. He started out doing personal training.

And on part two of today’s show, folks, you’re going to hear his success story too. So you’re going to hear the success story of TWA Photos. You’re going to hear the success story of Kola Fitness. He started out doing personal training. And then he decided, you know what? I want to open up a gym.

And then he said, you know what? I want to open up a second gym. And that’s where we met him, is as he was scaling the business. And so what he does when people want to lose weight, I’ll tell you his secret. He tells them, here’s the deal.

I need you to not eat wheat, no sweets, and no alcohol. And people are like, what? He’s like, no wheat, no sweets, no alcohol. We’ll see you three days a week working out. And he starts that process. He starts small.

No wheat, no sweets, no alcohol, three days a week working out. And over time, they start to add maybe more detail to it, more supplementation, more detail, maybe more vigorousness to it. But they start off with no wheat, no sweets, no alcohol, three days a week working out. And then they start to build on that foundation. I want to get your, just for anybody out there that’s thinking about becoming a SureWood . tv patient or client, and they’re maybe concerned about what’s going to be required of them, what sort of life changes need to be made in the lives of people that are thinking about implementing the SureWood path?

And I know there’s a lot of details, a lot of research that you do into each and every patient, but what are a couple of practical steps that every single one of your patients has to implement right away? Well, I appreciate you know I know Charles is why great people, by the way, and I concur with what he said that’s a great start for anybody right there so at least take that I think for us. Our advice would be simply put, if it’s real food eat it.

don’t diet.

If it’s in the original package, it’s fine. If you can imagine it being in that package in the Garden of Eden, it’s fine. So I tell people typically to stay away. It’s going to sound crazy. Anything the government subsidizes, don’t do it. That’s kind of what I tell them with food and people can go, oh yeah, I get that because the government subsidizes wheat, corn, soy, dairy, and that kind of mess, you know.

So I tell them stay away from that. Then I tell them that every day I want you to try to get, you know, somewhere between about seven hours, give or take, is probably if you can get that much. And then I tell them every day that you don’t move is a day you’re dead. So I want them to move more, sit less. The days you don’t move are the day that you are going to be in the rigor mortis. So I make sure I tell them that.

And then I want them to have the last little bit. Speak life over self, man. Don’t speak death over self.

Because many times people can walk themselves into a process of oblivion by talking themselves into death every day, saying they can’t do it.

Now, for anybody out there that hasn’t worked with us, I mean, you and I have had the opportunity to work together faithfully each and every week now for years.

What would you say the impact has been on your business, working with us, you and I working together, for anybody out there who’s maybe thinking about working with us or becoming a client of ours?

Well, without question, people need guidance today, Clay. It’s like a ship without a rudder. You represent the rudder. You can teach them how to drive, but you also shift that boat in the right direction. And I would recommend people do connect with you because you will do a good job. It will be consistent.

It will be predictable. And if people just copy these habits, no matter what business you’re in, you can adapt them to the business, the habits work, and you will see a good return on that investment. And it will exponentially grow. And then the last thing I’ll say with that, When you connect with Clay Clark, you need to set your bar high. He will not let you set that bar low because he’s going to stretch you, he’s going to push you, and he’s going to get the, on a set like this, he will pull the potential out of you and get you believing again in a good way. So, highly recommend it.

I just, working with you has been an honor. It’s a true win -win. For anybody out there that’s looking for health optimization, check it out at surewood .

tv, surewood . tv.

And again, thank you. you do is so analogous for health to what we do for wealth. And so And so for anybody out there, if you’re looking to optimize your health, check out Sherwood . TV, Sherwood . TV. Dr. Sherwood, thank you so much.

And again, for anybody out there that doesn’t know the story here, which should be everybody, you and I were just talking offline the other day. And you were saying, hey, Clay, I just want you to know, since you and I first connected, we’re up you know, eight times. And I just thought, well, man, you know, there’s so much discouragement in the world we live in. We need to document this and get this on camera. So thank you for keeping us updated, sir. And I can’t wait to have you on the show next week.

You’re welcome. Thanks for having me, as always. Take care. Bye -bye. I’m Dr. Brett Kasbaum, and I was looking to learn more about business, scaling, sailing, closing. potentially franchising, growing that business and actually working on it and not as much in it.

Oh goodness, it’s going to take me a little bit of time to process everything I brought in over the last two days, but there’s definitely some things I need to go back and implement immediately. Some with key players, some of our processes systems, some scripting. We’ve been using scripting. I think we can improve on it and that’s definitely one of the first things we’ll do because we’re seeing the patients coming in on a real regular basis. and I think we can capture more of those patients with even a small tweak of some of our scripts. Coming to the workshop today has definitely been helpful in adding to and giving the big picture, the 10 ,000 foot view.

So I would recommend everyone who’s been working with one of the coaches that’s part of Thrive 15 to definitely attend one of the workshops. You network with other business owners, you learn from other people’s questions, If you’re just considering being a part of one of these coaching teams, this is a great place to start. You’ll get that 10 ,000 foot view and then you can work individually with a team of coaches. to really hone it in and give you those action steps to move forward.

So definitely if you’re on the fence, come be a part of it. Welcome to Tulsa on behalf of me. America’s number one business coach has answers.

It’s your broda from Minnesota.

Here’s another edition of Ask Clay Anything on the Thrive Time Business Coach Radio Show.

Welcome back to another special edition of Ask Me Anything here on the Thrive Time Show on your radio and podcast download.

On today’s show, we’re answering the question that has been emailed a lot lately.

People say, hey, hey, hey, I have heard from a friend of mine that you helped their company grow.

I’ve seen a testimonial online about how you’ve helped a company grow. I’ve heard on social media how you’ve helped a company grow. I know your program is month -to -month.

I know there’s no contract. I get it, but I would like to know what actually do you do for your clients? What do you guys actually do? How do you actually help them have wins or successes? Or what kind of things do you do? What kind of strategic help?

What kind of accountability?

What kind of deliverables?

What kind of back -end support? What do you do to help your clients?

And so I thought what we would do is invite one of my friends and one of our clients, Dr. Breck, onto the show.

It’s DRBRECK .

com if you want to look him up here.

DRBRECK .

com, Dr. Breck.

And Dr. Breck Kasbaum is a chiropractor who has had major success in the past year. And the guy has been in business for over 15 years but he’s been able to double his business in just the past 12 months. So how did he do it?

What did we do to help him?

All of these things will be answered on today’s show as I interview Dr. Breck about his experience with actual one -on -one business coaching and how we’ve been able to help him double the size of his business in just the past 12 months.

Now, Dr. Brecht, talk to me about what kind of changes have you made, and how has it impacted your overall profitability or growth? Well, I’m happy to report that, you know, December of 2018, we had our highest grossing month. So I’m super excited about that. Ever?

Ever. Whoa, that deserves, you know what, that deserves…

Wins of the week!

That’s a win of the week.

Dr. Brecht celebrating a sales record here. A new year, a new you.

How is it possible?

He’s a diligent doer. So what kind of practical changes have you made?

Oh, man. Well, we had to look at our price structure. So, you know, we have to have to be honest with the value and what it costs to deliver services. And we can’t continue to give away services. you know, for free or losing money on them.

And so that was one of the big steps. We also had to get rid of toxic employees or even contractors, in our case, the massage therapist, our self -employed contractors. But… Little warning about therapists, by the way. The only difference between the rapist and a therapist is a space.

Yeah. Just think about it. OK, back to you. That reminds me of Sean Connery on Saturday Night Live.

What other changes have you made this year? I was non -existent on our SEO. I mean, I literally was non -existent.

If you put my name in exactly, spelled correctly, you might have found me on like 20 pages back.

Got it, but now you’ve got all the content, all the tags, all the Google reviews. So that all started from scratch and we now have like 257 reviews and we’re climbing the Google search engine each day. I was doing a search for you, was it yesterday? And I think you were over 250, let me pull it up real quick. 257, you’re right, 257 Google reviews. And so are you having people that are finding you online now?

Yes, and that’s a nice new thing.

You know, people come in and they’re like, hey, I saw your reviews. Are you up 10 % more than last year, 20 %? What percentage are you up now?

We’re up, so it fluctuates a little bit, but I mean, literally from like a year and a half ago to now.

Yeah, we’re up double.

Double.

Yeah.

Now have you have you fixed yours?

Have you changed or improved your sales scripting or your sales processes?

We have Yeah, we very intensely went over a lot of scripting and things. But then also we do. We do have a no brainer offer. Yeah. And so the conversion aspect of that to go from, hey, this is all free to I do expect you to pay me at some point. Getting a better conversion script for me to work from has also been very helpful.

business owners before they come into our program have a hard time finding good people. And then after they’re in the program, that’s usually not a problem anymore. Is that the case with you? Are you doing good on finding people? Or how have you changed your recruitment process?

Just before starting working with Tim, we had some change up and some people left on their own accord and they were about to have that conversation anyway, so it worked out.

Nice timing. Um, but, uh, yeah, so we’ve brought on some great people, um, in the last year and, uh, and now we’re, we’re from a totally different way of thinking about that with not being held captive and a hostage in my own office. How do you feel now? Do you and your wife, does it feel better? Do you have more pride about the business now that you’re more profitable?

Absolutely. I see the difference in her eyes too. I’ve been a doctor for the last 15 years, but to be a successful doctor is a little better. So I needed tangible action steps, like give me a task to do today that I can put my hands to work. on doing that. But I mean, I had to borrow money from family members.

Thank you, Dad. Big shout out to your dad. I owe you. But yeah, I mean, it was tough on my wife. She’s a schoolteacher and we were we were living paycheck to paycheck every month trying to rob Peter to pay Paul. Got it.

And not fun. Not fun at all. And you’re a doctor. You’re a chiropractor. Yeah, it’s embarrassing. Your business does not have to be embarrassing, and you don’t have to feel stuck.

But you do have to take action if you want to get unstuck. Thomas Edison has said, and I quote it so many times on the show, vision without execution is hallucination. So if you feel stuck, you feel overwhelmed, you don’t know what to do, Just reach out to us today. Just reach out to us today. Go to thrivetimeshow . com and schedule a 13 -point one -on -one assessment with yours truly, and we can see if we can help you.

Again, my name’s Clay Clark. I’m a business coach. Big shout -out to Dr. Breck. And as always, we like to end each and every show with a boom. Three, two, one, boom! My name is Joe Lye and I’m with Kirkpatrick & Lye Orthodontics.

At Kirkpatrick & Lye Orthodontics, we create beautiful smiles by straightening kids’ teeth and adults’ teeth. The services that Clay and his team provide be something like how to get more customers into my business and get the message out that I’m the best orthodontist in Tulsa. He does that by social media. We get the word out through videos and pictures. and being just top of mind awareness as he would always say.

Also, how to reach out and create that bond with my referring doctors. He helped me kind of get somebody in -house to go out and meet doctors. Helped me kind of continue building that relationship while I do the work. Website, the website’s so majorly important. We get several patients through our website. And what he’s doing is he’s There’s a certain way that you want your website to look and certain content, because you want call to action items in your website.

And we didn’t have that before. So now we get seven or eight new patients just through the website alone. Clay and his team are, I would just say they’re over the top. I mean, nothing is too big. Nothing’s too grand for Clay and his staff and his team. I mean, he says, boom, he really means it.

I mean, they over deliver, really, to be honest with you. And they come up with ideas that are just top -notch. And if you don’t like something, great, move on. He’ll figure out something that works for your style and your identity. But I would just say the biggest thing for Clay and his team is they over -deliver. Clay and his team help kind of create that culture also for your business that, hey, we got to get things done in a timely manner.

Holds me accountable to do the certain tasks so that we can create things in a timely manner. So there is a sense of urgency that he creates, and a lot of it’s just through his enthusiasm. He’s always on the go, so it kind of puts you on that same mindset of, hey, let’s get this done. Let’s work hard, but let’s also have fun with it. When I went to orthodontic school, we got zero training on marketing.

Actually, when we got out of school, when I got out of school, 18 years ago, it was kind of taboo to actually do any marketing. The most you could do is put your name in the yellow pages. And so now it’s pretty common knowledge and pretty mainstream to go ahead and get your name out there, tell everybody your story, who you are, what you’re about. If you don’t do that, it’s a leg of your business that you’re lagging behind. Because you could be the best or the honest or the best, whatever. But if people don’t know that, then you won’t get the customers coming in.

I meet with Clay and his team on every Friday about 11 o ‘clock. And to be honest with you, at the beginning, I wasn’t that thrilled with it. Coming in every week just kind of seemed like a lot. But for me, I find the marketing aspect interesting. I enjoy it. I love working with Clay.

I think it’s the main reason why. I’ve kind of built a relationship with him. I think it got to a level now where we’re pretty good friends. And so, to me it’s enjoyable. I really enjoy the creativity and how when you put the energy into it and the work into it, how everything kind of comes back and it works. I’ve worked with Clay and his team for about I think it’s about three years.

Every year it’s just gotten better and things have grown. I’ve been trying to get my wife and her pediatric dentist office and our partners on board with Clay for a while. I just saw that they were kind of getting stagnant in their practice and times were kind of getting slow for them and they needed more referrals. And I knew that Clay could definitely help them out. by even just one thing, which would be change your website. And just by doing that, you’re going to get patients very easily.

But another thing, too, is that they needed to change their culture and their mindset of how to bring in patients and creating a brand as well for them and giving them more of an identity so the whole staff could come around. For anybody that’s coming out of school or just starting new with a business, of any sort, be it medical or anything of that nature. I highly recommend Clay helping you create that business model. We’re trained to do what we’re trained to do, but we’re not trained to do the business aspect or the marketing or how to deal with the patient or our staff. So Clay can pretty much do all that. But what I like the most about Clay and his staff is that everything’s in -house.

I don’t have to go to one place to do my website. I don’t have to go somewhere to do my videos. I don’t have to go another place to shoot photographs. Somewhere else to do web content or team coaching or entrepreneurship. Clay pretty much is the total package. He’s really a great mentor.

So if you’re new and starting a business and you want to avoid all the pitfalls, I would definitely hook up with Clay and his team. If someone’s not using Clay and his team to help build their business, they’re missing out on a lot. There are so many details and so many aspects of creating a business that Clay really makes it simple. makes it fun, and you learn so much in a short amount of time that I think he’s the best entrepreneur, business coach, marketer, you name it. The guy and his team’s got it all going on. Hello, my name is Charles Colaw with Colaw Fitness.

Today I want to tell you a little bit about Clay Clark and how I know Clay Clark. Clay Clark has been my business coach since 2017. He’s helped us grow from two locations to now six locations. We’re planning to do seven locations in seven years and then franchise. And Clay has done a great job of helping us navigate anything that has to do with like running the business, building the systems, the checklists, the workflows, the audits, how to navigate lease agreements, how to buy property, how to work with brokers and builders. This guy is just amazing.

This kind of guy has worked in every single industry. He’s written books with like Lee Crockrell, head of Disney with the 40 ,000 cast members. He’s friends with like Mike Lindell. He does reawaken America tours where he does these tours all across the country where 10 ,000 or more people show up to some of these tours on the day -to -day. today, he does anywhere from about 160 companies. He’s at the top.

He has a team of business coaches, videographers, and graphic designers and web developers, and they run 160 companies every single week. So think of this guy with a team of business coaches running 160 companies. So in the weekly, he’s running 160 companies. Um, every six to eight weeks, he’s doing reawaken America tours every six to eight weeks. He’s also doing business conferences where 200 people show up and he teaches people a 13 step proven system that he’s done and worked with billionaires, helping them grow their companies. Um, so he’s, I’ve seen guys from startups go from startup to being multimillionaires, um, teaching people how to get time freedom and financial freedom.

him through the system. critical thinking, document creation, making it, putting it into organizing everything in their head to building it into a franchisable, scalable business. Like one of his businesses has like 500 franchises. That’s just one of the companies or brands that he works with. So amazing guy, Elon Musk, kind of like smart guy.

He kind of comes off sometimes as socially awkward, but he’s so brilliant and he’s taught me so much. When I say that, like Clay is like, he doesn’t care what people think when you’re talking to him.

He cares about, where you’re going in your life and where he can get you to go and that’s what I like him most about him. He’s like a good coach. A coach isn’t just making you feel good all the time, a coach is actually helping you get to the best you and Clay has been an amazing business coach. Through the course of that we became friends. I was really most impressed with him is when I was shadowing him one time.

We went into a business deal and listened to it.

I got to shadow and listen to it.

And when we walked out, I knew that he could make millions on the deal. And they were super excited about working with him. And he told me, he’s like, I’m not going to touch it. I’m going to turn it down because he knew it was going to harm the common good of people in the long run. And the guy’s integrity just really wowed me. It brought tears to my eyes to see that this guy, he doesn’t, his highest desire was do what’s right and anyways just just just an amazing man so anyways impacted me a lot he’s helped navigate anytime I’ve got nervous or worried about how to run the company or you know navigating

competition and an economy that’s like, I remember we got closed down for three months. He helped us navigate on how to stay open, how to get back open, how to just survive through all the COVID shutdowns, lockdowns, because our clubs were all closed for three months. And you have $350 ,000 of bills you’ve got to pay. And we have no accounts receivable. He helped us navigate that. And of course, we were conservative enough that we could afford to take that on for a period of time.

He was a great man. I’m very impressed with him. So Clay, thank you for everything you’re doing. And I encourage you, if you haven’t worked with Clay, work with Clay. He’s going to help magnify you. And there’s nobody I have ever met that has the ability to work as hard as he does. He probably sleeps four, maybe six hours a day, and literally the rest of the time he’s working.

And he can outwork everybody in the room. every single day, and he loves it. So anyways, this is Charles Kola with Kola Fitness. Thank you, Clay. And anybody out there that’s wanting to work with Clay, it’s a great, great opportunity to ever work with him. So you guys have a blessed one.

This is Charles Kola. We’ll see you guys. Clay Clark is here somewhere. Where’s my buddy Clay? Clay’s the greatest. I met his goats today.

I met his dogs. I met his chickens. I saw his compound. He’s like the greatest guy. I ran from his goats, his chickens, his dogs. So this guy’s like the greatest marketer you’ve ever seen, right?

His entire life, Clay Clark, his entire life is marketing.

Transcribed with Cockatoo