Renowned Voice Actress Anna Vocino Shares How & Why She Built Her Gluten-Free Focused EatHappyKitchen.com (In 1,300+ Grocery Stores) + How to Get Products Into Retail & Grocery Stores + Why “No” Means “Not Right Now”

Audio Transcription

Transcribed with Cockatoo

Some shows don’t need a celebrity narrator to introduce the show, but this show does. In a world filled with endless opportunities, why would two men who have built 13 multi -million dollar businesses altruistically invest five hours per day to teach you the best practice business systems and moves that you can use? Because they believe in you, and they have a lot of time on their hands. This started from the bottom, Now they’re here. It’s the Thrive Time show starring the former U . S.

Small Business Administration’s Entrepreneur of the Year, Clay Clark, and the entrepreneur trapped inside an optometrist’s body, Dr. Robert Zilner. Two men, eight kids, co -created by two different women, 13 multimillion dollar businesses. On today’s show, we’re talking about something that you probably know about. It’s Mrs. Potato Head. You know about Mrs. Potato Head, but do you know the voice behind Mrs. Potato Head? Potato Head?

Folks, on today’s show, we’re interviewing the renowned voice actress who you’ve probably heard her voice on a lot of things. In fact, I would argue it is statistically not probable that you have not heard her voice before. And with that being said, Anna, welcome onto the Thrived Time Show. How are you? I love it. I love being welcomed on with a double negative.

Let’s go. OK. So first off, before you became the voice of Mrs. Potato Head, Yes. What are some of the other projects that people may know you from? Video games, hundreds of video games. You’ve probably played.

I’ve been playable characters. I’ve been non -playable characters. I have been the voice of promos on NBC, ABC, HBO, CBS, Fox, you name it. I have done hundreds of cartoons, commercials, radio ads, even those annoying phone systems, the never -ending phone trees where you want to yell at the computerized voice. I am the computerized voice, and I apologize on behalf of all of us for your inconvenience. Could you demonstrate?

If you don’t want to, it’s OK. Or maybe some of the different voices that you’ve done, is there maybe a voice that you might be comfortable demonstrating on the show? Oh, well, I think the phone voice is the most irritating. So should we start irritating people just from the jump? Let’s start there. So let’s say you call.

Let’s say you call The Thrive Time Show and you’re really upset about an episode that you heard and you want to just give them a piece of your mind, okay? So I would come in and I would say, hi, thanks for calling the Thrive Time Show. Press 1 if you’d like to leave positive feedback. Press 2 if you have an axe to grind. And so then they would press 2, right? And then I would go, I’m sorry, I didn’t get that.

And then they’d mash 2. 2, 2, they’d be screaming. I’m sorry, I still didn’t get that. And then I would probably discontinue the call because isn’t that what the computers do? They hang up on you or they route you and you stay on hold for 20 minutes. then they hang you up.

I’m not responsible for that part of it, but I’m part of the problem. How did you? I gotta pay my bills. How did you or when did you arrive on the idea that you wanted to become a vocal actress? I’ve always wanted to do it. I have always worked in comedy.

I started in improv and then moved on to stand up and was a stand up for years. I really love voice acting because you didn’t have any pressure of what you looked like. You didn’t feel like you needed to lose five pounds before you went in to shoot a job. You could just be yourself. And for me, I was just very comfortable behind the mic and could always do the funny voices. But then you have to train and you have to be like you’re in the podcasting and radio world.

You have to make sure that you can speak well and pronounce your words and read a script, but you don’t have to memorize lines. So I always kind of liked it. And then when I booked my first job as a very young, you know, baby actor and made you know, two, three months rent and one job. I was like, this is a good gig. Can I do more of this? And just worked really hard to be able to do more of that and have been lucky to have worked for 25 years now.

What was your first gig that you got that felt like a real gig? You know, I mean, I’m sure you did some hell gigs. You did some, what was your first entrance where you thought to yourself, self, I may actually have a career here. Well, you know, I always say you have to book, you have to book, you have to get three jobs before you start to really believe that you can do it. Because the first time sometimes feels like a fluke. Because if you knew the numbers that you’re up against, it is a numbers game, but it’s kind of a confluence of a numbers game, a talent game, a being available game, and having access to the opportunities.

So you have to have all those things have to meet in one place and the planets have to align, right, for you to get a job. So what was the first job where I thought, I think, honestly, I did a bunch of recurring voice work for that show, that soap opera, The Young and the Restless. And so I was repeatedly going onto the set and it shot at CBS down in West Hollywood. And I would go in there and I was like, this is, they would keep having me back. And I think it’s when you start to get the repeat business. And that’s what I’ve learned down the line, having my own business.

When you have people coming back, that means you have a good product, AKA me. I was a good product and reliable and somebody they wanted to hire again and again. Anna Vocino. Annavocino . com. That’s the website. Annavocino .

com. Very good. That’s how you do it. So we go there. Yes, this is where we can find that which you do. But you also have been quietly bootstrapping something that’s really catching on here.

Eathappykitchen . com. Correct. Let’s talk about eathappykitchen . com. Eathappykitchen .

com. What is eathappykitchen . com, and what motivated you to start it? Well, what motivated me was kind of a long process. In 2002, I was diagnosed with celiac disease, which is an autoimmune disease where the only known way to handle it is to not have gluten. And in 2002, there was not a lot of dialogue around gluten -free and what that meant.

And I know in America, there was a lot of eye -rolling surrounding people with food allergies and food restrictions, but it’s a legit medical thing. tasted some of the gluten -free food that was on the market at the time, and it was absolutely revolting. And I remember throwing a pack of $17 cookies across the room going, this is disgusting. It had my little Tara, you know, I will never go hungry again moment. And I decided there’s got to be a better way. things gluten -free that I was determined to make taste good.

Then in around 2012, I had aged. I had been eating a lot of gluten -free treats and started podcasting with a guy named Vinny Tortorich. And he taught me about no sugars, no grains. And I switched my entire focus to cutting out the processed foods, the seed oils, the sugars, the grains, all the trickery that happens in food labels. And I now have well, three cookbooks with a fourth on the way in the fall, a line of pasta sauces, spices and cheese bites. And I just kind of looked for places in the marketplace that I as a mom and a wife and somebody who needed to stay in shape and not get full blown type two diabetes, what was I looking for in the marketplace?

And what like the confluence of what was I looking for the marketplace and what were my recipes that I would make all the time that maybe I could figure out a shelf stable version that was clean. And that’s kind of how it all came about. And turns out people are also looking for those things. Now, this company has become a fast -growing phenomenon. It is taking off. I have five great kids, and one of my great kids is very, very allergic to anything gluten, anything gluten at all.

It just shuts her down. Other people can’t relate to the stomach pains and all the things that it’s debilitating to her if she eats a gluten. And so, you know, tell me about how Who is is an ideal fit for your website? And maybe what kind of reaction you’re getting from your customers as you’re continuing to gain traction? You know, that’s a very good question. Because my ideal customer is looking for no sugar added, all of my stuff will always be gluten free, because I need to be able to get high on my own supply.

And I would never make something that has gluten, because then I can’t eat it and enjoy it. So here’s, here’s the thing. being pasta sauce is inherently gluten -free. There should not ever be gluten in pasta sauce. Most people pair it with pasta. So it’s got gluten in it, or you can get gluten -free pasta, or I do it with vegetables, zucchini noodles.

I do it with meat. That’s how I take it in. So looking for gluten free s would be somebody who’s l for you product. But what I call my little low carb who are willing to spend a little bit more on a very good product, because the problem is a lot of the stuff that we’re replacing on shelf is it’s trashy. It’s bad ingredients. It’s not good for you.

And people are getting very savvy now about how to read food labels, which is good, because I’m part of that solution. So I’m looking for those people, generally moms like myself, dads who are looking for a way to turn around their health prognosis. I get a lot of folks who are like, middle America folks who’ cutting out sugars and g to be able to trust where from. I can’t make every would die trying in the p possible. So I think it is we find out where our food Now correct me if i’m wrong, but I think your products are now in 1100 grocery stores. Maybe more than that 1300 plus.

Yeah Yeah, how do you get your product? How did you get your product into stores? Listen, it is that is I always say if I can tell jokes to drunk people at 1 a . m at flappers in burbank Um, I can pitch a grocery store buyer because they are very not having it They’re trained grocery store buyers in this country are trained to extract as as much money and value o every three months to mak doing that. So if you’re bootstrapped, as you menti We haven’t raised our seed round.

We haven’t gotten to our Series A. We’re bootstrapped from our direct -to -consumer sales and a crowdfund that we did with my cookbook fans. And so everything has got to line up to grow this company. So we don’t have excess bucks to be like, we want to pay several hundreds of thousands of dollars for shelf space. We’re not in that place. So we have to rely on me being able to pitch grocery store buyers, applying, sending the message of the brand, you know what I mean? Getting that brand story across.

What is our value over what our competitors are doing? And for us to take up that valuable space, because grocery stores are, they’re calculating their dollar per square inch of shelf space in the store. So I’ve got to be able to get in there, give a compelling story, make sure that our sales back it up, make sure that my audience is going in -store and buying until the regular Joe who’s never heard of Eat Happy Kitchen will see it on the shelf and go, oh, I want to try that pink crema sauce. That looks interesting. We have to run promos. That’s a thing that I learned.

I didn’t know. When you see sale tags at the grocery store, that’s not the grocery store paying for it. The brand is paying for that because we want to do what’s known as drive trial. We want to get you trying our wonderful product. So yeah, that’s how I got in. It was just diligent.

And sometimes it takes 1, 2, 3, 4 tries. And by tries, I mean, they review the category once a year. So you got to you got to take it at bat, and you have to wait several months. And then they say no. And then you got to wait for that review to come back and just improve what you can about your numbers, your packaging, your price, anything you can improve, pitch them again. And just just, I don’t know where I’m down, I guess.

Now, I, you and I haven’t talked offline about this, but I’ve worked with a lot of people to help me with this. get their products in stores. And so I know a little bit about that. But I always tell clients, step one, you make a list of all of the dream stores you want to be in, like a perfect world. You make a list of all of them. And then step two, you have to call them all until they cry, buy, or die.

Cry meaning they say, quit calling me. I love it. Buy, they buy something. Or die meaning that sometimes the actual representative no longer works there anymore, and now you have to move on to a new person. Bye. Yeah. When you’re calling at scale and trying to schedule pitches, who are you typically talking to within the grocery world?

So, okay, so this is great. And I would even take, I would even advise folks to stop trying that part of it. I would say actually, generally a no in the grocery business means a not right now. just because you didn’t m review doesn’t mean you ‘r ready in a year or two do we think that we’re read and that’s okay. There ha I’m like, oh, this is suc we’re going to get this a And then two years later, when we do get it, I can see with hindsight that we were more ready two years later. And that’s OK.

The buyer is actually saving me from myself. So what you do, first of all, we have brokers that we work with, and the brokers will field a lot of these category reviews. There are also free resources like Startup CPG is a wonderful organization that I’m a part of that helps emerging brands get all this information. Every grocery store is different. It’s not like a homogenized system. Everybody does things differently.

This one wants the slotting fees and the free fills. That one wants you to do this program and that, like everyone’s category review is different. What Whole Foods is looking for is very different from what Kroger is looking for. So you have to kind of have systems in place to be able to say, okay, this category review is coming up, let’s make sure we’re applying. So I have, there’s myself, I have two co -founders, we have brokers, there is help.

And at first there was no help. We did it all ourselves. But the moment that you can get somebody who believes in the brand, you need those folks out there pitching for you. And the level of diligence and persistence that it takes to the amount of rejection you deal with, I always tell people, you disagree, but I always tell people, if you make a hundred calls, you probably only even speak to three people. And of the three people you talked to, maybe one has an interest right now, and you have to somehow find that to be encouraging. Somehow you have to call 100 people and only reach three and get one potential, and somehow you have to program your mind to perceive this as positive.

Maybe you disagree. What’s your reaction to somebody out there? What were your advice to somebody out there that just is struggling with the sheer persistence needed to develop traction? Boy, let me tell you this. If you’re listening right now, and you feel like you don’t have the persistence or what’s called the rhino skin, it’s okay. You just have to practice that anyway.

Practice it as much as you can, as often as you can, and you’ll just get better at it. It’s a skill. It’s a muscle. It’s really hard in the entertainment industry because you have a lot of people like writers, actors, comics, directors. They’re very sensitive, creative people, but it’s a brutal business. So for me, it was a wonderful training ground.

you know, to be able to get on stage, the moment you get on stage and you bomb for real bomb, and you feel that in your central nerves, you can feel it moving through your body, the horribleness of a bomb happen in the moment happening. Okay. And once you have that, nothing will be as bad as that. Just trust me like you even a grocery store buyer who is stone faced or might not write back to your emails. You just have to keep doing it. You’re absolutely right that it is a numbers game.

I would say this, one of my biggest, I think, competitive advantages is that I to my cookbook fans products. I call five pe shoppers of the Eat Happy Kitchen brand and I talk to them and I say, hey, what’s going on with you? How’s your life? Thank you for being a buyer. And generally they’ll open up and they’ll say like, hey, I’ve lost all this weight or I need to get back on track.

And I’m like, I’m not your Sherpa or guru. I’m just happy to connect. But I think that connection with people I learned things about my brand. Like for example, our spices were packaged in a way that I thought was very eco -friendly. It was very eco -friendly, but it was not user -friendly. So we did a repackaging.

And I learned this from talking to the people. So I think what makes you a stronger, those hundred calls will be a lot stronger if you have more information, evidence, changes, things you’re doing to improve your brand. You don’t need to fill someone’s time with just bullshit. Sorry. You don’t need to fill someone’s time with just BS of saying like, hey, I’m just checking in. Don’t say that.

Have something important to say, some new piece of information. And I bet that three who respond will then turn into a lot more higher numbers. Now, I’ve got two final questions for you here in the final 90 seconds. Very important for me. I want to know this. I got a big stack of notes here. I want to ask you, how do we develop traction before we’re in the stores?

You know, how do you do? How do you? How does one because now you’re you have momentum, but when you don’t have momentum, what do you say to somebody out there that’s trying to develop traction? Before? Yes, that’s a great question. That’s a great question.

Direct to consumer. We have this amazing thing called Instagram, Facebook, Tik Tok shop, Amazon, you can put your products up and start running ads. And, you know, gather an email list. There are all kinds of ways that then we always release our products direct to consumer first, take that feedback and then decide if we want to go the retail route. Because as you know, the retail route takes way longer and a lot more convincing and there’s a lot more gatekeepers. There are not gatekeepers online.

So if you have a product that’s ready to go, Do it. Absolutely do it. That’s how you gain information, traction, data. You can say, before we pitched any grocery store, we had the data that our sell -through rate was 100 % month over month because we kept selling out of our runs of our sauces. Great. We finally have a data point that we can then put into a deck for retail pitches, but we wouldn’t have that if we didn’t hit direct -to -consumer first.

Easy access point. Now, final question I have for you about the entrepreneurship side of it, then we’ll get into the brand here, is from a scripting perspective, so many entrepreneurs are reluctant to have a script, but yet I’ve happened to throughout my career, I’ve met some of the world’s top comedians and they’ll tell you they really work hard to script out their routine. But the key is to make it sound like it’s not a script. But it is a script. And the world’s best actresses, I’ve only met a handful of them, but I’ve met a few of them. And they’ll say, oh, and I really work hard to know my script so well that it doesn’t sound like I’m reading a script.

What do you say to somebody out there who’s an entrepreneur who’s sort of been reluctant to develop a quick pitch or a quick script? I mean, now more than ever, we’re in the You know, the hook, the three second hook. If you don’t have your three second hook online, people are going to scroll away. They’re done. Everyone’s got, we have these like dopamine receptor addled brains that can’t handle longer rambling things. Like even me, I’m talking too much right now.

I’m not making my point enough right now. You’ve got to dial in your talking points. You’ve got to humanize it and make it your own. I think people would be shocked to find out that I’m actually quite introverted when I’m not talking on the mic or on stage. I’m quiet and alone with my thoughts a lot because I like to be quiet and alone with my thoughts. But no, what would I say?

Too bad. Work on it. You got to work on it. I mean, there’s just things in business, you know, it’s like too bad. You better step up. Do you want it badly enough?

Then do it. If you don’t, that’s okay too. Don’t beat yourself up, but maybe it’s not the right place for you. I’m going to pull up your websites one more time, and I’ll put it on the show notes so listeners can find your work there. That’s me smoking some basil. AnnaVocino .

com. A -N -N -A -V -O -C -I -N -O . com. I’ll put a link on the show notes. And then we have the website here, eathappykitchen . com.

You are our guest, so I’m going to give you the final word. What’s the message you want to share with our listeners out there that maybe have heard about your product for the first time or products, and they would love to know? What’s the call to action that you have for them? Okay, my co -founders hate that I say this. You don’t have to buy my products. You, but what I want you to do is start reading the labels.

Every time you pick up a product at the grocery store, please read the label because you would be shocked how much companies are changing formulas. And that thing that you thought was clean is no longer clean. They’re adding stuff all the time. So that, my call to action is, you know, check me out on Instagram, Substack. I’ve got all sorts of free recipes and free resources. And if you want to buy my stuff as a result of that, it’s wonderful and you’re going to love it, but you don’t have to.

I’m anti, I’m anti, what can I say? I really appreciate the fact that you have started out as a comedian and then sort of learned through that rejection. And then you’ve learned that process and that process then turned into a successful voice acting career. And then now you’re putting it into entrepreneurship. And I love that you not only have a great product, but you’re teaching what you’ve learned along the way. Thank you for carving out time for me.

And we’d love to have you on the show sometime in the future. Thank you so much. Have a great day. She just lets him be Clay Clark. I mean, so he’s endorsed by his mother and he’s doing magnificent work. So it was great meeting you out there and all the people that he surrounds himself with.

His Clay Clark starts his days at five o ‘clock in the morning. Oh, it’s incredible. Yeah. He’s, he’s like, he’s, he’s a machine. He’s a machine. But his, you know, I got, I have problems with my company starting at nine o ‘clock.

Yes. Hundreds of people showing up at 5 .00 AM in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Man, he’s a leader of a leader. He’s fantastic. Yeah, man. No, he is.

He is. Hello, my name is Charles Kolaw with Kolaw 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 Tim

,000 or more people show up to some of these tours on the day -to -day. 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.

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, grow their companies. So I’ve seen guys from startups go from startup to being multi -millionaires, teaching people how to get time freedom and financial freedom 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. the long run. And the guy’s integrity just really wowed me. It brought tears to my eyes to see that this guy, his highest desire was to do what’s right.

And anyways, just an amazing man. So anyways, impacted me a lot. He’s helped navigate. Anytime I’ve gotten 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. It 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 Kolaw with Kolaw 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.

Bye -bye. Hi, I’m Aaron Antus with Shaw Homes. I first heard about Clay 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 was going

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. 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 1800 % 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 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. My 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 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 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. 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. And we went from expecting maybe two hundred fifty thousand this year to we’re at four hundred thousand. I’ll see with candies we’re finishing business owner at twenty three. So I’ve been working this candies company for about five years now and we started working with Thrive. 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 meeting up with them weekly and 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 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 going to 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. 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 higher Interviewing every single week. It’s just been great and such a lot. I don’t waste as much time on 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 mean, 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, working 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. So I’ve always had coaches for whatever was important.

My rich dad was one of those persons. I wanted to learn how to play Monopoly in real life. So he was my coach. The Thrivetime Show, two day interactive business workshops are the highest and most reviewed business workshops on the planet. You can learn the proven 13 -point business systems that Dr. Zellner and I have used over and over to start and grow successful companies. I mean, we get into the specifics, the specific steps on what you need to do to optimize your website.

We’re going to teach you how to fix your conversion rate. We’re going to teach you how to do a social media marketing campaign that works. How do you raise capital? How do you get a small business loan? We teach you everything you need to know here during a two -day, 15 -hour workshop. It’s all here for you.

You work every day in your business, but for two days you can escape and work on your business and build these proven systems so now you can have a successful company that will produce both the time freedom and the financial freedom that you deserve. You’re going to leave energized, motivated, but you’re also going to leave empowered. The reason why I built these workshops is because, as an entrepreneur, I always wish that I had this. And because there wasn’t anything like this, I would go to these motivational seminars, no money down, real estate, Ponzi scheme, get motivated seminars, and they would never teach me anything. It was like you went there and you paid for the big chocolate Easter bunny, but inside of it, it was a hollow, nothingness. And I wanted the knowledge, and they’re like, oh, but we’ll teach you the knowledge after our next workshop.

And the great thing is we have nothing to upsell. At every workshop, we teach you what you need to know. There’s no one in the back of the room trying to sell you some next big, get rich quick, walk on hot coals product. It’s literally, we teach you the brass tacks, the specific stuff that you need to know to learn how to start and grow a business. And I encourage you to not believe what I’m saying. And I want you to Google the Z66 auto auction.

I want you to Google elephant in the room. Look at Robert, Zellner, and Associates. Look them up and say, are they successful because they’re geniuses? Or are they successful because they have a proven system? When you do that research, you will discover that the same systems that we use in our own business can be used in your business. Come to Tulsa, book a ticket, and I guarantee you it’s going to be the best business workshop ever.

And we’ll even give you your money back if you don’t love it. We’ve built this facility for you and we’re excited to see it.

Transcribed with Cockatoo