How to Scale Your Business

Business Coach | Ask Clay & Z Anything

Audio Transcription

Learn How To Scale Your Business From The Business Coach : Podcast Transcript

Learn How to scale and grow your business with Thrive Time Show. Business Coach, Clay Clark, teaches on Scaling your business the right way.

Host: And now our broadcasting from the center of the universe and the thrive15.com world headquarters. Lets go. Presenting the world’s only business school without the BS. With optometrist and entrepreneur Dr. Robert Zoellner and the former small business administration entrepreneur of the year in your year Clay Clark. It’s the Thrive time show on talk radio 1170. Three, two, one. Boom.

Clay Clark: All right thrive nation. Welcome back to the Thrive time show during your drive time home. For many of you this has become kind of your Audio Dojo of Mojo. It’s kind of like you’ve been working all day and you want to start a business. Maybe have a business and you want to grow it and you’re just going, “I just want to finish my work day because I want it in the worst way, I want to get in there and learn from my entrepreneurial Sensei”.

Today, we’re here to teach you how to start and grow a business. Specifically today we’re talking about how to scale your business. I’m going to give you a quick notable quotable real quick just kind of a quick [unintelligible 00:01:04] here we go quick little pop this quick little [unintelligible 00:01:09] here it is. Once you nail it, you want to scale it, so once you know how to sell your widget and make fifty bucks, once you know how to sell your thing and make a hundred bucks or sell your thing and make $2. You want to scale it. Once you can nail it, you want to scale it. Today, I have a very special guest with me today. He is here for very special reasons.

Dr. Roberts Zoellner is an optometrist turned tycoon. He is one of the most successful Oklahomies out there. He’s a great guy and he’s out there in a different country expanding his entrepreneurial empire. You can’t just fill in for Dr Zoellner. You got to find somebody who is a source of wisdom, but a guy who could bring a little alacrity. A little vivaciousness to the microphone. You the guy who can pontificate with the best of them. We brought in Jared Hogue. If you’re not in the know, Jared Hogue is a guy who’s had a little bit of success helping scale some businesses. Helping scale specifically some churches and he has a great, he’s a phenomenal video production company, so Mr. Jared Hogue, how are you sir.

Jared Hogue: Man, what a pleasure to be here clay, listening to the show all the time and was super honored when you asked me to come on.

Clay: Well here’s the deal, I want to first brag on something you guys have going on. It’s called RomanMedia.tv.

Jared: Yes sir.

Clay: For anyone listening right now who is a business owner, what the heck is RomanMedia.tv? Is it a kind of a aquaduct themed kind of Coliseum themery? What do you guys do over at Roman media?

Jared: Absolutely, you hit the nail right on the head right there Clay.

Clay: I knew it.

Jared: We create videos. It says right there on our website. We create stuff mostly videos. We got a start actually, this was a long time ago working with you-

Clay: Yes.

Jared: -making videos, specifically rap videos at that.

Clay: Okay, I’m going to give you a quick sales pitch. If you go to YouTube right now and you type into the word[unintelligible 00:02:56]

Jared: Yes. It’s called See you on Monday.

Clay: See you on Monday.

Jared: Yes. This is a love song to Chick-fil-a.

Clay: It’s about because that you’re closed on Sunday.

Jared: Yes. What day do you want Chick-fil-a, the most but when the day that they’re closed?

Clay: Now, if somebody is listening right now and they have watched this video and they go, “This is what I want for my business”.

Jared: Yes.

Clay: I want to go viral bro. Now, every business owner wants to make a video that’s going to capture the essence of the company tells the story. How much does that cost?

Jared: That’s just like a million dollars.

Clay: No, but seriously what is it. Is it $500? Is it $5,000? What can I, if I’m an entrepreneur. I got a very big vision for a small budget. What does it cost to hire a video professional such as yourself to make it awesome? What’s the lowest? What’s the biggest? Just give me something, give me some traction.

Jared: Sure, so with that, I’m probably give you an answer you’re not really going to like because it’s just like building a house. When you build a house you can build a $30,000 house or you can build a multi-million dollar mansion.

Clay: Those are the best ones, the ones that are 30 are always good.

Jared: It really does vary based on the needs of the customer but through that Chick-fil-a video, we had the pleasure of working with the University of Oklahoma, we worked to Slap watch, Cherry berry, The Frozen Yogurt chain.

Clay: Okay, wait a second, so you said you worked with Slap watch?

Jared: Yes.

Clay: We were talking about that ” [unintelligible 00:04:16] ” watch.

Jared: Same people that creates Zany Bandz.

Clay: Slap watch, just so you guys know, a little connection with Thrivers. Slap watch was featured on The View. With Barbara Wawa, Barbara Walters. See, Oh my gosh, it’s a slap watch, it’s amazing [unintelligible 00:04:31] The Slap watch they sold millions of dollars of these units.

Jared: Yes.

Clay: They also invented the Zany Bands, which are like those bracelets in the shape of pirate ships and stuff. It’s a Tulsa entrepreneur Lori Montague and her partner Jim that made this product. She is one of my mentors and so I was so excited for her success. I just pumped up to watch her go from photography to building this thing and you guys were building her social media videos.

Jared: That’s correct.

Clay: Then you did videos for Cherry Berry?

Jared: Yes.

Clay: Okay, so you’re sort of a big deal?

Jared: I don’t know if I go that far.

Clay: People if they want to get a hold of you, if they’re listening right and they are now your business owner and they want a video for their company.

Jared: Yes.

Clay: They just got a RomanMedia.tv.

Jared: That’s the simplest way to find us.

Clay: Fill out the form, that’s the normal thing to do.

Jared: Yes.

Clay: Then boom, they are on the phone with you.

Jared: It got to happen.

Clay: Okay, so thrivers, the business coach is teaching you how to scale your business. Move number one is a four-part system, okay. It’s define, act, measure, refine. Many of you are saying what are you talking about. I’m going to repeat again. Define, act, measure, refine. This is the path of entrepreneurship period. You say what is entrepreneurship. It’s define what you think is going to happen. How you’re going to solve a problem for a customer, define it.

How am I going to solve the problem for a customer? That’s all entrepreneurship is. It’s finding a problem people have and you say, “I will solve it and I will charge for it”. That’s all it is. I will give you an example. Back in the day, I didn’t have any money, I didn’t have any connections, I didn’t have a hell one nor. What I did is, I basically would go out there and I would mow my lawn. I would get paid to mow the lawn because my dad did not want to mow the lawn and so he’d pay me to mow the lawn. That’s an entrepreneur. You find a problem, you solve it.

Jared: Yes.

Clay: Another move, uncle Jerry he had a hobby farm and all the fences were broken all the bar. Everything always needed spackling and painting and new shingling. I’d say to him, “Hey there are some problems the shingling needs fixing, that spackling needs spackling”. What’s the basic if you paint something if you don’t know about sheet rock. What happens is you have these screw holes and nail holes and you put spackling down which kind of fill in the holes, you need to paint it. He’s always building something.

I did that. I looked for problems that I could solve and I charged people for it. That’s what entrepreneurship is. First step is define. I’m going to give you a notable quotable, this is from Eric Ries. He is the author of The Lean startup which by the way Eric Ries was a consultant for Kleiner Perkins. Kleiner Perkins is the venture capital fund that funded, Square, Google, Uber. I’ve never heard of Square. I’ve never used it. Fine. It’s fine. I’ve never used Google, I use MSN. Come on, MSN that’s Bing now. You’re not even using msn.com. I would never use Google or Bing, I use Yahoo.

You’re full of it. You are not even a real human. Okay, Uber. “I would never use Uber bro. I am more authentic. I’d like to just like to go outside and see who picks me up. Put my thumb up and then whoever just picks me up, whatever’s meant to be bro”. No seriously these guys funded billion dollar companies and they say, “Success is learning how to solve the customer’s problem.” Jared, I want to ask you as an entrepreneur growing your business over the years obviously you’ve had your ups, you’ve had your downs. That’s what entrepreneurship is, you’re learning as you go.

Jared: Yes.

Clay: Talk to me about how important it was, maybe an early event where you were what you learned, “Wow a customer has a problem and I can actually solve it”.

Jared: Yes, probably the first legit business that I started was an auto detailing company.

Clay: Yes.

Jared: This is around the time that was first getting to know you and you were teaching me a lot of this stuff that we’re talking about today. Specifically you and Dr. Zee say a lot the whole Forbes stat of it. I can’t remember the exact number but it’s an exorbitant amount of people that want to start this business.

Clay: 57%.

Jared: 57% of you listening out there want to start a business at some point. If you can get into a business that a lot of people don’t want to do you can do very well.

Clay: Well.

Jared: What I did is the problem that I noticed is that people want to get their cars cleaned and they did not want to do it themselves. I started-

Clay: Wait. You’re saying that people want to keep their cars clean?

Jared: Yes.

Clay: And didn’t want because a lot of people feel like you have to be a Nostradamus or some sort of Socrates of success to start a business but you said people want a clean car.

Jared: Yes.

Clay: They don’t want to do it themselves.

Jared: Absolutely.

Clay: You said that’s the business?

Jared: It’s a business.

Clay: Okay, back to you.

Jared: I wanted to start a business. At the time this is the only marketable trade I had.

Clay: Yes.

Jared: I knew how the detail a car really well.

Clay: How did you know how to do it?

Jared: Well, I had actually worked like you and Dr. Zee talk about. I worked for another company actually Fine Airport Parking, who is one of the best detailing companies in Tulsa now. I had learned how to detail cars there and started my own business called Shine on a Dime.

Clay: You started shining over a [unintelligible 00:09:17] you saw problem.

Jared: Yes.

Clay: You solved it now you also have done this with ministries all over.

Jared: I have.

Clay: Talk to me about what may be a problem you saw with ministry and how you helped to solve it with a good end.

Jared: Yes. So, I’ve been working in the church world since I was about 15 and one thing especially today. You look around this office right now it’s a beautiful space we’re standing in lots of re-purpose woods. Just all kinds of great stuff. The culture here at least from what you walk in and see looks amazing.

There’s a lot of churches that struggle with that because whether it’s financial struggles or time commitments or whatever the case may be. My business partner and I noticed that churches need help. We started making pre-made videos for churches to purchase at a very minimal cost, but a very high quality video. We are working the churches all over the world.

Clay: If I’m listening right now and I work for a church maybe I am a pastor, you are saying I can make my Sunday service super at an affordable price. I could use you guys and you guys could make relevant content.

Jared: Absolutely. Honestly, based of something we heard here on the Thrive Time Show actually all of the videos on our site right now if you go to creativesheep.org. This is one of our other domains that we have. Creative sheep like a lamb but a sheep.org.

Clay: Wait a second I have never been on the internet.

Jared: [laughs]

Clay: What I will need to do, do I need to get out my Smartphone. What was it? What was the website again?

Jared: You go to http://

Clay: Colon, I should cleanse it, I always do.

Jared: www.creativesheep.org.

Clay: Creativesheep.org.

Jared: Check it out. If you just give us your email address, you can get anything on our site right now you want on our site right now for free.

Clay: What?

Jared: Yes.

Clay: I say what, I feel like I should say what? because it doesn’t quite make sense your are giving away all of your stuff for free.

Jared: Yes. We are actually in a transition right now and we are moving into more of an educational market for our churches. We are doing more consulting and we are wanting to make products available for churches to not just come buy a video from us, but to learn how to do these things on their own. What we are doing right now is that for the exchange of your email address we are going to give you any video on our site right now for free so that we can let you know about these stuff as it comes available.

Clay: Now thrivers if you are just listening are you going to Facebook live. All of you want to go to Facebook live they want to say, “Where are you guys broadcasting?” We are broadcasting at a 20,000 square foot facility called the thrive15.com, the world headquarter. It’s like the nerve center, it’s like the Disneyland of entrepreneurship. I am telling you what, thrivers if you are just tuning in, you are not going to want to miss out on today’s show. We are teaching you how to scale your gifts. [unintelligible 00:01:53] now rule number two is act. Eventually you have to take action. Stay tuned to Thrive Time show.

[music]

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Host: Live, local, now you are listening to the Thrive Time Show on talk radio 1170.

Clay: All right thrive nation welcome back to the inspiration station this is your audio dojo or mojo and Tulsa’s only local radio show where you can learn how to grow and start a business. My name is Clay Clark and I am business coach. I am the former SBA entrepreneur of the year in your ear. I am joined here with–Today not Dr. Robert Zoellner no. He is on an international mission. We will call it a peace keeping mission to [unintelligible 00:03:49]. This guy, he is out, he is expanding entrepreneurial empire. I will just say he is not in the country right now he is doing some things. I cant really speak about what he is doing but he is doing some big things. You kind of look around and you are like, “We need a replacement, we need a valid guy.”

Why I love The New England Patriots is that every weekend I have no idea who is playing for the team. I look on the jersey and I am like, “Is that Danny Woodhead?” Who is Woodhead? Is he actually– He is like five foot eight you see that running back? All over sudden Danny Woodhead is your guy and just like, “Woodhead, Woodhead I buy the jersey Woodhead. Next week it’s like, “Who is that guy? I thought they cut [unintelligible 00:14:26] before but now he is on the team again, okay cool. It’s like the Patriots they only bring excellence in. Everybody who is on the team is excellent. That’s the whole deal, they don’t care who it is as long as it is excellent. It might not be a name you know but it’s an excellent name meaning they get it done.

We are bringing on what I believe to be the Wes Welker of entrepreneurship. This guy could be like– I wouldn’t say [unintelligible 00:04:51] he is more feisty. I would say he is an adlerman. He is an adlerman of entrepreneurship. If you don’t know what I am talking about just [unintelligible 00:04:58]. The guy we are having on the show today he is a sleeper and I am telling you what. How old are you right now Jared?

Jared: 33.

Clay: When he is 40 he will be worth $ 1 million.

Jared: I appreciate that.

Clay: I know it’s going to happen because I’m telling you, this guy he knows what he is doing with entrepreneurship and he had to start with what he had. He started with the tools and resources he had. He started in an auto detailing company and it grew and he realized, “I found a problem, I could solve it.” He moves up to the next thing now he is making videos and doing high level consulting for churches and companies and he moves up boom, it’s like a next step. It’s like playing Mario back in the day where you are pu bu bu and you move up to the next level, pu bu bup and you move up. You just keep moving up. We are talking today on how to scale your business.

We just talked about how to define, meaning you find a problem you can solve and you define it, you say, “This is a problem I think I can solve, I think I can charge this much”. Now, the step two is that you have to act. I am going to give you a notable quotable which blows the minds of many entrepreneurs.

I want to read to you. I want to play a song that I feel like is going to touch your soul and I want to make sure it the right way. Here we go. You need to act as an entrepreneur. A notable quotable from Eric Ries, “Ask most entrepreneurs who have decided to pivot, they will tell you that they wish they had made the decision sooner. Jared, I want to ask you this question here.

First of, why do most entrepreneurs that you have met, they start a business model that is not working too well. Why do our church– Maybe their methodology is not working well or a culture that is not going the right way or a social media campaign that is not going the right way. Why do many of them in retro respect wish they would have taken action sooner or pivoted sooner? From your perspective.

Jared: I don’t know if it’s lack of education or laziness. I’m not [laughs] I’m not sure what it is. I think a lot of times in the church world, business world really doesn’t matter we get caught in the rut of doing what we have always done and just hopping that it is going to change, and it doesn’t. I am a huge proponent of going outside there and finding something different like I was saying before the break.

When I started Shine on a Dime, the detail company we started in probably the worst possible way. We wanted to charge the lowest price and just undercut everybody and take all of their business but that does not work. It didn’t work for me anyways. We went fledgling along for a while and then I got smart. It’s because I hung around with guys like you. What pivoted my company was there are three businesses that we looked at, that we applied some things that they did and it transitioned our company. It actually allowed us to start charging a premium for what we were doing.

Clay: What companies were you studying?

Jared: I was studying DJ connection which was the DJ company you started. Chick for Lay and Quick trip.

Clay: I would say this thrivers, when I, the business coach, started DJ connection– This is a true story okay so I am going to kind of keep the music to you so get the vibe. I thought that I was going to start the DJ business and I was going to have like a club DJ experience.

This is how I started, I started my DJ business, I went out to the Club Millennium. The club millennium right there off Memorial and 81st. I would walk in the clubs and say, “Here is the deal, my name is DJ Clay, I can bring it. I will get people at your club. I am telling you what I am the most entertaining DJ you have ever seen. I beat match, I play the music people love. I promise you I will keep it very high energy. You are going to love it, you are going to have unbelievable drink specials, I am going to love it.

The first club guy he comes and says to me, “Hey, tonight we had a little bit of a slower turnout. I know I was going to pay you the $400 but what I am going to do I am going to go ahead and pay you $100 cash. Then I am going to call an IOU is what I am going to call. Next Tuesday when you come in I am going to get you the rest of it now. I am going to give you what I call cashier’s cheque which is as good as gold.” I am not kidding that happened. I am supposed to get 400 I get 100 but he is going to pay me 300.

I show up and he is like, “So things have changed a little bit, I am trying to talk to my boss. I have got to talk to my manager. Point is we are a little bit short on the cash right now but next Friday if you can bring it. If you can get about 50 students out to this event am to you [unintelligible 00:19:02] whatever student you get up to club millennium. I am just telling you I will make due, and I always make due because I tell you what, I am a man of my word.” I am going, “Alright Vinnie I guess it sounds good.”

I go out to the next show I hop on the microphone again and say, “Alright folks welcome to the club millennium here, unbelievable dance club here. We are having a great night tonight. Tonight we have the dollar long neck and I am telling you what. Tonight is thirsty Thursday and we are going to do–” I get excited. Again he goes, “Here is the deal, I have a situation that happened [unintelligible 00:09:34] back, we had an employee who, what we call– He took some of the money.

What I am going to have to do is I am going to have to settle with you right now. It’s going to be what I would call an IOU. I am not going to pay you tonight anything at all but I will take– All the time I am going, “What am I doing?” I kept doing it because I was loyal to this function. I Deejayed the cronies. I deejayed there at the [unintelligible 00:09:55] stand. By the way that’s located right now, in front of what is now–what is the Sunshine Furniture. Used to be a Target and it was basically a nasty bar where they put a bunch of sand in front of it and they convinced 40 year olds to sign up for volleyball tournaments.

[laughter]

Clay: Here was the thing. I stayed loyal to it because I wanted to be consistent. Eventually I realized my dad actually my dad– may he rest in peace. I talked to my dad, my dad calls me and he says, “Hey, I think eventually you should do weddings because you know weddings they happen all the time, there’s less drama, less fights.” I literally hug–I remember saying the deejays to have it one time is a true story. I went to it and the guys go, “Hey, how was the show?” This guy Jeremy goes, “The show was good only we had it an Asian gang–no offense to the Asians. This is just what he said, “We had an Asian gang showed up and sprayed us with A.Ks and so my car got shot up and I just had to leave.” I’m like, “What?”

I look and he literally had bullet holes all over the car of his Bumblebee yellow whatever it’s a truck that was. I’m going, “I’ve got to get out of this.” I pivoted into weddings and that was my deal but I wish I would have done it sooner. Hogue what mentorship or advice would you have for the entrepreneur who’s stuck in the rut to doing the same thing over and over and over. It’s not working and they’re fearful of changing to a new industry or a new niche?

Jared: No matter how old you are or how young you are go find somebody that has done it and find a mentor. Whether that mentor is thrive15.com which is an incredible place, whether you’re listening to this show, go find a book. Just go find a mentor. Somebody that’s doing what you want to do and do what they’re doing.

Clay: Once you’ve found the mentor.

Clay: I’m just telling you what’s going to happen.

Jared: It’s going to be beautiful.

Clay: Years ago, I remember my wife was the front desk lady for Dr. Robert Zoellner.

Jared: Come on now.

Clay: She was the front desk lady. I remember if I could just meet this guy and ask him the questions he would have the answers. If I could meet with Yoda and get his answers and I could just use the force that I could go fight Darth Vader and grow my business. I remember thinking that thought and guess what? It actually happened thrivers. It actually happened and it could happen for you. Stay tuned Thrive Time Show.

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Host: You’re listening to Thrive Time Show on talk radio 1170.

Clay: All right Thrive nation welcome back to your inspiration station. We’re broadcasting from the left coast of the Arkansas River in the beautiful thrive15.com world headquarters and within the thrive15 world headquarter. We are now broadcasting from the box that rocks within the dojo of mojo. If you’re on Facebook live you can check it out. I’m going to tell you what, it is a work in progress. It’s like the Death Star. You remember the death star from The Empire Strikes Back? Where it could still fire shots. It was the second one–was it the second one where–it was the third one where it would work, it actually worked. It could actually blow up a planet but it looked like it couldn’t

Jared: You’re asking the wrong person I’ve not seen Star Wars.

Clay: Same was it the third Star Wars? No one knows? Unbelievable. Thrivers who are listening right now just email [email protected]. It was Star Wars where the Death Star it looked kind of bad but it could still blow up planets. We’re kind of under construction right now. This is thrive15.com world headquarters. Is beautiful but we’re always it’s been proving there’s a lot of construction. I will said the Tiki village is done in the back. I will say the bar area is done, I will say it’s looking beautiful already for conferences but there’s a few more tweaks if you’re on Facebook live you can see it

Jared: This place is incredible.

Clay: You like it?

Jared: Yes. It’s amazing.

Clay: Today we’re talking about how to scale your business. Okay. Step number one you want to define what you think’s going to work. What’s the problem that you think you can solve for the marketplace? Step two you got to go act. You actually have to go try to sell it. A lot of people say, “Do I need to form an L.L.C?” Now this is a controversial thought. I don’t believe you need to form an L.L.C. until you’ve sold 15 somethings. I say it all the time. “Well, I just feel like I might get sued?” If you have no net worth, who cares if you get sued? Just get used to it. “Oh, I’m just worrying about making sure my name is registered legally.” Just start a business. Just try to sell something and then check it out.

I started Epic Photography and I started booking weddings before I checked it out. I even had cameras. Is that ethical? No. I would go to book it and the bride would say, “I’d like to go and pay a deposit.” I would say, “Here is the deal, we have a little bit of a waiting list I cannot accept your payment right now but as soon as something come available I’ll let you know.” Then I would go back and tell Jason and Dan I’m like, “We just [unintelligible 00:25:28] I made a list and once that list got to 15, we bought cameras. True story. That’s how I did it with a D.J. business. You’ve got to try to sell it before you can even deliver it sometimes. I’m just telling you. Don’t take people’s money and then not deliver. At least see if people want it. Act.

Third is you’ve got to measure. You’ve got to measure those results. I’m going to give you a notable quotable. This is a notable quotable from Eric Ries. He’s the bestselling author of The Lean Startup and a leading adviser back in the day for Kleiner Perkins who, by the way funded Square, Google Uber, “Never heard of it. I don’t know what these companies are.” Fine, maybe you haven’t been outside this year. It is. He is the bestselling author he knows what he’s talking about. He says, “We must learn what customers really want. Not what they say they want or what we think that they should want”. He goes on to say, “Customers don’t care how much time you spent building something.”

He says, “Customers don’t care how much time something takes to build they care only if it serves their needs.” Jared talk to me about measuring. You’ve helped ministries and churches really grow and flourish. Why is it so important measure my friend?

Jared: Well it’s wildly important to know where you’ve been, where you are and where you’re going. If you don’t know that what are you doing? There’s no way to know if you’re succeeding or not. One thing we did, I just stepped down as the–I think my title was the global kids director at Church on the move and so–

Clay: What did you say? Church on the move?

Jared: Yes. It’s a context yes.

Clay: Church on the move if you’re listening–we have people listening in Australia we have a lot of people in New Zealand presented like a hot deal in New Zealand right now. I’ve never been there but at some point I want to come there. We have people who are listening right now in Australia, Canada. Church on the move is a church with a population of–I don’t want to make up a number but over 10,000 maybe people?

Jared: Somewhere in there yes.

Clay: They have a Christian school. A little context, if you go–how was the website is it C.O.T.M or?

Jared: Churchonthemove.com You can check out the school at lincolnchristianschool.com and then draggotusa.com is the summer camp that we have.

Clay: churchonthemove.com check it out that’s where you can validate the man we have on the show is not crazy. The name is Jared Hogue and his website, by the way if you want to learn more. You can get to him and you can you can find out more about what he does for you guys by just going to his website. Jared what website can they find you best at?

Jared: Probably the easiest at RomanMedia.tv.

Clay: Okay, so back to you.

Jared: Yes. One thing that we did at the church for example is– we believe very strongly that to our job as people on staff at a ministry is to actually equip people to do the work of the ministry.

Clay: Equip?

Jared: Yes. It’s scriptural. Ephesians 4:12 talks about this. That our job is to equip people to do the work of the ministry. We’re supposed to train them, give them the tools they need to do the work of the ministry.

Clay: You’re trying to teach other people to minister?

Jared: Yes.

Clay: You know if this catches on pretty soon other people could be ministering and pretty soon this could grow into a thing.

Jared: Exactly. We’re trying to develop a leadership pipeline for the church. We reinstituted a program that had been done years ago but we had stopped doing it for a while. We implemented what’s called the Service director program. These are volunteers that are overseeing rooms. We’re talking about kids, you’ve got anywhere from 100 to 150 kids in a room, somewhat are less but you’ve got people overseeing rooms like this as volunteers.

Clay: Yes.

Jared: We developed this program and in addition to that we also developed a communicator program. At that time, January 2015 when I took this on I think we had like eight volunteer communicator–

Clay: Eight?

Jared: Yes. We had 15 volunteer singers and we had, I don’t know two or three volunteer production people. Granted we had about 25 volunteers between these three things.

Clay: What you do is you take a two one a five and boom you got 25?

Jared: Exactly 25 in this and so over the course of 18 months we just put our heads down and went to work. We grew this program from 25 to 127.

Clay: Wait a second. You go take a 127 you divide that with a 25 what do you do? You put a five then you carry with a boo boo boo boo. That’s like a 500%.

Jared: Yes.

Clay: It’s a thing.

Jared: Yes. We grew this. I don’t want to paint a picture that oh we had this all planned and mapped out beforehand, we did but at the same time it was kind of messy–

Clay: I want to brag on you. You understand the process of define, act, measure, refine. When you define something, outside of God, I don’t know anybody who can define the perfect thing. Then you act outside of God, I don’t know anybody who makes the perfect actions. We all make mistakes. Then you measure. Outside of God, I don’t know anybody who says, “Well, I’ve done the measurements and I

am God.” Then you refine. You take the feedback and you pivot. When we come back Thrivers, we’re going to hear how Jared was able to measure and actually refine, and help take a system and grow it by 500%.

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Host: You’re listening to the Thrive Time Show on Talk Radio 1170.

Clay: All right Thrive Nation, welcome back. I’m telling you what, when I say welcome back, I am sincerely excited to have you, an army of you. Because I’m telling you what, 57% of you, according to Forbes Magazine, 57% of you want to start or grow a business. I know what it’s like when you have no money in your bank, you’ve got a big vision, and you have no resources. I remember watching my dad deliver pizzas, and I remember thinking, “I can’t believe my dad’s delivering pizzas.” This is a third grade, you want your dad to be like a movie star, a firefighter, an astronaut. The kids on the bus, when you’re sixth grade, they make fun of your dad when he delivers pizzas.

Now, as a 36-year old man, I can’t be more proud of anybody than a guy who would deliver pizzas to take care of his family. I’m just telling you, I watched my dad about 10 weeks ago, passed away from ALS. When he passed away, it’s the worst thing in the world. But I’m going to tell you what. Watching your dad battle through something like that, and my dad, the entire time, was thankful to God. He kept talking about how thankful he was that I was his son, just awesome. Just watching my dad battle financially for years, all I want to do is I want to help you grow and start a successful company.

Being totally real with you Thrivers, if I never work another freaking day of my life, I just sit around and just go, “Well, I just think I just want to watch more Patriots.” I want to watch every show there is about the Patriots, then watch the recap of every game and read all the Patriots’ books. I could do that, I don’t need to work again. But I’m on this show. I’m spending my time with you guys, broadcasting the Dojo Mojo, because I want to help you be successful. Because I know what it’s like to be a kid and watch your dad work so hard and not get very far. I’m telling you as a business coach, you can learn this.

Today, we don’t screw around at the Thrive15.com show, we don’t screw around the Thrivetime Show. We only bring on people who really care, who really are sincere about why they’re here. We brought on a guy today named, Jared Hogue, who I’ve known really over the past decade, probably seven to eight years. Jared is a guy who worked with me. He studied the dark arts of the entrepreneurship from a dojo. He learned things, he went out and start his own business. Today I can proudly say he’s consulting churches all over the country. We were talking about today how to scale your business.

We’re talking about the four steps. How to define the problem that you solve for the marketplace. Step two, how to act. Just get out there and quit talking about it. It’s hard to build a reputation. According to Henry Ford, Henry Ford whoever that is, according to Henry Ford, “It’s hard to build a reputation based on what you’re going to do.” He said, “It’s hard to get a reputation based on what you’re going to do.” You build a reputation based on what you do. Then you act, then you measure. He had the courage to act then to measure. He helped to grow a ministry from– you said what? 25 people?

Jared: It was some of our volunteer teams. We had 25 people on this, about 25 volunteers on this team to a 127 over the course of 18 months.

Clay: You grew by 500% in 18 months.

Jared: Yes.

Clay: We were talking off the air and just the other day or just today actually, you were talking to somebody on the phone. Tell us about that conversation.

Jared: Yes. Yesterday, we were talking about some of this. We were talking about how to build this team, and putting the systems in place. We had some incredible systems in place. I can’t take full credit for this, we had an amazing team that helped pull all of this off. Some of the things that we did, is we put a system in place for when we recruited these people so that we could– we did exactly these steps. I didn’t necessarily even realize it at the time. We defined the need, we took action, we measured it, and along the way in the church world, it can be hard to measure certain things because how do you gauge success in the church?

Clay: How many people are going to heaven? Seven-

Jared: Is it based on attendance? Is it based on offering that comes in? Those are baseline but those are not the main ways that you gauge success. Ephesians 4:12 says that our job, as people in ministry, is to equip the saints to do the work of the ministry. That’s just equip the volunteers to do the work of the ministry.

Clay: You’re so passionate about this. You grew up in Tulsa.

Jared: I grew up in Illinois but I’ve been in Tulsa now for 15 years.

Clay: When did you move from Illinois to Tulsa? How old were you?

Jared: When I graduated high school, I was 17 years old.

Clay: So 17.

Jared: Yes.

Clay: You’ve lived in Tulsa from age 17 to, how old are you now?

Jared: 33.

Clay: 33, and now you’re moving to where?

Jared: Boston, Massachusetts.

Clay: Is it Tom Brady? [unintelligible 00:36:30]

Jared: The only reason is Tom Brady.

Clay: I love Tom Brady so much, I’d move out there to Boston. [unintelligible 00:36:35], bill or check? Boom. What caused you to move out there? Why are you going out there?

Jared: My brother in law and my sisters have started a church out there and we’re going out there to help them grow this church.

Clay: Who is your brother in law?

Jared: James Cruz. James and Sarah Cruz. They started Adore Church. You can check out, it’s Adorechurch.com.

Clay: Adore?

Jared: Adore.

Clay: How do you spell an Adore?

Jared: A-D-O-R-E. Adorechurch.com

Clay: I was thinking like, A Door. A-D-O-O-R.

Jared: I got you.

Clay: Literally, A Door.

Jared: No, like adoration. Which means love, respect, and worship.

Clay: I don’t even know what he’s talking about, I’m a simple man. All I’m saying is I tell you something about the door, a window, church.com, whatever. The thing is, you’re going out there and you are– what is your motive?

Jared: Man, just to help people. I want to help grow and scale this church. James has a vision to launch several campuses and grow. God gave him a vision for how many people are going to be in this church and me and my wife want to be a part of that.

Clay: Now Thrivers, point number four. Okay. You define, you act, you measure. Point number four. You have to refine.

Jared: This is huge.

Clay: Somebody is looking at someone next to you and say, refine. Somebody’s looking at that mirror and say, refine. Somebody is taking a selfie, “What [unintelligible 00:37:38] a selfie picture of myself. Look, it’s me and myself. I’m in my car.” and it’s like, “Look at me and-“. By the way, just a real quick rant. What’s going on with that?

Jared: Too many.

Clay: What’s called a selfie?

Jared: It’s ridiculous.

Clay: Dude, I don’t even like my selfie. I don’t even want to take– I don’t like my- It’s like, there’s so much Photoshop.

Jared: It’s ridiculous.

Clay: What’s going on with that?

Jared: I kid you not. I’m sitting at a Starbucks the other day, working on some stuff, and there’s a girl sitting next to me just taking like repeated selfies. Adjusting the light, adjusting the angle, it was ridiculous.

Clay: Thrivers, I think a lot of times what happens is, when people start taking a whole lot of selfies, they feel like they’re becoming a social media wizard and maybe that’s true, maybe it’s not a different show.

Jared: I’m going to go with it’s not.

Clay: It’s not? It’s not the key to being a social media wizard?

Jared: It depends on who you are. But for the most part, I would go with no.

Clay: Now, Thrivers. Here’s the deal. If you are listening right now, you have to refine. Listen, unless you are like God’s gift to entrepreneurship, you have to define, you have to act, but then you’ve got to measure the results and you’ve got to refine. Now, I’m going to give you a notable quotable from Eric Ries. Again, this is a guy, Eric Ries, who was a leading consultant for Kleiner Perkins. It’s K-L– just check it out. Kleiner Perkins. Just Google it. You can spell it wrong, you’ll find it. Kleiner Perkins.

These guys have funded Uber, Google, Square. They know their stuff. He says in his book, Lean Startup, he says, “When in doubt, simplify.” Now this right here– I want to go on a rant real quick. When I bought the DJ connection, in the office right now at Thrive15, there are some things right now I’m working through that are just irritants. One, as an example right now, you walk in with these two banners, these two flags that are up, and I want each flag to be the same distance on the sidewalk. I want them to be parallel.

I don’t know why that is, but I do know if we go on vacation together, thrivers, if we ever had the misfortune of going on vacation together, if we said we would leave at five and we leave it 5:01, I almost don’t want to go on vacation anymore. I was like, “Forget it.” That’s the part of me that makes me want [unintelligible 00:39:36]. Right now, we’re setting up these post up stands, and we have one that leans forward more the other. Irritates me all day and I’m just like, “Oh my gosh.” I’m obsessed with perfection.

I’ve sold companies over the years. There’s four different companies I’ve sold. Each one was a million-dollar business. I’ve sold the business, a multi million worth. They’re doing over a million dollars of revenue. I’ve sold that company. When I sell it, I just don’t care anymore because I can’t even be around mediocrity. It honestly, and you and I share that trade. It irritates me to the point where I’m like, “I don’t even don’t want to see it.”

Jared: [laughs]

Clay: I have a desk in my office and back in the day we had a dude who started using my desk part-time. He would do things that was so inefficient with my computer. I have two monitors, he disengaged one of them. He downloaded some programs. He thought he’d make the computer faster, he made it slower. I was just like, “You keep the computer. You keep the desk.”

That was it right there by the Israeli flag. Seriously that was it. That was my desk and I’m like, “I’m done. I’ll just have my own perfect desk in my own perfect man cave.” This what happens, I’m just telling you. A lot of you listening right now, you are an OCD perfectionist and you struggle with the idea of ever acting until it’s perfect.

Jared: Yes.

Clay: Entrepreneurship, this is entrepreneurship. You define what you think is going to work and you throw a grenade. Shoo, poof and then you measure did something happen? Then you refine. That’s the game.

Jared: Yes.

Clay: That’s how it works.

Jared: Absolutely.

Clay: Why is it so hard to learn that skill?

Jared: It’s exactly like you just said. As a Type A, as a leader, as an entrepreneur you want to see things better. That’s why you’re here. You’re here to fix things. You’re not content until things are perfect. You always see the imperfection which is a gift and a curse. With that I think one of the things that we struggle with the most as this Type A entrepreneur type is that we want to fix everything all at once.

Clay: Everything all at once.

Jared: It’s just because – you just want to rip your hair out.

Clay: [laughs]

Jared: Where I actually heard you say about, say this. I think it was Malcolm Gladwell in Outliers where he’d – and I could be wrong on the book. He talks about how when we want to lose weight just as a society, we want to do it overnight.

Clay: Overnight.

Jared: When we want to become a millionaire, we want to do it overnight.

Clay: Right immediately.

Jared: Exactly. He talks about how rather than trying to do that, what if we did in steps and stages and we did it – what if every week our goal was to get 1% better.

Clay: 1% better.

Jared: Just 1%. That’s totally attainable.

Clay: Now Hogue, real quick. If people were to get a hold of you, what website could they go to?

Jared: You could go to RomanMedia.tv, you can find me at creativesheep.org. If you’re a church leader out there listening, go to creativesheep.org. I know we’ve thrown a few websites out here but you can get any of our content for free out there just by giving us your email address, creativesheep.org.

Clay: Now Thrivers, if you want to change your life I, the business coach, give you three ways to do it. One, go to Thrive15.com, Thrive15.com. It’s 19 bucks a month. It’s the world’s best business school. If you can’t afford it, set your own price. This just in, you can choose your own price. I don’t care. Two, come out to our workshop for the thrivetimeshow.com or three go to thrivetimeshow.com and share your podcast or listen to it again. Your always three, two, one bull.

[00:42:32] [END OF AUDIO]

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