Business Podcasts | How to Create a Workflow That WOWs Your Customers!!! How to Create Repeatable WOWS w/ Dan Heath (Best-Selling Author of Made to Stick) + The NewConcept.Healthcare & TipTopK9.com Success Stories

Audio Transcription

Hey, I’m Ryan Wimpey. I went to a small private liberal arts college and got a degree in business and I didn’t learn anything like they’re teaching here. I didn’t learn linear workflows. I learned stuff that I’m not using and I haven’t been using for the last nine years. So what they’re teaching here is actually way better than what I got at business school. And I went what was actually ranked as a very good business school. The linear workflow, the linear workflow for us in getting everything out on paper and documented is really important. We have workflows that are kind of all over the place. Having linear workflow and seeing that mapped out on multiple different boards is pretty awesome. That’s really helpful for me. The atmosphere here is awesome. I definitely just stared at the walls, figuring out how to make my facility look like this place. This place rocks. It’s invigorating. The walls are super, it’s just very cool. The atmosphere is cool. The people are nice. It’s a pretty cool place to be. Very good learning atmosphere. I literally want to model it and steal everything that’s here at this facility and basically create it just on our business side. I’m Rachel with Tip Top K9 and we just want to give a huge thank you to Clay and Vanessa Clark. Hey guys, I’m Ryan with Tip Top K9. Just want to say a big thank you to Thrive 15. Thank you to Make Your Life Epic. We love you guys, we appreciate you, and really just appreciate how far you’ve taken us. This is our old house, right? This is where we used to live two years ago. This is our old neighborhood. See, it’s nice, right? So this is my old van and our old school marketing and this is our old team and by team I mean it’s me and another guy. This is our new house with our new neighborhood. This is our new van with our new marketing and this is our new team. We went from 4 to 14 and I took this beautiful photo. We worked with several different business coaches in the past, and they were all about helping Ryan sell better and just teaching sales, which is awesome, but Ryan is a really great salesman. So we didn’t need that. We needed somebody to help us get everything that was in his head out into systems, into manuals, and scripts, and actually build a team. So now that we have systems in place, we’ve gone from one to 10 locations in only a year. In October 2016 we grossed 13 grand for the whole month. Right now it’s 2018, the month of October. It’s only the 22nd, we’ve already grossed a little over 50 grand for the whole month and we still have time to go. We’re just thankful for you, thankful for Thrive and your mentorship and we’re really thankful that you guys have helped us to grow a business that we run now instead of the business running us. Just thank you, thank you, thank you times a thousand. So we really just want to thank you, Clay, and thank you, Vanessa, for everything you’ve done, everything you’ve helped us with. We love you guys. Get ready to enter the Brivetime Show. We started from the bottom, now we hit it. We started from the bottom and we’ll show you how to get it. We started from the bottom, now we hit it. We started from the bottom, now we hit it. We started from the bottom, now we’re on the top Teaching you the systems to get what we got Cutting Dixon’s on the hooks, operating the books He’s bringing some wisdom and the good looks As the father of five, that’s where I’ma dive So if you see my wiping kids, please tell them hi If you see NC up on your radio And now three, two, one, here we go We started from the bottom, now we’re here We started from the bottom, now we’re showing you how to get what’s coming All right, Thrive Nation, welcome back to the Thrive Time Show. My name is Clay Clark. I’m the former USSBA Entrepreneur of the Year, and I am joined here with my partner, Dr. Robert Zellner. And Z, we are interviewing an incredible guest today, my friend. Dan the man! Yes, Dan Heath. And Dan, this is something that you might find interesting. I have attended a local megachurch and one of the senior pastors at this church, he says, you have to read this book. And that book was made to stick. And that’s how I first got introduced to your writing. So, apparently pastors of megachurches like what you are writing. Wow! Yeah, it’s not often that people discover our work in church. So that’s good to hear. Yeah, so it’s a book I reference at least once a week, and it’s powerful. So if you’re out there and you want to become a more effective speaker or a more effective copywriter or advertiser, I’d encourage you to check out the book, Made to Stick. But since then, you’ve actually been working on this book, you’ve released this book called The Power of Moments. And for our listeners out there that aren’t familiar with your newest book, The Power of Moments, can you share what this book is all about and what inspired you to write this book? Absolutely. I mean, in one word, The Power of Moments is a book about experience. It’s about how do we create better experiences for the people we serve, our customers, our patients, our students? How do we create better experiences for our kids and for ourselves in life? And the starting place for this book is something you might think of as the Disney paradox, which anybody that’s ever been to a theme park before, I think, can relate to this. And what I mean by that is that if we were to track your happiness levels on a moment-by-moment basis during your time at Disney World, let’s say, my guess is that the vast majority of those measurements would actually be worse at the theme park than they would have been if you were sitting on your couch at home. So hot on the surface of the sun. Yeah, I mean it’s blazing hot, it’s humid, there are these 45 minute lines to ride like a two-minute dumbo ride you would have preferred not to be on to begin with. It’s expensive and the traffic back and forth and the parking and yet there are a couple of things that will happen at the theme park that will be memorable, right? Your kids will light up over some ride that they rode or you know one of the characters will come by and you’ll take a picture you’ll be looking at for 20 years or you’ll have one of those moments as a parent where you’re just you know reveling in the joy of having this child and those couple of moments they may be a minority of the day. They might be 15 minutes out of an 8-hour day and yet a year later if you look back and you say, hey, how was your trip to Disney World, you know what you’re going to say? You’re going to say, it was amazing. It was one of the highlights of the year. And so that’s the paradox that I’m talking about, how in the moment, an experience can feel one way, and yet we feel very different about it looking back. And I think the significance of that, the kind of takeaway lesson, is that when we talk about improving experience, what we’re really talking about are creating moments. In the book, we call them peak moments, that great experiences hinge on peak moments. The book is really an attempt to figure out how do we create more of these memorable, meaningful peaks. You know, this for me is a peak moment because I’ve read your stuff. The level of research that you put into your books, that you and your brother put into your books, is absolutely, and I mean this with all due respect, it’s insane. It’s maniacal. It’s intense. I mean, it is detailed. You guys obsess about an idea, and you have so much data to support what you’re saying. I just want to ask you this. Do you remember the moment where you were, the impactful moment where you thought, I need to write a book called The Power of Moments? Did you hit your head on the toilet seat after watching Back to the Future? When you write a book, you guys aren’t screwing around. These aren’t these charlatan, half-researched, half-baked books. You guys go deep, and that’s what makes your books so powerful. You guys really go deep. What inspired you to write this book? We actually have a perfectly identifiable moment for this book, which I guess is appropriate, given the subject. It happened one Christmas, a couple of years back, when Chip and I were together at our parents’ house, and as we often do, we had scrawled ourselves away in our dad’s office to talk about what we were working on. We walked in the office that day with a different book idea. In fact, we’d been working on this particular idea for probably six or eight months by that point. It was one of those things that had just become a bit of a slog. You know, we had done enough work where we were really reluctant to let it go, and yet I don’t think either one of us were super excited about it. And so at some point in this conversation, and I can’t remember how this came up, but the phrase defining moments popped out. And so I think mainly as an attempt to procrastinate our real work, we just started brainstorming about this topic and you know we were talking about the Olympic medal ceremony and just what a beautiful patriotic emotional moment that is and the fact that somebody designed that at some point in human history and we talked about political defining moments you know these weird things that just catch on like the the Howard Dean screams one night at a rally and suddenly he’s thought to be a lunatic you know it’s just the weirdest. Or George Bush Sr. expressed surprise at a UPC scanner, and all of a sudden he’s terminally out of touch. These kind of weird stand-in moments that take on a life of their own. So anyway, we end up brainstorming about this topic for two hours, and we’re filling up page after page of a Word document with associations and research links and what have you, and we kind of come out triumphantly after all this and parade ourselves into the living room where the rest of the family is and we say, we’ve got a new book idea. When we announced this kind of moment’s idea, because we knew it instantly as soon as we hit on it, the whole family just had this visible sense of relief on their faces because apparently none of them liked the old idea and they were just too polite to tell us. Dan, Dr. Z here. I have five brothers. How is that the dynamics? That’s a lot of books. That’s a lot of books. Yeah, a lot of books. I’m not sure I could sit down and write a book with any one of them, though. But how does that dynamic work? I mean, it’s awful close, and yet you guys, is there a lot of tension? Do you guys work real well together? I mean, you guys ever go in the cage fight? I mean, do you guys… Walk me through that a little bit. I think our secret sauce is that we’re 10 years apart. So I’m 45 and Chip is about to turn 55. And so, you know, growing up, we never had that classic kind of brotherly rivalry, you know, it would have been pointless, you know, for him to really pick a fight as a 15 year old with a five year old, like, you know, you’re pretty much gonna win every contest, you know, and so we didn’t really have that. And in fact, we didn’t have much of a relationship, you know, because he was off at college by the time I was eight years old and so This really has become our relationship as adults this this chance to work on these big interesting Meaty projects together. I guess some some brothers fix up cars together, and we write these weird psychology business books I think it’s very cool. So how did you guys come up with the idea for for you to to write a book? I mean you guys sit around one day in the man cave and said, hey, bro, let’s write a book. I mean, how’d that happen? 100% serendipity. I mean, if life had gone on as normal, we never would have, but we had a very fortunate stroke of luck, and that was years ago, Chip had begun to research what makes urban legends stick. And I know we’re going to talk about sticky ideas later, but he had written a journal article just explaining you know these crazy ideas you know you know somebody found a rat in their bucket of Kentucky fried chicken and that’s what I mean by urban legend. Why do these ideas seem to spread so effortlessly and what is it about them that makes them sticky? And he’d written up some of his early research and in a journal you know it wasn’t anywhere with a big readership but somehow an editor at Random House named Ben Lennon happened to see the piece and thought it was interesting and called up Chip and basically asked him, you know, do you think there’s a book here in this material? And Chip got excited about it and later on he called me up and asked if I wanted to join the project because between the two of us I’m more of the writer and he’s more the researcher. And so my feeling was, you know what, if if Random House is asking, the answer is yes. Yeah, absolutely. We’re going to get a book out of this. And that’s the book that became Made to Stick. And we did it really for ourselves. I mean, we loved the material and we thought it’d be fun to write a book. And we figured it would sell 28 copies and we would go back to our lives having done that. You sold at least 29 copies. Yeah. And so, you know, it just kind of blew our minds when it came out and like a week after or a couple of days after it comes out, we’re on the Today Show and we’re in Time Magazine. Needless to say, that was not part of any of our grand schemes. The success of that book kind of opened a lot of doors for us. We just enjoyed the hell out of it. We love the process of researching and writing and talking about what we’ve learned. It’s really become a career. Well, you know, in your newest book here, that the power of moments you write, our relationships are stronger when we perceive that our partners are responsive to us. Responsiveness encompasses three things. Understanding my partner knows how I see myself and what is important to me. Validation. My partner respects who I am and what I want. Caring. My partner takes active and supportive steps in helping me meet my needs. Can you share with the listeners what you mean by this? Because this is some profound observations that you guys have put together here. Yeah, to be clear, this is the research of a guy named Harry Reese who spent his career researching what makes relationships grow stronger. And what’s fascinating about this is Harry Reese has looked at marriages, he’s looked at friendships, he’s looked at business partnerships, and what he’s proposing here is that there’s a kind of universal truth about stronger relationships, and it’s what you just shared, what he calls responsiveness, where the three parts are understanding, validation, and caring. And what we talk about in the book is how many of the moments that we remember in life are moments that draw us closer to other people. And so we’re trying to describe these memorable moments where we really felt like we emerged more bonded closer to someone than when we started. What are those moments made of? And what we’re arguing is that Harry Reese has the secret, that it’s this quality of responsiveness that creates big, powerful moments. So I’ll give you one example. We tell the story in the country. It’s called Stanton. Just abysmal test scores. And so, in fact, it’s so bad that the district kind of reclaims it and fires management, brings in an outside party to run the place. And so what happens is in year one, they get new management, they get a bunch of new teachers, they overhaul the school, they redo the paint colors, they put penance on the wall, they get new curriculum. Essentially, it’s a brand new school and test scores actually go down after all that. All that work. They come back for year two and the one thing that changes is in the summer before year two, they start this kind of curious new practice they call a home visit. And all it means is that a teacher, you know, let’s say a first grade teacher, goes to visit the parents of each of his or her students in their homes. And when they get to the homes, they just ask a series of four questions. They don’t bring, you know, promotional materials, they don’t bring documents, they don’t bring checklists assigned, they’re just there to ask a couple of questions. And, you know, one of them is, what are your dreams for your child? And what do we need to know to teach your kid better? And what were your educational experiences like? And what do you wish had been different? And these conversations, you wouldn’t think that an hour spent in someone’s home would be relevant in a school year that lasts nine months and you know, runs across hundreds and hundreds of instructional hours. And yet, everybody dates the turnaround to Stanton to that practice. They said even in the first week of school you could detect the difference. You know these students come in and where the year before it was just almost non-stop pandemonium in terms of discipline all of a sudden the students are lining up appropriately and and the explanation is that this moment was was just a gangbuster moment of responsiveness. That for the first time, these parents felt listened to. They felt taken seriously. And that spillover effect affected their investment in their child’s education. They start showing up for PTA meetings. They start volunteering for duty. And it also spills over into the student’s attitude towards school. And so that’s an example of how just a moment, you know, an hour of time out of a school year when properly designed can have just a massive effect. You know, I just to validate what what you’re saying there, Dan, I went to Elephant in the Room, one of our companies, it’s a men’s grooming lounge. We had somebody who had a question about their schedule and they felt like they weren’t being heard. And you know, a lot of times if you send an email into a big company you don’t know if it’s being responded to. And I just happened to be nearby and Eric, one of our show hosts was there when he read the email, we saw the email in our team meeting today, but it meant the world to her that I just was in the area and I stopped by to verify that I received the email. And it might not seem like a big deal, but that moment, I heard so many people say, you’re just coming into the store and verifying that you got that email, even though you were just in the area, for her it made the biggest, it was a big pendulum shift for her, and all week we’ve been hearing about that. And so I would just tell you if you’re out there And you’re a business owner Those these moments really do matter and that’s why there’s an excerpt that you guys posted of your book the moments the power of moments in fast company where it said Moments are not created equal our experiences are mostly forgettable and occasionally remarkable, but those remarkable moments don’t create themselves what if we didn’t just remember the standout moments of our lives and work, but made them? The idea that you could make these moments, you could be intentional about these, that’s the part that stood out to me. Can you share maybe for all the business owners out there that are going, okay, okay, I believe in this idea, but how do I actually get this working for me? Can you talk about how you can intentionally create moments that matter? Yes, and I think maybe the best case study to start with is a hotel in Los Angeles called the Magic Castle Hotel. And so if you’ve never stayed there, it’s not a very big place. Just picture in your mind what the Magic Castle Hotel looks like. I like it already. And let me tell you, it looks nothing like what you’re imagining. What this place actually is, is a 1950s era apartment complex, two-story. It’s like the kind of place you might have stayed off campus in college to save some money. It was later converted to use as a motel, painted bright yellow. Very, very average place. I mean it looks like a well-kept budget motel. The rooms are average, the lobby is average. It’s got a pool that’s like that, you know, a little smaller than your neighbor’s backyard pool. And so why am I talking about this place? Well, a surprising fact is that this place I’m talking about is currently ranked as the number two hotel in all of Los Angeles on TripAdvisor. We’re looking at it right now. We’re looking at it right now on the big screen in the man cave. So we can we can see what you’re describing here. And you, my friend, have described it to the T. Continue, my friend. So how in the world? I mean, you’re looking at the pictures of this, and I encourage all the listeners to do the same. When you see this, your mind will explode. How could this place possibly outrank the Ritz-Carlton and the Four Seasons? And the answer is they figured out the power of moments. So one of my favorite examples is by this kind of average pool I was talking about, there’s a cherry red phone mounted on the wall and just above it is a sign that says Popsicle Hotline. And you can pick up the phone someone answers popsicle hotline will be right out and within minutes Somebody comes out wearing a suit They’re holding a silver tray loaded up with grape and cherry and orange popsicles They deliver them to you right there at poolside wearing gloves like an English Butler all that for free They have a snack menu where you can go up to the front desk and ask for for Cracker Jacks or Sour Patch Kids or root beer or cream soda or M&M’s all for free just for the asking. You can check out board games. They have a board game menu and they have a movie menu. They’ll do your laundry if you drop it off in the morning. They’ve got magicians doing tricks in the lobby several times a week. And so when I describe this whole side of the Magic Castle to you, I mean, now you can start to understand how, especially a family, you know, vacationing in Southern California, how you might just straight up choose the Magic Castle over the Ritz-Carlton. And the reason is because you know, you have an instinct that a year later, you know, you’re not going to remember the marble furnishings in the Ritz-Carlton. What you’re going to remember is, you’re not going to believe this, but there’s a phone by the pool where you can pick it up and somebody will bring popsicles out to you. I mean, that’s the power of moments. I will tell you, for all the listeners out there who are saying, okay, I want to see this. Eric Chupp, our show observer here, he’s going to add links to all these different photos so everyone can see the Popsicle hotline, so they can see the pool, which I would say is definitely average. At best. At best. See, that was kind of mean. It was definitely a good two and a half star. But that just goes to show you can take a facility that looks like this and add the moments to it, which is just an incredible story. I mean, it’s just so awesome. I want to ask you this here, Dan. What’s your process for writing a book? Actually, can I just add one more thought for the business owners out there? I want to make sure that everybody listening doesn’t think the moral of this Popsicle Hotline story is that you need something wacky. You need something kind of silly and funny like that. I know there are people out there that run a shipping business or B2B sales or IT consulting and it doesn’t lend itself to a Popsicle hotline. I get that. The moral of the story is this, that we can’t problem solve our way to a great customer experience. Think about the Magic Castle as an example. Imagine that a manager had taken over that hotel but hadn’t done the moments. You know, there’s no popsicle hotline, there’s no snack menu, there’s no board game menu, and instead their strategy was, hey, we’re gonna pay careful attention to customers’ responses on surveys, and every customer that stays here, we’re gonna give them a survey and we’re gonna look at what they’re complaining about and, by God, we’re gonna fix those things. So, you know, if the pillows are too soft, we’re going to get firmer pillows. And if the lamps are too bright, we’re going to get dimmer bulbs. And if check-in is too slow, we’re going to hire more people to check them in. And my question to you is, it’s clear that that strategy of fixing problems would make the hotel better, for sure. But where would that hotel end up on the TripAdvisor list? And there’s no way it ends up as number two. It might be number 250. And so I think that’s the takeaway lesson for businesses of all kinds, is that addressing complaints is not the same thing as winning affection. That if we want great experiences, what we know is that great experiences hinge on peak moments, and we’ve got to start building those peaks. I would say that what you’re saying, from my experience as a business coach and someone who’s helped a lot of brands is 100% true I think about Chick-fil-a a client that I’ve coached over the years I mean they hand people they hand young kids a balloon when they get there They have a cow a large cow that’s in the in all the stores What does that cost to have a large person dressed up as a cow mascot? I don’t know what that costs, but kids go there my kid I have five kids they all want to go back because of that. There’s a local pediatric dentist in Tulsa called Dr. Morrow and Lye, and they have a huge aquarium in the middle of the pediatric dentistry, and they have video games for the kids, and they offer beverages and that kind of thing. Kids come back because it’s memorable, and it gets stuck in your head, and absolutely it works. I want to ask you this because you guys, when you hear, you know, academia, you hear about Stanford, you start to hear your academic background. I think a lot of entrepreneurs are thinking, this is going to be the most boring book of my life. I couldn’t possibly read this. It’s so theoretical. But you guys write in a very conversational tone. So I want to ask you, what’s your process for writing books? Because your books don’t come across as highbrow Ron Burgundy reading business books that are don’t, you know, it doesn’t come across like that to the reader, but yet I think with your academic background a lot of people might think that it would. Talk about your process for writing books that are so applicable for entrepreneurs. Yeah, thanks for saying that. I mean, what we’re constantly trying to do is, we’re trying to accomplish three things at once, and so we find ourselves spending a lot of time just iterating between these three points and one is We want to make sure there’s evidence for the things we’re saying and and you know There’s not always going to be randomized control trials for this stuff a lot of it’s a lot of it’s subtle a lot of it is You know not the kind of thing the academic study So we do the best we can to find pockets of evidence where we can whether that’s real-world case studies or academic research research. The second thing is we want there to be stories to carry the message because there’s a reason why you know people aren’t subscribing to academic journals in their free time that nobody wants to read that stuff you know nobody has the time for it some people don’t have the expertise to get through all the statistics and so we want to find stories that carry the message and and that’s what makes a book readable is the stories you know and it’s also the hardest part of writing is finding the stories that will just keep you flipping the pages. And then third, and then ultimately, we want our books to be practical. We’re not ashamed to say our books are how-to books. If somebody gets all the way through one of our books and doesn’t have ideas about how to make their life better or their business better, we failed. That’s what we set out to do. And so that’s our process, is just to figure out what’s the intersection of those three circles? Where’s the evidence? Where are the stories? And are the lessons practical? And if we can do all of those three things, then we think we’ve got a book. If you’ll allow me to put you on the hot seat here, because your book made the stick. I’m not sure how many pages are in the book. I can say that I’ve dog-eared pretty much all of them. And you lay out this idea, this concept for getting your ideas stuck in the heads of your ideal and likely buyers, your audience, your congregation, whoever you’re speaking to, and you lay it out using S-U-C-C-E-S. That’s the method you laid out. And you talked about, first off, to get your ideas to stick in the minds of other people. In your book, Made to Stick, you talk about they have to be simple. Can you help all the entrepreneurs? We have so many entrepreneurs I’ve tried to help over the years write, let’s say, advertising copy or to come up with a business model that’s different from the competition. And simplicity ultimately scales, whereas complexity fails. Can you talk about your method for simplifying the ideas that our listeners are trying to communicate to their ideal and likely buyers? Yes, so first let me say success, this almost perfect acronym. You know, if we would have just had one more S, we would have had the full word success, but instead we have this truncated success. Let me tell you what those things stand for, and then we can kind of tick through them one by one. So a sticky idea is simple, unexpected, concrete, credible, emotional, and it’s often told as a story. So your question was about simplicity and I think our version of simplicity doesn’t mean dumbing down. What it means is more like in the army they have this great strategy for creating battle plans and so some quick back story here. You know the old expression no battle plan survives contact with the enemy. That was essentially what the army had learned is that they spent massive amounts of time and resources developing these elaborate battle plans and very quickly they would be rendered obsolete by the enemy’s actions and so in the 80s there was this kind of reform movement to figure out how do we create more useful battle plans and part of that reform was that they added something called the commander’s intent to the top of their battle plans. And the idea of the commander’s intent was to specify in kind of plain talk language what the intention of the plans was. So, you know, at high levels of the Army the commander’s intent might sound like break the will of the enemy in the Southeast region. And then, you know, a couple levels down when you start to get closer to the ground troops it might sound like my intent is to have 3rd Battalion on Hill 4305, to have the hill cleared of enemy with only ineffective remnants remaining, so we can protect the flank of 3rd Brigade as they pass through the line. So what that tells you is if all of the specifics in the plan become irrelevant, at least you know what was behind them, what the intent was. And the way that they get to the commander’s intent is they ask themselves simple questions. If we do nothing else during tomorrow’s mission, we must blank. The single most important thing that we must do tomorrow is blank. And I think that there is a direct analogy between that and what it’s like to be an effective communicator, that as communicators we should be able to fill in that blank and say, the The single most important thing that my audience must understand and remember is blank. That may sound simple, but I’ll tell you my experience is that 99% of communications aren’t structured that way. If we really knew what our core message was and we really took that seriously, we would be spending half of every PowerPoint deck and half of the airtime in every speech and 50% of the word count in every email, just reinforcing that one point. Instead, what you find is the PowerPoint becomes a kind of everything but the kitchen sink. It’s like all the interesting points that we want to make around a certain topic get piled into one master PowerPoint and all of a sudden, the commander’s intent gets buried in that onslaught. lot. And so what’s hard about simplicity to wrap this up is that we have to prioritize that simplicity is painful precisely because we have to leave some ideas behind that may be interesting and may be useful but just aren’t the most interesting and useful that we need to communicate. You know Dan my partner Dr. Zellner is the master of unexpected advertising. Of being simple? I know. No, no, no. He’s like the leading optometrist in northeastern Oklahoma. And he just, I mean, he brings a marketing perspective that people don’t expect. With his auto auction, it’s the same thing. With the bank he invested in, it’s the same thing. Each business, it’s unexpected, his unorthodox approach to marketing. In your book, Made to Stick, you talk about the importance of being unexpected. Can you describe what you mean by unexpected in terms of making your ideas stick? Yeah, I think there’s a quote that I remember from one source that they said, the aha experience is often preceded by the huh experience. And what that means for communicators is if we want to get across a message, the first thing we’ve got to do is earn attention and a lot of times that can come from posing a mystery so You know I saw the cover of a book one time and I remember just being sort of frozen in my tracks by the the title of The book was why do men have nipples? Whoa? and I remember thinking I Sort of want to know the answer to that and five seconds ago. That was that was nowhere in my consciousness. Freakonomics does a great job of this too. Some of the things on the flap copy of their book are, why do drug dealers so often live with their moms? Now you find yourself, gosh, that’s weird. I wonder why that is. What’s going on there is what George Loewenstein, who is a professor at Carnegie Mellon, what he calls a curiosity gap. And what that represents is there’s a gap that has been opened up between what we know and what we want to know. And his point is that when we become aware that that gap exists, it creates a kind of itch. It’s actually modestly unpleasant. And the importance of that is it creates a little spark of desire to scratch the itch. In other words, you know, we’ll flip through a couple of pages to find out the answers to those things. And that’s a precious thing if you’re a communicator, is if you can get the audience to want to know the answer, all of a sudden, you’ve piqued their interest in your idea. I don’t know why now I want to know why males have nipples. It’s like an irresistible thing now. I’ve already ordered the book on Amazon. When you talk about concrete as the next phase, you say you write that an idea must be grasped in a way that can be remembered later, which apparently my longing now to know why men have nipples is that idea. Concrete. If I’m struggling, if I’m listening out there and I say, gosh, how do I get my ideas to be remembered after the speaking event, after the radio show, after they see the advertisement, what would be your tip to make your ideas more concrete? Well, if you forgive me a brief tangent, I think there’s a story that perfectly illustrates this. So the story starts with a friend of a friend of mine who’s a big business traveler. He’s always on the road, meeting with clients and whatnot. And he was coming back recently from a meeting he had in Vegas. And he had a little bit of time to kill on the way back in the Vegas airport, so he walks into a bar, he’s going to get a drink, and before he can even order, a young woman approaches him, an attractive young woman. She says, hey, can I buy you a drink? And you know, this is not something that happens to this guy very often, and so he says, well, absolutely, sure, I’ll have a drink. So she goes up to the bar, brings back two drinks, one for her, one for him. They have a cheers moment. He’s thinking, this is the greatest day of my life, takes a big sip, blacks out. Next thing he remembers is waking up some untold amount of time later in a strange hotel bathtub full of ice. And there’s a sign on the wall of the tub when he kind of comes to and it says, don’t move, call 911. And fortunately, there’s a cell phone right by the tub, so he picks it up, calls 911. The operator asks him to describe the situation, and he’s panicked and describes what he’s seeing. And the operator says, sir, can you reach behind you in the tub and see if there’s a tube sticking out of your back? So he does that, and sure enough, there’s a tube. Oh, my goodness. He says, what in the world is happening to me? I don’t understand. And the operator says, sir, stay right where you are. I’ve called the paramedics. There’s a ring of organ thieves in town and they’ve gotten to you. They’ve harvested one of your kidneys Sick, this is known as the kidney thieves urban legend It is one of the most successful kind of viral sticky ideas of the last few decades Let me let me comfort all of you. This is false I’m like, oh, oh. And so the question is, anywhere you go in the world, they’ve heard some version of the story. And you know the details are different. In India, it’s not going to be Vegas. It’s going to be Mumbai. But it always has the kind of core elements of the story. And the question is, why is this so sticky? And so back to your question about concreteness. Concreteness means that we use visual sensory language and the importance of that is a month from now You know long after you’ve forgotten listening to this podcast long after you’ve forgotten my name or the book’s name or anything else you’ll be able to retell this story perfectly and When you retell it you won’t be remembering the precise words that I use like remembering a credit card number or something Instead what’s going to happen is you’re going to replay the film that I just embedded into your brain and you’re going to see those images and you’re going to narrate to them and you may well use almost totally different language and yet the core of it will be the same and the reason you’ll be able to do that is that I used concrete language in telling that tale and what’s so important about that is in the business world it’s almost like we have an allergy to concrete language. You know, if you look at classic corporate communications, it’s so chock-full of abstractions and buzzwords and it’s almost designed to be, you know, stick-proof. But I think if we can get in the habit of letting people see things, of painting, you know, mental scenes of the things we’re describing, that’s a powerful communication tool. I’ll give you one example. I was working with some executives from a major department store years ago, and one of the people was pitching basically a revamp of their inventory systems, which doesn’t sound like a super sticky turf of ideas, right? We want to overhaul our inventory systems. But what they designed to build attention and to make this concrete was they showed, hey, if you’re on the floor of this department store and a customer comes up and has a question, maybe they have a shirt that they like, but we don’t have their size in stock and you want to check and see where do we have it. Our store inventory system is one interface. That interface looks like this. They actually had screenshots. If you don’t have it in store, you might look at nearby stores, you know, another one across town. That’s a different inventory system. It looks like this. They had another screenshot. And if you don’t find it in either place, you might check online. Guess what? Online’s a totally different system too. It looks like this. So imagine this floor rep trying to help a customer find a daggone shirt and their size, shuttling between these three completely independent inventory systems with three different interfaces. That’s concreteness, the ability to see those interfaces and to imagine the emotion and the frustration of what that’s like for a real human being on the floor of the department store. That’s, in essence, using the same strategy as this crazy urban legend I talked about. So that’s concreteness. You know, if you’re out there listening, and for sake of time here, Dan, I want to make sure our listeners know, but for anybody out there, if you own a business or any kind of – you run an organization, you want your ideas to stick more effectively, I encourage you to check out Dan’s book, Made to Stick. It’s incredible, but I want to give you an opportunity here to share a little bit more about your newest book, and as we wrap up, to share with them why all the listeners need to get a copy of The Power of Moments and maybe what kind of applicable nuggets they can find within your newest book, The Power of Moments. I would say something very simple and that is if you aspire to deliver a better customer experience or if you’re interested just in what it means to live a more meaningful life, that’s what this book is about. It’s a book about improving experience ranging from better personal relationships, better patient experiences in hospitals and clinics, better student experiences in school. What we’re trying to find is the common DNA that links all of those very different kinds of experiences. I’ll foreshadow what we find in the book. There are four elements that seem to characterize these very meaningful, very memorable moments. And those elements are elevation, insight, pride, and connection. And so if you want the director’s cut version of that story, check it out in The Power of Moments. Dan, I appreciate you taking time out of your busy schedule and undoubtedly the formation of your newest book that you and your brother are probably creating right now below the surface. But I appreciate you taking time out of your schedule to hop on the show with Dr. Z and I. On behalf of the entire Thrive Nation, thank you for lending us a little bit of your time and for the Thrive Nation, if you’re out there and you’re not familiar with Dan Heath and Chip Heath and their work, Dan, what’s a website you would direct everybody to where they can learn about all of the books you’ve created and undoubtedly the books you will be creating in the future. So yes, we have a website called heathbrothers.com. That’s where you can find out about all of our books. I’ll also mention that I have a podcast called Choiceology, and it’s a podcast that concerns behavioral economics and decision making and the traps and biases that we’re all prone to that disrupt our decisions and also how to fix them. It’s a one-season podcast, seven episodes, very manageable. So if you’re interested in that topic, check it out. Well, Dan, thank you again for being on the show today and have an awesome day, my friend. Thank you, appreciate the chance to be on. We like to end our show there, Dan, with a three, two, one, boom. So if we can do a countdown together, that’s the ultimate way we can do that. Personally, yeah. All right, well, Thrive Nation, as always, we want to end with a three and a two and a one and then a boom. So here we go. Three, two, one, boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. You can have your own mic if you want, whatever you want, Odin. Okay, I’m a little bit afraid of Odin. Hi, I’m Ryan Wimpy. And I’m Rachel Wimpy, and the name of our business is Kip Top Training. Our business is a dog training business. We help people with behavioral issues and teach their dog how to listen. When I was learning to become a dog trainer, we didn’t learn anything about Internet marketing or advertising or anything at all, just dog training. And that’s what’s so great about working with Clay and his team, because they do it all for us. So that we can focus on our passion and that’s training jobs. Clay and his team here, they’re so enthusiastic, their energy is off the charts. Never a dull moment, spirit thread. We’ve been working with Clay and his team for the last five months, two of which have been our biggest months ever. One, our biggest gross by 35%. Clay’s helped us make anything from brochures to stickers, new business cards, new logos, scripts for phones, scripts for email, scripts for text message, scripting for everything. How I would describe the weekly meetings with Clay and his team are awesome. They’re so effective. It’s worth every minute. Things get done. We’ll ask for things like different flyers, and they’re done before our hour is up. So it’s just awesome, extremely effective. If you don’t use Clay and his team, you’re probably going to be pulling your hair out, or you’re going to spend half of your time trying to figure out the online marketing game and producing your own flyers and marketing materials, print materials, all the stuff like that. You’re really losing a lot as far as lost productivity and lost time. Not having a professional do it has a real sense of urgency and actually knows what they’re doing when you already have something that’s your core focus that you already know how to do. You would also be missing out with all the time and financial freedom that you would have working with Clay and his team? We would recommend Clay and his team to other business owners because they need to be working on their business, not just trying to figure out the online game, which is complex and changing daily. So no one has a marketing team, too. Most people don’t. They can’t afford one, and their local web guy or local person that they know probably can’t do everything that a whole team and a whole floor of people can do in hours and not just weeks or months. There’s a definite sense of urgency with Clay and his team. I used to have to ride other web people, I mean really ride them to get stuff done, and stuff is done so fast here. People, there’s a real sense of urgency to get it done. All right folks, on part one of today’s show we focused on how to grow your company, which is great. However, the key to building a sustainably profitable company is you need to focus on how much you have, how much you get to keep, not just how much you make. How much do you actually get to keep? And one of the biggest expenses that’s a line item that every business owner pays for is credit card processing. So on today’s show, we’re joined with Tyler, the longtime credit card processing service of choice that I’ve used for many, many years. And he’s here to share with you how he can help you save a lot of money. So without any further ado, Tyler, welcome on to the show. How are you, sir? I’m great, Clay. Thanks for having me. Hey, awesome. Well, I want to ask, what is the website people can go to if they want to verify that you, in fact, are a real person? Yeah, www.integratedpaymentservices.com. OK, so integratedpaymentservices.com. OK, so I’m going to pull up. That’s us right there. Integratedpaymentservices.com. So, for anybody out there that’s not familiar with you, what exactly do you do and how can you save our listeners money? Yeah, so we set businesses up to accept a credit card as a form of payment. And we do that in any way that you can think of accepting a card, whether that’s in person, whether it’s through a website, maybe it’s integrated into a software, maybe it’s through a virtual terminal where they’re taking a lot of payments over the phone, maybe they’re sending out invoices with links, really any way that you can think of capturing a payment through credit card or even ACH, we set businesses up to do that, whether they are a new business and looking to do it or they’re a current business and looking to maybe lower what they’re paying now. Now what I’ve found is that every time I’ve sent somebody to you, and I’ve referred a lot of people to you over the years, everybody that I’ve sent to you has told me that on average they’re saving just thousands and thousands of dollars per year. So how is it possible that you guys are saving the average business owner thousands of dollars? Well, it’s because we’re not exclusive with any And the way that we do that is just, you know, we see ourselves as wanting to price our customers as low as possible and have their business for many, many years. For a lot of processors, you know, maybe price them a certain way and they make their money in a few months and if they lose the customer, they don’t care. That’s not our philosophy. And to give you an example, a statement last night I reviewed of a customer, I sent it to me, I’m about to have a call with him in about an hour. We’re gonna save him about $2,000 a month. So again, I mean, you said $2,000 a month? Yeah, $24,000 a year. Really? And so what do you have to do, what does the process look like if somebody wants to compare rates with you? What’s step one, step two, step three? Yeah, so step one, obviously we have a phone conversation, we talk about, you know, their needs as far as how they process the transactions. We, you know, maybe they’re not doing things as efficiently as they could. Do we see if maybe we have a product that could help them? Then what we do is we get them to, you know, send us one or two of their previous month processing statements. We put together a comparison. Everything looks good. They love the savings and they’re ready to move forward. It takes about two days, that whole process and that whole first phone call takes about five to ten minutes. So, pretty simple process. Okay, so again folks, we’ve created a landing page here, thrivetimeshow.com forward slash credit card. When you fill out the form, the form goes directly to Tyler and his team and they’ll take care of you. But again, step one, fill out the form. Step two, they’ll give you a call. And again, on average, I’m finding that the clients I’ve sent your way are telling me they’re saving $3,000, $4,000 a year off of their credit card processing costs. And again, but there are people that you’re saying that some people you’re able to save thousands of dollars per month. Oh yeah. Yeah, it just depends on the customer and how they’re priced. You know, it’s funny, not funny, but a lot of people don’t look at their statements close enough and a lot of these processors start adding in fees and adding in different services that they didn’t even know that they were paying for, that we can go in and just eliminate. What is the biggest question that people ask you when they fill out the form? My final question for you is, when people reach out to you, because you talk to people every single day that are looking to reduce the amount of money they’re spending on credit card fees, what’s the question everybody asks you that I’m not asking you today? Well, I mean, the first question they ask, you already asked, is how are we able to save them money? Second question is usually, why should we use you? And my answer to that is, because we do what we say we’re gonna do. I mean, I know we’ve done business with you for years, but whenever there’s an issue, our company, we answer our phones. Whenever you have a problem, we answer our phones. We don’t have any contracts, and what we say we’re gonna do, we do. We don’t ever raise your rates. How we price you from the beginning is how you’ll be priced for the entire time that you do business with IPS. Well, I can just tell you folks, I’ve had the opportunity to work with you for years and years, and I’m very happy with the results that you guys provide. And again, we put a landing page together because people ask me all the time, Clay, who do you recommend for credit card processing? So check it out, folks. It’s Thrivetimeshow.com forward slash credit dash card. I would argue that this conversation would save you an average of over $3,000 a year. But again, some people are saving thousands of dollars a month. Tyler, thank you for your time, sir, and we’ll talk to you next week. That sounds great, Clay. Have a great week. Take care, brother. Bye. Oh my God! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey guys, Luke Erickson here with the Thrive Time Show. As you can see behind me, we’ve got all kinds of energy going on people are starting to show up for the conference it is hot in this place we got grill guns over here we’ve got people playing the drums, we’ve got a fire breather and man people are so excited as they come in The conference is kicked off, this house is packed, we’ve got Eric Antic with shoplifters up there We’ve got Steve Curry, Timmy Jordan, the concept of their forward goals. Talking about what is possible when you just implement, when you implement, when you do that proven system. So exciting. People are going crazy. Now Michael Levine, writer of many, many PR books. The man who represented people like Michael Jackson, Barbara Streisand, George Bush, We just wrapped up day one. It was incredible. We had some remarkable speakers. Michael Levine. We just finished with a lady named Jill Donovan who owns a company called Rustic Cuff talking about the power of the Dream 100. I cannot wait to see what tomorrow holds. Come on in! Welcome to the 5th annual Metro-Mobile Day 2! That’s right, you’ve heard me, come on in! Hey guys, Luke Erickson with the Thrive Time Show here with you. It is day 2 and the energy is high. People are so excited to be showing up. The team is ready. Come on, let’s see what it’s like to go on in for day two. Follow me. I’ll tell you what, people are so excited to be here for day two. It is going to be incredible. Cannot wait to see what today has in store. Right now, here at the conference, we’ve broken into groups going over search engine optimization. I know for most of us, myself included, if you hear that term, you go, what is that? What does that mean? That’s too techy for me. Well, our experts are breaking it down for people so that you can clearly understand how to come up top in Google. It’s doable. It’s possible. Now we’re in the middle of a break and what we like to do is we like to give you as much tangible and relevant information from about the start of the hour for 45 minutes. Then we take approximately a 15 minute break to allow people to connect with other entrepreneurs around them, bathroom break, and also use this time to just really digest all of the good information that you’re receiving the whole time. Right behind me we’ve got Bob with his drill gun melting an ice sculpture. It is awesome. The ice sculpture represents our life, right? It’s here for a time, but we all need to have the sense of urgency to implement the things that we’re learning so that we can make the most of the time that we have. We are outside. You can see a line behind me. What’s going on is that we partner with different companies to help them implement the proven systems over and over and over again. And one of those companies is Master Machine. And so what we like to do is partner with these companies to also help them give samples to other people as they come to the conference and truly get their name out. I just wanted to recap some of the amazing things that have happened today. We’ve had entrepreneurs like Paul Hood, the good CPAs. We’ve had Jill Donovan and Michael Levine come up and just impart so much wisdom and knowledge. We’ve got an incredible giveaway for one of our teamies. Hey there Thrive Nation. One of the things that we love most about our business conferences is that we want every entrepreneur to leave with their questions answered. So what we do is we let them put the questions up on the board here so that they can ask their specific questions and Clay will not end the conference until every question is answered. Behind us Clay Clark answering all the different questions that entrepreneurs have brought to the conference. Whenever someone comes here and starts to hear this information, especially for the first time, it just brings about so much anticipation of wanting to actually implement the proven systems and processes. And so Clay always wants to make sure that he answers all of those questions so that they are the most set up for success, so that they can go home and start implementing. If you have any questions, email us at info at Thrivetimeshow.com. We have come to the end of the 2019 Christmas Conference. It was incredible. These entrepreneurs have gotten so many tangible things that they can go and they can implement. Check us out for more information at Thrivetimeshow.com. And as we always like to do, we want to end with a boom. 3, 2, 1, boom! Oh, look at this cute baby! What a great baby! Quality baby, that’s a healthy baby. Prime 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 non-violent way possible. They’re killing the game. Yeah. And 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? Hi. Thank you. Good. We’re doing well. OK. Now, I’ll start with you, Jenny, because frankly, Sean likes you more. No, I’m just kidding. So, let’s start with you. So, how did you first discover us and the business coaching that we provide? So, I was listening to different podcasts about business. I was starting up our business. And so, you were the first one to pop up 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 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? It’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? This is probably… Oh, look at this cute baby. What a great baby. Quality baby. That’s a healthy baby. Okay. 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. I’m gonna pull that 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? 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 share. Well, you know, the one thing I always try to do is, you know, my father, great guy, may he rest in peace, he worked his tail off like so many people do. And there was no real economic result 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 30s. 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? Because like, 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 so you guys, I paired you up with Sean. You’ve been working 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, from that point to now, 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 there in October of 2020, like they only had a few months, but they made about $95,000 by the 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 or you’re 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, you know, 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. 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 you all optimize everything and keep us with Google, just 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, health care 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 know, you always say great things about Mike and Jenny. You’re always, what makes them good to work with? Because I want to make sure for anybody out there, if you go to thrive timeshow.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 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, when I first started coaching, you taught me about these two types of business owners. There’s the happy hopers out there, and then there’s the diligent doers. 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’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 ask great 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 can be a tough thing to do, Jenny. And I’m not, 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 is, it’s difficult because you feel like you’re begging for something even though you know you did the right thing. So it is, it’s difficult for me. It’s just my personality type, but we get it done anyways. I 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 will 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 the number that’s urgent. I’m like, okay, not. And I go, what? He’s like, 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. That’s why you came to me. You don’t have any customers. So why don’t you do a first free consult? Say, I’m not going to do it. 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, okay, I came to your conference and I saw a person that did the first consult for a dollar. I’m gonna 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 healthcare is superior to most. So just getting people in for that dollar, because a lot of people are, they’re nervous about going to the doctor or they don’t trust healthcare system. And so they know that they can come in, they’re only gonna 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, 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 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. You begin 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 almost a growing pain experience. We’ve had so many leads so fast. 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. 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 where you can, you know, how does that help you? Well, it’s really a good benefit because, you know, at the end of the week, you know what your income was, you know what your leads was. So wherever we’re lacking in, we can quickly adjust and make that adjustment to make it work for the next week. Now when you, 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 terrible story, long time client and he got motivated. He set up a trade show. He didn’t tell me he’s doing that. It’s fine, you don’t have to tell me, but he set up a trade show. I think he was gonna 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’s kind of off and I’m like, are you okay? Yeah, dude, fine. What’s wrong? Hi, just, 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. We’re in a tight spot? Why are you in a tight spot? He says, I did a trade show. You did a trade show. 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, being, you know, and he got called by one of these kind of scam. I thought a scam occurry or jackassery Yeah, they call you they go Hey, this is Sean Yeah, this is Sean Sean. Yeah, I know we 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 would we like to meet with you is what we meet with you Yeah, so now I meet here now Sean again. I’m not we’re on the phone, but I still like the phone voice here. So now, Sean, so because we’re so honored, you know, we’re we’re inviting you to a plated dinner to honor your just your honor, your honor, your greatness, your humbleness. And it’s going to be a thousand dollars a plate, you know, for you and your wife. And did you want four seats or eight? Most people do eight. Oh, I guess just four, four, four. And that does include a glossy magazine feature in, we’ll just call it like Missouri local top doctor Jack Assery. It’s a great magazine. And you’re also on the, you’ll be on a billboard. We’ve teamed up with the billboard. It rotates through your, hey, don’t get too excited. And just because we’re honored, we’re not, you know, again, we’re just honored now. Do you want to do the four, four tickets? 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. To be technical, nobody was at this trade show. I mean, everybody was not at the trade show. I got photos of 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. I’m sure you’ve never encountered this sort of thing, Virginia. Have you, you know, Jenny, have you ever seen a situation where that sort of shamockery 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 pin show. The only people that were there were people looking for free pins. Oh, I know, and it feels terrible. And then you kind of have to sell it to yourself all day. But guys, we’re getting our name out there. Sean, can you pass the megaphone back there? It’s right behind you. Yeah, because I always tell people, when you get your name out there, what you do is you just run outside and say, all right, come visit New Ponce Health Care. And people go, why are you yelling at me? I’m trying to shop for my groceries. New Pops up up there. My name up there. Getting the next. Is this effective? It’s of course it’s effective. I’m getting my name out there. And that leads to buying Frisbees, branded Frisbees, Goozies. You know what I’m saying? Branded Pins. Yes. All of a sudden you buy these things. Sean, you know what I’m talking about. Oh yeah. Okay. So now we have to do, and I’m going to show you, this is kind of the back end of one of my companies, Elephant in the Room, and you do a search for eitrlounge.com, and then you go to forward slash staff. I’m not gonna 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. Wow. 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, there’s like a reaction in the marketplace. People are actually putting more money in, they’re investing, the stock price is going up. But I don’t know anybody that I’ve met in my life, I’ve never met a client that can afford to bring in 3.3 million and lose 49 million, you know? So like 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, you know? 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 Ginny and Mike’s business. We’re in the process of building all those checklists. Yeah. Sean, what kind of checklists 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, right? And I got to go to Denver to meet with the founder of oxyfresh.com. This is a brand we’ve worked with and help them to grow to 550 locations. Now 550 locations. Okay. And if you type in carpet cleaning floats, 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, Sajan, before I met you, we just were grinding, okay? Yeah. And the biggest challenge that the locations have is managers. Finding a 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’ve followed up with the people involved in the trip so far before leaving? Oh man, 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 have 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 is broken Making sure that the people who are there know you’re coming and when you’re gonna be there and be joy like from what do you? Think I’m checking a bag. Oh, yeah, you’re probably not checking a bag there. It is lost all right No, and am I am I get you think I’m catching 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 paranoia 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 four 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 not every I am completely paranoid. And that is the paranoia is what makes the businesses run. Yeah. And I asked my staff every day, guys, elephant in the room. Did you guys get a review? And they say, yeah, we got a review. You asked me 10 minutes ago. OK, I’ll talk to you in four minutes. You hear me say that. I’ll say I’ll talk to you in five minutes. Yeah, I’ll do it. 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? I found that they don’t like to follow up. No, people don’t like to follow up. It’s almost like an awkward communication thing that people try to avoid, yeah. And it’s not necessarily that you’re being mean or any type of way, but 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 done. In my mentorship moment for you, is it 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, what position did you play? Goalkeeper. Goalkeeper, okay. So is a goal, this is a 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 ball’s 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, for some reason, you enjoyed it. Yeah, right. I’m getting 100 miles an hour fastball. Did you ever see 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. Like as a manager, you have to want like you have to sort of seek out conflict, but like people. So 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 gonna 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, I’ll tell you what, I’ll call you back in an hour. 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? 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, 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 thrive. Time show dot com forward slash millionaire thrive. Time show dot com forward slash millionaire. You can download 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, yes, 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. Another example, I work with an auto auction. The auto auction says that the first time 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, 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, okay, great. You gotta 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 console 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. Now, 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 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 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 wasn’t an excuse. I 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 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 use 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 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 build the website, $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. Like, 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 gonna 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. Bye. Thanks for having us. All right, Sean, so we got three people in a very small space here in the studio. Sean, introduce us to today’s guest there, sir. Okay, so this is Kandra Sipansky, and it’s quite a last name, folks. Yep. You play hockey? No. Okay. That’s a hockey name, sure. So we were going over some of the stats before, and she owns an eyelash extension salon. What’s the web address where I can go pull it up here if I want to look at it? It is, uh, there’s, yeah, so there’s two. Which one are we going to? She has the extensionist, which is T-H-E, and then X, tensionist. Tensionist. Yep. Got it. Okay. That’s right. There we are. Okay, got it. Okay, so what are the services that you all provide here? Mainly just eyelash extensions. Eyelash extensions. We do other stuff, but that’s been the main thing for years, and then we started adding things like permanent makeup, brow stuff. And how long have we worked with you? How long have we had the opportunity to work with you? Since 2019. So tell us what kind of growth have you had from 2019 versus now we’re in 2022? So 2019 it was 880. Yeah it was like it was like 880,000 is what the tax return said. That’s great Yeah, okay. And then what’d you get to this year or 2021, I guess? 2021, it was like 900. Oh, 1.4. Yeah. 1.4. 1.4. Okay. And when we work with a lot of clients, you know, a lot of clients, if you’re out there listening today, what we want to do is we want to help you grow your company. And so I want to walk you through the process of how to grow a company because a lot of people watching go, I want to grow my company. It’s kind of a big, vague idea, but I want to dial into the specifics of what we’ve had to do to grow the business and what we’re doing moving forward here. So first off, when we started working with you, you’ve always had a product that people love. I mean, is that an accurate statement? Yes. People love it, I think. So what we’ve had to do is build the online reputation so that people that don’t know about your business, who haven’t been in the business, they can hear about it before they kind of, they can go online and build an online opinion about your business before they come in. Right. How have you been doing on gathering objective Google reviews? Has that been something you guys have been hammering on there, Kendra? How have you been doing on that? Every stinking week she hits the key performance indicator at each one of her locations. We have nailed that. Like, they just do it now. It’s awesome. Okay, so step one, we’re gonna put the online reputation. There’s a lot of detail in there. Have you guys gotten into video reviews yet? Yeah. Oh, they have an ungodly amount of them. It’s ridiculous. They’re on the website. Yeah, if you go to the testimonials page on theextensionist918.com, you’ll find them. Now when people go to the website, then you want to create some sort of a no-brainer, some sort of a hot deal, so that way people that don’t know who you are don’t hesitate to do business with you. Now again, you guys have, in my opinion, you’re branded as one of the top, aka premier brands in Oklahoma right now for what you do. What’s the no-brainer offer that you now offer first-time customers? So we’ve just been doing a discounted classic full set, but Sean and I were just talking about doing a $1 full set and trying that. So $1 for a full set maybe? Yeah. Okay, okay. Yeah, I’ve always been afraid to do that, but I think we’re gonna. Well, and too, we’ve got the memberships going now too. You didn’t have a membership model. Now we have membership packages we’ve developed that make it make a little more sense to get somebody in for a dollar, because just like with Elephant in the Room, Clay, if you can convert the majority of them to a membership, it makes a lot of sense to give away 25 or 40 bucks on the first service. Right. And for people that don’t know, Elephant in the Room is a haircut chain that I own and founded. But again, regardless of whether you have a business that’s a eyelash extension business or a haircut business or a dog training company or a home building company, the step one we gotta do is we gotta improve the online reputation. Now, step two, we gotta get those video reviews. Step three, we gotta enhance the website. Step four, we gotta enhance a no-brainer. Come up with a no-brainer that gets people excited and off it’s so hot, people will not reject you. And then step five, if we can make a membership model for certain services, you can do that. Has a membership model helped you with the sustainability of your finances? So far, no, just because I feel like we weren’t offering a good enough no-brainer. It’s only been a couple of months. Oh, so it’s kind of a new thing. Kind of a newer thing. Now, the hiring and process, next thing is you want to create a hiring process. Now, one of the things that’s tough about your business or my business or any company out there, it’s finding good people. Now, if you have a system in place to find good people, that is not so challenging. Have you guys started the group interview process? How’s that going? It’s good. Has it helped you? It’s a lot of fun, actually, yeah. Okay. We went from, in 2019, you had 14 employees and now you have 40. Wow, okay, so you went from 40, from 14 employees, okay, from 14 employees to 40 employees. Now, people who work with me, it’s very interesting. I was just talking to a guy literally probably 39 minutes ago. I mean, who I’ve worked with for years. And the one thing that he mentioned to me, it’s interesting. He goes, you know, Clay, I’ve worked with you now for almost a decade. And he’s like, my business is now 10 times what it was 10 years ago. And he’s like, it’s just a consistent application of effort. I just go down that boom book, I follow it, and every week we just get 2%. And he’s like, I try to explain that to people, and they don’t often get that it’s not like a one big idea. All these things are big ideas, but it’s the implementation. Can you talk about what it’s like working with our team and Sean on a weekly basis now since 2019? Well, I feel like talking to him every week, I have someone who can help me with ideas and stay on my ass about things. And like you said, the consistency. So that’s, I feel like, the biggest thing that Sean helps me with. Just the consistency. Right. And the tracking. Because before, I didn’t do any kind of tracking at all. And that’s been probably the biggest thing for me. Now tracking, what it does is it takes the feelings out of things. Let me just give you an example. This is a kind of a funny thing. One of these clients I’ve worked with for years, I was talking to him on Monday. And it’s really funny, because on the tracking sheet it shows how many outbound calls did you make? How many appointments did you set? So again, in his particular business, it’s a different industry, but it’s how many calls did you make? How many appointments did you set? How many leads did you get? And we just try, how many Google reviews did you get? How many, how many dollars a week did you spend on your Facebook ads? And we just track every week. And that tracking allows us to see obvious patterns. So we get to the part where the calls, it shows the number of calls being made. And I know his caller. Like I know the caller, cause I’ve been around the guy. And the owner brought the caller to the meeting. And so I’m going, so you made that many calls? Because I don’t think you did. And he’s like, no, no, I didn’t do it. So sometimes people, even with a tracking sheet, they’ll put in information that’s kind of bogus. Yeah. Has the tracking sheet, I’m not looking for specific names, but has it allowed you, Kendra, to expose bogusness in your business, like gaps? Yeah. Yeah. For sure. Yeah. And. She tracks a lot of the lead sources. She tracks, she’s also tracking whether or not the people are in fact getting the reviews to put onto the sheet, which we can go and verify ourselves. But still, this person is supposed to be supplying, we just got this in the last week or two. Because when you delegate a lot of stuff, you gotta follow up on it regularly. And this person went two weeks or so, just copying and pasting the same amount of leads. Wow. Now installing a quality control loop, I’m not sure if we’re there yet in the system, but for the elephant in the room as an example, it’s a haircut chain. And we have mystery shoppers that we pay to come in, or they get a free haircut, to come in and get a haircut. And then what we do is we try to get feedback from them. And they have a checklist that’s very simple that they go over, but it’s sights, sounds, smells, experiences, just so that we know. And they text me how it’s going. Well, you know, it’s interesting because when you have mystery shoppers, you pick up on things you wouldn’t pick up on. So, like, recently, this past week, we found out that there were smudges on one of the windows that had been, you know, not addressed since the last mystery shopper. Or we’ll find out, we have, you know, five stores, so we found out that the bathrooms at one of the stores were dirty. Have you guys started putting in the mystery shop yet? Has it started yet? No, okay, so we’re still kind of… Now, where do you… Right now, how many locations do you have open now? Five. Okay, so now as you’re scaling the systems, that’s kind of the next process, the systems and the checklists? Yeah. How are you doing on that process, Kendra? How are you on implementing the building scripts and checklists for everything? We’ve made a lot of scripts within the past couple of months, just for every little thing, mainly on the phone. So where do you where do you see the vision going now? How many locations? Do you have five? Five. Where do you see the vision going? What’s the plan? Are you looking to license now? Are you looking to franchise? What do you see as the future? I would like to license. License it, okay. So no more stores that I open. Yeah, there’s still room. We can fit about 14 more stylists in the space that we have, which will bring in a minimum of a half a million dollars more just with the space that we have. But it’s important to mention that we are maintaining a very healthy 20% profit margin in this business as well. Well, let’s talk about that for a second, because a lot of times people forget that part. You know, you got to get the accounting done. And I kind of view this as part of the tracking process. But when you start tracking and you start to go, well, this is how much money came in. And this is how much money went out. And you go, wow. You know, you can discover real quick, wow, there’s maybe not enough there. Tracking, did you end up having to maybe raise prices or cut any expenses or did that help you kind of seeing where the income in and the expenses were going? I think for me, it was a lot of the just not knowing, like being a business owner and waking up every day and not knowing if you’re gonna have enough money for payroll or if you’re gonna have enough money to pay the bills. And so doing that just gave me the mental picture, the physical manifestation of how we’re actually doing. And that was not as bad as I thought. Now, everybody’s got their own flow, you know? So what I do with my businesses is, I know how big I wanna get. I’m very happy with where we’re at, so it’s good. And people all the time, they go to Thrive Time Show and they’ll schedule a consultation. I just talked to a guy today and he was like, I don’t understand why you have 160 clients. Why not take on 400? And I just know, because our business is very involved. Like every business owner we work with, it’s like, we have to really get to know you. Where the haircut business, I don’t have that. You know, it’s like, I don’t know most of the customers and we scale it out. But you ultimately, no matter what kind of business you’re in, if you’re in a high touch business, like a dentist or a cosmetic surgeon, I mean, Dr. Whitlock, one of my clients, it’s very high-touch. We eventually have to get to a place and space where we figure out our ideal schedule, a schedule that works for our family and one that’s kind of, where do you, are you happy currently with your schedule? Have you optimized it? I’m not saying it has to be, check all the boxes that the world approves, but I mean, do you like your schedule now? That was also another thing that I started doing because of Sean was my calendar. And I’ve sucked at it for a long time, but now I follow- She has every minute of her day blocked out every day. And so you feel good about where you’re headed now? Yeah, I do. I pretty much don’t have to do anything with this business anymore, so I just opened a Daylight Donuts. Really? I’ve been spending time doing that. Last Monday. Bam! Yeah. Awesome. Is it a little crazy? Yeah, just because the person that was supposed to work in open. Yeah, bailed. Bailed. So I’ve been having to do it. Yeah. Now for entrepreneurs, if you’re out there today and you are, let me just pull this up real quick here. If you’re out there today in the Northeast Oklahoma, Tulsa area, one, you can visit the business here, the extensionist918.com. You can check it out. You can learn more about it. I encourage you to do so. Also, you know, we have workshops that we do. And the workshops, what I like the workshops is that we’re able to work in kind of a shop-like environment on somebody’s businesses, on their business, for a window of time. So people will come to the workshop. We start at 7, we go till 3, and they’ll go, I learned more in a day than I’ve learned in years. And we hear that all the time. How would you describe the actual business workshop experience? It’s pretty much everything that’s in coaching just like packed in two days. Got it. And so is that helpful for you? Is that kind of a reinforcement thing for you? Yeah. Sometimes when I’m getting up super early I’m like, why am I going? I already got a coaching. But every time that I go, it like gets me going again. By the way, I have a question for you. This is not dogging any of our attendees, but we have one guy who attended the past workshop and he is brand new to business. And he asked a ton of questions that I would have asked when I was 20 years old. And to me, it was great to hear it, because I’m like, ha ha, I remember when I had those questions. And it almost reaffirms what you’ve learned. Do you learn stuff from other people that have questions? Yeah. Do you kind of learn stuff from their questions? Yeah, yeah. So Sean, people like Kandra are not a dime a dozen. I really do believe, you know, we look for diligent doers to help people that show up, people that knock out the homework, people that are not super high emotional. It doesn’t mean you can’t have emotions, it doesn’t mean you can’t be excited, but you know, people that can just knock it out. What makes Kandra a great client to work with? Just for anybody out there that’s thinking about reaching out to us. She is just very stoic in that if something is going wrong or is just like it doesn’t matter if it’s a small thing or a large thing, she comes in very even keeled and goes, we got to like fix this thing. And it’s just a very unemotional process. She’s also very realistic about timelines. She blocks her action items into her calendar, which is a big deal. She actually does that. So she gets stuff done and she’s also a client that, you know, she can operate very consistently with this business and build another business and still not be emotional and freaked out. So it’s just, it’s very rare. And that’s what we would look for in a great client. Cause you never know in business, like what emotional turmoil is headed your way. It’s more about your mindset towards when things come up and she’s really mastered that. Now, now Kendra, you know, according to Inc magazine, I’m going to pull this up for a second. Inc Magazine reports that 96% of businesses fail. And it blows my mind, but I talked to a guy at the last conference and he was like, I love the idea of coaching, but the thing is, and he said, Clay, I’ve tried other coaching programs in the past. And the issue is I’m not gonna meet with somebody every week at the same time. That’s just not, I’m not, and I’m not a guy who uses a to-do list, okay? And I’m not a big calendar guy. And that’s the problem with other coaching programs. And I kind of like your program because I think I go, no, no, no, no, no, no, that’s not us. That would not be a good fit. So if you were out there telling people who would be a good fit to become a client, because we get our clients grow by default, 96% of businesses fail according to Inc Magazine. So by default, we know most businesses fail, but we don’t want to take on every single client. Who would be a good fit for us and who wouldn’t, kind of from an outsider’s perspective? Someone who knows that they have to put in the work to do it, because that’s what it takes. I feel like a big reason that that 96% is 96% is because they don’t do anything to grow or take responsibility, because it is your responsibility and no one else’s. I love it. And again, I’m not going to get into your personal life, but I do want to point out something. Everybody likes to say that I can’t become successful because I have this going on in my life. And I see people that are newly married. They say, I want to grow my business, but I just got married as a kid. Just as a kid. I see people, people that, but we wasn’t over our clients this year. Her husband passed away and she had her best year of all time. And I asked her why. And she said, because we worked so hard as a couple to build the business. And when he passed, I recognized that, you know, it didn’t help to pout about it. I was just gonna focus on growing the business to kind of honor what we had built together. I think of another client that recently they’re growing their business and a weather situation attacked their business in a way that, you know, if you live on the coasts, weather can hit you. And their business was ravaged years ago by disastrous hurricane weather. And they went on to have their best year of all time. And I’m talking to the owner and he’s going, man, I, you know, now the challenge for him with his particular business is staffing because more and more people are harder to find to work in his particular industry. But again, we can all make excuses or we can all step up and make it happen. So I encourage everybody out there, if you’re looking to grow your company, you can go to thrivetimeshow.com, and at thrivetimeshow.com, you can click on the little consulting button here. Let me see here. You can schedule a free 13-point assessment. Let me go there right now. Feeling the flow, working it, going to Thrive Time Show. If I spell it right, it helps. Go in here, awesome. And I click here, boom. And you can schedule a free 13-point consultation with myself, and I’ll teach you all the systems that I have in place to help you grow your company. Or if you’re looking for eyelash extensions, and I know that I’m not, but if you are, you can go to theextensionist918.com. Kendra, thank you so much for joining us. I really do appreciate you. Thank you. Take care. Now, Sean, a lot of people reach out, they go to Thrivetimeshow.com, and they always ask me, they say, Clay, what do you do? And so I’ve tried to explain it in as succinctable way as possible. But first thing we do, you know, Sean, a lot of people go to Thrivetimeshow.com or I’ll see people at a tour, I’ll see them at an event, people will reach out to us and they’ll say, what exactly do you guys do? And if I had to explain it to you succinctly, we essentially grow businesses seven times faster than the average business that doesn’t fail. Although Inc. Magazine does show that 96% of businesses fail by default. So if you go to Inc. Magazine, you see that 96% of businesses fail by default. So I guess one benefit is our clients don’t fail, but the next thing they do is they grow seven times faster. So what we do here is we help you reduce the working hours that you’re working and decrease your costs while increasing your sales and your profitability. And then since 2006, we’ve got a team now that does graphic design, photography, branding, print media, photography, videography, digital marketing, systems creation, public speaking, coaching, booking, workflow mapping, search engine enhancement, PR, marketing. We do a lot of PR, a lot of monetizing. We help people to grow their business, their podcast, their dentistry, their law firm. But what we do is we document those success stories over here at thrivetimeshow.com. If you click on the testimonials. And since 2006, I have over 2,000 success stories. So if you’re out there today and you want to become the next success story, what you have to do is you go to thrivetimeshow.com and you click right here on growth consulting and you schedule a free 13 point assessment. And that free 13 point assessment, what that does is that schedules you a time to meet with me so that you and I can go over where you’re at versus where you want to be. And then if you want to work with us, I charge $1,700 a month. It’s a flat rate of $1,700 per month to help you grow your company. And again, folks, if you want to learn more about that, we’ve got the in-person workshops, we’ve got the one-on-one coaching. Sean, how long have you worked here as a consultant? How long have you worked here? Doing consulting, it was about 18 months after I came on board, so it’s coming up on five years. Five years! And just think of a few clients off the top of your head that have had massive growth. I mean, I think about what, Levi Gables? Oh yeah, Levi, he’s working on company number three and four right now. What’s his company called? His original company, he came to us, called gei-usa.com. Gei-usa.com. That’s a client you’ve worked with, he’s had tremendous growth. We just did an interview with Kandra. Yep. The attorney, James, we’ve worked with him. Who else can you think of? Nick Holman. We grew his business by fivefold and we decreased his workload. That’s a cabinet company. Yeah, the cabinet guy. Yeah. So again, if you’re out there and you’re saying, I need to see the success, I need to see the documentation, I need to see the proven plan, all you’ve got to do right now is go to Thrivetimeshow.com, Thrivetimeshow.com, and you click on testimonials and bam, you can see what we do. My name’s Clay Clark. I’m the former USSBA Entrepreneur of the Year. I built all the systems, built all the processes, and I’ve been, since 2006, coaching clients. And along the way, I’ve started to discover great people like Clay Stairs or Sean Lohman or Andrew or different members of our team. And we teach them the processes so that they can help you grow your business for less money than it would cost you to hire one minimum wage employee. If you hired one minimum wage employee out there full-time, it’s gonna cost you about two grand a month after taxes, insurance, et cetera. It turns out we’re less. Turns out, this just in. So schedule that consultation today by going to ThriveTimeShow.com, click on the business consulting button right there, click on the red button that says schedule your free 13-point assessment with me and you can schedule that today. Sean, I appreciate you and I want to remind everybody out there, Sean, you smell terrific. Alright JT, so hypothetically, in your mind, what is the purpose of having a business? To get you to your goals, so it’s a vehicle to get you to your destination. And would you need profits to get there? I mean, when you have a business that’s successful, in your expert opinion, would you need profits to get you to your goals? Yeah, because if you have a $15 million business, but you have $15 million in expenses, it’s kind of pointless. Holy crap! Alright, so the question I would have here for you, if you could take like 10 minutes or less and see if you could save $3,000 a year by reducing your credit card fees, would you do it? Yes, absolutely. Holy crap. Why would somebody out there who’s listening right now, who has a sane mind, why would they not go to Thrivetimeshow.com forward slash credit dash card, Thrivetimeshow.com forward slash credit dash card to schedule a 10-minute consultation to see if they can reduce their credit card fees by at least 3,000 bucks a year. Why would they not do it? Yeah, why would they not do it? Maybe because they don’t understand how you set the website. This tree is a symbol of the spirit of the Griswold family Christmas. That’s clear. Okay, so that could be true. So I would encourage everybody to check out Thrivetimeshow.com forward slash credit dash cards right time show dot com forward slash credit dash card what would be another reason why someone would not be willing to take ten minutes to compare rates to see if they could save three thousand dollars or more on credit card fees maybe they think it is a waste of time and then it won’t it’s not possible there’s somebody out there that’s making more than three thousand dollars every ten minutes and they’re like nah that’s not worth my time We gettin’ that rap money. We gettin’ that rap money. There’s probably some, someone out there. Okay. They would think that. Well, I’ll just tell you folks, if you’re out there today, and you’re making less than $3,000 per 10 minutes, I would highly recommend that you go to thrivetimeshow.com forward slash credit dash hard. Because you can compare rates, you can save money, and, you know, the big goal, in my opinion, of building a business is to create time, freedom, and financial freedom. And in order to do that, you have to maximize your profits. Holy crap! Now, one way to maximize your profits is to increase your revenue. Another way to do it is to decrease your expenses. It’s a profit deal! It takes the pressure off. JT, is there any other reason why somebody would not be willing to take 10 minutes to compare rates to see if they could save a total of $3,000 a year on average? I am at a loss and I cannot think of any other. Shampoo is better. I go on first and clean the hair. Conditioner is better. I leave the hair silky and smooth. Oh really fool, really. Stop looking at me swan. Let me tell you a good story here real quick. I actually years ago compared rates with this company here called IPS. It’s integrated payment services and I scheduled a consultation. I don’t know if I was skeptical. I just thought whatever i’ll take ten minutes i’ll compare rates i can’t tell you can tell me i’m a doctor no i mean i’m just not sure but can’t you take a guess well not for another two hours you can’t take a guess for another two hours and in my case in my in my case my particular case i save over twenty thousand dollars a year holy crap wow which is uh you know, like, uh, groceries when my wife goes to the organic stores. Find everything you need today? Yeah. Great. Okay. Oh, God. Everything okay, ma’am? Oh, it’s just that you’ve only scanned a few items and it’s already 60 bucks. I’m so scared. Okay, I’m a trained professional, ma’am. I’ve scanned a lot of groceries. I need you to stay with me. It’s just that my in-laws are in town and they want a charcuterie board. This isn’t going to be easy, so I need you to be brave, all right? What’s your name? Patricia. Patricia, all right. I need you to take a deep breath. We’re about to do the cheese. You know, that’s the difference between eating organic and not organic. So, because my wife eats organic, I had to take the 10 minutes needed to compare rates to save the $20,000 a year on credit card fees just for one of my companies. One question, what’s the brand name of the clock? The brand name of the clock Rod we have a name of the clock it’s an elegant from Ridgeway it’s from Ridgeway let’s let’s buy by the clock and sell the fireplace I encourage everybody out there go to thrive time should I come forward slash credit dash card you schedule a free consultation request information a member of our team will call you they’ll schedule a free consultation it should take you 10 minutes or less. And they’re going to compare rates and see if they can’t save you more than $3,000 a year off of your credit card processing. You were hoping what? I wouldn’t owe you money at the end of the day. No, you don’t owe us money. Because at the end of the day, the goal of the business is to create time, freedom, and financial freedom. And in order to do that, you need to create additional profits. The number of new customers that we’ve had is up 411% over last year. We are Jared and Jennifer Johnson. We own Platinum Pest and Lawn and are located in Owasso, Oklahoma. And we have been working with Thrive for business coaching for almost a year now. Yeah, so what we want to do is we want to share some wins with you guys that we’ve had by working with Thrive. First of all, we’re on the top page of Google now, okay? I just want to let you know what type of accomplishment this is. Our competition, Orkin, Terminix, they’re both $1.3 billion companies. They both have 2,000 to 3,000 pages of content attached to their website. So to basically go from virtually nonexistent on Google to up on the top page is really saying something. But it’s come by being diligent to the systems that Thrive has, by being consistent and diligent on doing podcasts and staying on top of those podcasts to really help with getting up on what they’re listing and ranking there with Google. And also we’ve been trying to get Google reviews, asking our customers for reviews. And now we’re the highest rated and most reviewed Pest and Lawn Company in the Tulsa area. And that’s really helped with our conversion rate. And the number of new customers that we’ve had is up 411% over last year. Wait, say that again. How much are we up? 411%. Okay. So 411% we’re up with our new customers. Amazing. Right. So not only do we have more customers calling in, we’re able to close those deals at a much higher rate than we were before. Right now, our closing rate is about 85%, and that’s largely due to, first of all, like our Google reviews that we’ve gotten. People really see that our customers are happy, but also we have a script that we follow. And so when customers call in, they get all the information that they need. That script has been refined time and time again. It wasn’t a one and done deal. It was a system that we followed with Thrive in the refining process. And that has obviously, the 411% shows that that system works. Yeah, so here’s a big one for you. So last week alone, our booking percentage was 91%. We actually booked more deals and more new customers last year than we did the first five months. Or I’m sorry, we booked more deals last week than we did the first five months of last year, from before we worked with Thrive. So again, we booked more deals last week than the first five months of last year. And it’s incredible, but the reason why we have that success is by implementing the systems that Thrive has taught us and helped us out with. Some of those systems that we’ve implemented are group interviews, that way we’ve really been able to come up with a really great team We’ve created and implemented checklist that when everything Gets done and it gets done, right? We it creates accountability We’re able to make sure that everything gets done properly both out in the field and also in our office And also doing the podcast like Jared had mentioned that has really really contributed to our success, but that, like I said, the diligence and consistency in doing those and that system has really, really been a big blessing in our lives and also it’s really shown that we’ve gotten a success from following those systems. So before working with Thrive, we were basically stuck. Really no new growth with our business. And we were in a rut. The last three years, our customer base had pretty much stayed the same. We weren’t shrinking, but we weren’t really growing either. Yeah, and so we didn’t really know where to go, what to do, how to get out of this rut that we’re in. But Thrive helped us with that. They implemented those systems, they taught us those systems, they taught us the knowledge that we needed in order to succeed. Now it’s been a grind, absolutely it’s been a grind this last year, but we’re getting those fruits from that hard work and the diligent effort that we’re able to put into it. So again, we were in a rut, Thrive helped us get out of that rut. And if you’re thinking about working with Thrive, quit thinking about it and just do it. Do the action and you’ll get the results. It will take hard work and discipline, but that’s what it’s gonna take in order to really succeed. So, and we just wanna give a big shout out to Thrive, a big thank you out there to Thrive. We wouldn’t be where we’re at now without their help. 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-turn-key marketing and coaching system that will grow your practice and get you the results that you are looking for. I went to the University of Oklahoma College of Dentistry from 1983 to 1985. 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’s 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 Crocker, 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. 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. Think of this guy with a team of business coaches running 160 companies. 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 helping them grow their companies. 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, organizing everything in their head to building into a franchisable, scalable business. One of his businesses has like 500 franchises. That’s just one of the companies or brands that he works with. 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, Clay 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. 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. Clay has been an amazing business coach. Through the course of that we became friends. My most impressive thing was 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. When we walked out I knew that he could make millions on the deal and they were super excited about working with him. 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. 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. Anyways, just an amazing man. Anyways, impacted me a lot. He’s helped navigate any time I’ve gotten nervous or worried about how to run the company or navigating competition and an economy that’s, 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. Go back eight years ago. Think about the number of clients you had back then versus the number of clients you have now. As a percentage, what has been the growth over the past eight years, do you think? We got to inspire somebody out there who just doesn’t have the Okay, so Clay, it’s like I would go up and down from about $10,000 a month up to about $40,000, but it’s up and down roller coaster. And so now we’ve got it to where we’re in excess of 100 clients. That’s awesome. And so I would have anywhere from 5 clients to 20 clients on my own with networking, but I had no control over it. Without the systems, you’re going to be victimized by your own business. For somebody out there who struggles with math, let’s say that your average number of clients was 30 and you go to 100. As a percentage, what is that? I have doubled every year since working with you. Clients have doubled in revenue every year. That’s 100% growth every year I’ve worked with. So I’m looking, we’ve been good friends 7, 8 years and I’ve got doubled 5 times. Which is just incredible. I mean the first time you do it, that’s one thing, but when you do it repeatedly, I mean that’s unbelievable. We’re working our bless assurance off this year to double. We’re planning on doubling again. We’re incorporating some new things in there to really help us do it, but we are going to double again this year. I started coaching, but it would go up and down, Clay. That’s when I came to you, as I was going up and down, and I wanted to go up and up instead of up and down. And so that’s when it needed a system. So creating a system is you have nailed down specific steps that you’re going to take no matter how you feel, no matter the results, you lean into them and you do them regardless of what’s happening. You lean into them and it will give you X number of leads. You follow up with those leads, it turns into sales. Well I tell you, if you don’t have a script and you don’t have a system, then every day is a whole new creation. You’re creating a lot of energy just to figure out what are you going to do. The best executives, Peter Drucker is a father of modern management, and he said, the most effective executives make one decision a year. What you do is you make a decision, what is your system, and then you work like the Dickens to make sure you follow that system. And so that’s really what it’s all about. So with a script here, we have a brand new gal that just came in working for us. She nailed down the script, and she’s been nailing down appointments. Usually we try to get one appointment for every 100 calls. We make 200 to 300 calls a day. Somebody out there’s having a hard time. On their script. What’s so she’s making how many calls a day? She’s making between two and three hundred calls a day. And our relationship is weird in that we we do. If someone were to buy an Apple computer today and or let’s say about a personal computer, a PC, the computer is made by, let’s say, Dell. But then the software in the computer would be Microsoft, let’s say, or Adobe or whatever that is. So I basically make the systems, and you’re like the computer and I’m like the software. It’s kind of how I would describe our relationship. Tim, I want to ask you this. You and I reconnected, I think it was in the year 2000 and, what was it, maybe 2010? Is that right? 2011 maybe? Or maybe further down the road, maybe 2013? 2012. Okay, so 2012, and at that time I was five years removed from the DJ business. And you were how many years removed from tax and accounting software? It was about 10, 11 years. We met, how did we meet? What was the first interaction? There was some interaction where you and I first connected. I just remember that somehow you and I went to Hideaway Pizza. But do you remember when we first reconnected? Yeah, well we had that speaking thing. Oh, there it was! It was Victory Christian Center. I was speaking there. My name is Robert Redman. I actually first met Clay almost three years ago to the day. I don’t know if he remembers it or not, but I wasn’t working with him at the time. I asked to see him and just ask him some questions to help direct my life, to get some mentorship, but I’ve been working with Clay for now just over a year. The role I play here is a business coach, business consultant. I work with different businesses implementing best practice processes and systems that I have learned here by working with Clay. And the experience working here has, to put it real plainly, has been just life-changing. I have not only learned new things and have gained new knowledge, but I have gained a whole new mindset that I believe wherever I end up will serve me well throughout the rest of my life. Since working with Clay, I have learned so much. I mean, I would like to say it was everything about business in terms of the different categories. I haven’t learned it all, but I’ve learned all about marketing. I’ve learned about advertising. I’ve learned about branding. I’ve learned how to create a sales process for organizations in any industry. I’ve learned how to sell. I’ve learned how to create repeatable systems and processes and hold people accountable. You know, how to hire people. It’s almost like every aspect of a business you can learn. I have learned a lot in those different categories. And then, again, the mindset that I’ve gained here has been huge. Working here, you can’t be a mediocre person. You are a call to a higher standard of excellence, and then as you’re called to that standard here, you begin to see those outcomes in every area of your life, that standard of excellence that you want to implement, no matter what you’re involved in. I would like to describe the other people that work with Clay are people that are going somewhere with their life. Marshall, in the group interview talks about how, you know, the best fits for this organization are the people that are goal-oriented. So they’re on their own trajectory, and we’re on our own trajectory, and the best fits are those people where there can be a mutually beneficial relationship, that as we pursue our goals, and we help the business pursue those goals, the business helps us pursue our goals as well. And so I say people that are driven, people that want to make something of their lives, people that are goal-oriented, they’re focused, and they’re committed to overcoming any adversity that may come their way. Clay’s passion for helping business owners grow their businesses is unique in that I don’t know if there’s anyone else’s that can be as passionate. You know, whenever a business starts working with Clay, it’s almost as like Clay is running that business in the sense that he has something at stake. You know, he’s just serving them. They’re one of his clients, but it’s as if he is actively involved in the business. Whenever they have a win, he’s posting it all over his social media. He’s shouting it across the room here at Thrive. He’s sending people encouraging messages. He can be that life coach and business coach in terms of being that motivator and that champion for people’s businesses. It’s again unique because there’s no one else I’ve seen get so excited about and passionate about other people’s businesses. The kind of people that wouldn’t like working with Clay are people that are satisfied with mediocrity, people that want to get through life by just doing enough, by just getting by, people who are not looking to develop themselves, people who are not coachable, people who think that they know it all and they’re unwilling to change. I would say those are the type of people and in short anyone that’s content with mediocrity would not like working with Clay. So if you’re meeting Clay for the first time the advice I’d give you is definitely come ready to take tons of notes. Every time Clay uh… every time clay speaks he uh… it gives you a wealth of knowledge uh… that you don’t want to miss i remember the first time that i met clay i literally carried a notebook with me all around i was looking at this notebook the other day actually i carried a notebook with me all around and i just took tons of notes i filled the entire notebook in about about three or four months just from being around clay following him and and and learning from him. And then I would say come coachable. Be open to learning something new, be open to challenging yourself, be open to learning and adjusting parts about you that need to be adjusted.