Doctor Rebecca Heiss | Springboard: Transform Stress to Work for You + How to Deliver a Powerful Keynote Speech With Confidence + Doctor Heiss Shares a Practical Plan for How We Can Transform Stress to Work for You

Audio Transcription

Transcribed with Cockatoo

(Speaker 5)
See, the world doesn’t go easy on anyone. It has challenges for the rich and the poor, the educated and the uneducated, the young and the old. No one escapes it. Life tests everyone. And the only difference between those who endure and those who collapse is the condition of the mind. That’s why I say, toughen your mind or the world will break it.

(Speaker 5)
Now, toughening the mind doesn’t mean becoming cold or unfeeling. It doesn’t mean ignoring the pain, the loss or the disappointments. It means developing kind of resilience, a toughness that allows you to bend without breaking, to feel the weight of life without collapsing under it.

(Speaker 4)
Some shows don’t need a celebrity narrator to introduce the show, but this show does. In a world filled with endless opportunities, why would two men who have built 13 multi -million dollar businesses altruistically invest five hours per day to teach you the best practice business systems and moves that you can use. Because they believe in you, and they have a lot of time on their hands. They started from the bottom, now they’re here. It’s the Thrive Time Show, starring the former U . S.

(Speaker 4)
Small Business Administration’s Entrepreneur of the Year, Clay Clark, and the entrepreneur trapped inside an optometrist’s body, Dr. Robert Zunich. Two men, eight kids, co -created by two different women. 13 multi -million dollar businesses.

(Speaker 1)
Ladies and gentlemen, we have a fantastic, spectacular, mind -blowing, life -changing interview today. And I encourage everybody out there, if you don’t hate yourself, grab a pen and a pad and prepare to enter into the lab of the Dojo of Mojo Fo Show as we interview Dr. Rebecca Heist. Dr. Rebecca, welcome to the Thrive Time Show. How are you?

(Speaker 2)
I love it.

(Speaker 1)
Now I got to ask you this because I’ve watched some of your other interviews and you come across as a very relatable likable person, but you’re also a doctor which creates a little bit of that formal thing. Tell us a little bit about your background before hopping on today’s show what have you been doing over the past decade kind of where did you come from.

(Speaker 2)
Okay, let me tell you where I came from first. I came from a really, really small town in upstate New York. Shout out Norwich, like graduating class of under 100. Let’s go. You do not need to call me doctor. I appreciate it.

(Speaker 2)
I have earned it. And I’m not that formal, you know, it’s a piece of paper that hangs on my wall that says I did something or I know something about something, but I know very, very, limited amount of knowledge, but I know a lot about a very specific thing. And there’s there’s so many people out there that know a lot more than I do. So I appreciate that. But yeah, I’m out to continue to continue to learn and grow myself. So that’s, that’s where I’m going to journey.

(Speaker 1)
So for people out there that are kind of going, okay, what is your specialty? So you know, there’s a lot of doctors out there a lot of

(Speaker 25)
good doctors.

(Speaker 1)
What is your specialty you’ve decided to focus on?

(Speaker 2)
I am a stress physiologist, and what that means is that I study the hormones, the behavior, the way our body responds when we’re under stress. And then I help people utilize that stress rather than trying to get rid of it, because most people you meet will tell you, you know, get rid of stress.

(Speaker 31)
It’s bad for you.

(Speaker 2)
You got to minimize it in your life. And I think that’s garbage. I think, in fact, you’re never going to get rid of stress. So how can you use the stress that’s happening to you in a different way? That’s what I do. I’ve been a keynote speaker for the last 10 years.

(Speaker 2)
I’ve written a couple of books and I have a lot of fun with all the stress in my life every day.

(Speaker 1)
Okay, so let’s talk about some stress here. One of the things that causes stress in my life is interviewing great people like you. You know, I always think to myself, self.

(Speaker 11)
Don’t screw it up.

(Speaker 1)
There’s that inner dialogue. And what I want to do for the listeners is I want to have the curiosity that our listeners would have if they were interviewing you. And so when we look you up, we find this book, Springboard, Transform Stress to Work for You. I’m going to ask you the questions that I think a lot of our listeners would be asking you right now. So first off is, what you’re saying is so counterintuitive. It’s so different to what is being told at most colleges and universities.

(Speaker 1)
Why are you sharing the potential good news that stress could be used as a springboard when most formal education is teaching that stress is something that should be avoided?

(Speaker 2)
Yeah, in part because that’s what the research says. Let’s look at the highlight. Here’s the easy example. Look at Olympic athletes. What are their breaking world records? It’s not at practice.

(Speaker 2)
It’s when stress and pressure is at its peak. And so this kind of mindset shift is accessible to all of us. You don’t have to be an Olympian to have that mindset shift. And what we see in the data, one of my favorite studies, and actually the study that really turned me on to this research, looked at 20 ,000 Americans over the course of eight years. And people that had very high levels of stress, I’m looking at your audience right now, high levels of stress, right?

(Speaker 2)
And you believe that the stress is bad for you, which is what you’ve been taught. Die at a very high mortality rate, 43 % higher than the rest of the study. Now, here’s the good news. People that had that same very high level of stress, you’re not changing that, But you shift your mindset, and the mindset is stress could be good, it could be bad, it just is, it’s just energy. It’s not necessarily bad. Those people had the lowest rate of mortality of the entire study.

(Speaker 2)
Lower, in fact, than the people who had very little stress in their life. So over the course of this eight -year study, 182 ,000 people died prematurely, not because they had high levels of stress, but because they believed that stress was bad for them. This is how powerful this shift can be.

(Speaker 1)
You know, I don’t expect you to have spent hours and hours researching me, but I’ll just kind of let you into my life a little bit here. People pay me to help them grow their business. That’s what they do. So I have 160 clients. I’ve got some cosmetic surgeons. I’ve got some pro athletes, some professional musicians, and everything they do, is high stress.

(Speaker 1)
When you’re coaching a team, when you’re performing in front of 20 ,000 people, everything they do is high stress. And so let’s work off the assumption that somebody is in a high stress environment or the success they seek is going to take them to a high stress environment. Tell us about a few of the moves that you teach in your book, a springboard transform stress for you. Tell us some of the moves that you teach in your book that are maybe some practical takeaways that everybody out there could benefit from.

(Speaker 20)
Absolutely.

(Speaker 2)
I’m going to start with a thing that actually isn’t in my book, but I heard you say, and I’ve got to address it because it’s driving me nuts. You said from the start, I get into the space where I just tell my brain or my brain is telling me, don’t screw it up. Don’t screw it up. don’t screw it up. And this is so powerful because I feel like so many people think like this and the brain does not comprehend the negative. So when you say don’t screw it up, all your brain hears is screw it up, screw it up, screw it up.

(Speaker 2)
Don’t miss that foul shot. Missed that foul shot, missed that foul shot. So that in and of itself is a huge aside. Let me walk you through the training in the book. The training in the book focuses on our stress response as a whole. Now, our stress response evolved in 200 ,000 years ago when we were literally being chased by tigers.

(Speaker 2)
So today, the same stress of a high performing athlete or cosmetic surgeon or whatever it is that you’re in a high performance state in, you’re having the same stress response as if you’re being chased by a tiger. So your brain interprets it as a literal life and death situation. So the first step is to recognize it’s not a tiger. This isn’t going to kill me and eat me in the next three minutes. What that means is all of the stress, all of the energy that my body is releasing to help me fight or flee this stressor that I’m feeling, I can begin to utilize differently. When I say, oh, stress isn’t debilitating, stress is enhancing.

(Speaker 2)
And simply that mind shift of it’s not a tiger, this is happening for me, not to me, allows me then to get into the second stage, the transfer stage. And in this stage, I can begin to utilize that energy. So most people, when they’re stressed out in these situations, will tell themselves, calm down, right? Take a few deep breaths, calm down. Well, I’m going to do this to you right now, Clay. Let’s pretend that you just told me about like a really stressful situation that you had.

(Speaker 2)
And I looked you dead in the eye and I was like, Clay, calm down. Like, what would you want to do to me in that moment?

(Speaker 1)
Yeah, I don’t know. I process the two variables we have going for us here is one is your your likable person with good energy. So maybe you say it may work. However, maybe if there’s somebody that I’ve been in the trenches with for a long time, who’s maybe on my last nerve, maybe I respond a little different.

(Speaker 2)
I will tell you, it could be my very best friend. And if I’m telling them something that I’m stressed out about, and they say, Oh, calm down, I’m gonna have a visceral response to that. And part of the challenge is that’s what we’re telling ourselves to do all the time. It’s like we’re trying to calm down our energy and we don’t have control over that. Like you can’t physiologically prevent your adrenal glands from releasing adrenaline. You can’t prevent your heart from speeding up.

(Speaker 2)
It’s going to. And that’s great, let’s use that energy rather than trying to suppress it. So while we don’t have control over our activation or how heightened we get under stress, what we do have control over is this balance of emotion. So what does that heightening mean? So there’s sort of two axes of emotion. There’s the activation or the stimulus, like how stressed out are we?

(Speaker 2)
How stimulated are we? How aroused are we? And then we have no control over that. What we do have control over is the emotional balance. What does that mean? So is it an adventure or is it an ordeal?

(Speaker 2)
That we get to choose. Is it excitement or is it fear? That we get to choose. We’re in a heightened state. What does it mean? That’s up to us.

(Speaker 2)
And that’s where I challenge people to get curious about this emotional surge of energy. Can it mean anything else? Can it be that you’re excited? Can it mean that this thing is meaningful to you? because nobody ever gets dressed out over their shoe coming untied.

(Speaker 1)
Yeah. Now in your in your book, one thing that you do, and I was researching the book to kind of understand the way you put it together. And you filled the book with case studies. You’re filling the book with interviews. There’s a lot of research that went into that. And so what appeals to me is we all have opinions.

(Speaker 30)
I like opinions.

(Speaker 1)
It’s great. I mean, somebody likes LeBron James. Someone likes Michael Jordan. Someone likes Larry Bird. It’s exciting that you like Magic Johnson. Somebody’s debating about Steph Curry right now.

(Speaker 1)
Someone’s going, come on, it’s Will Chamberlain, man.

(Speaker 2)
Somebody’s really having that debate right now going on. I’m saying Sue Bird.

(Speaker 1)
I’m saying it’s Sue Bird. You love Bird. OK. You know what I’m saying? There’s people that can debate. There’s opinions.

(Speaker 1)
And then there’s facts.

(Speaker 24)
And so you decided to go through case studies, interviews, a lot of research to put together this book, Springboard.

(Speaker 2)
Tell us about the kind of research that you put into developing the work and the research that people can find in this book. Sure. I mean, a lot of it is very personal to me. One of the stories that I work through is one of my dearest friends being diagnosed with a stage four cancer diagnosis. That’s a real tire. That’s a stressful moment.

(Speaker 2)
And looking at the way that that changed our community and people coming together. So one of my favorite research studies that’s involved in this book looks at what makes for a meaningful, purposeful life. And we pulled We pulled all kinds of research from the research that I did personally to other stress physiologists. We packed this book chock full of all of the interviews, as you mentioned, all the interviews, all the stories. One of the most meaningful ones to me was looking at the correlation between purpose, meaning, and stress. And especially in moments of really deep stressors.

(Speaker 2)
What we have to recognize is the most powerful Purposeful, meaningful lives, the highest correlate of those purposeful, meaningful lives is in fact stress. So past traumatic events, current level of stress, even future warrior stress. and anxiety is correlated to a purposeful, meaningful life. So in the moment, looking at yourself and going, oh, this stress is here serving me so that I may live a purposeful, meaningful life. Because when we look at that result, even I was unconvinced. I’m like, I don’t know.

(Speaker 2)
I feel like I could live a better life. pretty meaningful life without all this stress. So I’ll ask your listeners the same question that I asked as a follow -up to this study to really get clarity. I want you to consider a project or an accomplishment that you’re most proud of. You got it? Now go back in time to when you were in the middle of that project.

(Speaker 2)
What was your stress level, Clay?

(Speaker 1)
Scale of zero to 100.

(Speaker 2)
How stressed out were you about the project that you were most proud of? Oh, probably 100. And this is what our data found. Most people are stressed out of their guard when they’re doing the most meaningful, purposeful work of their life. And then they’re like, but I want less of it. I want less stress.

(Speaker 2)
No, you don’t. You want meaning and purpose in your life?

(Speaker 1)
Run at the roar. Run towards those things that are bringing meaning and purpose and fear into your life, because ultimately, that’s what brings us the greatest stuff. Now you come across as a high -octane, fun -loving communicator. But you also have stress, whether it’s being on interviews or keynoting. So I want to tap into the keynote stress, because I’ve keynoted quite a bit as well, maybe not to the extent that you have. But whenever you do, at a certain point, the profundity of the moment occurs where, unlike basketball, where maybe the crowd can look at 10 different athletes playing simultaneously, or baseball, where someone can look on the field and see all these different athletes, or football, there’s 22.

(Speaker 1)
If you’re a stand -up comedian or a keynote speaker, everybody zeros in on you. And it’s even more intense than tennis, where there’s two people they can look at, or even golf, where there’s a lot of people. It’s all on you.

(Speaker 2)
And so the ultimate challenge of the keynote speaker job is really overcoming fear, anxiety, lack of confidence, and the audience can smell a non -confident presenter. So what do you do to get yourself aligned or ready to deliver a power -packed keynote? I’m going to tell you three strategies. The first is, I feel the fear. The day that I don’t feel anxious or nervous before a performance is the day I need to quit because it’s telling me it’s not meaningful anymore. So I allow that fear in.

(Speaker 2)
I’m like, good, it’s here. It’s here to serve me. And then I add on a layer of excitement. I tell myself that I’m excited. Now at this stage, it may be a lie, right? I may not be excited.

(Speaker 2)
I may be sitting in the fear. But what our brain does that it releases all of these hormones and our body is having this release of cortisol and adrenaline and all of these stress hormones. And our brain is looking to our body to understand what this means. So it is my job then to put a big smile on, to throw my shoulders back, to open up. And it signals to my brain through somatic feedback that I’m not scared, that I am in fact excited about this. And I tell myself, I’m excited, I’m excited, I’m excited.

(Speaker 2)
And I become a little bit excited. And then when I step out on stage, the audience sees me, confident shoulders back, big smile on, and they feed that back to me. Because humans are contagious, right? And if I step on stage, and I’m like, scared, and I’m looking down at the ground, and I’m like, hey, guys, I’m really excited to be here, they’re going to feed that anxiety back. And how we show up, with one another, we’re plucking the strings of each other saying, okay, are you scared?

(Speaker 2)
Are you excited? And the third piece is probably the most important thing that I do. I recognize this is not about me. There may be 2000 pairs of eyes staring at me, but this isn’t about me. That releases the ego in me that really wants it to be about me and allows me to serve the audience. It’s about them.

(Speaker 2)
It’s about them. So it is my privilege and gift to be able to give and offer something to this audience. But it gets out of that fear zone of I have to prove myself. And instead of having to prove myself, I can offer something.

(Speaker 1)
And that’s a switch that is really important to flip, especially in keynote. But actually in any circumstance, yeah. I don’t mean this as a backhanded compliment, but at a certain point, you have to become obsessed with your topic. At a certain point, you have to become obsessed with the research.

(Speaker 2)
At a certain point, and I think about the athletes I work with or the professional musicians, they are obsessed with their craft. When did you lock on and become obsessed with this idea of teaching everyday normal people how to use their stress as a springboard to do great things? So that’s a great question. I would love to say that it was earlier. Here’s what happened. What happened is I was teaching.

(Speaker 2)
I loved teaching. I was teaching students and academia and it was I loved my students, but it was a safe career for me because I knew I was good at it. I knew this was fine and it was good and it was safe for me. And unfortunately, my sister was diagnosed with terminal cancer. And in that moment, I had this reckoning of my own mortality. And I was like, oh my gosh, if this is the rest of my life, I’m going to be really disappointed.

(Speaker 2)
And so I, in that month, I quit my job. I sold my house and I divorced my husband. Cause I was like, this is not, this is not the mediocrity is not what I sought. I want to be the best. I want to obsess. I want to dive in.

(Speaker 2)
I want to offer this message to as many people as I can, because I want to be the PR agent for stress. This is, to me, something that can challenge and change people’s lives.

(Speaker 1)
So I actually had to begin to apply my own research to my own life in the moment of losing a family member, losing my husband, and losing my profession and my home. It was a big shift, and it allowed me to prove out my work and forced me to obsess a little bit more about how I spread the word.

(Speaker 2)
Okay, let’s do this for a second.

(Speaker 1)
Let’s say for a second, the mics are turned off, the camera’s turned off, and you’re at a restaurant or a bar setting, and you’re talking to people, and you’re not, you’re not, you know, you’re wearing a hoodie, you got your jeans off. You know me, this is it, yeah. And someone’s like getting, they’re kind of debating, or they’re maybe arguing, or they’re pushing back on what you’re saying. What are those common pushbacks or questions or arguments that you hear from people that are going, yeah, but stress, it causes people to be stressed. Rebecca, you don’t want to be stressed.

(Speaker 2)
What do you, what do you, what kind of questions do you get from people? You know, when you’re, when you’re having these conversations, when you’re not on a mic, not on a stage. Yeah. I mean, actually that’s exactly the one you just said is that there’s, there’s two questions that I get most. They’re like, yeah, but when I’m stressed, I feel more stress. And I’m like, Yes, that’s the whole point, is people stress out, and our research from 2024 showed that people stress out even more trying to get rid of their stress, because that’s the only technique we’ve ever taught people.

(Speaker 2)
Get rid of your stress, go meditate, go breathe, go eat. yoga. And it becomes this like hit list of things that you’re supposed to do. And so my whole thing is like, no, no, no. Don’t, invite the tiger in for a cup of tea. Don’t try and push it away.

(Speaker 2)
Invite it in. Let’s develop a totally new strategy with this stress. It’s a complete mind shift from trying to get rid of it and fighting against it. Invite it in and sit it down, getting curious with it. The other thing I get a lot, which I think is just hilarious is, oh, well, you’re a stress physiologist, so you don’t get stressed anymore. I’m like, if I didn’t get stressed, I’d die.

(Speaker 2)
That is, you need stress to live and to have a meaningful, purposeful life. So the challenge again is, I guess, I’m trying to think of other questions they might ask. How much stress is too much stress? How do I know it’s too much stress? You don’t. It’s just energy.

(Speaker 1)
There’s no too much or too little, because too much for one person is too little for another.

(Speaker 2)
It’s just energy.

(Speaker 16)
And when we stop defining stress as good or bad, and we recognize it’s just energy that our body has available to us, then these labels begin to dissipate, and it’s less about who’s right and wrong, and good or bad, and just how we want to use this to move forward.

(Speaker 29)
Now, I want to ask you this, getting kind of into your personal life, and you can hang up on me.

(Speaker 15)
No, bring it on.

(Speaker 1)
It’s great. I love it. Wide open. How is that happens? People just end the show. But how do you organize the first four hours of your day?

(Speaker 2)
When you wake up, what does that look like for a high octane person getting stuff done? What’s your routine? What does your daily first four hours look like? My daily first four hours, get out, get sunshine. I take my dogs immediately out. The first thing, get them fed, get out, breathe in the air, take a little walk, move my body.

(Speaker 2)
I put supplements in my body. I’m not trying to shout out anything. I’m not getting paid for any endorsements, but I put supplements in my body. I drink a lot of good water. And then I sit out on my front porch with a cup of coffee and no phone. So the first, I’d say, good 30 minutes of my day, I do not look at my phone because once that phone hits, then it’s game on.

(Speaker 2)
And I want to have time to put my thoughts together. What did I dream about? What am I thinking about? What am I waking up with that my brain is kind of trying to sort through? And then I dive into deep projects. So my first four hours, I will probably dedicate 30 minutes to checking email, making sure there’s nothing that is emergent.

(Speaker 2)
And then I spend the first big chunk of time in a deep project, whether that’s writing, building a workbook, working on a keynote. It’s deep thought time, because by the afternoon, my brain gets overloaded and I shut down early. So this, I mean, this interview right now, my gosh, it’s 4 .30 my time. I’m like, you’re lucky you’re getting a sentence out of me, a complete sentence.

(Speaker 1)
That’s tough work. Because by the end of the day, I’m starting to get that brain fatigue, you know, and I want to be fresh. So I save all of my, more simple tasks, my email, my little checkboxes that I have to do for the afternoon. So now if somebody is, you know, they’re thinking about, they’re going on to Amazon right now and they’re thinking about, you know, I might want to go buy a regrettable burrito from the convenience store. They always say, can I get something else? You said that whenever you go buy your gas, they say, can I do anything else?

(Speaker 2)
And you’re thinking about going, you know, I probably, I mean, tonight I might say yes to that regrettable burrito or I, or I might be in a slushy through the slush.

(Speaker 1)
Yeah. Somebody’s out there thinking about, or even there’s the news, there’s the new quasi healthy Impulse purchase where it’s like a protein bar, and you look at it. It’s not healthy, y ‘all. And it’s like a Snickers that somehow has the word protein on it. So somebody’s thinking about buying that kind of thing with their dollars, or they’re thinking about buying a hardcover edition of your book, Springboard, Transform Stress to Work for You for $28 .95.

(Speaker 1)
Now, the benefits of buying the Springboard faux candy bar facade slash protein combo because it tastes good and it makes you look bad. We know that. That’s the benefit there.

(Speaker 2)
And then you got over here, book, you know, there’s a lot of words in it. It requires. So walk everybody out there. Well, why should everybody buy your book springboard transform stress to work for you as opposed to buying a regrettable impulse purchase at their local convenience store? Let me start with, you’re gonna get a dopamine hit from the protein bar. Good, good for you.

(Speaker 2)
You’re going to get a long -term shift in how all of your energy operates after you get my book. So that is my biggest pitch that I can offer people. Everybody has stress, everybody has it. And my book offers the solution to use it differently. If you can use the stress that is piling on you, compounding on you in a way that served you rather than having to fight against those impulses to buy the protein bar, why wouldn’t you do that? That’s a long -term solution.

(Speaker 2)
And here’s the other thing that I’ll let you in on a little secret. It’s not that long. This is the early advanced copy. So it’s not, it’s a paperback, but it’s not that long. And look, there’s QR codes in it. I actually set it up.

(Speaker 2)
for our generation of TikTok and easy reads.

(Speaker 1)
There’s QR code, there’s interactive pieces, there’s quizzes, so it’s personalized to you. There’s pictures. It’s an easy two -hour, sit -on -the -plane, immediately actionable book that’s can begin to change your life with in two hours. All right, here we go.

(Speaker 2)
Final 60 seconds on the clock.

(Speaker 1)
You can say anything you want. A lot of times great people like you hop off podcasts like mine and you go, geez, that guy, I wish he would have asked me. I know. Or I should have said that. Why didn’t you?

(Speaker 2)
Yeah. I want to get your thoughts. I’m gonna give you the floor here. You’ve got the final 60 seconds. What do you want to communicate to the Thrive Nation who’s anxiously out there taking notes?

(Speaker 28)
Stay anxious.

(Speaker 2)
Being anxious, being stressed is a gift. It’s a privilege.

(Speaker 27)
And we have the ability to channel it so that it can work with us rather than against us.

(Speaker 1)
I would say trying to eliminate your stress is the wrong thing to do. move. If you want to be a high performer, that is part of the deal. So let’s stop fighting it. That’s all outside. Dr. Rebecca, you are a living legend.

(Speaker 2)
I really do appreciate your time.

(Speaker 24)
Thank you so much.

(Speaker 1)
And we look forward to hopefully having you on the show again.

(Speaker 26)
I encourage everyone to check out your new book Springboard again.

(Speaker 25)
Thank you so much for your time.

(Speaker 6)
It’s been an absolute pleasure. Thank you. Take care. Bye bye. Cheers.

(Speaker 3)
I would say well with one of our services for our lawn care services, we have tripled our client base. And that is pretty impressive. Yeah. And they’re repeat clients.

(Speaker 6)
They keep coming back.

(Speaker 3)
So that’s way exciting. Like you said, we didn’t understand all the processes at first, and now that we’re using them and we’re using them on a daily basis, it’s really helped us out a lot. My name is Kelly Culley, and our company name is Purple Cow Junk Removal.

(Speaker 1)
And sorry.

(Speaker 3)
Purple Cow Junk Removal and Home Services. Hi, I’m Tamara Mallott and our company name is Purple Cow Junk Removal and Home Services. Well, I would say, you know, I was a little skeptical at first. and then we came to your show in December of last year, and it was eye -opening. It changed how we ran the business, how we thought out to run the business. What’s it like having a team that helps you that you know is going to be a flat rate per month?

(Speaker 1)
Well, I don’t think we would have gotten as far as we have without you guys. And yeah, there’s no hidden fees. I haven’t come across any bills that I didn’t know I was paying out for you guys. So, I mean, it’s straightforward what the fee is. You guys have been so helpful with our website, helping us get our systems together, helping us with our workflow.

(Speaker 24)
Yeah, no surprises, no catch.

(Speaker 3)
And you guys were telling me, it’s purplecowjunkremoval . com, purplecowjunkremoval . com.

(Speaker 1)
You were pointing out that you guys are able to generate more income now in a month than you used to be able to generate in a year. So I’m going to start with you, Kelly. What has that meant for your family, being able to generate more revenue now in a month than you used to be able to generate in maybe a year previously?

(Speaker 6)
It’s great. We’ve been able to. help my daughter out with schooling more. We’ve been able to just have more financial freedom. Tamron, can you maybe explain, because we’ve had the opportunity to work with you as a consultant and coaching service to kind of guide you down the path.

(Speaker 1)
So it’s always rewarding for us to hear from people like you. How would you describe the process of working with a coaching team on a weekly basis to guide you down the path? It has been phenomenal. When we first started with Purple Cow, we didn’t have any idea about processes and what we needed to streamline our business. And then after working with Thrive, we not only know how to streamline our processes, but we know what they are. and we know what they mean to our business.

(Speaker 1)
And you guys have been absolutely wonderful to help us through that. Well, Thrive Nation, on today’s show, we’re interviewing a success story. These are people that had an idea. They turned the idea into reality, and now they’re here. These are real people. They probably listened to this podcast one too many times, and they said, OK, we’ll reach out.

(Speaker 1)
We’ll take action. And they’ve gone from a goal, maybe a dream, to a goal into actual success. They’ve done it. They’ve turned the idea into success. They’re here.

(Speaker 23)
They’re from Ames, Iowa.

(Speaker 3)
Iowa.

(Speaker 1)
So if you’re watching today’s show and you’re looking for a hookup for rhubarb or for anybody who can give you a tour of Ames, Iowa. I know a lot of people like to go to Iowa for tourism needs.

(Speaker 6)
You’re going to love today’s guests, Kelly and Tamara.

(Speaker 22)
Kelly, welcome onto The Thrive Time Show.

(Speaker 1)
How are you? Good.

(Speaker 3)
How are you doing, Clay?

(Speaker 1)
I’m fired up to be here with you. Tamara, how are you?

(Speaker 6)
I’m doing excellent.

(Speaker 1)
Thank you, Clay. OK, I’m going to go back and forth between you two, kind of tap into your collective wisdom here. So Kelly, first off, so people can prove that you’re real and you’re not a hologram, what is your first and last name and what’s the name of your company? My name is Kelly Culley, and our company name is Purple Cow Junk Removal and, sorry, Purple Cow Junk Removal and Home Services. Now, Tamara, again, please feel free to one -up them so people can prove you’re not a hologram. What is your first and last name, and what’s the name of your company?

(Speaker 1)
Hi, I’m Tamara Mallott, and our company name is Purple Cow Junk Removal and Home Services.

(Speaker 3)
Now, I’m going to pull up your website, because we were having a great conversation this weekend. And you guys were telling me, it’s purplecowjunkremoval . com, purplecowjunkremoval .

(Speaker 1)
com. You were pointing out that you guys are able to generate more income now in a month than you used to be able to generate in a year. So I’m going to start with you, Kelly. What has that meant for your family, being able to generate more revenue now in a month than you used to be able to generate in maybe a year?

(Speaker 6)
previously? It’s great. We’ve been able to help my daughter out with schooling more. We’ve been able to just have more financial freedom.

(Speaker 1)
Tamron, can you maybe explain? Because we’ve had the opportunity to work with you as a consultant and coaching service to kind of guide you down the path. So it’s always rewarding for us to hear from people like you. How would you describe the process of working with a coaching team on a weekly basis to guide you down the path? It has been phenomenal. When we first started with Purple Cow, we didn’t have any idea about processes and what we needed to streamline our business.

(Speaker 1)
And then after working with Thrive, we not only know how to streamline our processes, but we know what they are and we know what they mean to our business. And you guys have been absolutely wonderful to help us through that. Now, Kelly, I got to ask you this. There’s somebody out there watching today’s show. My dad, he used to deliver pizzas at Domino’s. He worked at Quick Trip.

(Speaker 3)
And may he rest in peace. And honestly, I’m super appreciative that my father did what he could do to provide for us.

(Speaker 1)
But he never really did figure out how to achieve financial success. He just never was able to do it.

(Speaker 2)
What would you say to somebody out there that hasn’t been to one of our workshops yet or hasn’t experienced what the coaching has made?

(Speaker 6)
Because whenever I’m helping guys like you, I’m always trying to help.

(Speaker 1)
I always kind of picture like I’m helping my dad, you know, somebody who like wants to do well and just need somebody to help him. How would you describe maybe the impact it’s made on you guys? Well, I would say, you know, I was a little skeptical at first, and then we came to your show in December of last year, and it was eye -opening. It changed how we ran the business, how we thought out to run the business, preventative processes and all that. What are all the services that you provide there, Tamara? Like what are the services you guys provide at purplecowjunkremoval .

(Speaker 1)
com? At purplecowjunkremoval . com, we provide junk removal, handyman, snow removal, lawn care, and landscaping services. OK, so you provide quite a bit.

(Speaker 3)
And what I’m going to do now is I’m going to pull up what we call the workflow. So for anybody who’s a new client into our system, we’re going to guide you down this path. And I really wanted to see if you guys could explain to us how you’ve been able to go down that path.

(Speaker 1)
And then I’m going to have a few members of our team that can hop on and maybe interrogate you a little bit about it. So step number one, you’ve got to know your revenue goals. And I know when I sit down with business owners or potential business owners, 100 % of the time, They really don’t have their goals in focus. They typically have the idea of, hey, I want to become successful. But they typically don’t have it broken down into a weekly revenue goal or a daily revenue goal. What kind of an impact has it made on your life there, Kelly, having these goals in place?

(Speaker 1)
It’s helped a lot. Like you said, we didn’t understand all the processes at first. And now that we’re using them, and we’re using them on a daily basis, it’s really helped us out a lot. Now, Tamara, the next box here as we take people down this workflow, box number two, is you’ve got to know your break -even point. You have to know how much stuff you have to sell to break even.

(Speaker 6)
And really, you have to have a tracking sheet. And most people I know do not have a tracking sheet. They just don’t. They do not have a tracking sheet.

(Speaker 3)
They don’t track their income.

(Speaker 1)
They don’t track their expenses. And so the idea of having a tracking sheet can be abnormal, unusual. And typically, entrepreneurs will tell me, well, my accountant handles that, or my bookkeeper handles that. How important is it for you there, Tamara, to have a tracking sheet where you know what your income is and where you know where your expenses are? It’s imperative to have that tracking sheet. It shows you what you need to make it through.

(Speaker 1)
the week and to keep going just the bare minimum. And once you can understand that bare minimum, you can grow from that. And you guys helped us figure out where that was, what our breakeven point was, so that we could grow, so that we could nail our system, so we could scale it. Now, Kelly, I want to ask you this. I’m not trying to get you in trouble. I just want to ask this question here.

(Speaker 1)
The number of hours you’re willing to work. So in my case, what I do is I have a very predictable schedule. I basically go from 5 AM to 6 PM, and I just do it every day.

(Speaker 3)
And that’s what I do. And then Sundays, I try to change that a little bit, try to take the day off, take the kids to church, do that kind of thing. But I have a schedule that works for my wife and I. So it’s very normal for me to go to bed at 9, very normal for me to wake up at 3.

(Speaker 6)
I just have a very normal schedule.

(Speaker 3)
But that’s not normal for most people that I used to work in 40 hours a week or 35 hours a week. And you as a couple, you have to agree on that schedule. So I want to ask you this.

(Speaker 21)
As you’re growing the company and you’re having unbelievable amounts of leads now, you’re generating leads, people are reaching out to you every day wanting to hire your services.

(Speaker 3)
How important was it or how important is it for you and your wife to continually look at that schedule and adjust it to make sure that you’re on the same page in terms of the number of hours per week that you’re willing to work?

(Speaker 1)
Well, it’s not always the easiest. Right now, I know we put in, we don’t leave the office most days until 7, 30, 8 o ‘clock at night. So we’re here a good 12 hours a day. It’s worth it. It’s worth it. It’s worth it.

(Speaker 1)
We’ve been together 25 years almost and we’ve been through a lot. So. Yeah, we make it work now. Tamara, move it on to the next box here. It’s you have to have your unique value proposition.

(Speaker 6)
You have to have a way. You’re not the only company in America. This just in. You’re not the only company in America. This just in to do junk removal.

(Speaker 1)
But yet we have to make sure that you see it. out in that clutter of commerce, that people remember you, they remember the company. And so the company name itself, Purple Cow Junk Removal, that stands out.

(Speaker 20)
But how would you describe, Tamara, what it is that you do differently from other junk removal companies that are in Iowa?

(Speaker 1)
Let’s see. What we would do differently or what we do differently is, oh, Our unique power to offer the services to the client, not only those services, is to go behind the services and to make sure they’re happy with every bit of what we do. The quality assurance means a lot to us. So if they’re not happy, we’re not happy. And if they’re not happy, we’re going to fix it. Now, Kelly, the branding thing.

(Speaker 1)
So many people, they reach out to us and they go, Clay, I’ve seen the success of brands you’ve worked with. I’ve seen Oxifresh . com. I’ve seen, you know, clients tell me this all the time. This is how our calls go. People say, hey, look, I went to Thrivetimeshow .

(Speaker 1)
com. I looked up your case studies. I’ve seen these companies you’ve worked with. And they’ll reference. They’ll say, I’m familiar with Oxifresh. I know you’ve worked with those guys for 15 plus years.

(Speaker 1)
I know there’s 500 locations. And they say, hey, I know you worked with Tip Top Canine to help them franchise. And they’ll go, you know, wow. I know you’ve done that. I know you helped grow Tip Top K9 from one location to 18 locations.

(Speaker 3)
They say, hey, I know you’ve worked with Beverly Hills Precious Metals to help them scale, and they’ll say that, but then they’ll go, yeah, but my industry, it’s a little different, and I’m in Iowa, and I don’t know that I have what it takes, and I don’t have a website, I don’t have business cards, and I don’t have a team to help me. And I know you guys claim that you charge $1 ,700 a month flat rate to do the photography, the video, the web, the search engine, coaches down the path. But is there a gotcha? Is there a catch? Is there some sort of overtime fee? Do you charge per hour, per call, per email?

(Speaker 1)
I had one guy talk to you last week. He said that his consultant coached him and said, if you ever need something, call me throughout the year. And then at the end of the year, his consultant sent him an overage charge for over $15 ,000 of backdated phone calls, emails. So I wanted to ask you, could you explain to listeners out there, what’s it like having a team that helps you that you know is going to be a flat rate per month? Well, I don’t think we would have gotten as far as we have without you guys. And yeah, there’s no hidden fees.

(Speaker 1)
I haven’t come across any bills that I didn’t know I was paying out for you guys. So, I mean, it’s straightforward what the fee is. You guys have been so helpful with our website, helping us get our systems together, helping us with our workflow. Yeah, no surprises, no catch. Now, Steve Jobs once said, he says, simplicity scales and complexity fails.

(Speaker 3)
Steve Jobs, you know, the guy who invented the iPhone, the iMac, the iPad, things that start with an I. He’s the guy who took Pixar, which is a failing company, and introduced Toy Story. Steve Jobs, the founder of the personal computer concept, Steve Jobs, he said, complexity fails. Complexity fails, but simplicity scales.

(Speaker 9)
And so when we work with clients such as yourselves, we want to make it into, I call it core, repeatable, actionable processes, or the crap. We want to break it down into simple, repeatable processes, not because you’re not smart, but because you are smart, and I know you’re busy, and I want to build a system that is scalable.

(Speaker 3)
And so one thing I know that our team talks to you guys about every week, Kelly, is we got to get video testimonials. We’ve got to get images of projects we’ve done. We’ve got to write search engine content. And we have to get more Google reviews.

(Speaker 19)
Could you talk about maybe the mind freedom that it’s provided, knowing that you have a checklist of things you need to do every week, and you don’t have a new idea every five minutes?

(Speaker 3)
Right. I mean, we’re all human.

(Speaker 1)
We all forget. It’s nice having that checklist. I give one to two. guys. You know, they know that they got to greet the customer with a friendly smile, shake their hand. They know that they have to take notes as they walk through the job.

(Speaker 1)
They have to take pictures. They know that they have to be presentable in front of the client. They know it.

(Speaker 3)
And it’s all right there on a piece of paper, 1 through 10, 1 through 20, whatever. the checklist without it, we would fail. You know, one of the things that blew my mind as a kid growing up without wealth is I remember being around people that were successful. And I remember thinking, that seems so easy. Why can’t we as a family do that. And so that was kind of how it started for me. I’m like, we’re not doing well financially.

(Speaker 3)
I want to, I’ll study the people who are successful and I’ll do what they’re doing. And I’m sure if I do exactly what successful people are doing, I’ll probably get the similar results. It was just a very similar thing. It made sense to me, but yet it was so foreign for many people around me. What do you say here, Kelly, for somebody who’s watching today’s show that goes, I don’t know if I have what it takes to implement this system and to become successful, regardless of what industry they’re in. Well, Clay, I could say I grew up a lot like you did.

(Speaker 1)
My mom lived on welfare my whole life, up till I was 18. We had nothing growing up.

(Speaker 6)
So that’s, Purple Cow means a lot to me. I want to be able to give back to the community. I’m sorry, I kind of went off the question here, but this is kind of an emotional thing for me. Yeah, but this is real because I grew up without nothing. Everything I ever wanted, I either had to work for. I started working at 14 because I was tired of being broke.

(Speaker 1)
And then just from there, I mean, if you have a dream, follow that dream. I got the opportunity to purchase Purple Cow from Josiah.

(Speaker 3)
and I felt like it was just a blessing from God. And I will not and cannot or cannot and will not fail at Purple Cow.

(Speaker 1)
Tamara, what kind of growth have you been able to have in the past year for anybody, just as far as maybe if it’s a percentage or maybe it’s like five times or two times more or 1 % growth?

(Speaker 3)
How would you describe how much growth you’ve been able to have in the last 12 months?

(Speaker 18)
I would say, well, with one of our services, for our lawn care services, we have tripled our client base.

(Speaker 3)
And that is pretty impressive.

(Speaker 1)
And they’re repeat clients. They keep coming back. So that’s way exciting. What would you say, Kelly, in terms of growth, if you had to say like a multiple or a number? Because so many people watch this show, and they’re like, yeah, did they grow by 1 % or 2 %? I’m not going to say we’ve grown at least.

(Speaker 1)
Compared to last year, we have probably grown at least 20, 30 % easily. Yeah. And so you, again, this is, so the lawn care sides up three times overall growth, 20, 30%, somewhere on that range.

(Speaker 3)
As the years go by, we’re going to learn more and grow it more. I mean. 100 % are goals. Yeah. Now, the next box, box number seven here. Again, for anybody out there watching today’s show, box number six, you’ve got to create a three -legged marketing tool.

(Speaker 3)
You say, what does that mean? We’ve got to create a system that is implementable, that will generate leads from your ideal and likely buyers. We have to create a system that is implementable, that you can actually do, that you can apply, that will help you reach your ideal and likely buyers. Now, box number seven, box number seven, is we have to create sales systems, which means sales scripts, recorded calls, sales presentation materials, perhaps business cards, perhaps one sheets, perhaps auto wraps. Kelly, how does it feel knowing you have a team that can make this stuff whenever you need it?

(Speaker 6)
How has that impacted you knowing, hey, I’ve got a team.

(Speaker 3)
If I ever need to make something, they got it.

(Speaker 1)
Oh, it’s great.

(Speaker 3)
It’s a lift off the shoulders, let me tell you.

(Speaker 1)
We use our website. Google alone generates most of our leads. We rarely have to use local service ads. Our website gets us leads. God, enough to keep us so busy. Right now, we have our one sheets, we have our business cards, we have our signs.

(Speaker 1)
door hangers. We’re right now we have put our ad out with the Iowa State football schedule. So we have a little ad on on the the Hawkeyes or no, it’s not Hawkeyes gotta get shot. Oh my goodness. Cyclones. You guys just beat South Dakota yesterday, right?

(Speaker 1)
I believe so. OK, I believe so. This just in. Fun factoid. Now, next update here for your next step is you have to know what it costs you to get a new customer. And this is a thing that you guys, through the tracking sheet, you know that.

(Speaker 1)
But again, for anybody who’s watching today’s show, maybe this resonates with you, maybe it doesn’t. I have a haircut chain called Elephant in the Room, and it costs me approximately $20 to give you your first haircut for $1. That’s what it costs me to give you your first haircut for $1. And I know that number because if I don’t wow you and you don’t come back again, it’s not sustainable. It’s not profitable, but we’re willing to spend the money on it. You say, where do we spend the money?

(Speaker 1)
We do search engine domination. We do online social media ads on Facebook. We do retargeting ads. We market to current customers. So I know what it costs to get a customer.

(Speaker 6)
That’s box number eight. Determine your sustainable customer acquisition costs. Box number nine, you got to create repeatable systems. Kelly, you’re a busy person. Tamara, you’re a busy person.

(Speaker 3)
You want to create a checklist for everything.

(Speaker 6)
You want to have a system for everything.

(Speaker 1)
To build an organization, you have to be organized. And I see so many get -rich -quick hype hucksters, people online, charlatans pitching, get rich in five minutes, invest in this crypto coin, you’ll be a billionaire by noon. I see that kind of jackassery. But at the end of the day, what makes a successful company is it’s that messy middle. It’s building those systems and processes. Tamara, how much of an impact has it had for you having checklists and processes in place as you continue build more and more processes and checklists.

(Speaker 1)
It frees up our time. So when we first started, we didn’t have any checklists, any processes in play. And now that we do, and those processes and checklists are becoming not bigger, but more simple. It allows us to do the things that we need to do because we know that our techs are doing what they need to do because it’s simple. It’s right there for you. The shoulder taps have been way so much less frequent than they were when we first started.

(Speaker 1)
Yes and no. Well, you guys just said how your systems get more simple over time. I think people need to know that. If your business is getting increasingly complex, there’s something wrong. Simplicity scales, complexity fails. This just in, Steve Jobs said, simplicity scales, complexity fails.

(Speaker 1)
What does that mean? It should be getting more simple over time, not more complex. We move on to the next box. And again, for anybody who wants to download this book for free, follow along. Go to thrivetimeshow . com forward slash free resources.

(Speaker 1)
Someone says, well, why would you give away all your books for free? Why would I do that? Well, again, Kelly, you know this. When you grow up poor, you want to be able to teach other people how not to be poor. If you’ve ever overcome poverty, you sort of view poverty as like a disease. And if you see other people struggling with the same disease, you kind of want to, you know, give them some treatment that works.

(Speaker 1)
And so I make all these books available for free. You can go to thrivetimeshow . com forward slash free dash resources. But what we do here as a coaching program is we help you implement. We help you implement those systems. If you’re watching today’s show, you can download these books for free.

(Speaker 11)
and then we’re going to help you implement these systems.

(Speaker 1)
So we move on here to box number 10. You got to manage people. This just in. You can’t make your dream work unless you can make your teamwork. This just in. You can’t make your dream work without teamwork.

(Speaker 1)
You have to hire people. How do you hire? How do you inspire? How do you train? How do you retain? How do you find good people?

(Speaker 1)
How do you hire? How do you inspire? How do you train? How do you retain? We teach all these things. I’m going to go back to you, Kelly.

(Speaker 1)
Most people tell me, I can’t find good people. I’m in Iowa. It’s too tough. There’s too much rhubarb. People are distracted. People say, I can’t find good people.

(Speaker 1)
I’m in New York.

(Speaker 3)
The city’s falling apart. It’s Sodom and Gomorrah. I can’t find good people. People say, Florida, I can’t find good people. It’s too swampy. It’s too hot, too swampy, too many alligators.

(Speaker 3)
Alligators are eating all the good people. People say, in Washington, I can’t find good people.

(Speaker 1)
My governor’s crazy, can’t find. People always tell me, they always tell me some sort of local reason why they can’t find people. But I’ve never had a hard time finding good people. And I know that you guys are learning the same system, so you also will not have a hard time finding people. Can you talk about the implementing the hiring systems and the processes so that you don’t find yourself short -staffed? Well, we want to find people that are good fit for Purple Cow.

(Speaker 1)
We want to find people that are friendly, know how to talk in front of a customer. And to do that, we have weekly group interviews. I mean, it gets… They’re hectic, but they’re worth it. You’re eventually you’re going to find you’re going to have weeks where you’re going to have nobody that’s just not a fit, but then you’re going to have weeks where you find one or two people that are just a perfect fit for your company. So do the weekly group interviews.

(Speaker 1)
It’s worth it. Now we move on to box number 11, 12, and 13. And for sake of time, I’m going to go 90 miles an hour through these steps here. Box number 11, you’ve got to create a weekly repetitive schedule. You just have to have a schedule. You’ve got to know what time am I going to do the weekly group interview?

(Speaker 1)
What time is my staff meeting? What time? So many businesses don’t have a time to start their day. It’s like in my office. We start the day at 7 every day. We have a huddle every morning.

(Speaker 1)
We have our weekly staff meeting every week at the same time. We do the interview at the same time. If you do not have a weekly repetitive schedule in place, It’s hard to get traction in any area of your life. If you wanna get good playing an instrument, you gotta have time scheduled to practice. If you wanna get good at a sport, you schedule time to practice. If you want to not be successful, and you want your life to be perpetually stressful, don’t schedule time for anything, and just work off of some sort of osmosis, feeling -based, focused schedule, and then you too will experience jackassery.

(Speaker 1)
Box number 12, you gotta create this onboarding system. Once you hire people, they have an onboarding packet, a handbook, documentation, Maybe you have a non -solicitation agreement. Maybe you have an organizational chart. We have gotten into that on past shows and we’ll get into that on future shows. And then box number 13. It’s not about how much money you make.

(Speaker 1)
It’s about how much money you keep. This just in. It’s not about how much money you make. It’s about how much money you keep. Because at the end of the day, why are you building a business? You’re building a business Two, create time freedom and financial freedom.

(Speaker 1)
There’s three P’s in business, three P’s. You want to make a product that wows the customer, right? So the customer says, I always want to pay less, P number one.

(Speaker 10)
The customer always wants to pay less.

(Speaker 3)
Two, the employees, they always want to get paid more.

(Speaker 11)
This just in, every employee wants to get paid more.

(Speaker 1)
This just in, every customer wants to pay less. And this just in, P number three, profits. Nobody cares about your profits. Let me repeat that again. Pay.

(Speaker 17)
Every employee wants to get paid more.

(Speaker 1)
Price. Every customer wants to pay less. Profits. Nobody cares. Nobody. Nobody’s going to care as much as you do, Clay.

(Speaker 1)
Right. Yeah.

(Speaker 14)
There it is. So we’re going to help you through that process.

(Speaker 3)
What I’m going to do now is I’m going to bring on a Levi onto the show here. So Levi is going to be on mic, but off camera. Levi, are you over there? Yes, sir.

(Speaker 16)
OK.

(Speaker 1)
So what we’re going to do is we’re going to get some folks behind the Levi mic. So we’re all going to kind of hop in line. Tell me your name. and last name, Levi, and what question do you have here for the folks at Purple Cow? Because these guys are doing it. They’ve done it.

(Speaker 1)
What question would you have on behalf of anybody listening to today’s show, Levi? So my name is Levi Matthias, and I am 19 years old. I’d say my number one question is, how do you get past the, mental barrier of you know, basically, how do you stay so consistent and get through that mental barrier of I really don’t want to do this, but you do it anyway? Kelly, well, you gotta you gotta get in the thought of mind that nobody else is going to do it for you. So if you don’t do it, it’s not going to get done. So you just gotta you gotta push through that that I still get that.

(Speaker 1)
that gut -wrenching feeling sometimes, but I just tell myself, you know, Hey, if I ain’t going to do this, nobody else is going to do it for me. Right. Well, let’s go on to the next question here. Let’s have our next person hop on here. Tell us your first name and your last name again. These are real successful entrepreneurs.

(Speaker 15)
They’re in the messy middle.

(Speaker 2)
They’re building a real business.

(Speaker 1)
Uh, this isn’t, uh, uh, a charlatan show.

(Speaker 7)
This isn’t a show about somebody who’s somehow had an epiphany and then got to the top of the mountain through luck and entropy.

(Speaker 6)
No, these are real people and they’re real grind to the company. Everybody go to the website right now. This will help our clients rank higher in Google, by the way. Everybody go to purplecowjunkremoval . com. Purplecowjunkremoval .

(Speaker 6)
com.

(Speaker 1)
Okay, next question. What’s your name? What’s your first name, last name? What question do you have? Yes, my name is Rihanna Roller and my question for you guys is what was the deciding factor for you to make you realize that you wanted a business coach and you wanted to be pushed harder to make your business grow? Let’s go to Tamara for this one coming in hot.

(Speaker 1)
All righty. So what decided what we did, how we decided we wanted a business coach, um, when we put Purple Cow, the gentleman that owned it before us suggested Clay and the team because he had worked with them before. And we were skeptical at first, so we went to a conference and it opened our eyes. I came back feeling like, hey, I might just have what I need to make it through. And then once we started working with the play called us and says, Oh, we’ll take you on.

(Speaker 1)
And we started working with one of the coaches and it just, it all worked out. It was awesome. I want to interject something real quick. I want to a big shout out to Josiah on part two of today’s show. I’m going to share our interview with Josiah. So everyone can meet this guy.

(Speaker 1)
He came to our conference in like 2018 or something. And he looked like he was born yesterday. He and my Hummer, my Hummer stopped working. So I had a Hummer I was driving at the time and it stopped working. And he said, I could fix it. So he climbs underneath.

(Speaker 1)
This is a conference attendee, by the way. He climbs underneath my Hummer and then proceeds to fix the vehicle. And I’m like, what do you do? And he says, I have aspirations to start an auto lift company.

(Speaker 3)
And now he’s gone on to build a very successful company. He’s just a great guy, a really kind person.

(Speaker 14)
And he’s the kind of guy who will get underneath your Hummer at a conference and fix the vehicle.

(Speaker 1)
I didn’t ask him to.

(Speaker 3)
He had heard somehow through the conference that my Hummer quit working. And he was like, I can fix it. And he goes underneath the vehicle with his tools, fixes the vehicle.

(Speaker 1)
I’m not exactly sure what he did, but he made it happen. So next question. Who’s on the show here next? These are all wonderful people in the office. What’s your first and last name? And what question do you have or question do you have for Tamara here and Kelly?

(Speaker 1)
They’re real entrepreneurs, really getting it done. My name is Robert Brumley, and my question is this. Earlier, you spoke about the importance of your website. Could you be more specific on how that has helped you grow your business? Kelly, going to you, sir. Well, the testimonials have helped us a bunch.

(Speaker 1)
The fact that we have Clay and his team putting our video testimonials on there, our business pictures, all that that they’re doing for our website has really, really helped and improved our income. I’ll say this too, one thing. When I was building my first company, djconnection . com, this is a true story. I went to a web guy.

(Speaker 1)
And I went to the web, and I’ll tell you how I met this guy. He had built the website for Garth Brooks. And I thought, man, you can’t go into Walmart without seeing Garth Brooks everywhere. If he could build the website for him, I’d probably want him building my website for djconnection . com. So I went to the guy, and I said, I want to hire you to build my website.

(Speaker 1)
He said, no problem. And I said, how much is it? He says, yeah, it’s about $20 ,000. And I’m going, whoa! Because I’m working at Applebee’s, Target, and DirecTV. But I’m going, all right, can we pay that over 12 payments?

(Speaker 1)
He said, yes. So I paid this guy to build the website. Very happy that he did it, by the way. I paid him to do it. And I said, I kind of want a video on my home page. Who do you recommend for that?

(Speaker 1)
And he says, well, you got to go with this company. And I said, I’ll probably put that on the back burner to something I’ll come back to later. So anyway, so then I reach out to a business consultant to help me grow my company. And the guy Bruce was my business consultant. And Bruce says, Clay, you got to have a video on your website. It’s killing you not to have a website.

(Speaker 1)
I said, who do you recommend, Bruce? He recommends a guy. It’s $8 ,000 to build the video. Now, this is on top of the video. 20 grand for the website. So then, this is a true story.

(Speaker 1)
So then I’m talking to my mentor at the time, Dr. Zellner. I said, Dr. Zellner, I need more customers. He says, Clay, you gotta get a yellow page ad. I said, a yellow page ad? He said, absolutely. I said, this is back when yellow pages were relevant.

(Speaker 1)
He said, you gotta do that and then advertise on the internet. I said, do you have a contact? Long story short, he connected me to a person who knew a person. I’m on the phone with Jeremy McCasland. Jeremy McCasland says, Clay, for $3 ,000, month, a max 2 ,500 entry level, you could be the top of the yellow pages.

(Speaker 1)
So you start doing all the math here and basically every time I was getting quote unquote advice, it kept resulting in me having a bigger and bigger bill. And one of the great things that we’ve been able to do for great clients like yourselves is we have a whole team that does all this. So you don’t have a bill every month that’s a new bill for a new thing. It’s a flat rate.

(Speaker 8)
And again, the act of building a website, it is not an event. It’s a process.

(Speaker 6)
on the Purple Cow, folks, every single week.

(Speaker 1)
We harass these folks, and every single week they do a great job of gathering video testimonials from real clients they’ve really worked with, and that really does help their real website rank higher, and it also improves the conversion rate.

(Speaker 6)
Another example, if you go to MakeYourDogEpic . com, JT Lawson and his team, he gets videos every single week from happy customers. He gathers images of happy dogs. We write search engine content. So again, if you’re building a website, it is not an event, it is a process.

(Speaker 13)
Who’s our next guest?

(Speaker 3)
first and last name.

(Speaker 6)
And what questions would you have for Kelly and Tamara?

(Speaker 1)
Real entrepreneurs building a real business. And again, folks, if you’re keeping score at home, and I know you are, it’s purplecowjunkremoval . com. What’s your name? What question do you have? Hi, my name is McKenna Breedlove.

(Speaker 1)
And the question I have for you guys is which out of the 14 initial steps was the hardest or most transformative to implement for your business? All right, let’s go with Tamara for this one. I think it was figuring out what our processes were. So this had to come from many places.

(Speaker 3)
Kelly had worked in the field, so he knew some of them. And then I would go, and I work in the field, too. So together, we would figure out what are the simple steps to get our text from point A to point B simply streamlined. And it took a lot. A lot of it was trial and error. Trial and error.

(Speaker 1)
Now, Tamara, I will say this. I find that a lot of clients, they’ll tell me, they’ll say, Clay, making the processes was like the biggest thing.

(Speaker 12)
And then I also hear people say, you know what?

(Speaker 10)
Generating leads was the biggest thing.

(Speaker 1)
So I hear kind of people saying those two things. Maybe there’s two things or three things that are the biggest thing. I’m going to go to Kelly, get your thoughts. Kelly, was it processes?

(Speaker 7)
Was it generating leads? Was it both of it or something else?

(Speaker 6)
I would have to say a little bit of both.

(Speaker 1)
At first, it was figuring out how to get those leads.

(Speaker 3)
But once we started getting those leads, now they’re just there. We’re getting daily. I mean, we’re getting leads daily. So it’s been great. Did you have a follow -up question, McKenna, about this process? Are you good?

(Speaker 3)
Yeah.

(Speaker 1)
Oh, she’s good. OK, awesome. Next question coming in hot. What is your first and last name? And what question would you have here for Kelly and Tamara? My name is Jazar Kiza.

(Speaker 1)
And my question for you guys is what’s the biggest challenge you guys have faced?

(Speaker 11)
And how did you guys and like the business coaching help you guys overcome it?

(Speaker 3)
Let’s go to Kelly. I think some of the biggest right now has been managing the people. We’ve had to learn a lot. I went from went from working in on or in the business to owning it and now working on it. And so managing people wasn’t really my forte back then. But Clay’s guys, they helped me, you know, they said, hey, get get some kind of merit based pay.

(Speaker 3)
It’s just managing people was not our strong suit at first, but Clay and his guys have kind of walked us through that. So it’s gotten a lot easier.

(Speaker 1)
Now, I have two final questions for you guys. Two final questions for you. One is if you had to describe like a 30 seconds or less ish, what makes a purple cow? We’re going to

(Speaker 3)
some listeners that are going to be in Ames, Iowa.

(Speaker 1)
They’re going to find this podcast.

(Speaker 10)
Kelly, why should everybody check out your company, PurpleCowJunkRemoval .

(Speaker 1)
com? We’re unique. We’re an honest company. We’re straightforward. We give a free, no obligation quote. And we’re not afraid to tell people if that’s something we’re not comfortable doing.

(Speaker 1)
And they appreciate it. They really appreciate it a lot. They like the honesty and they love how fast we respond to them. So Tamara, I’m going to ask you the same question. Why should anybody, if someone stumbles across this video, they’re in Ames, Iowa, why should everybody check out your, your company there again? Why should everybody visit your company?

(Speaker 1)
Purple cow, junk removal . com because they won’t be disappointed because they will get their money’s worth. And then some. Bam. OK. Final question I have here for you.

(Speaker 1)
For anybody who’s watching today’s show, who’s thinking, Kelly, about going to Thrivetimeshow .

(Speaker 3)
com, that’s our website. They’ve gone to Thrivetimeshow . com. They’ve seen thousands of testimonials from real people. They’ve seen the Eric Trump. They’ve seen the Robert Kiyosaki.

(Speaker 3)
They’ve seen Tim Tebow.

(Speaker 1)
They’ve seen a 20 -year history. But they’re like, I don’t know. I don’t know. I mean, I know I can name my price for a conference ticket, but that seems, I don’t know. I don’t know if that’s real.

(Speaker 6)
I don’t know if that’s real. And I know they do a free consultation, but I don’t know. If I fill out the red button, if I click the red button, I fill it out, what’s going to happen?

(Speaker 1)
Kelly, what do you say for anybody out there who’s on the fence thinking about going with or scheduling a free consultation or visiting our workshops there at thrivetimeshow . com? Well, when it comes to owning a business, you know you got to take chances. So we took a chance. We were skeptical at first, and we’re glad we made that leap. I mean, we’ve gotten so much knowledge.

(Speaker 1)
just on everything on how to run our business, how to keep the processes going, the checklists. What do you got to lose? I mean, you’re running a business, you’re taking that chance, why not take a chance here? Tamara, I’ll ask you the same question. For anybody out there who’s on the fence, they’re going, you know, I’ve heard about thrivetimeshow .

(Speaker 6)
com. I know you guys offer a scholarship ticket so anybody can afford the conferences. I know you guys do a free consultation, but I’m on the fence.

(Speaker 1)
What do you say, Tamara? I agree with Kelly. I say take the chance. You cannot make money if you don’t spend money and this is a good investment. Guys, I’m gonna pull up your website one more time for anybody out there if you’re watching today’s show while driving down a gravel road While on a skateboard and you’re attempting to take notes with a sharpie. I encourage you to write that down It’s purple cow junk removal calm if you’re in a family Sub maybe a suburban maybe you’re in like a Tahoe you’re driving down the road Your kids won’t stop touching each other and you’re into the shoulder boom and you’re just trying to find a pen Go to purplecowjunkremoval .

com. For anybody out there that’s on a parasailing right now, and you’re using an Etch -A -Sketch to take notes, and you just can’t seem to do it without it erasing itself, that’s purplecowjunkremoval . com. And for anybody out there who just learns through repetition, write it down, folks. That’s purplecowjunkremoval . com.

Kelly, I really do appreciate you. Tamara, we really do appreciate you guys. Thank you for hopping on the show. Thank you for being diligent doers. It’s an honor to serve you guys. And I hope you have a great rest of your day.

Thank you, Clay. Thank you, Clay. Have a great weekend. Take care, guys.

Transcribed with Cockatoo