TipTopK9.com | The Co-Author of Rich Dad Poor Dad Sharon Lechter Shares How She Sold One Million Copies of Rich Dad Poor Dad! + “Clay really helped us w/ his systems, doubling our size, helped us double our incomes.” – Ryan Wimpey

Audio Transcription

Hey, I’m Ryan Wimpey. I’m originally from Tulsa, born and raised here. I’ve definitely learned a lot about life design and making sure the business serves you. 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. 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. Play is hilarious. I literally laughed so hard that I started having tears yesterday. And we’ve been learning a lot, which, you know, we’ve been sitting here, we’ve been learning a lot, and so the humor definitely helps. It breaks it up. But the content is awesome, off the charts, and it’s very interactive. You can raise your hand. It’s not like you’re just listening to the professor speak. The wizard teaches, but the wizard interacts and he takes questions, so that’s awesome. If you’re not attending the conference, you’re missing about three quarters to half of your life. It’s probably worth a couple thousand dollars. You’re missing the thought process of someone that’s already started like nine profitable businesses. So not only is it a lot of good information but just getting in the thought process of Clay Clark or Dr. Zellner or any of the other coaches. Getting in the thought process of how they’re starting all these businesses. To me just that is priceless. That’s money. Well we’re definitely not getting up sold here. My wife and I have attended conferences where they up what was great information and then they up sold us like half the conference. I don’t want to like bang my head into a wall, and she’s like banging her head into the chair in front of her. Like, it’s good information, but we’re like, oh my gosh, I want to strangle you. Shut up and go with the presentation that we paid for. And that’s not here. There’s no upsells or anything, so that’s awesome. I hate that. Oh, it makes me angry. So, glad that’s not happening. So the cost of this conference is quite a bit cheaper than business college. 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. I would definitely recommend that people would check out the Thrive 15 conference. The information that you’re gonna get is just very, very beneficial. And the mindset that you’re gonna get, that you’re gonna leave with, is just absolutely worth the price of a little bit of money and a few days worth of your time. Get ready to enter the Thrive Time 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 Cousin Dixon’s on the hooks, I bring down the books He’s bringing some wisdom and the good looks As the father of five, that’s where I’mma dive So if you see my wife and kids, please tell them All right thrive nation on today’s show I have the pleasure We have the pleasure of interviewing the certified public accountant and entrepreneur that many many people know She’s become a household name. Her name is Sharon Lector. You see she is the CEO behind Rich Dad, Poor Dad. She’s the lady who created the book with Robert Kiyosaki. I’m not sure if the listener is out there if you’re aware of this, but the whole Rich Dad, Poor Dad book series really started as a result of Robert Kiyosaki wanting to make a board game and Sharon Lecter writing an elaborate sales brochure that mutated or was changed and transformed into the book known as Rich Dad Poor Dad. In fact, they sold the first 1 million copies of that book out of her home. Ladies and gentlemen, in 2009, Sharon Lecter was appointed to the National CPA Financial Literacy Commission as a national spokesperson. This right here, folks, is the same council that served both President Bush and President Obama. And Sharon today has a team of over 5,000 people around the world who help her with her various assets and entrepreneurial endeavors. And in her free time, she was approached by the Napoleon Hill Foundation to take the manuscript to a book that was written in the 1930s called Outwitting the Devil and to refresh it. So she’s worked with the Napoleon Hill Foundation now to release multiple books, including Think and Grow Rich for Women and Outwitting the Devil. Ladies and gentlemen, family and friends, without any further ado, it’s my pleasure to introduce to you my friend, Ms. Sharon Lecter. Sharon Lecter. Ms. Lecter, how are you doing today? I am fantastic, Clay. Thank you so much. Hey, I have a question for you. I think a lot of listeners would like to know off the bat here. When you guys created the Rich Dad, Poor Dad series, what was your role with that book? And what did the idea for that book come from? Well, at the time, this is back in 95. Robert Kiyosaki had gone to see my husband, Michael Lecter, who is an intellectual property attorney, with an idea for a board game. And it was drawn out on a piece of paper, but he needed somebody to help really make it happen. And so we went to see my husband about getting it copyrighted and patented. In that process, I had already been working in the area of financial literacy, and so my husband introduced us. I thought that I would enjoy seeing the potential of the game, which I really did. So I met Robert at the first beta test for the game, and it was drawn out on a piece of butcher block paper, and the playing pieces were different caliber bullets, so first impression is everything, right? Right. Of the three tables, I was the only person who got out of the rat race, but at the same time I really saw the value of the messaging, which is consistent with my messaging and understanding the importance of passive income, the importance of building assets, and not relying on a job or a paycheck for your financial health. And so I volunteered to help them. My background had been I helped build the talking book industry and in that we also had electronic games. So I had a network of influence that I could draw on. And as we were looking at it, Robert wanted to charge $200 for the board game. And I said, well, maybe we need a brochure. We need a brochure that kind of talks about the philosophy so that people will be convinced to invest $200. In that process, he asked me to be his partner. The brochure was Rich Dad, Poor Dad. We never expected it to be a huge success in its own right. It was written really as a brochure to sell the game. Of course, the world came and said, ìNo, your brand is not only Cashflow. Your brand is Rich Dad.î So we thought, ìWell, okay. Maybe we should write, decided to write three books, Rich Dad, Poor Dad, Cashflow Quadrant, and Guide to Investing. And we did those, and then, oh no, people still wanted more. So we wrote a total of 15 books during the 10 years that I was his partner. I own the company and I led it as the CEO. And then we had a second brand of books that we’d launched, the Rich Dad Advisors books, along with all of our other programming. And so that’s really how it got started. He was interested in the fact that my background and my philosophy was consistent with his, the fact that I was a CPA, and the fact that I had the experience and the connections to help build the business. And so we became partners, and in 10 years, we built the Rich Dad brand globally. Now, I understand, and correct me if I’m wrong here, but I believe that you sold the first one million copies of the, now we know, brochure slash book out of your actual house. Is that true? Did you actually sell a million copies of a book out of your house? Yes, we did. We really ran the company out of my own for the first three years. And in fact, our local post office got to the point where they said, Sharon, we can’t handle your volume anymore. So a local fulfillment house that would store the inventory and ship for us. But yeah, we sold the first million books. We made it to the New York Times Best Seller list. The original book was published by a company that my husband and I own called Tech Press. And it was so that we could control the book. If we wanted to give it away, we could. Traditional publishers, that’s not something you can do with them. And as we built that success and got it on a list, all of a sudden, we had all these publishers coming to us wanting to help us. And it was a good thing because when we really hit the stride, we had a phone call from Oprah wanting us to be on Oprah. We knew we needed to have more depth of distribution and it was in the middle of these conversations so we were able to do a deal with Warner Books and the rest is history. Seven and a half plus years in the New York Times bestseller list. That’s phenomenal. Sharon, this is Robert Zellner, by the way. Love your books and so excited to have you on the show. When you were writing the pamphlet for the game, when did it morph into the book? I mean, because that’s a big pamphlet for a game. So you’re starting to write the pamphlet, and then at what point did you say, I think this is a book? Well, we said we need a brochure, but the brochure became the book. And it was really to tell the story and to really be able to give it to people for free. And really to have a $15 product that would lead to the $200 board game and that’s why it was not originally published in hardback. It was originally published in paperback. Aha. Now, Sharon, I know you’ve met probably thousands of people all around the world as you’ve become more of a face yourself. No longer behind the scenes, you’re out there doing more interviews and being more seen. So I’m sure you’ve run into people all around the world who’ve said to you, Sharon, your book really did change and impact my life. Well, we have one listener who’s one of my current clients who’s the head of marketing for Shaw Homes. And if you check it out there, Sharon, it’s a shawhomes.com. It’s the largest home builder in Oklahoma. And he claims, now again, he claims, now Sharon, you’ll have to get a hold of it at some point to verify this, but he used to deliver pizzas for Domino’s. And he said that the book Rich Dad, Poor Dad changed his life. And he told me, he said, you’re going to interview her? Are you kidding me? He said, so he asked me if I would ask you a question on today’s show. So he wanted to know… First tell me what his first name is. Aaron Antus. Aaron, okay. Aaron Antus, the head of marketing for the largest home builder in Oklahoma, shawholmes.com. And Aaron said, he wanted me to ask you, he said, when did you have your aha moment in your life, Sharon, that changed your view of your financial world? When did you, Ms. Sharon Lecter, have your aha moment that changed the way you view the financial world? Well, I think our lives are a series of aha moments. But I think, first I want to address Aaron because a lot of people come up to me and around the world and say that Rich Dad Poor Dad changed their life. And Aaron, I want to tell you nobody changed your life but you. I’m honored and thrilled that something that I wrote inspired you, gave you the motivation to take action. But I want you to own it and I want you to stand in the fact that you sought out the information but then you actually took action and employed it. And so Rich Dad Poor Dad as a book doesn’t change anybody’s lives. Hopefully it inspires people to take action to change their own lives. But as it relates to me, my financial ah-ha’s, there’s probably been quite a few of them, but the first one probably was having grown up in a very entrepreneurial home. We lived in a house between my dad’s used car lot and my mom’s beauty shop. My dad also owned Orange Grows and rental properties. I swore I would never be an entrepreneur because I grew up in that environment. I was on the fast track in Cooper’s and Library in Atlanta, Georgia, and I realized that I was working way too many hours for other people. And I said, if I’m going to work this hard, I should be working for myself. And that was in 1979, and that’s really when the entrepreneurial bug bit me and I’ve never looked back. Now Sharon, your father, now correct me if I’m wrong, I tried to spend a copious amount of time researching you so that I’m well prepared. Maybe some of the things that you hadn’t talked about in some of your books. And I had read, or actually watched an interview that you did where you’re talking about, I believe that your father only had a third grade education in terms of formal education, yet he went on to teach the engineering school for the United States Navy. Is that accurate? Did I get that wrong? Is that correct? He did. He was born in the hills of Alabama. His father died when he was very young, and so he had no formal education past the third grade. But he joined the Navy as early as he could, and ended up becoming, he was a Master Chief in the Navy and his last five years we were in Great Lakes and he was running the engineering school for the Navy. Now you actually have sold, I’m not sure if you’re aware of this, but I can tell, I guess you sold 26 million copies of the Rich Dad books while you were CEO, is that correct? Did you sell 26 million copies of that book? Of the Rich Dad series, yes. Primarily Rich Dad Poor Dad, of course, was the greatest one, but yes, globally. And it was in over 50 languages and over 100 countries. Well, so Sharon, you could probably stop, you know? So why are you so passionate about financial literacy? Apparently, you’re doing pretty well. I mean, why are you still continuing to, at the young age you are, continuing to go out there, travel around the world, and passionately teach financial literacy when you could have obviously clearly been done years ago? Well, it’s a true statement. I’ve been financially free for 20 years. But I think what drives us is not necessarily, for me, it’s never been about the money. I believe growing up as a little child, my father would ask me each night if I added value to someone’s life, and I still ask myself that. I lost him in 2006. But I continue to feel that each of us has a responsibility to support others, and I think that I have a gift and a responsibility, that I have the ability to teach people about money, how to change their mindsets about money, how to go from scarcity thinking to abundance, realizing that the opportunity is there, you just need to learn how to teach yourself how to recognize it and seize it and take action. And it was literally, you know, what I’m doing this year with the Play Big Movement is really me coming back in to focus on what I want to do. I really thought about retiring last year and it didn’t sit too well with me and I said, you know, this is what I’m, I was, I’ve been given a gift an opportunity and as long as I can continue supporting people taking control their financial lives that’s what that’s what I want to do so I’m back out in the game and I’m literally doing it and sharing with people what I’m doing how I’m doing it and inviting them to come along with me in the play big movement there’s a private Facebook page called the play play big movement Play Big Movement with Sharon Lecter that’s joining for free and come along with us. Now Sharon, we have another one of my clients based in Canada and he actually is a CPA. His name is Josh and Josh wanted me to ask you a question because he has an accounting firm that is designed to be very, you know, it’s designed to help their clients, steer their clients financially, not just pay their taxes. They’re based in Canada. And he wanted to know, because he listens to our podcast all the time, he wanted to know, from your perspective as a CPA, where do you see most CPAs missing it when it comes to actually helping their clients? Not just teaching them theory, but where do you see most CPAs, or do you see CPAs missing it when it comes to helping their clients? Well, Josh, I appreciate that question. And I applaud you for going the extra mile. And all CPAs are not created equal. And CPAs, you can fall into the category of being a service provider. Give me your stuff, I’ll do your tax returns. Give me your financial records, and I’ll give you financial statements, but a CPA has the opportunity to use their depth of experience of looking at multiple different companies and really becoming a true advisor to business owners or to individuals financially and just help steer them in the right direction. All certified public accountants are not personal financial planners. They don’t necessarily have that designation, but many of them do. And so to ask them and to sit down and have them walk you through your tax return, both as a business or as an individual, and to find out things that you should be doing or should, you know, things that you should stop doing is very important. And I think many CPAs are, should do that. Many of them do and others don’t. So I applaud Josh for going the extra mile because we have, we bring to the table, my years of public accounting still are a huge benefit to me each and every day because I saw how many companies did it right but probably even more importantly I saw the mistakes so many companies made. And it’s a tremendous education and being able to share that education through my books, through my games, through my mentoring is a true gift for me. And so when you are a CPA, you have that experience. You have the opportunity to share that wisdom with your clients. And hopefully they all do, but I know not all of them do. Shep, right behind you there in the Man Cave Studios, there’s a book on the top shelf. It’s going to be the very, very top shelf, and you’re going to see a book with all these post-it notes coming out of it. I’d like if you’d take a photo of that, or photos of that, and share that with the listeners on today’s show notes. But before you do that, can you explain to the listeners what you’re looking at there? What book that is? This says, Guide to Investing, What the Rich Invest in That the Poor and Middle Class Do Not. Look at that book. It’s Robert Kiyosaki with Sharon Lecter. And that book was… And this thing looks like it could be a miniature version, maybe a small rural town’s phone book, pretty good size for a book. And I don’t know what you’ve done with this tabbing system here, but there’s tabs, stapled, taped, stuck, highlighted, checkmarked, crossed out, circled, drawings, everything. You’ve got this thing. That book, I tell you, that book, I could not put that thing down. It’s like a grilled stuffed burrito. I wrestled with that book for probably a year. It was like I wrestled back. I mean, seriously, it was probably, I mean, maybe six months of just reading the same book over and over and over. And that book was a game changer. And what’s so exciting is that Sharon Lecter has agreed to be with us on six shows. So we’re going to have her on six separate shows. So if you enjoyed today’s interview, you are definitely not going to want to miss out on the future interviews. So how do you make sure you never miss out on an interview? Well, if you never want to miss out on an interview, just go to the Thrive Time Show on iTunes. Find the Thrive Time Show on iTunes, and then click the subscribe button. And after you subscribe, you’ll never miss an episode. That’s right. And if you want to get yourself some free conference tickets in the process, as the Canadians call it, all you have to do is leave us an objective review on iTunes and email us proof that you did it, a screenshot of your review to info at thrivetimeshow.com. We’ll give you two free tickets to the world’s highest rated and one of the world’s best workshops, it’s the Thrive Time Show Business Workshop. But objectively, it has the most reviews and I’m telling you, you’re going to absolutely love it. To learn more about the Thrive Time Show Business Conference and why you’d want to attend, go to thrivetimeshow.com, click on the conference button and there is the information. Ladies and gentlemen, family and friends, without any further ado, we always want to end this show with a boom. Chuck, are you emotionally prepared to end with a boom? Here we go. 3, 2, 1, boom! I know many of you have had a challenging year. Many of you watching this have a successful company. Many of you have a business that has struggled. Maybe you’ve had a business that you’ve just, for whatever reason, have never been able to get over the hump. Maybe you’ve always been just kind of stuck in a rut, and that’s become your normal. Maybe you went from the goal you used to have a goal to thrive, and now your goal is just to survive. Well, to build your faith and to build your encouragement that you have the mental capacity and the tenacity needed to succeed, I thought I would get one of our younger success stories on the Thrive Time show so you can talk to an entrepreneur who I don’t believe is yet 30 years old but yet is still achieving massive success. Stephanie, welcome on to the Thrive Time show. How are you? Good, Clay. Thank you. So, Stephanie, where’s home for you? I live in rural western Wisconsin, so Sparta, Wisconsin. And how did you originally hear about the Thrive Time Show business consulting program? I heard about you guys actually through Entrepreneurs on Fire. You did an interview with JD over there. And do you remember them when you where you were when you first heard that show? I was cleaning a house, actually. Well, you were cleaning a house in Wisconsin, and from the time that you… I remember the exact house. Yep. So from the time that you decided to get up the courage needed to schedule a call until now, how much have you grown? Since then, let’s see, 1,462%. 1,462%. And what kind of a time frame has that been, the time that you reached out to now? Yep. I reached out, we started working together in March of 2020. It is October, end of October 2021. So a year and a half. Wow. OK. So we’ve done a lot together, and many things you’ve done very, very well. And so I thought I’d do on today’s show is I’m going to bring up the things that you’ve been able to implement that we’ve taught you. And I’d love to get your take on how you’ve been able to implement these. I’m going to go through 10 core systems that I believe you’ve been able to implement well, and I’d like to get your take on it. First off, you were not resistant to the idea of upgrading your branding. You were not resistant to the idea of upgrading your website print pieces. You actually leaned in and you wanted to get it done and get it done quickly. Talk to the listeners out there about how having an upgraded website has helped you. Yeah, the just overwhelming professionalism that people get from visiting our website just really blows them away to make them like realize that we are professional and that we stand apart from everybody else in the area. So the website was key. I also think one thing that a lot of clients probably get stuck on is being like too nitpicky about things and just like wanting it perfect as opposed to wanting it done. So I think the biggest thing is get it done. We can always change things later, but it’s better to have an awesome website than a perfect website like right now, you know. And now step two, we optimized your website. A lot of people have great websites that look wonderful, but they’re not canonically compliant. They’re not indexable. They’re not searchable. So therefore, humans on the planet Earth who are using search engines can’t find them. You, again, you didn’t push back. You leaned into it. Talk to the listeners out there about how optimizing your website has helped increase your leads. Oh, definitely. So Google leads are like huge for us and people finding our website are huge. So writing the content articles, making sure those keywords are showing up. We’re showing up when people search, you know, health cleanings, or whatever they’re searching, whatever search terms we’re trying to show up for. So that’s huge. And of course, the review side of things is huge too, for pointing people towards our website. Okay, you jumped ahead on my little cheat sheet here, but step three, gathering objective reviews. You guys have done a great job of gathering objective reviews from your happy clients. Talk to the listeners out there about the importance of gathering objective Google reviews from your happy clients. Oh, it’s so important. Like, when I started working with Thrive, I definitely didn’t think, like, I needed to focus on that. I think I had 12 Google reviews when we started working together, and now between the two locations we have, I think, like, 210 or something like that, like five star reviews, all real. And when people find us, I mean, it’s not even a, how much do you cost? It’s when, when can you come? I don’t care how much you cost. So people are ready to close like that. Now, step four is building a transparent and easy to understand sales system. You know, a pricing structure where somebody who maybe is not the most complicated individual, somebody who’s very simple like me could understand your pricing real quickly. Again, you’ve leaned in on that. You’ve been great to work with. Talk to the listeners about the importance of having a simple to understand pricing structure that your ideal and likely buyer can understand immediately. You just want them to not be confused. They’re like, why is this like this or whatever? And also from the like inside perspective of the managers or whoever is answering your phone, they need to be able to quickly answer questions and stuff without having a lot of training. So it needs to be able to be, you know, in like the sales script when they’re doing a call that they can just very quickly know what the numbers are and not have to be complex about it. Now, step five is implementing sales scripting. You have done a great job of implementing sales scripting and so many entrepreneurs, I’m telling you, oh, they say, I don’t want to do a script because I don’t want to sound like I’m reading a script. I don’t want my staff to be sounding like they’re reading. I want my team to have their own personality. I want them to embrace their true selves. And, therefore, when their phone rings at their local business, every time their phone rings, it’s just like a minefield. You never know if the phone is going to be answered professionally, if it will be answered at all. You never know what people are going to say. Nothing is written down. It becomes a verbal tribal tradition. It becomes a celebration of jackassery. Tell the listeners out there, why have you embraced sales scripting and how has it helped your company? Sales scripts are amazing as well as, of course, the call recording so that we can hold people accountable to the sales script. But it just takes all the guesswork and then all of the variables of what people say are removed so that if something is not working, we are able to pinpoint what that is and tweak one thing as opposed to whatever the people are deciding to say. So, and it also like, it’s just, it flows really nicely and it doesn’t sound robotic at all. Once you get used to it, it’s like, I could, I could say it off the top of my head, the exact scripts we use and we know they close. And that way we know it works instead of just people doing whatever they feel like. Now you also implemented a quality control checklist system where basically it’s not in people’s minds. They don’t have to remember, your technicians don’t have to remember what they’re supposed to do. There’s a checklist for everything. I mean, everything. When you go into clean a home or a commercial business, there’s a checklist for everything. Talk to the listeners out there about the mind freedom that you’ve experienced since, you know, taking it out of your head and putting it on a checklist. Yeah, it just makes it so simple because it’s like, here’s the standard the cleaning tech is responsible for and is going to be held accountable to. And if that’s not hit, then we know that there’s a problem. They don’t get to say, well, I didn’t know. They don’t get to say, I didn’t know. And then on the client side, they have expectations set. Instead of them setting the expectation, we are setting the expectation, as opposed to them being like, well, I thought you guys were going to clean my gutters. It’s like, well, it ain’t on the checklist, so we’re not going to clean your gutters. Now, knowing and optimizing your numbers in terms of the financial aspects of the company. Again, you’ve leaned into that. A lot of people who are into fitness, I find lean into that. They want to know how much they weigh, what their body fat percentage is, how many calories they’re eating. People that don’t want to lean into fitness, don’t want to know how many calories they’re eating, don’t want to know their body fat percentage. People that are into artwork, doing well at art, musicians. I’ve worked with a lot of musicians. Musicians that are good want to know how they sound. They want to hear themselves. People that are not good don’t want to hear themselves. Of great ballet dancers and performers want to see themselves in a mirror. They want to analyze. Great builders want to see checklists and processes and blueprints. People, accountants who are good at their job, they want to know the numbers. Entrepreneurs who are not good at entrepreneurship never want to know their numbers. Talk to the listeners out there about the importance of knowing and optimizing your numbers, actually knowing how much profit you’re going to make per job. Yeah, I would say number one most important thing, in my opinion, is the tracking sheet that we implement together and that every single day I’m in the tracking sheet and knowing exactly where my business is, especially now I am very removed from the day-to-day kind of operations to a point. I’m not answering the phones. I’m not doing this. I’m not seeing the complaints or any quality issues or whatever. But I have my finger on the pulse of my business and every single aspect of the revenue, expenses, leads, closing rates, number of appointments, number of reviews, number of photos that are getting uploaded, just everything you could possibly know about the business, I know. So I’m never questioning or going off of emotion, because that’s not what we want to do. We want to go off of facts and numbers. And so I know that, you know, we’re growing or whatever, we’re closing, et cetera, et cetera, because the numbers don’t lie. So I love the tracking sheet, and I think it’s the number one thing that people should implement. If they don’t do nothing else, they need to know their numbers. Now you’ve attended a multiple in-person, two-day interactive business workshops. And the reason why we include that is a quasi-free service. What do I mean by that? I mean, it’s not a revenue generator for me. If you’re a client of mine, I say, hey, you can come to these events. We make it very, very affordable. If you’re not a client, you can pay $250 to attend the workshop. And if you’re in a tight spot, we have scholarship tickets available. But the point is everybody can afford to attend. Can you explain how the interactive business workshops have actually helped you to maybe further understand the path or to get a whole picture view of the actual business plan? Yeah, I love the conferences because I always walk away with action items. Even though I go over these things with my coach every week, it just, I always walk away with something like, wow, I get a fresh perspective on things because you’re interacting with a lot of other business owners and like bouncing ideas off of each other and hearing what worked for them or what people are struggling with. And of course, then like having you like explain it in the way that you do, it just makes it very like actionable. Like I always go away with like, this is what I need to do on Monday to make these things happen. It’s not just like it’s this motivational thing. Do you laugh a little bit? Do you have a little bit of fun? I do. I have a lot of fun at the conferences. Okay. And what kind of people attend the conferences? Not liberals. Oh, that’s funny. Okay. Yeah. It seems like all – we start at 7 a.m. and it seems like, you know, the entrepreneurs are like, this is awesome. We start at 7. I can be done by 3. I can still make some calls. Again, you’re sitting next to people that have had massive success, people that have been in the program for years. Is that helpful to sit next to other people that have actually helped you? I can’t even, like the people I’ve met there have been life, they’ve changed my life. Like obviously you guys have all changed my life, literally, I’m not just blowing smoke here. But meeting the people, you know, the Josh Wilsons of the world who I literally texted him today. Like, you know, we’re on a friend basis. We have calls all the time. Like just the people that I’ve met is just, uh, is life changing. What is your website of people right now want to go online and they want to look up your website and kind of, you know, see who you are and what you’re all about. Yeah, it is www.serene-clean.com. And, uh, okay. So you, you came to the workshop, you’ve implemented the tracking sheet, the group interview, people say, I had so hard to find people. I’ve never had a hard time finding people. Even right now, I don’t have a hard time finding people, but I can tell you, it’s a system that I’ve applied. It’s a proven system, a proven process that I’ve done. I’ve been doing this process of hiring people. This marks, I know it’s crazy, 22 years of doing the same system. Every week, interviewing people, 22 years I’ve been doing this. I’m a 40 year old person, I’ve been doing the group interview for 22 years. Can you talk about the importance of doing the group interview and how it’s changed your business? Oh, it’s so important. Like that has been, I would say that’s a big game changer too because I always have candidates like ready to go when something happens. And you know, in the past two months, we’ve taken on a huge contract and I have hired probably 40 people and somebody quit today, somebody quit yesterday. I fired somebody three days ago. It doesn’t matter. Next, next, next, you know, so it’s amazing. Just a little context, just so you know, things that will get you fired if you’re out there and you don’t know about serene-clean.com. If you’re not on time, if you don’t honor your commitments to the client, you’re going to get fired. And there are certain people on the planet Earth that don’t want to honor their commitments to their client, and they don’t want to show up on time, and therefore you’re not a good fit for Serene Clean. So she’s not running around just randomly firing people. She’s just saying, if you have a certain standard and expectation, and on behalf of the customer, because you’re a customer advocate, you’re saying this is the standard we have to deliver at. Now, next thing, step number 11 here. You pay yourself well and you don’t apologize for it. Now, it is gonna be said that you actually make more money now per month than many people make per year. And I repeat that, you make now more money per month than many people now make per year. And you’ve learned to pay yourself well and not apologize for it. But I knew you, you know, going back to when you first called us to where, you know, you were really grinding to make it work and now you’re doing really well. Now that you’re paying yourself well and not apologizing for it, are you able to enjoy more time, freedom to work out, to read, to spend time with family, friends, to think more meta on your business or how has that impacted you? Oh yeah, definitely not having to worry about income is really empowering. Also, of course, that just allows you to do a lot of good in the world. Because number one, we’re here to make money, but money is just a tool. And so that allows us to help the community, help our families, buy cool stuff, of course, but the time freedom is really, that’s the whole point of this for me, is like, I don’t want to have to be anywhere I don’t want to be at any given time, so, and now I can do that. Now, final thing is you’ve been able to sustain diligence and accountability. What does that mean? Diligence is where it’s the steady application of effort over time. It’s like long after the motivation, the big idea wears off. You know, there’s always the excitement of a new idea. Woo, new idea. Yes, new idea. Love the new idea. Just had a new idea. I should buy a boat. I should buy, I should start a company. It should be called Serene Clean. Well, long after that idea has worn off, then diligence kicks in. And diligence is a steady application of effort. If you’re out there and you’ve ever played sports at a high level, you’ve ever been a top-notch speaker, you’ve ever been a top musician, anybody out there who’s done anything at a high level, you know the level of preparation is what prepares you for the ovations. And then, but everybody out there, if you have a sound mind and you’re being honest, you need a little bit of accountability. We all need accountability. Somebody that can hold us accountable to push through goals, push through obstacles that made that time seem insurmountable. You know, sometimes it’s like, it seems overwhelming. How has the weekly meeting and the accountability helped you to stay diligent and consistent over time? Yeah. I love that. My coach definitely holds me, because everybody needs to be held accountable no matter how high achieving you think you are. And obviously, the pig-headed discipline is awesome to have that, but you still need somebody to hold you accountable. And for me, there’s certain things, like there’s always some place that you can do better and improve on. And so what my coach, Bloomer, he always, it’s like, okay, it’s been two weeks now. You haven’t gotten a video review, what’s going on? And it’s like, I don’t like getting video reviews. Like he’s calling me out on it. I love that because like, I hate it, but I love it. And because that’s, we need to be told where we’re failing. I mean, they’re telling us where we’re good, but we need to be told where we’re failing. Oh, that’s amazing. Now, again, you are a diligent woman who’s reached out. We only take on 160 clients. I think you certainly occupy one of those spaces as well. And what’s interesting is, you know, last year our average client grew by 104% and we didn’t have any client that grew by over 500%. So 1,462% is certainly going to impact that average. What advice would you have for anybody out there listening who’s contemplating going to thrivetimeshow.com forward slash EO fire to schedule a consultation? Because again, if people want to schedule a free consultation with me, I don’t charge for that. We do have call screeners. They’re going to make sure I’m not wasting your time and you’re not wasting my time to see if you’re a good fit. But there’s people out there contemplating going to thrivetimeshow.com forward slash EOfire.com. That’s thrivetimeshow.com forward slash EOfire.com. What advice would you have or feedback would you have for somebody thinking about attending one of our in-person workshops or scheduling a one-on-one consultation? I think that most people should definitely go to the conference. But when it comes to the one-on-one coaching, I think you really need to look at yourself and say, am I ready to maybe be told to do things that I’m not comfortable with? And am I ready to do it? Because you can always heim and hau and go back and forth. But if you’re not ready to implement anything, it’s probably not a good fit. Because your coaches are going to push you. And that’s the whole point. You’re paying them to push you. So if you’re not ready and willing to make changes, then don’t bother. I tell you what, I really do appreciate you taking time out of your busy schedule to join us. I’m so excited about your growth there. And hopefully we’ll see you in December. Are you coming in December to the conference? Not with this big job. I’m on a military base. I’m on a military base right now. I’m rejected. OK, that’s fine. But maybe we’ll see you at the next one, okay? Thank you for being here, I appreciate you. Thank you, Clay. Take care, bye bye. Okay, hey guys, my name is Stephanie Pipkin, I own Serene Clean and this is my grandma Sue and we are going to briefly just go over the Dream 100 drop-off that she does for Serene Clean and how it has really helped grow our business and spread the word of our business in our area. So just a little background on Serene Clean and working with Thrive Coaching. So I’ve used Thrive out of Oklahoma for two years this month and when we started working with Thrive we were at about $200,000 in revenue a year and this year we’re projected to do $1.4 million in revenue a year. So it’s grown very, very drastically since we’ve implemented all the systems and that’s what we’re going to talk about today is some of the, one of the systems that they have encouraged and harassed us to use. And it works really good. And that’s Dream 100 Dropoffs. And that’s something that my grandma Sue does for me. And she is absolutely killing it. So, grandma, basically, if you can just describe what it is that you do at these dropoffs, what do you do? When I get there, of course I introduce myself and the business, and I just tell them that I am a business to business call. I’m not there to sell them anything. I’m just there to introduce them to a new business in our area. What do you bring and leave with them? I actually have a little gift for them, and then a sweet treat, and I have the paperwork that explains all about Serene Clean. As I’m talking to them, I try to give a little bit of, talk about things that would encourage them, makes it a little more relaxed and casual. Then I do sign my name on all the things so I tell them that they can’t forget me and put a little smiley face with it. it and leave them as I go then I say and here’s a sweet treat to get you through the day. So basically she just goes gets a box of donuts, hits all our stops of the day and what she’s leaving behind is basically a sales sheet that explains like what makes Swing Clean different and on the back of it is commercial references of companies that we already cleaned for. So the whole purpose of this is to get us more janitorial accounts because those are excellent accounts for us. And the thing she’s also asking is, how do they clean now? And are they using a service now? How happy are they with it? Is there any issues? And who are you usually talking to? Are you talking to the receptionist? Who are you talking to? It’s kind of split. A lot of the businesses I’ve been to recently, I’ve actually talked to the owners. If it’s a large, large business, I’ll be talking to the lady or person, it’s usually a girl, at the front desk. And I ask her, sometimes they don’t know or they don’t tell me, and sometimes they do know, so it just works out really well to find out from them, do they have a cleaner? And like a lot of them that I talk to the owners, they actually are doing a lot of the cleaning themselves. So it just gives me a little heads up too of what they’re doing and then I pass it on to Steph. Yeah, so then at the end of her stop she types up a little synopsis of who she talked to, what was the reaction, things like that, and you know is there room because really the goal of her doing this is to get the foot in the door for me to do a walkthrough and bid an account. That is the whole purpose of this. And overall, how would you say the reaction is? It’s been really well. You don’t know, but I always… I get excited when it’s a great day and the sun is shining and sometimes it’s snowing, but whenever, when I have a great day and everybody’s just happy to see me. It just makes it a fun thing to know them. I’ve been from the area for a long time, so a lot of times I see old friends also while I’m out. Yeah, and this has worked really well for Grandma in particular because it’s just coming from a very not salesy place at all. They’re not trying to sell, she’s just trying to introduce them. A lot of people are just so turned off by very hard selling, and so it’s just like one getting them with the doughnuts like nobody will turn that down and then really it’s just yeah a very friendly thing and this is like a long game thing almost never is it the first stop that they’re gonna you know have us do a walkthrough a lot of times that sheet will sit on a desk for a long time and then when they’re ready to go and you know they they’re either pissed off about their current service or they’re just overwhelmed doing it themselves Who is that you know lady who dropped off the donuts? What where is that she? Serene clean and then it’s top of mind and it’s just really impressive and so kind of like the highlight of her doing this She’s done this how long have you been doing this? Eight months. Eight months? We she got me a walk-through at a very large manufacturing facility who is like a dream client It’s daytime commercial, Monday through Friday, like an amazing account, like who I would wildly want. And she got me a walk-through, we ended up winning the bid and I’ve been cleaning for them for two weeks now and that’s like a $5,000 a month account. So it’s significantly impactful and again this is long game thinking of, you know, she’s making these introductions and you know we’ve gotten plenty of smaller accounts as well from her doing these things. And just being consistent. That’s the biggest thing is, you do this every week, right? Every single week, unless we have a significant snowstorm. Every week, and it’s fairly inexpensive from, like for us, we always did the donuts. I’ve tried other things, but the donuts just seem to be a hit. And yeah, I just know a lot of people are hesitant to do this, but if we can do this in a small town and to have that kind of success rate. And it really, we just want to be top of mind. And it’s working. And it’s growing the business really, really well. And it’s just fun to work with Grandma. So yeah, so that is how we do Dream 100. And it’s working great. And we just say, go do it. Don’t be scared. Just make yourself do it, basically. For me, I don’t like to do it. But I knew Grandma would be great at it. And so this is one of those things of delegating and outsourcing if you don’t want to do it. But if you don’t have somebody to do it, you need to do it. Because if you don’t, your business will just not grow the way you want. So yeah, that is how we handle this. 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 a few years ago. This is our old neighborhood. You can 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 four 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 ten locations in only a year. In October 2016, we grew to 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. The Thrivetime Show, two day interactive business workshops are the highest and most reviewed business workshops on the planet. You can learn the proven 13 point business systems that Dr. Zellner and I have used over and over to start and grow successful companies. When we get into the specifics, the specific steps on what you need to do to optimize your website. We’re gonna teach you how to fix your conversion rate. We’re going to teach you how to do a social media marketing campaign that works. How do you raise capital? How do you get a small business loan? We teach you everything you need to know here during a two-day, 15-hour workshop. It’s all here for you. You work every day in your business, but for two days you can escape and work on your business and build these proven systems so now you can have a successful company that will produce both the time freedom and the financial freedom that you deserve. You’re gonna leave energized, motivated, but you’re also gonna leave empowered. The reason why I’ve built these workshops is because as an entrepreneur, I always wish that I had this. And because there wasn’t anything like this, I would go to these motivational seminars, no money down, real estate, Ponzi scheme, get motivated seminars, and they would never teach me anything. It was like you went there and you paid for the big chocolate Easter bunny, but inside of it, it was a hollow nothingness. And I wanted the knowledge, and they’re like, oh, but we’ll teach you the knowledge after our next workshop. And the great thing is we have nothing to upsell. At every workshop, we teach you what you need to know. There’s no one in the back of the room trying to sell you some next big get-rich-quick, walk-on-hot-coals product. It’s literally, we teach you the brass tacks, the specific stuff that you need to know to learn how to start and grow a business. I encourage you to not believe what I’m saying, but I want you to Google the Z66 auto auction. I want you to Google elephant in the room. Look at Robert Zellner and Associates, look them up and say, are they successful because they’re geniuses or are they successful because they have a proven system? When you do that research, you will discover that the same systems that we use in our own business can be used in your business. Come to Tulsa, book a ticket, and I guarantee you it’s going to be the best business workshop ever, and we’re going to give you your money back if you don’t love it. We’ve built this facility for you, and we’re excited to see it. We 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 gotta inspire somebody out there who just doesn’t have the time to listen to their call. 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 rollercoaster. 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 five clients to 20 clients on my own with networking. But I had no control over it. I didn’t. 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. So I’ve doubled in clients, I’ve doubled in revenue every year. That’s 100% growth every year I’ve worked with you. Now, so I’m looking, we’ve been good friends seven, eight years, and I’ve got doubled five times. Which is just incredible. The first time you do it, that’s one thing, but when you do it repeatedly, 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’ll 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 hundred calls. We make two to three hundred calls a day per rep. Right. And she’s been nailing down five and eight appointments a day. Somebody out there’s having a hard time. 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 do… If someone were to buy an Apple computer today, or let’s say 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. reconnected. I think it was in the year 2000 and 2010, is that right? 2011 maybe? Or maybe further down the road, maybe 2013? 2012. Okay, so 2012 and at that time I had 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 that… 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, you know, 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, a business consultant. I work with different businesses implementing best practice processes and systems that I have learned here by working with Clay. 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 that can be as passionate. 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. You know, he’s sending people encouraging messages. He can kind of be that life coach and business coach in terms of being that a 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 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 speaks, he gives you a wealth of knowledge 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 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 learning and adjusting parts about you that need to be adjusted.