Clay Clark | The Clifton Taulbert Story – Episodes 1-2

Audio Transcription

Get ready to enter the Thrivetime Show! We started from the bottom, now we’re here. We started from the bottom and we’ll show you how to get here. We started from the bottom, now we’re here. We started from the bottom, now we’re here. We started from the bottom, now we’re on the top. Teaching you the systems to get what we got. Cullen Dixon’s on the hooks, I’ve written 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 hi. It’s C and Z up on your radio. And now 3, 2, 1, here we go. We started from the bottom, now we’re here. We started from the bottom, and that’s what we gotta do. All right, today we are joined with a best-selling and Pulitzer Prize-nominated author, a man who’s had his life made into a movie, a man who helped start a bank, a man who helped launch the Stairmaster, and my good friend, Clifton Talbert. Thank you for being here, sir. Thanks, Clay, it’s a pleasure. Hey, I really do appreciate it. And today we’re gonna talk a little bit about failures. We’re gonna talk about really overcoming adversity. Everybody, if you’re watching right now, and you’re a human, we’ve all had adversity. I know right now I’m dealing with my dad having cancer. It doesn’t feel good. I know that my son was born blind. I know that everybody watching this has had some kind of personal tragedy or financial tragedy, but yet we have to press on. And so I’m going to ask you some questions, and we’ll see what we can learn from your experience. So I guess question number one here is, what have been some of your failures? you know when I when I think about that and you are right we don’t live in this world without failures but the failures are not necessarily the worst thing that can happen to us because it helps to shape us for the future and I won’t necessarily call it a failure but I can call this maybe the greatest tragedy in my life that could have easily set me back for the rest of my life was the death of my daughter I almost gave up I didn’t have a reason to live Annie was the light of our lives and when Annie died I I somehow felt that I had died with her. How old was she? She was seven years old. Seven. But at the same time, as time moved along, my wife and my son and myself, the three of us began to gel in such a way that we became this invincible unit of three that determined that we would make Annie’s life worth remembering. Was, just, I feel like, I don’t know the whole story, that’s why I’m asking, but did, was she sick? That’s the difficult part. Annie was born with sickle cell anemia, but she had never been sicker there in her life. She got sick one day and 21 days later she was dead. So you’re dealing with the death of your daughter, I can’t imagine that, you know, other than, I know my son couldn’t see, I felt helpless and it was a tough What did you feel like doing? Did you feel like crawling into a hole? And then what did you do? I mean, what did you feel like doing? And then what did you do? Well, several things to answer that. Because let’s back a little bit. Before I’m married, before Annie, one of the great challenges that I faced was leaving the Mississippi Delta. And I thought St. Louis would be the answer and I realized that I didn’t have all the qualifications that were needed and so I have my high school diploma. I graduated number one in my class. Boom. And I’m just so excited to be in this great city and I can’t get a job. I can’t get a job for a number of reasons and I’m trying everything that I can. But there is one job that I do not want. This one job I’ve said I would never do. I would never wash dishes for anybody. Because that to me was a throwback to the world I had left. But I had to do it. I had to break down and do this job that I didn’t want to do because I was committed to taking care of myself. I was committed to helping my family. So I had to do that job. But the job, that job became the cotton fields again. And I realized, I’m in the pots and pan room in St. Louis washing dishes. My physical body is there, but my mindset is not there. If my mindset had been there, I guarantee you, I wouldn’t be sitting here with you today. And I want to give just a little bit of context for people that maybe don’t know. You grew up in a completely segregated time in American history where African-Americans and Caucasian Americans do not… There was no social interaction for the most part. It was almost nil. And so that, you know, that becomes a construct for defining what I want and what I thought would happen. And to make this closure with Annie, and when Annie passed away and I had to draw from some strength, had I not been able to survive Mississippi, had I not been able to survive not being able to get a job, every survival, You build up something inside of you that prepares you for something bigger that you may have to deal with. So that’s why I’m saying I don’t rule the day that challenges come. But what I try to do is figure out how to get beyond that because that success movement will be an asset at some point. And I think it was an asset around our lives because I had learned over the years not to cave in. I don’t know if on the camera crew, the people here were here when this was happening, but kind of alluding to, you know, you’re going to St. Louis and you’re getting all sorts of rejection. I know when we were, even for Thrive, as we were building a team of people and we were talking to venture capital partners and stuff, the amount of rejection you get is unbelievable. And you have to have that attitude of like, well, I guess if this company in St. Louis didn’t hire me, then I’m one step closer to the one that will. But you have to kind of approach it that way. I learned from that because I was like 17, 18 in St. Louis, and no one rejects you from picking cotton. Yeah. Too bad. But you can go, if you can walk, you can pick cotton. So I’m not dealing with rejection historically. I get into the city where the culture is entirely different, the expectations are greater than I’ve ever seen, and I’m expected to do things that I know absolutely nothing about. I am failing in front of my own face when I’m assuming that I’ve come to this city to achieve and to really accomplish great things. Well, there’s all sorts of research that shows that entrepreneurs don’t start a business for two reasons. There’s more, but the two main ones is they don’t have capital. They feel like they don’t have capital, access to capital. The other one is they’re afraid. They’re afraid. You know, where do I start? They’re kind of like that fear, like mixed with I don’t know what to do, but it’s also that fear. How do you battle fear? I mean, how do you do it? I mean, you’ve taken your book and got it into bookstores all across the country. You can walk into any bookstore and you can find your book and every once in a while I’ll go into like a Barnes & Noble and I’ll see Eight Habits of the Heart there or I’ll see a different book. How do you battle fear? Well fear is a real thing. It’s almost like an unwanted guest that shows up and really wants to park its car or sit on the sofa with you. And the thing about fear is that it never really lies to you. It only tells you the truth that takes you down rather than the truth that can lift you up. And because it is so apparent to you what you’re hearing, you believe it. And that’s what fear does. It just feeds on itself and grows. So how does one get rid of it? What do you have to do in order to move yourself beyond that fear situation that comes up in your life? For me, it does show up. But you also have to have memory of days when you didn’t have fear. Counting those little successes as if they were really, really big ones. I think there’s a couple moves you can do here if you’re feeling like you’re stuck with fear. I’ve heard people say either have to be dumb or numb. Now I kind of have a unique hybrid where I do both I think. But what I’ll do is if I am just freaked out like today. We had a presentation today and I’m a little bit freaked out because I know who’s gonna be there. I know who’s gonna be there. I know I was thinking this would be a big crowd. Now we’re down to just three or four people and the three or four people who are there are the people who needed to be there. And I’m saying to myself, oh, because this is going to mean it’s more one-on-one questions. It’s a little scary. I don’t know if you’ve ever done a presentation where you definitely need it to go well, and there’s just. And so I am like, well, I’m not going to think about it at all, in fact, until the meeting, because I can’t do anything with this thought. So I just plunged myself into busy work, doing other activities right up until the meeting, because I did not want to be nervous. I didn’t want to allow that emotion of fear to get there. But that was a conscious decision on your part. And I think that’s what we’re telling the audience right now, is that fear is real. I mean, it is not a figment of your imagination. It’s real. But you can also consciously decide not to give it a seat in your house. How do you then keep yourself moving forward when everything seems to be falling apart. Because as you start a business, you know, you start running out of capital, then you start, then you get capital, and then an employee quits, and they got another hole in the boat. You run over here and you plunge, you block that, you plug that hole, and now you’re just bailing water, and you’re going, yeah, I got, finally I’m good, I got the capital, I got the employee, I’ve been, you’re sitting on the boat, and you’ve got both, you’re trying to hold those holes. And then you spring another leak called no customers. And now you’re like, oh no. And so you’re doing all that. It feels like an entrepreneurship. It’s like duct taping holes and trying to just keep on going. How do you do it? You do it. You just do it. But it’s also an incredible learning process because when you just do it, you really understand what you have done and you’re more in tune to how that outcome should be and it becomes a treasure, for lack of a better term, of having accomplished something that you can put in your wheelhouse because you’re going to need that again. You’re going to need that memory that, oh, wait a minute, three months ago I had this and I stopped it. I just this morning, my dad, you know my dad, and he’s battling cancer and found out it’s spreading and it’s a bad deal. And I’m driving to work today and I just that feeling, that emotional just like, why is this happening to me? I start to feel that, what is the deal? What’s going on? And I remember, this morning, I just said to myself, I’m like, I literally say it out loud while I’m driving. I say, I’m driving the Hummer of love and I’m like, it’s going to be a great day. Dad’s going to be proud. I’m calling him at the end of the day. I’m going to talk to my dad. I am not going to lose, I am not going to lose my energy today. I’m not going to get zapped. I’m done with it. I am done with that feeling I’m moving on and I’m talking to myself if I am an entrepreneur right now, and I feel myself going through a challenging time personal health adversity Do you ever talk to yourself? You know I wrote a chapter in a new book called wrestling at midnight talking to yourself That to me is an incredible piece of advice. It is great medicine. Talk out loud to yourself, stand in the mirror and look at yourself, talk to yourself, do an analysis of your day out loud, tell yourself what you’ve done right, tell yourself what you’ve done wrong, tell yourself what you can do better, and literally talk to yourself and tell yourself that circumstances can be better and anticipate that to become a reality. You know what’s interesting is as you say this, I know there’s a lot of people watching this right now who are going, I feel kind of scared right now. If somebody is watching this and they feel like they are just, they don’t, they’re afraid to make the first step, what do you say to that person? You can’t really run in the race if you’re not at the starting line and you’re not ready to get set, go. There will be fear, it will be right there with you. But you can really brush fear to the side. You can do that. Because I’m telling you, you can do that. Because when I didn’t have that job, and you know one thing about a mortgage payment, they never call you from the bank and say, gee, Mr. Talbert, we heard you didn’t have a job. Don’t worry about that monthly payment. No, nothing stopped coming. Everything started to, everything was continuing. But the idea of movement, the idea that I could make a difference in my own life, I learned that lesson at a very difficult time. And it’s a lesson I have never ever forgotten. I have heard you been described a gentleman who does not know you well but we were conversing about one of your books and he had said well he’s lucky I’ve heard that you know he’s lucky and I look at this poster over here and I’m if we can look at this as luck and Ray Kroc he says the two most important requirements for major success are first being in the right place at the right time and second doing something about it. Now with the StairMaster you had an opportunity to market this product and it wasn’t selling any units. How many trade shows did you go to before you sold the StairMaster? Come on now, go back there with me. How many did you? It was awful. It was absolutely awful. The reality was awful, but the dream was driving me because I knew that Lanny Potts had something, even though the world of fitness had not recognized it. Lanny Potts is the inventor of the Stairmaster. Lanny Potts is the guy who invented the Stairmaster. Lanny Potts. Yes, I knew he had something, but here’s the problem is I had no idea about physiology. You know, I was not a health nut. You know, I was not talking not only is every day yeah but I recognize the value in that and I set out to make it happen going is almost like an 1803 Thomas Jefferson told losing clock go west tell me what’s going to do with this alright well that’s like I feel yeah I had no idea what was west of the stairmaster but I knew I had to find out how many trade shows that you go to I wanna know how what’s that what’s the number of traditions that you went to I was a trade shows every year for probably three years. So you for three years you marketed the StairMaster without getting paid? No, they don’t give you money when you’re working on commission if you don’t. So you’re on a commission only basis you’re not selling anything so you’re not really making any money. How many hours a week did you spend learning about the StairMaster or trying to learn about how to sell it? I mean how many hours a week were you devoting to selling this thing? You know, I would love to say it was like a 24-7. I mean, obviously there was some break time and some down time, but I had a lot to learn. But a lot to learn when you believe in what you’re doing, it is not as earth-shattering as one would think, but it does take a lot of time and a lot of effort. And there were, you know, friends who told me that it wasn’t going to work, you know, you’re wasting your time. But you have to know inside of yourself if you believe in what you’re doing. If you’re driven by something inside of you that is bigger than what the outside conversation is, that’s what really matters. So you marketed it for three years before you sold anything? Yeah. Okay. I found out today that the top farmers insurance agent in the state of Oklahoma has a 8 tenths of a 1% closing ratio. So it’s not even a percent. And he sells more policies per month than anybody else. Blew my mind. And so one of the guys in our district was asking, what’s your secret? And I guess he responded with 14,600 outbound calls per month and we closed 144 deals and that equals.08. What? So as you’re marketing for three years, some people would say you’re unsuccessful. Some people would say you’re a failure. I would even say in this context here that you were dealing with three years of rejection. Then you finally got a deal? Well you know, there is some rejection that’s hurtful. There’s some rejection that set you all the way back to Mississippi to the cotton fields. And I think with Stare Master it was all of them. But at one point there came this man who made a difference. Who’s this man? He was a guy that worked for the military. Okay. And he realized what I was doing wrong. Yeah. And he pulled me aside and began to share with me what I needed to do in order to accomplish what I needed to accomplish. And then when you finally did the United States government purchased some Stairmasters, right? That was your first deal? How many did they purchase? This was the Militant Air Naval Station in Militant, Tennessee. I knew exactly where it was. They ordered one unit or two? No, they ordered one unit. Keep in mind, nobody ever heard of this before. The Stairmaster? Yeah. No one heard about it? Nobody. I mean, just… So they called and you’re like, did they call you? Did they mail you an order? We had our full-color brochures, but I didn’t realize that people like to have a sample. I couldn’t carry the sample in the car. The thing was huge. So I took a brochure. Did they call you on the phone and say, I want to get one of these guys? Do you remember what happened, how that order happened, the first one? Yeah, I got a telephone call. And did you get so you you want to buy a stair master? I mean were you did you were you kind of in shock were you like you messing with me? No, I wasn’t in shock But I was so thrilled And in that being thrilled I realized even more what I didn’t know and Even more how I was treading into territory that I had never been I mean, this is not like selling a StairMaster to a gym on 15th Street. This is to the United States government. And I am literally scared to death. Did you go, did you actually go there to see if the StairMaster was working properly? It’s worse than that. We shipped the StairMaster and Lanny and I left the very next day, like at 3 o’clock in the morning, and put another StairMaster on the back of the truck so that we could beat it to the station driving there. So just in case something went wrong we had everything we needed to make it work. I want to make sure, because we had a meeting with Mr. David Robinson, you know, a while back and I put the presentation on a thumb drive I put it on Dropbox.com, I put it on the computer because of this story. And sure enough, the day of our presentation, the computer would not work, but I had it on the backup. And I remember this story from you, but you actually put it on the back of a truck. On a pickup truck. And you drove? We drove from Tulsa, Oklahoma to Millerton, Tennessee. How many hours? Forever. Forever. And you’re driving and you’re trying to race against time to get there at the same time the other one. At the same time we got through commercial traffic. Did you tell, you were married at the time. Yeah. So you told Barbara, Barbara I’m driving to Tennessee, I’m gonna… Well, Lanny came by and humped a horn at three o’clock in the morning, picked me up. Three in the morning? Yes. Okay, you didn’t wait till nine? No. Okay, so three in the morning, you get up, you drive out there, you show up, what do you do? You shake hands and everybody’s there to see it unveiled. Were they shocked? You guys drove all the way here? No, they weren’t shot, but it was kind of strange to see us with one they didn’t order. We’re just in the area. We were just servicing other military bases in this area. But you know, it’s the idea of wanting to take care of your customer. It’s the idea of knowing what you have, but at the same time being prepared to handle a small adversity, should it happen. When I first heard this story, one of the things it did in my mind was it’s wanting to wow the customer. And one of the things I picked up, as I do now, I’ve done this for since I started sending emails. So I think it’s 2001 or something. When a customer ever gets an email from me, I’ll always call and say, did you get the email? Or when I, you know, if somebody calls me, I’ll text them. I always have this kind of double follow-up thing. And it’s because I’m always worried that the stairmaster is not going to show up maybe I guess that’s what I’m afraid of. Yeah well it’s not only that I think it brings another level of comfort to your customer that you are very concerned about them and you want to make sure that they’re taking care of and nothing slipped up along the way. So if you had to quantify a number of rejections that you had how many I mean hundreds of rejections before you sold those three years were there hundreds of rejections? There are two types of rejection. Okay. There are the rejections where people say, you know, we have enough equipment. We don’t need anything else. We’re good right now. Yeah, we’re good. You know. And then there are the rejections that are the hurtful ones. Where in the world did you get this? These are stairs to where? where. You just stand on stairs and go nowhere. No, we don’t want it. I got a lot of those. And so, but you were able to mentally say, hey, I left the cotton fields. I took a job washing dishes. If I can get through that, I can get through this. And that goes back to what we mentioned earlier. Whether it’s with his failure, with his adversity, our ability to face these issues head on and to really take charge of our own lives, we are building up an asset base that we can draw from that prepares us for the future that we don’t quite know how it will look, but we can be prepared for. when he was born blind. That to me just took the air out of my sail. Moving forward now, when I have a client that rejects me in some capacity, it happens all the time, you know, I almost don’t process it. I had one guy I talked to who was a venture capital guy, and I’ll never forget this. This just happened a while back. He says, no. In my mind, I instinctively process it as a need for you what’s your main concern? And I go again and he says no. And I ask again and I said, well the third time I got a yes. And I remember talking to him and he just commented, you don’t seem to process no very well. And I just basically referenced, I guess I never articulated it that way, but it’s kind of like, you know, I’ve dealt with some adversity over here and so you know you And you know, the easiest thing in the world is to is to kind of go with the flow. Okay. And if that flow is no, go with it, but I don’t like no. Okay. Not when I know that I’m at a good position, I have something to offer. The other person may not know everything that I know about that, but to come out with just a blank no, you know, I recall because I’m human, I recall, but I don’t another angle, another avenue, in order to make it happen. You recoil, but usually it doesn’t take you longer than about 24 hours, is what you’re saying? Yeah. You know, 48 hours is too long to worry about somebody else in that type of a situation. I’ve never seen you battle adversity where it’s got you down for more than about five minutes. So I’m impressed that you said 24 hours. I’m human, just like everybody else. Now let me ask you this. We’re getting into the brass tacks of some specific action steps that the folks at home can imply. What do you do on a daily basis to stay positive? What are you doing on a daily basis to kind of stay positive? Or do you read a book every morning? Do you pray? Do you do? What do you do? What’s your process? Because all of us deal with failure. What is your thing to get yourself coached up every morning? Well, the first thing that I tend to do every morning is when I start out my day, I really have reflection. Because I become thankful. First of all, that I’m alive. Because that means there’s nothing I can’t tackle because I’m here to do it. If I was not here, then I can’t handle it. So I become very thankful for just being alive, no matter what the problems are. I become thankful that I’m here to deal with them because I know there are millions of people who would want to be here just to deal with them. So starting out in that mode of being thankful for life and then as I drive to work or whatever, you know, I think about my family. And I think about what can I do to make their lives better. You know, and I have to kind of guard myself there because I love work, but I also realize that my family and me, we have to have that time together as well. So I have to have that emotional time there. I had to plan for that as well. Have you been guilty of working too much? Yes, sir Okay, and then so you you reflect and you ever go yesterday was a too much work day for me I need to okay. Yeah, so on a daily basis. Let’s just say that Yesterday you had a bad thing that happened. So today Yeah, you wake up you are thankful Do you make a to-do list of what you’re going to get done for the day? I start out that driving with thankfulness. But once I get beyond that, I kind of find myself moving into the world of work. And the first thing I do when I get to my office, I have a notepad. I have a computer, but I have a notepad. That’s what I use, the notepad. Notepad. You heard it here. Notepad, do not use computers. Is that a principle? No, that’s not a principle. That’s a Cliftonism. I have a notepad. You’re ready to throw all the computers away. I try to get a look at the day. And I write down every single thing. I don’t know how small it is, but I have to do. What time do you wake up? Probably at 5 o’clock every morning. 5 o’clock in the morning? Yeah, I work out. Now, you one time had told me, and I don’t know how you said it exactly, but I remember I was talking about how I was so busy, and I probably need to talk to you about it again in just a minute Off camera or something, but I get so busy and you had said you love work. Mr Clark you love work and you’d like to say that you’re doing this to provide for your family That’s probably true in some way, but you love work and you talked to me about well If you get up early, you’re not gonna take away from family time because your kids aren’t up yet and I remember being challenged because I thought I’m not a morning person and you are basically are let me know that I probably wouldn’t be a happily married person then if I Was it was interesting that you explain this and so for somebody right now who’s watching this who says? You know they wake up ten minutes before they wake up ten minutes before they have to leave to work every single day They wake up with their hair on fire. They’re stressed. They get to work barely on time. They don’t have anything written down There’s no to-do list. There’s no time for reflection. There’s no time for thankfulness. What kind of encouragement would you give somebody who is like how I used to be, that doesn’t like to get up early and do these sorts of things? You know, I would say getting up early is a great opportunity. It’s a great opportunity to wake up early and to start your day thinking about the life that you have, thinking about the family that you have, and of course thinking about the work that you have the opportunity to do. And back to me, the work that you have the opportunity to do. Looking at it from that perspective, and once you get into that work mode, again, you go back to the list, because if you don’t have a list, all of these things will just bombard you and you try to end up doing five things at one time, and you get everybody in the office confused because now you bring them into your crazy head Yeah, as opposed to your nice outline list Do you write things on the list like you know? By my beautiful wife in your case Barbara by Barbara this or tell Barbara I love her or call the kids or do you write anything or you know call my son or do you write family things on? That to-do list too, so you write family things you write personal things? Because I don’t trust my mind to remember everything my heart wants to do. And see, I once thought that you could… every time I come to your office, if you ever get a chance, we might go to his office, he might let us in his office at some point, but we go to your office, it’s always very organized, you always have everything so neat, and you always seem to be so calm, and it frustrates me, I’m like, how is he so calm? How is he have all these businesses and things he’s doing? How’s he selling books? And how’s he, how are you so calm? And yet I feel like I’m just rushing all day trying to get stuff done. And I realized that you’re a planner. I mean, you get up early and you literally have a two to three hour headstart every day on the average person because you’ve been up for three or four hours. At the end of the day, I do an assessment of how the day went. When does that happen? Probably around five o’clock. What time do you kick yourself out of there and say, I gotta get out of here, I gotta go see my beautiful wife? It depends. Some days I will leave at 4.30, but most often that’s not the case. But I do, at the end of every day, I look at my list to see what I’ve done, see what I didn’t do, and transpose that over to a new list. Because if you leave that blank on the old list, you may forget it’s there. You don’t want to do that. I’ve done that. Work is not easy, but you’ve got to be determined to be successful. And those are the code words for hard work. So you just do it. Well, let’s just say this. This is a capstone thought for the folks at home here. If I’m watching this and I am battling right now racism, I’m battling financial poverty, if I’m battling some kind of personal tragedy, if I’m battling some sort of adversity right now, some sort of perceived failure, something not good, what would you tell me? I think it’s important for every individual to recognize his or her value. And more importantly, to have a resolution within themselves to succeed. Abraham Lincoln said, the greatest thing that a person can do is to have that resolution within themselves to succeed. And that goes back to what we said earlier, that wrestling at midnight, coming to the conclusion that in spite of everything that’s around me, I want to focus on those things that are good that I’ve done. I don’t want to focus on the failures. I want to focus on those things that I’ve done that have been successful. Because if I have been successful one time, that tells me I can be successful the second time. Now if I’ve been successful five times and failed 20 times, what am I going to focus on the five times I was successful. And I’m going to say, wait a minute, I’m successful, and let’s take it to the next level. But you have to have that personal resolve. That’s literally is a very critical aspect of maintaining sustainability and success in a person’s life. Napoleon Hill, the famous success author, he wrote that failure is a prerequisite to success. And basically behind every failure there’s a seed of an equivalent benefit and I know that you’re one of the guys I know with the highest character, the best work ethic, the most integrity and I know it’s because you’ve gone through a lot of stuff and I appreciate you opening up your heart to us and sharing these personal stories and it means the world to me that you would take your time out of your busy schedule to be here. I just want to tell you again, thank you so much for doing that. It’s a pleasure. A real pleasure. Thank you. JT, do you know what time it is? 410. It’s TiVo time in Tulsa, Oklahoma baby. Tim TiVo is coming to Tulsa, Oklahoma June 27th and 28th. We’ve been doing business conferences here since 2005. I’ve been hosting business conferences since 2005. What year were you born? 1995. Dude, I’ve been hosting business conferences since you were 10 years old, but I’ve never had the two-time Heisman Award winning Tim Tebow come present. And a lot of people have followed Tim Tebow’s football career on the field and off the field. And off the field, the guy’s been just as successful as he has been on the field. Now, the big question is, JT, how does he do it? Well, they’re going to have to come and find out, because I don’t know. Well, I’m just saying, Tim Tebow is going to teach us how he organizes his day, how he organizes his life, how he’s proactive with his faith, his family, his finances. He’s going to walk us through his mindset that he brings into the gym, into business. It is going to be a blasty blast in Tulsa, Russia. Also, this is the first Thrive Time Show event we’ve had where we’re going to have a man who has built a hundred million dollar net worth Wow. Who’ll be presenting. Now we’ve had a couple presenters that have had a billion dollar net worth in some like a real estate sort of things. Yeah. But this is the first time we’ve had a guy who’s built a service business and he’s built over a hundred million dollar net worth in the service business. It’s the yacht driving multi-state living guru of franchising. Peter Taunton will be in the house. This is the founder of Snap Fitness, the guy behind 9 Round Boxing. He’s going to be here in Tulsa, Russel, Oklahoma, June 27th and 28th. JT, why should everybody want to hear what Peter Taunton has to say? Oh, because he’s incredible. He’s just a fountain of knowledge. He is awesome. He has inspired me listening to him talk, and not only that, he also has, he practices what he teaches. So he’s a real teacher. He’s not a fake teacher like business school teachers. So you got to come learn from him. Also, let me tell you this, folks. I don’t get this wrong, because if I get it wrong, someone’s going to say, you screwed that up, buddy. This is Michael Levine. This is Michael Levine. He’s going to be coming. He’s going to say, who’s Michael Levine? I don’t get this wrong. This is the PR consultant of choice for Michael Jackson, for Prince, for Nike, for Charlton Heston, for Nancy Kerrigan, 34 Grammy Award winners, 43 New York Times bestselling authors he’s represented, including pretty much everybody you know who’s been a super celebrity. This is Michael Levine, a good friend of mine. He’s going to come and talk to you about personal branding and the mindset needed to be super successful. The lineup will continue to grow. We have hit Christian reporting artist Colton Dixon in the house. Now people say, Colton Dixon’s in the house? Yes, Colton Dixon’s in the house. So if you like Top 40 Christian music, Colton Dixon’s gonna be in the house performing. The lineup will continue to grow each and every day. We’re gonna add more and more speakers to this all-star lineup, but I encourage everybody out there today, get those tickets today. Go to Thrivetimeshow.com. Again, that’s Thrivetimeshow.com. And some people might be saying, well, how do I do it? I don’t know how to do it. How does it work? You just go to Thrivetimeshow.com. Let’s go there now. We’re feeling the flow. We’re going to Thrivetimeshow.com. Again, you just go to Thrivetimeshow.com. You click on the business conferences button and you click on the request tickets button right there. The way I do our conferences is we tell people it’s $250 to get a ticket or whatever price that you can afford. And the reason why I do that is I grew up without money. JT, you’re in the process of building a super successful company. You started out with a million dollars in the bank account? No, I did not. Nope, did not get any loans, nothing like that. Did not get inheritance from parents, anything like that. I had to work for it. And I am super grateful I came to a business conference. That’s actually how I met you, met Peter Taunton. I met all these people. So if you’re out there today and you want to come to our workshop, again, you just got to go to thrivetimeshow.com. You might say, well, when’s it going to be? June 27 and 28. You might say, well, who’s speaking? We already covered that. You might say, where is it going to be? It’s going to be in Tulsa, Russell Oklahoma. It’s Tulsa, Russell. I’m really trying to rebrand Tulsa as Tulsa, Russell. I’m sort of like the Jerusalem of America. But if you type in Thrive Time Show and Jinx, you can get a sneak peek or a look at our office facility. This is what it looks like. This is where you’re headed. It’s going to be a blasty blast. You can look inside, see the facility. We’re going to have hundreds of entrepreneurs here. It is going to be packed. Now for this particular event folks, the seating is always limited because my facility isn’t a limitless convention center. You’re coming to my actual home office and so it’s going to be packed. So when? June 27th and 28th. Who? You! You’re going to come. I’m talking to you. You can get your tickets right now at thrivetimeshow.com and again you can name your price. We tell people it’s $250 or whatever price you can afford. And we do have some select VIP tickets, which gives you an access to meet some of the speakers and those sorts of things. And those tickets are $500. It’s a two-day interactive business workshop, over 20 hours of business training. We’re going to give you a copy of my newest book, The Millionaire’s Guide to Becoming Sustainably Rich. You’re going to leave with a workbook. You’re going to leave with everything you need to know to start and grow a super successful company. It’s practical, it’s actionable, and it’s TiVo time right here in Tulsa, Russia. Get those tickets today at thrivetimeshow.com. Again, that’s thrivetimeshow.com. Hello, I’m Michael Levine, and I’m talking to you right now from the center of Hollywood, California, where I have represented over the last 35 years 58 Academy Award winners, 34 Grammy Award winners, 43 New York Times bestsellers. I’ve represented a lot of major stars and I’ve worked with a lot of major companies. And I think I’ve learned a few things about what makes them work and what makes them not work. Now, why would a man living in Hollywood, California, in the beautiful sunny weather of LA come to Tulsa because last year I did it and it was damn exciting. Clay Clark has put together an exceptional presentation really life-changing and I’m looking forward to seeing you then. I’m Michael Levine. I’ll see you in Tulsa. James did I tell you my good friend John Lee Dumas is also joining us at the in-person two-day interactive Thrive Time Show business workshop. That Tim Tebow and that Michael Levine will be at the… Have I told you this? You have not told me that. He’s coming all the way from Puerto Rico. This is John Lee Dumas, the host of the chart-topping EOFire.com podcast. He’s absolutely a living legend. This guy started a podcast after wrapping up his service in the United States military and he started recording this podcast daily in his home to the point where he started interviewing big-time folks like Gary Vaynerchuk, like Tony Robbins, and he just kept interviewing bigger and bigger names putting out shows day after day and now he is the legendary host of the EO Fire podcast and he’s traveling all the way from Prudhoe, Rico to Tulsa, Oklahoma to attend the in-person June 27th and 28th Broad time show two-day interactive business workshop if you’re out there today folks you’ve ever wanted to grow a podcast a Broadcast you want to get him you want to improve your marketing if you’ve ever wanted to improve your marketing Your branding if you’ve ever wanted to increase your sales you want to come to the two-day interactive June 27th and 28th Broad time show business workshop featuring Tim Tebow Michael Levine John Lee Dumas and countless big-time super successful entrepreneurs. It’s gonna be life-changing. Get your tickets right now at ThriveTimeShow.com James, what website is that? ThriveTimeShow.com James, one more time for the four enthusiasts. ThriveTimeShow.com This moment, we own it, ayy I’m not to be played with Because it could get dangerous See, these people I ride with This moment, we own it Thrive Time Show 2-Day Interactive Business Workshops are the world’s highest rated and most reviewed business workshops because we teach you what you need to know to grow. You can learn the proven 13 point business system that Dr. Zellner and I have used over and over to start and grow successful companies. We get into the specifics, the specific steps on what you need to do to optimize your website. We’re going to teach you how to fix your conversion rate. We’re going to teach you how to do a social media marketing campaign that works. How do you raise cap? How do you get a small business loan. We teach you everything you need to know here during a two day, 15 hour workshop. It’s all here for you. You work every day in your business, but for two days you can escape and work on your business and build these proven systems so now you can have a successful company that will produce both the time freedom and the financial freedom that you deserve. You’re going to leave energized, motivated, but you’re also going to leave empowered. The reason why I built these workshops is because as an entrepreneur I always wish that I had this. Because there wasn’t anything like this, I would go to these motivational seminars, no money down, real estate, Ponzi scheme, get motivated seminars. 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. I wanted the knowledge. They’re like, oh, but we’ll teach you the knowledge after our next workshop. And the great thing is we have nothing to upsell. At every workshop, we teach you what you need to know. There’s no one in the back of the room trying to sell you some next big get-rich-quick, walk-on-hot-coals product. It’s literally we teach you the brass tacks, the specific stuff that you need to know to learn how to start and grow a business. And I encourage you to not believe what I’m saying, and I want you to Google the Z66 auto auction. I want you to Google elephant in the room. Look at Robert Zellner and Associates. Look them up and say, are they successful because they’re geniuses or are they successful because they have a proven system? When you do that research, you will discover that the same systems that we use in our own business can be used in your business. Come to Tulsa, book a ticket, and I guarantee you it’s going to be the best business workshop ever and we’re going to give you your money back if you don’t love it. We built this facility for you and we’re excited to see it. And now you may be thinking, what does it actually cost to attend an in-person, two-day, interactive, Thrive Time Show business workshop? Well, good news, the tickets are $250 or whatever price that you can afford. What? Yes, they’re $250 or whatever price you can afford. I grew up without money and I know what it’s like to live without money. So if you’re out there today and you want to attend our in-person, two day interactive business workshop, all you got to do is go to ThriveTimeShow.com to request those tickets. And if you can’t afford $250, we have scholarship pricing available to make it affordable for you. I learned at the Academy at Kings Point in New York. Octa non verba. Watch what a person does, not what they say. Good morning, good morning, good morning. Harvard Kiyosaki, The Rich Dad Radio Show. Today I’m broadcasting from Phoenix, Arizona, not Scottsdale, Arizona. They’re closed, but they’re completely different worlds. And I have a special guest today. Definition of intelligence is if you agree with me, you’re intelligent. And so this gentleman is very intelligent. I’ve done this show before also, but very seldom do you find somebody who lines up on all counts. As Mr. Clay Clark is a friend of a good friend, Eric Trump, but we’re also talking about money, bricks, and how screwed up the world can get in a few and a half hour. So Clay Clark is a very intelligent man and there’s so many ways we could take this thing but I thought since you and Eric are close Trump what were you saying about what Trump can’t what Donald who’s my age and I can say or cannot say what first of all I have to honor you sir I want to show you what I did to one of your books here there’s a name of Jeremy Thorne who was my boss at the time. I was 19 years old, working at Faith Highway. I had a job at Applebee’s, Target, and DirecTV. And he said, have you read this book, Rich Dad, Poor Dad? And I said, no. And my father, may he rest in peace, he didn’t know these financial principles. So I started reading all of your books and really devouring your books. And I went from being an employee to self-employed to the business owner to the investor. And I owe a lot of that to you. And I just wanted to take a moment to tell you, thank you so much for allowing me to achieve success. And I’ll tell you all about Eric Trump, but I just want to tell you, thank you, sir, for changing my life. Well, not only that, Clay, you know, thank you, but you’ve become an influencer. You know, more than anything else, you’ve evolved into an influencer where your word has more and more power. So that’s why I congratulate you on becoming. Because as you know, there’s a lot of fake influencers out there, or bad influencers. Anyway, I’m glad you and I agree so much, and thanks for reading my books. That’s the greatest thrill for me today. Not a thrill, but recognition is when people, young men especially, come up and say, I read your book, changed my life, I’m doing this, I’m doing this, I’m doing this. I learned at the Academy at King’s Point in New York, acta non verba. Watch what a person does, not what they say. Whoa. Hey, I’m Ryan Wimpey. I’m originally from Tulsa, born and raised here. I went to a small private liberal arts college and got a degree in business. And I didn’t learn anything like they’re teaching here. I didn’t learn linear workflows. I learned stuff that I’m not using and I haven’t been using for the last nine years. So what they’re teaching here is actually way better than what I got at business school. And I went what was actually ranked as a very good business school. The linear workflow, the linear workflow for us in getting everything out on paper and documented is really important. We have workflows that are kind of all over the place. Having linear workflow and seeing that mapped out on multiple different boards, it’s pretty awesome. That’s really helpful for me. The atmosphere here is awesome. I definitely just stared at the walls figuring out how to make my facility look like this place. This place rocks. It’s invigorating. The walls are super, it’s just very cool. The atmosphere is cool. The people are nice. It’s a pretty cool place to be. Very good learning atmosphere. I literally want to model it and steal everything that’s here at this facility and basically create it just on our business side. Once I saw what they were doing, I knew I had to get here at the conference. This is probably the best conference or seminar I’ve ever been to in over 30 years of business. You’re not bored, you’re waiting live the whole time, it’s not pushy, they don’t try to sell you a bunch of things. I was looking to learn how to just get control of my life, my schedule, and just get control of business. Planning your time, breaking it all down, making time for the F6 in your life, and just really implementing it and sticking with the program. It’s really lively, they’re pretty friendly, helpful, and very welcoming. I attended a conference a couple months back and it was really the best business conference I’ve ever attended. At the workshop I learned a lot about time management, really prioritizing what’s the most important. The biggest takeaways are you want to take a step-by-step approach to your business, whether it’s marketing, what are those three marketing tools that you want to use, to human resources. Some of the most successful people and successful businesses in this town, their owners were here today because they wanted to know more from Clay, and I found that to be kind of fascinating. The most valuable thing that I’ve learned is diligence, that businesses don’t change overnight. It takes time and effort, and you gotta go through the ups and downs of getting it to where you wanna go. He actually gives you the roadmap out. I was stuck, didn’t know what to do, and he gave me the roadmap out step by step. We’ve set up systems in the business that make my life much easier, allow me some time freedom. Here you can ask any question you want, they guarantee it’ll be answered. This conference motivates me and also gives me a lot of knowledge and tools. It’s up to you to do it. Everybody can do these things, there’s stuff that everybody knows, but if you don’t do it, nobody else is going to do it for you. I can see the marketing working. It’s just an approach that makes sense. Probably the most notable thing is just the income increase that we’ve had. Everyone’s super fun and super motivating. I’ve been here before, but I’m back again because it motivates me. Your competition’s going to come eventually or try to pick up these tactics. So you better, if you don’t, somebody else will. 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. So this is my old van and our old school marketing and this is our old team and by team I mean it’s me and another guy. This is our new house with our new neighborhood. This is our new van with our new marketing and this is our new team. We went from 4 to 14 and I took this beautiful photo. We worked with several different business coaches in the past and they were all about helping Ryan sell better and just teaching sales which is awesome but Ryan is a really great salesman so we didn’t need that. We needed somebody to help us get everything that was in his head out into systems, into manuals and scripts, and actually build a team. So now that we have systems in place, we’ve gone from one to 10 locations in only a year. In October 2016, we grossed 13 grand for the whole month. Right now it’s 2018, the month of October. It’s only the 22nd, we’ve already grossed a little over 50 grand for the whole month, and we still have time to go. We’re just thankful for you, thankful for Thrive and your mentorship, and we’re really thankful that you guys have helped us to grow a business that we run now instead of the business running us. Just thank you, thank you, thank you, times a thousand. So we really just want to thank you Clay and thank you Vanessa for everything you’ve done, everything you’ve helped us with. We love you guys. If you decide to not attend the Thrive Time Workshop, you’re missing out on a great opportunity. The Atmosphere Place office is very lively. You can feel the energy as soon as you walk through the door. And it really got me and my team very excited. If you decide not to come, you’re missing out on an opportunity to grow your business, bottom line. Love the environment. I love the way that Clay presents and teaches. It’s a way that not only allows me to comprehend what’s going on, but he explains it in a way to where it just makes sense. The SEO optimization, branding, marketing, I’ve learned more in the last two days than I have the entire four years of college. The most valuable thing that I’ve learned, marketing is key, marketing is everything. Making sure that you’re branded accurately and clearly. How to grow a business using Google reviews and then just how to optimize our name through our website also. Helpful with a lot of marketing, search engine optimization, helping us really rank high in Google. The biggest thing I needed to learn was how to build my foundation, how to systemize everything and optimize everything, build my SEO. How to become more organized, more efficient. How to make sure the business is really there to serve me, as opposed to me constantly being there for the business. New ways of advertising my business, as well as recruiting new employees. Group interviews, number one. Before we felt like we were held hostage by our employees. Group interviews has completely eliminated that because you’re able to really find the people that would really be the best fit. Hands-on how to hire people, how to deal with human resources, a lot about marketing and overall just how to structure the business, how it works for me and also then how that can translate into working better for my clients. The most valuable thing I’ve learned here is time management. I like the one hour of doing your business. It’s real critical if I’m going to grow and change. Play really teaches you how to navigate through those things and not only find freedom, but find your purpose in your business and find the purposes for all those other people that directly affect your business as well. Everybody. Everybody. Everybody. Everyone. Everyone needs to attend the conference because you get an opportunity to see that it’s real. Everybody. Everybody. Everybody. Everyone. Everyone. Everyone needs to attend the conference because you get an opportunity to see that it’s real.