David Robinson | Creating An Ethical Corporate Culture (Part 1 of 2) | Celebrating the TipTopK9.com, Platinum Pest & ColawFitnes.com Success Stories

Audio Transcription

Some shows don’t need a celebrity narrator to introduce the show. But this show does. In a world filled with endless opportunities, why would two men who have built 13 multi-million dollar businesses altruistically invest five hours per day to teach you the best practice business systems and moves that you can use? Because they believe in you. And they have a lot of time on their hands. This started from the bottom, now they’re here. It’s the Thrive Time Show, starring the former U.S. Small Business Administration’s Entrepreneur of the Year, Clay Clark, and the entrepreneur trapped inside an optometrist’s body, Dr. Robert Zunich. 8 kids co-created by 2 different women. 13 multi-million dollar businesses. We started from the bottom, now we’re here. We started from the bottom and we’ll show you how to get here. Started from the bottom, now we’re here. We started from the bottom, now we’re here. We took pride, started from the bottom, and now we’re at the top. Teaching you the systems to give what we got. Colton Dixon’s on the hoops, I’ll break down the books. See, bringing some wisdom and the good looks As the father of five, that’s why I’m alive So if you see my wife and kids, please tell them hi It’s the CNC 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 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 here David, thank you for letting me come visit you, my friend. Thanks, Clay. Appreciate it. Alright, well today we’re going to be talking about creating an ethical corporate culture. Now this is, well I think you’re super qualified to talk about this and so I’m excited to get your feedback on this because you played in the NBA for 14 seasons. Right. And an NBA is known, I mean it gets a bad rap in some areas and a good rap in others, but there are players who are interesting characters. Right. And the league is known for having some great character people and then there’s also sometimes the music that’s played in the locker rooms and the things that are said on the corridor are so profane that some parents kind of cover their kids ears at the game and so you see both extremes but yet you carried yourself in an ethical way during your career. I try to. Okay, so principle number one we’re teaching here is establish your business ethics and David before you and I can really begin to ethically, I guess, begin resolving these, teaching people how to set up a ethical corporate culture, we have to kind of define what the word ethical means. So in your mind, what does it mean to be ethical? Well, I think one of my mentors when I came to San Antonio was McDermott, General McDermott, built USAA, a huge organization, was a phenomenal player in building San Antonio into the city that it is today. And his rule that he lived by was the golden rule, do unto others as you would have them do unto you. And he built his whole organization around that rule. And I think that that’s a great example of what corporate culture should be. People who know me know that my faith is a big part of who I am and and how I approach things but that doesn’t mean everyone else shares my faith but there are certain rules as as human beings as a society that we should follow and and treating other people like you want to be treated I think is a phenomenal place to start so if you want to define what an ethical culture is I would say you could build your whole business around that that idea to if I’m the customer how do I want to be treated and proceed that way? If you can teach everyone in your organization that mentality, then I think you have a great culture. For somebody watching this, just trying to give kind of devil’s advocate perspective of this, you’re very self-disciplined, or at least that’s the rumor. So you’re a guy who’s all about high expectations and reaching for something more and press and press and don’t stop. Right. So if you were going to say I came to work for you, if somehow I was able to sneak in your organization and you hired me. So if I’m working for you, I would guess that you would want to push me because you would want to be pushed. That’s just my. No, I don’t think that that’s necessarily the case. Okay. I think you need to, I wouldn’t want someone to try to turn me into something I’m not. So I think that that’s what you have to understand is that one of my personal rules is always put a person in a position where he can succeed. Some people have Michael Jordan type talent. Let him loose. Hey, that guy, just let him go. But some people have the reserve type talent. And that guy can still bring something to the table. He can still be a very, very valuable part of your organization. I mean, Steve Kerr was not known as this great, you know, superstar who dominated everyone, but he had a role, and he did it extremely well. If you put Steve in the right situation, he was gonna kill you. So, that’s my goal with every single person around me, whether it’s a teammate or an employee, I’m going to figure out what they can do well, I’m gonna try to put them in a place where they can be successful, and let them go in that role. So you’re helping somebody here So if I’m a small business owner and I again I average one is ten employees or less, right? And let’s say that I’m hiring right now. Okay, so I don’t know it’s down a Chick-fil-a Yes, and I’m hiring right now and I’m looking for an extroverted person to work the the work the front It’s kind of a shame on me sort of deals the owner if I hire somebody who’s an introvert and want them to be the Extrovert dealing with customers, is that right? Yeah, that would be a mistake, yes. No, you’d certainly, you need to find what their abilities are, what their talents are. Yeah, you certainly don’t want to put someone, if the guy’s not a shooter, don’t put him on the perimeter. You know, make sure he understands that and he can play within the role of the offense. So, okay, this makes a lot of sense. Now, when you played for the Spurs, you were known as one of those good guys. And I think that what was neat, though, is that the Spurs, I don’t know whether they did it to you or you did it to them, but you guys became known as a good guy team. Right. So, and again, I don’t know, chicken before the egg, I don’t know if you came in and were the good guy, and now the team became the good team, or I’m not sure if that was the ownership, but you guys were known as a good guy culture. How did you specifically, let’s just go into the locker room. How did you lay out this ethical culture in the locker room? What sort of rules did you put in effect there? Well, our goal was not to be known as the good guys. Okay. We certainly, we don’t go about trying to say hey, we’re we’re You know any better than anyone else? That’s not the goal at all when we came in I said look we’re gonna do things in a professional manner We’re going to do things The right way here, so that means you know trying to get the right amount of rest coming into practice prepared to practice It means having the right mentality and being team players when we step out on the floor, I don’t care about what your stats are, I don’t care about how many shots you got yesterday, I don’t care about your salary paycheck. Don’t bring that stuff to the floor. That’s not what we need. We’re gonna do things the right way, day in and day out. If you’re a role player, you do your job, you’ll get rewarded. At the end of the day, somebody’s gonna want you because you did your job very, very well. And so that’s creating a culture. That is getting them to understand that success for the organization means success for the individual. And that way they can kind of fit in their role. So you define for people, we’re gonna do things the right way. It wasn’t your goal to be the good guys, but you said, we’re gonna do things the right way. So let’s go into the locker room and here’s the situation. There’s one small business owner I worked with a few months ago. If you’re watching this, this one’s for you. I was working with them and they have a front desk person who listens to crazy music. Like crazy, as in music that has curse words within a salon environment. So there’s a men’s grooming sort of environment and yet there’s music playing overhead with foul language. Right. And he talks to the front desk guy and says, hey guy, the owner says, can we please stop doing this? And this is maybe the third or fourth time. That’s probably nicer than I would have been about it. I want to have you now come into the salon. So we’re pretending that you have been brought on as an advisor for the day. How did you deal with it in the locker room? Because you know what happened there. And how would you deal with it in the small business? Well, we have to understand what the goal of the business is. So if the goal of the business is to bring in a certain clientele and that music does not match that clientele, then we shouldn’t be playing that music. It’s nothing personal against me, against that person. We have different tastes. Have no problem with that if you’re listening to that at home, you do what you want to do. But in this place, we’re going to do things that build around the business. And so you just need to be real specific about what the expectations are and you need to demand those things. Not because you don’t agree with this person or you don’t like this person, but because it’s what’s best for the business. So what would you say, now here’s an example, the same business, perpetually late employee. I’m sure in practice you probably had a guy who attempted to be late just to see what would happen, to see if Coach Popovich would deal with it first or if you would or however it would happen. So a guy shows up to practice. Let’s say in this case he shows up to work 10 minutes late. How do you, how did you as the captain of the team, or how would you as an owner of a business process that? Specifically, what would you say to me if I walk in 10 minutes late? Well, I think there’s a lot of factors there. If he’s doing that purposely. Perpetually. Well, perpetually. Perpetually is fine, as long as it does not affect the quality of their work or the business goals. I’ve never been one that’s a stickler for times. I mean, if we have a business where you can work half the day and you can still get your job done, more power to you. I’d rather see you at home with your children. I’d rather see you get your children off to school. I don’t know why this person’s late. There’s a lot of factors. He could wanna spend the time in the morning feeding his children and taking them to school. I have no problem with that. If that’s what, if it doesn’t affect the quality of our business, I don’t want you to be there at nine just because it makes me look good, yet you’re there at nine and I have control over you and I can tell you to be there at nine. That doesn’t bother me. Let’s say that it did affect the team’s goals. Well then that’s a problem. So how would you deal with that? And we would be very specific about that. If it were, we’re at a bank and it starts at nine and you have to be at your station at nine and you may not work at the front desk but you may have a station over here for loans or something but someone is going to come in at nine at some point to get a loan and you need to be at that desk. That’s a different situation. Then that person needs to understand if they cannot make that work then they are hurting the business and they don’t belong either in that role or with the organization. I just love how you focus on performance. It’s black and white for you. It seems like there’s no gray area. I try to make things black and white. I think if you can, the more that you have defined, the easier it is to determine the outcomes. I always try to understand what’s my role, what’s their role, what’s the goal. One thing I learned doing non-profits is going back to the mission statement. You always go back to the mission statement. What are we trying to accomplish? If it doesn’t help what we’re trying to accomplish, it’s a useless endeavor. What about the personality type who tries to corrode the culture? So I’m sure, maybe it never happened on the Spurs, but other teams. But what happens to the player who is trying to stir up something between another player They’re trying to you know that that kind of that person is for every reason trying to create animosity Yeah, you can’t quite pin them on it, but then you just you don’t I mean they’re always trying to How do you deal with that? There’s always people like that and I think There’s there’s a couple things you need to consider and first of all is do you actually have a culture established? So, I mean, if you don’t have one established, it’s very hard to deal with a person like that because there are no expectations. You don’t know, they don’t, you can’t specifically call them out on the types of things that they’re doing because there’s no real culture. But once you have a culture, which at the Spurs, we always did have a great culture. There was, when you came in, you knew what you were getting into and you knew what we expected of you. So, it was very easy to call someone out when, hey, you’re doing things detrimental to what the team is about. This is, we don’t talk about your salary. We don’t talk about it to the media. We don’t talk about it in this lock room. That’s your business, has nothing to do with what we’re trying to accomplish on the floor. So that was very clear. And if people came in and they started whining about salary or they started picking fights with other individuals, then that was clearly unacceptable in our organization. So everyone, I’m writing this down because this is really good nuggets here. You said we always go back to the mission statement. Always mission statement. Let me ask you this. Again, in America today, nine out of ten of these businesses are small businesses. Some of them haven’t taken the time to write a mission statement. We’re so busy we don’t have a mission statement. My first suggestion would be sit down and write a mission statement. Okay, all right. So that’s a great action step. Understand where you’re headed. Understand who you are, what your core business is, and what you’re trying to accomplish. Because everything you do needs to go into that. If it doesn’t go into that, then you’re wasting your time and energy. Love it. And I know it thrived, and our purpose is to help provide mentorship and entertaining education for entrepreneurs. That’s our niche. And it’s our focus. And I think that on the Spurs, your goal was to win championships. That’s your mission. Absolutely. And to do it the right way. Right. Was there a certain mission statement that you remember them having or something that was kind of like a, or was it really just to win the championship the right way? No, it was to win, but in order to win, we felt like we had to build the right team. Yeah. That was a real key. And I guess there’s an analogy there with business. You have to build the right team. You have to build an organization that can withstand not only the competition of the day, but the changes for tomorrow. So you’re trying to build this team that’s flexible, that’s intelligent, that works together well, that is focused. And so that’s what I felt like when I came to the team, how do I get us from here to there? We were not a very competitive team when I came. How do I help move this organization over here so that we can be competitive? What was your team’s record when you took over? The year before I came in, we won 21 games. We lost 61 games. And then what was your rookie year? How did you do? Because you’re all NBA, I think you’re rookie year, right? My rookie year, we went from 21 wins to 56 wins, and we lost 26 games. So we pretty much flipped the record, which was great. But there was a lot of other factors that came together. At the time, we had a new coach that was a very good coach. We had some players that we had brought in, which were fantastic. But it was the beginning of a change in culture. And we consistently over the last 20 something years have been at a high level because that culture was established and has grown. Principle number two, develop progressive disciplinary procedures. Now David, I see this a lot where you see a small business and every time someone does something they say, I’m gonna talk to Danny, I’m gonna tell Vanny, I’m gonna talk to her. I’m going to talk to him. We need to have a meeting. And there’s all this talking and meetings when there’s no disciplinary procedure. There’s no expectations as to what happens next. So it’s all these empty threats. And again, it’s a bunch of small businesses where they’re stuck. They’re not growing. And the key, I think, of a small business owner is to win, to make money, to feed your family, by providing value to customers. You don’t want to stay small. It’s not a badge of honor to be a small business. You want to grow and be a big business. Alright JT, so hypothetically, in your mind, what is the purpose of having a business? Um, to get you to your goals. So it’s a vehicle to get you to your destination. And would, uh, you need profits to get there? I mean, when you have a business that’s successful, in your mind, in your expert opinion, would you need profits to get you to your goals yeah cuz if you have a 15 million dollar business but you have 15 million dollars of expenses it’s kind of pointless holy crap all right so the question I would have here for you if you can take like 10 minutes or less and see if you could save 3,000 bucks a year by reducing your credit card fees would you do it yes absolutely oh why would somebody out there who’s listening right now, who has a sane mind, why would they not go to Thrivetimeshow.com forward slash credit dash card Thrivetimeshow.com forward slash credit dash card to schedule a ten minute consultation to see if they can reduce their credit card fees by at least three thousand bucks a year? Why would they not do it? Yeah, why would they not do it? Maybe because they don’t understand how you set the website. This tree is a symbol of the spirit of the Griswold family Christmas. That’s clear. That can be true. So I encourage everybody to check out Thrivetimeshow.com forward slash credit dash card Thrivetimeshow.com forward slash credit dash card. What would be another reason why someone would not be willing to take 10 minutes to compare rates to see if they could save $3,000 or more on credit card fees? Maybe they think it is a waste of time and then it won’t. It’s not possible. There’s somebody out there that’s making more than three thousand dollars every ten minutes and they’re like nah that’s not worth my time. Hello, we getting there everybody. We getting there everybody. There’s probably some someone out there. Okay. They would think that. Well I’ll just tell you folks if you’re out there today and you’re making less than three thousand dollars per ten minutes I would highly recommend that you go to throttletimeshow.com forward slash credit dash hard. Because you can compare rates, you can save money, and you know the big goal in my opinion of building a business is to create time, freedom, and financial freedom. And in order to do that you have to maximize your profits. Holy crap. Now one way to maximize your profits is to increase your revenue. Another way to do it is to decrease your expenses. It’s a profit deal. It takes the pressure off. JT, is there any other reason why somebody would not be willing to take 10 minutes to compare rates to see if they could save a total of $3,000 a year on average? I am at a loss and I cannot think of any other. Shampoo is better. I go on first and clean the hair. Conditioner is better. I leave the hair silky and smooth. Oh really fool? Really? Stop looking at me swan! Well let me tell you a good story here real quick. here. I actually years ago compared rates with this company here called IPS. It’s Integrated Payment Services and I scheduled a consultation. I don’t know that I was skeptical. I just thought whatever I’ll take 10 minutes I’ll compare rates. I can’t tell. You can tell me I’m a doctor. No I mean I’m just not sure. Why can’t you take a guess? Well not for another two hours. You can’t take a guess for another two hours? And in my case, in my particular case, I save over $20,000 a year. Holy crap! Wow. Which is like groceries when my wife goes to the organic stores. Find everything you need today? Yeah. Great. Okay. Oh, God. No! Everything okay, ma’am? Oh, it’s just that you’ve only scanned a few items and it’s already 60 bucks. I’m so scared. Okay, I’m a trained professional, ma’am. I’ve scanned a lot of groceries. I need you to stay with me. It’s just that my in-laws are in town and they want a charcuterie board. This isn’t gonna be easy, so I need you to be brave, all right? What’s your name? Patricia. Patricia, all right. I need you to take a deep breath. We’re about to do the cheese. You know, that’s the difference between eating organic and not organic. So because my wife eats organic, I had to take the 10 minutes needed to compare rates to save the $20,000 a year on credit card fees just for one of my companies. One question, what’s the brand name of the clock? The brand name of the clock, Rod. Do we have it? The brand name of the clock, it’s in elegant from Ridgway. It’s from Ridgway. Let’s buy the clock and sell the fireplace. I encourage everybody out there, go to thrivetimeshow.com forward slash credit dash card. You schedule a free consultation, request information. A member of our team will call you. They’ll schedule a free consultation. It should take you ten minutes or less. And they’re going to compare rates and see if they can’t save you more than $3,000 a year off of your credit card processing. You were hoping what? I wouldn’t owe you money at the end of the day. No, you don’t owe us money because the end of the day at the end of the day The goal of a business is to create time freedom and financial freedom in order to do it in order to do that You need to create additional profits of new customers that we’ve had is up 411% over last year. We are Jared and Jennifer Johnson. We own Platinum Pest and Lawn and are located in Owasso, Oklahoma. And we have been working with Thrive for business coaching for almost a year now. Yeah, so what we wanna do is we wanna share some wins with you guys that we’ve had by working with Thrive. First of all, we’re on the top page of Google now, okay? I just wanna let you know what type of accomplishment this is. Our competition, Orkin, Terminex, they’re both 1.3 billion dollar companies. They both have two to three thousand pages of content attached to their website. So to basically go from virtually non-existent on Google to up on the top page is really saying something. But it’s come by being diligent to the systems that Thrive has. By being consistent and diligent on doing podcasts and staying on top of those podcasts to really help with getting up on what they’re listing or ranking there with Google. And also we’ve been trying to get Google reviews, you know, asking our customers for reviews and now we’re the highest rated and most reviewed Pest and Lawn Company in the Tulsa area and that’s really helped with our conversion rate and the number of new customers that we’ve had is up 411% over last year. Wait, say that again. How much are we up? 411%. Okay, so 411% we’re up with our new customers. Amazing. Right. So not only do we have more customers calling in, we’re able to close those deals at a much higher rate than we were before. Right now our closing rate is about 85% and that’s largely due to, first of all, like our Google reviews that we’ve gotten, people really see that our customers are happy, but also we have a script that we follow. And so when customers call in, they get all the information that they need. That script has been refined time and time again. It wasn’t a one and done deal. It was a system that we followed with Thrive in the refining process, and that has obviously, the 411% shows that that system works. Yeah, so here’s a big one for you. So last week alone, our booking percentage was 91%. We actually booked more deals and more new customers last year than we did the first five months, or I’m sorry, we booked more deals last week than we did the first five months of last year from before we worked with Thrive. So again, we booked more deals last week than the first five months of last year. It’s incredible, but the reason why we have that success is by implementing the systems that Thrive has taught us and helped us out with. Some of those systems that we’ve implemented are group interviews. That way we’ve really been able to come up with a really great team. We’ve created and implemented checklists. Everything gets done and it gets done right. It creates accountability. We’re able to make sure that everything gets done properly, both out in the field and also in our office. And also doing the podcast, like Jared had mentioned, that has really, really contributed to our success. But that, like I said, the diligence and consistency in doing those in that system has really, really been a big blessing in our lives. And also, it’s really shown that we’ve gotten the success from following those systems. So before working with Thrive, we were basically stuck. Really no new growth with our business. And we were in a rut, and we didn’t know. The last three years, our customer base had pretty much stayed the same. We weren’t shrinking, but we weren’t really growing either. Yeah, and so we didn’t really know where to go, what to do, how to get out of this rut that we’re in. But Thrive helped us with that. They implemented those systems, they taught us those systems, they taught us the knowledge that we needed in order to succeed. Now it’s been a grind, absolutely it’s been a grind this last year. But we’re getting those fruits from that hard work and the diligent effort that we’re able to put into it. So again, we were in a rut, Thrive helped us get out of that rut. And if you’re thinking about working with Thrive, quit thinking about it and just do it. Do the action and you’ll get the results. It will take hard work and discipline, but that’s what it’s gonna take in order to really succeed. So, I just wanna give a big shout out to Thrive, a big thank you out there to Thrive. We wouldn’t be where we’re at now without their help. Hi, I’m Dr. Mark Moore, I’m a pediatric dentist. Through our new digital marketing plan, we have seen a marked increase in the number of new patients that we’re seeing every month, year over year. One month, for example, we went from 110 new patients the previous year to over 180 new patients in the same month. And overall, our average is running about 40% to 42% increase, month over month, year over year. The group of people required to implement our new digital marketing plan is immense, starting with a business coach, videographers, photographers, web designers. Back when I graduated dental school in 1985, nobody advertised. The only marketing that was ethically allowed in everybody’s eyes was mouth-to-mouth marketing. By choosing to use the services, you’re choosing to use a proven turnkey marketing and coaching system that will grow your practice and get you the results that you’re looking for. I went to the University of Oklahoma College of Dentistry, graduated in 1983, and then I did my pediatric dental residency at Baylor College of Dentistry from 1983 to 1985. Hello, my name is Charles Colaw with Colaw Fitness. Today I want to tell you a little bit about Clay Clark and how I know Clay Clark. Clay Clark has been my business coach since 2017. He’s helped us grow from two locations to now six locations We’re planning to do seven locations in seven years and then franchise and clay has done a great job of helping us navigate anything that has to do with like running the business building the systems the checklist the workflows the audits how to how to Navigate lease agreements how to buy property How to work with brokers and builders. This guy is just amazing. This kind of guy has worked in every single industry. He’s written books with like Lee Crocker, or Head of Disney with the 40,000 cast members. He’s friends with like Mike Lindell. He does Reawaken America tours where he does these tours all across the country where 10,000 or more people show up to some of these tours. On the day-to-day, he does anywhere from about 160 companies. He’s at the top. He has a team of business coaches, videographers, graphic designers, and web developers. They run 160 companies every single week. Think of this guy with a team of business coaches running 160 companies. In the weekly, he’s running 160 companies. Every six to eight weeks, he’s doing Reawaken America tours. Every six to eight weeks, he’s also doing business conferences where 200 people show up and he teaches people a 13-step proven system that he’s done and worked with billionaires, helping them grow their companies. So I’ve seen guys from startups go from startup to being multi-millionaires, teaching people how to get time freedom and financial freedom through the system. Critical thinking, document creation, making it, putting it into, organizing everything in their head to building it into a franchisable, scalable business. Like one of his businesses has like 500 franchises. That’s just one of the companies or brands that he works with. So, amazing guy. Elon Musk, kind of like smart guy. He kind of comes off sometimes as socially awkward, but he’s so brilliant and he’s taught me so much. When I say that, like Clay is like, he doesn’t care what people think when you’re talking to him. He cares about where you’re going in your life and where he can get you to go. And that’s what I like him most about him. He’s like a good coach. A coach isn’t just making you feel good all the time. A coach is actually helping you get to the best you. And Clay has been an amazing business coach. Through the course of that we became friends. My most impressed with him is when I was shadowing him one time. We went into a business deal and listened to it. I got to shadow and listen to it. When we walked out I knew that he could make millions on the deal and they were super excited about working with him. He told me, he’s like, I’m not going to touch it, I’m going to turn it down because he knew it was going to harm the common good of people in the long run. The guy’s integrity just really wowed me. It brought tears to my eyes to see that this guy, his highest desire was to do what’s right. Anyways, just an amazing man. Anyways, impacted me a lot. He’s helped navigate. Anytime I’ve gotten nervous or worried about how to run the company or navigating competition and an economy that’s like, I remember we got closed down for three months. He helped us navigate on how to stay open, how to get back open, how to just survive through all the COVID shutdowns, lockdowns. I’m Rachel with Tip Top Canine 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? 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 ten 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. The Thrive Time 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 system 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 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 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 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. 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’ll even 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. If you 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’ve got to inspire somebody out there who just doesn’t have the time to listen to our call. Well, okay, so Clay, it’s like I would go up and down roller coaster. And so now we’ve got it to where we’re in excess of 100 clients. That’s awesome. And so I would have anywhere from 5 clients to 20 clients on my own with networking, but I had no control over it. I didn’t. Without the systems, you’re going to be victimized by your own business. For somebody out there who struggles with math, if you would 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 got doubled five times. Which is just incredible. I mean, the first time you do it, that’s one thing, but when you do it repeatedly, I mean, that’s unbelievable. We’re working our blessed assurance off this year to double. We’re planning on doubling again. We’re incorporating new, 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. That’s when it needed a system. 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 turns into sales Well, I tell you, you know, it’s 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? Right. And 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 the script here, we have a brand new gal that just can’t 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 script. What’s so she’s making how many calls a day? She’s making between 200 and 300 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. That’s kind of how I would describe our relationship. Tim, I want to ask you this. You and I reconnected, I think it was in the year 2000 and, what was it, maybe 2010? Is that right? 2011 maybe? Or maybe further down the road, maybe 2013? 2012. Okay, so 2012, and at that time I was five years removed from the DJ business, and you were how many years removed from tax and accounting software? It was about 10, 11 years. We met, how did we meet? What was the first interaction? There was some interaction where you and I first connected. I just remember that somehow you and I went to Hideaway Pizza. But do you remember when we first reconnected? Yeah, well we had that speaking thing that… Oh there it was! So 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, business consultant. I work with different businesses implementing best practice processes and systems that I have learned here by working with Clay. And the experience working here has, to put it real plainly, has been just life-changing. I have not only learned new things and have gained new knowledge, but I have gained a whole new mindset that I believe wherever I end up will serve me well throughout the rest of my life. Since working with Clay, I have learned so much. I mean, I would like to say it was everything about business in terms of the different categories. I haven’t learned it all, but I’ve learned all about marketing. I’ve learned about advertising. I’ve learned about branding. I’ve learned how to create a sales process for organizations in any industry. I’ve learned how to sell. I’ve learned how to create repeatable systems and processes and hold people accountable. You know, how to hire people. It’s almost like every aspect of a business you can learn, I have learned a lot in those different categories. And then, again, the mindset that I’ve gained here has been huge. Working here, you can’t be a mediocre person. You are a call to a higher standard of excellence. And then as you’re called to that standard here, you begin to see those outcomes in every area of your life, that standard of excellence that you want to implement no matter what you’re involved in. I would like to describe the other people that work with Clay are people that are going somewhere with their life. Marshall in the group interview talks about how 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. 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. I would say 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, it’s unique in that, I don’t know if there’s anyone else’s that can be as passionate. You know, whenever a business starts working with Clay, it’s almost as like Clay is running that business in the sense that he has something at stake. He’s just serving them. They’re one of his clients, but it’s as if he is actively involved in the business. Whenever they have a win, he’s posting it all over his social media. He’s shouting it across the room here at Thrive. He’s sending people encouraging messages. He can be that life coach and business coach in terms of being that motivator and that champion for people’s businesses. It’s, again, unique because there’s no one else I’ve seen get so excited about and passionate about other people’s businesses. The kind of people that wouldn’t like working with People that are satisfied with mediocrity. People that want to get through life by just doing enough, by just getting by. People who are not looking to develop themselves. People who are not coachable. People who think that they know it all and they’re unwilling to change. I would say those are the type of people. 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 challenging yourself. Be open to learning and adjusting parts about you that need to be adjusted.