Entrepreneur | Business Savvy: Finding Out What You Don’t Know

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 hear what we got. Cullen Dixon’s on the hooks, I’ve written the books. He’s bringing some wisdom and the good looks. As a 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 three, two, one, here we go. We started from the bottom, now we’re here. Started from the bottom, and that’s what we gotta do. This topic here, we’re going to talk about business savvy, finding out what you don’t know. This is huge. This is huge. And I’m hoping that I have permission to do it. If you, what about this, if you guys knew, if you knew, say you met with a doctor, maybe some of you have had this happen to you, you meet with a doctor and he says, whoa, whoa, whoa, if you keep doing this, this will happen. Anybody ever had that meeting before? If you keep doing this, this is going to happen. So you go, is it mean for the doctor to tell you? You know, if you keep eating this, you’re going to have cholesterol problems. If you keep doing this, you’re going to have a heart problem. If you keep… Is that mean? Okay, so I’m going to give you the same sort of stuff for your life here, and then somebody will go like, it’s offensive. I can’t believe the doctor told me I can’t eat that. I love deep fried chicken. And you’re like, well, sorry. But okay, so I’m just trying to give you some real talk. Hopefully, you don’t get super offended. If you do, we can give ourselves swirlies and then get back on the phone. We just put your head in the toilet, you flush. It’s awesome. Okay, but here we go. All right, so let’s get into it. Martin Luther King Jr. Who was that? Somebody talk to me. Who was that guy? Anybody? Are we not teaching history here at, uh, where are you? What? He led the civil rights movement. What else? What does that mean? What does that mean? Great leader, speaker, minister. How many of you know somebody who is emotionally still inspired every time they hear that name? So what does it mean to the people who are emotionally inspired by that? What does that mean? What does Martin Luther King Jr.’s name mean to those people? What does it stand for? He cared about people and he found a way to connect to see what they need and see what the need was and to do something about it. I will say this about that man. He was a guy who was willing to die for everybody else. To me that’s huge. I don’t know about you, but I’m the kind of guy who like, you know, I’m pretty committed to stuff, but like, if we get bombed, I’m kind of going to go roll, roll, roll to Canada, I think. You know what I mean? I’m not a big, like, I don’t want to like die for a cause. For business, I’ll sacrifice a lot, but I don’t know if I want to die for a cause. for Martin Luther King Jr. because he knew he was going to get killed. Do you guys remember the talk? You ever see the speech on YouTube or in a high school class or something where he said, he’s seeing the other side? Have you seen that one? And he tells people, don’t worry about me, I’ve seen the other side. You know, he gave that talk after receiving death threats. Like, he knew it was over. Right? But he had to do it because he wanted people to know they need to push on. Big, I mean that’s huge, right? So when he says something to me, when he says something, I listen right away. If he says something, I say, what? You know, like what, what, what is this here? So we’re going to break this down here. I want you to look at this here. Nothing in the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity. Okay? Now I am not at all chastising you guys because I really do care. But I want you to think about this for a second. I’m gonna show you guys, and when you guys edit this you can put it up on the screen, but I’m gonna show you guys here, we’re all said and done. There’s a kid who heard about the online education platform that I make it with our team. He heard about the fact that somebody could teach him how to start a business and he actually called our, his family called our company, okay. And this kid is 10 years old and he has a thing called cerebral palsy. You ever heard of cerebral palsy? What does that mean? He can’t, well he can’t use his mouth. So he wrote a business plan using his eyes, where he literally looks at a screen and he writes… what’s that? Yeah, that’s him. He wrote a business plan with his eyes, and he was able to write a business plan to articulate his goal. His goal was to raise $250,000 for the organization that gave him the machine that allows him to now talk. Could you imagine being trapped inside a body with a fully functional brain and not being able to communicate at all? And how awesome it would feel when you had the gift to be able to use your eyes to look at a letter on the screen and to focus on it and then to write something. I’m not ripping you guys, but I want you guys to remember this, okay? Then we’re gonna get into this. Every day you have is a gift. And we need to make sure we don’t waste it. I promise you, and I’m not ripping you guys for enjoying your fall break. I’m just telling you this like for enjoying your break, your spring break. I tell you this because I care. But there is a lot of people, that kid, who would absolutely do anything to be able to use his arms or his legs or be able to talk. And a lot of us have the ability to do that and we don’t even use that at all. You know what I’m saying? We don’t even value that, okay? So when Martin Luther King is talking about this concept as he says, nothing in the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity. One of these he’s referring to is when he says conscientious stupidity there are people that consciously that means they know they know what they’re doing They’re planning on doing nothing This is their plan. There are entire websites dedicated to ways to waste time right and Then there’s also the sincere ignorance, which is the other side where it’s kind of like you just have no idea What the heck’s going on and we just say weird excuses. Right? But what I’m trying to say, and I’m just I’m not trying to hurt your feelings, okay, but we talked about it before. You guys have some goals. Somebody here tell me one of your goals. Like in terms of travel, what’s the place you want to go to? Anybody have a goal? Rio. Where do you want to go? How many people want to have kids? Okay. How many of you want to have a few kids? Maybe two kids, three kids? Four kids. Boom. Four kids. Anybody want to have more than four kids? How many do you have? Five. Five. Six. Okay. I’m just being real. This is real. I’m just trying to help you guys, okay? Right now, with my family, with five kids, insurance, food, that’s what it comes out to every month to take care of my kids. Thirteen thousand dollars a month. That’s what it costs me. So I’m just saying, like, it’s nothing in the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance or conscientious stupidity. So either way, if you’re not aware of what it costs to raise humans above the poverty line, it is either one, sincere ignorance, or it is conscientious stupidity. But the point is, we have to start to do something about it. We can’t just have these goals and then think that it’s going to happen. Make sense? So we have to revere every moment as a precious gift, just like the way Keith does. You’ve got to view it as, man, this is a gift. I’ve got a whole day available to do some things. Some things being like to make a plan, to reach out to somebody, to whatever your goals are. I don’t know what they are, but you’ve got to think about that, okay? So I want to break into these three areas. These are massively important. In what areas are you shooting yourself in the foot? This is a question we should ask. Oh, this is a tough question to ask. I’m going to try to irritate everyone equally during this segment, okay? One, when you yawn in a room, it makes people think that you have a mental disorder or that you disrespect people. Does that make sense? So, I went to church, I went to church, and I made the mistake of not even trying not to yawn. If you have to yawn, I get it. But, you know, you can kind of cover up a little bit. I didn’t do it. I was like, grrr. And I caught eye contact with a pastor years ago. What does that feel like? Awkward. What does it make the pastor feel like? Yeah. Yeah, so some of us are doing that. We don’t even recognize what we’re doing. Right? Now what about our actual aura? Like the way in class, you go to class, you know, you carry around this little like energy, right? You carry this energy, there’s something around you that says something. Do you know if you sit in the first row of your class and you’re the first one to get there and you look your teacher in the eye the entire time, you will get more letters of recommendation. Do you know this? Do you know this? You know this, right? I mean, we know this. If you sit up there right up front and the entire time, I swear to you, if you get right up there and you talk to them, when it came time for me to get my first jobs, all those people wrote letters because they all knew my name. And why do they know my name? Because I’m right there! Make sense? So, some of us, real quick, we’ve got to be checking ourselves real quick here. What are the areas where we’re shooting ourselves in the foot? And don’t look around and think that somebody else is doing it. You’re doing it too. I’m doing it too. In some way, we are literally coming to work and just blasting off our foot every day. In some way, we’re just doing it. Some of us are tied to these weird beliefs. I’ll give you an example. I have a conservative worldview over here. Cool? Well, in a business setting, does anybody care what political party you vote for? Is it a general rule? So, if you’re like in a business setting trying to raise capital and you let people know consistently, let’s say, that you’re over here on this voting side, or over here, could it potentially hurt your chances of raising capital from one out of two people? That’s an example. Another one is when I’m resting, like when I’m not actually like working, my resting facial position is one of being frustrated or mad. So I tend to be like, when I’m having a good time, right? How many of you have ever been, got yourself doing that, looking all mad, right? Well, what’s the deal? Have you guys met people from different places in the country who look mad all the time? You met these people at college, right? Have you ever met other people who look like they just woke up at all times? It’s like 5pm, 6pm, 8pm. They look like they just woke up, like they’re just barely getting by. That might be a way you’re shooting yourself in the foot. How about people that you know who have a hard time speaking English, but they could, they just choose not to. Have you met that person? You know what I’m talking about though, right? This is funny to him. Okay, so you know what I’m saying though, right? So I want you to ask yourself, I need you to write that down, that you have to think of one area where you’re shooting yourself in the foot. Just think of one. What is it? There’s all sorts of statistics out there that show that people who articulate themselves, who dress well, they tend to get paid more. But you have to do it. You’ve got to do something about it, okay? Second is, does your personal marketing inspire? Some of you are sitting in your resumes with crazy spelling errors, with nasty photos, looking horrible. Couldn’t we go to somebody who’s an art major or photography, graphic design, and say, hey, will you take a headshot of me? Right? My name is Mimi, I’m planning on applying for a job and I would like to have a nice headshot. How many of you have seen somebody who you know put together a resume with a crazy looking photo of themself? How many of you have seen somebody or maybe seen yourself submit a resume with everything spelled wrong? How many of you know somebody who talks so crazy that it’s amazing that that person even has… And we have one girl, when I was at ORU, I won’t mention her name, but she used to talk in this, like it was almost like she was in some sort of like hip-hop dictionary. And then we had another guy that was like straight woods. And people would know, people would refer to this guy as straight woods. Because he’d be like, how y’all, how y’all, and how y’all doing? And we’re like, that’s no big deal. And he’d be like, hey, we was going to go, and we was, you know, he would just do this stuff and you’re like did he really just say we was and he’s always how and you disappoint we’re like nobody even listened to what he was saying they would just listen to what he like how we said it now true story somebody eventually pulled him aside and said you realize you Pete your nickname because he was like offended why why do people call me so you know straight woods because you sound like you’re out of the woods bro and he’s like okay what do I need to do well he changed his whole way he talks. Intentionally made that decision. And I know the guy. And today he’s doing great. But he just had to like learn that. I’m just saying, some of you are like, well, don’t judge me. Well, people will, you know. So I’m just being real. Now, the example for me, I used to wear double hoop earrings, right? Double hoop earrings, look at the holes, right? Double hoop earrings. And then I would meet brides and grooms at, and where would I suggest for the bride and the groom to meet me? Over there. Oh, wasn’t that smart yet? Check it out. We’re going a little bit farther west on 71st. A little farther west. What’s her name? Nick? No. Yes. Oh, it’s funny. It’s funny. All right, so here we go. So I would be on the phone. Imagine that you’re on the phone with me, Miss Hurd. We’re on the phone, right? And you’re excited about trying to find a DJ for your wedding. You know, you’re so excited about the fairy tale princess. And I go, just smacking you with some ghetto reality, right? And I’m just saying, hey, why don’t we go ahead and meet at my office, you know? I’m over there. I could meet you at McDonald’s, at your office. And I’m like, well, yeah, I’ve been meeting people at McDonald’s? So I like him trying as hard as I can. I am doing what he says, which is sincere ignorance. Well, I’m not booking anything. Now, Clifton Talbert, who is that best-selling author, who every single one of y’all need to watch his movie, to watch his movie, you need to read his book, you need to do everything you can do to just, I’m telling you, he’s a living legend, unbelievable. His life was made into a movie, unbelievable. Best-selling author. But Clifton, I’m sitting down with him. Now, Clifton is black. He is African-American. He is not Caucasian, right? So we’re meeting, and he says to me, he grew up during legal segregation, where black people have to go over here, and white people have to go over here, which is why I chose this quote. So I’m trying to make a point here for you guys. He points out to me, do you understand, Mr. Clark, that being white is a gift? And I’m just like, what? This is what he said to me, okay? And I’m like, how is that a gift? He’s like, I grew up at a time where I had to go in a different door called the back door. You know, I couldn’t even go to the drinking fountain. I couldn’t even go into a bank. You know, today I own a bank, but I couldn’t go into a bank back in the day. And because people would see my skin color and immediately judge. And they would say, I’m not worthy and I would have to go somewhere else his first time that he went to the circus if you watch his movie or read his book it’s crazy he goes to the circus he’s 12 years old he’d never been to a circus before they turn on the lights right drumroll you know elephants they turn on the lights he’s thinking it’s good to make an announcement they told him to leave because he was black he’s 12 first time you’ve ever been to a circus now some of you might have dealt with that a little bit in your own life in certain areas. But why are we doing that to ourselves every day? So he pointed out to me, he’s like, you have two earrings in. That’s like two reasons not to hire you. And then what are you wearing? What is your shirt? It says Wu-Tang Clan. Why are you wearing a Wu-Tang Clan shirt? What are you doing? Where are you meeting people? McDonald’s. McDonald’s! Why are you meeting McDonald’s? He’s like frustrated for me. Right? Now I’m just telling you this. Have you been over to that, been over to that Walmart over by here? Have you seen a group of people that you would not hire? Oops. Groups of people you wouldn’t hire. Massive slews of people, herds of people. Alright? So, now is it offensive if we were to tell them like homes race aside white black Asian Indian I don’t carry walk up to say hey you can’t wear that and get a job and then he’ll turn and his only God can judge me tattoo will show you that he doesn’t care right but I’m just saying we’re in a culture where people do make a first impression they do it doesn’t matter whether they should they do and it’s not going to change. That’s just how people are. Does that make sense? So I’m asking you, the question is, what does your personal marketing say? When I look at you, what do I think? Now I’m going to give you this little nugget, okay? You want to dress the way that you want to be addressed. Dress the way you want to be addressed. Does that make sense? You want to dress for the role that you want, not for the one you have. And I’m just going to be really critical because I know that I can just blast Joseph with a truth cannon and he won’t even care. He’ll just grow back. I assume that you’re still in college and that you are a upwardly mobile guy. That’s my assumption. But there could be little changes in the way that you dress that would make me think you’re out of college and ready to be hired. There’s just little, subtle, small changes that could do. I assume that you’re a certain here, but then I would, now, if you do it right, people will start calling you sir, ma’am. People will say, excuse me, ma’am. People will say, do you work here? Some of you girls will say, do you work here? They’ll go, do you work here? You’re like, no, I’m a student. We need to explore that why and where people are confused. They don’t know. It makes sense. You have to do it though. Right? If you go on my Facebook page, which you’d have, you’ll see, you know, you were on my Facebook. We’re Facebook friends now, right? Are we? No. Are we on Facebook friends? Okay. So we’re Facebook friends. No, it’s good. This is good. This is good. This is fine. But if you guys, you know, I’ll be Facebook friends, but if you look me up there, you’ll see like when I’m at home, you know, I’m really completely sold out into professional sports. I own probably 50 jerseys, you know what I mean? And I’m just into it. You know what I mean? I think today I have an Oklahoma State jersey on underneath my shirt here. See, I got an Oklahoma State jersey. Oh, boom. See? But the thing is, is that like, if I came in here wearing an O-State jersey, you’d have a certain opinion. So we have to look at it and go, gosh, you know, it’s in my house, I can wear what I want to wear. But even I’ve noticed there, when I see people at Walmart and I’m not in my uniform, people will go, because they’re used to a certain perception. Does that make sense? So we need to focus on the personal commercial. it’s a 30-second commercial before I even hear you talk. You’re walking down the hall and I’ve watched this commercial. Hey, my name is such and such brought to you by Horrible. Don’t hire me. And I’m like, whoa, that’s a great, you know, then all of a sudden it’s, or such and such, very credible, could be a good person. I, you know, and all of it, you just, these are a little, do we not do it? It happens all the time, okay? So we have to make that first impression a big one right okay, and the third thing is does your Appearance Scream credibility or don’t trust and buy from me Okay, now some of you. We just need to be real we need to be real with ourselves I Remember my good friend from college, he used to say, axe at every moment, axe. And I’m like, what are you doing? Are you wood chopping? What are you saying? What are we talking about? Are we talking about wood chopping? No, it’s just I’m like, stop it. Seriously, stop it. Because I am coming at you from a certain angle. Now, another friend of mine, a certain worldview, and I will perceive it a certain way. Now, another friend of mine, he is a music artist. That’s what he does. He is a performer. He has won a Grammy. He is a music guy. He is performing with the stars. Is it possible that musicians have a little different uniform than a non-musician? Yes. Okay, so hear what I’m saying. Please hear me. If you are a musician, you probably want to dress differently than what I would recommend for you to dress like based upon what you told me your goals are. If you saw a musician always in a suit and tie, unless there was a certain style going on there, you would probably have a different perception. Does that make sense? And you have to be careful about the perception you want to have. Maybe you’re like Timberlake and you want to have a perception that you’re a certain way and you want to wear a suit and tie. I don’t know. But you have to think about it because some of us are not even thinking about the commercial and we’re just Running it all the time. Does that make sense? We’re not thinking about what the commercial says, but we just have it on blast It’s playing all the time Does that make sense to you guys? So I’m gonna give you your five your five little areas to check yourself on is one. How do you speak? Right. Do you speak? Do you speak with clarity? Is that a weakness? Do some of us have a smaller vocabulary? Yes. Do we work on it? Absolutely. How do we work on our vocabulary? We can read books written by intelligent people. Do we sound though the way we want to be Perceived right second. Do we look the way we want to be perceived we look that way Very few classes in ORU about this by the way, right? But how do you how to dress how to write how to dress and why cuz it’s offensive. Well, it’s really offensive when you don’t have a job. How many of you know a brother, sister, cousin, neighbor, somebody who can’t get a job and looks like they shouldn’t be hired? Do you look at them and you go, I would not hire you? Okay, so this is helpful for somebody, hopefully. Okay, so second is how do we look, okay? Right? The third is how does our relationship feel when we interact with people? Do we come across like we’re always trying to rip people off or always trying to do the least amount possible. Do we always feel like we’re trying to negotiate every… Have you met that negotiator guy? Have you met that guy? He says, hey, you guys want to go to Brahms? And he’s trying to get you to pay half for gas to go to Brahms. Have you met that guy? Hey, we should all do this. And he’s trying to get you to pay after he offered that negotiator thing. All right, the fourth area we have to be aware of the fourth area. Okay, the fourth area, who do we associate with? Uh-oh, who do we associate with? That hurts. Who do you associate with? That’s tough. Because some of you are lying to yourself, which is terrible, because that would be sincere ignorance. You’re hanging around a bunch of idiots and you have this belief that you will change them. How’s that working? So I’m saying, some of us, we have to make sure where the people we’re around are the right commercial. Does that make sense? How important is that power of association? Okay, so let me show you an example. This is a new business card we just got today. I’m pretty excited about it. Here we go, sir. This is the back of the card. Okay, this is the back of the card. There we go. Sorry for short, anybody. I’ll print some more later. Okay, but you see, those are the people who are on our team, right? So the guy who used to run Disney World is on our team. David Robinson is on our team, right? Okay, Sean Copeland, this is a 34-year-old guy who started a bank, he’s on our team. Well, when people look up those people, when you guys can keep that card, when you look up those people and you’re like, so you mean the guy who was just in Forbes magazine, the NBA Hall of Famer, works with you, you’re actually partners, like you actually own the same company together, you’re actually partners? Yes. So you mean you spend 30 minutes with that guy every week? Yes. It changes your perception of everything based upon your team. Does that make sense? So what if you could go out, have you ever bought a book that says forward by, somebody you know? A book by an author you’ve never read, but the forward was by TD Jakes or Joel Osteen or Marilyn Hickey who’s done that before you bought a book and it says forward by okay there’s a book and since we’re at a Christian college I won’t tell you the whole title but it’s called think big and kick insert word okay think big and kick look at that book on Amazon tonight it says Donald Trump huge it says Donald Trump huge on the cover and then really small it says with Bill Zanker. You realize Bill Zanker wrote that book and Donald Trump just wrote the foreword. That who you’re with totally affects the person. Does it not? Do you see that? Okay. Now, the final thing we’re going to talk about is the personal branding. The personal branding. Okay. This is huge. That’s your business card. That’s the words you tend to use. That’s like how you say hello and how you say bye. Example, personal branding. This is a great personal branding. Everyone can say this. When you see somebody and you say goodbye, you say, what can I do for you? You start saying that to people. Hey, what can I do for you? Personal branding. Someone says, how are you doing? And you say, I am doing great. I’m having an awesome day. How are you? People know you as the person who’s always having an awesome day or the person who’s always having a bad day How many of you’ve ever met somebody every time you ask them how they’re doing? It’s bad How are you doing? The personal branding says I have one friend of mine He says too blessed to be stressed and I am what does he say? I’m appointed and I’m anointed and I’m like, all right, how do you favorite of God? I’m like, okay, you know Another one of my friends he’s gone through some personal real hell this last year. I say, how are you doing? And he says, I’ve gone to the bottom, I’m going to the top, doing great. You know, and he just, he says it. And so his personal branding is, that’s what you remember. And then when he finishes the conversation, he always says, what can I do for you? And you remember that. Now some of us are out there, our personal branding, how are you doing? All right. So you finish the conversation. See you. I mean, that’s not memorable, right? So I want you guys to think about this today because again, nothing is more dangerous. I say dangerous. Have you met people with five kids that aren’t aware of how much it costs? You know, have you seen this? I’ve seen them at Walmart. You have too. You know, how do we get ourselves in these conundrums? I don’t know, right? Have you seen people, friends of yours, who want to go on a missions trip but aren’t aware of what it costs? Have you seen friends here who want to start a business, not aware? That’s that sort of sincere ignorance. You almost want to get mad at them, but then you realize they don’t know. So you’re kind of like, well, they’re just harmless and dumb. They’ll get hit by a bus soon. And then you move on. It’s just like playing in the road. I mean, seriously, it’s just playing the road. I’m just it’s dangerous right now. The second is that conscientious stupidity That’s where we’re choosing to be stupid And I’m just want to tell you guys today not because I dislike you and not because I want you to feel guilty much I give you guilt trip, but you’ve been given a gift called a day You know it’s air in your lungs, and you need to revere that you need to wake up every day And I’m telling you you might have somebody maybe somebody have nothing on your to-do list, but how many of you can think of one person in need that would need one, just one call? One call would make the world. Anybody, anybody, anybody know that? One person who could just really need a call right now? So if you’ve got nothing going on, put it on your schedule to call that person and say, hey, you know, how you doing? And give them a gift. Check on them. You can change somebody’s world that way. Or we can look at the remote for another four hours and do nothing. So we just got to make sure it’s okay to have balance and downtime and you know what I mean it’s okay to be humans. I’m just saying is you need to be intentional about how we manage those gifts of every day. Does that make sense to you guys? So little homework for you I want you guys to think about this. I would love for you guys to be able to successfully at the end of this campaign you don’t have to turn it into me. I would love for you to be able to know in what areas are you shooting yourself in the foot, in what areas is your personal marketing, can it be improved? Now does it cost a lot of money to sometimes improve your wardrobe? No. Sometimes it doesn’t cost a lot at all. And then these areas, are we portraying that credibility or are we kind of, okay, big, big stuff. If you guys are going, man, this is, oh man, this is a little deep. There is a book called Think and Grow Rich, which I talked to you guys about. How much do you get paid if you read that? A hundred bucks. If you read that, he’ll talk about this a lot, okay? And there’s a science to achievement. There’s a reason why Barack Obama and McCain and Mitt Romney, they all sort of dress similar. Why? Because they understand there’s a certain perception they have to have. What if Obama’s like, I’m going to be the first black president and I’m gonna wear t-shirts? How would that go? We’ll take him seriously, right? So am I gonna take you seriously is the question I’m asking So I want to take you seriously. I want to help you but that’s that’s the you have marinate on that Okay, so we’re gonna get on the phone here. Okay guys, we’re gonna phone and we’re gonna be calling here from 7 Until 8, okay 7 to 8 who needs some coffee? Does anyone need some coffee? Anybody need a Red Bull? Anybody need a Red Bull infused with your coffee? Okay, make sure you guys go ahead and grab a beverage. We’re going to get on the phone here for an hour of power. Boom! 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 there? I mean, is when you have a business that’s successful and you’re in your mind, your expert opinion, would you need profits to get your to your to get you to your goals? Yeah, because 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 could take like 10 minutes or less and see if you could save three thousand bucks a year by reducing your credit card fees. Would you do it? Yes, absolutely. Holy crap! Why would somebody out there who’s listening right now, who has a sane mind, why would they not go to thrivetimeshow.com forward slash credit dash card thrivetimeshow.com forward slash credit dash card to schedule a 10-minute consultation to see if they can reduce their credit card fees by at least $3,000 a year. Why would they not do it? Yeah, why would they not do it? Maybe because they didn’t understand how you said the website. This tree is a symbol of the spirit of the Griswold family Christmas. That’s clear. Okay, so 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 ten minutes to compare rates to see if they can save three thousand dollars or more on credit card fees maybe they think it is a waste of time and that it won’t it’s not possible there’s somebody out there that’s making more than three thousand dollars every ten minutes and they’re like nah! that’s not worth my time we gettin there everybody there’s probably some someone out there. OK. They would think that. Well, I’ll just tell you, folks. If you’re out there today and you’re making less than $3,000 per 10 minutes, I would highly recommend that you go to thronetimeshow.com forward slash credit dash hard. Because you can compare rates, you can save money. And 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. Ah. It’s a profit deal. 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 I cannot for really let me tell you a good story here real quick here I actually years ago compared rates with this company here called IPS its integrated payment services and I scheduled a consultation I I don’t know if 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. But can’t you take a guess? Well, not for another two hours. You can’t take a guess for another two hours. And in my case, in my in my case, my particular case, I save over twenty thousand dollars a year. Holy crap. Wow. Which is like groceries. When my wife goes to the organic stores. Find everything you need today? Yeah. Great. Oh God. Everything okay ma’am? It’s just that you’ve only scanned a few items and it’s already 60 bucks. I’m so scared. Okay, I’m a trained professional ma’am. I’ve scanned a lot of groceries. I need you to stay with me. It’s just that my in-laws are in town and they want a charcuterie board. This isn’t going to be easy, so I need you to be brave, alright? What’s your name? Patricia. Patricia, alright. 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 ten 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, it’s an 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 at the end of the day, the goal of the business is to create time, freedom and financial freedom. And in order to do that, you need to create additional profits. The number of new customers that we’ve had is up 411% over last year. We are Jared and Jennifer Johnson. We own Platinum Pest and Lawn and are located in Owasso, Oklahoma. And we have been working with Thrive for business coaching for almost a year now. Yeah. So, what we want to do is we want to share some wins with you guys that we’ve had by working with Thrive. First of all, we’re on the top page of Google now. I just want to let you know what type of accomplishment this is. Our competition, Orkin, Terminex, they’re both $1.3 billion companies. They both have 2,000 to 3,000 pages of content attached to their website. So to basically go from virtually nonexistent on Google to up on the top page is really saying something. But it’s come by being diligent to the systems that Thrive has, by being consistent and diligent on doing podcasts, and staying on top of those podcasts to really help with getting up on what they’re listing and ranking there with Google. And also, we’ve been trying to get Google reviews, asking our customers for reviews. And now we’re the highest rated and most reviewed pest salon 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% were up with 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 been a big blessing in our lives, and also, you know, it’s really shown that we’ve gotten a success from following those systems. So before working with Thrive, we were basically stuck. Really no new growth with our business, and we were in a rut, 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 we just wanna give a big shout out to Thrive, a big thank you out there to Thrive. We wouldn’t be where we’re at now without their help. Hi, I’m Dr. Mark Moore. I’m a pediatrician. Through our new digital marketing plan, we have seen a marked increase in the number of new patients that we’re seeing every month, year over year. One month, for example, we went from 110 new patients the previous year to over 180 new patients in the same month. And overall, our average is running about 40 to 42% increase month over month, year over year. The group of people required to implement our new digital marketing plan is immense, starting with a business coach, videographers, photographers, web designers. Back when I graduated dental school in 1985, nobody advertised. The only marketing that was ethically allowed in everybody’s eyes was mouth-to-mouth marketing. By choosing to use the services, you’re choosing to use a proof-and-turn-key marketing and coaching system that will grow your practice and get you the results that you’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. Clay’s done a great job of helping us navigate anything that has to do with running the business, building the systems, the checklists, the workflows, the audits, how to navigate lease agreements, how to buy property, how to work with brokers and builders. This guy is just amazing. This kind of guy has worked in every single industry. He’s written books with Lee Crocker, the head of Disney, with the 40,000 cast members. He’s friends with Mike Lindell. He does Reawaken America tours where he does these tours all across the country where 10,000 or more people show up to some of these tours. On the day-to-day, he does anywhere from about 160 companies. He’s at the top. He has a team of business coaches, videographers, and graphic designers, and web developers, and they run 160 companies every single week. So think of this guy with a team of business coaches running 160 companies. So in the weekly, he’s running 160 companies. Every 6-8 weeks he’s doing Reawaken America tours. Every 6-8 weeks he’s also doing business conferences where 200 people show up and he teaches people a 13 step proven system that he’s done and worked with billionaires, helping them grow their companies. I’ve seen guys from start-ups go from start-up to being multi-millionaires, teaching people how to get time freedom and financial freedom through the system. Critical thinking, document creation, organizing everything in their head to building into a franchisable, scalable business. One of his businesses has like 500 franchises. That’s just one of the companies or brands that he works with. Amazing guy, Elon Musk, kind of like smart guy. He kind of comes off sometimes as socially awkward but he’s so brilliant and he’s taught me so much. When I say that, Clay doesn’t care what people think when you’re talking to him. He cares about where you’re going in your life and where he can get you to go. That’s what I like him most about him. He’s like a good coach. A coach isn’t just making you feel good all the time. A coach is actually helping you get to the best of you. Clay has been an amazing business coach. Through the course of that, we became friends. My most impressive thing 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, brought tears to my eyes to see that this guy, his highest desire was to do what’s right. And anyways, just an amazing man. So anyways, impacted me a lot. He’s helped navigate any time I’ve gotten nervous or worried about how to run the company or navigating competition and an economy that’s like, I remember we got closed down for three months. 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 K9 and we just want to give a huge thank you to Clay and Vanessa Clark. Hey guys, I’m Ryan with Tip Top K9. Just want to say a big thank you to Thrive 15. Thank you to Make Your Life Epic. We love you guys, we appreciate you and really just appreciate how far you’ve taken us. This is our old house. Right, this is where we used to live a few years ago. This is our old neighborhood. See? It’s nice, right? So this is my old van and our old school marketing. And this is our old team. And by team I mean it’s me and another guy. This is our new house with our new neighborhood. This is our new van with our new marketing, and this is our new team. We went from four to 14. And I took this beautiful photo. We worked with several different business coaches in the past, and they were all about helping Ryan sell better and just teaching sales, which is awesome. But Ryan is a really great salesman, so we didn’t need that. We needed somebody to help us get everything that was in his head out into systems, into manuals and scripts and actually build a team. So now that we have systems in place, we’ve gone from one to ten locations in only a year. In October 2016, we 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 systems that Dr. Zellner and I have used over and over to start and grow successful companies. When we get into the specifics, the specific steps on what you need to do to optimize your website. We’re 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. 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. 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, 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. If we go back eight years ago, think about the number of clients you had back then versus the number of clients you have now. As a percentage, what has been the growth over the past eight years, do you think? We’ve got to inspire somebody out there who just doesn’t have the time to listen to their calls. Okay, so Clay, it’s like, I would go up and down from about $10,000 a month up to about $40,000, but it’s up and down roller coaster. And so now we’ve got it to where we’re in excess of 100 clients. That’s awesome. And so I would have anywhere from five clients to 20 clients on my own with networking, but I had no control over it. Without the systems, you’re going to be victimized by your own business. For somebody out there who struggles with math, let’s say that your average number of clients was 30 and you go to 100, as a percentage, what is that? I have doubled every year since working with you. So I’ve doubled in clients, I’ve doubled in revenue every year. That’s 100% growth every year. So I’m looking, we’ve been good friends seven, eight years, and 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 some new things in there to really help us do it, but we are going to double again this year. I started coaching, but it would go up and down, Clay. That’s when I came to you, as I was going up and down, and I wanted to go up and up instead of up and down. And so that’s So, creating a system is you have nailed down specific steps that you’re going to take, no matter how you feel, no matter the results, you lean into them and you do them regardless of what’s happening. You lean into them and it will give you X number of leads. You follow up with those leads, it turns into sales. Well, I tell you, if you don’t have a script and you don’t have a system, then every day is a whole new creation. You’re creating a lot of energy just to figure out what are you going to do. The best executives, Peter Drucker is a father of modern management, he said, the most effective executives make one decision a year. What you do is you make a decision, what is your system, and then you work like the Dickens to make sure you follow that system. And so that’s really what it’s all about. So with a script here, we have a brand new gal that just came in working for us. She nailed down the script, and she’s been nailing down appointments. Usually we try to get one appointment for every 100 calls. We make 200 to 300 calls a day per rep. Right. And she’s been nailing down five and eight appointments a day. Somebody out there is having a hard time. Call them script. So she’s making how many calls a day? She’s making between two and three hundred calls a day. And our relationship is weird in that we do, if someone were to buy an Apple computer today, and or let’s say you buy a personal computer, a PC, the computer is made by, let’s say, or Adobe or whatever that is. So I basically make the systems and you’re like the computer and I’m like the software. It’s kind of how I would describe our relationship. Tim, I want to ask you this. You and I reconnected, I think it was in the year 2000 and what was it, maybe 2010? Is that right? 2011 maybe? Or maybe further down the road. Maybe 2013? 2012. Okay, so 2012. And at that time I was five years removed from the DJ business. And you were how many years removed from tax and accounting software? It was about 10, 11 years. We met, how did we meet? What was the first interaction? There was some interaction where you and I first connected. I just remember that somehow you and I went to Hideaway Pizza. Do you remember when we first reconnected. Yeah, well we had that speaking thing that oh There was so it’s victory Christian Center. I was speaking there My name is Robert Redmond. 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. You know, working here you can’t be a mediocre person. You are a call to a higher standard of excellence and then as you’re called to that standard here, you begin to see those outcomes in every area of your life. That standard of excellence that you want to implement no matter what you’re involved in. I would like to describe the other people that work with Clay, are people that are going somewhere with their life. Marshall, in the group interview talks about how, you know, the best fits for this organization are the people that are goal-oriented. So they’re on their own trajectory, and we’re on our own trajectory. And the best fits are those people where there can be a mutually beneficial relationship that as we pursue our goals, and we help the business pursue those goals, the business helps us pursue our goals as well. And so I say people that are driven, people that want to make something of their lives, people that are goal oriented, they’re focused, and they’re committed to overcoming any adversity that may come their way. Clay’s passion for helping business owners grow their businesses is, it’s unique in that I don’t know if there’s anyone else that can be as passionate. You know, whenever a business starts working with Clay, it’s almost as like Clay is running that business in the sense that he has something at stake. You know, he’s just serving them. They’re one of his clients, but it’s as if he is actively involved in the business, whenever they have a win, he’s posting it all over his social media. He’s shouting it across the room here at Thrive. You know, he’s sending people encouraging messages. He can kind of be that life coach and business coach in terms of being that a motivator and that champion for people’s businesses. It’s again unique because there’s no one else I’ve seen get so excited about and passionate about other people’s businesses. The kind of people that wouldn’t like working with Clay are people that are satisfied with mediocrity, people that want to get through life by just doing enough, by just getting by, people who are not looking to develop themselves, people who are not coachable, people who think that they know it all and they’re unwilling to change. I would say those are the type of people, and in short, anyone that’s content with mediocrity would not like working with Clay. So if you’re meeting Clay for the first time, the advice I’d give you is definitely come ready to take tons of notes. Every time Clay 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 three or four months, just from being around Clay, following him, and learning from him. And then I would say come coachable. Be open to learning something new. Be open to challenging yourself. Be open to learning and adjusting parts about you Be open to learning and adjusting parts about you that need to be adjusted.