Entrepreneur | Developing a System for Retaining Quality People + Strengths and Weaknesses In The Workplace With Jack Nadel

Audio Transcription

Get ready to enter the Thrivetime Show! We started from the bottom, now we’re here. We started from the bottom and we’ll show you how to get here. We started from the bottom, now we’re here. We started from the bottom, now we’re here. We started from the bottom, now we’re on the top. Teaching you the systems to get what we got. Cullen Dixon’s on the hooks, I’ve written the books. He’s bringing some wisdom and the good looks. As the father of five, that’s where I’mma dive. So if you see my wife and kids, please tell them hi. It’s C and Z up on your radio. And now, 3, 2, 1, here we go. We started from the bottom, now we’re here. We started from the bottom, and that’s what we’ve gotta do. Phase number five of starting a business 101. We’re talking today about developing a system for recruiting, training, and retraining quality people. Clay? Well, I’ll tell you what. The quality of your people will ultimately be the biggest throttle on the growth of your business. Why is that? It’s like if you have a go-kart you drive as a kid, and maybe you go to these go-kart racetracks and they put a governor on it, they call it, or a limiter. Yes. It allows the go-kart to only go so fast. That’s how a business is if you don’t have skilled people. So at Thrive 15, we’re blessed to have some really talented people that we’ve recruited to work here. And therefore, if I want to get a graphic design piece done, or you want a downloadable, or you ask us a question, we can… We have people who are fast moving, fast thinking, hard working, they want to go. But if we had a bunch of people who are just mailing it in, we wouldn’t be able to do that. And so you want to have the best possible people available to execute your systems. Because if you have an A-level system, but C-level people, you’re ultimately not going to deliver that A-level quality of service that you want to deliver. Okay, that makes sense. And we’re going to have 10 steps on how to do this. And before I turn it over to you, I’m going to read one step, then I’m going to have you deep dive into that, Clay, and we’re going to go back and forth that way. But let’s begin with a notable quotable quote from Michael Gerber. He’s a best-selling author of the E-Myth book. Great book, everybody, E-Myth book, go get it, it’s going to change your life forever. He says this, the greatest business people I’ve met are determined to get it right no matter the cost. Specifically, get it right no matter the cost as it relates to HR. I have had to fire a lot of people over the years because they couldn’t get it right. Meaning, you and I, we have a Monday meeting every week you attend. We have 9 a.m. required ongoing education meetings. You’ve been here long enough to know there’s a few people who no longer work here, or some people you’ve seen, who can’t figure out what 9 means. Does 9 mean 9-10, 9-15, 9-30? And if it happens enough, you have to say it’s time to move on. Because you, as an owner, have to deliver for your customer. And if you can’t start your meeting on time, you can’t deliver what you promised, you can’t get things done, you’re ultimately taking money from people without exchanging value, which, aka, stealing. So it’s kind of a deal where like, if you’re taking money from the customer and you can’t deliver, I kind of get serious about it. And I go look, if I can’t get it right, I gotta move on. You have to. And so before you fire somebody, though, you wanna ask yourself two critical questions. Does the person know what to do? And if they don’t know what to do, it’s your fault, you gotta train them. And if they do know what to do, it’s do they want to do it? And if they don’t want to do it, you gotta ask yourself, am I motivating them? Because if you are, then good, you need to move on. If you’re not, then you need to make sure you’re motivating them. Because some people create a caustic work environment and it’s just negative. And so we’ve all worked at a job where there’s a negative work environment and you don’t want to be that guy or gal who creates a negative work environment where people don’t want to come to work because it’s so negative. And if we’re being real, I think the majority of people watching right now, there’s a stat I want you to put up on the screen, but Gallup did a research, G-A-L-L-U-P, Gallup did research to show, if you look up Gallup and disengaged employees, we’ll put it on the screen, they did studies that showed I think it was 71% of the workforce is disengaged at work. That’s huge. 71%. Meaning they do not like their job. So let’s just, we got to get into this and we’re going to teach you how to find the right people and how to systematically do it. But very, very important that you create a positive culture at the workplace. And we have extra trainings on how to do that. Awesome. Step number one, determine how much it is costing you per week to not have the right people working for you. Yeah. So how do you do that? Well, if you have a front desk person whose job is to answer the phone and convert those inbound calls into appointments, ask yourself how many deals are they not closing a week. Unfortunately, I dealt with a guy recently. He lives in China. He’s from China, and his business sucks. I feel horrible. I talked to the guy. No, it sucks. And he has great marketing. He’s getting all sorts of leads, but the person who’s answering the phone is terrible. They’re just awful. We actually mystery shopped them. We called. In my team, Thrive15, we have a team of people. We do this for people. But we mystery shopped. So we called his business and we recorded the calls. And the person on the phone was so awful that I don’t know anybody with a sound mind. That would hire them? That would buy the service. I mean, because you call and you’re calling, boop, boop, boop, boop, boop. Yeah, hey, I’m looking for a… And the people answer the phone, hello, thank you for calling, yadda, yadda. And you’re like, yeah, I was calling to find out more information about your blah, blah, blah, blah service. And they go, okay, it’s on the website. Well, I wanted to see if I could, you know, set an appointment. Probably couldn’t, I’m headed to lunch. No way. Seriously. So that’s the kind of stuff that you’re going to deal with if you’re not very careful. So you’ve got to make sure that step number one, very, very important step, is how much is it costing you? I mean, if you have a maintenance shop and people are screwing up and you have to redo every third car. Say you’re an auto maintenance shop and you have to… Literally I worked with a landscaping company and they had a guy who had a habit of throwing rocks through the windows of people’s homes using the weed eater. Get out. So he’s weeding. And you’re breaking glass everywhere. So he’s running around just racking up, just, he’s, every time he’s mowing a lawn, it’s like, what’s that sound? That almost sounded like the house went under or something. I mean, seriously, every time he went out to mow, the boss, I’m not kidding, he would be like, dude, yada yada’s gonna go mow today and I swear it’s gonna be a, and he’d get a text message like, hey dude, I don’t know how it happened, but I accidentally broke the deck on the, on the standup mower. He’s like, how do you break a deck? And he’s going, hey, I don’t know what happened, but the leaf blower, it’s burning. He’s like, how is it? No, I’m not kidding. He’s like, I didn’t know I needed to change the oil. The leaf blower created a fire. No, true story. And on his chainsaw, the chain kept coming off the thing because he wouldn’t lubricate it. This guy was just costing tons of money. So you want to ask yourself, first off, how much does it cost you? Put it in your notes section. How much does it cost you right now to not have good people working for you? Excellent. Step number two, determine the weekly job posting budget that you will stick to, stick with it. Yeah. What you want to do is you want to have a budget, a weekly budget you’re going to spend on job posting. I’m going to give you the four main sources I recommend you advertise. One is Indeed, Indeed, I-N-D-E-E-D. Indeed is a company where you pay basically per click. It’s a great way. It’s like a monster.com, but for a pay-per-click model. You pay per person who clicks the job post, you know, ad. Okay. Second is Craigslist. Obviously, it’s 2016. Next year, the data will change a little bit. But Craigslist is about $25 a week to post. When you post a job, it’s on Craigslist. People can look, find jobs, that kind of thing. The third is monster.com, a great resource, monster.com. Very, very nice. And the fourth one is bullhorn reach. Bullhorn reach. And it kind of works with LinkedIn and it helps promote jobs. But you need to make sure that you commit, hey, I’m going to spend $300 a week on posting for jobs or $400 a week or whatever. Because if you can’t fulfill, like for Elephant in the Room, we have more people that want a haircut than we have people. Wow. So we turn down right now, Jose, probably 65 to 100 haircuts a week. Are you serious? Yeah, because we don’t have enough people. So we just had the strategic meeting last week and we said, moving forward, we need to spend another probably 200 a week on posting for jobs because we just don’t have enough candidates right now. You know, we have chairs we’ve purchased, we’ve built out, we have the office, we have the decor, but we have empty chairs because we don’t have enough stylists and barbers who can keep up with the demand. So what does it cost you to not have the right people and how much you’re going to spend per week to promote those jobs. Step number three, create the perfect job description. Good news, we have a downloadable for you. Make sure you make note of that. We have a downloadable for the Thrivers. How do we get it? Email info at thrive15.com and we will send you the perfect job description. If you want a book to learn about how to do it, which is a great book, it’s called The Ultimate Sales Machine by Chet Holmes. And that book, The Ultimate Sales Machine by Chet Holmes, teaches you how to hire superstars, or you can get our template that we have available for you at info at thrive15.com. But the thing is, you have to write a job description that makes people want to work there. If it’s a job description that makes people not want to work there, they’re not going to… If you write something like, we’re hiring for a position that requires technical skill in the areas of welding. I mean, am I excited? But if you said it, such and such welding, we are literally helping transform the fabrication industry. We’re working on products for major companies, including ABC, 123. If you’re looking for more than just a job, you’re looking for a career, give us a call today. We’re looking for superstars like you. Boom. Then all of a sudden people want to do it. We have a Now Hiring video that’s sensational. We’ll send you the link too as a downloadable. We’ll send you the downloadable. It’s a job posting. It’s a video about the jobs. We use that for our companies and it works great to recruit top talent. Which is step number four, Clay. Create a recruitment video if possible. You want to do it because it’s going to let people know that you are professional and that you’ve gone through the time needed to describe what the culture is like. Credibility, man. Yeah, absolutely. And so we have a Now Hiring video that is sensational that we use and it works very, very well. And then this one, I know that you’re pretty passionate about it too. Step number five, create a recruitment email address. Do you mean like a Gmail, Yahoo, you mean? No, it can’t be at like Gmail because people are worried about working for a company that their boss is promoting to hire people using a Gmail account. A lot of people are doing this too. We’re saying, if you’re interested in the job, respond back to scott at yahoo.com. People are like, you mean scott at yahoo.com would be my boss? You mean the same Scott who hasn’t taken the time needed to get a domain-specific web address? So what you want to do, or email address, so your email should really be, your address like hr at thrive15.com or hr at johnny’sboots.com. The name of your business. Yeah, you wanna do that. You don’t wanna have like a Gmail or a Yahoo. Very, very important. Perfect, step number six, and you kinda highlighted this on step number two. It says this, determine which job posting platforms you will use each week. For example, i.e. Bullhorn Reach, Munster, Indeed, Craiglist, Staffing Company, et cetera. Yeah, I mean, a lot of times people, you might not have enough time to recruit good candidates. So maybe hiring a staffing company is actually for you a better choice. And a staffing company, you do pay, let’s say you hire someone for $10 an hour. With a staffing company, you have to end up paying about $14 an hour. But guess what? They recruited them. They found them. They’re saving you all the time and money you would lose by having to find people, interviews, job posting, the cost of the ads, background checks. So a lot of times those staffing companies are a great solution for a great many people. I know Dr. Zellner likes to use staffing companies, our CEO of Thrive 15. And I like to use them as well. So I know that the staffing companies are a great solution for a great many people. So look into it. Awesome. Step number seven, create your response email for job applicants. Don’t read resumes. This is controversial. When someone sends you the resume, I have an email that our team sends out and it’s a template. It’s the same every time. It says, hey boss, loved your resume, would love to schedule a time to meet you this week for an in-face interview, in-person interview. You know, hey boss, loved your, the email says, hey boss, I loved your email, or loved your resume, I’d like to schedule a time this week to meet for an in-person interview. We have this time or that time available which works best. The reason why you do that and I hate to say this Jose but you see it we have group interviews every Tuesday. Yeah. About 80% of the candidates that apply for the jobs here anywhere any business I mean I’ve seen this across the board nationwide coast to coast in in different countries. 80% of people who apply for a job literally do not show up on time for the interview. They can’t find the building. They are actually not who they said they were. And so you’re going to blow up the majority of candidates just the process of elimination system, but you don’t have to waste your time. You just have them all show up at the same time. Seriously. So if you’re a small business, have 18 people show up at the same time. And what we’ll do is we have this thing. We have two options. One is if enough people show up, you do a group interview. So you interview them all at the same time, asking them broad questions about their goals. And you’re just trying to see who’s the most hireable. Or B, you have you and your staff interview six people simultaneously. So six different rooms, and you’re interviewing them all. But you have to find a way to quickly hire people. And you can’t use all of your time in individual one-on-one interviews for people who aren’t going to show up. You can’t block off your three o’clock time slot to interview people, and then they don’t show up. It wastes your time. Step number eight, which is says, determine the time of the week for your weekly interviews. You have to have the same time every single week that you do weekly interviews. You’ve got to set up those boundaries. You have to have a set time. So you go every Tuesday at 5 o’clock, I’m going to do interviews, and every Thursday at 5 o’clock. There you go. Every Friday at 9. Whatever that time is, block that time off and revere that time. Don’t fill it with anything else but interviewing, because you need good people. Step number nine is decide whether a group interview is right for you. Yes, and we as group interviews, I don’t know who they’re not right for. I’ve seen this work for coders, web developers, roofers, staffing companies, photography companies, medical companies, haircut businesses, video companies, PR firms, construction companies. I have never seen it not work well, and we can walk you through how to do it effectively, but this is how you do the group interview. You say, hey everybody, welcome to tonight’s interview. There’s six of you here tonight, and what we do, we do things a little differently here. I’m going to ask you guys all three questions, and then what I’m going to do is I’m going to let you guys ask me any questions that you have, and then I’m going to explain all the compensation involved. So the first question I’m going to ask everybody is what are your goals? Second I’m going to ask you is what are you looking for out of a job? The perfect job. Three is I’m going to ask you what made you interested in this job. Then you can ask me any questions you want. It’s fine. Then I’m going to talk about compensation. And whichever one of you I feel like connects best with us, we will invite you back for a shadow day. It will be a day where you come to work and you will shadow our top people, our top guy, top gal, and then we can see if just culturally you fit in and if it’s a good fit. And I’m even willing to pay you for your first day of work even if we don’t hire you. Just want to see if it’s a good fit. And what it does is it streamlines that process. Now once somebody does well during their shadow, that’s when I do background checks and all that kind of stuff. But I just want to get them in to see if they fit in. That’s excellent. Yeah, man. And finally, this is how you get to hire great, quality people. You’ve got to script out your interview, step number 10. What do you mean? Do we have a template for this? How do you script that interview? We do have a downloadable template. We have that available. And feel free to email us at info at thrive15.com. We have that. And each company is going to have a little bit of a different interview outline. But the point is you’re asking them their goals, what they’re looking for from their next job, and what has them interested in this job. You want to know that. If someone doesn’t have any goals, it’s hard to motivate them. The second thing, though, is they need to be able to ask you any questions that they want to ask so that they feel there’s a comfort level. It’s a two-way conversation. Sure. And that final part there, guys, is you really, really at that point want to be very transparent about expectations and compensation. Because if someone doesn’t know how much they’re going to get paid, they might love the idea, but it’s hard to budget based off of no knowledge, right? True. I’m sure you’ve been to job interviews where people are vague about what you’re going to make, how much money you’re going to make. It’s unsettling. Oh, right. You’re like, I hate to be a jerk, but I start tomorrow. How much? They’re like, oh, you care about us, buddy. I mean, you have to know how much you’re going to make. We’ll pray about it. Oh, yeah. We live in the Bible Belt, so you get a lot of people saying, we are going to pray about it. But I’m just telling you, you really, really want to make sure that you know how much you’re going to be prepared to pay them. Yes. Well, there you have it. These are your 10 steps on how to develop a system for training and recruiting quality people. Like always, if you have any questions, you want to get a hold of our free downloadables, email us at info at thrive15.com or feel free to call us at 1-800-594-4457. We’re here to see you succeed. See ya. Boom! If I have an idea for a new product, I’m going to find a way of finding a sophisticated buyer. Jack, today we are talking about understand your strengths and weaknesses. And in your book, The Evolution of an Entrepreneur, you write, when you’re considering something new, it’s best to do a careful analysis of your strengths and weaknesses. And then look at the market’s opportunities and threats. This is called a SWOT analysis, the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. Jack, kind of break it down. Why is it so important for every business owner or potential business owner to know about their strengths and their weaknesses? Well because anything that you put in the market is going to take a certain amount of strength to do it. Whether it’s in purchasing inventory or in getting it out there or in It involves costs and it involves decisions. Now if the item happens to live within my strength category, I won’t hesitate if I think it’s a good product. And an example would be when they came out with the highlighter. I was manufacturing ballpoint pens but I decided I needed a highlighter and I Decided wow I can I can just find a way to put the highlighter on the back end of the pen boom It’s no big expense and I forget it. Yeah same business. I’m in and That’s what I’m gonna do. So what you do your strength is actually being in that business. So you know where the pitfalls are. You know where you’re commissioned, you know where you can hit it big and you just avoid the pitfalls. If I have a new product, I want to find somebody who is doing something that is very, very close to what I’m planning to do and I want to see how he’s doing it and how his results are and who he’s selling it to and how he’s cranked the market. Okay. You want to know your strengths and your weaknesses and in your book, you wrote this here, you said when starting out in business I had limited time and limited funds. My selling skills were great, but my detail skills were and still are terrible. Now that was written a while back, so I’m sure you have great detail skills now. No. So what were you, what was it, so you’re saying you were great at sales, but weak at details? I was great at sales, but the act of accumulating, categorizing, and putting information in its right place is not one of my strong suits. But there are many, many, many, many, many people out there who do have those skills and are available for hire. The strength that I have, I feel, is very hard to duplicate. I’m a marketer and I’m a seller. I understand selling and selling to me is a science and I’m good at it. So that’s what I’m going to do and find out first if I have an idea for a new product, I’m going to find a way of getting a sample. I’m going to find a way of finding a sophisticated buyer and the way I sell it is I test it is to try to sell it if I’m successful I go on from there. You test it by trying to sell it? Yes, sir Boom that is I hear that from more and more, you know top entrepreneurs all the time I mean, it seems totally counter to what’s being taught on most on most campuses Well, it seems like this, it seems… There are two things. One is a matter of opinion, another is a matter of practice, and another is a matter of results. I find someone asks me, how do you train somebody to sell? I say, you take them out to sell. The only way. When I first started my company I would take each individual that I hired and I would personally do the training. Okay. And I would do it cold, what we used to call cold turkey. Oh wow. You know, you go in this building, you go in this door, you never met the guy before, now sell him. Really? Yeah. Wow, that’s kind of a sink or swim method, huh? It’s, it’s, it’s, uh, I guess it’s the, it’s the tough, it’s the tough guy’s approach, but it works. So what action items should all the Thrivers take as a result of knowing their strengths and weaknesses? Should they get a sheet of paper and write down all their strengths and weaknesses? Or what should we do? They could, whatever that means of keeping scores up to them, I can’t tell them that. I think they should simply put their effort into the place where they have their greatest strengths. And my greatest strength, and I find that there’s no rules. See, this is the interesting part of it. There are no rules. I was manufacturing ballpoint pens in the United States. And I was thinking of spreading into Europe. And what I did was, first of all, I went to several European trade shows. I exchanged conversation with people who were in the business. I showed them what I had to sell and then I spent some time privately with other people that were in my business and I just asked them like you’re interviewing me. Yeah. I asked them questions and I get rid of the the giant mountains like for example my business is built on communication. Best thing I can do is I know how to stand up in front of a group and communicate with them. This is extraordinarily important. But the first thing I want to find out is what’s the problem? So I would visit individually, I visited a half a dozen people in my business, told them I lived in Los Angeles and I was going to open up a new service in Europe that’s similar to the way we do it in the United States. I think it could be very helpful to them. And I found out what they thought about it. Well, the first guy and the second guy and the third guy, because one of my ideas was I would have a universal sales meeting. Like I would have a sales meeting in France, but I would invite every distributor in France to the sales meeting. And I’d say, it won’t work here because they don’t like each other. I said, I never saw anybody argue with this pocketbook. I said, let’s try it. So I put together a sales meeting, I got a room together, all competitors, all theoretically didn’t like each other. It was great. It was great. It worked like a charm. And they did. And it worked for them. Sometimes while you’re out there, you realize you need something else. There must be an ingredient that’s added to it. So you have to think of that. So being both a manufacturer, a distributor, and a seller, I was able to really get through the tough parts and say here’s what I really have to know. And I knew, for example, that my universal sales meeting worked in Europe. Actually worked, even though everybody said it wouldn’t. It did. It did. It actually worked. But I knew also that I could address these people and see what is missing. Okay. And what is missing. So I would say, oh gee, I know what I need here. Yeah. I don’t need an ordinary pen, I need a name brand. Now where am I going to find a name brand? I was doing a lot of business with Schaefer in Ohio. What was Schaefer? Pen Company. Pen Company in Ohio. Schaefer very well owned Pen Company at the time. Anyway, they had one pen that we were doing a big business with. They were not doing any business in Europe and I got the exclusive for it. Wow. And I, wow, I just killed them. I really, really, really a home run. But it was, it did so well that three years later I was out of a contract. Now I had all these customers and I didn’t have my Schaefer. No! So I said, well, what other name brands are there? And suddenly I realized, I’m manufacturing in France. Why don’t I get a French designer? And I did. And I started negotiations with Pierre Cardin. And in six months, I had to deal with him. So you’re really good about knowing, I mean, you went in knowing, hey, your strength is going to be sales. My strength is going to be sales, and the market is going to tell me what I need. Okay, and then your weaknesses were, you know, all the detailed work, keeping track, so you hired people to do that for you. That’s correct. And that freed you up to do what you do best. That’s right. So anybody watching this, if you’re going, I am really awesome at details, but I’m terrible at sales. We got to find a way to switch it around maybe you focus on the details that someone else do the sales or vice versa or whatever your strength and weakness is. We have to know that and play to your strength right? Always, always play to your strength because I could go out and sell a deal. Yeah. But I needed someone to put all the numbers I could understand them, but I do, if I say, to use the word, suffer, I use it loosely without a college education, so no one ever showed me how to do that. So I’m talking to a group and someone says, I want to go into the export business, but I don’t know how to fill an export form. I said, see, I’ve been in the export business 30 years, and I’ve never seen an export form. You knew how to focus on your strengths and avoid the weaknesses. You didn’t spend your whole day filling out paperwork and stuff that makes you crazy. That’s correct. So, Jack, I appreciate you sharing this, because for the thrivers who don’t know, your book, The Evolution of an Entrepreneur, is an unbelievable book with just endless nuggets of knowledge, over 70 years of entrepreneurial experience. Thank you. Thank you for bringing the clarity, my friend, and again, thank you for being here today. Well, it was a pleasure, and as I say, I wrote the book so that all practical, real knowledge. The difference between me and most other people is there’s no theory in my book. Amen It’s all fact. Yes, it’s all happened and it happened to me These are the best kind not it’s my strong bias, but that’s the only books that should be written. I think person Thank you so much. Thank you. All right JT. So hypothetically in your mind, what is the purpose of having a business? To get you to your goals. So it’s a vehicle to get you to your destination. And would you need profits to get there? I mean, when you have a business that’s successful, in your expert opinion, would you need profits to get you to your goals? Yeah, because if you have a $15 million business, but you have $15 million 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, I don’t know, 10 minutes or less and see if you could save $3,000 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 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 three thousand dollars 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 10 minutes and they’re like nah that’s not worth my time There’s probably some someone out there. Okay. I 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 thrive. Time should I come forward slash credit dash hard because you can compare rates, you can save money. And, you know, the big 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. JTs are 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! Let me tell you a good story here real quick. 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 if I was skeptical. I just thought, whatever, I’ll take ten 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 case, my particular case, I save over $20,000 a year. Holy crap! Wow. Which is, you know, like groceries when my wife goes to the organic stores. Did you find everything you need today? Yeah. Great. Okay. Oh, God. No. 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, 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 Rod. We have a name of the clock. It’s an elegant from Ridgeway. It’s from Ridgeway Let Let’s Buy the clock and sell the fireplace I encourage everybody out there go to thrive time should I come 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 10 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, 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 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, okay. I just want to let you know what type of accomplishment this is. Our competition, Orkin, Terminix, 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 the listening and 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 Pessimon 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 percent over last year. Wait, say that again. How much are we up? 411 percent. Okay, so 411 percent we’re 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 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 that when 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 and doing those and that system 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 with our business and we were in a rut and we didn’t know okay 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. You know, they implemented those systems, that 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 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 are looking for. I went to the University of Oklahoma College of Industry 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 ten thousand or more people show up to some of these tours on the day-to-day he does anywhere from uh… about a hundred and sixty companies he’s at the top he has a team of uh… business coaches videographers and graphic designers and web developers and they run a hundred and sixty 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 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 of 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, 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 impressive thing was 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. 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. 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 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’ve grossed 13 grand for the whole month Right now in 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 today interactive business workshops are the highest and most reviewed business workshops on the planet. You can learn the proven 13 point business systems that Dr. Zellner and I have used over and over to start and grow successful companies. When we get into the specifics, the specific steps on what you need to do to optimize your website. We’re gonna teach you how to fix your conversion rate. We’re gonna 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, 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 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. Okay, so clay it’s it’s it’s like I would go up and down from About ten thousand dollars a month up to about forty thousand was up and down rollercoaster and so now We we’ve got it to where we’re in excess of a hundred clients That’s awesome And so I would have anywhere from five clients to twenty 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, 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 have doubled in revenue Every year it’s a hundred percent growth Every year I’ve worked now, so 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 yeah, I mean that’s 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 when it needed a system. So creating a system is you have nailed down Specific steps that you’re going to take no matter how you feel no matter the results you lean into them and you do them Regardless of what’s happening you lean into them and it will give you X number of leads you follow up with those leads 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 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. make two to three hundred calls a day per rep. And she’s been nailing down five and eight appointments a day on that 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, or 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 even 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. Oh, there it was! It was Victory Christian Center. I was speaking there. My name is Robert Redman. I actually first met Clay almost three years ago to the day. I don’t know if he remembers it or not, but I wasn’t working with him at the time. I asked to see him and just ask him some questions to help 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 don’t learn 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 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 wanna 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. 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 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, 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.