Sharone Lechter | The Co-Author of Rich Dad Poor Dad Shares Why You Can’t Delegate Your Financials + “It will completely change your mindset. It will change your life.” – Rachel Wimpey + Celebrating the TipTopK9.com Success Story

Audio Transcription

Hey, I’m Ryan Wimpey. I’m originally from Tulsa, born and raised here. I’ve definitely learned a lot about life design and making sure the business serves you. The linear workflow, the linear workflow for us in getting everything out on paper and documented is really important. We have workflows that are kind of all over the place. Having linear workflow and seeing that mapped out on multiple different boards is pretty awesome. That’s really helpful for me. The atmosphere here is awesome. I definitely just stared at the walls figuring out how to make my facility look like this place. This place rocks. It’s invigorating. The walls are super, it’s just very cool. The atmosphere is cool. The people are nice. It’s a pretty cool place to be. Very good learning atmosphere. I literally want to model it and steal everything that’s here at this facility and basically create it just on our business side. Play is hilarious. I literally laughed so hard that I started having tears yesterday. And we’ve been learning a lot, which, you know, we’ve been sitting here, we’ve been learning a lot, and so the humor definitely helps. It breaks it up. But the content is awesome, off the charts, and it’s very interactive. You can raise your hand. It’s not like you’re just listening to the professor speak. The wizard teaches, but the wizard interacts and he takes questions, so that’s awesome. If you’re not attending the conference, you’re missing about three quarters to half of your life. You’re definitely, it’s probably worth a couple thousand dollars. So you’re missing the thought process of someone that’s already started like nine profitable businesses. So not only is it a lot of good information but just getting in the thought process of Clay Clark or Dr. Zellner or any of the other coaches, getting in the thought process of how they’re starting all these businesses, to me just that is priceless. That’s money. Well we’re definitely not getting upsold here. My wife and I have attended conferences where they upsold, where it was great information and then they upsold us like half the conference, and I want to like bang my head into a wall, and she’s like banging her head into the chair in front of her. Like, it’s good information, but we’re like, oh my gosh, I want to strangle you. Shut up and go with the presentation that we paid for. And that’s not here. There’s no upsells or anything, so that’s awesome. I hate that. Oh, that makes me angry. So, glad that’s not happening. So the cost of this conference is quite a bit cheaper than business college. I went to a small private liberal arts college and got a degree in business and I didn’t learn anything like they’re teaching here. I didn’t learn linear workflows. I learned stuff that I’m not using and I haven’t been using for the last nine years. So what they’re teaching here is actually way better than what I got at business school and I went what was actually ranked as a very good business school. I would definitely recommend that people would check out the Thrive 15 conference. The information that you’re gonna get is just very, very beneficial. And the mindset that you’re gonna get, that you’re gonna leave with, is just absolutely worth the price of a little bit of money and a few days worth of your time. Get ready to enter the Thrive Time Show. ♪ We started from the bottom now we hit it ♪ ♪ We started from the bottom and we’ll show you how to get it We started from the bottom, now we hit it We started from the bottom, now we hit it We started from the bottom, now we’re on the top Teaching you the systems to get what we got Cousin Dixon’s on the hooks, I bring down the books He’s bringing some wisdom and the good looks As the father of five, that’s where I’mma dive So if you see my wife and kids, please tell them 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 hit it. We started from the bottom, and that’s what we gotta get. Two men, 13 multimillion dollar businesses, eight kids, one business coach radio show. It’s the Thrive Time show on your radio and podcast download. radio and podcast download. Now, Chup, as a business coach, you and I have both worked with a lot of top-level, high-flying entrepreneurs. We’ve also worked with a lot of entrepreneurs that come to us slightly broken. They’re a little bit down, and we’ve helped repair them and helped them get into a level of success. Stitches and band-aids and things, yeah. But one of the things people always want to talk about is marketing and branding and sales. But people never want to talk about accounting and bookkeeping. They want to talk about the holy triumvirate. Marketing, branding, sales. They love that. Feelings and visions and new deals and growth and build-outs. But no one ever wants to talk about financials. They always want to delegate that. But yet, every single successful entrepreneur I’ve ever met really has a fundamental grasp of the financial aspects of the business. And so on today’s show, we’re interviewing a certified public accountant. Check. We’re interviewing a New York Times bestselling author. Check. We’re interviewing the CEO of the Rich Dad Poor Dad organization. Check. We’re interviewing somebody who worked with Robert Kiyosaki to write the 14 books of the Rich Dad Poor Dad series? Check. We’re talking about the lady who took his idea, which was on a piece of paper to make a board game, Robert Kiyosaki’s idea to make a board game, and turned it into a book empire. Check. We’re talking about a lady who was asked by the National CPA, Financial Literacy Commission, to serve as their national spokesperson. Oh, by the way, this is the same council that served both President Bush and President Obama. Check. This is a lady who has a team of over 5,000 people who help her with her various entrepreneurial projects. 5,000, that’s a lot. Check. Ladies and gentlemen, we have a person here who’s written Napoleon Hill’s or she helped recraft Napoleon Hill’s book, Outwitting the Devil. You see, Napoleon Hill wrote a book, the manuscript for Outwitting the Devil in the 1930s. But when the best-selling self-help author of all time went to release it, his wife told him not to because she thought it was too controversial. And so years later, Sharon Lecter revived the manuscript and helped her release Outwitting the Devil? Check! She also helped to write Think and Grow Rich for Women? Check! She also helped to release the Napoleon Hill book Three Feet from Gold? Check! Ladies and gentlemen, our next guest is bona fide. She’s an unbelievable author, a dynamic speaker, a top-level entrepreneur, which indicates that she does not know who I am, because if she did, she would not have agreed to be on today’s show. So ladies and gentlemen, without any further ado, our exclusive interview is Sharon Lecter, and she’s teaching you why you just cannot delegate your financials. Now, as far as the financials, look at the numbers. Sharon, very few entrepreneurs, I mean, we have a ton of people that attend our workshops. When they come to the workshops, and Dr. Z, you’ve seen this, people want to talk about marketing, oh, the vision, sales, and then they want to go back to talking about the vision, marketing, and then sales. Then Sharon, sometimes they’ll go back to the vision, then back to sales, then back to marketing. And yet, but you have to know your numbers. And I’ve heard you talk at length about this, but I’d like for you to share with the listeners about why you can’t abdicate your financials and why you can delegate them to a certain extent, but why you as the owner of the company have to be aware of what is going on financially. Can you coach us? Certainly. And I can’t agree with you more. You do a webinar or a seminar on sales and you sell out. You do a webinar or a seminar on understanding your financials and it’s hard to get people in their seats because it doesn’t sound exciting. But at the end of the day, your numbers tell a story and you’re creating that story. And so if your story isn’t going the way you want it to go, the sooner you know about it, the better. And so it’s very important for entrepreneurs. And sometimes, you can’t be the one doing the numbers because you want to focus on growing your business, but you need to make sure you have the right people on your team. But you always need to know your numbers, and you need to have a dashboard or something so that you’re constantly on it. As I sit at my desk right now speaking to you, I have my accountants outside working on some things for me. They know that I need to, you know, at any given time, I know what kind of accounts I have. I know what kind of money I have just because of my years of experience. But as a CPA, that’s obviously important to me, but it’s more important to me as a CEO. If you own your company, if you don’t know what the numbers are telling you, then you can get a very rude surprise, and it’s very important for people to understand the importance of understanding the income statement, which is telling you over a period of time how you’re doing it, and then also to understand your balance sheet, which tells you basically like a snapshot of a day in time, showing you what your assets and liabilities are and how those two play together are very important. Sharon, I see, it’s painful for me to see it. And as a coach, and I write for Forbes, and so I have a certain platform. But you have one of the biggest platforms in the world. So I’d like for you to maybe give the tough lesson to the entrepreneurs out there listening who are saying, yeah, I know accounting. I know I need to know my balance sheet. And I know I need to know the income statement. But I don’t, because my accountant handles that. Could you give us the tough love for somebody out there who is refusing to know their numbers? I’m sure you’ve met people like this before. Well, they know the stat of the number of businesses fail in the first three years, and the primary reason they fail is lack of capital, lack of funding, and lack of financial management. And what happens is, you know, those entrepreneurs that fall into that category play are the ones who put their head in the sand. And they think that if they just drive faster and they make more sales, everything’s going to be okay. The issue is unless you understand the whole picture and you understand what your margins are, understand what the bottom line is, you can’t really grow your business. And people that are losing the nickel on something say, if I can just sell more of them, I’ll be okay. No, you’re just going to lose that much more money. You have to understand the cash flow of your business. And more importantly, you need to understand the timing of your cash flow. And so it’s not just understanding that you’re selling a lot, but you need to understand when that money is coming in and when you have to spend money in order to make the product. So let’s say you sell a million dollars’ worth of product. Well, you have to have that product in your inventory or you have to have the money to build it so that you can collect a million dollars. And so you probably need a lot of that cash up front. And so what happens is business owners who don’t pay attention to that end up having to go to very expensive money factoring those receivables to be able to pay for the inventory. And they get themselves further into debt, further into problems. And instead of feeling good about being successful, that success costs them their business because they have not paid attention to the numbers, to the cash flow, and the timing of that cash flow. You know, our show, we’re all about teaching listeners specific action steps they can take, and so I want to take a second to brag on a listener that’s actually doing this properly, but Aaron, who I mentioned earlier with Shaw Homes, one of the things that gives them an unfair advantage over their competition is that they know the costs of the materials. So like when the cost of plywood went up drastically recently, Sharon, they know that. And so they were able to quote the clients accurately and they don’t get to the end of the, when you finish the home, you know, you close on the home, the new buyer moves into the home. They don’t have to tell the buyer, oops, it’s going to cost more money and they don’t run out of cash. So I’d like for you to put on a little mini seminar here about what we need to know about cash flow, because Shaw Homes knows cash flow, they know their expenses, that’s why they can quote people a price and honor it. But their competition, I mean, if you go online and read the Google reviews, there are so many reviews by customers complaining about the bait and switch move. I don’t think people are, the other builders are dishonest as much as they just don’t know their numbers. Can you talk to us about cash flow and just kind of cash flow 101. What do we all need to know? Well, Aaron’s business is a perfect example of the timing of cash flow that I just mentioned because it doesn’t you don’t build a house overnight and so they have to have the financing to get that house done knowing that the payoff is in the future and when that payoff comes in hopefully it’s going to have not only pay off their expenses, but give them the profit on top of it. And those expenses include all those materials you’re talking about, but even more so, the labor of all the people on their team. And so just as in, when I talk about cash flow, I want to take a minute about materials. So we talk about just-in-time ordering. So when they’re building that house, they can’t put plumbing in until they have the plumbing in before they can pour the concrete over it. Those things have to come in. There’s a stage in which you have things done. You can’t have the roofers waiting to put the roof on when it’s not ready for them. Each stage of process of building a home has to be timed appropriately so that you have the minimum cost of labor for the people and technicians doing their job. And that has to be perfectly timed. And so that takes talent, that takes people who know what they’re doing. But it also, underlying, takes that expert and that individual understanding what every minute of that costs them. So when they have a delay or they have products not, you know, the lumber isn’t there, they have a week delay on lumber, they have to recalculate and find out what that’s going to cost them to make sure they’re always working to their budget to make sure they have the profit that they’re expecting at the end of the day. You know, people, we talk about remodels as a homeowner, all right? You always say it’s always going to take another, you know, several months past what they promise. It’s a guarantee, and it’s going to cost you more than what you originally commit to, because you’re going to have surprises. And that’s something that can be very painful, but that’s those unexpected things. Every business has unexpected things. The issue is, the sooner you find out about them, the sooner you can plan and recover. And that’s all about cash flow. And cash flow comes with, from the moment you start your business, one of the things that can kill you is that you think you have sales and the sales are there but you don’t have the, it’s going to take you 69 days to collect on those sales. Well, you have to have the cash to be able to build the product as I said earlier. What happens when all of a sudden you’re hugely successful and you have a huge order that comes in and you don’t have the ability to respond to that order. Your business can crumble. And that’s why it’s so important to always have a pulse on your cash flow, not just your income and expenses, but also the cash flow, which is the timing of that. That’s why when Fortune 500 companies, they do an income statement, a balance sheet, and a cash flow statement, so that you can see what’s happening within the business. Because the assets could go up because they’ve got outdated inventory. You know that when you start looking at the cash flow statements. Now, one of the things that you have created that was powerful for me as a young whippersnapper, Sharon, the year would be 1999, I believe. This is maybe what, because you wrote the book in 95. Is that correct? You and Robert came out with the book in 95? We published it in April of 97. 97, okay, so the year is 1999. Dr. Zellner can vouch for me here. I dressed like Eminem. I had no idea what I was doing. Sharon, I went on to build the largest wedding entertainment company in the country called DJConnection.com, and we did 4,000 events per year at the peak before I sold it. But I’m there working in a call center, and I’m reading this book, the Rich Dad Poor Dad book, and at some point you’re talking about this cash flow quadrant concept. And I’m not sure how refined it was at that point. It was probably 2001 when I really started paying attention to the book and really understanding it. So it’s 2001, so I might have even read The Cash Flow Quadrant. But you talked about there’s this quadrant. And you said to me directly like it was yesterday. You said, Clay, you start off as an employee, step one. I’m going, oh, that’s good, that’s good. Step two, you become self-employed. You own your job. And I’m going, yeah, that’s awesome. Step three, you own a business where other people work at the business. It creates jobs for others and time freedom for you. And then step four, you become an investor. And I realized I am an employee and I can’t afford to become self-employed yet. I now must get three jobs. So I worked at Target, Applebee’s and DirecTV. My wife worked at Office Depot and Oral Roberts University. I turned off my air conditioning, Ms. Sharon. You caused me to turn off my air conditioning. It is your fault and your credit. So it was very hot in Oklahoma in June and July. We had no air conditioning. It was hot. And I’m reinvesting in myself, but I didn’t quit my day job until I could afford to become self-employed. Can you walk us through those four steps about being an employee and when it’s time to make the jump to become self-employed and what it looks like to become a business owner. Just walk us through your cash flow quadrant. Well, the cash flow quadrant, if you imagine just across the top left corner is E for employee, the bottom left is S for self-employed. And so that left side of the quadrant, that’s what school teaches us. You know, that’s how we are taught. And that’s exchanging your time for money as an employee or self-employed individual or even a small business owner who really owns a job not a business. The right side of the quadrant, the top right corner, is B for business and that’s where you have systems, you have other people working for you, and the real test of whether you’re an S or B, as a B you own a business. If you walked away and came back in six months it would still be operating, it’s not dependent on you being there. So you totally own an asset, and that asset is the business, and the business is being run by systems and people. And then you have investor as a bottom right, and investor is where your money is working for you, whether you’re invested in real estate or in the stock market or in IRAs, whatever that is, that’s your money working for you. So your personal business is your personal financial statement. When you put money into your asset column, they’re like employees working for you. Those are your investments. And you want every wealthy person in the world has one thing in common. They own investments. They own assets, and those assets work for them. So on the right side of the quadrant, school doesn’t teach us how to be business owners. School doesn’t teach us how to be investors. We learn that through the real-world education or through the world of hard knocks. And so, as I sit here today on this phone call, I live in all four quadrants. The vast majority of my income comes as an investor and a business owner. But I’m still an employee of my own corporation. I still am self-employed. When I go out and speak, I get a speaker’s fee. And that’s the left side of the quadrant. But I want more and more of my income to come from the right side, because that’s not me working for money, it’s my assets working for money, business owners and investors. And so you don’t have to be an only one, you want to be. Everyone wants to have money as investors that are working for you, and have a business owner. And if you own real estate, that’s a business. You are in the business of real estate. So all of those things work together. And your ability to earn money on the left side as an employee or a self-employed person is finite. You only have so many hours, so many days in a week. However, on the right side, as a business owner and as an investor, your ability to make money is infinite. I think a lot of people get stuck there in that self-employed area where their ability to earn is limited. It is finite. They get stuck there. Why do people get stuck there, Sharon? You’ve helped people get unstuck in that area. What’s that doom loop where people are stuck in that self-employed area? Well, I think a lot of times you start getting so busy working in your business, you forget to work on your business. People feel like they have to do everything on their own. They don’t bring in the talent to help them grow their business. I mean, in order to be able to go from a small business to a big business, you have to have systems. And when you do everything yourself, it’s going to be hard to grow, and nobody’s going to ever be doing it exactly the way you want to, but if you create the systems, obviously we can think of the most perfect example, McDonald’s everywhere. The owner is not there, it’s run by teenagers, and it’s done that because the systems are so ironclad that all that somebody has to do is follow the systems. And that’s the ideal of going from a small business to a big business. A big business has systems, and you manage the systems, not necessarily the people. And you have people working for you, your systems are working for you, other people’s money. And that’s what really gets you out of a small business to a large business. Now maybe as a small business you’re a doctor or you’re a lawyer, so how do you do that? Well, you hire other doctors or other lawyers, and you start building a practice around it so that you have the ability to earn, have systems on how the operations are being handled and other people, and you make a percentage off the other doctors and lawyers. You’re taking the overhead and your ability to grow and leverage. In order to, you know, you might have a very successful small business, but a successful small business can only scale and therefore be sustainable if it has systems. I feel like the systems involve checklists, processes, workflows, and sharing their things. They’re so boring. I mean, they’re not vision, they’re not sales, they’re not marketing. I mean, the systems thing, I’m kind of a sick freak in that I actually enjoy making systems because I like the result, and I think I also just like the process of making systems. But I think a lot of people get stuck in that rat race and they’re not even looking for a way out. Why do you feel like a lot of people get stuck and they’re not even, I mean, before, I think people will come up to you at a seminar, they’re 45 years old, and they’ve been stuck in the rat race for 20 years and then it just occurred to them for the first time at your seminar that it is possible to get out of the rat race? Why do you think people don’t even try to get out of the rat race? Is it just they don’t know or they’re overwhelmed? You’ve seen it probably more up close than I have. Why do you think a lot of people get stuck in that rat race? Well, sometimes we get in a world of comfort and that comfort turns into complacency. And even though we’re not where we want to be, we’re able to pay our bills and we can put our head on the pillow at night. And we end up just getting too comfortable. And what happens is a lot of times we have a crisis and we get thrown into chaos and we end up having to become creative again and that gives us the ability to have a bigger vision. And that, you know, the whole concept of understanding what’s possible. And I think, you know, a huge issue is your environment. Are you hanging out with other people that are in that same category, people who are just getting by, people who are on the rat race? And if that’s the environment you’re putting yourself in, then it seems normal, right? If you want to get out of that environment, then you need to put yourself in an environment with people who are really striving for success, because they can help you. And most of the time, school certainly teaches us to do it on our own. And so we come out in the business world, and we think we have to do everything on our own. And it’s so important that we realize that you have the right people around you, the right team, the right peer network. We have the opportunity to really grow more quickly. The right mentor. Mentors are priceless, because they’ve been successful where you want to go. And they can help speed your way to success by opening doors, steering you around the pitfalls. And there’s a difference between a mentor and a coach. A coach may not have that success, but they know what you want to do and they can help you be accountable and make sure you stay on track. Oh Thrive Nation, we just had Sharon Lecter on the show. How is it possible, Chop? It was a Sharon Lecter lecture. I was nervous. So good. I was nervous. Yeah, well you should be. Sharon, do you remember when you wrote Rich Dad Poor Dad? That was pretty cool. I mean, I was, I’m just telling you, she is such a great lady, kind lady, and she’s agreed to be with us on six separate shows, which is so exciting. And so on our next interview with Sharon Lecter, we’re going to ask her about why college is probably not the right move for most people. We’re going to ask Sharon, you know, why do you feel that college may not be the right option for many people? And so she’s going to question the great religion of college, which I know is heresy to many people. You can question people’s religion, you can question their politics, you could question a lot of things, but you cannot question. I think questioning, even asking the question whether you should go to college or not, I think asking that question to some people saying, should I go to college or not, is a lot like getting a kiosk at the mall and setting up a nice beautiful… Chip, can you grab my megaphone over there by the man sink? It’s like setting up a kiosk. Imagine this, Thrive Nation. Imagine you’re at a mall, a local mall area there, where there’s a lot of stores there. There’s Victoria’s Secret, there’s Bath and Body, there’s Champs, there’s a Foot Locker, there’s an Orange Julius, there’s a Chick-fil-A. The standard American mall. Imagine that you set up a kiosk just outside of the food court and you play this game. play this game. I’m not getting a lot of feedback from you. I’m going to say that you weigh 152. Still a little bit high. Okay, all right. Not getting a lot of it. Ma’am, where did you go? Ma’am, what happened to you? Sir, sir, all right. We’re going to play the IQ guessing game here, folks. Sir, you look like your IQ is a 7. I don’t know. Okay. You don’t want to guess. You can’t go over. The price is right. You can’t go over. Is it 50? Okay, we’ll go back to the weight guessing. But, ma’am, ma’am, you back there, you look like… Folks, let me guess your age. Let me guess your age. Ma’am, you look like you’re 47. 22? No way! Wow, you drink? All right, ladies and gentlemen. All right, now, go. Go step right up here. I’ll guess your weight. I’ll guess your age. I’ll guess your IQ. It all is happening here. All we got to do is just walk by. I’ll guess. If you don’t win, you can just keep on walking. That’s not going to go up in the world, Chuck. No, it’s not going to get you very far. Because I have a megaphone available at all times in the Man Cave, we were able to imitate that scenario with perfect quality. It’s funny how many times you’ve said that. Hey Chuck, grab my megaphone, would you? Alright so Thrive Nation, stay tuned as Sharon Lechter on our next episode here, asks the question, is college right for you? And as always, without any further ado, three, two, one, boom. Boom. Boom. Boom. company. Many of you have a business that has struggled. Maybe you’ve had a business that you’ve just, for whatever reason, have never been able to get over the hump. Maybe you’ve always been just kind of stuck in a rut and that’s become your normal. Maybe you went from the goal you were. You used to have a goal to thrive and now your goal is just to survive. Well, to build your faith and to build your encouragement that you have the mental capacity and the tenacity needed to succeed. I thought I would get one of our younger success stories on the Thrive Time show so you can talk to an entrepreneur who I don’t believe is yet 30 years old but yet is still achieving massive success. Stephanie, welcome on to the Thrive Time show. How are you? Good, Clay. Thank you. So, Stephanie, where’s home for you? I live in rural western Wisconsin, so Sparta, Wisconsin. And how did you originally hear about the Thrive Time Show business consulting program? I heard about you guys actually through Entrepreneurs on Fire. You did an interview with J.D. over there. And do you remember where you were when you first heard that show? I was cleaning a house, actually. Well, you were cleaning a house in Wisconsin, and from the time that you… I remember the exact house. Yep. So from the time that you decided to get up the courage needed to schedule a call until now, how much have you grown? Since then, let’s see, 1,462%. 1,462%. And what kind of a timeframe has that been, the time that you reached out to now? Yep. I reached out, we started working together in March of 2020. It is October, end of October 2021. So, you know, year and a half. Wow. Okay. So, we’ve done a lot together and many things you’ve done very, very well. And so I thought I’d do on today’s show is I’m going to bring up the things that you’ve been able to implement that we’ve taught you. And I’d love to get your take on how you’ve been able to implement these. I’m going to go through 10 core systems that I believe you’ve been able to implement well, and I’d like to get your take on it. First off, you were not resistant to the idea of upgrading your branding. You were not resistant to the idea of upgrading your website, print pieces. You actually leaned in and you wanted to get it done and get it done quickly. Talk to the listeners out there about how having an upgraded website has helped you. Yeah, the just overwhelming professionalism that people get from visiting our website just really blows them away to make them like realize that we are professional and that we stand apart from everybody else in the area. So the website was key. I also think one thing that a lot of clients probably get stuck on as being like too nitpicky about things and just like wanting it perfect as opposed to wanting it done. So I think the biggest thing is get it done. We can always change things later, but it’s better to have an awesome website than a perfect website like right now, you know. Now, step two, we optimized your website. A lot of people have great websites that look wonderful, but they’re not canonically compliant. They’re not indexable. They’re not searchable. So therefore humans on the planet earth who are using search engines can’t find them. Again, you didn’t push back. You leaned into it. Talk to the listeners out there about how optimizing your website has helped increase your leads. Oh, definitely. So Google leads are, like, huge for us and people finding our website are huge. So writing the content articles, making sure those keywords are showing up. We’re showing up when people search, you know, house cleaning, whatever, they’re searching, whatever search terms we’re trying to show up for. So that’s huge. And of course, the review side of things is huge too for pointing people towards our website. Okay, you jumped ahead on my little cheat sheet here, but step three, gathering objective reviews. You guys have done a great job of gathering objective reviews from your happy clients. Talk to the listeners out there about the importance of gathering objective Google reviews from your happy clients. Oh, it’s so important. Like when I started working with Thrive, I definitely didn’t think like I needed to focus on that. I think I had 12 Google reviews, uh, when we started working together. And now between the two locations, we have, I think like 210 or something like that, like five-star reviews, all real. Um, and when people find us, I mean, it’s not even a, how much do you cost? It’s when, when can you come? I don’t care how much you cost. So people are ready to close like that. Now, step four is building a transparent and easy to understand sales system. You know, a pricing structure where somebody who maybe is not the most complicated individual, somebody who’s very simple like me could understand your pricing real quickly. Again, you’ve leaned in on that. You’ve been great to work with. Talk to the listeners about the importance of having a simple to understand pricing structure that your ideal and likely buyer can understand immediately. You just want them to not be confused. They’re like, why is this like this or whatever? And also from the like inside perspective of the managers or whoever is answering your phone, they need to be able to quickly answer questions and stuff without having a lot of training. So it needs to be able to be in like the sales script when they’re doing a call that they can just very quickly know what the numbers are and not have to be complex about it. Now, step five is implementing sales scripting. You have done a great job of implementing sales scripting and so many entrepreneurs, I’m telling you, oh, they say, I don’t wanna do a script because I don’t wanna sound like I’m reading a script. I don’t want my staff to be sounding like they’re reading. I want my team to have their own personality. I want them to embrace their true selves. And therefore, when their phone rings at their local business, every time their phone rings, it’s just like a minefield. You never know if the phone’s going to be answered professionally, if it’ll be answered at all. You never know what people are going to say. Nothing’s written down. It becomes a verbal tribal tradition. It becomes a celebration of jackassery. Tell the listeners out there, why have you embraced sales scripting, and how has it helped your company? Sales scripts are amazing, as well as, of course, the call recording so that we can hold people accountable to the sales script. But it just takes all the guesswork and then all of the variables of what people say are removed so that if something’s not working, we’re able to pinpoint what that is and tweak one thing as opposed to whatever the people are deciding to say. It also flows really nicely and it doesn’t sound robotic at all. Once you get used to it, it’s like, I could say it off the top of my head, the exact scripts we use and we know they close and that way we know it works instead of just people doing whatever they feel like. Now you also implemented a quality control checklist system where basically it’s not in people’s minds. They don’t have to remember, your technicians don’t have to remember what they’re supposed to do. There’s a checklist for everything. I mean, everything. When you go into clean a home or a commercial business, there’s a checklist for everything. Talk to the listeners out there about the mind freedom that you’ve experienced since, you know, taking it out of your head and putting it on a checklist. Yeah, it just makes it so simple because it’s like, here’s the standard the cleaning tech is responsible for and is going to be held accountable to. And if that’s not hit, then we know that there’s a problem. They don’t get to say like, well, I didn’t know. They don’t get to say, I didn’t know. And then on the client side, they have expectations set. Instead of them setting the expectation, we are setting the expectation, as opposed to them being like, well, I thought you guys were going to clean my gutters. It’s like, well, it ain’t on the checklist, so we’re not going to clean your gutters, you know? Now, knowing and optimizing your numbers in terms of the financial aspects of the company, again, you’ve leaned into that. A lot of people who are into fitness, I find lean into that. They want to know how much they weigh what their body fat percentage is how many calories They’re eating people that don’t want to lean into fitness don’t want to know how many calories are eating Don’t want to know their body fat percentage people that are into artwork and doing well at art musicians I’ve worked with a lot of musicians musicians that are good want to know how they sound They want to hear themselves people that are not good Don’t want to hear themselves of great ballet dancers and performers want to see themselves in a mirror. They want to analyze great builders want to see checklists and processes and blueprints people to accountants who are good at their job. They want to know the numbers. Entrepreneurs who are not good at entrepreneurship never want to know their numbers. Talk to the listeners out there about the listeners out there about the importance of knowing and optimizing your numbers actually knowing how much profit you’re going to make per job. Yeah, I would say number one most important thing in my opinion is the tracking sheet that we implement together and that, you know, every single day I’m in the tracking sheet and knowing like exactly where my business is, especially now I am very removed from the day-to-day kind of operations to a point. I’m not answering the phones, I’m not doing this, I’m not like seeing the complaints or any quality issues or whatever. But I have my finger on the pulse of my business and every single aspect of the revenue, expenses, leads, closing rates, number of appointments, number of reviews, number of photos that are getting up, like just everything you could possibly know about the business, I know. So I’m never questioning or going off of emotion because that’s not what we wanna do. We wanna go off of facts and numbers. And so I know that we’re growing or whatever, we’re closing, et cetera, et cetera, because the numbers don’t lie. So I love the tracking sheet. And I think it’s the number one thing that people should implement. If they don’t do nothing else, they need to know their numbers. Now you’ve attended a multiple in-person, two-day interactive business workshops. And the reason why we include that is a quasi-free service. What do I mean by that? I mean, it’s not a revenue generator for me. If you’re a client of mine, I say, hey, you can come to these events. We make it very, very affordable. If you’re not a client, you can pay $250 to attend the workshop. And if you’re in a tight spot, we have scholarship tickets available. But the point is everybody can afford to attend. Can you explain how the interactive business workshops have actually helped you to maybe further understand the path or to get a whole picture view of the actual business plan? Yeah, I love I love the conferences because I always walk away with action items, even though like I go over these things with my coach every every week. It just I always walk away with something like wow, I didn’t like a fresh perspective on things because you’re interacting with a lot of other business owners and like bouncing ideas off of each other and hearing what worked for them or what people are struggling with. And of course, then having you explain it in the way that you do, it just makes it very actionable. I always go away with, this is what I need to do on Monday to make these things happen. It’s not just this motivational thing. Do you laugh a little bit? Do you have a little bit of fun? I do, I have a lot of fun at the conferences. Okay, and what kind of people attend the conferences? Not liberals. That’s funny. It seems like all, we start at 7 a.m. and it seems like the entrepreneurs are like, this is awesome. We start at 7, I can be done by 3, I can still make some calls. Again, you’re sitting next to people that have had massive success, people that have been in the program for years. Is that helpful to sit next to other people that have actually been there? Oh my, I can’t even, like, the people I’ve met there have been life, they’ve changed my life. Like, obviously you guys have all changed my life, literally. I’m not just, you know, blowing smoke here. But meeting the people, you know, the Josh Wilsons of the world who I literally texted him today. Like, you know, we’re on a friend basis, we have calls all the time. Like, just the people that I’ve met is life changing. Now what is your website if people right now want to go online and they want to look up your website and kind of see who you are and what you’re all about? Yeah, it is www.serene-clean.com. And okay, so you came to the workshop, you’ve implemented the tracking sheet, the group interview, people say, it’s so hard to find people. I’ve never had a hard time finding people. Even right now I don’t have a hard time finding people, but I can tell you it’s a system that I’ve applied It’s a proven system a proven process that I’ve done. I’ve been doing this this process of hiring people This marks. I know it’s crazy 22 years of doing the same system every week interviewing people 22 years. I’ve been doing this. I’m a 40 year old person I’ve been doing the group interview for 22 years Can you talk about the importance of doing the group interview and how it’s changed your business? Oh, it’s so important. Like, that has been, I would say that’s a big game changer too because I always have candidates like ready to go when something happens. And you know, in the past two months, we’ve taken on a huge contract and I have hired probably 40 people. And somebody quit today, somebody quit yesterday. I fired somebody three days ago. It doesn’t matter. Next, next, next, you know, so it’s amazing. Just a little context. If, just so you know, things that will get you fired if you’re out there You don’t know about serene dash clean calm if you’re not on time if you don’t honor your commitments to the client You’re gonna get fired and there are certain people on the planet earth that don’t want to honor their commitments to their client They don’t want to show up on time and therefore you’re not a good fit for cigarettes for serene clean So she’s not running around just randomly firing people She’s just saying if you have a certain standard and expectation and on behalf of the customer because you’re a customer advocate You’re saying this is the standard we have to deliver at. Now, next thing, step number 11 here, you pay yourself well and you don’t apologize for it. Now, it is gonna be said that you actually make more money now per month than many people make per year. And I repeat that, you make now more money per month than many people now make per year. And you’ve learned to pay yourself well and not apologize for it. But I knew you, going back to when you first called us to where you were really grinding to make it work, and now you’re doing really well. Now that you’re paying yourself well and not apologizing for it, are you able to enjoy more time freedom to work out, to read, to spend time with family, friends, to think more meta on your business? Or how has that impacted you? Oh yeah, definitely not having to worry about income is really empowering. And also, of course, that just allows you to do a lot of good in the world. Because number one, we’re here to make money, but money is just a tool. And so that allows us to, you know, help the community, help our families, you know, buy cool stuff, of course, but the time freedom is really, that’s the whole point of this for me is like I don’t want to have to be anywhere I don’t want to be at any given time. So and now I can do that. Now final thing is you’ve been able to sustain diligence and accountability. What does that mean? Diligence is where it’s the steady application of effort over time. It’s like long after the motivation, the big idea wears off. You know, there’s always the excitement of a new idea. Woo, new idea. Yes, new idea. Love the new idea. Just had a new idea. I should buy a boat. I should buy, I should start a company. It should be called Serene Clean. Well, long after that idea has worn off, then diligence kicks in. And diligence is a steady application of effort if you’re out there You’ve ever played sports at a high level. You’ve ever been a top-notch speaker You’ve ever been a top musician anybody who out there who’s done anything at a high level, you know, the level of preparation Is what prepares you for the ovations? Again, the preparation is what prepares you for the ovations and then but everybody out there If you have a sound mind and you’re being honest, you need a little bit of accountability. We all need accountability. Somebody that can hold us accountable to push through goals, push through obstacles that made that time seem insurmountable. You know, sometimes it’s like, it seems overwhelming. How has the weekly meeting and the accountability helped you to stay diligent and consistent over time? Yeah, I love that. My coach definitely like holds me, because everybody needs to be held accountable no matter how high achieving you think you are. And obviously like, you know, the pig-headed discipline is awesome to have that, but you still need somebody to hold you accountable. And like, for me, you know, there’s certain things, like there’s always some place that you can do better and improve on. And so what my coach, Bloomer, he always, you know, it’s like, okay, it’s been two weeks now, you haven’t gotten a video review, what’s going on? And it’s like, I don’t like getting video reviews. Like he’s calling me out on it. I love that because like, I hate it, but I love it. And because that’s, we need to be told where we’re failing. I mean, they’re telling us where we’re good, but we need to be told where we’re failing. Oh, that’s amazing. Now, again, you are a diligent woman who’s reached out. We only take on 160 clients. I think you certainly occupy one of those spaces as well. And what’s interesting is, you know, last year, our average client grew by 104% and we didn’t have any client that grew by over 500%. So 1,462% is certainly going to impact that average. What advice would you have for anybody out there listening who’s contemplating going to thrivetimeshow.com forward slash EO fire to schedule a consultation? Because again, if people want to schedule a free consultation with me, I don’t charge for that. We do have call screeners. They’re going to make sure I’m not wasting your time and you’re not wasting my time to see if you’re a good fit. But there’s people out there contemplating going to thrivetimeshow.com, forward slash EOfire.com. That’s thrivetimeshow.com, forward slash EOfire.com. What advice would you have or feedback would you have for somebody thinking about attending one of our in-person workshops or scheduling a one-on-one consultation? I think that most people should definitely go to the conference, but when it comes to the one-on-one coaching, I think you really need to look at yourself and say, am I ready to maybe be told to do things that I’m not comfortable with, and am I ready to do it? Because you can always hemm and haw and go back and forth, but if you’re not ready to implement anything, it’s probably not a good fit, because your coaches are going to push you, and that’s the whole point. You’re paying them to push you, so if you’re not ready and willing to make changes, then don’t bother. I tell you what, I really do appreciate you taking time out of your busy schedule to join us. I’m so excited about your growth there. And hopefully we’ll see you in December. Are you coming in December to the conference? Not with this big job. I’m on a military base. I’m on a military base right now. Oh, shit, I’m rejected. Okay, that’s fine, but maybe we’ll see you at the next one. Okay, thank you for being here. I appreciate you. Thank you, Clay. Take care, bye-bye. Okay, hey guys, my name is Stephanie Pipkin. I own Serene Clean and this is my grandma Sue. And we are gonna briefly just go over the Dream 100 drop-offs that she does for Serene Clean and how it has really helped grow our business and spread the word of our business in our area. So just a little background on Serene Clean and working with Thrive Coaching. So I’ve used Thrive out of Oklahoma for two years this month. And when we started working with Thrive, we were at about $200,000 in revenue a year, and this year we’re projected to do $1.4 million in revenue a year. So it’s grown very, very drastically since we’ve implemented all the systems. And that’s what we’re going to talk about today is some of the, or one of the systems that they have encouraged and harassed us to use and it works really good. And that’s Dream 100 Drop-Offs. And that’s something that my grandma Sue does for me and she is absolutely killing it. So, grandma, basically, if you can just describe what it is that you do at these drop-offs. What do you do? When I get there, of course, I introduce myself and the business and I just tell them that I am a business to business call. I am not there to sell them anything. I’m just there to introduce them to a new business in our area. What do you bring and leave with them? I actually have a little gift for them and then a sweet treat, and I have the paperwork that explains all about Serene Clean. and as I’m talking to them I try to like give a little bit of thing talk about things that would encourage them makes it a little more relaxed and casual and then I I do sign my name on all the things so I tell them that they can’t forget me and put a little smiley face with it and leave them as I go then I say and here’s a sweet treat to get you through the day. So basically she just goes gets a box of donuts hits all our stops for the day, and what she’s leaving behind is basically a sales sheet that explains like what makes Swing Clean different, and on the back of it is commercial references of companies that we already clean for. So the whole purpose of this is to get us more janitorial accounts because those are excellent accounts for us. And what the thing she’s also asking is, you know, who do they, how do they clean now? And, you know, are they using a service now? How happy are they with it? Like, is there any issues? And who are you usually talking to? Are you talking to the receptionist? Who are you talking to? It’s kind of split. A lot of the businesses I’ve been to recently, I’ve actually talked to the owners. If it’s a large, large business, I’ll be talking to the lady or person, it’s usually a girl, at the front desk and I ask her. Sometimes they don’t know or they don’t tell me and sometimes they do know so it just works out really well to find out from them do they have a cleaner and like a lot of them that I talk to the owners, they actually are doing a lot of the cleaning themselves. So it just gives me a little heads up too of what they’re doing and then I pass it on to Steph. Mm-hmm. Yeah, so then at the end of her stop she types up a little synopsis of who she talked to, what was the reaction, things like that, and you know, is there room because really the goal of her doing this is to get the foot in the door for me to do a walkthrough and BIN account. That is the whole purpose of this. Overall, how would you say the reaction is? It’s been really well. You don’t know, but I get excited when it’s a great day and the sun is shining. Sometimes it’s snowing, but whenever, when I have a great day and everybody’s just happy to see me, it just makes it a fun thing to know them. I’ve been from the area for a long time, so a lot of times I heal friends also while I’m out. Yeah, this has worked really well for grandma in particular because it’s just coming from a very not salesy place at all. It’s not, you know, they’re not trying to sell, she’s just trying to introduce them, and it’s very, you know, a lot of people are just so, like, turned off by, you know, like, very hard selling, and so it’s just, like, one, getting them with the donuts, like, nobody will turn that down, and then really it’s just a very friendly thing and this is like a long-game thing. Almost never is it the first stop that they’re going to, you know, have us do a walkthrough. A lot of times that sheet will sit on a desk for a long time and then when they’re ready to go and you know they’re either pissed off about their current service or they’re just overwhelmed doing it themselves, who is that, you know, lady who dropped off the donuts, where is that sheet? Ah, serene clean and then it’s top of mind and it’s just really impressive and so kind of like the highlight of her doing this, she’s done this, how long have you been doing this? Eight months. Eight months. She got me a walk-through at a very large manufacturing facility who is like a dream client. It’s daytime commercial Monday through Friday, like an amazing account, like who I would wildly want and she got me a walkthrough. We ended up winning the bid and I’ve been cleaning for them for two weeks now and that’s like a $5,000 a month account. So it’s significantly impactful and again, this is long game thinking of, you know, she’s making these introductions and, you know, we’ve gotten plenty of smaller accounts as well from her doing these things. Um, and you know, just being consistent, you know, that’s the biggest thing is, you know, you do this every week, right? Right. Every single week, unless we have a significant snowstorm. Every week. And it’s fairly, you know, inexpensive from like, for us, we always do the donuts. I’ve tried other things, but the donuts just seem to be a hit. And yeah, I just know a lot of people are hesitant to do this, but if we can do this in a small town and to have that kind of success rate, and it really, we just want to be top of mind and it’s working and it’s growing the business really, really well and it’s just fun to work with grandma. So yeah, so that is how we do Dream 100 and it’s working great and we just say go do it, don’t be scared, just make yourself do it basically. For me, I don’t like to do it but I knew grandma would be great at it and so this is one of those things of delegating and outsourcing if you don’t want to do it but if you don’t have somebody to do it, you need to do it. Because if you don’t, your business will just not grow the way you want. So yeah, that is how we handle that stuff. Thanks, grandma. 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 10 locations in only a year. In October 2016, we grossed 13 grand for the whole month. Right now it’s 2018, the month of October. It’s only the 22nd, we’ve already grossed a little over 50 grand for the whole month. And we still have time to go. We’re just thankful for you. Thankful for Thrive and your mentorship. And we’re really thankful that you guys have helped us to grow a business that we run now instead of the business running us. Just thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Times a thousand. 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 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. 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 our 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 was an up and down roller coaster. And so now we’ve got it to where we’re in excess of 100 clients. That’s awesome. And so I would have anywhere from 5 clients to 20 clients on my own with networking, but I had no control over it. Without the systems, you’re going to be victimized by your own business. For somebody out there who struggles with math, if you would say that your average number of clients was 30 and you go to 100, as a percentage, what is that? I have doubled every year since working with you. So I’ve doubled in clients, I’ve doubled in revenue every year. That’s a hundred percent growth every year I’ve worked with. Now 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 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 when they needed a system. So creating a system is you have nailed down specific steps that you’re going to take no matter how you feel, no matter the results, you lean into them and you do them regardless of what’s happening. You lean into them and it will give you X number of leads. You follow up with those leads, it turns into sales. Well I 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. 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. 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. On their 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 about a personal computer, a PC, the computer is made by, let’s say, Dell. But then the software in the computer would be Microsoft, let’s say, or Adobe or whatever that is. So I basically make the systems, and you’re like the computer and I’m like the software. It’s kind of how I would describe our relationship. Tim, I want to ask you this. You and I reconnected, I think it was in the year 2000 and, what was it, maybe 2010? Is that right? 2011 maybe? Or maybe further down the road. Maybe 2013? 2012. Okay, so 2012. And at that time I was five years removed from the DJ business. And you were how many years removed from tax and accounting software? It was about 10, 11 years. We met, how did we meet? What was the first interaction? There was some interaction where you and I first connected. I just remember that somehow you and I went to Hideaway Pizza. But do you remember when we first reconnected? Yeah, well we had that speaking thing that… Oh there it was! So it’s 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 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 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 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’s that can be as passionate. You know, whenever a business starts working with Clay, it’s almost as like Clay is running that business in the sense that he has something at stake. 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. 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 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 wanna 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.