Tag Archives: Defining Success Podcast

Episode 82: There is No Secret to Success | Sushant Misra, Host of Trep Talks

Sushant Misra explains there is no big secret to success in this episode of The Defining Success PodcastSushant Misra is the owner of Trep Talks, and he and I are in a mastermind together. He actually interviewed me on his show about six months ago. He’s a really bright guy, has a great advice. One thing that he brought up, which I have found to be true with the interviews I’ve done with people for The Defining Success Podcast, is that there is no big secret to success. It’s a great episode, I hope you all enjoy!

Sushant Misra is the host of Trep Talks, a web-based interview show where he interviews some of the most successful digital entrepreneurs on the internet. These entrepreneurs share their stories as well as a few “secrets” – i.e. mindsets, strategies and tactics that worked really well for them in starting and growing their own online businesses. He is also the owner of yogamatstore.com.

Zeb’s Take – There is No Secret to Success

It was a lot of fun for me talking with Sushant. He and I have a conversation every week and talk about our businesses and talk about ways to improve our businesses. It’s always been a good learning experience for me and everyone else that comes and participates in that mastermind group that we’re involved in. He gave so much practical advice, and a lot of great philosophical stuff too. One of the things he said that he learned from doing his Trep Talks show, the video show on his podcast, is that there is no big secret to success.

I think when I started the Defining Success Podcast I was kind of looking for that too. I think a lot of people when they think about using social media or using the internet they think it’s kind of like a gold mine maybe, or that you just jump in and you can make money off of it. But that is absolutely not the case. It takes a lot of hard work, dedication and commitment. So maybe the secret to success is that you need to work hard, you need to be committed, you need to persevere, you need to have all those different tools in place.

I remember being approached by a friend of mine. He had, it was called, The Leather Traveller, he would sell leather goods online. I guess it was a franchise or something. He put up a website to sell his leather goods. He thought, “I’m just going to put this website up there, I’m going to sell other people’s goods, and I’m going to make money. It’s that easy.”

What he came to realize was that he had to find out how to drive traffic to his website, had to make sure his website functioned properly, he had to make sure visitors to the website can find what they want and purchase the leather goods. He just didn’t have that level of commitment and interest to go in there and dive in there and make it happen. He kept telling me about all these dreams he had to use the internet to make money, but he would never do the hard work that was necessary to do that. (If he’s listening, I apologize for bringing that up. I know he’s really active and excited about the work he’s doing now.) I will say that from all the people I’ve interviewed on The Defining Success Podcast is that there is no secret to success. The secret to success is that hard work, perseverance, getting that stuff done, and doing it in a smart efficient way.

Such a great time talking with Sushant today, a lot of great advice in the interview. Adam, Scott, Jolene, Herby, Sushant: thank you all for being a part of that mastermind group.

Go out there and find your success!

Find out more about Sushant Misra and Trep Talks

Trep Talks. Learn. Start. Grow.Go to TrepTalks.com
Trep is short for the word Entrepreneur. It’s a great place for people that are interested in learning about online marketing or online entrepreneurship. Sushant is taking this project in a new direction. He’s working to create a lot of great educational content with really successful people teaching you directly.

Quotes

  • “Entrepreneurship is a process.”
  • “You have to find an idea that is at the intersection of the skills that you have, your own interests and passions, and something that can be monetized. If you have an idea that matches those three criteria, you have an idea that you have a good shot at pursuing.”
  • “Every person has something from their own experiences, from their own knowledge, that they can share with the world.”
  • “I really try to learn from every single guest. In the hopes that by coming from that place of curiosity, I will be able to create content that will be helpful to other people as well.”
  • “One of the big things that I’ve learned is that there is no big secret.”
  • “As an entrepreneur, if you have a small vision or a mediocre vision, you’re going to spend the same amount of time and effort in trying to get that off the ground as you are going to do with a big vision. It’s much better to try to achieve something bigger.”
  • “What really matters is choosing the right idea, the idea that is right for you, and just executing properly and consistently over the long term.”
  • “Business is really about people. You have to be comfortable talking to people, networking with people, and helping people.”
  • “People are very friendly, people are helpful. If you ask them for a meeting or some help, a lot of times they say yes.”
  • “You have to become comfortable making mistakes, learning from them, and not get discouraged from making mistakes. Once you can do that it really helps you take your entrepreneurial journey to the next level. At that point you really start learning at a rapid pace. You’re not getting discouraged by mistakes and you consider that as part of the process.”

sushant-quote1      sushant-quote2

More from the Interview

Sushant had Zeb on his show, Trep Talks, about 6 months ago. He was the first to turn the tables on Zeb and make him an interviewee on a podcast. Zeb had a great experience on Trep Talks and is excited to now have Sushant on The Defining Success Podcast. Zeb and Sushant are part of the same mastermind group.

In 2010, Sushant finished his master’s degree in Health Administration mainly because his parents wanted him to be a doctor, but he wanted to learn about business. He had realized that he was very entrepreneurial. After graduation he had the decision to take the safe life, get a typical 9-to-5 type job, or to really pursue his passion. He took a leap of faith.

“Entrepreneurship involves a lot of uncertainty.”

He didn’t know much about online marketing or online entrepreneurship, but from the little he did know and from his experiences visiting wesites, he knew the internet would continue to grow. He taught himself and created his own online ecommerce store called yogamatstore.com where he sold yoga products. He did that for a few years, but he wanted his own products and lacked the investment to be able to do that. He had to go back in the industry and work for some bigger ecommerce businesses and gain more experience.

Then he found a product that did not require a lot of upfront investment, he started Trep Talks. On Trep Talks he interviews a lot of knowledgeable people in the online world and put out those interviews. Now Sushant is at a point where he wants to take that project and make it something bigger.

Entrepreneurship is a process.

Sushant says there are two kinds of people who become entrepreneurs. One kind is an accidental entrepreneurship, these are people who have worked in the corporate world for 15 – 30 years, they have an acquired set of skills, they know a lot about a certain industry. Now with all that skill and knowledge about an industry they identify an opportunity and start a business. Often they have some capital investment, partners, and things like that.

The other kind of entrepreneur, which Sushant falls into, is someone who has an entrepreneurial personality. It’s innate to them. “For me, entrepreneurship is a process. I realize that it’s something that you do, you learn through the process, then you start something again.”

YogaMatStore is a learning process for Sushant about entrepreneurship, about his own personality, about the online world. He has taken that experience and brought it with him and to new level with Trep Talks.

He hopes to create something that is useful and valuable for people in the world, and that creates a better life for people around the world.

To feed his entrepreneurial personality he says you have to find a sweet spot, “My definition of a sweet spot is you have to find an idea that is at the intersection of the skills that you have, your own interests and passions, and something that can be monetized. If you have an idea that matches those three criteria, I think, you have an idea that you have a good shot at pursuing.”

Entrepreneurship is so difficult that if you are not truly interested or passionate about it, it’s not really something that everyone should pursue.

He says, I realized that I had a passion in learning about the online world. I started approaching people, I approached you, I really started talking to people about how the online world works. I started putting videos on the website just thinking that there are other people out there just like me who want to learn more about online marketing, online entrepreneurship, how to start a business, how to find clients online, and I received a great response from people on different social media sites and people emailing me with great feedback.

It was really a project for me to learn more about online marketing because I was really passionate about it. But, it seemed that it’s something that other people are also interested in learning about. I want to take it and turn it into a big business and really take this idea and take it further.

Fun Fact: Sushant had never used Facebook before 2013.
He realized that he should remedy that, so he created a set of interviews where he interviewed a lot of great Facebook marketing experts. He dug deep and asked them questions from the perspective of a beginner trying to learn how to leverage Facebook marketing, how to leverage Facebook advertising, to find your clients online, to really generate revenue for your business.

Sushant has interviewed 60 to 65 people for Trep Talks. He says it’s already been a great journey. He is appreciative especially of the people who gave him their time and knowledge in the very beginning and who believed in him.

He says one of his best interviews was the one with Zeb, but there are several good ones.

“Every person has something from their own experiences, from their own knowledge, that they can share with the world.”

One of his first interviews was with Tim Ferriss, a very well known online marketer, and it was done in person, an experience Sushant will never forget. Another one was with a blogger named Michelle Shaeffer, she was one of those first people who believed in him. She introduced him to a lot of other people that he was able to interview on Trep Talks.

“I always come from a place of curiosity and learning. I really try to learn from every single guest. In the hopes that by coming from that place of curiosity, I would be able to create content that will be helpful to other people as well.”

“One of the big things that I’ve learned is that there is no big secret.”

“I had this secret hope that they would share something, you know this secret formula, that made them successful, or that made them wealthy. And what I realized was there wasn’t really a big secret, a lot of it was really just perseverance and hard work and having a big vision.”

“As an entrepreneur, if you have a small vision or a mediocre vision, you’re going to spend the same amount of time and effort in trying to get that off the ground as you are going to do with a big vision. It’s much better to try to achieve something bigger rather than smaller.”

He says there is no shortage of ideas or talent. “What really matters is choosing the right idea, the idea that is right for you, and just executing properly and consistently over the long term.”

Advice: Find a big vision. Start. Learn. Refine your idea. After that it’s just about pure perseverance and just not giving up.

He says, 6 or 7 months ago when he started this project, networking and meeting new people was a big challenge for him. One of his mentors pushed him to start networking when he had to go back to working at a bigger business. Sushant had an a-ha moment. Business is really about people. You have to be comfortable talking to people, networking with people, and helping people.

“I could have never, in my wildest dreams, could have imagined that I would met so many wonderful people and have this opportunity to learn from them. It has been a wild ride. For me, it’s really something out of a dream.”

“People are very friendly, people are helpful. If you ask them for a meeting or some help, a lot of times they say yes.”

“You have to become comfortable making mistakes, learning from them, and not get discouraged from making mistakes. Once you can do that it really helps you take your entrepreneurial journey to the next level. At that point you really start learning at a rapid pace. You’re not getting discouraged by mistakes and you consider that as part of the process.”

Example
Sushant was doing Trep Talks as a full time job. At one point he wasn’t getting the revenue he needed, his savings was running out and it took him to a dark place. He clearly remembers thinking, in this dark place, this is where I should start looking for opportunities. A couple weeks later he ran across a funding opportunity from the government in Ontario, Canada. They help new and young business owners with funding and training and things like that. He applied for that opportunity, it took some time, but he finally was very fortunate to receive that and now is able to pursue his dream and take his idea to the next level. He had to stop and tell himself, “this is a dark place, I really need to look for an opportunity” and he found it.

Sushant has been in Canada for about a decade, before that he lived in India. He says he was raised in a very safe environment. He was very comfortable, he never wanted to take a risk. He cared too much about what everyone else thought about him. When he went to Canada, he kinda took that as an opportunity to try a lot of new different things, because he thought, “who cares, no one here knows me.” He wonders what if he would have felt that way sooner at a younger age.

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Episode 81: Twitter and Relationship Building | John Sparks, Owner of Online ImageWorks

John Sparks talks Twitter and building relationships online in this episode of the Defining Success Podcast.John Sparks owns his own social media company, an internet marketing business where he helps businesses expand their reach online: Online Image Works. One of the things he prides himself on is his experience on Twitter and how he’s been able to use Twitter to build a massive following and build some word-of-mouth marketing. In this interview he has some great tips and advice on using Twitter.

John Sparks is the Owner and CEO of Online ImageWorks. He has a passion for helping others learn about social media and technology and has become known as a nationally recognized social media coach.

Zeb’s Take – Twitter and Building Relationships Online

It was a blast talking with John. It’s always great to talk with someone in the same space as I am. We were talking about Twitter. I love the examples he gave and how he was able to help people out with Twitter. One of the things that he said that I thought was interesting was strategically stalking people with excellence in a good way. He mentioned it a couple of times. It’s something he uses to build a Twitter following and get people to engage and interact with him on Twitter and it could be used on other social media channels as well.

What he does is, if there is a person he wants to go after (he used the example of Oprah) he will do a little research and find out who is really connected to that person. Then he reaches out to those people, works to build a relationship, a genuine relationship, and potentially get that opportunity to meet the person you’re trying to go after.

I’ve never used Twitter in that sense, but it’s not a bad idea. On LinkedIn they do have that function sort of built in to their system. One of the cool things LinkedIn does is show your connections and how you are connected to them. For example, if I wanted to target golf course general managers, I could search for that and in the results it will show my connections. 1st Degree Connections are people that I’m already connected with. 2nd Degree Connections are people who are connected to someone that I know. If that is the case, I can ask for an introduction from the person I know who is connected with the person I’m trying to get a hold of.

LinkedIn is great for that, but I really like how John is using that same idea and strategy for Twitter. That has been working well for him. He’s been able to build up quite the following. He’s one of the top Tweeters in Dallas, which is very cool.

It was a great interview. I hope you learned a lot about using twitter and social media. Thanks to John for the great interview.

Go out there and find your success.

Find out more about John Sparks or Online ImageWorks

Visit OnlineImageWorks.com, which is his website hub.
John can also be found on all the social media platforms at /iamJohnSparks (ex. facebook.com/iamJohnSparks, twitter.com/iamJohSparks and at gplus.to/iamJohnSparks)Online ImageWorks

Quotes

  • “It’s building those relationships online and then taking them offline.”
  • “You can have anything that you want in life if you just help enough other people get what they want.”
  • “People reach out to people who reach out.”
  • “Make sure when you’re messaging people that your intentions are coming across as being good natured.”

sparks

More From the Interview

John has a media background working at television stations across the country. He was a newscast writer for broadcast journalism. Then ventured into the business world, then into education and finally was able to bring all that together when he started his business Online ImageWorks.

Social media, and the whole idea of people being able to access things when they want to and to interact was really exciting to John. The idea of using his background and skills to help people use these tools properly convinced him to start his own company.

Among other things John works on SEO, conducting social media campaigns, websites, design and coaching. It’s important to make sure people’s name looks good out there online. Coaching, how to use social media; sharing the idea that people reach out to people who reach out and that it’s a powerful tool if it’s used correctly.

Twitter
Twitter is John’s favorite social media platform. The area where we can have instant communication is interesting.

Businesses can use twitter to engage customers and as a listening tool.

John says businesses should use social media for several reasons. Social media increases your visibility. It shows people that you have something of value that you are offering in the market. It gives your business the chance to show what makes you different from everybody else. It can help you stand out in the crowd. And, it’s a great relationship builder; everyone wants to feel like they are welcome, special and appreciated. It’s building those relationships online and then taking them offline. It’s a great stepping stone for the offline conversations that happen later on for businesses to convert customers into possible clients down the line.

John sees so many companies that put up a twitter logo or pinterest logo and then you go there and there’s nothing there. There is nobody managing it. John’s advice for those companies is that if you’re not using the tools then get rid of the links.

What’s one trick or piece of advice that the average person may not know about social media and how to use it effectively?
Strategically stalking people in excellence in a good way.

The people that they are most socially influenced by on Twitter are the people at the very bottom of their friends list. Those are the people that instantly came to their mind when they first joined Twitter.

Oprah, just for an example, follows about let’s say 230 people. So if you can interact with and build a relationship with one of those people on Twitter. Then you could potentially get an introduction from that person. Thinking about LinkedIn and their 1st 2nd and 3rd connections, look through her list, look through their lists, look for Oprah’s 3rd connections. Look towards the bottom of the list and pick out the ones that do not have the verified account, the blue checkmark. Those people are probably going to be easier to connect with.

John says a lot of cool things have happened over the last 2 years owning Online ImageWorks. Just having the opportunity to work with some of these people and watching their businesses grow. John says seeing these Twitter accounts grow to a point where they’re getting verified on Twitter and build a following by thousands, and it’s not just about the number of the followers, but about the quality of the followers you have.

Mistakes
In conversations with people on twitter you have to be really careful how you talk with people so you don’t offend them. Twitter has the reputation of being light and fluffy. Where people don’t hear your voice, they don’t know your voice, they don’t know your true intentions. So make sure when you’re messaging people that your intentions are coming across as being good natured.

How did you get where you are?
Going out there and basically, I wanted to be a social media influencer. I’m soon to be on the Forbes and Huffington Post list of top 50 social media influencers. Going through and doing my research and finding out, okay if this is what I want to be who are the people that are on that list right now, and who is following those people, and how can I get some of those people to come follow me. And what can I add of value to get those people to follow me.

Advice
I would say finding those people that are in your industry that you’re interested in. And making a list of those people. And then going out and seeing who’s following those people. Provide good content and follow those individuals and see if you can engage with those people and follow them as well.

On Twitter, you just have to get out there and do it. Get out there follow people, engage, you’re going to make some mistakes, it’s gonna happen; mentioning people incorrectly, retweeting incorrectly… but you just gotta do it.

Define Success
John recommends the book, See You at the Top.
You can have anything that you want in life if you just help enough other people get what they want. That’s what success is about.

You have to have that positive mindset and take every positive thought captive. Turn those negative thoughts into thoughts of being successful. Even in your darkest moment. If not, you’re going to get sidetracked.

That positive self talk that’s so critical when starting a business and being successful on social media. John prides himself on his positive uplifting tweets — It’s amazing how many people go out there and will retweet those over and over again.

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Episode 80: Networking vs Working a Room with the Mingling Maven | Susan RoAne, Author of How To Work a Room

Author Susan RoAne talks about networing and working a roomThis episode I interview the Mingling Maven, Susan RoAne. She is the author of How to Work a Room. In the interview she gives great ideas on having conversations with people, how to start those conversations, and how to feel comfortable in those scenarios. One of the things she highlighted was the difference between working a room and networking. The real key to networking is in the follow-up.

Susan RoAne, or the Mingling Maven, is the best selling author of How to Work a Room. If you’ve ever walked into a roomful of strangers and felt uncomfortable, you’re not alone. According to research, over 90% feel the same way. Because it’s essential, to building our businesses as well as our personal life, we must be able to comfortably attend gatherings and meet, connect and converse with people we don’t know as well as the ones we do.

Working a room and networking in Susan Roane's book How To Work a Room

Zeb’s Take

What a great interview with Susan. She gave a lot of really great tidbits of information about how you can work a room, how you can feel comfortable in networking situations and meeting new people. I really love the advice she gave.

One of the things she pointed out that I’d like to talk about more is the difference between networking and working a room. Working a room is the initial interactions, initial discussions, and how to make sure your presence is known throughout the room. The networking side of it is through the follow-up. Networking isn’t the mingling and interacting at the location, it’s the follow-up afterwards and that is where the value comes in with networking.

I’ve seen it a lot at networking events. Business owners go wanting to grow their business and they expect outcomes the first time they show up. They walk in, they’re interacting with everybody, they are very outgoing, shaking everyone’s hand and exchange business cards. But they don’t get any business that one day and you’ll never see those people return again. I know from experience with our Chamber of Commerce that my continued presence there, the follow up I did with the people I met at the chamber, that ultimately it led to a lot of sales for me and my business down the road, as people began to trust and know me. Now that I’ve gotten better and gotten more experience at networking I have a good system set in place that encourages follow up, that promotes myself and reaching out to people. Then it’s either getting coffee with them or just connecting through email or social media networks.

The networking at the event is not the goal, it’s about the follow-up afterwards. If you are going to networking events to get the most value out of it make sure you follow up with the people you meet at those events. Because there is always an opportunity. Even if they are not going to be a customer for your business they have the potential to refer your business or connect you with people who can benefit your business. You can also help them in different capacities and build a relationship that way.

Go out there and find your success!

Find out more about Susan Roanne, The Mingling Maven

Go to www.SusanRoane.com or HowToWorkARoom.com
Email Susan at Susan@SusanRoane.com with your questions

Her Book, How To Work a Room
She says, “Please go to your local bookstore, if they don’t have it on the shelf they will order it for you. We have to support our local book stores. But of course it’s in online bookstores. The book is How to Work a Room, the Silver Anniversary Edition.”

Susan RoAne, Best-Selling Author and Keynote Speaker

Quotes

  • “I think that’s part of success, being willing to say yes and stretching ourselves.”
  • ” If you are not re-tweeting, letting someone know you appreciated a tweet, responding, engaging, commenting then you are a lurker, not a worker.”
  • “I found that the people who created their own luck[…], they said yes when they wanted to say no.”
  • “Real networking happens over time, it’s a process. It’s not something that happens once at an event.”
  • “The people who I find with the most success are people that have diverse relationships with people of different ages, different backgrounds, different interests; as well as those who are in their field.”
  • “Some of the best networkers are people who used to be shy, but they realized there was a benefit to meeting interesting people.”
  • “The banquet of banter is a potluck: what are you bringing to the banquet?”
  • “Bring who you are to what you do.”
  • “At a certain point the stuff that we have isn’t as important as the stuff we’re made of.”

susan      susan2

More from the Interview

Susan was a former public school teacher in Chicago and San Francisco. In San Francisco they had massive layoffs, Susan was one of them. She was then able to help former teachers find new career paths. That evolved into Susan writing books including How to Work a Room. She designed a career change workshop for teachers. Made sure it got on radio. When the editor of the San Francisco Examiner contacted her to do a local career series she said, “Yes.” She immediately got a headache because she wasn’t sure what she had gotten herself into.

“I think that’s part of success, being willing to say yes and stretching ourselves.”

Susan’s Book – How To Work A Room

The main premise of her book is to make it easy for any person that has to walk into a room, a meeting, a party, a reunion, a wedding, a conference, a retreat. So that no one stands at the door and feels uncomfortable walking into a room full of people they may not know. Susan’s mission is to take away that discomfort and help people prepare so they can make the most of whatever event they are going to.

In a Room

If Susan is at an event and sees someone standing alone, she’s the one that will seek them out and try to start a conversation with them. Because, she says, one of the top traits of people we really remember are the people who noticed us, came over to us, made us feel included. For the people already in the room, being cognizant of the people who are alone and welcoming them is not only a wonderful trait, it’s a brilliant business strategy.

For the first version of her book, Susan did most of her research at her local chamber. She saw things that people did that were wonderful. She also saw things that made her question how some people were raised.

Being able to work a room is a skill. To be a networker is a different skill. There are people that are wonderful in a room; we’ve all seen them, they are very conversant, they are interesting, fun to be around, but they have no interest in following up and no skill at following up. In her book Susan refers to these people as One-Night-Stands.

There are people out there with phenomenal networking skills. Networking is really the key to success. They have immense follow-up. They do what they say they’re going to do when they say they’re going to do it. They stay in touch. Those same people may feel very uncomfortable when they walk into a room full of strangers.

Those two skills together, working a room and networking, really are dramatic and they contribute to our personal and professional success.

New Rooms

Whether it’s Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Google+, there are new rooms that we need to appropriately work, appropriately be social in, and behave appropriately in. Each one has a different etiquette. If you are not re-tweeting, letting someone know you appreciated a tweet, responding, engaging, commenting then “you are a lurker, not a worker.”

Twitter is the most fascinating time-suck Susan has ever experienced that does not involve the TV.

In video chats for Skype and Google Hangouts, make sure you look great. Make sure you have the right lighting and that it’s not too dark. It’s different on the camera than it is to your eyes. Look at your office and make sure it looks they way you want it to be seen. When you are doing something face to face remember that you are really in that room with them, so you have to remember the same manners you would have in a real room. It’s still about paying attention and listening. Don’t look at your smartphone while you’re in a Google Hangout.

Teaching

Susan still loves speaking at a to universities and colleges. Sharing these techniques to empower a whole new group of people so they can go to places and meet people and get the first job, or the second or third. Even at high schools; giving kids the tools so they can connect with each other and people they need to know. “I think it’s wonderful.”

“I found that the people who created their own luck[…], they said yes when they wanted to say no.”

Advice

For people that feel uncomfortable going to an event, know that if you come prepared you will feel more comfortable. There are some things you can prepare ahead of time. There’s no reason now, with the internet, that you can’t do some research on the event ahead of time so you’re not walking in cold. Prepare your own self introduction, it should be specific to the event. Susan says her introduction at her chamber of commerce meetings is very different than at a friend’s wedding. Tailor your introduction to give people context for how to talk to you. It’s not the 30 second upchucking of an elevator speech; it’s 7-9 seconds, it’s a pleasantry. Give the benefit of what you do set in an interesting fun way that engages people so they get to ask what it means. Then you are invited to speak more. Only go on a little bit. Stop, look at the other person and say, “How about you?” not, “What do you do?” how about you, it allows them to talk about their passion which could be something different than their job.

How are networking and working the room different?

Working a room, you’re really just socializing. You’re mixing, meeting, greeting, you’re having a lot of little conversations and you’re circulating. It’s a social party. Nobody invites you to hog the time of one other guest.

Networking is very specific in that it’s the follow-up. You can’t network a room. Networking is a mutually beneficial process whereby we change ideas, information, ideas, advice, laughter. The real networking happens over time, it’s a process, it’s not something that happens once at an event. When you are developing a network you are developing a group of people where there is a stronger connection and it is the beginning of building relationships.

“The people who I find with the most success are people that have diverse relationships with people of different ages, different backgrounds, different interests; as well as those who are in your field.”

Icebreakers

Just look at the room/the event you’re going to. That’s what’s happening to everyone, it’s something in common. Susan talks about the food, she talks about how long it took to find a parking space. Look for name tags. If you are at a fundraiser, ask how someone came to support the cause. Say something that’s relevant to the event at hand, because that makes sense. It’s easy, it starts the conversation with small talk and then you can move from there.

Complement a tie, a nice scarf, an interesting necklace. It’s okay to compliment someone as long as it’s sincere. Notice things: pins, ties, jewelry; then you are in an easier conversation.

If you want to have something interesting to talk about make sure you know what’s going on in the world. Get it from a newspaper, online, TV, anywhere. Know what’s going on and you can always talk to other people.

For the Shy

In 1980 about 80% of people considered themselves shy, by 2000 it jumped to 93%. If you think you are shy, know that at least 90% of people in that room also feel shy sometimes. Some of the best networkers are people who used to be shy, but they realized there was a benefit to meeting interesting people. So they approach it as, “Oh my goodness, isn’t this great! I’m going to meet interesting people therefore I’m going to learn new things.” and it’s that attitude that gets them over the shyness.

“Some of the best networkers are people who used to be shy. but they realized there was a benefit to meeting interesting people.”

Susan suggests that if you walk into an event with someone that you don’t stay with them for the whole evening. Decide to split up and talk to other people then come back and introduce people to each other. Even for couples. Don’t stand face-to-face talking to each other; stand side-by-side facing room.

Susan’s Top Tips for a Great Conversation

Number one: Listen. Listen. Listen.

Two: “The banquet of banter is a potluck: what are you bringing to the banquet?” Be sure to bring your favorite stores. Listen to other people’s stories. Susan does this thing where she barrows other people’s stories, you can relate to people with kids even if you don’t have any. If you listen and pay attention to their stories that’s another story you can share to someone that has similar interests.

For conversation it’s listen, participate, don’t be afraid to ask questions, and don’t ask only questions. Share something of yourself.

“Bring who you are to what you do.”

On Success

“Can you look in your own mirror and feel comfortable with the person you are, how you treat people, how you’ve walked around this planet; and what your contribution has been?”

“It’s how you treat people.”

“I have a wonderful network of people around the world that I’ve stayed in touch with that has made me have the most wonderful life.”

“I want to know that when you’ve listened to me that you’ve got something that you can do to make your life just a little bit easier, better, and that to me is success.”

“At a certain point the stuff that we have isn’t as important as the stuff we’re made of.”

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Episode 79: Social Media and ROI | Brian Basilico owner of B2b Interactive Marketing

Brian Basilico, owner of B2B Interactive MarketingBrian Basilico is the owner of his own social media company. One of the things we talked about was return on investment, and looking at ROI when you are using social media and actually for many things you are probably doing.

B2B Interactive MarketingBrian Basilico is the owner of B2B Interactive Marketing. B2b Interactive Marketing combines audio, video, interactive, web, communications, and advertising, with branding and marketing experience of almost 30 years in the communications industry.

 

Zeb’s Take – Social Media and ROI

It was a blast talking with Brian about social media and all the different things that he’s doing. We had some great back and forth while talking about social media marketing.

The thing I want to expand on is the return on Investment or ROI of social media, which I think is very important for business owners understand when they are getting into the social media space. Social Media and ROI. People will ask me, “Should every business use social media?” My response is always yes. I honestly think every single business should use social media. Having said that, I don’t always think paying for someone to run a social media presence is the best investment of your money. Timewise, yes you should use social media, use it as much as you can. But sometimes the cost doesn’t make sense for the returns that you’re getting from the social media usage.

It is important to analyze time versus money and how you’re going to spend that using social media. Sometimes people think it’s a just one-stop-shop; it’s not, it’s a long term goal. If your goal in a business is to grow as large as you possibly can then social media is a no-brainer. Hire people to do it and realize that it’s an investment. If you are looking to use social media to make instant sales to cover the cost of what you’re paying for the social media, especially in the first few months, you’re going to be disappointed. With social media, you’re putting in the time, money and resources now for gains down the road.

Go out there and find your success!

Find out more about Brian Basilico and B2B Interactive Marketing

Go to his business website: B2B-IM.com and the website for his book: NotAboutU.com

Quotes

  • “It’s been something I’ve had to do for myself and since I was able to do it for myself I was able to do it for other people.”
  • “I’m a student first, I got to learn it. Then I’m a teacher second, and a purveyor or presenter last. You got to learn it, teach it, then do it.”
  • “Marketing has to be an investment and never an expense.”
  • “Marketing is a participation sport, it’s not like advertising where you pass it off to somebody.”
  • “The whole point of social media is crowdsourcing; getting other people to talk about your brand.”
  • “Get to know people, ask them for advice, and find out what happens.”
  • “When people are better when you are done, that’s success.”
  • “The reason I consider myself successful is because I have a message, I have a methodology and I provide value to people when it’s all said and done.”

brian-wm

More From the Interview

Growing up Brian was a musician. At 18 years of age he started a recording studio in his Dad’s basement. He had to learn to promote himself. At first, he used a word processor to print out articles, cut and paste them together into a newsletter that he would take to a copy shop and print and put together his newsletters. Since then he’s been a video editor and producer, he owned a commercial recording studio (produced jingles, radio programs and commercials), and online marketing.

“It’s been something I’ve had to do for myself and since I was able to do it for myself I was able to do it for other people.”

He says, the funny thing about marketing is marketing has never changed. It is always about people, knowing who the audience is and how they want to be communicated to. The thing that has changed is the technology and tools. You have to learn to adapt over the years.

Not too long no one knew what the smartphone was and now it’s updated every day.

“I’m a student first, I got to learn it. Then I’m a teacher second, and a purveyor or presenter last. You got to learn it, teach it, then do it.”

The smartest and most profitable people learn how to adapt to where their audience is. If you want to reach a 20 year old you need to text them. If you’re talking to 70 year olds, you still need to put out a print newsletter. You have to know where your audience is and you have to learn to adapt to get your message there. The message and the content has always been the same. It’s always been really good content and great articles. But, you have to know the channels where you can connect with them.

Branding
Branding is part logo, part image and part message. You need to know who your audience and know what your audience is looking for. An example Brian shared was for a company that made ferrules, a small part on a golf club. Once an industry staple, this company had lost a lot of their customers to cheaper overseas competition. Their business model was to sell high quality at a low price to the largest golf manufacturers. While doing research Brian spoke with someone who builds clubs for professional golfers around the world. This person agreed that this company made the highest quality part and it never broke, whereas the competitor’s part did break. He mentioned that fixing that one part cost $150 each time the repair needed to be made. He said I don’t care what I have to pay for that thing I want that ferrule. Now she manufactures custom versions of this and what sells she used to sell for $0.07 for $1.50. She learned that the marketplace had changed, without her noticing it. We completely reinvented her business.

Success Story
Brian shares his success story with a fortune 100 company that was making a $1k a month in online sales, Brian convinced them to put in a true ecommerce system on their site. By creating a very familiar interface for their ecommerce their online sales skyrocketed to $25k in sales a month.

What I see a lot of people doing wrong in marketing is throwing a lot of good money at bad. You have to consider social media and ROI. “Marketing has to be an investment and never an expense.” People don’t understand the concept of using marketing as an investment and how to measure their return on investment so they do get ripped off.

“The whole point of social media is crowdsourcing; getting other people to talk about your brand.” If you reward people for promoting you to your friends and give them something relatively inexpensive, you’re winning.

Brian’s Book
It’s Not About You it’s About Bacon: Relationship Marketing in a Social Media World by Brian BasilicoIt’s Not About You it’s About Bacon: Relationship Marketing in a Social Media World is Brian’s book. It is a why-to book about social media. It takes you through a whole journey of marketing. There are chapters on Facebook, LinkedIn, Pinterest and all that other stuff. It doesn’t tell you how to do things, it tells you why it’s important and who is there. The whole purpose of the book is getting you to understand the concept of what social media marketing means. From there, there’s lots of other opportunities to learn how to use it.

The title is from Brian’s experience at a conference. One of the other presenters encouraged people to use a hashtag, #bacon. She got 20 new followers. After that Brian started posting pictures of bacon and #bacon and breakfast with bacon online. Brian got an incredible response. What he came to find out was that the two most shared things on the internet were kittens and bacon. The whole concept is that social media marketing is not able sales and about you, and bacon is about creating a brand that is memorable and something that people will search out.

Advice for New Businesses
Go out and network. Go out and meet people. Find people you can have a 1-on-1 conversation with ask them about their experiences and their life. From there, ask them for referrals, for whatever you need. connect with them and then ask them for advice. Get to know people, ask them for advice, and find out what happens. Getting good proper referrals is the best way to get the best return on investment of quality. Look for good consultants and people who really have your best interests in mind and are not just trying to take your money. Then go learn as much as you possibly can, take online classes, community college classes, buy books, research; invest in yourself and in your own knowledge.

Success
Success for is seeing his clients blossom and make money. The biggest success that Brian gets is when they recommend him to somebody else. From a personal standpoint, it is making a difference in a way that changes people’s lives. I don’t care whether it’s through my business, or donating my time. “When people are better when you are done, that’s success.”

I’ve reinvented myself so many times, I’m very successful and always working harder to be better. The reason I consider myself successful is because I have a message, I have a methodology and I provide value to people when it’s all said and done.

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Episode 78: Start a Small Scale Business to Test Your Idea | Ben Alexander, Founder of Balloon Distractions

Ben Alexander founder of Balloon DistractionsBen Alexander is the owner of Balloon Distractions, who appeared on an episode of the Shark Tank. He didn’t get a deal with any of the Sharks, but he gained a lot of experience through the process. He talks with us about his experience on the Shark Tank as well as with his business. His advice to start with a small scale business is something that resonates with me.

Ben Alexander started Balloon Distractions in the Fall of 2003, starting an adventure that continues to this day. Balloon Distractions has been a blessing in his life, and the lives of all those who have learned a new skill, income, confidence and poise.

 

Zeb’s Take – Start with a Small Scale Business

It was great talking to Ben today about his business, how he’s been able to grow it and get these balloons out there; get kids excited, helping out restaurants and helping get people extra income as well. He started his business on a small scale.

The thing I want to expand on is that many people when they start a business they take out a loan, or try to find investors, or take out a second mortgage, or something similar to invest all that money into an idea. All because people tell them it’s a great idea. Then when they take it to market, they don’t get the response (in terms of sales) that they’re looking for.

What you could do with a business is start on a small scale, a small scale business. If you have a product, a service or an idea or something you want to try, do it on as small a scale as possible. See if you can get sales from it, because sales is the most important thing for any business. You really need to go out and seek those sales first to know if you have a business or not.

On Shark Tank the always about sales. How many sales do you have? Some of the people who go on the show haven’t even pushed the sales side of things for their business and then they don’t really know if their business is profitable or not. It doesn’t matter what people say, it matters what people buy in business.

Keep that in mind. If you have an idea, you don’t need a grandiose business launch. Find an inexpensive way to put it out there and try to sell it with your small scale business. Sometimes you don’t even need to have the product to sell it, you can get people to buy into the idea of the product. If you can get people to put money down based on an idea then you know you are onto something. Nowadays there are crowdfunding sites (like Kickstarter and Indiegogo) that you can get people to buy your product before it’s even out there on the market. That’s an excellent way to test and see if people are legitimately  interested in the product or not.

Contact Ben Alexander at Balloon Distractions

BalloonDistractions.comballoon-distractions-logo
BenAlexander@balloondistractions.com
If you are interested in growing a region contact Ben, (813) 391-3895

Quotes

  • “It’s always a bit of a leap to go from being an employee or salesperson to being a full on entrepreneur. I haven’t regretted it.”
  • “I’m looking for that 1% that are ballsy enough to be entrepreneurial, and say ‘Hey, I want to start something.’”
  • “That’s the amazing thing about capitalism in general, the creativity it engenders.”
  • “No one else has ever done what I’ve done.”
  • “I think there are not that many people out there that are actually entrepreneurial. If people had the choice between stepping out on their own and being entrepreneurial or working for $10 an hour. I think more people are likely to work for $10 an hour even though the gain is not as good.”
  • “I made kids happy; just did some goofy stuff and it was fun. I walked out of that gig I felt good. I felt good about the universe and I felt good about myself.[…] Doing balloons for people is a pretty humble thing to do.”
  • “To play it safe is also to play it boring.”
  • “Sometimes you just have to learn. The best lessons are going to be mistakes.”

Start with a small scale business to test your business idea.More From the Interview

Background
As a college student Ben took a semester to teach English in Taiwan where he met his wife. When he returned to school he was studying Economics and working as a waiter at a restaurant. At this restaurant they had a guy come in once in a while doing balloons, he serviced a few restaurants. Ben was getting tired of serving, he asked the balloon guy to teach him in return for payment. Ben joined his team and his first week doing balloons he made $800 in tips just from balloons. Ben thought, “wow, there’s something to this.”

When he graduated he got away from doing the ballooning, but he kept it in mind. He got married, had kids, got a job at a fortune 500 insurance company. In the summer of 03 he moved to Tampa Bay, he had a sales job that he hated and that wasn’t paying enough to cover his bills. He noticed there were a ton of restaurants, so he went out and started working at a couple doing ballooning. Then he went to the nearby college and recruited some students. We were in 30 markets by the time we were on The Shark Tank. He was in Episode 514 of The Shark Tank.

Ben lost his sales job when he was fired, but that day he went out and got 4 restaurants, a chain, to work with. He took that as a sign. I remember coming home and talking to a neighbor of mine who owned his own contracting business. He said, “You know you can always get a sales job. Why don’t you go out there and try to do this thing on your own. See if you can support yourself with your balloon business.” To this day Ben remembers that advice.

Ben says, If you’re doing 100% commision sales, you’re kinda already in business for yourself. You just maybe don’t have the structure behind you. I had experience in 100% commision sales, but I had never been a full on independent business owner or entrepreneur.

“It’s always a bit of a leap to go from being an employee or salesperson to being a full on entrepreneur. I haven’t regretted it. The last 10 years of my life, I’ve had the freedom to do a lot of things that I couldn’t to do if I had a normal 9-to-5 job.

“There’s definitely more risk in running your own business, but if you structure it right and you don’t go into crazy debt, it could be a nice lifestyle.”

Shark Tank
Shark Tank put them on a national stage. There are 200 markets in the United States, Ben is trying to get regional leaders and build a crew for each of the top 150 markets. They have regional leaders that work 15 hours a week, and we have people that are full time.

“I’m looking for that 1% that are ballsy enough to be entrepreneurial, and say ‘hey, I want to start something.’”

“Everything that you’re ever going to see that’s not natural started as an idea.”

“That’s the amazing thing about capitalism in general, the creativity it engenders.”

Ben suggests that if you’re an entrepreneur and you watch Shark Tank. If you have an idea try something on a real small scale. Don’t mortgage your house just to try something. If it’s profitable on a small scale you can grow it bigger and bigger and it tends to be profitable as you get larger.

To get on the show Shark Tank, Ben applied online, months later they asked him to create a audition video. He says, “I made it real wacky and crazy kind of like a Billy Mays Infomercial type of thing. I think they liked that.”

He says, to get on Shark Tank you can be an awesome person with an awesome business, but if it’s something people have seen before, like a fishing boat charter, or house cleaning… they want something different. When you tune in you have no idea what crazy off-the-wall creative wacky businesses you’re going to see.

The show suggested he do his sales pitch and then they drop balloons on him. They filmed in the morning, he didn’t know if it would go smoothly, he had no sleep the night before and he was heavily caffeinated. “I’m normally really hyper and energetic already, so to kick it up a notch, it just makes me look like totally nuts.”

“I think my pitch was not organized enough and I didn’t have a solid enough expansion plan.”

Balloon Distractions
“No one else has ever done what I’ve done.”

Ben still goes out and does gigs. He said “I made kids happy; just did some goofy stuff and it was fun. I walked out of that gig I felt good. I felt good about the universe and I felt good about myself.[…] Doing balloons for people is a pretty humble thing to do.”

What Ben wants to do is create a machine that, for example, is able to target St. Louis and in 90 days have a team up and running. He wants to do that without spending thousands of dollars in advertising to find those people.

Ben has several people that used to do balloons at restaurants for them that come back and become regional leaders.

“I think there are not that many people out there that are actually entrepreneurial. If people had the choice between stepping out on their own and being entrepreneurial or working for $10 an hour. I think more people are likely to work for $10 an hour even though the gain is not as good.”

“To play it safe is also to play it boring.”

Shark Tank boosted his business but it didn’t double it or do anything crazy.

Advice
There are 3 skill sets that are needed to run a business:

  • You need to be able to do it
  • You need to be able to sell it
  • You need to be able to manage the money

Ben says he should have, on day one, had someone come in and make sure the money was managed correctly.
He suggests: get a good accountant, get your quickbooks, and never get behind on taxes.

“Sometimes you just have to learn. The best lessons are going to be mistakes.”

Tim Robbins said it’s action, you have to take action, you can’t sit around and just plan s*** all day. You have to take action. A lot of people have these complicated business plans and they want to get a giant loan and all this other stuff. If you want to start a business, you need to take action up front.

You may have a great idea and people are like, “Wow, that’s a great idea!” And then you go out there and no one is willing to pay you a dime for it… maybe it’s not that great of an idea.

If you have an idea try it. Don’t try it for the next 30 years, but go present it to a hundred different people and just gauge the interest. If no one has any interest then take it back to the drawing board, improve it or change it. Even better, take your idea out there and ask, how can we make it better; you’d be amazed people will give you lots of information.

What do you think of Ben’s interview?

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Episode 77: Thriving Out of the Recession | Richard McKinnon, President of System 1 Interiors

Richard McKinnon of System 1 InteriorsRichard McKinnon is the owner and President of System 1 Incorporated. Because of Richard’s business sense, he realizes the importance on people to people interactions. That and advice from his father have helped him and his business get through the recession and thrive.

System 1 Interiors specializes in interior home remodeling including acoustic ceiling removal, plaster ceiling resurfacing, recessed lighting and interior & exterior painting. System 1 has been the leader in Acoustic Ceiling removal in southern California for over 30 years.

System 1 Interiors, Acoustic ceiling removal in southern California.

Zeb’s Take

He is a good friend of mine. Richie and I have known each other forever. He’s a really good guy. I’ve always been impressed with him. Basically, he was responsible for his entire family after his dad passed away and the business itself. He was able to overcome all of that and build a better stronger business. I’ve been working for Richie since the beginning of 2012.

The thing I want to touch on is the recession and how it contributes to business. In Richard’s mind he thinks that was a blessing. It was a good experience because he was able to take his business and lean it up, learn to make it more efficient, and that made his business ultimately better. He learned a lot of life lessons too; business lessons; what not to do, what to do. He really carved out a niche and now that his business is doing extremely well he has a much better understanding of his business. He runs a tight ship.

On more of a grand scale, I think, a recession really provides an opportunity. When you’re in a bull market and people are doing well in the economy, people look at the system in the wrong way. I’ve been involved with a few businesses where their question is, what’s the return on investment? They look at everything as numbers, and people like Richard and myself understand it’s not just a numbers game. It’s taking that extra step. Richard was on his way home when he got a call to do a job in Malibu, and even though he didn’t want to do it, he did, and it ended up saving his business. Those are the opportunities that you can’t value on a piece of paper. What ends up happening is people end up cutting those expenditures. They think, it’s going to cost this much in gas it takes this much time, it’s not an appropriate expenditure, let’s not do that. They miss out on this huge job, three months of business. They’re looking at numbers and not people and doing right by people. People look at numbers to tell the story of a business, but they can never take the place of the people to people interactions.

I’m going to work as hard as I can to make introductions, meet as many people, expose people to my business and add as much value and to genuinely help and be of service to people. If I looked at everything from a financial perspective, a balance sheet, whether or not going to the Chamber of Commerce was worth my time, whether or not having this podcast is worth my time, I would miss out on so many opportunities that have opened up as a result of me doing these things that I feel are necessary from a business sense.

The recession trims out those people that are looking at the bottom line. Those are the businesses that tend not to do so well in recessionary times. And the businesses that do do well, especially the ones that thrive out of a recession, are the ones that make those people to people encounters and really foster and develop those relationships.

 

Find out more about System 1 Interiors and Richard McKinnon

Go to www.system1interiors.com to contact Richie and find out more.

Quotes

  • “When I took over the business, for me, there was a lot of fear of the unknown. When I don’t have someone to go to, what is it going to be like when the training wheels come off?”
  • “We take pride in being the best. We’ll always strive for that.”
  • “Dealing with customers and dealing with employees and the different personalities and making that work and making it a positive thing. That’s the biggest struggle.”
  • “You’ve got to go, and you’ve got to do some things whether you like them or not sometimes because they could be very big opportunities.”
  • “I’ve always lived by the motto of just being real.”
  • “Don’t worry. Because it doesn’t improve anything in your life.”
  • “Just being a hard worker is successful in itself.”
  • “You’re going to be successful if you’re the best at what you do, or striving to be the best at what you do.”

richie

More from the Interview

How did System 1 Interiors get started?
In 1978 Richie’s father worked for a company that did acoustic ceiling spraying. He realized that if he had the right machinery and tools, he could start his own business and be able to raise and support a family. He knew he wasn’t the type to be answering to anyone, he wanted to be in charge of his own destiny. He got a loan from his father-in-law and began his business.

Richie grew up around his father’s business. He says, once he actually started working for his father he understood what it took. “It was very different: knowing what somebody does and then knowing what somebody does first-hand.” At the age of 20 he began working full-time with his dad. A few years later his dad was diagnosed with skin cancer. Richie decided he needed to get to know the business end of things as much as possible. He went with his dad to as many estimates and appointments, management things, as he could to see how things were done. When his father passed away Richie had already been mostly running the company for about a year and was able to get a lot of his questions answered.

He says, his father was the kind of person that no matter what, he would make something happen. “When I took over the business, for me, there was a lot of fear of the unknown. When I don’t have someone to go to. What is it going to be like when the training wheels come off?”

The Recession

“It was a complete blessing. It was business 101. It was a crash course. I really didn’t look at it then that way. I honestly get chills thinking about some of the things I had to go through, making decisions at such a young age. I was only 25 years old when I took over this company. We had, at the time, 7 employees. I had a lot of determination knowing that it really was sink or swim.”
Richie’s whole family was dependent on this business.

Richie says his business felt the impact of the economy on the decline before he heard about it in the news.
“I was grieving, at the time I had to put on that armor and lead this company through the troubled waters.” Having to explain to his long-time employees why there was no work while not really understanding why and trying to figure out how to fix it was difficult. In hindsight he realized that it’s nothing that they were doing wrong. It was difficult because a lot of the news wasn’t out he didn’t know how bad it was. “But the blessing about the economy dropping off for us, we’re a very very good business, we have a great reputation. I remember my father telling me before he passed, the one strength that you’re going to have and you’ll understand it one day, is that I’ve worked hard for 30 years of building this business to where it’s solid. No matter what you do, whether it’s advertising or things like that. We’ve built up a reputation… one day you’re going to see, when it gets busy again, just how much work was put into it.” He says, “Now I can understand that really what you put into your business, what you’re willing to put in, you will get it. So when you plant your seeds and you’re doing that hard work. A lot of times you don’t see the benefit, it comes later. A lot of times you can look back and say you know what, everything we did up to this point brought us through these lean times.”

The recession taught Richard to bear down and be a lean mean machine. They got a smaller shop, ordered less materials at a time, took away a lot of the things they didn’t actually need. If it wasn’t for the economy going down he says he would not have made those changes. Today System 1 would probably be wasting a lot of money, energy and resources, and not working as smart. “When you have an economic downturn, it’s really a reality check, and a time to go through everything and figure out what you need and don’t need. And then when the economy picks up all of a sudden you’re like a marathon runner, ready to go. … We’re better for it.”

I think a lot of our success has to do with the customer feeling comfortable and knowing exactly what they’re going to get and then where the success comes in is with executing that exactly as planned and exactly as you stated and if there is a hitch fixing it ASAP and making it right. That is the essence of what we try to do.

“My number one thing that I’ve learned is that clarity is key. Clarity is before you start anything with a customer you’re being crystal clear up front. In our business there are things that are unpreventable because of the nature of the business, explaining that to the customer ahead of time, so there’s not shock. Delivering exactly what you say you’re going to deliver. Knowing that it’s okay if somebody wants the impossible, to explain it, “That’s impossible.”

Biggest struggle
There are a lot of customers that are not capable of being pleased. Richie knows for certain they are the best company in southern California at what they do. “We’ve always known that we’re a very good company. We take pride in being the best. We’ll always strive for that.”

Dealing with customers and dealing with employees and the different personalities and making that work and making it a positive thing. That’s the biggest struggle.

Thriving out of the Recession

The last 3 years, his business has rebounded really well. The biggest asset to the company has been the internet. He says, the internet has separated the good companies from the bad companies. For the good companies, it makes them better. You don’t know who is going to put up reviews. We don’t have an on off switch where we do good work we do bad work. We only know how to do it well. If you can get a hundred reviews and 95 of them are straight A’s you’re going to get more business. At this point I’m not sure if the economy is as good as I believe it is, or if it’s a matter of since we’ve established ourselves as being a good company through our reviews that we’re just getting more work than others.

Advice

What’s the biggest piece of advice you learned from your dad?
Probably, never to give up on anything and to be there. It’s 4:30, it’s raining, there’s traffic and I get a call from a general contractor. He wants me to come to Malibu right now because a painting contractor didn’t show up. I really didn’t’ want to go; it’s going to take me an extra 3 hours to get home. But, I just had that advice, that you’ve got to go, and you’ve got to do some things whether you like them or not sometimes because they could be very big opportunities. It ended up being a job that probably saved our business back in 2008. I had no idea what it was, it ended up being a huge house for a Hollywood movie producer. It kept us busy for 2 or 3 months.

Be yourself. You don’t have to go and sell the jobs. You don’t have to put on a salesman pitch or face. Just go in there, be yourself and you’ll do fine. I’ve had to understand that I’m perfectly capable of doing this without having to try so hard on the sales pitch thing. Go in, be yourself and people will see though the fakes and phonies. I’ve always lived by the motto of just being real.

His advice to me was always just to be myself and to know that I’m perfectly capable of doing it.

What’s one piece of advice you would give to someone who found themselves running a business, like you did?
Don’t worry. Because it doesn’t improve anything in your life.
Don’t let the doubt and the worry […] freeze you from having a clear brain and execute what you need to do. You start looking at the bills you have coming in and the amount of work you have and it will freeze you up. One great thing about business is that you can bounce back and it doesn’t take very long to bounce back. Knowing that not only can you bounce back, but you will, and it doesn’t take long.
If you keep going, and you work hard, and you’re never gonna give up, and you keep going at it. Not only is it a probability that you’ll bounce back but you can even turn it into something more amazing than what you had before.

I’m constantly trying to figure out how to perfect the business. Constantly trying to think of creating new businesses.
I don’t like the thinking that everybody just needs a slice of the pie. Create your own pie. I’m constantly thinking about what else can I do. I feel I’m successful because I have a business mind and I have a mind to create.

 

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Episode 76: Gamification Makes Learning The Golf Swing Fun | Nancy Dunn Kato, Published Author and CEO at SwingPlay.com

Nancy Dunn-Kato is a very well respected golf instructor, one ot the top junior golf instructors in the country. In our interview she talks about the gamification of teaching the golf swing; how she makes these simple little games to help kids learn the golf swing. There’s a movement in education about gamification, working to make the learning experience more fun and enjoyable.
Nancy Dunn-Kato of SwingPlay.com talks about the Gamification of the Golf Swing
Nancy Dunn-Kato has been a Certified Class A LPGA Teaching & Club Professional Member since 1989. She has played and taught golf for over 24 years.

Nancy’s company SWINGplay and its concepts are a direct result of her dedicated work with junior golfers and a real, practical, understanding of what works best. SWINGplay’s unique programs are specifically designed to focus the learning needs of young and adult golfers at all levels from beginner to advanced players. The SWINGplay systems and methods reinforce the play in golf – to keep the learning experience fun, positive, and filled with success that grows naturally out of children’s play. Skill and ability grow quickly through the game-play!

SwingPlay fun ways to teach the golf swing.Zeb’s Take

It’s obvious that Nancy really understands the golf swing, and how to teach the golf swing. She made a lot of good points; young golfers teaching other young golfers how to play the game and how young kids can teach parents and how valuable that can be and how you can bring the family together.

The thing she talked about that I want to expand on is making the golf swing fun. She talked about breaking it down into little smaller components, and then teaching that in a fun game type of way – gamification. She’s talking about making rainbows, knocking out shark’s teeth, dragons, Leprechauns, shooting spray guns. I’ve actually had a chance to see some of the stuff she is talking about and it’s very cool. I can see how young people can accept and understand it all very quickly because of the way she sets up these little games.

In education, we get so much information from so many different resources. Before the internet, teachers were more on their own. Now, there’s someone like Nancy who creates this killer program about how to teach the golf swing to young kids. She can take that and give that to golf instructors across the country and they can understand. I think this gamification of learning coincides with our social culture and the way that we are able to share knowledge today. It really enhances the learning experience, I think education needs to go that way. Having a teacher that stands in front of a class and lectures is like if Nancy were a golf instructor that stood there and just tells you what you’re doing wrong. Versus, talking about rainbows and dragons, you can imagine the difference that would have on a little child. You can teach the golf swing, just like you can teach anything else, through this gamification process.

What do you think about this gamification process?

Find out more about gamification of the golf swing, Nancy, and SwingPlay

Visit SwingPlay.com or email Nancy at Nancy@SwingPlay.com

Quotes

  • “It was really frustrating. I never wanted anyone to feel that way. I believed in my heart that I could find a way to make it much more easy for other people.”
  • “Golf has been made too hard to understand and it doesn’t have to be that way; it could be easier.”
  • “I love teaching teachers.”
  • “They’re learning and they don’t even know their learning. That’s the fun part.”
  • “I really really wanted to create something different.”
  • “People helping people and using golf as a way to get the community together.”
  •  “I just wanted to make something that makes the world a little better.”

nancy

 

More From the Interview

Nancy got involved in golf in college when a couple cute guys invited her to play at Torrey Pines. She borrowed a pair of clubs that morning and finished the day with a couple pars. When she told her golf buddies it was her first day, they were impressed. She checked out the golf scene and had the idea to become a pro in one year. She found a golf instructor, worked hard and reached her goal in a year and a half. She made several mini tours and was on the top ten list.

After her swing, put a coke can on her pitching wedge and she had to balance it, that was the start of all the games she began creating. It was about finding a way to make it fun after the lesson so she could understand it.

“When we were on the mini tour, none of us could afford golf lessons. So whoever would go get a golf lesson they would come and teach us what they learned.”

She got to train with Derek Hardy, who taught her a lot, she could have gone on and qualified for the tour, but she wanted to get better and shoot under par more often, but that wasn’t happening. She changed her path.

Golfs Greenland Book by Nancy Dunn-KatoShe wanted to become a teacher, so she could understand why the lessons were so confusing. “I would cry in front of Derek Hardy all the time, because I couldn’t understand what he was saying. It was really frustrating. I never wanted anyone to feel that way. I believed in my heart that I could find a way to make it much more easy for other people.”

She joined the LPGA, started as an apprentice, and was able to move up. She was lucky to be able to study under Chuck Hogan. He was part of the LPGA teaching them how to become better teachers. He was all about making things fun, and to do it through games. When she asked him how to be a better teacher, he said don’t just tell people what to do, they need to know why they should do it.

She started on a path where I broke down the whole game.

“It’s just taking old terminologies and making everything easier and something that people can put their thoughts around and understand really quickly and it’s kind of amazing if you can use games or sensory perceptive play, which is what I love to do.”

What is SwingPlay?
She took every part of the game and separated it into modules. Then broke it down into simple understandable sensory perception with a skill game, a sound game or anything with the senses. She uses story telling. With young kids she teaches them how to make rainbows and their club is the paint brush; there’s all kinds of different rainbows for the different golf swings. She is telling them how to make rainbows, but they’re learning about a golf swing.

Kids have hands-on experiences and they become more self aware. They get to experiment all through play and self discovery. The kids have a great time. They’re learning and they don’t even know they’re learning. That’s the fun part.

She says, the educators of the world, they get it. It’s the 21st century of learning; it’s more hands on and discovery, let the people figure it out for themselves.

I’ve had high school kids and college kids help mentor these younger kids with table top projects. These kids get to be mentors and as they are helping the younger kids they are learning too.

What do you enjoy most about teaching golf?
Watching people’s reaction when they get it.

What life lessons and values do you think golf teaches?
Patience, love, respect. One thing about a golf course is, it’s like a park, it’s green and beautiful. Teach them to pick up trash and take care of the golf green. It’s a place where kids can go and be in nature.

Her book, Golf Greenland, is a 4 hour lesson all about putting, through story-telling and games. The fundamentals you learn in putting just go larger as you go up the game.

She wants to find a good home for her program. She’s really excited that Newport Beach YMCA is excited about it. She’d like to see it at more places libraries, schools, and places like restaurants. Maybe even try to standardize golf using everything she has created, make it more fun and get more people involved.

 

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Episode 72: The Social Golf Course Part 2

The Social Golf Course was written by Zeb Welborn and John Hakim.

The Social Golf Course by Zeb Welborn and John Hakim

The Social Golf Course

In Episode 72 of the Defining Success Podcast we go through our book chapter by chapter and discuss the ideas presented in the book. At the end of each chapter we present a question in our book, which we encourage readers to engage with on our website, SocialGolfCourse.com.

In Part 2, we discuss Chapters 9 – 14.

‘The Social Golf Course’ with John Hakim, Part 2

Chapter 9: How to Become a Social Golf Course
Basically, in this chapter we walk through each platform and the basics of how to use each platform. Create a social culture and reflect that culture online through your website, email list/newsletter, Facebook, Blog, Twitter, YouTube, and Instagram. Social media is constantly evolving and each platform will offer different ways to reach out and encourage golfers to play your course.

Which platform is the most important for golf courses to utilize to reach more customers?

Chapter 10: Greenskeeper.org Golf’s Social Network
In this chapter we discuss how golf courses can leverage Greenskeeper.org. How they can use it for free, and why Greenskeeper.org is a media buy.

How do I get more GK’ers playing my golf course? More ideas!

Chapter 11: Creating Content to Build a Golf Community
Creating content for social media is not easy. In this chapter we have lots of ideas and examples for creating content that will resonate with your golfers. Macro content is larger pieces of content designed to educate, entertain, or help tell the story of a golf course. Including 19th Hole Stories, the golf stories you share in the clubhouse before and after a round of golf. Micro Content can be posted more frequently. It is smaller pieces of content that are designed to build engagement.

What is your favorite 19th hole story?

Chapter 12: Implementing Social Media: Getting Your Staff Involved
To transform your course into a social golf course it’s important to have several members of your staff contributing. Staff members from marketing, top level management, turf management, the pro shop, tournament organization, event planning, and outside services can all be a part of your course’s social media presence.

What ideas do you have to get golf course staff more involved in the social media presence at your golf course?

Chapter 13: Managing Your Reputation
Today, customers naturally filter sales messages because the internet, search engines and social media provide a more accurate representation of your golf course. Properly handling negative and positive reviews on your social networks can not only bring more golfers to your course, they can help you make your business better.

How do you handle positive or negative reviews at your golf course? Have any examples?

Chapter 14: The Social Golf Course
Creating the social golf course will take hard work commitment and dedication. The social golf course is proud of their product. They strive to give the best golfing experience to every golfer that visits the course and then work to share that experience with as many people as possible.

Use social media effectively and turn your golf course into The Social Golf Course.

Do you have questions about how to turn your golf course into a social golf course?

Visit www.SocialGolfCourse.com!

Check out the book on Amazon.com, The Social Golf Course: Increasing Rounds with Social Media. Available for Kindle (you can download the kindle app for free on most smart phones, tablets, and computers!) and as a paperback.

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Episode 71: Overcoming Career Disaster | Melissa Krivachek from Briella Arion

Melissa Krivachek has had lots of ups and downs in her professional career. At a young age she was promoted quickly at the retail store she worked for, but when the recession hit, she lost her job. During that time she became homeless and even spent some time in jail. She rebounded nicely by creating her own business, Briella Arion, which she is running today. Learn how Melissa worked toward overcoming career disaster in episode 71 of the Defining Success Podcast.

Melissa Krivachek Owner of Briella Arion Author of Be Ballsy on the Defining Success Podcast with Zeb Welborn

Melissa Krivachek

Melissa Krivachek is the President of Briella Arion. She has been captivating, inspiring and motivating entrepreneurs across the globe since her early twenties. Chosen as Evolution Magazines 2013 Top Power Player Under 40, and featured on CNN, Forbes, Yahoo Finance, and receiving dozens of other accolades, Melissa’s passion for personal growth resonates with audiences looking for more fulfillment in all aspects of life and business. As the Author of Be Ballsy! How Not To Suck At Love, Success, & Happiness she loves teaching audiences how to break-thru limiting beliefs so they can have it all.

Briella Arion is a coaching company that works with six figure entrepreneurs so they can breakthrough the ceiling of complexity and have it all, all at the same time, love, success and happiness. Melissa has been with a six-figure salary and jobless.

In 2004, Melissa started at Walmart at 16 and the manager mentored her along the way. She exceeded his role in the company and became the store manager and in 2008, she was fired. Melissa bought a brand new car, a new home and eventually they took her car, her came and was $50,000 in debt.

She then began working for Family Dollar and Melissa got bored fairly easily and moved to Chicago where she began managing multiple stores. From 2004 to 2011 Melissa racked up a bunch of speeding tickets and ended up going to jail.

Melissa gravitated towards anything related to professional management. Melissa’s first client was a customer who was trying to get Melissa to sell her Visalis. He was having a really difficult time and she began coaching him. He’s a very passionate person, became a millionaire and is now doing extremely well.

Melissa’s Mastermind is a five-week program that holds people accountable to help you hit your goals. She does the program on Facebook so that you have accountability built into it.

Through her coaching Melissa tries to remove limiting beliefs from people to help them break through to more success.

Be Ballsy, written by Melissa Krivachek, focuses on helping people balance love, success and happiness and she has been able to maintain it.

Matt Lee was the first guest Melissa Krivachek had on her show. He’s actually the coach for Melissa and has helped her achieve phenomenal success.

The best thing Melissa is doing right now is working with lots of successful entrepreneurs and coaching them break through their limiting beliefs.

Melissa Krivachek Be Ballsy Overcoming Career Disaster

Melissa Krivachek

Engaging Discussion Questions:

  • Have you ever had to work at overcoming career disaster?

Success Quotes:

  • “Success is about the impact that you make, the money that you make and how clear your message is to the audience you’re reaching.”
  • “It’s more important to take small consistent action than it is to reach goals.”
  • “If your values and beliefs aren’t aligned with your values and results than you have a problem.”

Links to Great Stuff:

  • Briella Arion – I coach 6 figure entrepreneurs across the globe from my home in Marion, Iowa.
Be a Baller Melissa Krivachek

Be a Baller

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Episode 70: Don’t Let Your Ego Get in the Way | Virgil Herring Author of The Golf Journal

Don’t let your ego get in the way.  Virgil Herring is one of the top teaching professionals in golf and when one of his best players, Brandt Snedeker became the PGA Tour’s Rookie of the Year, Virgil expected recognition.  Brandt recognized another golf coach for his success and Virgil’s ego got in the way.  Learn from Virgil in Episode 70 of the Defining Success Podcast.

Virgil Herring Don't Let Your Ego Get in the Way

Virgil Herring

Best-selling author Virgil Herring is Director of Instruction at the acclaimed Westhaven Golf Club and is founder of Higher Performance Golf Academy. Virgil received the 2003 Tennessee Section PGA Teacher of the Year Award and was named 2002, 2003, 2005 and 2006 Middle TN Chapter PGA Teacher of the Year. He was named a 2009 U.S. Kids Golf Top 50 Instructor (source) by U.S. Kids Golf. And he also worked with PGA Tour player Brandt Snedeker.

Virgil got involved in golf after he injured his shoulder as a baseball pitcher at 16 years old.  He then turned to golf.  Virgil took up the sport by playing with his best friend at a young age. He knew that he wanted to be involved in sports in his entire life.

He went to college to learn how to become a part of golf management.  Today, he plays as much as he possibly can, but he became an instructor at an early age.  His first 1,000 hours of golf instruction were working with over-achieving collegiate golfers.  Everyone who worked with him told him that he had a knack for teaching.

Virgil likes to help others.  When he’s competing he’s too concerned about other people’s games.  He says he’s coached about 22,000 golf lessons, and coached 1,500 to 1,600 people.

The most compelling story Virgil has working with students was a young female golfer who Virgil took from a golfer who was quitting and three months later, she became a professional golfer.  And now, Megan Grehan is now a professional golfer.

Brandt Snedeker was another student of Virgil Herring’s who went on to do great things in golf.  Virgil was Brandt’s golf instructor for eight years where he went from an unranked junior, to the #1 player in college golf, to the #1 amateur in the world, to a two-time Nationwide Tour Winner, to the PGA Rookie of the Year.  He won the US Public Links and made the cut in the Masters as an amateur.

Brandt was never the best hitter of the golf ball, but he always ended up winning.  Virgil remembers the first time playing with him and one thing that Brandt had was confidence.  He knew how to hit the shot when he needed to hit it. Virgil has taught more than 20 people who hit the golf ball better than Brandt, but he’s been the best putter 3 out of the last 5 years.

When Virgil began teaching golf, he was a big believer in getting people to perform their best.  He saw the little differences between the average golfers and the exceptional golfers.  Virgil knew he wanted to be a competitive golf coach and his brand was helping golfers achieve their personal greatness.

When Brandt won his PGA Tour Event in 2007, he went on national TV and thanked another teacher.  Virgil reacted in disbelief and shock.  And they didn’t handle the situation very well and Virgil wish it hadn’t had bothered him as much as it did. They’re both members of the same club, but their relationship is nothing like what it used to be.

Virgil wrote The Golf Journal and Virgil believes this is the year for statistical data to help people track their statistics to help people understand what they need to do to get better.  His book helps people understand their golfing trends and how they can make those trends better. Golf teaches honesty, and integrity.

Virgil likes the creativity of golf.  There are a lot of different golf swings out there.  Golf is a long contest that trains focus, concentration and how to re-focus.

Another story Virgil re-tells is the time when Brandt asked Davis Love III about how he could stay on the tour and Davis told him that if he thought he should be out on the PGA Tour than he shouldn’t worry about it.  The guys who can miss a cut are ok, but those who treat it as life and death are in trouble.

The Golf Journal by Virgil Herring

The Golf Journal

Engaging Discussion Questions:

  • Name a time when your ego got in the way?
  • Have you ever worked with someone who was a world-class athlete or business person?  What traits did they possess that others did not?

Success Quotes:

  • “Success is choosing what you’re life’s mission is and chasing after it with all of your zest.”
  • “Golf mirrors life … how you handle adversity on the golf course shows how you handle adversity in live.
  • “There’s no such think as perfect.”
  • “When your ego gets in the way, sometimes bad things happen.”
  • “I get the chance to do exactly what I wanted to do since I was 21 years old and I get to do it every day.”
  • “Brandt Snedeker has a killer instinct that most people don’t have.”

Links to Great Stuff:

  • Virgil Herring – Virgil worked with PGA Tour player Brandt Snedeker from 2000-2007 and Tour players Harry Taylor, Brad Fabel, Cliff Kresge, Vance Veazey, Garrett Willis, Bob Wolcott & Kim Williams. He works with 52 Division-1 College Players and 22 top TN Junior Players. In Nashville, hear Virgil 7-8 a.m. Saturday on 104.5 The Zone.
Virgil Herring on not letting your ego get in the way

Virgil Herring

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Episode 69: Evaluate Every Decision | Griffen Halko from Stay Designated

As a DUI offender, Griffen Halko made a mistake that changed his life forever.  In Episode 69 of the Defining Success Podcast, we discuss how important it is to evaluate every decision.  Griffen’s decision resulted in the death of a good friend, sent him to jail and forever changed his future.

Griffin Halko Stay Designated Evaluate Every Decision

Griffen Halko

Stay Designated, Inc. was conceptualized in March of 2008, in a hospital bed located in the Intensive Care Unit at UCI Medical Center. While recovering from critical, life threatening injuries, Griffen Halko came face to face with reality.

Before the accident in March 2008, Griffen was working locally in Chino Hills an Diamond Bar.  And, he was frequently involved in the night life scene, visiting bars. In March of 2008, Griffen had a night out with a good friend, Eric and his girlfriend at the time.  They had a couple of drinks and Griffen drove home and his car was hit by a vehicle in Grand.  Eric was killed in the crash.  Griffen was transported to UCI Medical Center were he sustained serious injuries and was in a coma.  Doctor’s believed he wouldn’t be able to walk.  He came out of the coma and became healthy.

Griffen was charged with vehicular manslaughter, two counts of felony DUI and an enhancement with driving above a .15 BAC.  While he was laying in his hospital bed, he decided he was going to take this opportunity to educate others about the danger of drinking and driving.  He pled out to a felony DUI and started Stay Designated. Both the victim and the perpetrator struggle.

Griffen hopes to educate others so events like these don’t happen again. As a young man, Griffen identifies as an addict, but he does not identify as an alcoholic, but he does make poor decisions while drinking alcohol. Stay Designated has a few different programs.  Griffen does a lot of mentoring and a lot of coaching with people who have substance abuse problems.

Stay Designated has a three-tier mission. The first is to educate others about the effects of alcohol and drug use.  The second is victim advocacy for those affected and for perpetrators.  The third tier, and the most important is to get hands-on in the community to create a designated driver program.

Chances for change brings an individual who fails a drug test at school or work they need to complete an out patient program.  They work hands on with a treatment specialist.  They have a bunch of courses they need to attend and once their course work is done they can go back to school or work.

Stay Designated is very new.  They have weekly marketing meetings and they start working the streets.  They work with attorneys, schools, the city, Psychology Today and the Yellow Pages.  They also try to work in the community as much as possible. There have been individuals that Griffen has worked with who have achieved clean time and have been able to get their lives back together.

Six years after Griffen’s accident, but this year Griffen was granted an expungement by the courts that put an exclamation point on his success story. One of the most difficult things that Griffen has encountered is that Griffen is looked at as an offender.  When Griffen started this program he had no idea what it would become and it has expanded greatly since then. Getting off the ground was probably the hardest thing for Griffen to do.

Stay Designated Griffen Halko Defining Success Podcast Zeb Welbon

Stay Designated

Engaging Discussion Questions:

  • What’s a bad decision you have made that you wish you could take back?
  • How important do you think it is to evaluate every decision?

Success Quotes:

  • “When you’re getting in a vehicle, make sure you haven’t been drinking.”
  • “Think before you act.”
  • “If you have the emotional support and the drive, you can get it done.”
  • “If you can go to sleep at night and rest easy and have a good heart than you are successful.”

Links to Great Stuff:

  • Stay Designated – “To offer support to those struggling with alcohol as well as other substance abuses and destructive behaviors. With a focus on reducing driving under the influence injuries and fatalities, intoxicated driving, underage drinking, and drug abuse, we strive to offer education and other means of prevention, promote victim advocacy, as well as assist those both directly and indirectly affected. Ultimately, we aim to achieve positive rehabilitation for all parties involved.”
Griffen Halko Evaluate Every Decision

Griffen Halko

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Episode 68: The Social Golf Course Part 1

The Social Golf Course was written by Zeb Welborn and John Hakim.

The Social Golf Course by Zeb Welborn and John Hakim

The Social Golf Course

In Episode 68 of the Defining Success Podcast we go through our book chapter by chapter and discuss the ideas presented in the book.  At the end of each chapter we present a question in our book, which we encourage readers to engage with on our website, SocialGolfCourse.com.

In Part 1, we discuss Chapters 1 – 8.

Chapter 1: The Death of the Traditional Golf Course. When I think of the glory days of golf, I think back to the time my grandfather played the game as the men’s club president at his local golf course.  The times have changed and we must think about the game differently. The local golf course must take the responsibility for developing and enhancing their local communities — online and offline.

Question: When were the glory days of golf?

Chapter 2: An Industry in the Rough Golf has been in decline since 2005.  It’s been a scary time in the golf course industry with more courses closing than opening and the outlook doesn’t look pretty.  Golf courses need to take a much more active role in promoting the game.

What is the biggest problem facing golf today?  How can we fix it?

Chapter 3: The St. Andrews Model St. Andrews is the undisputed home of golf, but it is not by luck.  St. Andrews marketed themselves and their golf course to the world which has made St. Andrews the most recognizable golf course in golf.  The most important thing golf courses can do is to market their golf course effectively.

What are some interesting ways you’ve seen golf courses market themselves? How do/would you market your golf course?

Chapter 4: The Mulligan Tee time wholesalers have been detrimental to the golf course industry.  Social media has created an opportunity for local golf courses to eliminate the need for tee time wholesalers and create a strong personal brand for themselves.

Are tee time wholesalers good or bad for the golf course industry?

Chapter 5: Golf is a Social Game Golf is a social game.  It’s a no brainer that social media and golf go together.

What makes golf special?

Chapter 6: Marketing in Today’s Economy Effective marketing methods change all the time.  Right now, social media is outperforming all other forms of advertising methods.  We all must learn how to market effectively as technology is changing the way we live and the way we consume information.

What is the future of marketing in the golf course industry?

Chapter 7: The Golf Niche Golfers are really easy to reach through social media.  Targeting features on different social media platforms offer a great opportunity to connect with your target market.

Who is your ideal customer? How can you get them?

Chapter 8: How Being Social Can Increase Profits at Your Course The big question is, how can social media make money for your golf course.  In this chapter we go in detail about how social media works and how you can profit from using social media at your golf course.

How has social media impacted your relationship with your customers?

Part 2 will complete our discussion on The Social Golf Course.

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Episode 67: The Learning Experience | Fred Shoemaker from Extraordinary Golf

In Episode 67 of the Defining Success Podcast, Fred discusses what he’s learned teaching golf and how people tend to learn best and enjoy the experience when they are allowed to learn for themselves.  As a coach, Fred avoids passing judgement and simply guides his students to be more aware of their experience during the process.  Learn how Fred Shoemaker cultivates the best learning experience.

Fred Shoemaker Extraordinary Golf The Learning Experience

Fred Shoemaker

Fred Shoemaker is the founder of Extraordinary Golf which provides an environment where golfers could know their remarkable ability and learn to unfold it moment to moment.  The school has been named One of America’s Top 25 Golf Schools in America by Golf Magazine and has been a life-changing experience for many participants.

Fred has spent most of his career—over 42,000 lessons, and thousands of golf schools and workshops—helping people overcome the obstacles that prevent them from discovering and expressing their potential.

Fred fell in love with golf at an early age and at some point he realized that there was a lot more to the game than just the golf swing.  He was a coach at UCSB in 1975 and has been involved in the game for a long time.

Fred’s Dad was in the military and they were stationed in Guam at an early age and he began visiting the golf course regularly where he fell in love with it.  Fred was not fascinated in playing golf professionally, but he became fascinated with coaching the sport.

Sometimes golfers need to look at what they do before and after they get on the golf course to help improve their game.

Fred knows that his first ready-made answers don’t help people.  Letting people experience the learning process is the real key to success in learning and education.  Since 1950 human beings are not getting better at golf. The learning experience is a key component to learning and happiness.

Anybody who has developed anything has gone through a lot of failures along the way.

Extraordinary golf focuses on the individual and works with each golfer individually.  Extraordinary golf helps to capture people when they do something that is extraordinary.  The basis of extraordinary golf is awareness.  Human beings are capable of accomplishing anything as long as they are aware.

Transformations are difficult.  Fred has been a part of some remarkable transformations and to watch people undergo those transformations is profound.  Fred has been able to change the way golfers think about their swing and how they respond to positive and negative thoughts.  Through that he has witnessed many transformations.

Golf is a game where you can keep improving well into your seventies. We have a sport that can teach us something about life if we choose to learn from it.

One of the biggest mistakes Fred feels he has made is not acknowledging the people who have had an impact on his life.  The connectivity of all of us is undeniable and he feels like he’s a link in a chain and he intends to be the strongest link in the chain he can be.

There are some people who have chosen a purpose to play golf and for those people who have found a reason to play golf that makes sense . . . they have won the game.

Fred Shoemaker from Extraordinary Golf Talking About the Learning Experience

Fred Shoemaker

Discussion Questions:

  • Would you like a life of endless interest or endless boredom?

Links to Great Stuff:

  • Extraordinary Golf – “Extraordinary Golf challenges the cultural views on learning. We’ve come to see that golfers are far more able than they believe. But, they haven’t learned to develop–or access– what they have.”

Success Quotes:

  • “Success is to be up for something bigger than what your life is about . . . to have a cause that’s worth giving your life to.”
  • “There is no such thing as a bad day in gratitude and appreciation.”
  • “Really successful people always interpret the world in a way that empowers them.”
  • “How we interpret life . . . is what changes our world.”
  • “When one changes one’s language you actually physically change your body.”
  • “If you rob people of their failures, you rob them of their future.”
  • “The golf swing is the most analyzed human motion in recorded history.”
  • “Sometimes the questions make the difference and not the answers.”
  • “The way we do one thing is the way we do other things.”

Visit the website for our new book, The Social Golf Course.

Extraordinary Golf by Fred Shoemaker

Extraordinary Golf by Fred Shoemaker

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Episode 64: Pinterest and SEO | Cynthia Sanchez Host of Oh So Pinteresting Podcast

In this episode of the Defining Success Podcast, Cynthia Sanchez shares her thoughts on Pinterest and how to optimize your website to take advantage of Pinterest and SEO.  She also discusses the importance of including proper descriptions so you can be found in the Pinterest search engines and reach more people.

Cynthia Sanchez Pinterest and SEO Oh So Pinteresting Podcast

Cynthia Sanchez

Cynthia Sanchez first started to use Pinterest in 2011, and launched Oh So Pinteresting in February 2012.   After a few months she was approached by a company to see if she could help them with Pinterest and manage their social media accounts. In September 2012, she left her job as a full-time radiation oncology nurse to focus on building Oh So Pinteresting and my business. . . . and the rest is history.

Cynthia got involved in Pinterest reluctantly and the first time she got on Pinterest she was hooked.  She was seeing pins and images that linked her to these new websites which she never would have encountered using traditional Google searches.

Pinterest is a very visual platform and she thinks that’s the appeal of it because you can quickly browse through images to see what gets your attention to decide which website you’d like to visit.  For her, it was eye opening.  We relate to images in a more emotional way where we get lost in the pictures, we relax and it causes our brain to react in a different way.

In January of 2012, Cynthia was looking at podcast categories and she came across Pat Flynn’s Smart Passive Income Podcast.  She didn’t realize that she could start a business with her blog and so she listened to all of Pat’s podcasts and it could be something that she could do in her spare time.

She decided to write her blog on her personal experiences using Pinterest.  And after starting her blog, she was quickly approached by a business that wanted her to help manage their businesses Pinterest page.  She went to Blog World in New York and she created business cards.  One of the posts she wrote when she came back was about using Pinterest to get your hair cut.  She asked the salon owner if she could leave her cards in the salon.   A local business owner visited the salon, saw her cards and approached her.

Cynthia focuses on just doing Pinterest for the majority of the businesses she works for.  Last week, they launched a new way for how categories appear and they are constantly changing.  Cynthia is now working to stay on top of managing her social media presence.

The biggest piece of advice Cynthia can give to business owners is to come up with a strategic plan.  You need to think of your ideal client and how they connect to your business.

The early adopters of Pinterest were women from the midwest and traditional social networks are adopted in a particular geographic region.  Women represent the largest population on Pinterest.  In Europe, the ratio is closer to 50/50 while in the U.S., there are many more females than males.  You can customize the boards you want so you can get and see the topics you want to see on Pinterest.

Cynthia thinks that many businesses don’t use Pinterest and SEO (search engine optimization) properly.  They don’t take the time to incorporate keywords into their SEO strategies and this is extremely important on Pinterest.

When Cynthia works with clients she is on Pinterest five to six days a week.  She tries to get on Pinterest at multiple times every day.  She tends to pin a lot about social media, Pinterest, web design and other topics.  She tries to spread out her posts throughout the day.  Cynthia tries to pin between 5 and 12 times when she plans how often she posts on Pinterest.

One company that did Pinterest very well was a boot sock company, which is a product that has become very popular recently.  She doesn’t have an active account, but her picture went viral on Pinterest, and the girl did around a million in sales and was a featured entrepreneur on Shark Tank.

Cynthia’s podcast has been on for a year now and the coolest thing about podcasting is that she’s been given speaking opportunities as a result.  She’s given multiple speaking engagements across the country as a result of her podcast.

Cynthia Sanchez from the Oh So Pinteresting Podcast

Cynthia Sanchez

Engaging Discussion Questions:

  • How do you use Pinterest?
  • What is your favorite thing about using Pinterest?

Links to Great Stuff:

  • Oh So Pinteresting – Have you heard of Pinterest? It has become one of the fastest growing sites in history. In a nutshell, it is an online visual bookmaking site but, if approached with a strategy, it can be a very powerful tool. I’m here to teach you all about it.

Success Quotes:

  • “Success comes in little bits and bites . . . Those little successes all add up to the big success.”
  • “People don’t think of the SEO of Pinterest.”
  • “My favorite thing about Pinterest is being to connect with different parts of the internet that I never would have found before.”

Special Requests:

  • Go out there and find your success.
Cynthia Sanchez at NMX

Cynthia Sanchez

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Episode 62: Don’t Get Attached to Outcomes | Creativity Coach & Author Dr. Eric Maisel

Dr. Maisel shares his thoughts on creativity and how developing a process and sticking to it regardless of outcomes can help you to become creative.  The struggle with many creative people is that they expect something to happen when they create something and when the outcome doesn’t match their expectation they get discouraged.  Don’t get attached to outcomes. Learn how to explore your creativity in Episode 62 of the Defining Success Podcast.

Dr. Eric Maisel Don't Get Attached to Outcomes

Dr. Eric Maisel

Dr. Eric Maisel is the author of more than 40 books. His interests include creativity and the creative life, the field of creativity coaching which he founded, and natural psychology, the new psychology of meaning that he has recently been developing.

Eric started out as a novelist early on his career, but it wasn’t paying his bills.  He then decided to become a psychotherapist.  He recognized that no one was studying creativity and he began studying and learning creativity.  He eventually moved out of psychotherapy and became a creativity coach.

Creativity in the business world is meant to be innovation and/or problem-solving.  Creativity to artist’s is manifesting potential.  Creativity means the results and the desires to manifest ideas so they turn into tangible products.  Most creative people are stuck because they don’t know what to do, they are not able to work and they have difficulty in the competitive environment.

Dr. Eric Maisel Don't Get Attached to Outcomes

Dr. Eric Maisel

Dr. Eric Maisel suggests that creative people start a process where they work early in the morning every day.  By creating this habit, creative people can avoid being stuck in a pattern where nothing gets accomplished.  Another thing Eric suggests is to continually think of the meaning behind the things you create.  Establishing a meaning will help guide the process and make it important to complete.

Eric suggests that creative people start in the morning is because at the end of the night of the night most of your brain cells have already been used.  At night, people are thinking and working in the morning will help take advantage of that thought process.  Lastly, if you do something in the morning that is creative and has meaning you will be much more positive throughout the day.

There are two kinds of typical creative coaching sessions, the first session gives the client the opportunity to air their concerns so Dr. Maisel can address them and create a plan for subsequent sessions.  The regular coaching sessions will be about the issues he identifies in the first meeting.

A woman came to one of Dr. Eric Maisel’s workshop and she created a novel set in World War II and the book that came out of this was called the Puppet Boy of Warsaw.  And the pound amount of her two book deal was a phenomenal amount.

The most regular thing that Dr. Eric Maisel encounters in his coaching session are people who have tried to be creative for years without having much success.  They are looking for practical advice and emotional support in the process which Eric has been able to offer them.

Natural psychology does a better job explaining what the meaning of life is.  It shifts the idea from seeking meaning to the idea of making meaning . . . more specifically, value-based meaning.

Dr. Eric Maisel runs the Life Purpose Bootcamp.  Life Purpose Bootcamp is about getting a good handle on your meaning and your life purpose. Eric uses process to help him understand how his life purposes get manifested day in and day out. Don’t get attached to outcomes.

Creativity Coach Dr. Eric Maisel

Dr. Eric Maisel

Engaging Discussion Questions:

  • Have you ever found yourself getting attached to an outcome?
  • Do you have a process?
  • How are you creative?

Links to Great Stuff: EricMaisel.com – “Dr. Maisel, widely regarded as America’s foremost creativity coach, maintains a coaching practice, trains creativity coaches, and provides core trainings for the Creativity Coaching Association.” Suggested Reading: For Depression and Sadness: Rethinking Depression and The Van Gogh Blues: The Creative Person’s Path Through Depression For Creativity: Coaching the Artist Within: Advice for Wrters, Actors, Visual Artists & Musicians from America’s Foremost Creativity Coach and Secrets of a Creativity Coach Success Quotes:

  • “Success is making yourself proud of your efforts.”
  • “Most people can’t white knuckle creativity.  You have to do it because you love it.”
  • “Natural psychology focuses on our meaning needs and tries to articulate what meaning really is and how we can have more of it in our lives.”
  • “Life purposes are not given to us.  They’re decisions.”
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