Why Dave Decided to talk to Nick Sonnenburg:
Nick Sonnenburg has found that speed in a business is not just doing more in less time. Why grind out more work with less value when optimization saves you both time and money. With Nick having been employed by people like Tony Robbins, Aetherium, and many other big name companies he saw this first hand. Oh and did we mention he saved Aetherium $1,000,000/month just by optimizing their use of Slack?
Tips and Tricks for You and Your Business:
(1:54) “You’re Going to be Learning Be Rocket Science…”
(3:16) Nick’s Super Power is Easily Pausing to Go Faster in Business
(6:54) Nick Shut off His Company’s Marketing For a Year...Yeah Dave Was Shocked to
(8:18) The Disadvantages of Moving Fast in the Wrong Direction
(10:17) How Do You Know When to Use Each Tool for Your Business?
(14:36) Your Brain Should Not Hold the Company’s Secrets to Success Hostage
(17:40) Leveraging the Agency System
(21:07) Conversion Auditing, Do You Know How to do it? Better Yet, Do You Know What it is?
(26:03) Outsourcing is Some Awesome Sauce IF You Know What Needs Outsourcing
(28:02) You Increase the Speed of Your Company with Getting Rid of Roadblocks
(29:57) Optimizing Slack to Increase Your Company’s Speed
Quotable Moments:
(4:32) “I suffer from PTSD as an entrepreneur. Having cycled a couple of times and understanding the fear of ‘Oh my gosh what it if I lose it..’ so I just had the gas going the whole time.”
(8:22) “A lot of people move fast, but moving fast in the wrong direction doesn’t help you either.”
(15:38) “You can allow other people to look at how others do their job and give suggestions. Fresh eyes spark innovation.”
(26:58) “I think defining success and being able to measure success is one of the most important things with funnels and with any project in general to be honest. And I think people just don’t take enough time up front to think about those types of things.”
Other Tidbits:
Nick helped Aetherium save nearly $1,000,000 from optimizing their Slack page.
Nick’s company, Leverage, specializes in outsourcing and has helped people with buying a house all the way to optimizing a funnel. This wide range of services though has allowed them to identify what niches require and thrive off more optimization.
Important Episode Links:
One Funnel Away Challenge
DotCom Secrets Book
Email Dave
Connect on Facebook
Follow On Instagram
Contact Episode Guest:
GetLeverage.com
Nick@GetLeverage.com
Episode Transcript:
00:00 Welcome to funnel hacker radio podcast where we go behind the scenes and uncover the tactics and strategies top entrepreneurs are using to make more sales, dominate their markets and how you can get those same results. Here is your host, Dave Woodward. Everybody welcome back to funnel hacking
00:18 radio. I am so excited. Day I'd be up to and bring it on. A dear friend of mine who has been a mentor of mine, actually guy I've loved getting to know better and the one introduce you guys to Nick Sonnenberg. Thanks for having me. I am so excited. Uh, for those of you guys, go ahead. I'm honored to be called a mentor. You are. No, honestly I, it's one of the things I've, I am so impressive. For those of you guys who don't know, nick, this is a guy who's been an x high frequency trader from Wall Street, does the CEO of leverage, which is a company. I've got a ton of admiration for. A, they're totally disrupted the agency model, but the part I love is his. The way in which you think nick is, blows my mind. You have this ability to look at super, super complex problems and be able to minimize it down to the very key factors and to communicate it in a way that so many other people can understand.
01:08 We, we're just talking about this whole idea that, uh, you've got a new book coming out come up for air where you've consulted one and two type of employee businesses, consulted Tony Robbins, consultant, large, huge companies as well. And I think the part I love, just as every time I talked to you, is just to see, I mean, your mind races at this crazy, crazy pace and yet you slow things down so well to be able to explain things to people there. It's like, oh, oh, I get it. And I'm just totally impressed with that. So I, I don't have that skillset. And so when I see someone like you who does, I'm like, oh my gosh, I'm so impressed.
01:42 Well, thank you very much. A, I'll give you a story to piggy back off of that. So, uh, my first day of Grad school I went to Berkeley for my masters. I did financial engineering. And the very first day they, they said, look, you're going to be learning rocket science here, but the real goal is that you should be able to explain these concepts to a five year old. And that's really how you know that you've mastered a subject as if you can explain it very clearly in an in a simple way. So it's a big honor for you to say that to me cause that's something that really has sat with me since Grad school.
02:14 Well I love it. I get it. It's one of the things I've always, every time I talked with Russell I loved, he spends so much time on trying to get down to even a little doodle in a drawing for that same principle as, I mean there's a lot of people who will talk over people's heads and think that this techno babble and everything else is going to flatter people. All it does is confuse them and actually pushes people further away. And when you talk with people like yourself, with Russell, it literally draws people to you. Every, we were at TNC and I saw you hordes of people just trying to get your attention just to talk with you because of that.
02:44 You were the one with the hordes. I had them anymore. Um, no, like when I speak to people and I can't understand what they're talking about, I usually, the first thing that starts going on in my head is I don't think this person's really a master of what they're talking about. If, if they're explaining it in such a complex way,
03:00 you know, I love that concept. I wanna kind of expound on that. So we're, one of the things we're going to get to here later in the podcast is what leverage is doing right now on fixed pricing of funnels. So hold tight to the end because you want to hear that for sure. But I want to talk to you about one of the things you and I were talking about, this whole idea as far as the power of pausing to go faster. And for those of you guys have been following our journey as far as click funnels. Um, I actually, I all announce it right now. We are going to be changed our podcast, uh, to where right now we're 78,000 customers and we're in change the kind of the idea behind the podcast to bring on more people like yourself who understand scale and really invite people on our journey to get to a hundred to build a culture of 100,000 customers or users here before the end of this year.
03:46 But to do it, and it's one of the things you and I were just discussing was when you build a company as an entrepreneur, it's, so a little backstory here. Last week we were at a jewelry store and who's our VP of marketing at all of our marketing team in and we spent a bunch of time, I, Russell was there kind of identifying what the, the forefront is going to be as far as all these other funnels we want to do. But the one thing I realized was for our team, one of the things that's hard is the speed at which we go and it's what you and I were talking about. I, I suffer from Pstd as an entrepreneur of having cycled a couple of times and understanding the fear of, oh my gosh, if I lose it, I just, and so I keep going at the gas going all the time. And yet, uh, as you and I were just talking about, you have this ability to really understand the power of pausing to go faster. If you don't mind. Can you expound on that?
04:37 Totally. And there was a good, a great book. Um, I'm going to look up the name, it's called weight, which is all about the power posing. But yeah, what we were talking about before is once you go live with a company and you have customers to support, I mean that's it. Like you have to put a huge amount of focus on maintaining the, the, the system, supporting your clients, making sure that they're well supported. So sometimes when you grow too quickly, um, things break. And then a lot of, a lot of time that, that you have to invest down the road is spent on kind of fixing issues that kind of arose from premature scaling. So in development software development, you have, um, you have a, a concept that is, um, what's it called? It's called a coat. Um, oh my God, I'm blanking right now that you have technical debt, just like, and what that basically means is, you know, you've hardcoded some product or some feature that you want to do, but not a super scalable way.
05:42 So in a year or in two years from now, since it wasn't done in such an abstract way, you're going to have to Redo it because inevitably whatever you'd thought you need now you're going to get feedback from people and things and needs are gonna change and you're going to to change it. And the more time that you kind of invest, it's always a trade off, right? Like if you were to try to make something as abstract as possible, now you move slower to get that feature at least, but then you have less technical debt. And just like there's technical debt and coding, you have operational debt and companies, right? The quicker you launch, um, launch or do whatever it is, that's it. Like you don't have the bandwidth or you have less bandwidth now to go back and document processes or think through is this the best process and could we automate things because at the end of the day you have these people to support and it's really hard to find the bandwidth to go back and revisit a process document it, um, automate various things.
06:43 So like what I did, we at leverage, we grew to seven figures the first year, fully bootstrapped. We had like a hundred people at the end of that year and we moved so fast that a lot of stuff broke and it was really hard to go back and find the bandwidth to fix it. Um, because we were just having to support the current clients. So what I ended up doing actually last year as I shut off marketing for a whole year. Just kidding. Yeah, it was, it was one of those, I got the team together and I'm like, and I said to them and they all freaked out. I'm like, we're shutting, therefore I'm free. Just listen to this. I'm like, I was like, yeah, you heard me. We're going to do a year of zero marketing and we're just going to focus on internal processes, procedures, quality of service. We don't. And, and what I said to them was, we don't need a single one, single more client.
07:39 We just need to retain what we have and engage what we have more and um, improve our internal efficiencies to drive profit margins up. And it was a really kind of contrarian type of way of thinking about it. People always say, you know, sales sells, but I dunno, sometimes sales doesn't solve everything because if you're a new startup, sometimes selling and getting more customers and you haven't really dialed into product market fit or internal efficiencies, sometimes sales could hurt you more than it helps you. That's fascinating. At least that's my experience though. It's honesty. It's, it was just so fascinating for me. As we sat down with the, again, we had probably 25 26 of our team members this last week, and Julie's kind of running the show and I'm hit and miss in and out of meetings and stuff. And I heard it was Friday and it was kind of a people bringing together kind of their ideas for the whole week.
08:36 And they were talking about, you know, what are the good things, what are the bad things, what are things you'd like to change? And one of the things that that kept coming up was this idea of speed. And I'm like, I know like one speed and that's fast forward as fast as I can go. And yet I also realized as, as you grow as an entrepreneur, as you grow as an executive in your team, you have to understand that not everybody goes at the same pace you do. And for some that speed really, it literally, it creates so much stress for them. I was shocked to see just the anxiety created and, and how, and so I love hearing you saying you literally shut down. I can't do that.
09:14 You guys are super impressive. Like what you guys, what you and Russell have belt over there. I am. I am really amazed by it. But you know, a lot of people move fast, but moving fast in the wrong direction, it doesn't really help you. You either, right? That's true. You have a bit slower, but make sure you're going in the right direction. So it's always a balance of speed, um, uh, speed versus kind of being a little bit more long longterm focus. But in a lot of cases, like when I've pushed the team, hey, this needs to get out by next week or something like that, stuff breaks or it wasn't thought out very in a very, uh, systematic way. And we find that we ended up moving fast in the wrong direction and the whole thing was a waste of money in some cases. Not In all, but so it's just something, there's sometimes a benefit to going slower.
10:05 So is that the premise of your next book come up for air? No. So what's coming prayer come up for air kind of is, it naturally came out of my experience with building leverage, which is a fully remote, you know, bootstrapped company. Um, as well as uh, from my consulting business where I go into companies and help them improve and optimize and automate their internal systems and processes from a process operational slash tech point of view. Um, so in my experience with consulting and it leverage, I found that there is this pattern and everyone kind of struggles with three main areas of their business. Um, so I wrapped a little framework around it called CPR, which stands for communicate, plan and resource. And I realized one day that all companies were struggling in these three areas. And it was something that I realized without realizing it at the time, was a framework that we were running leverage by without it being formal.
11:06 So the first thing is communication. And I realized most companies are not communicating efficiently. There's all these new tools out there like slack and a sauna and all these things that a lot of startups know about, but a lot of mainstream companies that have been around for 20 years, um, have never even heard of. Right. And then also, even if you're a startup, like I'm sure you guys, are you guys using slack at Click funnels? Right? So first of all it's, it's, it's one thing to know about certain tools, but it's another thing to know when you should use a certain tool, like when should you use email versus slack versus text message, right? Versus a project management software. So, um, that's like the first thing people have never, when you got hired at a company, you get an employee manual of vacation days or insurance, but it doesn't tell you, hey, we use this type of tool for this, this type of tool for that.
12:03 So I was consulting for a theory. I'm, they were a 1200 person company. They were using slack, but it was misconfigured and they didn't have naming conventions for channels. They weren't using third party APP integrations. They had the wrong notification preferences. And I calculated that because of these inefficiencies there were probably losing about a million dollars a month. Something is silly. No, but when you have a blog, I mean this was a really extreme case, but when you have like a thousand people in a slack channel and it's nonstop all day at channel, like what's the Wifi password or at channel who wants to do, everyone has the wrong notification preferences and they're just getting distracted. There's, there's all that research that if you're in a flow state, it takes you like 10 minutes to get back into it. So you know, if it takes you 10 seconds to read each of these messages and it happens a hundred times a day and then you take people's average rate and you take that a thousand eyeballs are getting distracted.
13:00 It was massive. So not to get off too far off topic. So, um, come up for errors is kind of a, that employee handbook that you never got where it is at a high level of teachers. You had to think about the different types of tools when to use a communication tool versus a project management tool versus documenting knowledge. So then it goes a bit deeper into each of those. So what's the difference between internal versus external communication? Right, so slack for internal email for external, then I go into best practices. Okay. How do you optimize slack? Then look at email. How do you optimize email? How do you actually get to inbox zero? Um, the best way to get to inbox zero is to get to email zero. So a lot of people have a lot of email because they're using it when they shouldn't be using it.
13:43 So then the next part on planning it's like, okay, well when do you use a project management software versus a communication tool? A lot of people are project managing via text or via slack when it really belongs in a project management tool, which is what it's used for. And you can capture state and a whole bunch of other stuff because in a communication tool, the problem is it gets lost and then you had to start having to scroll. And at a high, at a high level, the name of the game is be able to know what you have to work on as a manager and know what people are doing and be able to find information as quickly as possible. Like at the end of the day that's, that's it with all of these tools. So creating guidelines and best practices with when and how best to use these different types of tools is kind of what I'm trying to achieve with the book.
14:28 And then the the are for resource is the most overlooked thing, but most companies are not thinking about documenting knowledge. And I have a, I have a difference between static and dynamic knowledge in the book. So static knowledge would just be like an internal Wiki. Like what's the Wifi Password, what are the core values, what's the vision? It's just, you know, where can I find that document? But then you have what I call dynamic, which our processes, so doing payroll, like how do you, what is the process of doing payroll and can you generate a checklist to make sure that all the steps are, are done. And what when you document knowledge, a couple things happen. One, you de risk the company so that if someone leaves, you have the knowledge there so that de-risked that company makes it faster to get someone else on board. But the, uh, the second thing that it does is you save money because a lot of time is spent looking up information or wasting people's, so that all gets saved.
15:28 But probably the biggest impact that you get is it really sparks innovation because once you've documented something, now you can allow for other people to take a look at how other people do their job and give suggestions because fresh eyes spark innovation. Um, if you have new people looking at how payroll is done or how the onboarding process is done, all of a sudden you're going to start getting people looking at things in different ways. So when I was a high frequency trader, I used to have to take a two week block leave to make sure I wasn't hiding trades and before I left. Yeah, when you're a front office trader, you have to take a block leave. And so what I have to document, what's going on in the market and how my algorithms worked and how, what, you know, how to run my book.
16:15 And even though I was the expert at that market or that algorithm, there'd always be some improvement when I got back, when I got back. You know, even if it's small, but people would just start challenging like how everything was being run and they would find things that just because I'm looking at it day in and day out, I wouldn't find, so at leverage we do quarterly rotations where the person that does payroll does customer success and customer success. Um, just for like just for like a week out of the quarter. But that's to stress test the system so that if all of a sudden we get a bunch of people that quit or just to make sure that we don't get too relaxed and doing things because that's the way that they've always been done. So that is really commission have come up for air. No, I love it. I the quarterly rotation. I'll have to, I'll have to talk to her to you about that one. That'd be, yeah, I'd be terrible. Jake's job as a designer though. He did come back and no color whatsoever is everything we looked here. Yeah. Just everything's black and white.
17:19 Well I'm vastly again, you've done so many cool things and I know one of the things you guys are looking at right now, uh, you mentioned your work with Nora who I'll get a lot of our community knows as far as [inaudible] and created our certified partners program years ago and you're looking at the changing the way that agencies are run. So if you don't mind, give me some ideas probably with which you guys are looking at doing. So leverage, um, which is uh, the websites get leveraged.com if you want to check it out. Leverage is like a new type of agency. So rather than going to the traditional agency where you have put up like a 10 or 20 k retainer per month, we, we made it more cost, affordable, affordable. You pay for whatever you use. And we do things in three main buckets, admin, marketing and operations.
18:00 And you could do a small one off task or you could have us do a whole app for you. So we've, we've done, uh, we've helped people get renters for their home. That would be an admin task, book, travel, do research. But then on the marketing side of things, we do a lot of podcast production, podcast marketing. We've created books, funnels. Uh, we've designed people, whenever I give a talk, they designed the PowerPoint. I'm a writer for inc. I, um, I audio record all of my content and a cab when I have downtime and I send that, I send that to the writer and they write the article posted on ink and then they blast it on social media. We've helped people, you know, get a ton of followers on Instagram. And then on the operations side of things, we've, uh, we'll help people automate processes, document processes, set up CRMs, do customization with a CRM, set up Shopify sites, et cetera.
18:58 So what we're talking about nor about which I'm really excited. Um, one of the things historically if leverage is we would, uh, we would always do something as a custom, a custom project or task. But in the three and a half years we've seen they've, that a lot of people are requesting these funnel buildouts, you know, book launches, launches, et Cetera. So, and then also just, um, like conversion audits. We've been just getting people to come to us like, Hey, we would love a conversion. Like, will you take a look at our funnel and just tell me what, tell me what you think. So what we've been talking in Nora about is, is helping us to kind of create some fixed item menu menu projects and tasks and the funnel space, um, that are well defined that people can just like click a button and say, Oh, I want a conversion audit.
19:47 I'm going to get, I'm going to get the traffic strategy, the messaging, the offer, the delivery, this much money. Um, so we're starting off with a conversion audit because that's kind of the easiest intro to someone. But then what we're also in the background figuring out now is a full done for you funnel. So you leverage is unique in the sense we have people in all different skill sets. So it's not like we're just for copywriting or just for funnel strategy or just design. So we're uniquely positioned that we could do the full start to finish scope. So we, we are also figuring out some fixed price fixed price for doing a full build out of a funnel from start to finish. Nick. Super Cool. Super Cool. This isn't the, one of the things I'm super excited about this. It was fun when I saw the two guys talking at TNC cause I just knew some amazing brainchild was going to come out of your conversation. And so it was fun just to see you guys talking. Yeah we were just like, oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my God. This is awesome.
20:54 So what are things you've done as far as his whole idea as far as a conversion audit? Yeah, give people a little more cause for a lot of people everyone talks about traffic and everything else. But it seems to be like this nebulous thing that people don't understand. I want to run traffic and I want to get, make things work. But I don't know exactly what that means. How does your conversion audit, what are you looking at? How, what are the things that people should be paying attention to? What do they need to provide to you? Things of that sort. So for one thing, so we're going to have two different buckets. One, if they already have something that they want audited and then another thing if they want from scratch, like a new strategy built up. Well one thing though that most people aren't thinking about what these things and me being a data science scientist, I'm, it's kind of the first thing I think of is, well how do you define success?
21:37 You know, what are the, how are you analyzing the data? Because a lot of people use our clients included. They'll ask us to do Facebook ads or something and they don't have good systems or metrics to even know are they making money or losing money with these things. So everything else aside, I think that's something important. And if you're running traffic, you should know your numbers and um, whether it's leveraged or someone else, you should set up some type of dashboards and some so analytics to be capturing that because flying blind with that stuff is a super dangerous game to play. It's so crazy. You mentioned that I lived, I was just talking to Dan Martell, uh, about some SAS metrics and things that we were looking at. And that was one of his biggest things was, you know, people just don't understand the importance of tracking their numbers in business and they'd look at their numbers at the end of the year and think, oh, did I make money or did I not make money?
22:28 I think I made money. I think, and it's just fascinating to me how frequently people wait, even you can't even wait a quarter. I mean, I'm looking at, I look at churn numbers on a daily basis and other metrics on a weekly basis. But I think the biggest problem I find for a lot of people, especially when they first get started was like, oh, it doesn't matter. I'm like, that's when it matters the most. Because for a lot of you, that's what, they don't have the money. It's like every dollar counts. Totally, totally. I mean it's, and then one thing that we were, we take data super seriously at leverage. Um, we're, we're using some really interesting, uh, we use a tool called mode analytics, which you have to be, uh, a data scientist to really use. It's kind of like a low level of bi software, but one thing is to be looking at churn.
23:12 But another thing is just to go even deeper decomposer term, maybe there's different types of turn. Like for me, there's churn because of quality versus engagement versus failed payment. So then get decomposing your turn into those buckets and seeing over time when you make a change, how does it affect each of those three subsets of turn? But then also taking it even a step further and like what are the leading indicators of churn? So for me, um, for engagement turn churn, uh, leading indicators, looking at, you know, how much they're using the service. So if we can kind of identify that, hey, if someone doesn't use a service for more than 10 days, they're 50% more likely to, to cancel, you know, then we start looking at that, those kinds of metrics. And then we have account managers take a look at them. But another thing that metrics has done for us is rather than having our account managers call or try to do a marketing campaign to 300 or 500 people, um, to try to get them to go to a, uh, a higher level service, like an annual plan or the next year, you know, you can, with the data, you can figure out who's the most likely and then instead of a thousand people, you get it down to 10 and you make the account manager's job way easier.
24:27 Oh, sure. So those are all types of things. But I will, yeah, if you're not, if you don't know your numbers, I wouldn't be doing Facebook ads, but the type of stuff like I mentioned before, traffic strategy. So how are you getting people to the funnel in the first place? Giving you copywriters on our team to look at your messaging. Like what is the messaging on the website, the email, the ads, um, you know, what is the offer and giving some suggestions, you know, is it free plus shipping or whatever, whatever the, the, the type of funnel is giving some feedback on the offer. And then, you know, lastly, this is the delivery of it.
25:04 I love that. You know, we've uh, spouse has been a lot of time on soul concepts as hook storing offer. And I think for at least for, for me, I think for a lot of our team, we typically like to start with the offer first. Cause we can build a good enough offer the then understand what are the stories you need to tell to basically get that off or sold. And what are the hooks you need to get to people to get engaged, to even listen to the story. And I appreciate, uh, I know you guys are very systematic over there and, uh, tons of systems in place that help people get through that. And I think for people who aren't as creative, it's one of the things they struggle with the most is how do I get started? So what are some of the things on your side when you're looking at it's idea as far as building out these types of funnels or even on an, on the conversion audit? Um, when a person gets stuck middle, what are some of the things are the tools that you guys are using to help them think more creatively
25:54 and they get stuck on a funnel or when they get stuck on what to outsource? I'm actually both, well, getting stuck on what to outsource is an easy one because most people aren't thinking about outsourcing. Um, and, and the trigger that I recommend is what, what are you doing on a daily or weekly basis that you don't get joy from? Or it doesn't tap into your unique ability. So if you were the CEO of a company and you are not a Facebook ad specialist or a really great copywriter and you're doing the Facebook ads in copywriting, like that would be a trigger. Um, you know, maybe there's someone better qualified at a lower hourly rate on top of that to, to do it. So, um, you know, some people like to do low level work because they find it relaxing, you know, Mark Cuban's known for doing his own laundry cause if he finds it relaxing, so obviously his hourly rates more watery. Um, but on the other, the other part of your question, I think defining success and being able to measure success is, is, is one of the most important things with funnels and, and with almost any project in general, to be honest in a lot of people don't take the time up front to think about those types of things.
27:11 I love it. I, I know that's been one of the main things. It's been fascinating for me as I take a look at where we've come. It just literally lasts for almost a year now as we've started to go from, it was Steven and Russell just kind of working together to now having an agency and as you start to scale an agency and you have people who are focused in different areas, um, it's been just so intriguing for me to see that growth and how it kind of like what you mentioned earlier, just having someone else's eyes to look on it can then trigger some of the thoughts of like, Oh yeah, I didn't think about that. We again, referring back to this last week, uh, Julie started working on the onboarding. We had some of our product guys there and they're like, oh, I never thought about that. I never thought about the location of this on the page. Or, or logically it would make sense it would go this way, but artistically it doesn't. And so I think it's a, that kind of stuff is really helpful. So thank you.
28:02 Oh, and, and, and you can go fast and a couple of ways. One, you just go fast. But another way to go fast, as you derisk the company to minimize those, those roadblocks and bottlenecks that come up that slow you down. And if you can remove those things that slow you down, that's another way of going faster. And one of the biggest things that people get slowed down, I know myself included, is if someone quits and then all of a sudden all that knowledge just gets lost. And then you have to onboard someone, like you've just moved really fast and then you hit this like this fork in the road or this, this massive hurdle. And then you're like three months back now and someone else. So as opposed to, you know, if you would have moved a bit slower, but then you smooth out those, those spikes, that's another way to look at these things.
28:46 So back to kind of what we said with slack, you might use slack, but maybe you're not using it. And the best way, and one thing that I really recommend is using channels versus direct messages. So if, if you're having a lot of private conversations with someone versus maybe there's a, maybe you're having a discussion with someone for their comp and it's a one-to-one direct message. Well, if you're the head of HR finance and then you leave, well, how are we going to find like that history? So maybe there should be a channel that person's name or comp Dash, that person's name and that's where you should be discussing the comp. So then you can add and remove people to the channel and the whole history is there and you don't waste a week, you know, back and forth with this person. So just as an example, there's a lot of little things you can do with these softwares that everyone's using, um, and a bit smarter way to avoid some of those obstacles that will inevitably up.
29:42 You know, when we were at TNC, one of the things you made mention of was this whole idea of slack and naming channels and this whole nomenclature and the way in the system. I know we're running short on time here for you, but do you have just like a few months, you can kind of explain what are some of the things using slacks, typically from a naming standpoint. So what I said earlier was the name of the game is to find the information as quickly as possible. What right. Whether it's an email, like a lot of people misuse email and they have a ton of folders where whereas they could just, if they knew how to search properly they could find it. Um, same with slack. So one thing I recommend is having just one or two kind of system owners of slack so that you avoid everyone in the company just spinning up channels.
30:23 Um, so that way you can create some kind of, some type of consistency. Um, I suggest as much as possible having private channels cause a lot of people don't know what's good for them and they'll start joining channels that they don't necessarily need to be a part of and they in a, in a non, in a nontrivial way, they started to waste a lot of time. But then lastly, naming convention. So slack doesn't have a foldering system but it's ordered alphabetically. So you could force the order of the channels by putting a number in front. So you could once, one thing you could do is, um, each department could have a number, but even if you don't want to do the numbers, if you have a finance department, you could have financed dash payroll, finance, dash credit cards, finance dash receipts. If you have HR department, you could have HR dash onboarding, HR dash offboarding, HR dash payroll.
31:16 Um, so what we've done is we've mapped our org chart to slack channels and then as we need more channels, we know, oh, it's this department name Dash and then whatever the new topic is. And because of what you ended up, it's, it's, it's a bit of a balancing or a dance that you have to play. But if you have this too few channels and then you have a lot of mixed conversations, you end up having to add a lot of people and they're having to read a lot of things that they don't need to be reading. And then kind of back to principle number one, you want to find stuff as easily as possible. So if you have just a finance general channel, it's not going to be as easy to find a payroll question as if you had a finance dash payroll channel.
31:58 Makes Sense. Awesome. Well Nick, thank you so much for your time. I, I could talk to you for hours on end. I appreciate you're so organized and systematic and I, I, it's a skill set I admire immensely. So I admire you and everything that you guys built. It's really remarkable what you guys have done over there. Well thank you. Well, I know people are gonna want to reach out to you. What's the best way for them to get ahold of them so they could just go to get leveraged.com my email is nick, get leveraged.com you can, that's my personal email address so feel free to email me. I'm pretty good about responding and I have a good system for that and I'm sure you do. Well good seeing you my friend. We'll talk soon. Thanks a lot. Hey, well, thank you so much for taking the time to listen. I can tell you the things
32:40 I love more than anything else aside from listening to podcasts is reading books. One of my favorite books was the very first book that Russel wrote. It's called Dotcom secrets, the underground playbook for growing your company online. So if you've already got a business or an idea and you've got something you want to get going right away, go ahead and check it out. We literally give you the book for free. You just pay the seven 95 shipping and handling. Just go to Dotcom secrets.com and we'll go ahead, we'll ship you out the book. You just pay 7.95 shipping and handling, and the book will be honest with you. Thanks again so much for listening and remember you're just one funnel away.
As I drive home from McCall ID, I reflect on the last 60 days. It has been filled with TONS of travel, some sleepless nights, and a bunch of AMAZING events that have given me so many take aways!
I was getting super frustrated with my podcast, even making it transparent in my episodes (I think I may have mentioned it a time or two ;) I have had a TON of people reach out to me to let me know that my content has made some sort of impact on them. Your "thank you’s" have given me a new rejuvenated energy to put towards this podcast and I’m SO excited to continue publishing my journey!
"If you’ve got a thought, an idea, a journey you’re going on; to document that journey through publishing. Take the time to really expose yourself, open up, let people see what’s really going on" - Dave Woodward
Some Topics Discussed This Episode:
"Challenges have literally become the biggest game changer for us at ClickFunnels"
Important Episode Links:
One Funnel Away Challenge
DotCom Secrets Book
Contact Episode Guest:
Email Dave
Connect on Facebook
Follow On Instagram
Episode Transcript:
00:00 Welcome to funnel hacker radio podcast where we go behind the scenes and uncover the tactics and strategies top entrepreneurs are using to make more sales, dominate their markets and how you can get those same results. Here's your host, Dave Woodward.
00:17 Hey everybody, welcome back to Funnel Hacker Radio. I'm so excited to be here, I really am quite excited actually. I've had the opportunity recently of just getting back From Funnel Hacking Live and from Traffic and Conversion. It's been one crazy, crazy busy 60 days here. I'm actually driving back right now from Mccall Idaho, where I’ve been up with my wife for the last two days, just kind of getting away and she and I were sitting there talking about how crazy it's been since the first of the year. We literally 60 days ago, we were up here in McCall, just finishing up a fun little vacation time with my family and then we jumped into, jumped on the plane and headed down to the Two Comma Club X cruise, were out for basically seven, eight days, I guess almost 10 days on a cruise, came back, got ready for 10X, went to 10X, was there for a week and then went off to the Bahamas for two days, came back, got ready for Funnel Hacking Live, went to Funnel Hacking Live for a week and literally the day after Funnel Hacking Live, went straight to San Diego and was there for four days for Traffic and Conversion-
01:20 Came home and then headed up to McCall. I think he'd been home maybe two, two and half weeks, three weeks since the first of the year. It's been a busy, busy time, but during all this period of time I was really getting kind of frustrated thinking, you know, I'm just done with this whole podcast and I made mention of that on a couple of different podcasts as well as some Facebook lives and I honestly want to let you guys know how much I appreciate all of the people who reached out to me. Whether it was in person at Funnel Hacking Live or in person to Traffic and Conversion or on a Facebook post or a text or personal message. I literally have had dozens of people reach out to me, thanking me for the content that I've produced, whether it was on Facebook lives or on a podcast.
02:00 And the crazy thing about it for me is it's not only energize me, but it has wanted me to be 10 times better. I've kind of rededicated myself to create an even better and better content for publishing purposes to make sure that what I'm providing actually gives you greater results that are more of take action type of of podcasts and content. I've got some great people we've lined up here to be interviewing over the next few weeks and I'm really excited to share this podcast with you. Also, I'm spending a lot more time digging deep to really kind of uncover some of the entrepreneurial scars of my own experience and many of you had asked to relate a little bit more about my own personal success stories as well as the ups and downs of the entrepreneurial journey and to share those with you guys so you can kind of expect those in the next month as well.
02:49 Again, I just wanted to use this podcast to first of all, thank you so much for everybody who’s listened as long as you've listened. Most importantly for those of you reached out and basically boosted me up in a time when I was kind of down and frustrated. I want to thank you for that. I'd encourage anyone else who's listening to other people's other content, whether it's on Facebook or blog posts or podcasts or youtube, wherever you're consuming content. It's amazing what a little thank you goes, It goes a long ways and I just wanted to say thanks for all those people who did that for me. And if you're following other people, I'd encourage you to do the same. On a side note, I highly recommend that you spend some time to start to publish. Publishing has become really one of the most important things and I'm starting to realize it more and more all the time.
03:35 A couple of benefits of publishing and I've seen recently, one has been the network. The connection has been fantastic. I've been amazed at the amount of people who actually listened. They don't ever say they listen, but then that all of a sudden they come up and say, you know what I've been listening to for a long time and I really appreciated what you said here, here and here., and it really changed my life. I've had people who've, I honestly had been my peers who I would never have thought they've spent anytime, listened to my, to my content and they've come out recently and said the thank yous as well. So I highly recommend that if you've got a, a thought, an idea, a journey that you're going on to document that journey through publishing, take the time to really expose yourself, open up, let people see what's really going on.
04:17 You're going to see a lot, much, a lot more of the vulnerable side of me coming out as I really kind of explain some of the journey that's I'm going on over the course of this next, this next year. Uh, we've ClickFunnels eclipse basically did over a hundred million in 2018 and we got some pretty lofty goals and a lot of that is going to take a lot of growth for me personally and I want to take you on that journey. And so I'll be sharing some of that with you. Uh, some of it will be the things that I'm going to, the people I'm going to be meeting, the people I'm going to be sharing with at bringing on. So I highly recommend that you spend the time doing the same thing. Um, it's, it is way outside my comfort zone to get on a pod podcast or to get on a Facebook live.
04:57 But as I've been doing it, I'm actually getting more and more confident in the content I'm providing but also in the stories that I'm telling. So first of all, thank you for everyone who has listened. Second of all, thank you for those people who reached out and acknowledged it. And third, and most importantly, I highly recommend that you do the to do the same and that is spend the time going out and start to publish. We just finished our third one funnel away challenge. It's in, in the midst of it right now. I highly recommend that if you're trying to figure out what to do next, and this could be either what to do with your own podcast, with your own content, with your own business challenges have literally become the biggest game changer for us at ClickFunnels. I spoke at traffic and conversion about it.
05:47 And I can tell you right now if you were trying to, anything in your business, the one thing you need to add is a challenge funnel. So right now if you don't mind, go to one funnel away, sign up and get involved in our challenge so you can kind of see and understand what exactly takes place. I'm gonna end up doing a podcast later about challenges, but I want to make sure that you get on it right away. So go to onefunnel away.com and sign up for the challenge. You will be super, super excited and glad that you did. Thanks.
06:23 Hey Everyone, thank you so much for taking the time to listen. I can tell you things I love more. Anything else aside from listening to podcasts is reading books. One of my favorite books was the very first book that Russell wrote. It's called DOTCOM secrets. It's the underground playbook for growing your company online. So if you've already got a business or an idea and you've got something you want to get going right away, go ahead and check it out. We literally give you the book for free, you just pay the 7.95 shipping and handling. Just go to Dotcom secrets.com and we'll go ahead, we'll ship you out of the book. You just pay $7.95 shipping and handling, and the book will be on its way to you. Thanks again so much, much for listening and remember you're just one funnel away.
Why Dave Decided to talk to Steve Larsen:
If you’ve heard the phrase “Lean into it” and “One Step Learning” then you most definitely have heard the name Steve Larsen before. Russell Brunson’s Padawan turned Master uses these sayings and principles to teach businesses and clients how to maximize their profits but today he wants to tell you how you can personally use them. He talks about the how and why behind each principle and how he used these exact principles to go from broke to a business coach. Like always, listen in for some great content and even learn how to maximize your knowledge gained at live events.
Tips and Tricks for You and Your Business:
(3:14) Steve’s Recent Geek Outs on the who
(4:28) What Do You Know About “One Step Learning”?
(6:44) Why Dave Loves One Step Learning
(9:23) Everything Isn’t New: Steve’s Philosophy on Events
(10:44) Steve’s Why’s and How’s for Frameworks
(14:04) Leaning In is How Steve Gets Through Challenges
(17:22) Sorry To Say It But...The Obstacle Is the Way
Quotable Moments:
(3:59) “They’re already a great fit, they don’t need to go create the problem and then go find the solution because they’re already feeling the problem.”
(6:24) It’s all about identifying where you want to go, where you are, and only learning like a hunter for the next step in front of you. That’s it. Blinders on everything else.”
(11:44) “ Understanding what those frameworks are and the natural step that most of the industry is taking that takes out most of the guesswork and it’s pretty hard to fail if you do it.”
(16:01) “It’s brutal honesty in oneself and with where you are like, ‘Steven...YOU’RE BROKE’ you know? And being okay with that and not judge your value off that.”
(19:08) “‘I don’t have any time’ Great, lean in. It’s not an excuse. I have empathy, but I have 0 sympathy for those kinds of scenarios.”
Other Tidbits:
Did you see Steve shaking at the Round Table Event at FHL? Our good friend is all good now but that’s just what happens when you’re trying to provide too much content on an empty stomach.
With consulting for thousands of companies now, Steve has become amply talented at Funnel Hacking other business strategies to understand the reason they worked for them.
Steve was unwillingly diagnoses with the symptoms of ADHD, he had too many goals and aspirations to allow the doctor to fully brand him as ADHD
Important Episode Links:
SteveJLarsen.com
Sales Funnel Radio Podcast
FunnelHackingLive.com
FunnelHackerRadio.com
FunnelHackerRadio.com/freetrial
FunnelHackerRadio.com/dreamcar
---Transcript---
00:00 Welcome to funnel hacker radio podcast where we go behind the scenes and uncover the tactics and strategies top entrepreneurs are using to make more sales, dominate their markets and how you can get those same results. Here's your host, Dave Woodward. Everybody welcome back to funnel hack black
00:18 radio. I literally have one of my most favorite people in the world on the show. He does not need an introduction, but I will introduce him afterwards. I want to welcome to the show with my dear friend, Mr Steven or Steve Larson. Welcome to show, but hey, thanks so much for having me, man. This is awesome. I am so excited. This is, I was going to try to go back. You are, I think what episode? Like 12 on funnel hacker radio. The one of the very, very first ones I ever did. I was so way, way, way back when, way back. Let's figure that one out. But it's been so cool for me to see your journey and you're just such a dear friend. You provide such massive value for those of us who were not at funnel hacking live. I don't know why you wouldn't have been there for some reason if you weren't, uh, just one of the many things that just epitomizes the kindness of Steve.
01:04 Do you want to go by Steve or Steven on this podcast? Which one you want is fine. Okay, so we'll go with Steve. So Steve was basically, they're at funnel hacking live. He was one of our round table hosts. You've already spoken. He just bought a ton of value. He's literally standing on a chair speaking to, he had the most people at anyone. I think we were like eight rows back of people around this circle. And so you basically have the knights of the round table with eight concentric circles behind it. Just couldn't get enough people around him. And all of a sudden I see Stephen sitting down. I'm like, Huh, that's kind of different. It's not normally like to you. And then I'll come over and he's like shaking. I'm like, dude, what's going on? He goes, I haven't eaten and I'm, and I'm like, stop everything.
01:45 You can't talk anymore. But like, listen, you guys are going to kill my favorite person in the world. You cannot do this to Steve though. Visit got us food. But that's just who Steven, I mean Steve, you give so much to everyone and it's just the most generous person in the world. The part I love is you just, you immerse yourself in content to a point that it is far beyond what most people would ever do. And because of that, the value that you're able to give people is so huge. I mean, I had people coming up to me, I would've paid $50,000 just to be, it's even stable. I mean people were so excited to be there, so we'll probably have to pay you next year to be around people. Hose. I was going to say, man, who is that guy?
02:26 But with that I just again see if thanks so much for being on. Anything else you want to say before we dive into some fun stuff and I appreciate that, that you know, I, I, the feeling is mutual. I just about passed out that day. I, I all the tricks, my vision actually boring. I was like, I'm not used to blurring out. And then I felt your hand on my shoulder pulling me down and I was like, oh, thank you. Oh my Gosh Dave. Thank you. Oh my gosh. Crazy. But honestly, the thing that I just love is Steve, you have this ability to connect with people at a level most people don't, which is, I know you're real strong. D I personality anyways. And with that you're, you're so driven, you get at the same time you have this heart of gold that people feel and they're just so drawn to you. I mean, it was funnel hacking live was so fun for me to watch it at the same time, scary because they've literally mauling you, they couldn't get enough of you. And it was just like, and I know you had friends there protecting and everything else, but every once in while it's like, listen back off.
03:27 Yeah, yeah, yeah. Thanks. So it's just neat to see. But so tell me, what are some of the things that you're, what are you geeking out on these days? What are the things that you're really enjoying the most? Yeah. You know, one of the things I've been focusing on a lot lately is this whole concept of getting more clarity on, on the WHO that we all sell. You know, this past little while, like I'm so geek out so hard on the funnel itself, obviously in the offer and the sales message, but what I've been noticing, the thing is that there's these people out there who frankly have terrible funnels, terrible offers, really bad sales message, but they're making a lot of money and it's been a pattern I've been diving into really in the past eight months and following up and seeing what's happening and the piece that they've all gotten good at is the WHO and they're good at talking to these people who are already a great fit.
04:18 They don't need to go create a problem and then present the solution cause they're already feeling the problem. They don't need to go and see, oh if I already see the, how do I build up the value of this land? They already see the value because they've been trying all the other avenues and products that already exist and because they get clarity on that one piece, the rest of it, they can be terrible at and make a lot of money and has been the thing of a Gig and out a lot lately is how to identify that. Who and where they are.
04:44 One of these you said at funnel hacking live, which I've taken notes on and I'm actually making sure I implement my own life these days. And that is [inaudible] one step. Learning, learning one step ahead. Oh yeah. If you don't mind just kind of explain to people what that is cause it'll tie into exactly what you said when you were talking about this. Who,
05:00 yeah. You know I, it was probably three years after I really started trying to do business on my own and it was, it was challenging. You know, it's very challenging and, and I'm, I'm reading and I'm studying and immersing and I think that's important, especially at the beginning of any journey is to really go deep for a little while. But then eventually you got to stop and put everything down. I remember one day I was riding my bike home from campus. We're broke, we're living on loans, and uh, and I started beating myself up and which if you're listening or watching to this right now, like I asked you not to do that. We all do that as entrepreneurs and it's not really fair to us by what we're trying to solve, you know? And, and, uh, I started beating myself up and I was like, basically, I was like, dude, why are you still broke? You know, I was like, what is going on? And you know, I started doing what we all do little, I know what I would do in that guy's business. I definitely know what he's doing wrong and I'm over here broke, you know, who am I, you know, to say that. And I started kind of beat myself up a little bit and I realized that I was getting stuck in these learning
05:57 loops where I would just study for the sake of feeling motion and the seventh of motion, but not actually doing anything. And for a couple of years, that's the way it was. And for a while if necessary to kind of immerse, but I would, I recommend everybody as fast as you can to put the books down and uh, I'm not telling you not to learn, not to read or study and everything, but the learning style changes. Um, most CEO's, like we all know, they read a book a week, which is great, but most of us in the entrepreneur world are not CEOs yet, but we try to behave like one. And so we consume and consume, consume and all it does is it bogs us down because we're trying to distill all this information figured out to do with it, but we didn't even have a thing to do at two yet.
06:40 And that's the issue. So it's all about, it's all about identifying where you want to go, where you are, and then only learning. But like a hunter, you know, for the next step in front of you and that's it. Blinders on everything else you just learn for to take the step rather than to learn generally hit stop learning generally. I think that's the big piece that would really help a lot of people now. I totally love that. I, it's uh, it's interesting, I went through this, that experience last year. Uh, I end up hiring a whole bunch of different coaches in different areas and um, part of was I just wanted to, I wanted to up my game a ton and one of those I ended up hiring thing I mentioned made a mention to you was, you know, Jerrick Robbins, Tony Son. And I wanted it primarily on the relationship side.
07:19 Um, I've had this experience of uh, being probably a little too direct for people. And it's interesting in my role at click funnels I had obviously I forward facing, I see a lot of people and I want to make sure that I, I care so much about people, but at sometimes I, I'm just, I've got so much on my mind, I'm like, listen, I'm so ROI based that at times I'm like, this conversation is going nowhere. And I ended up too fast. And I thought, all right, so Jerry, I need some help on how to get out of conversations in a kinder way and yet at the same time not spend a whole bunch of time. And so it was fun when I was talking to him because he had the exact same approach that you set and that is, you don't pick one thing you want to focus on what's the one thing.
07:58 And so for like a month we just dive deep into my marriage for a while or we dive deep into how do you communicate with your employees or we dive deep into, you know, different things and literally spend that whole month. And so everything he was giving me, it was just in that one area and the port I I loved the most was I saw such massive growth and areas that I, before I thought I was just kind of dabbling in, but then all of a sudden within a month or six weeks, I would literally get like a year's worth of growth just because of that focused opportunity. Yeah, it was just crazy. And so I, at the end of the year, I basically kind of came down the end and I'm like, jerk, the thing I need next is we're churn for us right now at click is the most important thing I'm working on.
08:40 And he said, well Dave, that's not my specialty. And but he referred me to two different people. One Who, uh, was a dear friend of mine, Dan Martell. So Todd and I hired Gan and we're working through some of his stuff. And then Keith Cunningham who speaks at Tony's mastery is this genius guy on understanding the numbers. And so I'm going to his event in April with gear three white, he happens to be there as well just to really dive in on the numbers, which is something I don't like as much, but I know it's what the next chapter is for me to get involved with. And so I just totally, when you set that at funnel hacking live, I'm like, man, I've, I've had personal experience with that and it made a ton of sense to me. And yet I was, I wanted to literally stop you and say, now listen, everyone, stop what you do.
09:26 It just pay total attention, justice deep right now because this is the only thing I do, the entire event that matters to you is because you go to an event and I've had that experience would go in there. Oh, that's a great idea. That's a great idea. And that's a great idea. And you get done. You're like, I can't implement all this stuff and nothing. And so I just, I just wanted to thank you for that and I want to make sure that people were listening. If you do nothing else, take Steve's advice on that because it's a game changer.
09:50 That's so true. You know, and what's interesting is like, I think because we're entrepreneurs, we're creators and we come up with these new things, we think that everything is new. It really isn't. It's like 80% is the exact same thing as what's already been done. 20% is your little glaze. That is, you know, your creativity. And if you can't name the framework that you're following the model that you're falling, that's where all the wheels spinning feeling comes from. That I've noticed in these coachings that I'll do and what do I do next? What to do next? I'm like, well, you're in the info product model, so just do it. All of them do you know book. Of course I take a thing. There you go. I'm in supplements. What I do. Well, all of them have already proved out how to sell supplements. Like I'm unique, not that unique, you know, get back to the basics. You know I'm special. Not really. You know, it's like, it's so funny. I feel like he can't name what you want, where you are now, the next step and then really understand the model that you should be following that there in lies noise. That's the formula to be feeling lost, you know?
10:47 Well you just mentioned a keyword. I think that people don't understand the importance and that's framework. Russell's done an amazing job, but that you have been a phenomenal job of that. How does a person find the framework and what exactly is a framework if you don't mind addressing those two
11:00 questions? No. Yeah, totally. So if you think about like a phone like Stephen, I'm in the B two B space. When you have to realize is that like if anyone has been selling in that space successfully at all and you are not like you're the variable, right? So you got to go back and he study. You got to look and be like, what is wrong with my business model and what are all these other like it's not so much looking at the funnel, it's looking at the whole business. How are they bringing people in and fulfilling on it? And now they continue to do that and we can look at it from a very 30,000 foot view and be like, okay, this is how most supplement companies are doing it or Btb or retail. It doesn't matter. Um, and you're seeing as a whole, the majority of them tend to be doing it this way.
11:39 And when you can figure that out, the game gets really easy. So your product is what's unique, your sales message or you're the banner that you lead with the charge, you know the beliefs that's unique. You are the attractive character, unique, but you're sitting on top of a model that's extremely proven. And then the game like most of the risk gets taken out of it. And so I can go take s a summit and figure out what the summit model has been and just put my stuff in there. And so understanding what those frameworks are and the natural step that most of the industry's taking, that takes out most of the guesswork and it's pretty hard to fail if you just do it. So what's been your experience to find out what that actual framework is? Cause you just rattled off a dozen different ones and because of your experience and you've literally have consulted with at this point, I would say venture say thousands of companies or clients.
12:26 You've had a lot of exposure to that. How does a person who's new to it tries to figure out how do I find out what a framework is? Yeah, I think it, I mean it takes a lot of homework at the beginning, you know, um, I think this truly is really what funnel hacking is. Um, if you go in and you start looking to see, like I would go see, okay, like all beliefs are upheld by story. Right. And um, I love, I love Ryan holiday. He teaches that when it, basically, the thing I learned from one of his books is that if you want to control an industry, you have to control the content they're consuming. And so that's one reason to publish so much. So one of the things I like to go do is if I'm doing supplements or B to B or whatever it is I'm looking at, I liked that goes personally, I like to go see who the content generators are.
13:10 It's really easy to find them because they usually are the tops of iTunes, the tops of their blogs, the hop and go start listing them out and then see what models they're actually making revenue off of. I found that those who are willing to publish frequently, usually they have some kind of, not always, some of them are just publishing for the sake of it, but it's usually easiest to find people who are both publishing and or spending ad money. So go click on ads, go look to see specifically the content that's out there and start buying their stuff and let them sell you and lean into the sale. You know, like I think it's so funny. Oh they just want to sell me something. Yeah, good de like you're doing your homework, you know, let them sell you by slowly and watch everything that they're doing and you're not just funnel hacking the sales process.
13:53 You're actually hacking their business process and you can start asking questions about the followup, the fulfillment, how many people they have in there and people get excited about their business, actually talked to you about it and you go in and start figuring out, oh my gosh, of the 10 people I just talked to, eight of them are kind of doing this, you know? And you'll see that a lot of the times, even if they didn't mean to naturally industries tend to sell in the similar ways. I love that. You know, one of the things you said there, which you've become quite famous for and that's his whole idea as far as lean in. What exactly do you mean by lean in? I Dunno. Everyone listened and you put a little tough skin on. Now is this all right? Go as tough as you want. Uh, so I keep the coin on my desk.
14:34 So when I was in, I was in college, I started going to some counseling. I was going through a rough time when did some counseling and I got inside of this, um, his counselor's office and he said, hey, have you ever been tested for Adhd? And I got so mad. And I was like, please don't tell me something's wrong with me. Like, who are you to tell me that something's wrong with me? Because I had all these dreams and aspirations and things are doing now and I didn't want to feel disqualified. And so I went and reluctantly took this test. I handed it back to him and he's like, you don't have ADHD but you have a lot of symptoms of it. And I was like, isn't that how you tell?
15:08 And I was like, I don't get it. Well, for a while this became like a banner. I would hold this on my, on my shoulders, like a flag. It was a burden. It was an excuse for me to not be successful. The fact that I was stupid, but the fact that I didn't own a briefcase made me feel like I wasn't professional enough to be an entrepreneur. Stupid but so is everyone else's excuse. Um, I couldn't talk. I was very overweight. Um, I was, I, uh, there's no way you would've gotten me on a podcast. I believe that I am the least likely success story. And if you think about like what? Like it wasn't by me sitting back at, well, I'm not that fat, right. Broke. You know what I mean? Like it. That's what's hard about this is that most of the time it, when you're sitting back with all these people who are trying to build a funnel or a business or being an entrepreneur for the first time, it's not that the models that they're falling don't work.
15:57 They are not working the model. And most of the time what's happening is like the s the stuff between their head isn't geared appropriately for their own benefit yet. And so I have to go back and help them realize like, look, the reason I can talk is because I couldn't five years ago. Right. The reason why I will loop athletic more athletic nails because I wasn't. And so it's brutal honesty in one self and where you currently are, Steven, you're broke. You know, and, and being okay with that and not judging your value off of it, but clearly feeling the state that you're in. Stephen, you're broke. It's even, you're dumb, right? I got kicked out of college. I had to go back four years later and apply and then I had to learn how to learn. And, um, all right, Steven, you're dumb. You don't know how to do this, you don't do this.
16:40 You've got no discipline. You have a video game addiction. You know, and I had to get really raw and real and too many people are afraid that they, um, that they, that they're not to be able to do that. Here's what I've noticed happens in one phone away in 2000 coaching. And that us as adults, most of our train track is actually built for us for the majority of her life. And it should be, you know, hey, you know, I've got three girls. Hey thing one, you cannot throw your spaghetti thing too. You know, like there's train tracks, he can't, there's rules of life. But eventually what happens is, you know, as the truck stop, and I've noticed that the majority of adults that I consult and teach and coach with is that they have never in their life actually picked the hammer up on their own, had a fought put down a track and put them first nail.
17:25 And on their own. They have done everything that everyone else has always told them. They've never had ever gain the confidence to do those kinds of things in their life. And so the whole concept of lean in is that when you think about Steven, what are my tracks? What are the tracks that I need to go down and follow? The reality is that the obstacle is the way, right? If you don't know what the tracks to follow, oh man, you don't know how to talk to you and write it. Dime to get raw. There are obstacles away. Go learn. You're broke, broke as a joke baby. Right? You've got to figure that out. You're lost in the sauce and just admitted, right. It stopped trying to like save face or save pride. No, you're dumb man. You don't have to learn. You know, and just being hard about it.
18:04 I don't know the tracks to go build as right. The obstacle's the way, it's why I keep this coin on my desk, you know, it says the is the way on the Ba. You got Yours too. Nice. So I actually, she even are showing each other our coins. I have to give Chris total credit to Stephen for this. I actually loved the book from Ryan Holiday. The obstacle is the way, but I never took the next step like he did and actually bought the coin. So I bought the coin and then I bought the coin for every one of my, my kids, my wife. And it's so true, Stephen. I love it in Pendleton and advances action, what stands in the way becomes the way best. I love that. And so whenever I get a little negative Nancy or I get poopy pants syndrome and I'm like, man, I don't want to be doing this right now.
18:44 I picked this out and I'm like, look, Larson. All right, what do, what do you want? You know, and stop blaming other people. So that's what lean means. Just lean in to whatever you feel like is your obstacle. You find out eventually it's your super power. No one would know who I am if I did not like, I'm completely convinced had I had the money to get to my first funnel hacking live. I wouldn't have worked for Russell because I wouldn't have had to go learn how to build funnels. I wouldn't have. I learned how to bootstrap. I got me in a certain mindset, but then too many people were like, oh, I don't have any money. Like, man, you are. It is literally tailored to you what you're supposed to be doing right now. But we, oh, easy out. Let me take that. You know, the easy road here, easy streets, like I don't have any time. Great write, lean in. It's not an excuse. I have empathy. Have zero sympathy though for those kinds of scenarios.
19:33 I love it. It's actually a, one of the main reasons we're so excited to have you as our one funnel away coach because you do have so much empathy because you've been there. There's, there's not a single person who can get on a call and say, well Steven, my life is different than yours. Okay. Yes. I mean you've, you've been through it. There's not an excuse you haven't dealt with in your own life or in dealing with other people and I appreciate that. A time that I actually, my kids have more of a man crush on you than they do on me these days. It Chandler and Christian like, oh my gosh, did you hear what Steven said? I'm like, I said that to you, but it doesn't matter. It's Steve set it. So it came from Steve Larsen, therefore it's God and whatever he says happen.
20:09 So, uh, it's been fun for me to see how much they appreciate you because of the fact that you have leaned in. Uh, I was thinking about you this morning. I was doing the stupid bloodflow resistant bands on this box steps that I, for some reason mentally these box, that stupid box step has just, Oh, just has my number. I cannot, I'm literally, I'm crying. I'm mad at Eric. I just want to hit him. I'm just just, but anyways, I agreed after I got done afterwards I sat there and thought, you know, it's the whole idea as far as lean in, if I quit, if I had said, you know what? Oh Gosh, I got to go. Really? I, you know, there's a million excuses that could have come up with and I hate it. Even the first, even hour afterwards, I was still sore complaining to my wife and kids.
20:54 I'm never doing this again. But again, it's that idea as far as leaning in and you become good at those things. And I think again, you've done such an amazing job at that and not just massive Kudos to you for that. I appreciate that. Thank you very much. Yeah, that's super cool. Well, tell me, I know kind of get close to wrapping things up here with you and I, I literally could talk to you for hours on end and I'm sure as, as you know, everyone else could do the same. Um, what's the best way for people to reach out to you? Honestly, Steve Jay larson.com and you know, that's the best. It's got all the, it's kind of my funnel hub. You know what a Dj Larson, l. A. R. S. E. N. It's not common. I think that's awesome. You're taking the same Garrett white thing with the, the middle initial only cause the guy wanted, Steve Lawson was asking for like 20, 30 grand.
21:42 I was like, oh my gosh, crazy. No, I totally understand that. Uh, again, if you guys aren't following seed on his podcast sales funnel radio, by all means, please listen to him there. Uh, you should be definitely signed up for the ones on a challenge is literally, it's the coolest thing for me, Steve, just to sometimes I, I laugh only because I hear you louder than I hear my own thoughts when you're in the room. I feel bad man, because if you guys don't know, it's literally on the other side of the wall is Dave and I'm like, crap. He's on a call here at cons and I'm known for the boom boom. I'm like, oh gosh. Well, the best part is there's about three inches of foam on that wall as well. Supposedly is supposed to absorb some of it. But for me, I love it.
22:25 It's a, it's a neat for me to see the excitement that others have following you. Uh, it's, you've been such a magnet to so many people and I think it's really, it's exciting for me to see as we look at our, you know, our two, two Comma Club coaching program, how many of them got started with you? And as they progress in and their sign up again next year because I need more, Steve, I need more of Steve. And it's because you give so much, you're the most gracious guy in the world. You care so much. And again, I think there's a huge difference between empathy and sympathy. And you do an amazing job of really, you'll pour your whole heart and soul into a person who's trying. Yeah. And if they're not, it's like, dude, I don't have time for you. Which is how it should be. Yeah. Any parting words? My friend? Very excited. Thank you so much for her, for having me here. Obstacles away, everybody. Awesome. Thanks Steve.
23:14 Every, thank you so much for taking the time to listen to podcasts. And one of the things we're really passionate about is trying to get everyone up and running as fast as they possibly can. And one of the things we've done recently that has helped so many people, and that is our one funnel with challenging. If you don't mind, if it's something of interest to you, we actually will pay you $100 for anybody who signs up for the one funnel away challenge. Or if you want to go ahead and sign up and do it yourself, just go to one funnel away. challenge.com again, that's one funnel away, challenge.com sign up, go through a 30 day challenge. Uh, it's one of the great, we've got Russell. Basically give me a 10,000 foot level. Julie's Swain comes in and gives you, kind of hear the nuts and bolts of exactly how to make it work. And then Steven comes in every single day and spends time basically telling you exactly what to do on a daily basis. So he'll you to hold your feet to the fire. Super Accountable. We've had more people get more success and things out of this than anything else. So go ahead and sign up at onefunnelaway.com. Thanks.
Why Dave Decided to Continue Talking with Carrie About the 7 Secrets to Marrying an Entrepreneur:
Here is the second part of the 7 secrets that Dave and Carrie have learned to survive a marriage with an entrepreneur. In this final part Dave and Carrie get deep with the remaining 4 secrets with things like the importance of living within your means, the effect of financial stress on their marriage, and the importance of a fist bump. Most importantly of all though Carrie and Dave discuss how it is you can truly get away WITH your spouse. When was the last time you did that and truly felt recharged?
Tips and Tricks for You and Your Business:
(1:22) Secret #4 Cheering on Your Spouse and Giving the Fist Bump
(4:16) Secret #5 Getting Away WITH Your Spouse
(7:48) Secret #6 Learn to Laugh *Cue laughter from Carrie and Dave*
(9:49) Secret #7 Don’t Be a Poser, It’s So Much More Fun Being Who YOU Are
Quotable Moments:
(0:52) “The whole reason I got into this was for my family. I wanted to make sure that as I built my businesses over the last 25 years that my family didn’t suffer, or didn’t suffer too much.”
(9:04) “It’s so good to just step back sometimes and just laugh. Learn to laugh. Laughter always seems to take all the heaviness away.”
(12:28) “Nothing breaks down marriage and communication more than financial stress.”
Other Tidbits:
Dave applied these principles himself this weekend with going cross country skiing with his marathon running wife FOR his wife.
Living within your means allows you to make more than your current means.
Important Episode Links:
FunnelHackingLive.com
FunnelHackerRadio.com
FunnelHackerRadio.com/freetrial
FunnelHackerRadio.com/dreamcar
---Transcript---
Speaker 1: 00:00 Welcome to funnel hacker radio podcast where we go behind the scenes and uncover the tactics and strategies top entrepreneurs are using to make more sales, dominate their markets and how you can get those same results. Here's your host, Dave Woodward.
Speaker 2: 00:17 All right, everybody. Welcome back to part two in our series with my wife here on the seven secrets to surviving and entrepreneurial marriage, so we did three on the last episode and we're going to wrap up these next four here. Before we do that, if you haven't listened to those three, go back and listen that one first and also let us know what are the things that you're doing? How are you surviving as the spouse of an entrepreneur? How are you surviving as the entrepreneur in your marriage with your kids, with your family? What are the things that you're doing to make sure that it's not just all business, business, business? Again, the most important thing here as the entrepreneurs to realize why you're really doing this. The whole reason I got into this was for my family and I wanted to make sure that, that as I started building my businesses over the last 25 years, that my family didn't suffer or didn't suffer too much.
Speaker 2: 01:05 There are times, as you're aware that it may have been a little bit much and there's always that balance going back and forth, but I really want to make sure I understand it and feel from you what are the things that you're doing. So go back and listen to the first three, let us know what your secrets are and enjoy this episode. Thanks. The next one is to make sure that we cheer each other on. And so in that part here, I really, I can tell you is probably one of the most difficult things for some people these days is the importance of cheering each other on.
Speaker 3: 01:34 Yeah, I think that that is a big one with, um, I don't know, you look at a lot of spouses that are together and you, when you first get married, right? Laurie, you first are dating. It's like super cool and you're like,
Speaker 1: 01:46 yeah, you should do this. Oh yeah, you should do it. This is great. Awesome. I'm so proud of you.
Speaker 3: 01:52 And then as you both get tired and exhausted and you start moving towards the goal, sometimes it gets harder to do that. And because you, your emotions change and your fatigue becomes more and you become more maybe sensitive, more irritated, more vulnerable, all of those emotions. And I think you have to step back and reground yourself and always remember that, you know, there's days when man, like I know like for Dave, like he would come home and he's just like beat up with stuff that's going on with work. And then he comes home to me and then I'm like, like I got all my stuff. And then I just see like his whole countenance change. And then the same thing where like, or he's had like a super awesome, you know, crazy experience. And then he comes home to me and I'm like, you know, like I'm frustrated or stuff that's going on.
Speaker 3: 02:45 And I realized that like I need to step back sometimes and say, you know, when, when he gets like winds are high fives or fist pumps, whatever it is, like things that are going on that I need to make sure that I give him the pumped back and the high five back and, and the I cheer him on. And the same thing for him for me. And I think that that's a big important thing is that you find moments in the day where you connect. And for us, like sometimes we just take, we take off like right after he gets home, like if it's late at night, it, this doesn't happen all the time, but I guess this would be the ideal world, right? Where we'd like to go for a walk and just kind of reconnect for a couple minutes and that he can just tell me all the things about his day and I can tell him all the things about mine and that you take moments to listen to each other, like really intently listened to each other.
Speaker 3: 03:34 And when you listen to each other, give feedback. See Man, that's awesome. I'm so proud of you. Or when they're having a day, like where they're just like, ah, I had a day. You can just get behind him and say, you know what, keep going. You've got this. I think good part is when you are having those types of days, you've got to make sure that, that you don't always bring that home either. You got to find a way of separating home life from business life. And uh, there was times when my commute was longer than it is right now. My commute now is about two or three minutes. And so because of that, I'm, when I've had a bad day, I've got to make sure that I'm, that I don't take it all in on, don't bring all that negative energy into the house. And sometimes I literally will just sit at the stop sign before I turned the corner of the house and go, okay, a couple of deep breaths.
Speaker 3: 04:23 What's most important is family here, so you shouldn't be taken all my negative energy out on them. So that's, uh, what's our, what's our next one? Okay. Hey, so the next one, which I think goes right into it is the importance of getting a way, oh yeah. Favorite thing. This is like one of our favorite things and one of that Dave has always been super good about, um, because especially when our kids were little is like it was so hard for me to leave them. And, and then there's times when you don't, like when you think of getting away, like what is it that you think of, do you think of like going on a plane and like going somewhere? Okay. Oh, sounded awesome. Well that's not always realistic. One for so many different reasons. And I think the important thing is, is make it simple and make it happen.
Speaker 3: 05:10 When you, like for us, we've always like made a goal to try to do like a 24 hour get away. And this doesn't happen all the time, but at least once a quarter we always made sure that we did that as the littles were growing up where we would just go away for 24 hours, we'd get a hotel room and once a quarter is a necessity, it's a necessity. Like you need to make it mandatory, put it on a calendar when you're going to do it. And we lived in town in California for 20 years and so it was super easy because there's so many places that we could go to up and down the coast and it felt like a little vacation, a little getaway. But guys, you have to get away. It cannot be a staycation because no staycation, because I know for like us, you completely check out.
Speaker 3: 05:52 Like you get rid of your phones, you give each other 100% attention, you don't go and sit in a hotel room and watch TV the whole time you are movies like go and talk, talk. And I can always, like for me it's always good to painful when we first get away cause I'm like, I feel antsy and I, and I think I feel antsy because I know Dave's Nancy and then, and then all of a sudden you're like, okay wait, this is amazing. Like you feel like your batteries recharged. You reconnected because how often do you forget to just be affectionate with your spouse? Like when you sit next to them just doing something like holding their hand or sitting close to them or, I dunno just giving him a little kiss on the cheek. Like so many of those little things you forget. And I think when you, um, when you get away and you recharge your batteries, like you realize how important those little, those little tiny things are.
Speaker 2: 06:46 I think as an entrepreneur, almost all this tello tell ourselves that we're doing this for our family. And I think if you're doing it for your family, then you need to make sure they know that. So for me, one of the main things has been to make sure that I do get away. And literally sometimes it has been literally less than 24 hours where I'll get home like at six o'clock, seven o'clock, we'll head out and we'll be back home the next day by three o'clock. Uh, just because of the things that are going on. But literally that's 24, 20 hours, whatever it might've been. Just getting away and reconnecting is, it is the juice of life for me. It is what actually helps me reconnect with the most important person in my life, my princess. And the whole idea for me has really been to turn my phone off, turn the TV off, and literally just talk. And I tried to make sure that it's not about work, it's about us. It's about our dreams, our goals. What are we really trying to do? Are we on the right path? Is this, is what we're doing? Is it going to get us to where we want to go? I think that, uh, getting away on a quarterly basis for 24 hours, as hard as it may sound, it's a mandatory. Yeah,
Speaker 3: 07:50 that's all right. You got to put it on the calendar, which I think leads us to number six. And that is learn. Yeah, you laugh. It's like, it's so like you sometimes you get so caught up and I don't, I don't care what, what journey you're on, whatever it is, life just gets busy and hectic and there's always just life stuff that happens and we forget. We get so serious about everything and we forget just to laugh and giggle and laugh at yourself. Laugh it off. Like today. I don't know for those of you guys who follow Instagram with us, but we would, we got away to McCall and it was just a quick, quick getaway and we both were like, oh, I mean they're just, we, it's always hard to get away, but it's so important to do it. And we did it. And I mean, do you feel amazing?
Speaker 3: 08:41 I feel awesome. I feel amazing. And the thing that I loved was we went cross country skiing today, which is not my favorite thing. His favorite thing. And it was just so funny. Like hers. We were just a train wreck today. This stuff we were doing and there was just this point where we were just both dying, laughing at ourselves and it's just, it's so good just to step back sometimes and just laugh, just learn to laugh and laughter always takes, it always takes all the heaviness, the Yuckiness, the tiredness that whateverness away, right? Yeah.
Speaker 2: 09:14 I think it's the most important part. You really have to make sure you spend the time getting away laughing and having fun and whatever that takes for you is really what you have to find a way of doing. And the laughter is by far, it's, it brings a whole bunch of energy back into your marriage, your life. And if, if you can't laugh at all the crazy stuff that you've had it happen in your life, then she got to find something else to do.
Speaker 3: 09:38 Exactly. Okay. So learn to laugh at how nerdy you are. Like that's your nerdiness is a gift in you. Right? Okay. So the last one is don't be a poser. Don't be a poser. Okay. So what does that mean? That means there was some advice that was given to us when we were first doing this. And the advice was whenever you're buying a house, whenever you're buying a car, always buy a little bit more than you can afford and then you will work hard enough to where you can afford it. Bad advice, bad, bad advice. Do not do that. Be who you are and be smart. And I can tell you, and that's the advice that like
Speaker 2: 10:19 we just give our kids like crazy. Always live under your means a little bit like when you're doing this because it's then you, then you can take risks. When you do that, you can take risks. If you are stressed out financially, you're so stressed out that you can't take risks, you can't go after all of the things that you need to go after. And it, it's so interesting to me because sometimes we go to these events and you know, people are like, they're just like, they're, they're dressed up and like in ways that they're trying to like be something and show this certain image and be who you are. Like I think that that's, and maybe that's just our ripe age of being married at 25 years, that we're learning that it's just, it's much more fun to be you. It totally is. I think the reality is for too many people, and I've seen it happen so often for entrepreneurs and that is you get a big spike in income.
Speaker 2: 11:11 You're like, oh my gosh, this is my normal income now, and all of a sudden you go out and you spend, assuming that next month that's going to be the exact same income, realize that the most important thing is you need to get, be able to find a way of building up to where you have at least six months of savings to pay for all your bills. It takes the edge off and are taking that edge off. It allows you to be much more creative. It allows you to be much more of a risk taker. It allows you to feel safety and security. And I know for, for most people there's that element of security is still there and you need to, especially as it provider, I'm probably, security isn't as important to me as it is to my wife, but I've realized that in our marriage I need to make sure that she feels secure and that security has come by making sure we have six months of savings more and more.
Speaker 2: 11:57 And that as big spikes come that you don't spend at at and above that thinking well next month will be even bigger and better. And so I think for a lot of people, this whole idea as far as the poser mentality or, or going out and dressing and acting as if it actually will tend to come back to bite you. Um, I've had that I've seen in my own life, I've seen it in others and that is money. Financial stress in a marriage, is that the most huge? It just nothing breaks down marriage and communication more than financial stress and even like the six months of savings that like that was our goal when we first got going so that we could always feel comfortable with that. And if you, the thing is is once you get to that savings and you get to that place where you have a nest, then you get to that place where it's not, it's never a stress anymore because you have way more than your six months.
Speaker 2: 12:50 You have way more than a year, you have way more. I mean you have just way more than any where you're able to have that, that comfort in it. And it's because you were smart with it. Not Because, oh, you've just got lucky. No, it has nothing to do with that. It has everything to do with you managed your circumstance correctly and manage the risk. And I think that's really one of the most important things. You have to be able to manage risks as an entrepreneur, that your number one responsibility is managing risk. And the biggest problem so many entrepreneurs get involved with is thinking that I can spend whatever I want because there'll always be more and there's not always going to be more. And I think that the key for me as again, we've been talking with our our son and our daughter in law is the importance of living within your means.
Speaker 2: 13:38 And you can still go out and splurge and have fun and do those kinds of things. But understand that there's, there are laws, especially associated with money, that if you start breaking those laws, you will pay the price and don't have negative 10 negative emotions with it either. Because I think like with our kids, like we always tried to teach them. We went to a seminar when we were first married and it talked about jars and like making sure that you put money in your jars of and create which, which jars they are, right? So it's like a fun jar. It's your savings jar, it's your yacht necessities. You have education. There's six different jars and you can look up just Google six jars if you're wanting to figure that out. But it's super, super cool. And so it just gives you permission to still have fun and to still do all those things and yet still save as you're going along and starting that journey. So anyways, that's the seven secrets, seven secrets of surviving and entrepreneurial bearish.
Speaker 2: 14:36 Beg so much. We love you guys. Appreciate you listening to this and hopefully this helps you. Uh, leave a comment, send us a Facebook message, reached out to my wife, tell us your secrets. Tell us your secrets. What have you guys done? Let us know. All right, we're signing off. See you later. All right, everybody. That wraps up our two part series to the seven steps to surviving an entrepreneur marriage. Let us know your thoughts. Reach out to me either through a Facebook personal message or send me an email or a Instagram. However you want to reach out to me. I'd love to know what your feedback is. Or He'd go ahead and leave a comment down below or on iTunes or stitcher or wherever else you might be listening this. I read all those comments out of the game. I'd love to kind of find out your feedback as well. Have an amazing day. Thanks again for listening.
Why Dave Decided to talk with Carrie about Being Married to an Entrepreneur:
After years and years of grinding in the entrepreneurial world, Dave and Carrie are now at a point where they feel they can see clearly through the clouds of life. The message that they want to share with you all from this moment of hindsight and excitement towards the future are 3 of the 7 Secrets to Being Married to an Entrepreneur. As entrepreneurs still on the journey they want to share with you the importance of enjoying the journey, the essentiality of transparence, and a personal story or two that just might put your Dave Woodward trivia to the test.
Tips and Tricks for You and Your Business:
(2:30) Secret #1 Ask Yourself, Are You Enjoying the Journey?
(5:01) The Woodwards’ Journey: When You Say ‘No’ to Med School and ‘Hello’ to Uncertainty
(8:44) Secret #2 Being Open and Transparent is Essential
(12:16) Secret #3 Your Relationship is a Team, Cooperate
Quotable Moments:
(3:20) “Realize that you also have to look at moments of how far you have come and not get caught up in how far you have to go.”
(7:54) “The Entrepreneurial Journey for us was not a straight line, ours us much more of...it was like switchbacks. And that’s just life.”
(14:22) “Without that team effort, there’s no way we could have accomplished what we have done. And, I wouldn’t be able to do what I do without knowing that she’d have my back the whole time.”
Other Tidbits:
As the wife behind the entrepreneur, Carrie has always struggled telling others her role in the family.
Important Episode Links:
FunnelHackingLive.com
FunnelHackerRadio.com
FunnelHackerRadio.com/freetrial
FunnelHackerRadio.com/dreamcar
---Transcript---
00:00 Welcome to funnel hacker radio podcast where we go behind the scenes and uncover the tactics and strategies top entrepreneurs are using to make more sales, dominate their markets and how you can get those same results. Here's your host, Dave Woodward. Everybody welcome back.
00:18 I'm so excited because this is my second episode of my wife, my Princess Carrie Woodward. So excited to have her here. Uh, we wanted to Kinda talk to you a little bit about what it takes to survive and entrepreneurial marriage. Seven secrets that we've looked at. We've been married now for 25 years and last. So a year ago, January, my son, our oldest son Chandler, got married and he married our first, our first daughter into our family of four boys. And Chandler's the oldest. So he married Fran, she's from Chile. And her experience as far as entrepreneurs, they were the people basically who couldn't get a job. They were always the broke people. And the idea of her husband wanting to become an entrepreneur was something that was really scary. So she was at funnel hacking live last year as well as this year where she kind of got introduced to a different idea of what an entrepreneur was having grown up in Chile, the way out of being an entrepreneur actually was going to college and getting a degree and I becoming a doctor, an attorney, an accountant, something that had a designations and letters behind it, that's the only way you could actually really make it.
01:25 And she got exposed to the fact that maybe you actually could even do better than a doctor, an attorney or an accountant or any other person with letters behind their names by actually being the entrepreneur who actually owns the business. And so we've had a lot of conversations with them and it's been interesting as my wife I were to sit in, you're talking about some of the things that we've learned over the last 25 years and thought, you know what? It might be fun to share those with you. So what are we going to do? Is, is tell you basically seven of the secrets that we've found to surviving being married to an entrepreneur. Sweetheart. I'm gonna let you take this away.
01:58 Okay. So when, when they went to, they're seeing them in this past year of them trying to take on this journey of wanting to chase their dreams and go after their goals and make a difference in the world and really go after their passions. It was just like a total eye opener for me of wow. Like looking back of what our past 25 years have been about. And I think that that was something that really started to make me look at it a little bit different and realize that the first secret with it is enjoying the journey. Because I think as entrepreneurs so many times you get so focused on the goal and it's so much work, right? I mean like you look at someone who is trying to go like that. Let's talk about the Olympics. First of all, they Olympics, I love watching these stories at the Olympics because it talks about what it took for those people to get there, right?
02:50 But with entrepreneurs, we sometimes forget that we're just like that. Like we have to work so hard and all those long training days through our journey in order to be able to get to the place where our goal is, wherever that that is. So I think that that's one of the things that as I, you know, we start talking to our son and our daughter in law that the importance of you guys have got to celebrate your wins and realize that you have to also look at moments of how far that you've come and not get so caught up in how far you have to go. Oh my gosh. That probably was one of the biggest weaknesses I had was the goal was so far out there that I, at times I just, yeah, I'd made a lot of wins and had been successful, but it was nowhere near where I wanted to go or be and our member times, my princess would be sitting there going, but look how far we've come.
03:45 I'm like, yeah, but look how much farther we have to go. And I think it's real important that you take the time to actually stop for a second and look back over that path and realize, oh my gosh, I can't believe how much I've learned, how much I've grown, how much I've made, the impact I've had and who I've become. Because I think part of the entrepreneurial journey is who you personally become through it all. And that's why when you're married to an entrepreneur, it's important that both of you understand there's a becoming phase and that becoming phase super critical, that you have to make sure that you celebrate the wins and you do. You enjoy the journey of becoming. Yeah, and I love that too. What you just said, because I think that's the importance of growth because you know, like, like that quote, nothing ever grows and comfort zones, we all can't stand it to be uncomfortable.
04:31 That's the worst thing in the whole world. But it's the only space that we grow. It's the only space that we change. It's the only space that we transform into who we are capable of becoming. And I think that that is super awesome, you know, it's interesting because a lot of times people get caught up in like, oh, I'm so miserable. I hate my job. I feel stuck. I feel all these things. Well then change it. But they won't change it. Right. Everyone loves to sit and complain, but no one wants to actually do something about. So the entrepreneurs are the ones who chose to do something about it and choosing to do something about it is not the easy road at all. But it is the most exciting, most amazing journey ever. And I think that that, as I look back at it, I think of, wow, 25 years.
05:18 Okay. Can I share that? How we started it? Okay. So I'll just do share this super quick. So when we first got married, we went down, Dave and I graduated from college together. I graduate with my bachelor's. He graduated with his masters. Well, he was going to get a second masters because of the field that he was going into. Well, we get down, we moved down to Texas, we get married and we're in school a semester and a half, right? And, and all of a sudden we have this feeling like, okay, the industry is changing and this isn't where we're supposed to be. We knew it. Like we just had this strong feeling confirmation. We just knew it wasn't where we were supposed to be and where we were supposed to go. So we made this huge jump and this leap of faith to jump out and to start our own business. And it was like, I think back at that now and I'm like, my dad's parents were probably thinking, what are you guys doing?
06:18 My Dad was furious. I'd been accepted to medical school and I bailed out on medical school. I then got a sec, I got a masters in exercise physiology and was then going back and getting them. And I'd just gotten married and now I'm getting a master's in physical therapy at the time. And leaving all of that. I had a full ride 4.0 and my dad's like, Dave, you have to understand you're married. You can't be doing this stupid stuff where you just don't know what you're doing. You're changing your mind all the time. And my dad, no, I really, I don't want to do this. He goes, it doesn't matter. You have to just suck it up. My Dad's an attorney and my mom was a nurse and so professional life was the only way you could ever be successful. And he's like, yeah, Dave, you will not make it as an entrepreneur. You just, you don't understand how hard it is.
07:00 So the interesting thing is that I think the importance of like sharing that story is that you have to know whatever your calling is, whatever your purpose is. And you have to follow that and you have the courage to follow it. And if you follow it, whatever journey it takes you on, it will be the one that you're supposed to go and, but you have to make sure that you are willing to be accepting of going in a direction and creating movement so that you can walk through whatever doors are gonna open for you and know that sometimes when you go in a certain journey, don't get so stuck on, that's the direction that you have to go. Always be open, always be open to what direction it takes you. And if you do that and you just trust the process, you will, you'll find whatever your purpose is, what of your calling is, whatever it is that you're supposed to do. Do you agree? Absolutely.
07:52 The Roi, at least for us, the entrepreneurial journey was not a straight line. Ours was much more of it. It varies. It was like switchbacks, but six days and that, and that is life. And I think that's the part it is for everybody and you just have to embrace that and enjoy it and really enjoy the journey.
08:08 Yeah. And I like, I can't, like, it's so interesting that so many friends of mine as you know, growing up as I was younger, you know, just starting our family and they're like, why aren't you doing what? What you're doing what you're doing? What? And then as I watched them who they had the quote unquote stable job, you know, now they're, they've, they've had to go from job to job to job, to job because they're always trying to grow and change and do things. So whether you Zigzag as an entrepreneur, are you zigzag, climbing up some other corporation, going from place to place, trying to find the job that you want. It's the same thing. So do what you love. Okay. Should we let journey, enjoy the journey. Okay. So the next thing, which I think is perfect, secret number two is do it as a team.
08:48 Super important. I made a massive mistake when I, when we first got going. And that was, I wanted to be the protector, the provider, and make sure that she never had any hardships or, or that I protected her from any of the bad stuff that was happening. And so when things went bad or wrong, I wouldn't tell her. And my princess is smart enough as any woman, is to be able to see all the other emotional baggage that I'm carrying. And she's like, I know something's wrong, gay. What's wrong? I'm like, sweetheart, everything's gonna be okay. Don't worry. I've got it. And like that I, that was a massive mistake because what happened was I didn't allow her to grow and to gain the emotional muscles that happen as you go through those types of a stressful situations together.
09:52 Yeah. So just make sure that you're totally open and transparent all the time and be honest with each other. Because I think that for me, that is where that, you know, like people will say to us like, how, Oh, you're so lucky you've been married for so long and it's worked for you. Are you kidding? Like it has not been a bed of roses and lilies and dandelions. It's been beautiful. And the reason why it is so special is because we have been through ups and downs together. Crazy and crazy ups and downs. And that's what makes the lilies and the roses and the dance, you know, like all of those beautiful things. That's what makes it amazing is because you go through that stuff together. So I think that, um, you know, like we've cried together, we've laughed together, we've done all of those things and, and it's, that's what's made these 25 years so beautiful because, because we've done it together
10:26 and I think that's the most important part is you have to be willing to share. And at times, especially the hard stuff, those are the hard conversations nobody wants to have. But as you have those and you grow together through those, it makes the wins so much, so much more amazing because you literally can cry through the winds in gratitude because you did it together.
10:47 Yeah. And just, and I think like that being, because okay, Dave tree, you actually jumped forward that was open and transparent about the good and the bad. So that, see, we'll call that secret number two now be open and transparent about the good and the bad. So the other thing to add to that is being open and transparent with the good and the bad. Be forgiving of each other. I think that, you know, as I'm around like other couples and stuff, you know, and I hear, I hear people complain about each other and, and, and it just, it's so good for me because it makes me look at myself in the mirror. It makes me think, wait, do I do that? Do I complain? Do I, do I not just stand to the side and, and, or not stand to the side, but stand next to him and kind of, you know, make sure that I, I'm there for him and that I'm, that I'm positive and that I'm supportive.
11:37 And that even when he has to share with me the ugly and he's being transparent and honest, that I'm appreciative of it and I'm grateful for it instead of angry. And I think that that's, it's not an easy thing to do. No, it's not an easy thing to do, but it's so, and, and we're continuing to learn that as, as, as years go on. But it's important to make sure that you, um, that you make sure that you're open and transparent and when your partner is being open and transparent, be grateful for that and allow yourself to receive it and accepted. Okay, so let's move on to do it as a team, which we're going to call that number three now. And what we were talking about with that was understanding your position on the team. Right? Okay. So what does that mean? That means like, you know, not everyone can be the quarterback. All of our kids have been really into doing sports growing up. And it's so funny, like you have all the parents are like, I want my kid to be the quarterback, or I want them to be, you know, this position and the one that gets all the attention and the wide receiver or the light Becker. And it's important for them to understand that the a team cannot be successful unless everyone understands their position in every position is just as important as the quarterback.
12:49 I think that's real critical. My wife has been amazing as far as supporting me through a lot of these crazy ups and downs. And I think for, for me that the most important part of that has been making sure I reciprocated as well. There's things that she wanted to do and I needed to make sure that I was there to support her in those things. Uh, one of the things, my wife is an amazing athlete, amazing runner. Uh, she's literally a world class marathon runner. And I, it was, even though at the time, running wasn't one of my greatest passions, I knew how important it was for her. And because of that, we would spend time going out and I would be there on her early morning runs on Saturday. She'd get up at five o'clock in the morning, go on long runs and, and I'd be out there bringing the water tour or doing everything I could to support her in that as we've traveled to the different events to make sure that I was there as a support because she had been there supporting me through thick and thin through the ups and the downs of the entrepreneurial journey there was important for me to be able to do the exact same thing.
13:50 And I think too often we get focused on it's only, it's a one sided approach. You Ha if someone's going to support you, you have to be able to reciprocate that. And for me, reciprocating that has been, uh, making sure she's able to find the things that she enjoyed and to really encourage her to go out and to do those types of things. At the same time. She's been an amazing support and I traveled a ton and even I traveled quite a bit right now. And with that, she's always been home taking care of raising our four boys. And without that team effort, there's no way in the world we could have accomplished what we've done. And I couldn't, I couldn't go and do what I do without knowing that she had my back all the time,
14:34 which is a give and take and so many ways because I think that one, you know, what day was just referring to is probably a whole nother secret. And that is don't get lost in yourself and make sure you have your own hobbies and things and things that give you for fulfillment. Um, and I think that, you know, Dave's always been really, really good at, at making sure that he pushed me towards that. And I am so grateful for that. And I think that, um, you know, for me there's been, there's been years and, and different, you know, things that we've done where we've worked together side by side. There's been things where we've done our own thing. And then there's been times where I've realized or not, I, we have realized as a team that in order for our team to be successful, in order for him to push at the level that he can push, I needed to be the one to take care of the kids.
15:26 And, and you know, that's a hard thing because sometimes like, like you get, you know, you go with people and I met, I'm, you know, in that phase where people are like, oh gosh, you know, what is it that you do? You have such great kids and, and we, we, we have been blessed with an amazing, amazing, amazing boys and I couldn't feel and be more grateful for that. Um, I also know that, you know, we've had our ups and downs, you know, the normal struggles and things that every family has. People you have, everyone has it, everyone has it. But I think that we've worked through all of those and we, because we've stayed so close as a family, meaning that we had to kind of set our team up a little bit different and realize that, okay, with the level and intensity these last couple of years that Dave has been pushing or different times in our life that I needed to focus on the kids.
16:18 And that was a hard thing for me and some places because, you know, we'd go to these events and be like, oh, so what do you do? And I'm like, Oh, I am like managing the home front so that we can all, so that we can make this thing happen. And I think that that's the thing is that you have to be, you have to know that not everyone can be the quarterback sometimes and it's give and take with each other spouses that sometimes it's for you. Sometimes it's for them. Um, and these last, uh, you know, a little bit, it's been 100% as these kids, you know, we've had weekends where it's been intense with the kids in there, all the different things that they've been having to do. And we've just had to know that, okay, this is what my position on the team needs to be.
17:02 This is what his position needs to be on the team. Does that mean what everyone else has to be like that? No, you have to decide what your plays are, what your team looks like and you got to decide how that's going to work so that your family can stay together. And for us, our family reunion, that was like one of our huge goals for us is that it didn't matter how much money we made or how much success we had if our family was a mess. And I think that, you know, just looking at different, different things that you go through in life that I'm watching my kids like how close they are. And I really, and I am grateful that we did our team the way that we've done where we've just really hunkered down and tried to manage what position and
17:50 everyone is in different stages of life so that we can, um, try to create that, that family unit that we desired to have. I think that for us, one of things we've gone, we've tried to live by is that no success can compensate for failure in the home. And we've really tried to focus most on family and to make sure that as we're doing that, that our family came first. Not to say there's an equal balance at all times, but honestly, the most important thing for us has always been to make sure that we focused in on and making sure that that happened. All right. That is the first three secrets of our series of seven secrets to survive and entrepreneurial marriage. So please first of all, let us know what you think about it. So if you don't mind either leave a comment down below, send me a personal message on Facebook or Instagram, email, whatever, however you'd like to reach out to me.
18:41 But also let me know what are the things that you've done. Uh, one of the things that you're doing in your marriage as an entrepreneur, how are you, what are the, how are you surviving as the spouse of an entrepreneur or an entrepreneur or as the entrepreneur self? What are the things you're doing to make sure that your life and your spouse and your life with your family is, is fulfilling and most importantly that it's, it's not all business business, business. So let us know. We're super excited to hear about that and tune in next time before the second part of the remaining four secrets to surviving and entrepreneurial marriage.
19:17 Harry, thank you so much for taking the time to listen to podcasts. And one of the things we're really passionate about is trying to get everyone up and running as fast as they possibly can. And one of the things we've done recently that has helped so many people and that is are one funnel away challenging. If you don't mind it, it's something of interest to you. We actually will pay you $100 for anybody who signs up for the one funnel away challenge or if you want to go ahead and sign up and do it yourself, just go to one funnel away, challenge.com again, that's one funnel away, challenge.com sign up, go through a 30 day challenge. Uh, it's one of the great things. We've got Russell basically giving you a 10,000 foot level. Julie Swing comes in and gives you, kind of hear the nuts and bolts of exactly how to make it work. And then Steven comes in every single day and spends time basically telling you exactly what to do on a daily basis. So heels you to hold your feet to the fire. Super Accountable. We've had more people get more success and things out of this than anything else. So go ahead and sign up@onefunnelaway.com. Thanks.
Standing on stage at Funnel Hacking Live this year with all the partners and their wives, during Garrett J. White’s presentation was one of the most impactful things I’ve had happen to me in a long time. Funnel Hacking Live this year was a huge milestone in so many ways. As my wife Carrie and I drive home from a weekend getaway to recharge after the last few crazy weeks, we reflect on the impact Funnel Hacking Live not only had within the community, but that it had on us as well. So my question to you is this: who do you see? And more importantly, do they know you see them?
❝ You’re not alone! So many times you feel like you are completely 100% alone in the journey in this entrepreneurship, and trying to go after your dreams” - Carrie Woodward
Some Topics Discussed This Episode:
❝If you are new to the ClickFunnels family, welcome home!” - Dave Woodward
Important Episode Links:
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Episode Transcript:
00:00 Welcome to funnel hacker radio podcast where we go behind the scenes and uncover the tactics and strategies top entrepreneurs are using to make more sales, dominate their markets and how you can get those same results. Here's your host, Dave Woodward.
00:17 Hey Everybody welcome back today. This is going to be a fun little podcast. I'm actually driving back from McCall, Idaho. I've been up here for the last couple of days with my wife. Just recuperating after a really almost 60 days of just busy life, crazy business stuff and wanted to just kind of take some time. First of all, introduce you to my wife. You'll hear me refer to as Princess, but she is the whole reason I've done all that I've done. And we're going to, uh, as we were up here, I've decided I'm going to do two different podcasts with her. This one here is going to be a reflection of some of the things that happened at Funnel Hacking Live. And the other one will be more along the lines of entrepreneurial, marriage and success and things of that sort. So it's gonna be a two part series here.
01:03 So this one here again is focused on I See you, We see you. It also can be referred to as I feel you. We feel you. And this really came down from those few guys who were at Funnel Hacking Live, had the opportunity of, of seeing Garrett White's presentation and what Garret was up on stage. He actually ended up bringing up all of the founders and partners of ClickFunnels and their spouses. And it was really one of the most impactful things that I've had happen in a long time. Um, we've been going along four and a half years now and there's a lot of things that happen behind the scenes. And what happened was we had the opportunity of basically having Garrett bring us all up on stage and look out over 4,000 people while we were there. He then basically almost had us in somewhat of a chant, basically going back and forth between the audience and us on stage.
01:58 And it was, uh, really one of the most emotional experience that had a long time as I actually felt. The gratitude and the appreciation of 77,000 customers represented by 4,000 that were there expressing gratitude and appreciation and at the same time seeing what we've done to try to build this. And at the same time, reflecting on them with those things that we've seen and what we're trying to do. But before I go too much more into that as an introduction, I want to bring on my wife. Uh, this is the most important person in the world to me. She has, we've been together now over 25 years, been married over 25 years. So, this is my wife Carrie Woodward my princess. Hey, so we're super excited to be able to spend a few minutes are kind of going through this. So sweetheart, tell me what was Funnel Hacking Live like for you this year?
02:58 I think the cool thing is, is that when we walk into the place, when were first setting up, when we first get there, and we see this, this months and months of this vision that they all had of how they're going to pull it together. And the long nights, the long days and long weeks along months, the hours and hours of lack of sleep that they never get. And um, all of a sudden you walk in and you see this and there's always a moment where you're standing there and you get emotional because you're just like, okay, they did it like it, it came together and then you realize like they didn't just do it. We did it like we all did it, we, we pulled together and it, and it just kind of came together. And, and, and why was it we, because it was we, you have to do it as a team in order for these guys to be able to keep going.
03:51 And I think that that was so powerful for me was when Garrett did his presentation for those of you guys were there. Oh my gosh, it was amazing. But it was super powerful because what he tried to show people was, you're not alone like so many times. You feel like you are completely 100% alone in the journey of this entrepreneurship and, and trying to go after your dreams and whether you've got a full time job or that works from eight to five, nine to five, and you know, you get paid a certain amount. There's still crazy stresses that come along with that. But you have a different family, a different tribe with whatever career, whatever job, whatever type of thing it is that you choose to do in life. And this particular tribe of people of entrepreneurs are special. And just to see everything that they go through is, is just so powerful.
04:42 And as I, um, I was standing out one one day and this, this amazing young mom came up to me, her name was Paige. So if Paige is listening. I just want you to know that I saw you and I felt you. And she came up and she just started to get emotional and she said, tell me. And then she stopped and she started sobbing and she said, can you tell me everything is going to be okay? And she couldn't get her emotions under control. And I was like, ahh! Like I felt her, I, I knew exactly what she was going through because as you know, the time of just building, building, ClickFunnels and doing this as a team with so many amazing people, um, there was those times when you know, you have to step back and go, okay, this is a huge jump of faith.
05:30 This is a huge leap of faith. And you see everyone hunker down and make so many sacrifices, families and spouses and also the people who work behind the scenes that so many people don't know about that. You see them do that and, and they do it. They're doing it for their families and they're doing it for you. And to see that and to see that that journey, that so many go through that as you keep pushing and as you do it together it works. And when we, when we got up on that stage, you know, Garrett pulled us up, he pulled up some other individuals and had them go through the same experience and then he pulled us up and had us say to the crowd, we see you. And they said it back. We see you. And it was so powerful to us. Like all of us were sitting up on stage and bawling like babies.
06:22 I was so incredibly embarrassed. I couldn't get my emotions under contr. It was so bad. But I think it was just like years of it. of just like seeing it come to that point of the long days, the long nights, the stress, but also the wins like the incredible wins. And I think that that sometimes it's something that we forget to celebrate, but just to know that we see each other and we know each other and we know each other are there. And I think within the entrepreneurial world, sometimes it gets lonely but you, because you are doing it alone a lot. But often we don't realize the importance and the power of allowing other people to know that we're seeing each other, that we're feeling each other and we're appreciating each other because that is, it's powerful. And I know for me when we were standing up on that stage, it was like, I just felt like I would just, I mean man, my bucket was just filled with like so many awesome, wonderful, like amounts of energy that was thrown at us and love and support and, and I just felt like, I hope that everyone in that room could've felt that with us too.
07:27 That we were throwing it back at them. That we like we sit and we, we, we have the like we want them to be successful and you know, we, we pray for our families, you know, whether whatever being it is, whatever higher power it is that you believe in for us, for me it's prayer, but we, we do that. We pray for you guys for the all of those out there who are, who are in our tribe and who are working with us and how we just want them to know that we're seeing them and we're feeling them. And for my sweet friend Paige out there, we see you and we feel you and we, we just want you to know to, to keep going. And I think that that was such a powerful thing because in the same time, that is when Dave was having the experience of like, oh, should I keep this podcast going that I'm doing, should I keep it going?
08:11 Should I keep it going? I don't know. Like you just feel like nobody is seeing it. Nobody's feeling you because you're, you see them and you feel them, but you don't know if they're reciprocating it. Like if they see you and they feel you back. And it was so awesome for me to see him and to feel him, feel so many people coming up to him and sharing with him how much they appreciated his podcast and his message. And I think that, gosh, like that just made me learn from an outsider. Just seeing him and seeing the people reach out to him and to reach out to, to us as, as spouses that you guys like. It is so powerful to share, you know, with your loved ones, whether it's just people in your home or your family or your friends around you, your community, whatever the heck you're community is, let them know you see them and that you feel them and that you appreciate them no matter what it is. That is so powerful. And I think that that is like, um, something that amazing that I learned from just this Funnel Hacking Live is the tribe that was there of so many people reaching out to each other and just letting them know that they see each other, they feel each other and, and they have each other's back and like keep going. You can do it and, and, and keep moving and keep like, just keep being awesome.
09:34 And again, really we want to make sure that you understand how much we appreciate you. If you're new to the ClickFunnels family, welcome, welcome home. I think, uh, as an entrepreneur it's one of the most lonely times and yet at the same time, I hope, uh, anybody who's listened to this, uh, that you feel we, we're here for you and for your success. It's been one of the most fun journeys, most stressful journeys, and yet at the same time, nothing excites me more than, than seeing someone have success, whether it's an eight figure award winning plaque or ring or a two comma club ring, or if it's literally the first thousand dollars. I remember the first thousand dollars I ever made online and I seriously, I thought I had won the lottery.
10:20 It works. It really works.
10:25 And I just want to make sure that I just, just, no matter what you might be going through, just keep going, just keep going. And I think that that's really the, what I've, I've seen the benefits and the blessing so much over the course of the last two weeks, especially just the value that exists when you just keep pushing. You just keep going and going and going. Sometimes you just never know when it's going to actually hit, but it actually does and it always, always will. And just again, want to make sure that we encourage you to never ever give up on your dreams, never give up and just realize that you truly are just one funnel away. Having an amazing day. This is my wife, my Princess Carrie.
11:04 Hey, hey
11:05 and Dave Woodward signing off right now. Thanks so much. We'll talk to you guys soon.
11:10 Hey everybody. Thank you so much for taking the time to listen to podcasts and one of the things we're really passionate about is trying to get everyone up and running as fast as they possibly can. And one of the things we've done recently that has helped so many people, and that is our one funnel away challenge. If you don't mind, if it's something of interest to you, we actually will pay you $100 for anybody who signs up for the one funnel away challenge or if you want to go ahead and sign up and do it yourself, just go to onefunnelawaychallenge.com. Again, that's onefunnelawaychallenge.com sign up, go through a 30 day challenge. Uh, it's one of the great things. We've got Russell basically giving you a 10,000 foot level. Julie Stoian comes in and gives you, kind of hear the nuts and bolts of exactly how to make it work. And then Steven comes in every single day and spends time basically telling you exactly what to do on a daily basis. So he'll just hold your feet to the fire. Super Accountable. We've had more people get more success and things done out of this than anything else. So go ahead and sign up @ onefunnelaway.com. Thanks.
Why Dave Decided to talk to Stephen Esketzis:
Stephen is a man of many events. With it only being the beginning of March, he’s already been to seven. Now he’s here to share with you how to maximize your effectiveness at any event you go to. With questions from “How do you differentiate between cockiness and introductions?” to the age old question of “Do I need a wingman?” he answers them all.
Tips and Tricks for You and Your Business:
(1:02) What’s the Takeaway From Every Event You Will Ever Go To?
(2:56) Stephen’s Learning Philosophy is Very Similar to Our Other Beloved Stephen
(5:54) How Stephen Went to Todd Brown’s Event With the Game Plan in Mind
(8:22) Go to the Event and Get Your One Thing, Relationship or Knowledge
(11:02) THAT Guy, You Know Who I’m Talking About
(14:42) How to Prevent Yourself from “Peacocking” at Events
(16:10) It’s Important to be the Connector
(19:59) Stephen’s System to Meeting the People He NEEDS to Meet for His Business
(21:54) Meeting Strangers is Networking...Just Don’t Be Strange
(25:20) Introducing Yourself Without Bragging About Yourself
(27:05) The One Question to Rule them All: Do You Need a Wingman?
Quotable Moments:
(3:34) “For me it’s all about compartmentalizing the content and going to the people I need to at that time.”
(15:20) “I think to me the key is to be yourself. Again, I love the whole thing of not being cocky or draw attention to yourself but the most important thing about networking to me is, and you and I have talked about this before, you have to always be adding value.”
(25:49) “You describe what you do, you don’t describe the money that you’ve made when introducing yourself to others.”
Other Tidbits:
Dave started with some of Dan Kennedy’s initial events
Just go to the event you need, and get what you need from it
If you are one of the people who knows people, then people will know you.
Important Episode Links:
The Lazy Contact App
FunnelHackingLive.com
FunnelHackerRadio.com
FunnelHackerRadio.com/freetrial
FunnelHackerRadio.com/dreamcar
---Transcript---
Speaker 1: 00:00 Welcome to funnel hacker radio podcast, where we go behind the scenes and uncover the tactics and strategies top entrepreneurs are using to make more sales, dominate their markets and how you can get those same results. Here's your host, Dave Woodward. Every welcome back to [inaudible]
Speaker 2: 00:18 great. This is that kind of crazy deal that happened here and want to make sure you kind of understand what's you're about ready to listen to. So I was down at TAC traffic and conversion this last week and ran into our very first dream car award winning affiliate Stephen. It's gets us. And while we were there, I thought, you know what? He's never actually collected on the his dream car because he was living in Australia. It's like five times as much. And so I thought, what, what if we just get you a Ferrari for the day here while we're in San Diego is we wouldn't out and got a fry. Kevin Nance and joined us and we started filming, drove over to core Natto, hit the Cornell of bridge. Uh, I spent some time over by the hotel del and just had a great time. And while we were there we started walking up and down along the beach and Kevin was filming basically some of the things that he's done that uh, Steven's done to become a number one to feel it.
Speaker 2: 01:04 But then also some of the things that just Kinda it lid became this open dialogue of events and why we're traffic conversion, why you go to events and and just kind of a success story type of interview. So I thought it'd be kind of fun just to strip the audio from that and let you guys listen to it. So understand that the audio quality is probably not that great. There was a lot of wind and a, we're at the beach and things but I think the contents worth it. So I want to at least give that to you guys. It's a listen to it, enjoy it and let me know what you think.
Speaker 3: 01:32 Steven and I are actually out here. Traffic and conversion. This is the second event that I've been to so far that actually the 30 benefits you so far this year in which the fourth event I pinches of my, the shield. It's been to four events in the first 60 days of the, of the year. And one of the things I've seen Steven at so many different events over all the years, what we want to con talk about is why do you go to an event and when you're adding event, how do you maximize your time? There's a ton of stuff going on. There's networking, there's content. It's really just trying to find out what are the secrets that you can, why does anyone want to go to live event? How do you get the most out of the live event? And that's kind of suffered talked about right now. So it's even having that so far you've been to the ship. Just the first one. This is number three. Number three. So it's, it's pretty crazy. The 25th, 26th of Jan of February. Yeah, this third. My fourth. So inventive 70 ventures. You can be as chair. It's been crazy. So why do you go to events? Look, to me it's
Speaker 4: 02:25 the biggest thing initially was the content. Um, when I got into digital marketing, it was all about learning the content, learning what was working and really being able to apply that in my business. But as I've grown as a business owner, as a marketer, it's never become a lot more about the network. Now. It's really been connecting with the right people and really getting in front of those people that are either going to be decision makers or Jv opportunities or maybe you've got some synergistic way to work together. Might not be right now, but you might have something say in the next six months or 12 months or something down the line. So for me, looking back now in reflection of the, all the events I've been to, uh, the
Speaker 3: 02:59 networks and the opportunities that have come from that may not have had a direct ROI straight away, but it's just incredibly Roi over time. I think that's, for me, that's one of the things I loved. I remember when I first got started, I was, gosh, it's been over 10 years now where I was going to a lot of Dan Kennedy's and Bill Glazer's GIC events. This is all about breakfast, [inaudible] marketing, even pre internet marketing type of stuff. But I remember it, those events being so fascinated by the people who are crushing it and I want it so bad, he's wanting so bad to be there. I want it. I want to just to feel like I was successful. And at the time I was like, oh my gosh, I'm never going to get there. And you saw all these people who were not just gurus but these are the guys who were actually just crushing it on stage.
Speaker 3: 03:42 Yeah. And more importantly in their own personal and business life. And I think the main thing that I saw at that point was how valuable that networking was. Yeah. Cause I agree with, at first it's all about the content where you go and you're there to learn the content and then implementing the content. I think that for me the hardest part was I would get so excited and so motivated there. And then I get home and man life, each of the patients like, oh crap on, never going to be able to do that. And you get hit with so many ideas as well. So you'll like not only do you come back and you, you've lost all your energy, but you're like, well, I know a hundred different ways I can go, which way is the best? So how do you deal with information overload at an event?
Speaker 3: 04:21 So for me, all I take going into an event with a bit of a game plan. So I say, well look, where do I, where am I now? Where do I want to be? Who the key people I want to meet and what's the key content that I need to take away from this meant anything outside of that I'll learn, but I know it's not going to be implemented there. And then it's something that I'm going to come back to or might make a note of the people that are experts in that field. So if that issue comes up or I want to learn more, I can then reach out and go back to that note. So for me, it's all about compartmentalizing the content and going to the people that I need to at that time. I should funnel hacking live. Steven Larsen, Tata principle.
Speaker 3: 04:53 I think that is so critical, especially when you're attending an event here at the time was referring more towards books in and content things he was learning. But it's this principle as far as just in time learning and seeing and you're just kind of talking about that where you had a game plan as far as when you're going to the event, you're like, you know, I need to learn Facebook trap at or I need to learn copywriting on. I'm going to this event to learn how to shoot video better. Or did you go with a game plan as far as what is the next step that you need? So, so often a lot of us are like, oh, I'm just going to capture every single thing and it never works that way. So Steve was like, okay, it's baby steps. Okay, all I need is I want that step, whatever that information pieces there, that's what I'm going to get.
Speaker 3: 05:29 And then it's like one step at a time. I think the problem that most of us have when we go to an event is you get this massive overwhelm. And I think the biggest problem I find for a lot of people who are going to events is they don't go there with a game plan. So excited. They're so motivated. So what were some of the events that you've gone to where you had a game plan and what were you looking to accomplish? Well, I mean, it's off into a whole lot of different events I've been to for the record. Real quick. How many events have you been to? I've seen, I'm into a ton of events and I see you at all, every one of them. Uh, I've
Speaker 4: 05:58 lost count. Honestly. I have lost count all the big digital marketing events. I've probably, you've seen me, uh, you know, uh, uh, I don't, like I said, I've lost count. I've been to all the funnel related ones and digital marketing ones, that traffic ones, the even business growth ones overall. Um, there's been a whole mix. Um, but it's, and now we've actually launched our own events company in Australia. So we're running our own Australian digital marketing event, which is crazy. So I've been on both sides of knowing what a good event it looks like as an attendee. And now I'm going to know what a, hopefully a good event it looks like as someone running one. So give me an idea of something where you went there with a purpose in what you got out of it. Yeah, so, so here's an example. I was at a marketing funnel automation run by Todd Brown and other click funnels affiliate actually, who's, you know, did actually, it did really well on the VA first book launch. I remember. Um, so did a really good job. I think he got a car too. It didn't, it was actually our very first dream car award winner. He and Jeff Walker, Jeff got the Ferrari and Todd actually, uh, was given the first check. Yeah, I remember that. So yeah. Anyway, I was at his event, this was going McAfee in years now. Um, and he's events specifically for copywriting and really getting this big idea. Um, it's something that that event is really well known for. And at that time we had an alpha.
Speaker 3: 07:11 It's launching a health website. It's, I was like, look, I really want to understand the principles behind creating this offer and getting it right to the right people. So I just circled all the sessions that I had at that time, uh, that I wanted to attend. And that was it. I was just there for those sessions. Anything outside of that, I was going back, working on taking the ideas from what I just learned and seeing how I could implement it. So that way you don't have a thousand things going on. You've got that tunnel vision. So you've got, you've gone to your session, get the takeaways out. One of the ones that are sessions that I got a lot out of was it, Laura was speaking there talking about how they do this copy's lining or whatever it was called. Um, mapping out all their different objections and handling those in the sales process.
Speaker 3: 07:50 So I was looking at that and yeah, it was phenomenal. I mean, you know, you take content and then you've got to go back and implement it. I think if you just sit there and then you go, all right, next session, next session. It's like a drug. You just kind of get out of it. You know, you're stuck in there. I mean the contents, awesome, don't get me wrong. But you know, you also want to make sure that you're executing the content. Um, so for me it was just, yeah, you to have that tunnel vision and no, yeah, it comes up. So I know the very first one I went to, and it's sometimes if the person doesn't know what they want, I just tell him, just go and immerse yourself in the experience. So the first time, if you don't know what you're wanting, I would say you just go and just get the feeling.
Speaker 3: 08:27 Uh, one of the greatest things for me as far as events is you are with a group of likeminded people, which as an entrepreneur, you'd never remember. You've been doing this a long time now. And the first time, same thing for me. When I first got started, I was like, there's no one liked me. I am all by myself. Yeah. So the very first thing I tell people, if you're trying to go to an event, what I highly recommend the very first time is just go and soak it all in. I don't care if you get anything else out of it. Just besides the idea of what is possible and sometime just that dream, it's capturing the dream. The second thing I tell people is when you're at an event, after you kind of get a little handle for it is to do exactly what Steven said and there's different types of events.
Speaker 3: 09:06 So like funnel hacking live is all in one room and it's choreographed to make sure that you get a whole bunch of exact steps that you need to take. A TNC is more of a trade show where it's broken down into multitracks and so you may be on an agency track, we may be on a copywriting track and so you kind of have to find out how the event is set up. But I love what you said and that is too often people go with this idea as far as, I'm just going to get everything. If you get that one thing, all you need is one good idea. Sometimes you just get that one good idea and you're one funnel away. Yes. Right. And what you were talking about was you literally got that and left the event. Yeah. Left. You didn't go off and implement it right then and there.
Speaker 3: 09:44 Well I mean cause that's the thing, you're getting shocked. Gung Ho, it's like a machine gun. You're getting all these different ideas, all these different nuggets coming out and they're all great, but you know, or you can only implement so much when you're at that event. Um, and keeping them on as well. A lot of events have recordings that you can take advantage of. So if you don't get it wrong, then the contents oil is generally available light if a purchase or online, um, Nordics as well tends to come out to a lot of events. So you take advantage of those. Um, you know, there's different content opportunities that he's pointing, but when you're there, you've only got one opportunity to connect with people. So for me right now that that's that time opportunity. Do you want to meet people and make the relationships? It's funny, I had this conversation with a friend of mine the other night and it was saying that in digital marketing we're all online, right?
Speaker 3: 10:27 But I know the most meaningful relationships with me and coming person. So it's so ironic that we're in a digital industry where everything's done online. All of these funnels online, we'll have hedges online, but at the end of the day, the most meaningful relationships and partnerships and joint ventures and will come from in person events. Um, and I just say that as, you know, it's so powerful. Just if I looked back and I didn't go to one event, there would be no one in the industry would really know. Even the success and any results that I've put together now we'll most likely not be there. And it's also like you said, lonely. You know, it's a, it's a journey that you're going on your own, so you want to have that support along the way. Well, it's funny cause I didn't know steam was coming this week. And so I flew in, left at six o'clock morning flight from Nashville to get out here because I had to be on a yacht, which I know.
Speaker 3: 11:11 Tough life. Third World First World problem for sure. So I can get on this yacht, 150 foot yacht brand separate, set up, great experience. And the very first person I see on the yacht is Steven. And I'm like, dude, what are you doing here? It's like I'm networking, I'm knowing these people. And that was before TNC even started. And I think that's one of the things again, all of a sudden you started getting these invites and, and that's the other thing, you know like I think one, one saying I've heard a lot and I totally agree with there's a lot of these deals are done at the bar where whether you're drinking or not, the idea is that you don't have to be in the sessions to be able to do a lot of these deals in network. It's at these after parties. It's up.
Speaker 3: 11:47 The networking events is that the mixes? It's, maybe it's just in someone's hotel room, just having a chat and maybe it's just organizing a meeting at the coffee in the coffee store inside the hotel. That's where the real money's made. That's where the real opportunities and the deals are. Um, you know, because it's those one on one connections, all those introductions, hey, have you met this person? And you might be in a group of three people and you'll introduce yourself to other people. So I found like, you know, last night I was at a Clickbank, a sponsored event. And when I went there, there's, you know, or might be in a room with a bunch of people I know, and all of a sudden they're making introductions. Hey, this software is fantastic. If you check this person out, the founders actually just there, let me go get him for you.
Speaker 3: 12:23 And one little connection like that at an ad on Facebook is to build the relationship. You'll go home next week and said, hey, you remember when we caught up clickbank? Oh yeah. Awesome. You know, I can't wait. Can you actually tell me a little bit more about what you do? I'll try it on my offers and away you go and that could be a huge successful partnership on that. I love that. So a couple of things as far as networking goes, don't be the person who's basically a whore just handing out all their business. That's probably wrong terms here. Don't be a person sleazy dealt be a sleazy person who's just as right. They give away their gifts, their business cards to everybody. We actually all hacking life and someone was actually putting their business cards on the top of every year and they're like, dude, are you serious?
Speaker 3: 13:02 You think that's been known as the Urinal Guy? That's terrible. Why would I want that? I never have any business cards and there's a couple of reasons why for me, I never want a business card because I know what I do with business cards when they get home I get, they just get thrown away. They didn't typically don't even get home. They typically go right in the trash. What I want is I want some grabbing their phone and I want them entering my contact information in their phone or to take a picture with the two of them. So you all of a sudden he grabbed the phone and we'll just even do this with Steven and I saw all of a sudden just grab your phone Elvis. You say, Hey, you know what I mean, take this picture right now. That picture now goes into the contact information with Steven so I can now send them a text or anything else saying, hey, it was great connecting with you at TNC.
Speaker 3: 13:44 Now we've got more of a relationship and you can respond to that. So I've, I haven't carried business cards in year one little hack for this and it's actually why I built this little free app and it's going to be a small plug here, but I promise you it's going to pitch or anything is a pitch and it's not a pitch. I'm not going to pre sell you. There's not always be trolls. There's not going to be a stack. Um, but uh, credit this APP called lazy contact. And what it does is you put your information in and then all you do is scan the person's foreign. Exactly. It. Just pull out your camera and you just hovered over the tall. Then I can get a picture of this and then that adds contact. You Click it and then you just hit save and now you've got my contact information.
Speaker 3: 14:26 Dude, that was really it. You've got my number, my name, my company, every day. I want that. Yeah, that's fantastic. Rosie, contact, lazy contact, purple F, lazy contact. I'm sure it's in the APP. So free. Totally true. Anyway, all right, so one of the things I always get asked is how do you dress for the event? Now, this kind of stuff, I never, ever, ever do it. The only reason I'm doing this today is because I had to pick a Ferrari that I didn't own and I bought. You know what? Easiest thing is more bling I have. The less confusing it's going to be for the people and it worked. I literally got in the car, put my hand on the steering wheel in the very first thing. The guy goes, dude, what sport did you play? Well, I didn't actually win this at a sport.
Speaker 3: 15:06 I said, actually that's one of our 10. It's our eight figure ward. He goes, what is that? Oh, it's free business had done over $10 million. And he's like, dude, you guys are making some serious money. No questions asked after that. As far as what, what actually his question was, how do I become a sales guy for you? That was the other question. So normally I do not dress like this when I'm at an event. Um, I prefer to be a little more casual. Stephen's attires we probably too casual today, but uh, you know, uh, I've had a mixture of it tell us. I think it really depends on the context as well. It does, it depends on what you want to get out and we'll talk to the impression you want to make, what event you're going to. If you're going to a networking event then you know, maybe would be more casual or if you go into it like last time there was a market as bullying might want to be a bit more dressed up.
Speaker 3: 15:50 Um, I don't think there's a term I've heard called peacocking. I don't know if that's a US thing, but you want to be like super cocky. This is total be deciding to when you're just standing out with everyone. Um, that's not my vibe. Uh, I like to just know mixing in and, you know, go with the flow. I think as long as you follow the dress code of what the event of you've done with precise business, casual is always safe. I'm typically button down shirt, jeans. Um, I prefer a tee shirt sometimes that's a little casual and fun. Yeah, I was just going to say, and it also depends on the weather of the place. That was the biggest problem I had with this trip was on one day I was phrasing. So I had three jackets on another day. Like today I could be in shorts and a tee shirt.
Speaker 3: 16:34 Um, you know, and not having any problems. So all of a sudden make sure you definitely check the weather of the event you're going to give us. I've made that mistake flying from Australia, told theU s events and I'm leaving from one climate, going to the exact opposite of another. Um, so yeah, that's, I don't want to tip, but check the event and check the weather. I think the key is just be yourself. Again, love the idea as far as don't do the whole peacocking thing where you're drawing attention to yourself. The most important thing about networking for me, you and I've had this conversation before and that is you have to always be providing value. Like what Stephen just did as far as, yeah, it's his own app, but the value app, that APP was huge. And I think that the key is just provide value to people.
Speaker 3: 17:15 And sometimes when I remember I first got started, I thought I had no value at all. In fact, I was talking, uh, so we had a dinner cruise last night with 112 people that we knew in this area. And, uh, Keith Yackey and Pete Vargas won't see we spot click funnels sponsored it. It was pizza and, uh, Keith event. But the cool thing about it was there was really no peacocking going on and there was no, no one was trying to one up each other, but they were all trying to provide a ton of value. And the one thing that Keith said last night that that was so important that was the connector gets all the love. And I was like, Keith boy talking about, he goes, well dude, you're not going to, I've known Keith for over 10 years now and I've seen him at different events and he loves to be the connector.
Speaker 3: 17:58 And what I mean by that is he's not providing any value per se as far as he's not up on stage teaching about how to do Facebook ads or youtube and Nielsen. One thing that he loves to do is connect people. And he says, the connector gets all the love. And as we were shaking hands with everybody as they're written off the yacht last night, well they were saying was they were just so appreciative for that event because it connected people that brought people together, provided them an opportunity. Now you don't have to do a whole yacht experience, but what you talking about was just even in the bar and you're like, oh, you know, I actually know someone who would be great for you so you're not taking it all on yourself. You're saying, you know, Steven, let me introduce you to Kevin. Kevin's great at at videos, great at this kind of stuff.
Speaker 3: 18:37 And Steven's like, awesome. He will remember me as that connector. And the more connections you can make with people, more value you can provide to people, the greater of a resource you are then perceived in the eyes of everyone else and then all of a sudden everyone's like, I don't know who, who does this? Who does that? Soon you become known as the person as the Goto. I don't know who it is right now, but as Steven, he'll know someone for sure. And that's the one of the things, if you don't feel like you have any content value, be the connector, that connector value gets all the love. And I'm thinking of the other ones to add on top of that as well as host events. Like you said, like feel free to host your own events even if they're not around a specific, you know, might not be a monster one or something, but it might just be a casual drinks and say, hey, we're watching this unofficial get together full this event.
Speaker 3: 19:20 And that's a great way to kind of capture attention for attendees. You might not even know. Cause I remember the very first time I came out to trafficking conversion summit, I was about 19 years old, something like that. Those are probably the same Thomas sided with quick funnels as well. And um, I attended a Superbowl party and someone posted in the Facebook group, I think it was the click funnels group saying Bruce at TNC we've got a, a, you know, a Superbowl party going on, whole bunch of young entrepreneurs, feel free to come if you want. So I sent them a message. I said, look, I literally just landed two hours ago off their 21 hour trip we'd love to attend. I went there and now looking back, four years later, these people are running eight nine figure businesses and these people are young like, you know, then my age, they're doing these crazy things.
Speaker 3: 19:59 Back then they would just get into the industry there. They're running some crazy businesses. I'm using click funnels of me, affiliates doing whatever they're doing in the marketing world, but it just a one little random catch up and I made the effort just to say, yeah, I'd love to come. Well, you know, let's do it. Let's just organize, put yourself out there a little bit outside the comfort zone and I need nobody, you know, some guy from Australia who didn't know anyone and just say, look, I'd love to attend. Or you know, what can I bring to the party? How can I make it better for you? It just helps, you know. So little things like that. Put yourself out there, host some events around for the bigger conference or is a great way to network. I told him these weird just kind of talking about it as far as the event side of things at the wholesalers, all own events.
Speaker 3: 20:39 Uh, last year actually here at TNC, uh, Andrew Warner was here. It was on the, the dinner yacht. Uh, we did with Pete and key and then like what you said, he ends up hosting Scotch night and he just invites him bucks buddies up and they drink scotch. I don't drink but it was so kind of him to invite me and so I had the opportunity to just be in there and mingling and just getting to know each other. And I think it kind of brings up the thing that you would allude to earlier, Stephen, and that is kind of having a target hit list of even the people you want to meet and of just go in there. I'm just going to be every single person out there. How do you kind of identify who it is that you want to meet? At an event. Look, it is tough.
Speaker 3: 21:16 If you've never met, if you've gone, they'd called and you haven't met anyone. I think you've got to really build a segmented list of people that you want to make. Um, you know, are you looking for people who might be affiliates, even for people who didn't want to have a channel partnership opportunity with you? Are you looking for speakers? Are you looking for, you know, what's that little niche of people you're looking to speak to? And then within that, I think you'll get opportunities and introductions to be made to specific people to go even deeper and say, Hey, do you know anyone that might know this person in particular? Uh, and then get an introduction like that. I think when you go to hard to meet someone directly, um, it, it looks like a cold approach and sometimes it looks a bit too difficult to, you know, they're kind of wanting to get something from you first.
Speaker 3: 21:58 So when you want to provide value, I think I typically try to surround myself in that circle. And then once I surround myself with people in that circle, I'll go in and say, Hey, look, I'd love to connect with you know, this person. Do you know someone who knows him well or do you know someone who knows her well, uh, and catch up with them. But that's kind of my approach is kind of build that segmented audience, hang out with them, provide value with them, buy a ticket to the event of whatever they're hosting. If it's a scotch night, if it's a boat party, whatever it is. That's kind of an also joining masterminds and things like that. One thing that I love doing is joining masterminds and networking with people through events like that. That's how I met Brandon through the yacht we had a few days ago.
Speaker 3: 22:36 Um, and then again, I'll introduce you to other people that you need to know. Sometimes you're not even the person that knows who needs to know people. So what I mean by that is he'll say, hey, you definitely need to meet this person. Um, you know, you don't know you need him yet, but you'll definitely needed for this project. You've got coming up. So I look, I tend to work in little groups. I like to compartmentalize, people are hanging out with, and one other thing as well that I was telling another friend while I was here is not spending the whole event with the same group of people. That's something so many [inaudible] um, you know, I've got a whole bunch of friends from Australia that came here, were hanging out last night, but some of them have hanging out with each other the entire trip. And I'm just saying that it's such a waste.
Speaker 3: 23:17 Like you don't want to waste your time with one group of people because you ruined the whole three or four day opportunity you've got. So try to keep meeting new people each night. Go to a different event, may go on your own if you have to. Even if you've got friends, it's great just to get out of your comfort zone and meet new people and build groups in different areas. We'll let that tell a couple of things. Don't be the stalker. That's right. There's nothing worse than as you were sitting there talking. I'm like, I can't tell you how many times. I mean I've, I've known Russell for 10 years and even before I was a partner in click funnels when I was with them at events, it was one of those things where I would see people literally just stalking him and, and you get to the point where he'd like, if a person's going to the bathroom, that's the worst place to try to introduce yourself.
Speaker 3: 23:59 Let them have their space and their piece and you just do all and be that person. If you are stocking someone, your value decreases. It diminishes so fast. If you want, try to find, again, everyone's kind of familiar. This whole idea as far as six degrees of separation, you want to find people who are two degrees of separation, one degree of separation away, ideally for the person that you're wanting to spend time with. Um, I love what you're talking about as far as don't spend time with just the same people. It's really, events are super uncomfortable for all of us. I don't care how much of an extrovert you think you are, if you're brand new to an event, it's man at times insight. In fact, classic example with Brandon Jot, so the very first night I had been at funnel hacking live for six days, I was exhausted and I flew over six in the morning.
Speaker 3: 24:46 I get on the yacht, my son's on the yacht with me and I'm like, know what? I just want to go back to my hotel. I just, I don't want to be here. To the point where let me walk down the steps and was looking to see the gangplank was still attached to the boat and it was taken off. I'm like, I think I could still jump off and get off there and just sudden bout ready to start walking there. The first may goes, hey, hey, hey, we're done. You can't get off now. And I'm like, ah man. I'm like, I don't want to be here. But I was so glad that there wasn't have the up to spending time with. You had a great, it was great for my son to spend time with Brandon and Brandon was so generous with his time with my son and just the opportunities.
Speaker 3: 25:22 You have to understand that even as an extrovert, you still are going to be exhausted at times. You don't want to get out, but realize you only have that certain two or three day window if you're an introvert, same type of thing. Find someone who basically can be the extrovert for you if you need that, but you need to make sure that you get out of your comfort zone. You need to be the person who is doing everything you possibly can. As you made mentioned, you're only here for two or three days. Don't be with the same group of people. Get outside your comfort zone. Make it as uncomfortable as possible. Try to get to meet people, but most importantly, try to provide value.
Speaker 4: 25:54 Yeah, absolutely. I think it makes sure of all these, even if you get one or two things wrong and what we're talking about today, you're going to go to malls ahead of the people that are just sitting at home in the hotel room. It's a numbers game, you know, go out in. The more events you go to, the better. The more people you meet the bed better. The more of these things we're talking about. The you try it the better. And over time you'll feel your experience on how confident you are, how you approach people, how you network, what your strengths are, where you think you might, you know, want to work on. It's just a, you know, it's a numbers game. This is more experience you've got, the better you'll get at this. I love that.
Speaker 3: 26:25 So I want to kind of talked about this idea as far as what's the difference between basically bragging versus introduction. How do you, how do you, do you need to provide value in? People need to know who you are, but how do you do it without bragging? I mean
Speaker 4: 26:36 nothing. Just one thing that comes naturally to more people than I'd like it to. I think especially these be especially in, yeah,
Speaker 3: 26:44 it means event and I think it's, it's also a very close link to your ego as well. Um, so I mean, the way I do it, I always ask what other people are doing in their business. You know, how I can help them, what I do, and then I really don't talk about, well, my business is, unless they ask to the, unless it makes sense in the conversation. But even at that point, you describe what you do. You don't describe the money you've made over a campaign. You don't describe that, oh, you know, I'm a 15 figure affiliate for x, Y, and zed company. You know, like all these things that you know, kind of people don't need to know, but you want to make yourself put yourself on a pedestal. It, there's just no place for it. People see through it. I happening. It kind of makes you look just not as successful as you really, I, it's called him actually shooting yourself in the foot because there's no need to really go out of your way and tell people how good you are if you're in fact that good.
Speaker 3: 27:30 So, you know, I, the way I see it is your network is your net worth. And it's a bit of a corny statement, but I know that I've seen that in spades. The more people you have around you, that successful people are gonna know you're successful. There's no need to brag. Um, yeah, I think that's all it really is to it. I love it. I think for me, one of the most important things is when you're talking to someone, make sure you're asking them there at that event. Find out what their, therefore see what value you can bite to them. So, hey, so Steven here, where are you from? Blah, blah, blah. All the nicety type of stat real quick. But really most importantly is what are you looking to accomplish? What are you trying to do? What are you trying to learn here? Who you trying to connect with, find out what's important to them very quickly the walls will come down and you'll find that you have an opportunity to trying to provide value.
Speaker 3: 28:14 And even if you don't know the answers to it, the fact that you're asking more about them than you were asking about you're telling about yourself. Yeah. It just makes the conversation so much easier. Absolutely. I think you just want to keep it smooth, succinct, um, and really just enjoy the company more than anything. I don't think you want to have another agenda or either when you're going to meet somebody, you really want to just go there and get to know them as a person. And I think people really appreciate that. I love that. All right, so Steven, how important is it to have in a wing man? Look, we man's a great, uh, I think, you know, if you can have someone there with you to help introduce you to people, that's always going to be an asset. Whether I go out of my way and get someone, they're probably not.
Speaker 3: 28:49 Um, you know, I'm not going to hire someone to come and say, hey, this is Steven. Like I think it comes naturally once you get to know people, you know, people just do this. And I think if you're going out and hanging out with your friends and you go to an event or a party or a networking, not, it's naturally going to happen. If you're quite humbled in that option, people are going to want to say, hey, Steven's being super, you know, you know, he's not bragging at all, but he's actually awesome, x, y, and zed. And I think he's just got to, you know, the more humble you are, the more reason there is for other people to really lift you up and say, look, this guy's like, he's not telling you how he is. He's a baller, he's awesome. He's really good at x, Y, and zed. Um, that's what you need to know about him. I think that's a really good way to bring it across. I totally agree.
Speaker 2: 29:28 Well, what'd you guys think? I'd let us know. Again, it was kind of a different type of an episode, but I'm actually looking at doing some other crazy trips here in the next couple months and thought we might start doing a little more of these, uh, sporadic interviews on the fly. So let me know what kind of, what you thought. Feel free to send me a personal message or a Facebook or Instagram. Uh, leave a comment down below on iTunes or Stitcher, wherever you might listen to. We check all of those. Obviously. Feel free to email me as well. Thanks so much. Have a great day. Talk to soon. Remember you're just one funnel away.
Why Dave Decided to Talk About Cheating:
Do you have integrity? More importantly than that, do you have integrity when it comes to the change you are trying to instill into the world. That change only comes from necessary, uncomfortable positions. Tune in and see if your funnels and business are a victim of cheating and get ready for some introspection.
Tips and Tricks for You and Your Business:
(2:54) Saying No to Your Trainer...Is it Worth it?
(4:31) THEY Might Not Know, But You Do
(7:08) Do You Put Yourself In Uncomfortable Positions Just to See Yourself Grow?
(10:04) Don’t Cheat Yourself Out of Your Progress (Especially in Funnels)
Quotable Moments:
(5:54) “When you get want you want and you struggle for self and the world makes you king for a day just go to the mirror and look at yourself. Ask that man what he has to say.”
(7:44) “You’re either growing or your dying. You are never the same person standing still and too often we look for the easy way out
(10:10) “There’s so much reward that comes from mastery but so many people are just too afraid to pay the price for mastery.”
Other Tidbits:
ClickFunnels is always burning the midnight oil for you
Do it for yourself
Important Episode Links:
OneFunnelAway.com
FunnelHackingLive.com
FunnelHackerRadio.com
FunnelHackerRadio.com/freetrial
FunnelHackerRadio.com/dreamcar
---Transcript---
Speaker 1: 00:00 Welcome to funnel hacker radio podcast where we go behind the scenes and uncover the tactics and strategies top entrepreneurs are using to make more sales, dominate their markets and how you can get those same results. Here's your host, Dave Woodward. Hey for lockers. Welcome
Speaker 2: 00:18 back. Uh, this is going to kind of crazy story of last couple of days, hour getting ready here for funnel hacking live, how you probably listened as after funnel hacking live, but just want to kind of get you caught up on some of the craziness stuff. It's been going around the office, uh, late nights and everything else and the repercussions of late nights. So let me kind of tell you what happens. Just die. It was two nights ago. I was working late here at the office. Uh, Russell and myself, uh, tons of are really, we had almost half the officer's, it wasn't here. We had nick and John and Brant and Jake and, and it was just getting late. It was one of those things where everyone's just putting in time. Russell had to take off, take care of some family stuff and I end up staying super late that night. I, and as he was leaving, basically, you know what Dave, you want, uh, I know you've got a lot on your plate if you want to go ahead and not, I'll take the early workout time at 6:00 AM if you want to take the nine o'clock and I'm like, that would be fantastic.
Speaker 2: 01:09 I'd love to get some rest. So Russell took the 6:00 AM workout time and I took the nine and when I got there I woke up totally refreshed. And what happened is, it typically does is all of a sudden it was, you know, eight 30 around about seven 30 and my phone and my email, everything else just started blowing up and the day just got way out of control and I'm going, oh my gosh, I can't, maybe she didn't even go to this work. I just, I got so much, I've got to get done. I just can't, I can't do this if I, you know, I have to, I just, it's not fair to Eric. It's not, I just need to go. I'll do the workout back. You know, I'll just go early because my thought I'd just go early and then I can get kind of get a head start.
Speaker 2: 01:48 So I supposed to be there nine. I got over there at eight 30 and Eric cabinet pull in right behind me. Eric's that guy's been trained, Russell and I, and when we got there I said, listen Eric, I am, my day is just gone crazy. I, I have to be out of here by nine 30 I just really, there's so much going on. I just cannot afford to be late, so if we just make sure we get through this thing real quick and just get this thing done, he goes, oh no problem Dave. We'll just, we'll get after it. And Man, did we ever, I was so sore, I was just beat. There was like no rest between out. It was just like, oh my gosh, I'm just exhausted doing legs and I just, it got to that point where it was nine 20 I'm tired.
Speaker 2: 02:28 I'm like, I got a whole day in front of me. I didn't get much sleep last night or didn't feel like it did and then all of a sudden he brings out the dreaded most painful symbol of torture. I just hate, I just cringe at, I just, I literally, I start to sweat more than I normally just for just because I'm like, I know how painful this is going to be. And what he brought out is what we refer to as the BFR bands stands for blood flow resistance bands. And so what you basically do is you put this almost like a tourniquet raw at the top of your thighs and then you inflate it. It's like a surgical, it's so, it's like fabric that has a surgical tube inside and you inflate this, this tube up so that it basically cuts off a lot of the blood flow to your legs.
Speaker 2: 03:10 And the whole idea is basically it helps you get a large pump. It helps you get actually to isolate more muscle, helps build more muscle, faster it, it depletes the oxygen and and just really the idea is a great idea. The only problem is it's super, super painful. And then the idea is you then do step ups on the step up on the box. So he put it on one leg, you put that leg up on a, on about a box, it's, you know, 18 inches, two feet off the ground, and you do step ups and do 30 of them. And then you get done with that and take a little bit of a rest and then you 15 and then take a little rest and you did 15 tickle the rest and they do 15 so you do 75 of these stupid step ups in with taking a break between them.
Speaker 2: 03:50 And then you do, now you're halfway done. Now you gotta go to the other leg. And I'm like, oh my gosh, I just don't want to do this. I just don't want to do this. And I said, you know what, Eric, listen, I got so much going on right now. I just don't have time for this. I'm just going to bail. And so I did, and I could see the look on his face. Like, you're, you're quitting. Are you really gonna quit right now? And like Eric, I just, I said, listen, I just got to go. And so I bailed out, went to the House, showered, got to the office. When I arrive at the office out, we'd just finished our daily standup and during the deal stamp, Russell told everyone that I, I, I was been late at the office last night and he and I switched times.
Speaker 2: 04:28 So I get my workout in and, and which was great. And then I'm walking by Shane's desk. It was, hey Dave, you know, instantly just ask. So how was your workout? And right then and there, all of the memory and all of the pain of my cheating myself out, I, I just felt terrible. And I just broke out into this, into this confession. I felt like I was literally father forgive me for I've Sene type of a thing and I just, I went through them as total, listen, this is what happened. I got there and I cheated. I didn't do the blood flow resistance bands and I left. I just didn't do it. And they all laughed and I'm sure they didn't take anything else about it. The whole day. But I did. And it literally just started to bug me throughout the entire day. And so I started, I knew the only one who knew and the only guy that hurt by my quitting was me.
Speaker 2: 05:18 It didn't impact Russell, it didn't impact Eric. It did impact shade and impact anybody. The office, just me. And I reflected on the poem that my grandfather gave me, I don't know, 20 plus years ago, I was serving a mission for our church and I was having some hard times, uh, just, it was just frustrating. And he sent me the letter and just basically said, you know, Dave, what matters more than anything else is that you're honest with yourself. You're true to yourself. And he said, you know what, there's a poem that I really like. And so I'm going to include this poem in here. And the poem is called the man in the glass. So I'm gonna read it to you here. It says, when you get what you want in your struggle for self and the world makes you king for a day, just go to the and look at yourself.
Speaker 2: 05:58 And see what that man has to say for it isn't your father or mother or wife whose judgment upon you must pass the fellow whose verdict counts most in your life is the one staring back from the glass. You may be like Jack Horner and Chisel a plum and think you're a wonderful guy, but the man in the glass says you're only a bum if you can't look him straight in the eye. He's the fellow to please, nevermind all the rest for he's with you, clear to the end and you've passed your most dangerous, difficult test. If the man in the glass is your friend, you may fool the whole world down the pathway of years and get pats on the back as you pass, but your final reward will be heartache and tears if you've cheated the man in the glass, and I totally did. I cheated myself out.
Speaker 2: 06:38 I was the person. No one else. No one else is impacted at all that what I did, and again, it's not, isn't that big of a deal in the eternal realm of things? No. But the problem is it's the little tiny, small things that make up and it's when you start cheating yourself out, you prevent yourself from the growth that you need. And I see this in business all the time, and I was thinking about, you know, how, how many uncomfortable situations do you put yourself in to grow? Are you trying to find it the easy way out? And you're always trying to cheat a little here. And she got a little there. And then you get fresh when things don't work or when you don't have the skill set or you haven't learned it. It's like, so how many of those uncomfortable situations are you avoiding?
Speaker 2: 07:17 And I can tell you right now, the key is you gotta stop avoiding growth opportunities in your life. You actually have to look for ways of growing. You've got to look for those things that are uncomfortable, that actually will help you to grow, to become the man, the woman, the person that actually will help you in your business, that allows you to get beyond and separate yourself from everyone else out there. Yeah. It's one of those things I've seen so many times, and that is you're either you're growing or you're dying, you're never standing the same, you're just never the same standing still and too often officer always looking for the comfortable way out, the easy way out. And I'm just a huge believer in the fact you've got to put yourself in uncomfortable situations. Being an entrepreneur, being a business owner, being that's uncomfortable.
Speaker 2: 07:54 But the key is you've got to keep, as you keep pushing through that, you've got to find out what am I doing? What are the things? Am I looking for easy way outs? And I looking to cheat the system here because realize when you're cheating the system, you're only cheating yourself. So there's a couple of things I learned through this whole process. Now, the first thing I learned is I exercise first thing in the morning because I live with a cheap otherwise, if I don't, so the way I avoid my cheating is by having the discipline of actually doing it first thing in the morning. Morning. The other thing I've realized is the impact of momentum. Momentum helps average people like me to obtain greatness. It's just one of those things, and the way I get momentum is by starting off with stacking successes, but really in the day, that's success.
Speaker 2: 08:33 That stacking a little tiny successes might be as little as you've been making your bed. It might be as little as getting to the gym. It might be one of those things where you just have to find some way of just getting that next thing I'm doing. Whatever it takes to make sure that you're building up those wins because the more wins you can stack earlier in the day, the easier it is for you to deal with all the other crap and all the other stuff that happens in business as you continue to fight and to push and to go through it because it's going to be there. You're going to run across it. It's one of the most frustrating things about life is you have to find a way of stacking wins. Uh, the other thing, just to kind of complete the story here is that next morning I woke up, I woke up early, I went to the gym, I did the cardio that I promise Eric I was going to do.
Speaker 2: 09:13 And then I went back over to Russell's gym. I strapped on those BFR bands, I pumped it up and I did those crazy stair stepping things all because I didn't want to cheat myself out. And again, I, when I put those bands on, it wasn't for anyone else but me. No one else was around. There was no fanfare, there was no bragging at the office. But you know what? I knew I'd done it. And that's what mattered most is. And I think so often as you take a look at things, sometimes it's, you know, we talk a lot about this fact you're one funnel away and people go, Gosh, how many funnels is that? I, I don't know. But I can tell you learn something with every single funnel that you build. And the key here is to make sure that you, you don't cheat yourself.
Speaker 2: 09:54 Don't cheat yourself out of the learning experience, do whatever it takes. Get good at it. Skill set, master that skill set. There's so much reward that comes in mastery that so many people, they just are afraid to actually pay the price of mastery. So pay the price you'll always be blessed for your business will be better for it. You'll be a better person, your family would be better people for it. So having an amazing day, get out there, crush it, and just remember you're one funnel away. By the way, speaking one funnel away. If you don't know, we actually are doing it. One funnel, a challenge, and this is probably the best thing you could ever do to commit to doing something on a regular basis every single day. So if you go to one funnel away.com and check it out, [inaudible] dot com we have a challenge that starts about every 30 days. It's typically towards the end of the month, beginning of the month. And what you'll find is you literally get a challenge every single day. And I can tell you those people who have actually doing it are seeing massive results. If you don't know what to do, the first thing I'd tell you do right now is go to one funnel away challenge or go to one funnel away.com so again, one funnel away.com take the challenge you'll be better for it. Have an awesome name.