100 Things To Do Before You Die with Sebastian Terry
Posted by John Livesay in podcast | 0 comments
Episode Summary
Being tenacious, creative and authentic is what pulls clients in and say yes to your pitch. Sebastian Terry has been all three since he was 24 when he started listing 100 things he wanted to do to find himself. From invading a red carpet event to helping a complete stranger deliver her baby, Sebastian’s passion is inspiring other’s passion as well. Because he had a healthy internal conversation with himself, Sebastian saw what he stood for.
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Our guest on The Successful Pitch is Sebastian Terry, the author of 100 Things: What’s On Your List? He has an incredible story of a life changing event that happened to him and realized he wasn’t happy and decided to do something about it. Created a list of things he wanted to do in order to be happy, and then figured out how to do them. Everything from getting on a red carpet to being there when the baby gets born. He has several obstacles that he overcame. The life lessons for you as an entrepreneur are just seeing what it takes to be authentic, find your passion and then whatever you have to do to make your dream come true. He is a living example of how he makes that happen. He has incredible insights as to what makes someone happy. If you’re not doing something that makes you happy, ultimately your business will not be successful. Enjoy the episode.
Listen To The Episode Here
100 Things To Do Before You Die with Sebastian Terry
I am thrilled to have Sebastian Terry who’s calling in all the way from Sydney, Down Under, Australia. I was lucky enough to hear him talk at an event called METal, and he blew everyone’s socks off. Literally, he himself likes to go barefoot so he already started off in a great way. He has this great line about, “In case of an emergency, oxygen mask will fall from the ceiling and you have to put yours on first before you can help others.” He really has learned to live that philosophy. He’s known worldwide for pursuing an incredible list of 100 things he wants to achieve before he dies. His story is not only about a bucket list. That’s what people think it is. It’s something far more reaching and is about connection and growth. What actually happened was he has always been curious, and a close friend of his passed away. That’s when he did this whole check in going, “Am I happy?” The answer was no. He wrote down 100 things he wanted to do. He followed his heart and this list, and he has just gone on all these amazing adventures.
Before he got to the 100 things, he realized that just ticking things off really wasn’t enough and now, he’s got this wonderful thing called 100 Things that acts as a conduit introducing people who need help to those who are willing to help. It just is something that I’m thrilled about. He’s turning it into a bestselling book, the Discovery Channel is doing a documentary on 100 Things To Do Before You Die. There’s just so much that he’s doing and one of those things includes marrying a stranger in Las Vegas. Welcome to the show, Sebastian.
Thanks very much. That’s a lot to live up to.
You have done it and are doing it. I just love the transition of, “Am I happy with my life? Life is too short, I just realized that. Then I’m going to do these things.” Then, yet again another pivot as they call it in the startup world, “I’m going to make this not just about me but other people.” Those are the elements of your story. Let’s start at the very beginning, your story of origin. Paint a picture for us before your friend died of what your life was, what you thought it was going to be, and what caused you to realize you weren’t happy.
[Tweet “100 Things To Do Before You Die”]
I guess I’ve never really thought about it. I was just following that conventional road that we tend to. I went to school, I finished school. I’ve taught at the university, so I did. I came out three and a half years later with a degree in something, but I felt very underwhelmed. I didn’t feel I knew who I was. In-depth to that point and in our searching for something of meaning, I ended up just backpacking overseas like many of us do until I was 24. Up until that point, I was just doing the things that I was told which is very common. We’re children at one point and we learn to do the things that we’re told. I was in Canada at 24 and that is when I received a phone call one night. It was from a good friend of mine back in Sydney. He delivered the tragic news that one of my closest mates growing up, a guy called Chris had passed away. It was a very sudden thing, an accidental moment and tragically, he lost his life. It rocked the community but for me in Canada, I guess I was left there by myself just pondering a lot of questions. “Why am I here? What am I doing?” All those questions that we tend to ask in those moments. The more I thought about it, the less clarity I had on anything. The one thing that stuck with me was just the notion of, “If Chris somehow knew that he only had 24 years on Earth, would he have changed the way he lived his life? If given another chance, would he live the same way or would he change? Ultimately, was he happy?”
Everyone’s 100 list is different.
I thought about it a lot and the more I thought about that. The conclusion I came to at least was that I don’t think he would actually change anything if he was given another chance. I think he lived a life that was very true to him. He loved the beaches. He loved his mates. He loved having a beer. All the things he did that were just very resonant with him. He knew his values, his principles, what he stood for. I thought, “A life far too short but one well lived.” I then turned that concept to myself at 24 in Canada. I just simply asked, “If today was my last day, looking back at my life, could I say that I wouldn’t change a thing? Am I happy ultimately?” It was almost instantly that I suddenly realized that I was actually really unhappy. I was just doing things that people had told me to do including even backpacking around the world. Everyone did it so I just copied. At 24 in Canada, I realized I didn’t know what I stood for. I didn’t know who I was and my values. That’s the moment that I picked up a piece of paper and a pen and I thought, “I’m going to write down a list of things that I think are going to make me happy and I think are going to help me uncover who I really am.” That was the beginning of my list of 100 things.
Was it hard coming up with 100 things or did you have more than 100?
I didn’t have more than 100. It took me a little while to get it all down on paper. I think we all have these ideas in the recesses of our mind. I actually hate the term bucket list. I think it’s very orientated around death. It’s a list of things that encompass my life and things I’d like to do. It very much is professional and it very much can be personal. Buying a house or starting a company or investing in this or that, it sits alongside proposing to someone or skydiving naked or marrying a stranger in Vegas, although I wouldn’t recommend that one. Actually I would if you’re up for a good time, you should do it. That’s the beauty of it. Everyone’s list is different. Even though it seems very quirky and outlandish, the list has certainly changed my life in the way I viewed it.
I’m now eight years down the track, having ticked off 72 things in this journey. I’m no longer in control of. It’s connected with a lot of different people around the world and it’s turned from this very self-indulgent journey where I make sure I do the things that I want to do. Now, it’s lending itself to a whole community of people who are being inspired to start their list. Now, what I do with probably 90% of my time is travel the world helping people with specific goals. True to the analogy you used at the beginning. I do think that life is very much like that emergency procedure they tell us on the plane. They do say, “In case of an emergency, put your oxygen mask on first before helping others.” If you think about that, that sounds quite selfish but I think in life, you have to have your oxygen mask on. You have to know who you are. You have to be feeding yourself so you can really understand who you are. At that point, the beautiful part of being selfish is you’ve been able to help others because you’re suddenly much more productive and you know who you are. That’s when you help others with their oxygen mask. It’s like this act that has happened very naturally over eight years. It wasn’t planned. I didn’t think anyone would ever hear about this. I never thought you’d be interviewing me when I started. I just wanted to smile more and it’s gone in a good direction.
[Tweet “Help others to make yourself happier”]
That’s a great line right there is that your initial intent instead of being famous or making a business out of something is to be happier, then you’re solving a problem for yourself. I find that time and again that any business that started with the intent to solve a problem that you personally are experiencing, that those tend to be the ones that have the most success and passion behind it whether they get funding or not. You’ve turned this into a business. It’s a book. If people go to 100Things.com.au, you can buy the t-shirts, you’ve turned it into a whole movement if you will. It’s really fantastic.
If people would go to my website, what I’d much prefer they do than buy a t-shirt is just start their list. I think it comes down to giving yourself permission to consider whatever it is that’s important to you, to consider your values and stuff. I’m not shy about this. It all happened very accidentally like from the show airing in America right now. It’s on go90. The Verizon product, it’s an app. To the books that you mentioned to list that and the others, I think you’re right. If you’re doing something authentically and genuinely for yourself because you actually think that it’s going to help you as a person, I’ve certainly found that it then has a potential to resonate with other people. Ultimately, passion inspires passion. If you can identify what it is you’re passionate about, I’ve certainly found myself that the world turns up to help you out. That’s why I’m here because people are good.
[Tweet “Passion inspires Passion”]
I found that to be true for myself and it’s amazing who shows up in your life to support you when you do show passion for something whether it’s getting a book done or there are connections to help you grow. Sebastian, one of the things on your list that you’ve checked off is crashing the red carpet. Since I’m in Los Angeles, that’s a dream I think of a lot of people. Would you mind sharing that story?
For me, I grow and I learn more about myself when I’m out of my comfort zone. A lot of my items are anchored to this me getting out of my comfort zone. I want to be on the red carpet mainly because it was a big challenge. I’m not wealthy, I’m not famous so I shouldn’t be there. The challenge was getting on there. I Googled red carpet events and the first one that popped up was the Cannes Film Festival at South of France. I researched that and I read that it was the more heavily attended event media-wise than the Oscars. I assume they’d have an amazing red carpet. I got my credit card out. I didn’t start with any money by the way. For anyone who thinks I’m just independently wealthy, I’m not.
I flew to the South of France. I basically tried everything to get on this red carpet. It was a couple of years ago now, but it was the first day. I got there and I tried to get media accreditation that failed. I tried to ask a few pretty ladies who were dressed up very elegantly for dates if I could be their plus one, and I was turned down. It’s a common theme in my life. I wore a sandwich board. I found a big bit of cardboard and I wrote, “Please give me a red carpet ticket.” As you would imagine, that didn’t work so I ended up hiring a tuxedo for I think it was about €80. I suddenly looked the part at least. I got right up to the corner or to the edge of the fence. There’s all these celebrities going past. I remember seeing Benicio del Toro, Jean-Claude Van Damme, Kate Beckinsale who’s one of the most beautiful women I’ve ever seen in my life. Then I saw Russell Crowe who is from this region of the world. He’s from New Zealand I think originally, although Australians try and claim him sometimes. He walked past me and I thought, “If I just make contact with him, he’ll help me.” I yelled out. I was like, “Russell, it’s me Sebastian.” He ignored me. He didn’t help at all.
My last resort was to quite simply crawl under the fence and walk across the road as if I belong there. Just to paint the picture, there were security guards along the perimeter of this fence every five to ten meters. There were hundreds of them. There were also the local gendarmerie which is the French police. They were just walking up and down looking after people. I just thought, “I’ve got no other option. I just have to try this now.” I waited for a moment when no one was looking at me and I ducked under the fence and I started strolling across the road. I put my hand up to my ear as if I had an earpiece in, I thought that would help. For some bizarre reason, nobody stopped me. My heart was pounding. I’m not confident doing these things. I’m just confident to attempt them, but I was in. My heart was pounding, I was sweating profusely. I somehow got across the road to the final security guard on the other side of the road. He was guarding a fence and if he had let me through, that would be me on the red carpet. He said a few words to me and I kept looking down at the ground. I didn’t make eye contact, I had my hand up to my ear. I just muttered something to him. I don’t know what I said because I was so scared. For whatever reason, he just let me passed. I went through the gate and suddenly, I was on the red carpet. I remember putting my right foot down and then my left foot and I ended up strolling on the carpet. I was euphoric. I don’t want to put too much of a point on it but I was elated. I felt like the most successful human that have ever faced our planet. John, we met and you know that’s not the case.
100 Things: It all goes down to that moment when you give yourself permission to consider your goals.
I think that’s the feeling everyone gets and everyone can get when you achieve a goal that’s meaningful to you. It reverts back to this question that I ask everyone, “What’s on your list? What are these things that are important to you?” It doesn’t have to be a red carpet. It could be something far more meaningful. It could be something far more meaningless. It doesn’t have to be hard or complicated. It could be very simple. I think it all goes down to that moment when you give yourself permission to consider your goals. It comes down to a choice. You just have to try and action. On this occasion, I got on the red carpet. I was there for half an hour by the way. I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t think I’d get that far. I ended up being the last person on the carpet. Almost everybody has left. Totally thousands of people were staring at me. The paparazzi all had their cameras on me. I ended up just walking back down to the fence line and not knowing what to do. I signed autographs for half an hour.
The elation you feel is pushing yourself past that comfort zone and then achieving something that seemed impossible. Once you’ve exercised that muscle whether it’s getting that dream employee or getting that dream client when you’ve had a successful pitch, now you have this amazing story to tell people and it just shows you have resilience and creativity and tenacity. That is how you pull people in to wanting to say yes to whatever else you want to do with your life. That’s a fantastic example. The other one that you told that really tugged at my heartstrings was one of the things on your list was delivering a baby. Can you tell us that story?
It’s a very abstract one but for me, I just wanted to see a human take its first breath on earth. That was just important to me. It was number 23 on my list. That is a long story but essentially I’ve got an email from a girl in Canada who had been following my journey online. She said, “I’m due with my second. If you come to Canada, you can help me deliver.” I simply said, “Yes.” I got my credit card out, I flew to her hometown in Canada which is actually named Regina, it’s the capital of Saskatchewan. I caught up with her for two and a half weeks. The baby was very late and then she ended up having an emergency delivery, and I missed the birth. The baby was very healthy which is great, but selfishly I thought, “I’m in this ugly named town and I’ve got no money. I don’t know anyone and I’ve got no baby to deliver.” What made matters worse was the fact that the Canadian media had started following my story. They asked me to do a morning breakfast TV interview the next morning live in the studio. I reluctantly said yes because I was really upset and I was embarrassed too because I hadn’t done what I wanted to do. I said yes and the next morning I was on the show. This has become a national story at this point somehow. I don’t know how but it had. This is beaming live to the country coast to coast.
The male anchor next to me, for whatever reason, just didn’t like me. He started off by saying, “Welcome, Sebastian. You must feel so silly.” I thought, “That’s more aggressive than I thought.” I laughed along with it but for five minutes he basically ridiculed me. At the end of it, he said, “Now you failed, what are you going to do?” I again thought, “That’s a bit harsh. Why are you being like that?” I said, “Actually I’d love to create an opportunity.” I’m basing this all on this idea that I’m doing something that’s authentically meaningful to me for whatever my reasons are. It just is. I think you become endlessly resourceful and creative in those moments. I looked down on the barrel of the camera and I just said, “If there’s anyone watching who’s five centimeters dilated or more, I’d love to hear from you.” The story goes from here. I was approached by ten people. I met one of them, her name was Carmen that very evening. She agreed to help me and I delivered a baby the next morning.
As a standalone experience, it was one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever been part of. It was incredible. It allowed me to see that people really are good. This couple were willing to do something so intimate, so personal, something that nobody would share with a stranger typically. Because they realized that I was doing my stuff for good reasons, I’m trying to find myself, they resonated with it. They resonated with someone who was passionate about what they did and for that reason, they really stepped up. The startup world isn’t really my thing although I’m edging closer into that at the moment. I am finding that doors are opening and people are bending over backwards to support, assist, work with me, collaborate with me because anything that I do is based from a very genuine place. That’s something that I think is very, very important for anyone.
What was the moment when you realized, “I don’t have to hit my own 100 to be happy. I’m going to try to inspire other people to come up with their list?”
It was a very natural progression in that sense. I remember there was a moment when I was in New York and I got put in touch with a guy who was very, very wealthy. His name is Tyson and we’re good mates. Basically, he heard of my story and he essentially offered me a blank check, knowing that I had next to zero dollars. He said, “I just want to help you with your journey. I really want to see you complete all 100 things.” What an amazing gesture and what an incredible human, very generous. That was the moment I started to think about things differently. I thought, “That would be great if I had the money. It would accelerate me ticking things off for sure, but would that be good for me?” For some reason, it didn’t sit well. I thought about a lot of it in the next few days and I actually started to think and realized that this journey wasn’t about 100 things. No one is defined by the things I do. I think you’re defined by just who you are. I realized then with more and more thought that my journey was really less about my 100 things. It was more about me just uncovering who I was via these things and learning to be me. I think probably my most profound moment is this idea that I just realized that my quest all along is just being about me trying to find out who I am. Now, the challenge is trying to be that person in every aspect, whether it’s an interview with yourself, John, or whether it’s something on a bigger platform or a smaller platform, any interaction. As long as we’re being ourselves, that’s the key to, far be it from me to say it, success whatever that is for. It would mean something different to everyone. That was a turning point for me.
100 Things: As long as we’re being ourselves, that’s the key to success.
You’ve hit on something that when you’re authentic then people see your passion. They know and understand why you’re doing something and that’s how you get people to say yes to whatever it is you’re pitching. In your case, you’re pitching people to come up with their own list but you’re also pitching something philanthropic. Tell us about what you’re doing with the camp.
There’s a charity aspect to what I do. The first charity I wanted to raise money for was Camp Quality, which is a kid’s cancer organization over here. I raised $100,000 for those guys, which was awesome. I did that so quickly that I thought I should just keep going. I then decided to raise $100,000 for Alzheimer’s Australia, which I did. I’m currently the Australian ambassador for the Make-A-Wish Foundation. I think that and a few other foundations, charities that I’ve raised money for. I’ve raised close to $350,000 somehow. There is that aspect of my list. I have to say though, that’s not why I’m doing the list. It was just as other things on my list fell into place. Number four was to raise money for charity based on the idea that I just never done it before. Embarrassingly, I’ve never done it. I’m very proud of all that for sure, but I think the way in which a journey has naturally lent itself for a bigger audience and it’s outgrown the story of just one man in this list. That’s the thing that I really, really believe. The idea that people started getting in touch with me and asking me for help with their list, I thought, “That’s so interesting, why are they asking me for help?” but I just said yes.
The first person I ever helped was Mark, a guy in a wheelchair. He wasn’t always there. He was able bodied but he got bitten by a tick in Greece and got Lyme disease. After three to four months tragically, he just became a quadriplegic. He can’t talk. He cannot move and he needs a ventilator to sleep at night. It’s really, really bad. He asked me to shave his head. I flew to Melbourne, I shaved Mark’s head, which is number one on his list because he’d created this list of 100 things. Once I got to know him, I thought I could do a lot more for him. I said, “What else can I do?” He said via his translator, “I want to complete a half marathon.” I said, “How can I help you?” He looked at me and it was the first thing I understood him say ever and he said, “Push me.” It was such a beautiful moment. The funny part is I said, “Why has no one offered to push you before?” He said, “It only came up in my list yesterday.” It immediately became the most important thing to me. I entered us into a half marathon and with no running ability, I pushed Mark for the race and we finished. It was the greatest single standalone thing I think I’ve ever done and it was just because I’ve helped someone else. That was probably the first time.
As the story goes, I’m now approached by people around the world who need help in various ways. People who are sick like Mark, but also people who are healthy. People who have no money and people who have plenty. People who are remote, people who are in the middle of cities. It doesn’t really matter. It’s why I spend my time doing this. The problem has become that I can’t help everyone, as much as I’d like to so I’ve got this growing community of people who now follow this journey of mine, 100 Things. They say, “Can you introduce me to someone because I want to help?” I’m playing this conduit role where I’m introducing those who need help to those who can help. My bigger purpose now, and I think it’s probably eclipsed, anything else that I’ve ever done is my next challenge which is to move to America, which I’m doing in very, very, very soon. I’m going to be building an app which is basically a marketplace for acts of good will, introducing people who need help to those who can help on a peer to peer level. That for me is my next big thing.
100 Things: What’s on Your List?
I’m sure that app is going to be just as successful as everything else you’ve done for us. Your Twitter handle is @Seb100Things and your book, 100 Things: What’s On Your List? is on Amazon. I can’t take you enough for sharing your journey. Is there any last bit of advice you want to have for people who are thinking about what to put on their list?
If people want to follow me on Instagram, it’s @Seb100Things. I’m on Facebook, Sebastian Terry or 100 Things, or my website, 100Things.com.au. I think a list is a really important thing and we all have them. It might sound like a quirky idea but we all have them. It’s a list of things in life. It encompasses everything. I really urge people to just take a moment. It might be 60 seconds to just stop whatever it is they’re doing at some point and simply ask themselves, “What’s on my list?” That thought, that permission, will allow a really healthy internal conversation. I also urge people to ask other people the same question, because I think the answer to that question when you give it proper thought, time, consideration, authenticity, etc. it has a potential to change lives. Not just your own but the lives of people around you. If you move forward in the startup world and in the business realm, knowing that you’re doing whatever it is that you’re doing for the right reasons because it resonates with you, it’s such a priceless invaluable tool or bullet in your gun. It all comes down to authenticity and I urge anyone to just ask themselves that one simple question.
Imagine what a more interesting world it would be instead of greeting people at a networking event saying, “What do you do?” You say, “What are one of the things on your 100 things to do before you die you want to do?” and then vice versa. That’s a much more interesting conversation, isn’t it?
100%. Thank you so much for having me. It’s so nice to connect with you again.
Likewise, thanks.
Links Mentioned
- Sebastian Terry
- 100 Things: What’s On Your List?
- METal
- go90
- Camp Quality
- Alzheimer’s Australia
- Make-A-Wish Foundation
- @Seb100Things Twitter
- @Seb100Things Instagram
- 100 Things Facebook
- Sebastian Terry Facebook
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Profit First For Fast Business Growth with Mike Michalowicz
Posted by John Livesay in podcast | 0 comments
Episode Summary
Having to restart a business from almost nothing and coming up on top is one proud experience Mike Michalowicz likes to share with business owners. But this is one life experience Mike doesn’t want to ever encounter again, because now he has learned that by letting go of his ego he rediscovered the meaning of entrepreneurship and felt that he wanted others to learn from his experiences of correcting himself. He is the author of four books including Profit First which Business Week calls “The Entrepreneur’s Cult Classic.” Learn how hiding money from himself made his business profitable because it forced him to find innovative ways to market for fast business growth.
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Today’s guest on The Successful Pitch is Mike Michalowicz who is the author of Profit First. He has incredible insights on the importance of paying yourself first with your profit in order for you to become profitable. What that does for you is it identifies those services and products you might be offering that are not profitable. If you just see your business growing and being this cash-hungry machine and never making a profit, you don’t even have a clue what you should be cutting and what you should not be cutting. He said, “A lot of people come up with excuses about why they can’t do it. It’s too simple to work. I’m very unique, this would never work for me.” Believe me, he’s got case studies of himself, having it work as well as many other businesses. He said you really have to take a look at what would you do if you had all the money in the world? More importantly, what would you do if you had no money in the world and they both give you freedom? Finally, he said a lack of resources with no money is what triggers innovation. Enjoy the episode.
Listen To The Episode Here
Profit First For Fast Business Growth with Mike Michalowicz
Our guest is Mike Michalowicz who is an entrepreneur behind the three multimillion dollar companies. He’s the author of Profit First, The Pumpkin Plan and what Businessweek deemed the entrepreneur cult classic, The Toilet Paper Entrepreneur. Mike is a former small business columnist for the Wall Street Journal no less and the former business makeover specialist on MSNBC. Today, Mike travels the world as an entrepreneurial advocate speaking to groups and people just like us. He’s globally recognized as the guy who challenges outdated business beliefs and teaches us what to do about it. Mike, welcome to the show.
Profit First: Transform Your Business from a Cash-Eating Monster to a Money-Making Machine
John, it’s a pleasure to be here. Thank you.
I always like to hear people’s story of origin. Before you were a famous author and a famous columnist and doing all these business makeovers, did you know you wanted to do this from the get-go when you were in school or what happened? How did you get where you are?
I was a little bit of a stumbling-bumbling fool I would say, perhaps I still am. After college, I had no entrepreneurial aspirations whatsoever. In fact, my upbringing was get one job and live that job for your life and that’s what I aspired to do. I thought that was a perfect formula. I just couldn’t get a job out of college. Without a job, at least not an adequate career job, I decided perhaps I could start my own thing. Quite frankly, there were a few beers in me when these thoughts came through. Liquid courage did help. I quit my job that night with a little bit of a slur in my voice. The next morning started my first business but also was married and had a young son at that point. It was trial by fire. It was motivation out of fear and it took me quite a few years. I started to fall in love with the experience of being an entrepreneur. I grew that small business. It was a computer service company and sold it to a private equity group after eight years. I started another business in computer crime investigation, ended up in the right place and the right time. That one headed it. We helped facilitate some of the Enron trial and some other major cases where computer forensic evidence was involved and sold that to a Fortune 500.
Clearly, I know everything about entrepreneurship and you sensed the ego as I say that. My ego got hold of me and just became this ignorant, obnoxious person. I’m ashamed of how I behaved. I thought I knew all the answers. I thought I was better than other people and decided to become an Angel investor. That’s where I lost all my money. I started investing with my own funds from the selling of my companies. I started investing in all these different startups and I had no right to be in that space. I had no clue what I was doing. All these businesses collapsed. I lost literally all my money in spending good money after bad. That became the spawning moment for me, the day my accountant called me and said, “Mike, you should declare bankruptcy,” which I didn’t. I didn’t believe I even deserve to be forgiven for what I have done. I worked through it but also had to resort on life.
We, my family, my three children at that point, we lost all of our assets, we lost everything has to start anew. I also experienced depression there in that period. For all those dark times which I hated going through, I never want to experience that. I don’t wish that upon anybody. It was the greatest learning lesson for me. It triggered me to rediscover what true entrepreneurship is, to become a columnist, to start writing books and then fell in love with that phase and I’ve been doing that ever since.
[Tweet “Only sell what is profitable”]
There are so many things I want to unpack there. The first one I want to talk about because this is everyone’s goal at some point typically is, and you made it sound so easy and I can see why that would inflate your ego because it must have felt easy, you sold not one but two companies and made a lot of money. There’s got to be some lessons from that that you could explain. Did you identify who could potentially buy your company when you started your company and you always had that on mind? Did somebody stumbled upon you and found you? Tell us a little bit about that, Mike.
The things that worked was my first company. It was really driven out of fear. I had to make that business work. I started building a little reputation in a niche community. That’s one of the lessons. Once I started targeting a niche, the business grew quicker. The other companies that were in that niche, really scratching the surface of it caught notice of me too and that’s where this private equity group stepped in, so they approached me. The second company, same thing. I was approached in the same thing. I figured out a niche. This was computer crime investigation but specifically we did defense investigation. We actually facilitate part the defense side of Enron. People ask me by the way, “You do work with Enron, were they guilty?” The answer is yes. There was no evidence otherwise. Even though they were our clients, ultimately through their law firm, they’re guilty.
The element I didn’t realize is timing is a major component. I think we can do some things to manage timing. I was just by luck in the right place at the right time but I attributed it to my own intelligence, and that was a fatal flaw. I thought, “Cool, I started a forensics business and do a couple of moves. It’s going to take two and a half years before it’s acquired for millions.” Clearly, I know what I’m doing and now looking in retrospect, I didn’t make Enron happen. It happened. I just happened to be there. Yes, we can be opportunistic, we can position ourselves but luck does play a component and I think I disregard the significance of that. That’s very important. Luck may and will present itself, we seem to grasp it. Be very careful with thinking, “I’m super intelligent. I know everything.” I sure heck don’t.
The real takeaway for me from what you said is figuring out a niche, what problem are you solving and be in that specific niche and then the fact that Enron got all that publicity that attracted someone, “You’re involved with that? I want to buy you.” That’s the luck part, but you also had the foresight to realize that you were solving a big problem and in this case, it had to do with computer crime. That’s really valuable. The other thing you mentioned that everyone experiences and so few people are willing to talk about so I’m really grateful that you brought it up, is this trough of despair that you hear that most entrepreneurs go through. Sometimes it happens before you get your business sold and you wonder, “What am I doing? What am I thinking?”
In your particular case, your journey was a little more dramatic, which makes for a great story which I love. We’re going on the hero’s journey and the stakes are very high. Where you’re in such a high peak of huge success and then, “Everything I touch doesn’t turn to gold.” The truth is that’s true for everyone and we just don’t see the failures whether you’re Richard Branson or Oprah. Not everything they touch turns to gold. You think it does and then you go, “Wait a minute, there’s plenty of things that didn’t work out for them. We just don’t get a lot of publicity around it,” or you forget about a movie that Oprah made that didn’t work out or whatever it is. How did you get yourself out if this trough of despair/depression?
It was a two-year journey. I remember the one that kick off was someone in my family looked at me and said, “You have the mightiest touch, Mike. You’ve done this twice now.” I believed it. I really felt like mightiest, anything I do, I do right. Then the collapse happened. How it transpired for me is first, disbelief. I was in really disbelief in how my business were failing. I was putting good money after bad and they’re collapsing faster. I truly believe if I just put more money in it, that’s going to be the solution. That’s disbelief and really disregard for the reality.
Then I had to face my family. I told my wife and children sobbing, ashamed because we lost our assets that day as I was telling them. I had lied to them by omission. Then I went into depression. How it manifested for me? I’m not really a drinker. I like a beer or a margarita or both. I was firing down beer after beer. I’m insomniac, I wasn’t sleeping and wallowing in my own errors believing that I couldn’t get better. Suicidal thoughts, planning; actually, I know a great way to kill myself now. Those nasty thoughts of the world is better off with me not being here. I also realized that that was such an easy escape for me but I would be actually punishing others. I never really, really believed it but I was thinking it for sure.
The turning moment, which is the most bizarre thing, was just to start journaling. A friend of mine said, “Mike, just start journaling AKA a diary. Start a diary.” I thought what that meant, John, was to write down, “Things will be okay. I look forward to the future. Life is good.” He said, “No, what a journal is write down the thoughts that are in your mind at the moment. It doesn’t matter how disgusting or nasty or angry it is, just write it.” I wrote these ramblings but I started feeling relief. I was bizarre just by writing nastiness, I felt relieved. I became an avid journalist. Then the moment came I said, “What do I want to do in my life?” A lot of people say, “When you’ve all the money in the world, what would you do?” The better question is, “When you’ve no money left, what would you do?” It’s the same choice. There’s absolute freedom when there’s nothing and there’s absolute freedom perhaps when there’s everything.
I asked myself, “If I have nothing, what would I do? I could start over.” I looked at that journal and I said, “I actually like the writing component.” I could write about what I’ve learned in my journey. I could fix my own wrongs. I could start helping myself. That’s when I started writing books. Wall Street Journal then called me and said, “We’d like you to write for us.” MSNBC called and said, “We want you to be on television sharing your thoughts.” I didn’t realize this but honestly, everything I was doing was actually just trying to correct me. I’m trying to fix me and started to realize maybe other people could benefit from this too.
Again, so many wonderful insights there; I don’t know if you caught it or not or if it was an intentional play on words but you were journaling, writing in a journal and then you became a journalist. This concept of getting our negative critical thoughts out so they don’t stay in our head. Whatever the format is, talking to somebody, writing it down in a journal is so valuable because anybody can do that. That’s great stuff. That’s how you get out of that cycle of just perseverating over and over again in all the negative things of “I’m not good enough. What was I thinking? No one loves me. I’m not having a good idea. There’s scarcity in the world.” I really love what you said, Mike. I’ve never heard anybody say that instead of asking, “What if I had all the money in the world, what would I do? What would I do if I had no money in that world?” Both have the same answer. There’s a whole other book there, that whole concept of freedom.
You write about in Profit First that you came across this small, easily overlooked paragraph in The Toilet Paper Entrepreneur. I want to just go a little bit on the journey. You get out this depression and you write The Toilet Paper Entrepreneur. That’s a great title. Tell us how you came up with that title and what this overlooked easily paragraph is in there.
The Toilet Paper Entrepreneur
I wanted to find an analogy of something that we experience in life but don’t talk about it. A situation where there’s lack of resources and we don’t talk about. That is the definition to me of entrepreneurship. Entrepreneurship is a struggle yet we don’t talk about it. It’s vibrato and chest-pounding when really for the vast majority of us, we’re scant on money, we’re scant on resources, contacts, friends, experience. None of that stuff is available to us, yet we survive. I was like, “That’s the bathroom.” The moment we run out of toilet paper and there’s that three sheets. Of course, you don’t talk about it because that’s embarrassing and personal. The realty is we’ve all been there and we’ve all navigated it. I wanted to get this reality of the lack of resources actually triggers innovation. The Toilet Paper Entrepreneur is the lack of contacts, meaning you don’t have a network of people, requires you now to establish a network of contacts. It’s finding a new way to approach it. A lack of education or experience forces you to break the rules. It was a beautiful thing. That’s what that book was about.
I also put in there literally a three sentenced paragraph. I started talking about profit in there because I realized it’s a problem that I had. As much as my businesses grew in these companies I told you I sold, they were never profitable. They only made money for me when I excited, which is the big difference. I wrote and I found a little trick, hide money from yourself. That was basically it. When money comes into my business, I immediately take a portion and hide it away from myself and I won’t even miss it. By doing that one little mechanism, I started becoming profitable. I started getting a few calls, a few inquiries. People were saying, “I tried that ‘take your profit first’ technique and it’s working.” I said, “It works for me. I thought I was just alone. I thought I was the only weirdo that experience that.” It turned into a full system now. We estimated it recently, we think there’s 30,000 plus companies doing Profit First at the start of this year.
I love that line, “Lack of resources triggers innovation.” Because that’s not, “Poor me, I don’t have the huge staff or the huge funding I need or whatever it is to make my business a success,” and just go, “No, I’m going to figure out how to do it,” or “I didn’t go to an Ivy League school,” whatever. “I don’t have the right contacts.” This concept of hiding money from yourself to get profitable reminds me of what people do with automatic savings programs or the concept of your 401(k), just to have the money taken out of your paycheck. You never even notice it so you don’t spend it. Applying that to the business, is there an automatic way to hide money that you recommend?
[Tweet “Lack of resources triggers innovation”]
Yes, there are a couple of steps. You’re very astute because that’s exactly the system. It is the 401(k). It is the ‘pay yourself first’ system. I’m just a guy who says, “It works on our personal lives, we got to apply it to our business lives.” This is the process, when money comes into your business what I found most entrepreneurs run their business off their bank account. Maybe you were told read the P&L, the balance sheet. We don’t do that. Quite frankly, I have been in business for twenty plus years, I don’t know how to read a balance sheet adequately, but my accountant wants me to. What I do is I log in to my bank and see what balance is available and I make gut decisions based upon that.
What I found is the best systems are ones who don’t requires a change but the system actually works around our existing behavior and puts guard rails in place to make our existing behavior that gives bad results, now give good results. What we do is we set up another bank account and ultimately, multiple bank accounts. For now, start with one new bank account at your existing bank, call it profit. When money comes in to your main checking account, immediately transfer that percentage into the profit account. This is the envelope system. We’re dividing up money and we know what money is available for what purpose.
Step two is we got to hide the envelope because we’re going to dip in there when emergencies come about. What you do is you set up another bank but the goal here is not a convenient bank. No online banking, no starter checks, no ATM card. Now, we’ll transfer a link. When I transfer the money into my profit accounts, down the envelope, I know its purpose. I invoke a transfer, sometimes it takes a few days. It goes to that new bank and now it’s out of sight, out of mind and I have to draw my business off the remainder. That simple process, it allows us now to work with what’s left over. It’s human nature to very easily adapt to the circumstances around us. When we downgrade our house or where we live to a smaller space, initially it’s uncomfortable, we’re used to more space. Then we sell off some furniture, we do whatever and be like, “Here’s my new cozy space again.” We’re very adaptable. When there’s less money now available to run the business, at first it’s a little bit uncomfortable but it’s shocking how quickly we adjust and rarely is the business compromised. We just find more innovative ways to do things. We find more cost effective ways to do things and because we’ve taken our profit first, we have assured profitability.
It almost reminds me of the analogy of just eat 10% less per day. You will survive and you’ll probably lose some weight. I think that’s that same mindset. You talk about why Profit First works is because it doesn’t try to fix you. We don’t need to be fixed. You have this great analogy about flying and flapping your arms. Could you explain what that does? I think we’ll all relate to what that feels like.
I decide to open the book this way. If someone called you, “Do you want to fly? It’s really simple. Run off the nearest cliff, start flapping your arms as hard as possible and you’ll fly.” If we are crazy enough to try that out and we actually jump and we start falling, the guy yells from the top of the mountain, “Flap harder.” Of course, it doesn’t work except there is the exceptional few. There are some that just by the happenstance of nature, they bounce off a rock or two, they land in a certain way, that it doesn’t kill them. Then we have what’s called a confirmation bias. The world points to that person that landed and said, “See? He flapped his arms right. He flapped harder. That’s why he survived. That’s what you need to do.” We’re all like lemmings, we keep jumping off the cliff trying to flap wings and the few survivors become the confirmation bias. When it comes to profitability, that’s what’s happening. Most businesses are not profitable.
There was a study in part conducted by the SBA, there’s other sources too. It identified, at least that’s what I’ve heard, that 83% of small business survives check my check. They don’t have enough money to survive next week if they don’t get deposited. That’s flapping real hard. The few survivors, the few Facebook or whoever it is, we point to them and say, “See? It does work. We just need to flap harder. We just need to get investment from bankers and private equity and all these people that come in.” The answer is, “No, they are the exception. They are the ones who are truly lucky.” Don’t bank on luck, instead bank on your human nature and leverage it to your advantage. Taking your profit first and saying, “You’re sitting in an airplane and fly that way. That’s going to work a little bit better.” That’s what I’m trying to say here.
Don’t bank on luck, bank on how you naturally behave now, your existing human behavior. The goal is however you already behave, we just got to put parameters around that that natural behavior becomes our advantage.
[Tweet “Hide the profit from yourself in a separate account”]
Instead of flapping your wings, get in an airplane. I would say that means collaborate. Don’t try to go alone a little bit too.
Collaboration works in all aspects of business, but when it comes to Profit First, I was the first guinea pig ever to do Profit First. I started it almost ten years ago, when I wrote. What I noticed was I set money to a profit and then I stole from the money. I “need” the money. It was like a drug addiction. I got a partner, his name is Larry. Talk about the buddy system is real simple or collaborating. I got checks for my business with dual signature. Larry does not own my business. He’s not part of my business. He has his own company. I said, “Larry, for me to take profit form my business, I need you to sign on this check too.” I did the same for him. Larry is a stingy guy. Anytime I want to access the profit account, he’s like, “No, you can’t touch it.” Let me tell you why and I had to justify that the distribution profit was the true definition of it, which by the way is a celebratory account. When you take profit out, it is a reward for the equity owners. It is not to be invested back into the business, plowed back, pushed back, reinvest. None of that stuff. That simply means it’s a deferred expense. I had to prove to Larry, “I’ve saved enough profit. The business can run on its own. I’m going to go on a vacation with this.” In the beginning it was, “I’m going to go to Starbucks with this.” Then Larry would authorize the check. That’s how I collaborated.
Tell us one more story of how this has helped you. You have an example of somebody who owned a hot air balloon company.
His name is Keith Fear. What Keith does is he had a hot air balloon business that was not profitable. The irony was he grew it to $500,000 or $1 million in revenue which sounds like a pretty, healthy small business. He was still at a full-time job because every time the balloon took off, it was costing him money. He’s losing money. Even though people are buying tickets, it still cost the money. He said, “I go to get profitable.” He read Profit First and said, “It ain’t going to work. This is a stupid system. It’s too easy,” was his answer. Six months later, he read Profit First again because his business is not profitable. He said, “No, it can’t work. I’m too unique,” was his next defense. “I’m different than the ordinary business, the ordinary guy.” Third time he read it, he said, “Out of desperation, the business was going under. I had to do it.” Then fast forward a year after implementing Profit First, his business achieved profitability. What was surprising was his business started to grow explosively. Here’s one of the hidden benefits of Profit First. When you take Profit First, you have assured profitability. That’s the beautiful part. Also, it now forces you to identify the services you offer or the price you offer that are actually truly profitable because you want to enough money to sustain unprofitable stuff, that’s an expense. He had to reduce the things he was doing. He only did now certain length trips. He couldn’t do the short up in the sky and back down. That was a money loser. The long ones where it was a day trip and you go picnicking, it was just a couple on losing money. The one hour trips, that was the money-maker. He refined what he did.
The Pumpkin Plan: A Simple Strategy to Grow a Remarkable Business in Any Field
The second thing is then when you do less services, less products, it forces you to service a more narrow community. Some people don’t want your service. The people that were daring themselves to go up in hot air balloon, they were the up and downers for five minutes. They were no longer buying from him. The couples that want to have a romantic getaway, no longer buying. The people that were out for an adventure for an hour, now started buying. Those were the profitable folks. He narrowed down his offering, narrowed down the clients that he’s tracking, which means less marketing to a more focused community which meant the community is talking about him more but it cost him less because he’s more focused. His business actually grew two or three times faster than it ever grew before because he took his profit first.
Once we get over the excuses of, “This is too simple, I’m too unique,” and then we finally do it, the big a-ha here is stop doing what’s not profitable. If the whole thing is not profitable, you can’t figure out what that niche is, then it is profitable and do more of that. When you niche down to only doing things that are profitable, then that’s what people start referring you to and that’s what you’re known as, as opposed to trying to be all things to all people. That is just fantastic insights there, Mike. You talked about without Profit First, the business really is this cash eating monster. When you take control of it, then you become the boss of the monster as opposed to the other way around. If you have the time, I’d love to hear one more story because you have so many great ones. What was your initial instinct on the story?
The baseball team. It’s a funny story because it was so visual for me. I got a letter in the mail, this is about a year after Profit First was released. I opened the letter and inside is a baseball card. It’s a manager of a baseball team in this yellow tuxedo. I flipped the card over, on the back it said, “Jesse Cole, Manager of the Savannah Bananas.” Below it, it said, “We’ve started Profit First and it saved out team. Call me.” I called this guy. Savannah Banana is a Minor League baseball team in Savannah, Georgia, had a million dollars of debt. They were going under. They implemented Profit First in a year. Eradicated the million dollars of debt, have become profitable, are now in regards to attendance and profits and revenue, the best performing Minor League baseball team in the US, because in part of Profit First, and a big part because of how this guy embraced it. He did the system but he then embraced innovation. They do some of the most crazy, fun, engaging and profitable things I’ve ever heard of.
It’s just so exciting and exhilarating. I’m so glad you shared with us your journey because it would be very easy to just look at, “I started two companies, I sold them and now I’m this best-selling author and I’m a TEDx speaker and I write for the Wall Street Journal and I’m on TV. It was easy and breezy and you could do it too, maybe.” Then you’re like, “No, I had my own challenges to overcome.” That same discipline that you learned when things weren’t going well is the discipline you’ve applied to Profit First and I think that’s really the big insight there. Without that experience, you might not have had the discipline and focus to come up with and clearly, it’s working for you and many other people.
We have challenges still yet in front of us but I think the ultimate thing is to realize that going through a challenge for me, it’s nasty and dirty. I never look forward to a problem. I never lived through it in the moment saying, “This is great. I’ll learn from this. I hate it.” The discipline of looking back at our life’s journey, I think we can find a lot of answers for ourselves in that.
Mike, how can people find your book, follow you on Twitter, etc.?
Amazon is the mecca for books, so that’s the place to go. The cheapest price is there. If you prefer bookstores, it’s in Barnes & Noble, airports and in your local bookstore. All my books, I have free chapter downloads and I blog. I like to podcast too. It’s MikeMachalowicz.com. Here’s the deal, that’s the longest, most Polish name on the planet, I get it. No one will figure that out, here’s the way to get there. My nickname in high school is Mike Motorbike. If you go to MikeMotorbike.com, that will get you over there. I hope the resources are big value, but I promise you this, I expect it to be the most different website you’ve ever seen if you do spend a little time on the homepage.
Thank you so much for being on today.
It’s been a joy, John. Thanks for having me.
Links Mentioned
- Profit First
- The Pumpkin Plan
- The Toilet Paper Entrepreneur
- Savannah Banana
- Amazon
- MikeMachalowicz.com
- SBA
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Max My Profit with Ben Fewtrell
Posted by John Livesay in podcast | 0 comments
Episode Summary
In order to earn more, every business owner needs to learn more. Knowledge transforms into confidence that lets business owners try things and not be fearful of change. Even after operating 64 trucks in the transportation industry in Sydney at the age of 24, Ben Fewtrell felt that he was not getting anywhere in life. Now he helps business owners to grow their businesses using the five stages of the Business Exceleration Blueprint. If you are still asking, “How can I max my profit?”, the simple answer is by working on your business to give it value and making it a valuable solution to your prospects. Learn why making time, people and money as the foundation of your business can help it grow and make people invest in it.
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Our guest is Ben Fewtrell who is an expert on helping businesses grow their business. He really shares with us a five-step process on how to get yourself from just struggling to soaring. It’s all about the foundation, the growth, how to optimize what you’re growing, the transitions so that you’re not the only person that can run the business, and finally how to diversify. He said you should really be budgeting for profit and that cashflow is like gas in your car. His real tip is on how to hire the right people and he has a really interesting insight into that. He says, “You don’t close a sale, you complete a sale.” Let’s learn the secrets to growing our business.
Listen To The Episode Here
Max My Profit with Ben Fewtrell
I have a guest all the way from Sydney, Australia. His name is Ben Fewtrell. He started his first business at the young age of eighteen in the transportation industry, and by 24 he had 64 trucks on the road, and by 28 he was done. He was working long hours and making hardly any money and he knew there was a better way. That’s when he then decided to pursue his passion for business and became a business coach. He spent thousands of hours training himself and others on just what they need. In the last ten years, he’s been featured in several publications. He’s an author. He hosts a podcast. He’s just an all-around great guy. His podcasts are called Business Brain Food and Daily Business Tips. He also gives keynote talks. If anybody who wants to book him from Australia into America, I would highly recommend that. Ben, welcome to the show.
John, thanks so much for having me.
I always like to ask my guests to take us back and flush out that little introduction. You’re 28 years old, you’re like, “I’m not going to kill myself. This is crazy. I’m going to help others figure out how to grow their business.” How did that all come about?
It was probably about six months before that moment in time that I had met somebody who called themselves a business coach. Back then, it was a relatively new thing. There weren’t a lot of people out there doing it. I went to one of those BNI breakfast meetings. I don’t know if you know those, John, where you get a breakfast and you get 60 seconds to do your elevator pitch.
I know it well because that’s what I train people on how to have a good one.
There was this one guy there and he would never use his 60 seconds. He would stand up and he’d say, “My name is Andrew and what I do is I help business owners work less hours and make more money.” Then he would sit down. I was in the situation where I was in the transport business and I had the disease that so many business owners have. That is that no one could do it as good as me at this or what I call the Superhero Syndrome where I was doing everything and it meant I was working crazy, crazy hours. I didn’t understand how to make money out of my business. We were turning over millions of dollars but I wasn’t making much, and I was making less than if I worked for somebody else and working a lot harder. This guy would stand up and do that every single week. When I go to this Breakfast Network, I don’t always get there but when I get there I said to myself, “I wonder what he actually does.”
One day I had lunch with him and he told me what he did. I ran back to my business. I was actually in partnership with my father-in-law. To give you an idea of what he was like, he would always find the twelve reasons why something wouldn’t work instead of the one why it would. When I told him about this coach, I said, “I found this guy that can help us,” I was struggling in a business and was not sure what to do, he just wouldn’t have a bar of it so it never happened. When I got to that point where I reached the end of the road and it was my relationship that was on the line, my marriage more than anything, that was the catalyst for me in making that change. My wife wasn’t happy and had given me a bit of an ultimatum. I had to make a decision. Do I sacrifice my marriage or my business partnership? Of course, my business partnership is what I sacrificed. I wasn’t happy there. Then I thought to myself, “What am I going to do?” As soon as I had sold my shares out of that business, I set in and said, “I wonder how many people are in the same predicament where they think they’re doing the right thing by working hard but they’re not getting anywhere.” That’s when the penny dropped for me. I went, “I want to do what that guy does that stood up every week and said he helps business owners make more money and work less hours.” I booked him in for lunch again and said, “How do I do what you’re doing?” Here I am today.
There’s a great example of having a compelling pitch that intrigues people enough to say, “That’s interesting, tell me more,” without having to get into all the details. That’s classic. Ben, I was watching one of your videos and you really are quite smart with this whole frame of reference. I’m someone who loves words, like within the word authority is the word author, so whatever you are the author of, you’re the authority of. Tell us about what you do when you talk about the word earn and how you add one letter to that that totally changes everything.
There are a lot of people out there that would like to be rich, let’s face it. If it was easy to get a couple of million dollars in your bank account right now, you’ll probably go, “Yes, Ben, show me how.” I can show you how. I think the great thing is that if you want to earn more, you do have to add one letter to the old L plate. You have to learn more. I always say to people the reason why there are people out there that are making $1 million a year or $2 million a year or $10 million a year, is they have learned how to. If you’re not earning that, you just haven’t learned how to. It’s possible. We know it’s possible. It was like the four-minute mile, people just have to learn how to run it. I believe the same in business is true. I think that you are a direct reflection of the knowledge you have, not because knowledge makes you money but knowledge gives you confidence to be able to try things that you may be fearful of trying otherwise.
You have a lot of different expertise. I’m going to dive in to the five-stage business acceleration blueprint, which totally ties into what you were just saying about the importance of learning to earn. Can you tell us what those five stages are?
Sure. I might just go back a bit because it’s important to understand that I think one of the challenges so many business owners were faced with is they didn’t have a road map. It’s like kids; businesses don’t come with an instruction manual. It would be nice if they did. It’s perfect for your listeners because if they’re pitching a business idea to an investor, if they’ve got a road map where they can say to an investor, “Here are the four stages I’m going to grow this business through. Here’s how I’m going to get the results.” That investor’s more likely to be intrigued and interested in investing in that idea. It’s great for any business, whether you’re looking for investors or if you just want to grow your business. What I worked out was there are five distinct stages a business goes through in its growth cycle. Myself and my business partner developed this thing called the Business Acceleration Blueprint. Now, when we work with a client, we take him through these five stages.
[Tweet “Budget for Profit”]
The first stage is foundation. This is a stage that so many people miss because it’s not sexy. It’s all the boring stuff like getting the basic fundamentals right in your business. The second stage is then the stage of growth. Growth is about being able to get your marketing and sales working in such a way that you have a predictable marketing machine. It’s important, if you’re going to grow a business that you know that when you spend $1, you’re going to get $10 back in. Whatever it might be, it’s got to be predictable. It’s no good waiting for the phone to ring. Having the best product doesn’t mean that you’re going to grow a great business. We’re seeing some great international organizations that make very average hamburgers yet they have over 30,000 stores. After you’ve got that marketing and sales working really well and got good cashflow then we go on to the third stage, which is to optimize. Optimization is all about systemizing repetitive tasks in the business with automation, in particular. In this day and age, it’s very easy to get into using software or a program of some sort that can systemize your business. It could be something simple, that doesn’t have to be automation. It can just be having a simple flowchart so people know what they’ve got to do. It just makes a business much more efficient, which of course includes profitability.
The fourth stage, the amount who go to business that has good foundation is growing nicely and predictably is optimized and runs efficiently, is now to transition how to working in to on. That’s a challenge so many business owners are faced with and being able to trust their team but also trust their systems that if they’re not there watching everything or macro-managing, that the business is still going to be successful. I’m sure as an investor they’d like to know that the business doesn’t rely on one individual because of course that’s dangerous. The transition stage is making sure the business can stand on its own two feet. The fifth stage, once you’ve got a business that runs without you having to be there, is then to be able to diversify. In the business sense that could be opening up of outlets, putting more vans on the road, it could be franchising or licensing or it could be totally something different. It could be buying other businesses or it could be investing in a property or a share. As an individual, it’s about diversifying and then capitalizing on the work you’ve done the previous few years to get to that stage.
Those are great stages: foundation, growth, optimization, transition and diversification. Let’s take a little bit of a deep dive into the one that’s so important. It’s like building a house, if you don’t have a solid foundation, the whole thing will crumble as you build up. What are some of the key mistakes people make in not having a good foundation?
If you look at why so many businesses fail, and that’s probably the point where I start with, is getting them to understand that businesses don’t fail because you want them to. Nobody starts a business with that as their goal. Everyone has this goal of building this great amazing business that’s profitable and fun to have, etc. The reality is most businesses fail, eight out of ten, they say statistically. I think it’s actually slightly higher in Australia. The reason for that is because they run out of money. When you look at the foundation side, the first thing is to do what I call financial foundation, which is having control of your money. It’s one of the resources that you need to manage. In your business, there are three resources that I believe you have in finances. One of them is time and people is the other one then money is the third one.
There are some key areas within finances that you need to master. One is reporting. You need to be able to look at a monthly profit and loss statement and understand what those numbers mean, look at the report and be able to make decisions based on what’s actually happening rather than on fictional. A lot of people say, “I go on gut feeling.” Gut feeling is not a great way to run a business. You want to run a business based on what’s actually happening and you want to be able to look at what are the most profitable products or services and then be able to capitalize on that by selling more of those. If something’s not making you money, you want to stop selling that. If expenses are getting out of hand, you want to know why. If you’re doing really well and you’re under budget, then you can also want to know why because you’d do more of that. The reporting is really important.
Max My Profit: Gut feeling is not a great way to run a business. You want to run a business based on what’s actually happening.
The second area then that it leads to is the ability then to be able to do budgeting. A lot of people think you budget for expenses or you budget for sales. I always say to businesses, “You’ve got to budget for profit because that’s why you’re in business. I know money is not everything but it’s somewhere very near to oxygen in my book. You want to be making sure you’re making money. Then the other real critical part of financial foundation is then cashflow forecasting. If you think about cashflow being like your fuel in your car, if you’re running out you’re going to stop. We want to make sure that there’s always fuel in the tank and that business continue to drive forward all the time. Those are the three key financial foundations but of course that leads to other parts of it. We don’t want to make business as accountants but we want to make them accountable.
You’ve got some really great sound bites, “Be accountable, and your foundation has to be both money, time, and people because it’s all about the team.” What do you look for when you hire people to work for you?
I think I made the mistake so many business owners make when they first start hiring, and that is to hire on skill. That can be important if you need somebody who’s got a qualification on something, then you’re going to have to hire that person. I really hire people on attitude because if someone’s got the right attitude and is a good fit with the team, then you can teach him anything. When I look for someone, that’s really the key thing; I look for what is their attitude and what are their personal attributes. Are they disciplined? You look at their lifestyle. Are they disciplined or are they lazy? They are a reflection of their life so that helps you then decide whether or not they’re going to be a good fit in your team. I always say to people, “Think of your business like a rowboat and you’ve got twelve people on the rowboat and you’ve got eleven people rowing, but you’ve got one person throwing the anchor at the back, it’s going to be a very difficult trip.”
The second part of this five-stage process, you talk about growth and the importance of sales and marketing. This is again really your sweet spot. What are some things business owners can do on LinkedIn to get more customers?
LinkedIn is a great platform. In fact, I always tell people LinkedIn is the most up to date business database in the world. We know that because you’re updating it. Everyone can jump on there. I think a lot of people are expecting with any social media platform that you can just put witty quote cards up or funny pictures up or a comment here and there, or maybe even pitch a product online and people are going to buy it. I think it’s still important to build a relationship. LinkedIn is probably more important than any other to have that ability where you can be very targeted but then start building a relationship with the people that you target. You do that by adding people to your network of course and you can look at second context through your current network and get introductions. I actually have a script that I wrote for people that are in the service-based industries to be able to contact somebody on LinkedIn. The good thing with something like LinkedIn is when you call somebody, if you just open with this online when you contact somebody at LinkedIn, you might Google them, get their phone number, ring them directly and say, “I’m giving you a quick call because I saw your profile on LinkedIn and I thought it was interesting.” Rarely will someone hang up on you.
Right, because you’re making it about them and not about you. You also have some really great skills and insights, and you give a whole keynote talk on this about how we can all simplify sales. I think one of the biggest challenges people get is, “I don’t know how to handle objection.” The biggest objection is, “Your price is too high.” Do you have any tips there, Ben?
[Tweet “Cash flow is like gas in a car.”]
This is a great distinction. If you’re getting that objection, you’re probably not articulating the value of what you offer. Objections are a good thing, by the way, so don’t be upset if you get an objection because it means that you’re getting closer to a decision. You’ve got to be comfortable with the fact that some people are going to say no and some people are going to say yes. We can use those objections as a tool to understand what is going on because communication is the response that we get. Whatever we’re getting back, we must have communicated something to get that response back. If someone says it’s too expensive or your process is too hard, what they’re actually saying to you is, “I don’t see the value in what you’re selling.” It’s totally different if someone says to you, “I can’t afford what you’ve got.” That means they see the value but they don’t have the money. I always say to people if you’re getting that objection that the price is too high, go back a few steps and go, “How can I make sure that my prospect sees the value in what I offer?” That’s going to come down to the questions that you ask. You want to be asking the right kind of questions to understand what it is they need? What are the challenges they have in their life that they need to overcome? Why aren’t they overcoming them? How does your product help them do that? I call that the POD formula: the Problem, Obstacle and the Desired Outcomes.
If you know what the problem is you solve. I always say to anybody, when they start writing up their sales process or thinking about objections, “Think about all the problems that you solved because the problem you solve could be different for every single person.” For example, if I own a hardware store that sells electric drills, for the person that wants to hang a picture, I’m solving that problem. For the person who wants to build a billy-cart, I’m solving that problem. For the person who just wants to drill holes in the floor to mount something, I’m solving that problem. For everyone, it’s different even though it’s the same product. I say to people, “Whether it’s the product or service, think about all the problems that you solved and then skip the O for a second and go straight to D,” which is the desired outcome and go, “What is the desired outcome for that problem that you’re solving?” For example, if the problem that you’re solving is overweight and the desired outcome is that, “I’m nice and fit and healthy and I can fit into the clothes I used to be able to fit into when I was eighteen,” then you can start thinking about what are the obstacles that person is faced with achieving that desired outcome? That’s where your marketing and your sales come in. That’s where you build the values. If my obstacle is that I don’t have time to exercise then if I want to help them reach their desired outcome, I could start pitching to them by saying something like, “Lose weight in ten minutes a day. Lose weight even if you don’t think you’ve got time to exercise.” All of a sudden, my sales have just become much more pertinent to what their desired outcomes are and their needs and it’s addressing their obstacle.
I love that so much because you’re getting inside the head of your potential customer and figuring out what their spoken or sometimes unspoken obstacle is to getting their goal, and then that’s what makes them go, “I want that outcome but I don’t have time.” If you don’t address the fact that you don’t have time in your pitch, then I just think, “I don’t have time to buy an exercise machine or whatever,” but you’d go, “In ten minutes, I could do that? Maybe I could buy a machine to workout ten minutes a day.” I love that you connected that problem, obstacle, desire. Half the people don’t even talk about what problem they’re solving, so just doing that is better than 50% of people out there. What gets you in the 1% then is you really take it to the next level of, “We’re not going to talk about your problem, we’re not going to talk about your outcome, but we’re going to talk about whatever your obstacle is to getting that outcome will be solved through this and therefore, you’ll pay anything to get that outcome because we’re overcoming your particular obstacle,” if I heard you right?
Absolutely. I always say to people, “Just imagine that you’re stuck in the middle of the desert and you’ve been walking through the desert for days and you’re just minutes away from death, from dehydration, and someone offers you a bottle of water for $10,000. You’ll find the money. You’ll buy it because the value is there.” The price is never too high. It’s that the value is not high enough.
The other thing is people say, ” I know I have to ask questions in order to get people to tell me what their problems are or their challenges.” What are the tough questions you find people afraid to ask?
One of the things is people dance around the fact that they are selling, and I think that’s dangerous because it puts everybody into a false sense of security. I’m pretty upfront with people. If I’m a salesman, I’ll say, “John, I don’t want to waste your time and I certainly don’t want to waste mine.” I’ll make sure you know my time is just as valuable as yours. That then allows me to ask the next questions where I would say, “John, is it okay if I ask you a few questions?” You’ll say, “Yes, sure.” Then I can start asking you because you’ve given me permission to some of the questions and I’ll make sure we’re not wasting each other’s time. I think things like saying, “Have you put aside a budget for this? Have you thought about how much you’re willing to invest to fix this problem?” Number one. I think too many people don’t do this, so they don’t qualify their leads.
Max My Profit: It is just about learning to ask good open-ended questions.
I think another thing that you’ve got to make sure you ask when you’re in any sales situation, whether you’re pitching for an investor or selling a product or a service is making sure that you have all the decision-makers at the table when you’re pitching whatever it is you pitch. Otherwise, you’ll get the one objection that’s very difficult to overcome and that is, “I’ve got to go and check with my partner,” whether it’s a business partner or a life partner. If you haven’t got all the decision-makers in the room then you’re in trouble. I think a lot of people struggle with asking that question. I think sometimes it is just about learning to ask good open-ended questions. What I mean by that are any questions that can’t be answered with a yes or no, but it typically start with a who, what, where, why, when and how. That enables you then to start gathering information so you can offer the right solution. You might love pitching what you pitch because you love it and you’re passionate about it but if it doesn’t resonate with your prospect, they’re not going to buy it.
In that spirit of open-ended questions, what do you find is some of the best closing questions that people can ask?
In my case, what I teach people is not to close and I teach people to complete because you’re starting a relationship. I think that the word closing has a negative connotation. What I like to do is I like to do a thing called temperature checking. The way that we do that is I use either/or questions, so alternates, rather than saying, “Will you buy from me?” The danger of saying “Will you buy from me?” or “Would you like to go ahead?” is you’re going to get a yes or a no. If you get a no, it’s all over. What I’d rather do is I usually say to somebody something like, “John, based on what you’ve told me, it sounds like it could be a good fit. Would it be okay if I offer you a couple of different options?” You’ll go, “Yes,” and I’ll say, “We’ve got it in green and we’ve got it in blue. Which color would you prefer?” Now instead of saying “Would you buy from me?” I’m now doing what’s called temperature checking. You might go, “I really like the blue.” I go, “Great. We could deliver that next week or the week after. Which week is going to be better for you?” One or two things are going to happen. You’ll say, “I’d like it next week,” or “Hang on a minute, I’m not ready to buy this.” I’ve got this opportunity now where I can go, “I’m sorry, what is it about the blue one that you weren’t happy with?” I can go back to my open-ended questions. Never am I getting a no to finish the conversation. I’m slowly easing us into doing what I call the completion process, which is of course in most cases paper work and payment.
It’s almost a little bit of the assumptive close in there until you’re told otherwise, right?
Absolutely. I always assume that because I say to people, “One of the key things is not what you do when you’re closing but what you do when you’re opening.” I do a thing called a positioning statement, which I know you’ll love because you’re all about positioning yourself. I would say, in my case for example, I walk into a meeting where we sell business services, I would sit down and say, “John, is it okay if I quickly outline how today’s meeting is going to go?” You’d never say no because we’d like to know what’s coming. It’s like sitting in a dentist chair and the dentist says, “You want me to just surprise you or would you like to know what I’m going to do?” I say to people have a positioning start where you say to somebody, “What’s going to happen in today’s meeting is I’m going to explain a little bit about my company, a little bit about myself, so you understand what gives me the right to be in front of you offering our services. Then I’m going to ask you a whole bunch of questions to find out exactly where you’re at, what problems you have, what’s stopping you from solving them, and see whether or not I can find a solution. If we both agree that what I can do will help you achieve those goals, then what we’ll do is we’ll have a look at the different options and if we’re all happy, we’ll get the paid work and the payment out of the way today and we’ll get you started. If not, no harm done. I’ll politely let you know if I don’t have a good fit and we’ll both be on our way. Is it okay if we go through today’s meeting that way, John?”
Just to jump back to one of the five steps here is this transition. I don’t think a lot of people even think about ever transitioning, as you said, from in to on. Getting somebody else to take over if you’re not there or you get sick or whatever it is that they are just so controlling that their identity is so tied up in it. How do you get someone to have the right mindset to even start thinking like that?
I think there are a couple of key factors. One is knowledge. If you put the oId plate on, you’ve got to learn. I think the knowledge needs to be, first of all, that you have the systems in place to be able to give you back the information you need to be comfortable that your business is working fine. Part of that process in foundation is setting up all the key performance indicators, the KPI, so you’ve got the reporting in place, and making sure that your business is structured for growth. What I mean by that is that you have distinct roles and responsibilities with KPIs attached to them. It is easy for you to monitor what’s going on, what’s working well, what’s not working well, so you can make more informed decisions. I think the reason a lot of people don’t make the transition is they’re uncomfortable because they’re not sure what’s going on is working. That’s the first step.
[Tweet “Hire people on attitude not just skills.”]
The second step, the other key fundamental is then the mindset. It’s your baby, you built it, you want to be a part of it, you feel proud of it, so you have this mindset that you need to be involved in it. The other dangerous mindset to have is that most people, and this is really a big problem for business owners all over the world, is that they value their money more than their time. What that leads to is that business owners will do a task that they’re not good at that they could pay someone a lot less to do than they’re paying themselves because they think they’re saving money. Huge danger. I always teach entrepreneurs that you’re making most money when you’re working on it, not in. When you work in your business, it feels good because you’re trading your time for money and you’re getting paid instantly. When you work on your business, you’re actually not trading your time for money. You’re actually trading your time to build leverage in your business that will pay you somewhere down the track, but it will always pay you more and it will pay you forever. It’s like you write a book. You don’t get paid now for that, you get paid later for that but you keep getting paid for it.
Ben, do you have a book that you would recommend either about business or life?
I’ve read so many books and I’m such a fan of telling people that can’t read books. The one that changed my life was Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill. I gave that book to somebody one day and they said, “I don’t get it. What’s it all about?” I said, “Did you read the cover?” That’s about mindset. I believe that your business is a direct reflection of who you are. I can give you all the strategies, I can teach you, I can put your sales process together, I can put an amazing marketing plan together and get leads barreling into your business, but if you don’t have the right mindset then it’s not going to work long-term. It will only be a short Band-Aid fix. As an entrepreneur, if you can get your headspace in the right thinking where you are doing the things that are going to make the biggest impact. Most of us grew up working with somebody else in the beginning. We had to look busy to be valuable. When you’re a business owner, being busy is not valuable, being busy is inefficient. I always say to business owners, “You’ve got to be productive,” and to be productive you’ve got to make sure that your mindset is in the right space so you’re not doing the wrong things, because that’s where people get busy.
Any last thoughts or words of advice?
We talked about going to the dentist. I always say to people, “You wouldn’t give yourself a root canal. You’d go and see a professional.” If you’re going to grow a business, don’t try to do it on your own. There’s nothing wrong with hiring a professional to help you. You’re building a house, you hire a builder. You’re getting your kitchen built, you get someone to come in to do that. People pay people to wash their car. Why don’t you have somebody help you build your business? You might get there on your own but we’ll just get you there faster and quicker and a lot more cost-effective than if you try doing it on your own. I always say, whether it’s me or somebody else, go and find somebody to help you, to be by your side to walk you down that path and guide you and help you overcome the obstacle. You’re never going to get there in a straight line, that just doesn’t happen, but you’re going to get there in a straighter line.
Ben, how can somebody find out more information about you, engage with you? What’s your best website to go to?
The best website to hit isMaxMyProfit.com.au. That’s my main business website. There’s whole bunch of freebies on there. You can download my latest eBook, which is Planning Your Path For Business Success or you can download the Business Plan Template that we’ve used to grow thousands of businesses across the globe. That’s a very dynamic business plan template that we used to sell for a few thousand bucks, you can get it for free just by going to MaxMyProfit.com.au.
Ben, I can’t thank you enough for being on the show and sharing so much wisdom and insights. It’s been a pleasure.
My absolute pleasure. Thanks once again for having me on.
Links Mentioned
- Ben Fewtrell
- Business Brain Food
- Daily Business Tips
- Think and Grow Rich
- MaxMyProfit.com.au
- Planning Your Path For Business Success
- Business Plan Template
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