Go For Launch — Rocket Fuel for Entrepreneurs

The COVID-19 pandemic accelerated the need for company leaders and their employees to accept the reality that hybrid work is not only possible but desirable for many reasons. While no one is certain what the “new normal” ultimately looks like, hybrid work is clearly here to stay. But the big question is how will companies be able to design a powerful hybrid workplace culture, regardless of where people are working. Many traditional companies are still struggling with the idea of hybrid or remote work. Gustavo Razzetti is the CEO and founder of Fearless Culture, a culture design consultancy that helps teams do the best work of their lives. For more than 20 years, Razzetti has helped leaders from Fortune 500s, startups, nonprofits, and everything in between on every continent but Antartica. Gustavo is also the creator of the Culture Design Canvas, a framework used by thousands of teams and organizations across the world to map, assess and design their culture. In addition to his consulting work with clients, Gustavo regularly speaks with leaders and teams about culture change, teamwork, and hybrid workplaces. His coaching and tools have helped countless executives and teams develop work environments where people collaborate to accelerate individual and collective performance. Gustavo is a prolific writer and author of four books on culture change. His newest book is Remote, Not Distant: Design a Company Culture That Will Help You Thrive in a Hybrid Workplace. His insights also have been featured in The New York Times, Psychology Today, Forbes, Fortune, and other media outlets.

Why is it that every single person in the world has stories and can easily tell them to their friends and family, but in the business context many people are afraid of storytelling—or they think it is only for creatives…or that it is less effective than data and facts? Jamie Dixon joined me on the Go For Launch podcast to talk about how to become a better storyteller. Jamie is a coach, trainer, and author who has worked with ambitious leaders in over 160 multinational companies over the last 10 years through his company, Shaping Paths. He coaches and trains in both English and Mandarin. He is also conversational in Japanese. Jamie is an IAC-accredited coach and a certified Tiny Habits coach. He is also certified in Everything DISC. In addition, Jamie is the author of several books, including his most recent title, The Story Habit: How Leaders Shape Stories That Drive Action. He also wrote the books Overcome and Get It Done and Shaping Paths. Show Sponsor: Accessibe Chances are your website has issues that not only frustrate many of your users, but could lead to significant fines. For example, if your site is found to violate the Americans with Disabilities Act, your first violation could result in a penalty of $55,000 to $75,000. And additional violations can result in a $150,000 fine. Go to Accessibe (affiliate link) to get a free site scan and to learn more about their compliance products.

One of the sweetest sounds in the world is a ringing cash register. And one of the best ways to hear it more often is to improve your word-of-mouth and personal referrals. My guest in this episode of the Go For Launch podcast is Raúl Galera. He's the Chief Advocate at ReferralCandy, an app that ecommerce brands use to set up and run customer referral programs. Founded more than 10 years ago, ReferralCandy has helped over 30,000 brands leverage the power of word-of-mouth and turn their customer base into their marketing team. Referral marketing is a blend of organic content, community marketing and influencer marketing. Word-of-mouth is a powerful channel for both successful global names as well as new, niche brands. Referral marketing blends perfectly with brands that have a clear customer-centric approach, making it affordable for companies of any size to attract new customers while retaining existing ones. Raúl has been leading ReferralCandy's partnership efforts for the past five years, working alongside marketing agencies, media and tech companies. Show Sponsor—Accessibe Did you know that 98% of websites cannot be accessed properly by people with disabilities? Chances are your site has issues that not only frustrate many of your users but could lead to significant fines. For example, if your site is found to violate the Americans with Disabilities Act, your first violation could result in a penalty of $55,000 to $75,000. And additional violations can result in a $150,000 fine. The ADA applies to all businesses—and there are many other accessibility-related laws to consider—so it's not something you should ignore. Several years ago, Target paid a $6 million settlement on a lawsuit brought by the National Federation of the Blind. Domino's Pizza also lost a lengthy lawsuit by a blind man who sued the chain when he was unable to order pizza off Domino's website or mobile app—even with screen reading technology. The good news is that it's easy to check your site for any compliance issues, fix them quickly and make your site user-friendly for everyone. AccessiBe is the first and only AI-powered solution that makes it easy and affordable to add ADA,  Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1, Section 508 and other compliance legislation to your website. All you have to do is get your web developer to install a single line of JavaScript code to your site. Within 48 hours of installing AccessiBe, your site will be compliance. And their pricing starts at just $49/month. Get Accessibe's free site scan and learn more about their compliance products.

Valerie Hayes is on a mission to help small businesses beat the odds and push through the roadblocks to become an industry leader. She helps overburdened entrepreneurs, small business owners, and CEOs run their companies like a high-performance sports car. As a fractional COO, Valerie helps untangle everything that's not working smoothly, sorts it all out, and puts it back together. Valerie's background as a business owner, a human resources professional in Fortune 500 companies, and coach/mentor for high achievers enables her to bring a multi-faceted, collaborative approach to every aspect of business. She's passionate about sharing her actionable insights with audiences around the world. Valerie is convinced that fewer businesses would fail if people knew more about how to run their business well and how easy it can be. Her direct, down-to-earth approach takes the mystery out of running a business. Show Sponsor: Accessibe Did you know that 98% of websites cannot be accessed properly by people with disabilities? Chances are your site has issues that not only frustrate many of your users, but could lead to significant fines. For example, if your site is found to violate the Americans with Disabilities Act, your first violation could result in a penalty of $55,000 to $75,000. And additional violations can result in a $150,000 fine. The ADA applies to all businesses—and there are many other accessibility-related laws to consider—so it's not something you should ignore. Several years ago, Target paid a $6 million settlement on a lawsuit brought by the National Federation of the Blind. Domino's Pizza also lost a lengthy lawsuit by a blind man who sued the chain when he was unable to order pizza off the Domino's website or mobile app—even with screen reading technology. The good news is that it's easy to check your site for any compliance issues, fix them quickly and make your site user friendly for everyone. AccessiBe is the first and only AI-powered solution that makes it easy and affordable to add ADA, Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1, Section 508 and other compliance legislation to your website. All you have to do is get your web developer to add install a single line of JavaScript code to your site. Within 48 hours of installing AccessiBe, your site will be compliance. And their pricing starts at just $49/month. Just go to Accessibe for a free site scan and to learn more about their compliance products. That's goforlaunch.io/accessibility.

In 2013, Luke Charlton decided to quit a comfortable 6-figure government job, move halfway around the world, and start an online business as a coach. Thinking he knew enough about marketing to survive in one of the most expensive cities in the world—London—he quickly realized it wasn't as easy as it looked. But after years of struggling and nearly going bankrupt, Luke finally discovered the formula for online success that has helped more than 4,000 coaches grow their businesses online. Along the way, Luke has spent more than $16 million on advertising, earned $50M+ in sales for his clients, and been hired by top ad agencies to write copy for experts such as Bob Proctor, Mike Dillard, Neil Patel, Grace Lever, Ryan Moran and many more. He has been featured in 6-Figure Coach magazine. Now, Luke spends his days living somewhere near Byron Bay in Australia, teaching other coaches how to get a lot of clients by sending just one 15-minute email per day. Learn more about Luke by downloading a free copy of his .

The pandemic upended a lot of norms, especially when it comes to traditional work models. Challenging the way work is done has accelerated to lightspeed, as people and companies are being forced to reckon with work “standards” in terms of hours per week vs. productivity and work-life balance. My guest on this episode of the Go For Launch podcast is Joe Sanok, author of the new book, Thursday is the New Friday: How to work fewer hours, make more money, and spend time doing what you want. The book examines how the 4-day work week boosts creativity and productivity. Joe doesn't just write about a 4-day work week, he lives it. He went from working 60-hour weeks to traveling with his family full-time in an RV while being even more productive at work. Joe believes working for yourself in your own business shouldn't have to feel like a job. And working smarter and limiting the time you spend on things that don't matter can help. Joe is also the host of the popular The Practice of the Practice Podcast, which is recognized as one of the Top 50 Podcasts worldwide with over 100,000 downloads each month. Bestselling authors, experts, scholars, and business leaders and innovators are featured and interviewed in the 750 plus podcasts he has done over the last six years. Learn more about Joe Sanok and also get a free Internal Inclination Assessmen at http://www.internaltest.com with promo code titnf.

Most of the “best” salespeople are happy earning six figures. But the Top 1% of sellers consistently make 7-figures.  If you're ready to double or triple your sales and break past the comfort zone of 6-figures, you'll need to learn ways to persuade your prospects that are more emotionally-based and less driven by logic-oriented sales models from the 1980s-early 2000s. Jeremy Miner, chairman of 7th Level, says that, “The single most effective way to sell anything to anyone in 2022, is to be a problem finder and a problem solver... NOT a product pusher.” 7th Level is a global sales training company that was ranked #1,232 of the fastest growing companies in the United States by Inc. magazine's list of the top 5,000 companies in 2021. In addition to serving as company chairman, Jeremy is also a contributor for Inc. magazine and has been featured in the Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Entrepreneur, and many more publications. Jeremy's philosophy has made him one of the wealthiest sales professionals. During his 17-year sales career, Jeremy was recognized by the Direct Selling Association as the 45th highest earning producer out of more than 100 million salespeople—selling anything, worldwide! His earnings as a commission-only salesperson were in the multiple 7-figures every year. Jeremy's unique brand of sales training pioneers the use of behavioral science and human psychology, reflective of his deep studies in the subject from Utah Valley University. Jeremy is the host of the podcast, Closers are Losers, and his new book, The New Model of Selling—Selling to an Unsellable Generation—co-authored by Jerry Acuff, CEO of Delta Point—is scheduled to be published in Fall 2022. Learn more by joining 7th Level's Facebook Group, . Show sponsor: Starting a podcast? Get up to two months free at , using the promo code LAUNCH at checkout.

Joining me for this episode of the Go For Launch podcast is Dean Inniss, Managing Partner at Your Best Life Now, an organization that helps people elevate their finance, family, fitness and faith through coaching, community, and exclusive once-in-a-lifetime experiences. His unique background of business experience, law enforcement, martial arts training and economic analysis gives him a rare perspective that enables him to successfully guide entrepreneurs, CEOS, and other top executives to new heights. In 2019, Dean decided to leave corporate America, where he honed his leadership, partnership, and business skills on a national, regional and local level. Most recently, Dean was the president and COO of a large regional mortgage bank that doubled its size under his leadership.

Vertical Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) platforms may seem like smaller markets because they are often measured by the size of the existing software market in the industry—for example, it is relatively small in youth sports. However, this ignores the many opportunities for vertical SaaS platforms to expand the addressable market—for example, to raise prices, upsell new features, own payments/banking relationships, and embed commerce. My guest today knows a lot about starting a vertical SaaS platform, attracting customers and gaining market share. Brian Litvack is the CEO and co-founder of LeagueApps, which he describes as the most comprehensive youth sports management platform available. ​​ LeagueApps is the operating system and community for youth and local sports leaders—providing them with the technology and professional network they need to succeed. The company is also building a movement behind its mission—creating amazing sports experiences for all. Through their FundPlay program, they donate a percentage of every dollar spent on the platform back to the communities and families that need it. Their goal is to impact 500,000 underserved kids by the end of 2022.

If you're ready to host your own event and anxious to get started but feel overwhelmed by all the things you need to do—from negotiating with hotels to coordinating with A/V providers, managing a volunteer team and figuring out what you are going to say and do while you're hosting—you're not alone! My guest today helps companies, coaches and celebrities create Powerful and Profitable events. Shay Wheat is CEO of Grace & Ease Productions, Inc. Shay is a Certified Event Producer™ and the creator of popular programs such as “The Powerful Event Process” and “The Ultimate Event Planner Certification Program.” Grace & Ease Productions produces in-person and live virtual events ranging from 200 to 4,000+ attendees. They have collaborated with many well-known celebrities including Lisa Nichols, Dr. Claire Zammit, Bill Baren, Alison J. Prince, Josh Turner and many others. Shay's clients have made over $24 million in revenue, gaining over 3,500 new clients and changing the lives of more than 16,000+ attendees.

This podcast episode is a little different than the rest. It's a personal conversation with my good friend Jim Mitchem about some serious topics, ranging from battling cancer to remembering a dear mutual friend, Nathan Richie, who passed away June 16, 2018. Jim is a branding consultant and award-winning senior copywriter who has convinced people to think differently about things for more than two decades. Since 2002, Jim's company Smash Communications has helped drive revenue for his clients via consistent messaging that elicits action across a range of media. As Jim says, “Copywriting is my superpower.” He's the author of several fictional books, including Minor King and Mongoose, as well as a non-fiction tribute to man's best friend, Gone Dogs: Tales of Dogs We've Loved. Jim is one of the most honest and kind people I know. I hope you'll enjoy our conversation. Find out more about Jim at Quick Like Mongoose. RIP, Nathan Richie.

There's a tendency to discount your price in order to get ‘quick wins, land more customers or keep existing customers happy. But there's a better strategy to win more clients—using value-added incentives. Marco Torres believes that value-added incentives such as complimentary travel packages beat price discounts. He joined me on the latest episode of the Go For Launch podcast. Marco is the founder of Marketing Boost, which has helped thousands of business owners worldwide boost sales and scale their businesses by as much as 5-fold through the use of incentive-based marketing. And his Facebook group is home to more than 28,000 active business owners who are raking in sales with his advice and amazingly affordable subscription program. During our interview, my brain was spinning with effective ways to use Marketing Boost. I hope you'll get a lot of value out of our conversation and check it out.

Today's podcast is all about learning how to create meaningful and inspiring online events. My guests are Daniel Moss and Michelle Garrison, the Co-Founders of We & Goliath. We & Goliath helps companies host more meaningful and inspiring events online. Their full-service formula combines smart strategy, platform savvy and innovative video that captivates, awes and inspires. Whether you want just live stream production or full-service virtual event management including event planning, technology, and marketing strategy for a multi-day event ... they can help tackle your Goliath. Michelle Garrison is a serial entrepreneur, digital strategist, and creative director, who's started companies and campaigns on the edge of sustainability and community-building trends for the last 20 years. She's helped companies reach triple-digit growth, and her projects have been featured in The Boston Globe, Washington Post, HGTV, Dwell Magazine, ABC, NBC and CBS. Daniel Moss is a senior event strategist with more than 20 years of experience leading and training agency and nonprofit teams. He's designed digital campaigns for large online and in-person events supported by lead nurturing automation, omnichannel retargeting and conversion rate optimization. His clients have experienced 7X attendance online vs. in-person, 5X monthly email signups, hundreds of #1 search engine rankings and 53% conversion rate boosts that increased revenue by $43,000/mo.

Most people think growing older and losing their edge is inevitable. But the truth is, the way in which you grow older is entirely malleable. Just because your chronological age is rising doesn't mean your biological age has to as well. It's time for a new paradigm. You can turn the clock back and stay at the top of your game at 40, 50, 60, and well beyond through precision performance longevity. My guest is Julian Hayes II, an executive health consultant & epigenetic atelier, and the host of Optimal Health for Busy Entrepreneurs. His journey began in his pursuit of becoming a doctor. However, he left school after one year to pursue a bigger dream. Now, he's the founder of The Art of Fitness & Life. This bespoke concierge health & performance advisory firm helps entrepreneurs, and executives live longer, richer, and healthier lives. This is accomplished through leveraging their unique DNA, data-driven health metrics, personalized bio-specific programming, a "performance team," and high-tech toys. On an organizational level, the firm helps companies elevate their bottom line through precision performance longevity. Julian has also written nearly 200 columns at Inc, along with frequently being published over at Entrepreneur, SUCCESS, Chief Executive, CEO World, Business Insider, Bodybuilding.com, and many more of the world's largest publications. He also is the author of the book Body Architect: A Real-World Guide to Ignite Your Fitness, Look Awesome Naked, Quiet the Inner Voices of Self-Doubt, & Design a Lifestyle on Your Own Terms.

If you ask many entrepreneurs how their life is going…and you'll hear a lot of lies. “It's great! I'm in control! I'm my own boss! I can do whatever I want, whenever I want!” The reality is, entrepreneurship is often miserable, as you become chained to endless days of working, tedious tasks and time away from family and friends. So how can you get control of your business, family and life as an entrepreneur? That's a topic my guest is very familiar with. For more than 20 years, Fabienne Fredrickson has powerfully mentored thousands of women business owners to grow, then scale their businesses, earning them tens of millions collectively each year while increasing their time off to enjoy lives they love. Her Leveraged Business methodology is based on her nearly 15 years of experience in generating multiple 7 figures annually with three children at home, while taking 14 weeks of unplugged vacations each year. It is proven to work. Fabienne's revolutionary book, The Leveraged Business: How You Can Go From Overwhelmed at 6-Figures to 7 Figures (and Get Your Life Back), is a definitive roadmap on how she's done it with heart and how you can too, without sacrificing your life.

If you're like many people, still trying to ‘e-blast' your prospect manually without a great way to track the results—it's time to make your inbox more sales focused. My latest guest on the Go For Launch podcast is Joel Stevenson, the CEO of Yesware. Yesware is a leader in sales productivity software. It helps both individuals and large companies scale their email marketing efforts, with templates and campaign tools; integrations with Salesforce and other software; phone tracking, a meeting scheduler; and more. Prior to joining Yesware, Joel was the general manager and founder of Wayfair's B2B division, which he grew to several hundred million in revenue. Before joining Wayfair, he held a variety of sales and marketing roles at Ariba, Innovus and Verizon. He earned an M.B.A. from the Yale School of Management, a B.S. in Business Administration from the University of Illinois, and studied Chinese at Harvard-Beijing Academy. He lives in Massachusetts with his wife and their four children.

Julie Broad is the founder of self-publishing services firm Book Launchers and an Amazon Overall #1 Best Selling Author who knows what it takes to be a successful self-published author. Through Book Launchers and her popular YouTube channel, BookLaunchers.TV, she helps subject matter experts write, publish, and promote nonfiction books that will boost their business. Julie's titles include More than Cashflow, which topped Amazon, and The New Brand You, winner of the Beverly Hills Book Award for Best Sales book. Her latest book, Self-Publish & Succeed, captures her leading tactics to write, publish and market a nonfiction book. An expert on writing a book with marketing in mind, Julie teaches the best approaches to write a book that builds your business and allows you to have more impact and influence with your brand. Her advice for authors and investors has been featured in Forbes, Entrepreneur.com, Yahoo! Business, CTV, the Toronto Sun, and many local and national TV shows. Born and raised in Canada, Julie currently resides in Los Angeles with her husband and son.

Webinars are one of the most powerful marketing and sales tools available. But many people avoid doing them due to the concerns over how much time and effort they take. Fortunately, there are ways to take full advantage of webinars while avoiding the hassles. The secret is to learn how to automate webinars the right way. Melissa Kwan is the Cofounder and CEO of eWebinar, an automated webinar solution that combines pre-recorded video with real-time interactions and live chat to deliver an engaging experience for attendees. She joined me on the Go For Launch podcast to discuss the journey of starting eWebinar, and their mission to make it the best software for automated webinars. Melissa has spent more than a dozen years in startups and has built three successful companies without venture capital backing. Her previous startup, a real estate tech company, was acquired in 2019. Melissa and her team at eWebinar believe that by automating the repetitive and tedious task of giving the same onboarding, training, and sales presentations over and over, they free people up to focus their time on something else they value more.

Making sales one-by-one is a noble undertaking. But to exponentially grow your business, affiliate sales can be a game-changer. To learn more about the ins-and-outs of affiliate sales, I asked Dominick Keenan to join me on the Go For Launch podcast. Dominick is VP of Sales at ClickBank, a global affiliate marketplace and e-commerce platform. He has had several roles within the ClickBank sales organization including affiliate manager and business development before taking the role of VP of Sales. He focuses on supporting ClickBank's current vendors and affiliates as well as growing ClickBank's business. Prior to joining ClickBank, Dominick worked in business aviation and commercial lending. He holds a Bachelor's Degree in Aviation Management from Rocky Mountain College, and an MBA from the University of Montana. If you've ever thought about adding affiliate sales to boost sales of your company's products or services, you will get a lot of valuable tips from Dominick.

Ignition is revolutionizing product launches and go-to-market planning, strategy and project management. Joining me to discuss Ignition's recent beta launch and features is Derek Osgood, Ignition's founder and CEO. Ignition is a collaborative, go-to-market platform that assists product and marketing teams in bringing new goods to market quickly and efficiently. Prior to his current role, Derek spent over a decade leading and scaling marketing teams at brands like Playstation, BBVA and Rippling. He has launched over 100 products working as a Product Marketer that have collectively generated over $1B in revenue.

This episode of the Go For Launch podcast focuses on how to diagnose business gaps and create your business battle plan. My guest is Stuart Leo, the founder and CEO of Waymaker.io—an intelligent business management and strategy platform that helps leaders build a better business in 30 days. Stuart is a global thinker in strategy, systems, and leadership development. As the founder of Waymaker.io, he has led the creation of Waymaker's Leadership Curve, a new way of building clarity, alignment and remarkable results in any organization.

Feeling overwhelmed at work? Amanda Hamilton can help you reclaim your time and delegate with intention. She joined me on the latest episode of the Go For Launch podcast. Amanda is the founder of Hamilton Raye—“Your Outsourced Admin®”— which brings professional remote administrative support to startup organizations and businesses. Prior to starting Hamilton Raye, she spent 10 years working in the corporate retail industry. She had a very successful career in production and sourcing where she had the opportunity to learn best practices for staying organized, managing constant changes in priorities, and finding process efficiencies to reduce workload. Loving the scope of her work and her team, but craving personal and professional growth, she longed to work remotely in order to live and work anywhere she pleased. Intrigued by the ‘digital nomads' she would often read about, Amanda decided to take her fate into her own hands. As Amanda started to connect with founders, CEOs, and small business owners, she saw an opportunity where these individuals were wearing multiple hats and looking for more time in their days and weeks. She says the most necessary piece of being a business owner is to maintain maximum efficiency and productivity, by keeping your schedule moving and remaining highly organized.

Using traditional SEO tools and manual writing processes, it can be hard to scale quality content. But with artificial intelligence (AI), you can create a scalable strategy that will ensure all of your content is at the highest possible quality. My latest guest on the Go For Launch podcast is at the forefront of helping companies use AI to scale their content creation efforts. Pankil Shah is the CEO of Outranking.io, an AI platform for writers, editors and SEO professionals to create content that ranks. He is an entrepreneur, founder and content marketing expert with more than 10 years of experience in leading product and growth for tech companies. Before starting Outranking.io, Pankil led growth for an enterprise database company, scaling revenue using content marketing. He also co-founded Vclassrooming.com, a learning management system aimed at improving K12 learning outcomes. AI can help you improve the relevancy of your content, increase conversion rates and make sure that you are always on top of what people are looking for.

If you don't have a clear message and image, you could be wasting as much as 80% of your marketing budget. Joining me to discuss this on the Go For Launch podcast is Orsolya Herbein, better known as Orshie. Orshie is a partner at Brand3, a virtual marketing and branding agency. On the podcast, she shared actionable tips to help business owners rethink marketing, stop wasting time and money, and accelerate their business growth.

It seems counterintuitive to many people: You must narrow your focus to Increase your chances of success as a professional services provider. The saying is true, "The riches are in the niches." My latest guest on the Go For Launch podcast is an expert on helping firms focus. Sean Campbell is founder and CEO of Cascade Insights. As a professional services firm owner for over 20 years, his work has spanned consulting engagements with the Fortune 50 to startups you've heard of; the sale of his first professional services company; and the growth of delivery, sales, marketing, and operational practices inside professional services firms. Sean has been training, mentoring, and educating all his life. An exceptionally well-regarded conference speaker and author, Sean has delivered talks for Fortune 50 companies and top-tier conferences. He has also been the author of several books on technical as well as business topics. Sean brings a wealth of knowledge when it comes to surviving and thriving as a service firm owner or the leader of a practice area inside a larger services firm.

Storytelling. We all learned and loved it as kids, but many of us forget about the power of storytelling in the context of promoting our businesses. In the latest episode of the Go For Launch podcast, I spoke to Ben Worthen about this topic. Ben is CEO of Message Lab, an award-winning agency that combines journalism, data and design to craft content and create experiences that get real results. Ben and his team help clients figure out how to tell stories that people actually want to hear. Ben developed his storytelling and investigative savvy working as a journalist for 13 years, winning many national awards for news and feature-writing. In 2007, he joined The Wall Street Journal, where he covered the tech industry and wrote more than 50 Page One stories. He also was editor-in-chief at Ready State and head of content at Sequoia Capital. Over the last two years, Message Lab has won seven Content Marketing Awards and has been a finalist for 16 more. Current and former clients include Facebook, Google, GoDaddy, ServiceNow, Elastic and Silicon Valley Bank.

Tracey Bissett is on a mission to redefine the world's economic future by increasing the financial literacy of entrepreneurs, also known as financial fitness. With over 20 years of experience in the financial services industry, Tracey helps entrepreneurs across all industries. As Chief Financial Fitness Trainer of Bissett Financial Fitness Inc., Tracey educates and empowers entrepreneurs to take control of and live their financial lives with confidence. A former executive at TD Bank, one of Canada's Big 5 Banks, Tracey has worked with thousands of entrepreneurs to secure the financing they needed. This hands-on experience coupled with her formal financial education gives Tracey unique coaching skills about all things money-related. Tracey is also a professor at Centennial College's School of Business and regularly leads speaking engagements to increase financial fitness awareness. Get a free monthly meeting template at https://cashcoach.biz.

Ron Carucci is co-founder and managing partner at Navalent, which works with CEOs and executives to enable transformational change for their organizations, leaders and industries. Ron's newest book and passion, To Be Honest: Lead with the Power of Truth, Justice and Purpose, is based on 15 years of research and more than 200 interviews with leaders around the world. To Be Honest explains how four factors—Clear Identity, Accountability, Governance and Cross-Functional Relationships—affect honesty, justice and purpose within a company. When these factors are absent or ineffective, the organizational conditions compel employees to choose dishonesty and self-interest. But when done well, the organization is 16 times more likely to have people tell the truth, behave fairly and serve a greater good. For three decades, Ron has helped some of the world's most influential executives tackle challenges of strategy, organization and leadership. In addition to being a regular contributor to HBR and Forbes, and is a 2-time TEDx speaker and has been featured in Fortune, CEO Magazine, BusinessInsider, MSNBC, Inc, and Business Week.

Tim Parkin of Parkin Consulting is a global consultant, advisor, and coach to marketing executives of many world-renowned brands. He specializes in helping marketing teams optimize people, process and performance to accelerate growth. By applying more than 20 years of experience merging behavioral psychology and technology seamlessly, Tim has unlocked rapid and dramatic growth for global brands and award-winning agencies alike. Tim is a speaker, author, and thought leader who has contributed to AdWeek, Forbes, MarTech, TechCrunch, and dozens of other marketing outlets. He is also a member of the American Marketing Association, the Society for the Advancement of Consulting, and was inducted into the Million Dollar Consulting Hall of Fame. For free resources from Tim, text Grow to 8443113200.

There are many “frameworks” purported to help companies achieve greater levels of growth. But many of them are challenging to understand and end up being underutilized. Tim Cakir is on a mission to develop a new growth framework based on Goals, Challenges and Opportunities. He joined me in this episode of the Go For Launch podcast. Tim is a growth consultant and founder of Squad One who helps companies, entrepreneurs and students achieve fast and consistent growth. Working with 17 startups to date, some of his best achievements include helping two startups reach 1.7 million euros in Horizon 2020 funding, increasing monthly recurring revenue (MRR) of one startup from $80k to $300k in less than 18 months and completing projects such as implementing Objectives and Key Results (OKRs), building company dashboards and launching new product launches. As part of Tim's passion for helping people realize their potential, he also teaches Bachelor and Masters programs at two universities in Barcelona—ESEI International Business School Barcelona and Geneva Business School.

Andy Cagnetta is the CEO of Transworld Business Advisors (https://www.tworld.com), where they have bought and sold over 10,000 businesses. Today, they have more than 400 business brokers, with over 3,000 businesses for sale. Andy has become the go-to expert on helping entrepreneurs maximize their potential before, during and after their big exit. Other than his work, he is very proud of his signature event, "Andy's Family Pasta Dinner," which raised over $2,000,000 for LifeNet 4 Families. He shares tips on how to prepare your business for a successful sale, as well as key considerations buyers need to know.

Jonathan Goldhill is a business coach and personal strategist who specializes in guiding next-generation leaders of family businesses to scale up their business as they take control over the leadership and ownership of the family business. Jonathan left New York for California at age 20 after his family's large, privately-held men's apparel manufacturing company—started by his great-grandfather—sold to a conglomerate in its third generation of family ownership. Within 10 years, Jonathan had established himself as the go-to expert for entrepreneurs looking to find their freedom. Today, Jonathan brings 30 years of experience advising, coaching, consulting, training, and guiding entrepreneurial and family businesses to grow their revenues, profits and people's leadership. Learn more at The Goldhill Group and get a copy of his book, Disruptive Successor. Links:  (book) (company)  (podcast)  

In my last show (https://goforlaunch.io/show155), I went on a rant on how to piss off podcast hosts. For this episode, I decided to take a more positive take on the subject, and give some tips on how to be a great podcast guest. Be sure to refer to the blog post I reference, How to Be The Perfect Podcast Guest, for more details and links. Happy podcast guesting!

As a podcast host, nothing is more frustrating than having a guest not show up at the last minute...then not responding...and doing this several times in a row. After my latest guest left me in the lurch, I decided to record a quick episode on how to piss off podcast hosts. If you want to know what NOT to do when you're invited to be on someone's podcast, please give this a listen! In a future episode, I'll expand on the right things to do to ensure you are a perfect podcast guest.

If the words "shooting and sending videos" give you anxiety, have no fear. Today's guest on the GFL podcast will put you at ease and give you lots of tips to get started making videos not only easy, but a routine part of your day. Darin Dawson is co-founder and president of BombBomb, a human-centered communications platform that enables users to use simple personal video messages to leverage their best asset— themselves. He's on a mission to re-humanize the planet and he wants to start with your business communication. He believes that human beings have intrinsic value and that every person deserves to be seen heard and understood. That's why he cofounded BombBomb. Darin also talks about their new book, Human Centered Communication.

Have you ever wondered what goes into the web development process? Have you had an idea for new software but no clue how to make it happen? My guest today is an expert on these topics. Ryan Vice is the Co-founder and CEO of Vice Software, which provides cost-effective web development services. Ryan has a wealth of experience—including 20 years of experience in shipping software; six years in building high-velocity development teams; publishing two books; and being awarded Microsoft MVP award three times. After doing all that, Ryan decided to transfer his skills to an entrepreneurial space. Vice Software utilizes modern toolkits and a globally distributed team to bring clients impressive design at a reasonable price point. The unique structure of his team allows Ryan to remain very hands-on, helping to create processes and best practices that speed up project delivery and increase ROI. Over the past three years, Ryan has led Vice Software to 50% year-over-year growth as the team grew from 15 to 45.

It's not a question of if but when your business will be hit with a cyber or ransomware attack. Fortunately, there are steps you can take to become aware and proactive in order to protect your business. Brian Fritton is the CEO and Founder of the cybersecurity firm Havoc Shield. He's also an alumnus of the 2020 TechStars program and a founding member of Forbes Technology Council. Brian has built products and led engineering, design, and IT teams at companies with credentials such as Fortune's 500 Fastest Growing Companies, the Inc. 5000 List and Entrepreneur's 100 Most Brilliant Companies. He's been the “guy in the hot seat” — responsible for defending a small business from cyberattacks — as a FinTech CTO at Patch of Land and the VP of Engineering for a critical political campaign and enterprise data science software maker. Brian brings the founder's perspective to cybersecurity in an increasingly complicated and risk-filled environment.

They say “leaders are readers”—and that definitely applies to my latest guest on the Go For Launch podcast, Brandon Hakim. Brandon is on a quest to give people the education they never got in school. When he was in college, he went into the dean's office and said “I feel like we're getting an outdated education.” The person replied that they were working on it. So Brandon walked out that day, and swore he'd teach himself the things he should have learned in school. He's since read over 1,000 books and realized that everyone who has excelled in any area of life knew things were never taught in school. That led him to found InsiderSchool.com—which has helped over 300,000 people read more books, learn better—and download the wisdom from thousands of pages of books into their brains through short, actionable videos.

Michael Keplinger is a partner at SmashBrand, an agile brand strategy agency for consumer package goods that specializes in a complete approach to market research, product design and testing. After earning a degree in computer engineering and working in the industry, Michael soon found himself developing marketing strategies for his own consumer product business. He quickly found a talent for connecting seemingly unrelated thoughts to discover room for innovation and opportunity. Michael says the key to success is about seeing everything from the eyes of the consumer and anticipating how they will react to a message or product. Michael currently leads his research team in developing strategies for clients and optimizing various aspects of branding and packaging through testing. Over the past decade, he has developed an agile methodology and a proven platform for consumer testing.

As a kid, you probably played Capture the Flag. Adults in the business world play it too—albeit a different version that we can call Capture the Category. It's no secret that companies that can best identify a problem, convince people they need to solve it—then create the optimal solution—often become the pre-eminent player, aka the Category King. But the path to category creation and dominance is neither quick nor easy, and it's certainly not for the faint of heart. I had a fascinating conversation with Kevin Maney on the latest Go For Launch podcast. Kevin is the co-author of Play Bigger: How Pirates, Dreamers and Innovators Create and Dominate Markets, which has sold more than 100,000 copies globally. He's a journalist who has been covering technology and society for 30 years. Kevin is a partner at Category Design Advisors, where he and his team have helped more than 50 companies discover, define and chart a course to dominate new markets. The book is a must-read for anyone interested in understanding the art and science of “playing bigger” by defining and dominating their category. In our conversation, Kevin lays out the highlights of what it will take to become a business icon in your own right.

At some point, everyone who is a customer has experienced the tremendous frustration of being passed around between a company's sales, marketing and customer service departments—and you get that terrible feeling that the left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing. When companies have to ask you for the same information repeatedly, or when everyone does not have full visibility into your history of purchases and support requests, it not only frustrates and drives customers away, but it leads to poor productivity and lost business. These days, companies really don't have an excuse for dropping the ball. There are many tools available for tracking customers throughout the buying journey, from marketing to sales and support. However, they can be complicated and expensive. My guest on the Go For Launch podcast is Nauren Batjargal. Nauren is the co-founder and Chief Operating Officers of Erxes, an open source growth marketing platform that is challenging conventional martech tools with their affordable, open source platform. Erxes has more than 1 million downloads in over 100 countries. Currently, Erxes is in the process of raising $3 million using an innovative offering. As an expert in her field, Nauren is an authoritative speaker on all things related to digital marketing, as well as start-up culture and lead generation.

If you're like most high-performing leaders, you're tired of being pulled in multiple directions with no time left for yourself. My latest guest on the Go For Launch podcast, Laura Noelle of Stretch Into Success, helps high performers live in powered, fulfilling lives— all while achieving their highest potential. As a certified Proctor Gallagher coach and former United States Air Force with 27 years of experience, Laura helps leaders focus on what really matters, so they can stop feeling out of control, become more effective and and spend more time discovering what they love.

Les McKeown of Predictable Success provides tough business startup advice to entrepreneurs. As a serial entrepreneur himself, Les has earned the right. In addition to being involved in the launch of more than 40 companies before he was 35, he was at the same time a founding elder in a fast-growing church, while serving on the board of a number of charities and non-for-profit organizations. He joined me on the latest Go For Launch podcast. Les first began to recognize recurring growth patterns early in his career as a serial entrepreneur. He uses the experience he gained during that time to co-found one of the first business incubators in the world, which he and his then business partner developed into a multi-national consulting company that advised on the creation and growth of hundreds of organizations worldwide. Less is a trusted advisor to fast-growth small to medium enterprises and thriving not-for-profit organizations as well as Fortune 500 companies and a number of the world's largest government agencies.

Dan McGaw is an award-winning entrepreneur, speaker and the CEO of McGaw.io, an analytics and marketing technology consultancy and SaaS platform, UTM.io. Dan is a thought leader in the MarTech world and leading instructor on the topic. Having spoken at the leading marketing conferences and online events, including Traction Conf and Forget The Funnel, he helps businesses extract and interpret the right data to grow their revenue exponentially. Dan previously served as the Head of Marketing at Kissmetrics, and in the past he worked as a CMO consultant for a number of high-growth companies, implementing tools, offering support and analyzing data. In 2015, Dan was selected to be a US government Ambassador of Entrepreneurship by the United States Department of State, where he had the privilege to advise the government, universities and private corporations on how to build entrepreneur ecosystems. He even flew out to Mexico to be an entrepreneur ambassador for Tijuana and Mexicali. Text the word Martech to 415-915-9011 to get a free copy of Dan's book, Build Cool Shit: A Blueprint to Creating A Marketing Technology Stack.

David Wood, founder of Focus.ceo, has some unique bullet points on his bio: He built the world's largest coaching business with 150,000 followers He was ranked #1 on google for “life coaching” out of 23 million results He's the author of “Get Paid for Who You Are”with foreword by Jack Canfield of Chicken Soup fame He has taught laser focus to leaders at Facebook, Square, Warner Bros, Salesforce—as well as Colorado prison inmates He has appeared on CNN Headline News, Forbes and has done over 180+ podcast interviews! He's my latest guest on the Go For Launch podcast, where he shared his advice on how to stay focused, avoid "Shiny Object Syndrome," and accomplish bigger goals in your life. In addition to the above accomplishments, David was nominated to the exclusive Transformational Leadership Council alongside such thought leaders as Don Miguel Ruiz, John Gray, and Marianne Williamson.

Brian Kight doesn't know your goals, but he knows how you can get there faster—through discipline. Discipline is the shortcut, and he's sharing this shortcut every day with his 32,000+ Daily Discipline subscribers. Daily Discipline is a free daily email with a central mission to help people build the discipline they need to accomplish what they want, as fast and reliably as possible. Brian has worked with some of the most notable businesses and sports teams in implementing his simple systems for training leaders, building culture, and creating winning behavior. Whether he is delivering world-class keynotes or advising an organization's leaders, Brian is making a difference for those ready to do the work. Brian's competitive mindset grew from the influence of playing football to becoming an entrepreneur. He sits on the board of the Charlotte, NC, chapter of Entrepreneurs' Organization (EO) where he advises other entrepreneurs and small business owners on how to compete and win.

Jack Tompkins is the owner of Pineapple Consulting Firm based out of Charlotte, NC. He helps clients analyze and visualize their financial and marketing data in interactive charts, graphs, and dashboards so they don't have to deal with the tedious processes of gathering and manipulating data. He shared his insights in this episode of the Go For Launch podcast. Jack's goal is to help companies grow profitably and efficiently by helping them not just know their numbers through and through, but also visualize them to quickly get the full picture.

Most of us have worked for bosses who were assholes. But those of us who are lucky also have gotten to serve with leaders who were badasses. Michelle Reines knows what it takes to become the type of leader who inspires and empowers those around them. She shares her insights on this episode of the Go For Launch podcast. Michelle is a speaker, author, coach, entrepreneur, founder of MDR Coaching & Consulting and creator of the unconventional Badass Leader brand. Early in her leadership journey, Michelle admits she was a terrible boss (aka an ass), oblivious to the impact she was having on people. Like many people, she didn't understand how to lead. She very quickly learned to appreciate the profound impact an unconscious leader has on people, teams, and organizational health and performance. The significance and value of a team became abundantly clear, as did the critical importance and necessity for her to immediately begin evolving as a leader. This painfully humbling experience set the course correction for what would become a lifelong hunger for leadership growth and contribution—a self- prescribed reparation in many ways, shared through her 12 Leadership Lessons.

Steve Young is an app marketing expert and founder of App Masters, which has helped companies 10x their downloads and revenue. Steve has worked with companies such as GoPro, Nextdoor, SpotHero and more. He also hosts the No. 1 app business podcast App Masters as well as a popular YouTube channel about app marketing.

Theresa Truong is the CEO of Loop Link. Loop Link helps creative consultants and strategists shift to sustainable growth. The company has helped over 120 business owners leverage the power of systems in their business, helping them reclaim their original vision and find fulfillment.

Dr. James Richardson knows how to grow consumer packaged goods companies. He is the founder of Premium Growth Solutions, a strategic planning consultancy for early-stage consumer packaged goods brands. As a professionally trained cultural anthropologist turned business strategist, James has helped nearly 100 consumer packaged goods with their strategic planning, including brands owned by Coca-Cola Venturing and Emerging Brands, The Hershey Company, General Mills and Frito-Lay, as well as other emerging brands such as Once Upon a Farm, Dr. Squatch Soap, Proven skincare, Rebel creamery and June Shine kombucha. James is the author of Ramping Your Brand: How to Ride the Killer CPG Growth Curve, a #1 Best-seller in Business Consulting on Amazon. He also hosts the Startup Confidential podcast.