Podcasts about The Home Depot

Blinds.com founder, Jay Steinfeld, bootstrapped his company — with only $3,000 in 1996 — to a sizable competitor of the big box shops like Home Depot, who acquired the company in 2014. Jay was an early adopter of this thing called “the internet” and transformed his small retail business into the world’s #1 online blinds retailer as well as the leading e-tailer of hard-to-buy custom categories of home goods. Jay intentionally designed a successful exit to Home Depot that included him staying on to run Blinds.com for an additional six years after acquisition. Jay is a passionate advocate and frequent speaker on how company culture and authentic core values drive profitable growth. Throughout his journey, Jay identified four principles that guided his decision making in every aspect of business and life which lead to his continuous happiness and success. He calls them the 4Es: evolve continuously; experiment without fear of failure; express yourself; and enjoy the ride. Jay just packaged up his experience and the 4Es into his new book, Lead from the Core: The 4 Principles for Profit and Prosperity which was just released. He thinks business owners need to stop asking themselves how little they can do for their employees before they quit and start wondering how much more they can do, and why this is a smarter strategy. This is an amazing episode that shows how caring for the people in your company will scale your business to heights you never thought possible. What You Will Learn How Jay shifted his mindset in his business after a personal tragedy Why it’s super important to understand what your employees want (including their personal goals) The four Es that that turned Jay’s business into a multi-million dollar company and competitor to Home Depot How to stay true to your purpose and the true north of your business, while still balancing the mechanics of your finances and shareholders Jay’s strategy behind going with private equity shortly before selling to Home Depot How he maintained an 8% turnover rate in his company Why Jay stayed on with his company for six years after he sold The importance of trying new things, in general, and how that transfers to your business life How intention led Jay to create his legacy Why Jay is so passionate about humanity in business The surprising motivation behind Jay today as he moves forward on five boards, some on the NYSE Bio: JAY STEINFELD founded and was the CEO of Global Custom Commerce, which operates the world’s number one online window covering retailer Blinds.com. Bootstrapped in 1996 for just $3000 from his Bellaire, Texas garage, Global Custom Commerce was acquired by The Home Depot in 2014. Jay remained as its CEO and later joined The Home Depot Online Leadership Team. After stepping away from these roles in early 2020, he has increased his involvement on numerous private company boards and serves as a director of the public company Masonite (NYSE: DOOR). He also teaches entrepreneurship at Rice University’s Jones Graduate School of Business and supports numerous charities. Jay is an Ernst and Young Entrepreneur of the Year and has earned a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Houston Technology Center. Active as an industry speaker on topics including corporate culture, core values, how to scale a start-up, and disruption, he has more than 100 published articles. Jay is passionate about adhering to his core values, which he calls the 4Es: evolve continuously; experiment without fear of failure; express yourself; and enjoy the ride. They have helped him make every business decision that led to his success and have turned into his new book, Lead from the Core: The 4 Principles for Profit and Prosperity

When you hear the words “company culture,” what comes to mind? Workplace culture is a hot issue these days, especially as it relates to jobs and the so-called “Great Resignation.” What do employees really want: freedom, tangible perks, a more inviting company culture? CEO and Entrepreneur Jay Steinfeld shares his story of success and expertise when it comes to corporate culture.  “If you want to do things of consequence, if you want to build consequential things, I think you must first help people become consequential.” - Jay Steinfeld, on improving company culture. On today's episode of the Taxgirl podcast, Kelly is joined by Jay Steinfeld to chat about corporate culture and the impact it can have on a company's workforce. Jay was the founder and CEO of Global Custom Commerce, which operates the world's number one online window covering retailer, blinds.com. Jay bootstrapped the company in 1996 from his garage with just $3,000; Global Custom Commerce was acquired by The Home Depot in 2014. Jay remained the company's CEO, and later joined The Home Depot's Online Leadership Team.  After stepping away from these roles in early 2020, Jay has increased his involvement in numerous private company boards and serves as a Director of the public company, Masonite. He also teaches Entrepreneurship at Rice University's Jones Graduate School of Business, and supports numerous charities. Jay is an Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year, and has earned a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Houston Technology Center.     Listen to Kelly and Jay talk about company culture and the Great Resignation:How did Jay start his business, how did it grow, and how did he make a name for himself in the booming world of tech and entrepreneurship? Jay says he frequently tells entrepreneurs to “experiment without fear of failure.” Experimentation is necessary and key to evolving and growing any venture. When he began his company in the 90's, it was before even Amazon was born. He built his business one step at a time, and gave himself permission to fail. The idea of failure can be terrifying for small businesses because of the heavy stakes on the line. How does Jay advise small or startup businesses to experiment and take risks with confidence? What does Jay wish he'd known before he started his business in the 90's?  How did Jay approach hiring decisions while growing his business? How can business owners know when to expand hiring, even when finances are tight?  Did dynamics change when Jay sold his business to Home Depot? Jay shares how the transition went: the CFO said they'd expected him to get tired of them and quit after 90 days, but Jay stayed on for 7 years after the acquisition.   Jay explains the idea of business “love languages” and how to find harmony with team members of different strengths, disciplines, and personalities.  When Jay's company reached significant milestones over the years, how did they impact the company (and the way Jay ran the company)? Jay details his definition of success and the way it informs his strategic choices in both workplace culture and business operations.  Kelly asks Jay to describe the moments when he “felt” successful along the journey of growing his business. He shares he felt many of those moments over the years, though sometimes the impact of his success came to him retroactively.  As the head of a growing business, Jay says he often felt he was seen as intimidating or scary, which greatly bothered him because he genuinely wanted everyone's voice and feedback.  How does Jay feel employee's thoughts on their superiors plays into today's Great Resignation? What advice does he have for companies to make their management teams more approachable and receptive? Jay says what people want most is autonomy. Why not give more generosity to employees? More traction, more upward mobility? More transparent conversations?

Fred Reichheld is the creator of the Net Promoter system of management, the founder of Bain & Company's Loyalty practice and the author of five books including The New York Times bestseller, The Ultimate Question 2.0. He is currently a Fellow and Senior Advisory Partner at Bain, where he has worked since 1977. Fred is a frequent speaker at major business forums and his work on customer loyalty has been widely covered in The Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Financial Times, Fortune, Businessweek and The Economist.   His upcoming article to be published in November marks his 15th contribution to the Harvard Business Review. In 2012, he became one of the original LinkedIn influencers, an invitation only group of corporate leaders and public figures who are thought leaders in their respective fields. In 2003, Consulting Magazine named Fred as one of the world's 25 Most Influential Consultants.   According to The New York Times, he put loyalty economics on the map. The Economist refers to him as the “high priest” of loyalty. Reichheld graduated with honors both from Harvard College (B.A., 1974) and Harvard Business School (M.B.A., 1978). He's based in Cape Cod and Miami.   Questions   Could you share a little bit about your own journey? How is it that you got to where you are today? Could you explain to us what the Net Promoter system is and how companies should really be using it to yield the best results? Could you share with us maybe two or three things that you believe are contributing drivers of loyalty? What are some things that companies should look at in trying to enrich the lives of your customers? Do they need to understand what type of customer they're serving and does the generation matter? Could you share with us what is Customer Capitalism exactly? And how does that impact the consumer? Could you share with us what's the one online resource, tool, website or app that you absolutely cannot live without in your business? Could you also share with us maybe one or two books that have had the biggest impact on you? Could you share with us what's the one thing that's going on in your life right now that you're really excited about? It could be something that you're working on to develop yourself or your people. Where can our listeners find you online? Do you have a quote or a saying that during times of adversity or challenge, you'll tend to revert to this quote, it kind of helps to keep you on track, or at least get you back on track if for any reason you get derailed. Do you have one of those?   Highlights   Fred's Journey   Fred shared that early in his career at Bain & Company, he noticed companies similar to us all, some brand new, some quite mature, but they were all outperforming all of the things he learned at the Harvard. Some were crushing it and a good example was enterprise Rent-A-Car, who started out as a tiny little rental leasing agency in St. Louis, and has grown now to become the largest car rental company on Earth without ever having to tap public equity markets, it's still a private company. And you think, Gosh, what I learned at Harvard was a capital intensive business, low growth industry, low margins, there's no way that you could grow on internally generated cash.   So, when he went to meet with Andy Taylor, their CEO, he said, “Fred, there's no secret, there's only one way to grow a successful business sustainably.” And so, he was listening for this great secret. And he said, “You treat your customers so they come back for more and bring their friends.”   And that basic idea changed his world because that's what he now understands is the key to success. If your customers are coming back for more and bringing their friends, your economic flywheel will crush the competition.   What is the Net Promoter System and How Companies Can Use it to Yield the Best Results   Me: Amazing. So I had an opportunity to get an advanced copy of your book Winning on Purpose: The Unbeatable Strategy of Loving Customer. I really, really love it. I haven't finished reading it as yet, but I've gotten quite far in it. And so, I just wanted you to share with us.   Fred, in the book, especially in the preface and the foreword, you kind of mentioned that you have this net promoter system, but people are not actually using it the way how you created it to be used. Could you explain to us what the Net Promoter system is and how companies should really be using it to yield the best results?   Fred shared that he's long been troubled by the fact that financial accounting is how we run our businesses. And while financial accounting is very good at telling us when we've extracted a million dollars from our customers wallets, it does nothing in helping us understand when we've enriched a million customers lives or when our teams have done work that's meaningful and toward an important purpose.   And Net Promoter was his attempt at helping companies measure that important idea of all the lives you touch, how many are enriched? How many diminished? And that evolved into Net Promoter Score is based on one question, how likely you'd recommend us to a friend, 0 through 10.   And it turns out that when someone gives you a 9, and especially a 10, you've enriched their life, you've lived up to the golden rule of loving your neighbor.   And 0 through 6, you failed, you diminish their life. And so, this notion of Net Promoter Score is just keeping track of all the lives touched, how many enriched, how many diminished, and how many promoters, how many detractors, it's very practical for running a business because your promoters are your assets, who come back for more and bring their friends. But also, it's a little bit inspirational because putting your teams to work, and enriching lives and measuring that outcome and helping them learn how to do better, that's really helping them live the right kind of life.   The Contributing Drivers of Loyalty   Me: So, at the end of the day, we're all trying to build better relationships with our customers. Now, in your book, you also said that loyalty means investing time and resources in relationships.   Do you know maybe could you share with us maybe based on your experience and your research, you've definitely been in the thing way longer than I have; maybe two or three drivers that you think contribute to loyalty.   And this is loyalty in general, which I'm sure impacts business relationships, because I mean, loyalty is something that as human beings, we do link it to a person. For example, if you have an animal, your dog is loyal to you as the owner, in a relationship; you're loyal to the other person that you're in the relationship with, whether it's a personal or professional relationship. So could you share with us maybe two or three things that you believe are contributing drivers of loyalty?   Fred shared that he thinks it's quite poorly understood in this day and age when people are demanding loyalty and trying to get loyalty through gimmicks and marketing, so called loyalty programs. So, he thinks it does make sense to get back to basics.   He thinks loyalty is an investment from you and another person in a relationship. And you think, “Why would I invest in someone else?” Well, it's because they stand for what you believe in you.   You believe that they'll reciprocate and treat you reasonably and not abuse your trust and that you're in a position to actually do something to make their life better. Otherwise, you're just wasting your time.   A lot of people think about loyalty as, “Oh, I want them to be loyal to me.” He thinks the way to start is, “How can I invest in this relationship and love them, make their lives better?”   And that's what great companies' do, that's what great leaders do, they inspire their troops to find ways to enrich the lives of customers sustainably, of course, profitably. But the whole goal in a business is making your customers lives better. Because when you do that, you're investing in the right relationships, they come back for more, they bring their friends, they say great things about you, they become your public relations force, that's how great business works.   And he thinks we get drawn off center a little bit because the larger our company is, the more it's run through financial mindset. It's our accounting numbers that we seem to view as the framework of success, when in fact, no, it's this golden rule ideas, it's love thy neighbor as thyself. And when you do it, you'll see the results because when customers feel the love, they are loyal and that's at the core of loyalty, it's earning loyalty by enriching customers lives. And loyalty from employees, by putting them in a position to earn lives of meaning and purpose, by enriching the lives of customers that they touch.   Me: I like the fact that you mentioned that it's not just about loyalty in terms of you getting the person to be loyal to you, but it has to be earned and it's not something that can be bought. So I'm glad that you mentioned at the beginning that a lot of these loyalty programs and marketing initiatives that organizations have that they dub as loyalty programs are not actually programs that will make or even influence your customers to be loyal to you. So it's good that you identified for us that loyalty is something that is earned.   What Companies Should Look for to Enrich the Lives of Customers   Me: Now, in terms of showing your customers or enriching their lives regardless of the industry that you're in, whether you're a financial company, you sell insurance or you have credit cards, or you're a retail company, what are some things that companies should look at in trying to enrich the lives of your customers? Do they need to understand what type of customer they're serving and does the generation matter?   Fred shared that of course it does. And yet, he finds that the most successful businesses, whether dealing with teenagers today or octogenarians, it's understanding how to communicate effectively, how to always act in your customers best interest, to listen very carefully to how you're doing and what they need. Because at the core, a business is trying to solve the customer's problem, it's trying to turn a frown, into a smile, and the human process of understanding that, he doesn't think that's changed in thousands and thousands of years. Of course, the technologies we use, the innovative approaches, those open up wonderful new opportunities, but the basics, they haven't changed.   One of his colleagues at Bain, they joined about the same year, Scott Cook, who's the founder of Intuit, who has built TurboTax, and other very successful business, huge, huge success.   And he said, “Fred, you want a big business, solve a big problem for your customers.” And that's the right way to think about it, “I am going to be a reliable resource that is going to make a real difference in your life by turning that frown into a smile, and I'm going to measure my success that way.”   Obviously, profits are necessary but those who think of profits as the true objective, they're not going to grow a very big business very long because that's very selfish, “How much money can I extract from your wallet, get away from me, I'm not going to tell you anything about myself for what I need.” If he has someone who actually acts in a loving, caring way, they're a mutually beneficial relationship affair. But that's the kind of person he's willing to actually share his information with and give constructive feedback to because he wants them to succeed, he wants them to succeed in helping him solve problems.   What is Customer Capitalism and How it Impacts the Consumer?   Me: So, while I was reading part of your book as well, I bucked up on a term, Customer Capitalism. Could you share with us what is that exactly? And how does that impact the consumer?   Fred shared that he thinks people have a framework in their heads about capitalism that's just dead wrong, that maximize shareholder value as the underlying concept. Through the years, whether it's Milton Friedman, or Adam Smith, there's an ancient and an out of date framework that people call capitalism, that without giving it this name, it's financial capitalism, because it's based on this idea of profits and shareholder and investor is the king. He thinks that has changed over the last few decades, at least, to where now, there's so much capital in the world; you can raise millions and millions if you have a good idea.   What there's not infinite amounts of are good people with good ideas who are willing to work together in a team framework to serve others.   And the real capital in that system, our customers, all the cash flow comes out of customers' wallets.   So let's keep track of how many customers you have, how many are coming back for more, how many referrals you're getting, that was the basic, those are the keystone metrics in customer capitalism.   And more than anything, it's being clear about the purpose. If the purpose in the old school capitalism was maximizing profits and shareholder value, in customer capitalism, the purpose is to enrich the lives of your customers.   Bain did a survey of a couple 100 Senior Executives around the world, C suite executives and they found that only 10% believe that the primary purpose their business existed was to make customers lives better. They thought it was about profits or great place to work or balance duties to shareholders, stakeholders. He just thinks that is dead wrong. A good business, a sustainable business has to have a primary purpose of making their customers lives better.   Me: Amazing. One of the companies that you mentioned in your book when I was reading was Chick-fil-A and I absolutely love Chick-fil-A, both me and my daughter. But one of the things that I really love about Chick-fil-A was the fact that I remember I traveled a few years ago and my daughter wanted to get something from them on a Sunday and they're actually closed on Sundays and I thought that was awesome, from what I read that was a principle that their organization had and they've lived it up to this day and they've still been very successful even though they're closed on a day when they could be making more profit, as you mentioned.   Fred stated that the purpose of Chick-fil-A is certainly to enrich the lives that it touches. It's interesting, the founder, Truett Cathy was one of his early teachers in his business career, and they're totally different people. He's a Southern, he was a Southern Baptist, very, very conservative point of view. He (Fred) lives up in New England, Unitarian Universalist, you couldn't be more liberal in your religious thinking. And yet they had enormous overlap at the core, he picked a proverb from the Bible, that essentially, it says, “A good name is worth more than silver or gold.” Or in other words, your reputation is everything, which he thinks is so true.   And this notion of net lives enrich and Net Promoter Score, you think about when you enrich a life, you're living up to the golden rule, you're loving a neighbor, when you diminish your life, you're failing.   And so, the reason Chick-fil-A has been very interested and supportive of Net Promoter is because we're trying to achieve the same mission, this is back to Truett Cathy's words, he was inspired to turn frowns into smiles on his customers' faces and that is the purpose of the business.   So, then you mentioned Sunday, he asked him why he closed on Sundays and he said, “It's not a religious thing, Fred.” He's a very religious guy but he's not preachy, their business does not put biblical quotes at the bottom of their cups, and they're not proselytizing in the parking lot. They try to be models; they try to help their people live up to this standard of loving your neighbor. And closing on Sundays, he just knew that you could not run a restaurant and have the manager there 7 days a week, you'll kill yourself. And he said, “Given that, and I definitely want my store operator there running the place not delegating to an assistant.” He said, “We have to close a day and closing Sundays gives this signal that we care about our people, and we care about golden rule.”   As he said, “But you know, Fred, I go to other restaurants on Sunday, it's not like it's wrong to go out and eat at a restaurant on Sunday. It's just wrong for us to try and have our managers running a business 7 days a week.” And he thinks it's brilliant. And it is a signal. He thinks it reminds people that they're different. And you're right, their productivity, they have far higher sales per unit than any of the competitors. And those competitors are open 7 days a week. And it shows you when you get the purpose right; your business can crush the competition.   App, Website or Tool that Fred Absolutely Can't Live Without in His Business   When asked about online resource that he cannot live without in his business, Fred shared that it's a new one for him, he discovered a company through one of his Bain partners, it's called BILT. The reason they were intriguing to him was their goal is to help their customers, their customers tend to be consumer brands, like Weber, who makes grills and place at manufacturers and so on. They try to help them build promoters among their customers, to create more promoters.   And what they've done is just taken one of the most painful steps in every customer's journey episode, which is assembly and first use, using paper instructions, which these paper instructions are horrible, let's be serious, they're written by engineers whose English is certainly their second language and they're just totally unintuitive.   So, BILT takes the 3D CAD drawing from the manufacturer, and then turns it into great little 3D instructions on how to assemble and use your product effectively and it's free to the consumer. So you go to a Home Depot or Costco and you'll start to see BILT on the packaging, and you know that you're going to get that home and you'll be able to put this thing together quickly and you'll feel great about yourself or Home Depot will have their faucets or ceiling fans, things that are really tricky to install, or garage door openers, and you go to BILT and you put the product in it and it downloads up to date information about how to put it together in a very intuitive way where you can zoom in and pinch out and rotate upside down and voice activated to help you guide you through your journey, it's just brilliant.   Me: Nice, very good. They obviously saw a need in the market, as you said, a problem that people were having challenges with and complaining about and created a product that would be applicable to make people's lives easier.   Fred stated that try ordering a bicycle online, you get it back to your driveway and then you try to put it together using paper instructions and he thinks you'll see why BILT is so successful.   Me: Yes, I can just imagine and my coordination of doing things like that are extremely poor, so I'm sure I'd benefit from using BILT.   Books That Have Had the Greatest Impact on Fred   Me: Could you also share with us maybe one or two books that have had the biggest impact on you? I'm sure you have many because you've been around for quite some time and I'm sure you've had to read and engage with a lot of authors over the years that have definitely helped enrich your life and the lives of others. But is there maybe one or two that have definitely had a great impact on you over the years, maybe something you read a long time ago, or even something you read recently?   When asked about books that have had biggest impact, Fred shared that he read a lot of books. Actually, he listens to them now; his eyes are so strained from working at his computer and writing a book, he can't read in a relaxed way so he listens to Audible. Probably the most impactful book in the last 10 years was written by a guy who passed away, Clayton Christensen was a business school professor, who he got to know, he worked briefly at Bain and then worked at an entrepreneurial thing and ended up at Harvard.   He wrote a book called How Will You Measure Your Life? And he (Fred) thinks he's just absolutely right. And the reason that helped him is, he thinks you do need to measure a life carefully, that's what a Net Promoter Score is, of all the lives he touched, how many enriched, how many diminished?   That's how you measure a life. And he thinks Clayton put this in very human terms, and thinking about that, not just in a business sense, but all of your relationships in life, how do you think about investing in those relationships and being loving and loyal in a way that's not just correct in your mind, but you know the other party felt the love, you have to get feedback on how you enrich their life. So, How Will You Measure Your Life is a big one.   There's a recent book by Adam Grant called Think Again: The Power of Knowing What You Don't Know, that he thinks is quite good. Adam is a guy that they must think along the same lines, because it was an earlier book that he wrote about it's called Give and Take. And he just makes the case that the world is full of people; there are some people who are givers, there are people who are matchers, they want a relationship to be in balance and then there are takers. And he said, one of the keys to life is avoid those takers, they're sociopaths, you can try and change them, but good luck.   And he thinks this is important and living a golden rule existence. Not all people want to be part of a community where people are treated with love and care, they'll abuse that community and he thinks if they can't be fixed, they have to be excluded. And then Think Again, Grant just says, we have these mindsets that are fixed, and he thinks of financial capitalism as a fixed mindset for 90% of the world and he needs to change the way people think about the purpose of business and how to enrich a life.    What Fred is Really Excited About Now!   Fred shared that he got the paperback galley of Winning on Purpose just a week ago and he can't take it off on his desk, but very pleased with the way it's come out. And that's going to be every day of his life for the next probably 90 days is how to get people to see the relevance of this book to their personal lives, not just their business lives because the subtitle of Winning on Purpose is “The Unbeatable Strategy of Loving Customers.” And loving customers, it doesn't sound like it's a business book, he doesn't know what it sounds, just a little flaky but it's not because this notion of loving thy neighbor as thyself is the core, it's the highest standard in human affairs. And what he's arguing and Winning on Purpose is that, that is how you win.   When you enrich lives, you have to do it sustainably, and you have to do it profitably, but that's not the magic, accountants can do the profits for you. The magic is figuring out how using your energy and ingenuity to love your customers and have them come to trust you and come back for more and bring their friends but it goes so far beyond business.   So, the great challenge he's got is getting people to recognize, he wrote this book for his granddaughters, infants who he wants them to see how you live the right life. And it sets out a way of measuring progress that he thinks is consistent with what Truett Cathy had in mind of building a reputation that you'll be proud of, and investing in relationships where you can earn people's loyalty.   It's probably a good rule of thumb anywhere to just don't spend time with a person unless you can figure out a way to make their life better. And by the way, the good news, chapter two and five of the book, demonstrate that companies that do this, they're the ones that get rich.   It's not clear from reading the Wall Street Journal, but every company, every industry, where they look at the Net Promoter Score, versus the competition, measured carefully, correctly, not just some self reported vanity metric, but real apples to apples.   It's the company with the highest Net Promoter Score who is growing faster and delivering better total shareholder value. And that's really good news.   But people are the mindset is fixed, they just don't get it. They say, “Oh, that's just some industries.” No, every time they're finding it, how did Andy Taylor grow to be the biggest car rental company on earth? How did Apple become one of the biggest companies on earth? Because they built a set of customers who are Promoters who are out there buying more stuff, and referring their friends and giving good feedback because they trust you, and making your employees feel special and loved, that's the flywheel that's going on. So, he's trying to convince the world that business works in a very different way than they probably learned in business school, or if they read the Wall Street Journal and The Economist.   Me: And you know, one of the things that kind of came in my head just now when you're speaking in terms of what we were taught in school versus what is reality, the reality is, a business isn't a static thing, it's made up of people and without people in the business, there is no business and people are human beings with feelings and emotions. And you get more out of people when they feel loved, when they feel listened to, when they feel heard, as you said, when you enrich their lives. So, if you really do live that principle, I'm sure you'll win in all aspects of your life.   Fred shared that he's worked at Bain & Company since 1977. So what is that 43 going on 44 years now. And they've been through good and bad times. For the last 10 or 20 years, it's been good times. If you look on Glassdoor, the place that rates businesses as great places to work, Bain, this year, it's the best in the world according to Glassdoor, it's always been one of the top several since Glassdoor started. And Bain hires lots of different kinds of people. But these are really ambitious, talented people. And even with that slice of ambitious people, when you look at what makes a person happy at work at Bain, they want to feel loved; they want to feel like they're a valued member of a team that wins with its customers. So it's an act of service and if you ask, remember he said the typical business person in the world, 10% of them think the reason their business exists is to enrich customer lives, at Bain, if you just ask everybody through the company, you find 60% to 70% of the people think the reason Bain exists is to make their clients more successful.   It's a servant culture where love is at the core, helping people succeed and putting smiles on faces and that's what makes it a great place to work.   And the irony is, he knows what makes, at least he thinks he knows what makes Bain a great place to work, it's that they are dedicated to helping their teams make a difference in their clients success, and be recognized and rewarded and part of a team that helps achieve that.   And it's financially successful but that's not the purpose, the purpose is making their customers lives better. And he thinks most great places to work lists, completely ignore that. They think it's refrigerators full of beer in the break room, pool tables and ping pong and cool fringe benefits, that's the fringe, the core is being on a team where you're playing a valued role at really making a difference in a customer's life.   Where Can We Find Fred Online   Website - https://www.netpromotersystem.com/ LinkedIn – Fred Reichheld   Quote or Saying that During Times of Adversity Fred Uses   When asked about a quote or saying that he tends to revert to, Fred shared that he wished he did. When he's preaching to whether it's at the dinner table or elsewhere, he goes back to this idea of how important loyalty is. You got to understand what your life stands for, what is your purpose as an individual and then the way you live that purpose is to invest in relationships with other people who share that purpose. And it's how you can invest and help those people succeed that he thinks helps you achieve your mission. So, “Choose your loyalties wisely, they guide your life and they define your legacy.”   Me: Love it, choose your loyalties wisely, they guide your life and define your legacy. Amazing. Love it, absolutely love it. And I'm sure every person on the face of this earth that wants to do good, wants to leave a good legacy behind. So the only way to do that, I believe, as you had said was to try and live by doing those actions on a daily basis, do it consistently because that's the only way when you leave this world you'll be able to leave that legacy.   Fred stated that and measure, so many people would say, “Oh, I can't measure love.” And he would say, actually you can, you can get feedback from your customers in a systematic Net Promoter framework and understand how many lives you've enriched and that is your legacy. And then you should be measuring your way toward the kind of life you want to lead.   Please connect with us on Twitter @navigatingcx and also join our Private Facebook Community – Navigating the Customer Experience and listen to our FB Lives weekly with a new guest   Grab the Freebie on Our Website – TOP 10 Online Business Resources for Small Business Owners   Links   The Ultimate Question 2.0 (Revised and Expanded Edition): How Net Promoter Companies Thrive in a Customer-Driven World by Fred Reichheld Winning on Purpose: The Unbeatable Strategy of Loving Customers by Fred Reichheld How Will You Measure Your Life by Clayton Christensen Think Again: The Power of Knowing What You Don't Know by Adam Grant   The ABC's of a Fantastic Customer Experience   Do you want to pivot your online customer experience and build loyalty - get a copy of “The ABC's of a Fantastic Customer Experience.”   The ABC's of a Fantastic Customer Experience provides 26 easy to follow steps and techniques that helps your business to achieve success and build brand loyalty. This Guide to Limitless, Happy and Loyal Customers will help you to strengthen your service delivery, enhance your knowledge and appreciation of the customer experience and provide tips and practical strategies that you can start implementing immediately! This book will develop your customer service skills and sharpen your attention to detail when serving others. Master your customer experience and develop those knock your socks off techniques that will lead to lifetime customers. Your customers will only want to work with your business and it will be your brand differentiator. It will lead to recruiters to seek you out by providing practical examples on how to deliver a winning customer service experience!

Stu rambled up front, Consumers Energy is looking to help small businesses, a UNLV student died, a Home Depot employee met his end, and more. Please like the Facebook and Twitter pages. Please consider subscribing to the Patreon.

It's our Thanksgiving Special! Host Chris Hill and Motley Fool analysts Ron Gross and Jason Moser explain why they're thankful for The Trade Desk, Costco, Home Depot, and Lowe's. We discuss why investors might want to avoid Peloton, Zillow, and Avis Budget Group. And since no Thanksgiving is complete without dessert, we dig into a few slices of humble pie and talk Under Armour, Verizon, and Macy's. Ron and Jason share why the Energy Select Sector SPDR and Roblox are on their radar, as well as investing resources for anyone hoping to learn more about finance. Plus, we talk Procter & Gamble, Target, and toothpaste when we revisit our conversation with Charles Duhigg, bestselling author of The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business.

This Podcast Is Episode Number 447, And It's About Why Getting The Leads And Doing The Work Are Still Not Good Enough There was a time when a contractor put a simple ad in the paper or a line listing in the Yellow Pages, and they would have more leads than they could handle. It was the only way to go, and the contractors who insist on that and "Word of Mouth" do not survive.   Could those contractors have avoided failure?   I believe they could have. This article explores the top reasons construction businesses fail and the three key questions that every contractor like you needs to ask to prevent failure. It would be best to answer these questions to provide a clear path to your continued and future growth and success.    Contractors who did not move from simple ads that had always worked, and evolved a Marketing Plan made the same mistake other failed companies and brands made. They were unable to Innovate, Reinvent, and Evolve by having a deep understanding of what business they were in, who and what they were competing with, and by challenging themselves to understand their actual expertise.   It's important to plan to give your construction business the best chances for success. Planning means anticipating challenges and developing ways to successfully address them, so they don't upend your construction company.  Here are the top reasons why your construction company could still fail: Lack of market demand  You need to have a market to make money. That means there needs to be enough people who need your service and are willing to pay money to hire you. Without that, you won't be able to cover your costs or earn enough to survive. Before you spend your time, money, and energy starting a business, make sure there's a need for it.  Some ways you can identify needs: Look for competition. If no one else is offering the service, there's a chance there's no market for it. That might not initially stop you from moving forward, but if no one already offers your product or service—or anything close to it—you'll have to do more to prove there's a market. Conduct market research. Studies and interviews help determine whether people in your target market agree with you that there is a need for your offering and that they would pay for it.  Lack of expertise Contractors like you might be tempted to partner with or hire their friends or family—people they genuinely like and would work well with. That doesn't always translate to success, however. For your business to be successful, you need specific expertise, and you need people whose skills complement yours.  You also need people who are willing to discuss your decisions with you and make sure there's a business case to be made for each decision you make. Someone with a differing perspective provides a vital way to double-check whether your choices are best in the long-term for your business or whether other options are available.  Ensure you hire people with balanced competencies. If your roofing business involves installing solar panels, you might need a technical expert to ensure the technology runs smoothly. You'll likely also need a financial expert to help you with bookkeeping and possibly a manager to oversee employees. It's OK to hire people you like, but make sure your team also has the skills to attend your business successfully.  Lack of finances You need money to produce your services and ensure all employees are paid. It's not enough to know how much money you need month-to-month; you need to forecast your development cycle, how inventory moves through your supply chain and variations in seasonal income.  If your construction business doesn't earn as much in the first few months as you predicted, you'll need to bring in more money quickly to save your business.  Ask Yourself: What are you offering? New construction, remodeling, or service and repair? Who is your competition? DIY, other contractors, money homeowners for a construction project? What is your real competency? Residential, Commercial, or both? The Truth Is Four Levels Deep! Challenging yourself is the key to answering these questions. Write your answers on paper or computer, sleep on them and then revisit them again and again until you get to the truth. Getting The Leads And Doing The Work Is Only Part Of The Answer Not answering them and acting on the knowledge is one reason why so many construction companies shrivel and die. They focus on the wrong areas to innovate or improve. They focus on the wrong enemy and threat. As a result, they miss what they could be doing to succeed and prosper over time. Define The Type Of Contracting You Offer And Who Is Your Competition It may not be the same form, structure, and category that you operate. For example, Home Depot does not see itself competing in the building supply business but for a share of the home and commercial remodel and repair market. Be that homeowner doing a weekend project, Handyman Contractors, Remodel Contractor, Trade Contractor, and other contractors and House Builders. This approach and behavior across the organization, too, saw themselves as fighting for a share of the building supply market. Final thoughts It is straightforward to get caught up in the short term and what you have today. You measure your share in the particular segment you operate in and obsess about your immediate competition just as contractors who did not market effectively did years ago. But you need to step back and ask yourself the three key questions and make sure you answer them in a way that will define and liberate your construction company at the same time. Also, keep in mind that you can significantly improve your odds of success by planning, being strategic with who you hire, ensuring there's a market for your offerings, and considering alternative funding sources.  P.S. Here's a Promo Code that you can use in both our Fast Easy Accounting Store and Construction Accounting Academy for a 40% Discount: FASTEASY40 You can use it today, November 26, 2021, to next Friday, December 3, 2021, at 11:59 PM. (Please note: Offer does not apply to Outsourced Accounting, Bookkeeping Review, or any Consultation and Training products; you can use it, however, to purchase any course or monthly subscription classes in Construction Accounting Academy). About The Author: Sharie DeHart, QPA is the co-founder of Business Consulting And Accounting in Lynnwood, Washington. She is the leading expert in managing outsourced construction bookkeeping and accounting services companies and cash management accounting for small construction companies across the USA. She encourages Contractors and Construction Company Owners to stay current on their tax obligations and offers insights on how to manage the remaining cash flow to operate and grow their construction company sales and profits so they can put more money in the bank. Call 1-800-361-1770 or sharie@fasteasyaccounting.com

In this episode I speak with Jay Steinfeld, author of: "Lead from the Core" and founder and CEO of Global Custom Commerce the #1 online window coverings retailer which was bought by Home Depot whose wakeup call was the untimely deaths of his mother and wife when three of his children were young and his journey moving through and past that and become the man and leader he is today. http://jaysteinfeld.com

Jay Steinfeld, founder of blinds.com (which he grew from $0 to revenues of hundreds of millions of dollars before selling it to Home Depot) shares heartfelt insights from his entrepreneurial journey and personal development in my conversation with him. If you haven't read his book Lead from the Core, you'll want to read it. Whether or not you have, you'll want to listen to this episode in which Jay talks about “autonomous excellence”, the 4 E's (evolve, experiment, express yourself, and enjoy the ride), a definition of success based on “getting better”, and the importance of embracing ambiguity.  8:10 – “I was observant, curious, anxious to learn… I was willing to take chances with myself and to be experimental in how I would be able to evolve.” 10:37 – about generosity and grace… “when it comes to people, you give them as much as you can… give them the opportunity to be themselves… providing an environment and resources to flourish… then you have a business that becomes autonomous excellence.” 13:50 – in talking about the 4 E's Jay made this insightful comment: “paradox is an important part of leadership, to understand there is no reconciliation of things, all these things exist together… for instance maintaining your long-term vision yet making sure you do everything that has to be done today.” 18:08 – “if you can get better, or I can help somebody else get better, that's success.” 27:16 – Advice for start-ups or high-growth managers “the key thing is to be able to deal with ambiguity better. I didn't need to know the right answer from the beginning… people believe you can research and use a spreadsheet and determine with facts exactly the way the path is going to be, but that's so untrue… you don't really know…until you go out into the wild.” You can learn more about Jay and the 4 E's on www.JaySteinfeld.com, and you can find him and easily connect with him on LinkedIn. 

Over the past year, retailers have become incredibly creative in addressing their supply chain issues. Unfortunately, a better procurement process, new capacity providers and automation can only go so far as many of these retailers are seeing unprecedented growth pushing their supply chain operations to its limits.In order to get a step closer to their distribution operations, many large retailers have taken steps this year to take full control of their supply chain. Some have bought their logistics providers, like American Eagle Outfitters, while others have bought their manufacturers, like Hershey Co., giving them a chance to build a more agile supply chain that happens to generate revenue as well.Home Depot has recently taken these steps by chartering its own container ships but also taking over shipping responsibilities from its vendors. In this episode, co-founder and co-CEO of digital freight brokerage Loadsmart joins us to talk about how Home Depot is pulling off this and how his company has worked to create tools for them to handle its new endeavor.Follow Point of Sale on Apple PodcastsFollow Point of Sale on SpotifyMore FreightWaves Podcasts

In the News today... ATV riders and dirt bikers attack an old man in Boston as the popularity of the recreation vehicles has spiked. Biden has arrived in Nantucket for Thanksgiving and has a ton of fudge waiting. Development in the Brian Laundrie/Gabby Petito case. And lastly, Florida not like the rest: Creep taking upskirt at Home Depot of all places.  See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In this episode, Mary connects with John Goldberg, Global Director, Executive Talent Acquisition at The Coca-Cola Company.  Mary and John discuss how individuals can determine if a company is a good fit for their capabilities and aspirations as well as culturally. They also discuss the many considerations impacting the future of work, qualities of a great interviewer, why empathy is a necessity when leading a team and the value of smart risks.   John leads the executive talent acquisition function for The Coca-Cola Company globally which he created when he joined 18 years ago. He has extensive global experience in identifying and selecting leaders and executives in over 70 countries. Prior to joining Coca-Cola, John held senior recruitment leadership roles with Microsoft and the Home Depot and was previously the owner and managing partner of a technology focused retained search firm. He has been a member of several Boards and is a frequent speaker at industry forums. His work has been profiled in both the business media and thought leadership organizations. John holds a B.A. in English Literature from Lafayette College and currently resides in Atlanta, Georgia. The post Episode 30: Insider Insights From A Talent Expert with John Goldberg   appeared first on Modern Career.

EP281 - Mark Mahaney, author and top internet analyst  Mark Mahaney is Senior Managing Director at Evercore ISI, Research Division, he's one of the original and longest lasting internet analysts on Wall Street. He recently published “Nothing but Net: 10 Timeless Stock-Picking Lessons from One of Wall Street's Top Tech Analysts.” We cover a variety of fun topics including the beginning of his career with with Mary Meeker. His initial evaluation of EBay. His long positions on Amazon, Netflix, and Priceline, and butting heads with Jim Cramer over Google. We also discuss what's next for Amazon, and where the best investments of the future might be. Episode 281 of the Jason & Scot show was recorded on Thursday, November 18th, 2021 http://jasonandscot.com Join your hosts Jason "Retailgeek" Goldberg, Chief Commerce Strategy Officer at Publicis, and Scot Wingo, CEO of GetSpiffy and Co-Founder of ChannelAdvisor as they discuss the latest news and trends in the world of e-commerce and digital shopper marketing. Transcript Jason: [0:00] Welcome to the Jason and Scot show this is episode 281 being recorded on Thursday November 18 20 21. I'm your host Jason retailgeek Goldberg and as usual I'm here with your co-host Scott Wingo. Scot: [0:16] Hey Jason and welcome back Jason Scott show listeners. Jason as you and the listeners know I am a huge scene in b.c. junkie and you can't turn on CNBC Durning Earth during earning Seasons without seeing Mark mahaney he is one of the top internet analyst. He was actually on recently talking about the artist previously known as Facebook meta Mark has a new book out called quote-unquote Nothing But net and is joining us tonight give listeners an early peek of what is sure to be the best seller in the bookmark covers some of our favorite companies including Amazon Apple Facebook / meta Google Netflix Twitter and Uber Mark welcome to the show. Mark: [0:56] Thanks for having me on guys. Jason: [0:58] Mark we are thrilled the chat with you is you know Scott is a huge Amazon fan boy so I anytime he gets a chance to talk Amazon he's excited. And I'm super excited because after tonight show I'm going to be smart enough to get rich like you and Scott so that's pretty pretty exciting for me. But before we jump into all that we always like to give listeners a little bit of a feel for our guests background and in your case I know I think you're officially the the oldest analysts on Wall Street is that true. Mark: [1:29] Well that's the oldest and longest lasting internet analyst on Wall Street but I don't look the part so how about we do that yes I've been covering Internet stock since 1998 do a series of bank said I started, working with this tremendous analysts her name was Mary Meeker her name is Mary Meeker and started the first Friday I was on Wall Street I got a call from the CFO of this tiny little online auction company that sold Pez dispensers and was looking to see whether any banks would be interested in their IPO that company was eBay so I wasn't there at the beginning of the internet but I was there pretty close to the beginning of the commercial for the public market to internet and it's been a fascinating ride and I thought there were a lot of lessons I could draw both from the successes the market and failures in the market and my personal successes and failures as a stock picker. Scot: [2:20] Cool what's so name some of the firm's so in my recollection you've probably worked at six firms like how many firms have you worked out over or that career. Mark: [2:30] Yeah now I don't want you to think I you know I jump around too much but I started off at Morgan Stanley also worked at Citibank Royal Bank of Canada. A small boot wonderful Boutique called American Technology research and I'm currently at evercore isi but I've been doing nothing but net. Hence the title of the book that's been my email tagline or always online is one of those two it's been my email tagline for 25 years but nothing but net and that's just doing my best to try to stay ahead of these internet stocks the early ones the the eBay's the Amazons the Yahoo excite if you might remember them infoseek. And then and then AOL and then and then later on some of the more Dynamic ones came out ended up with names like uber including most recently one you talked about Warby Parker so it's been a fascinating span and arguably one of the most dynamic. Parts of Wall Street I guess if you were working as an analyst on Wall Street. Or portfolio manager portfolio manager if you could have picked two sectors to be a part of to track over the last 25 years one of them has to have been the internet just how explosive it's been a been plenty of – explosions in there but there's been some wonderful wealth creation the other sector would probably be software just just too wonderful Industries I got lucky I was I was part of the internet. Scot: [3:49] Yeah I'm glad you didn't pick Mall Focus treats that would have been a bad choice. So you know as Jason mentioned there's kind of this auspicious title that you have of the oldest I would say wisest and most longest lasting internet unless. Tell us about some of the as you reflect in the book is kind of got some really good stories and you've been kind of on the front row seat of a lot of cool stuff maybe tell us what was your worst pick and best pick in the span of the career there. Mark: [4:22] Well I had a sale on Google it close to its IPO I was brought on to CNBC show and told by none other than Jim Jim Cramer that I was an analyst with a three-egg omelette on my face because of my cell phone call he was right I was wrong so you know one doesn't pretend one doesn't tend to forget moments like that on public television being told that you know you're pretty much an ass. But it does happen you know there are axes and then there are you know others and so I made plenty of mistakes I had to buy on Blue Apron although the lessons from that turned out to be different than I thought I got the call wrong but the lessons were different than I thought I kind of dissect that a little bit in the book. So those are some of my some of my worst calls I think my to my three best calls have frankly been sticking with a buy on Amazon for pretty much the last 15 years Netflix for the last 12 years and Priceline and now now booking for. [5:18] For a solid 12 years both Netflix of all three of those were really decades-long S&P 500 Best in Class stocks for a variety of different reasons and in the book I try to call out what were those reasons what were the what's that what's the pattern recognition so that you know we as investors can find the next Netflix and the next Amazon doesn't mean and Amazon and Netflix can't perform well from here but what are the things you can see in common that can help you as a stock picker you know kind of see ahead what really kind of started a lot of the the insights the idea of the book was this wonderful book that was written in 1980 called that one up on wall by Peter Lynch kind of a Bible or primer for anybody really looking to invest invest in the market with some wonderful advice and I really had any wrote it based on some wonderful examples of successful stocks and companies of his generation and I thought somebody needed to write one about our generation and you know these phenomenal money-making we know wealth-creating stocks that have. [6:19] That have soared the charts top the charts over the last 20 10 5 and even two years that have been dramatic dramatic winners from the covid crisis to I try to keep it long term in duration and frankly that's one of the big lessons I have in my book is. Is you know long-term I've found stocks do follow fundamentals they just do companies get bigger more Revenue more profits their stocks go higher almost always that's the case if you're a patient long-term investor so you can make money just investing you don't need to day trade and I think that was the last thing that really inspired me to write this book there about 15 million new. [6:53] Trading accounts that have opened up over the last two years you know the mean Traders the Robin Hood accounts and I just wanted to step back and say look you can have very good returns in the markets by buying high quality companies especially Tech and growth companies you don't have to day trade you can sleep better at night I got plenty of examples of companies that created wonderful. Shareholder returns over time and their stories you can take your time and really understand and stick with and anyway that's it this is this book is a little bit of little bit of personal Memoir but really more of a history of the Great. Companies and the ones that failed and then what are the lessons you can draw to apply going forwards. Jason: [7:32] Got it so I know it's not in your coverage area but you would have a buy on GameStop is that what you're saying no. I Nostalgia requires me to ask though I am staring right now at a pets.com. Puppet still in the box that's like sort of a Memento I have on my on my desk like we're you covering like those guys at the at the. Dot-com boom. Mark: [8:00] No no I didn't but I refer to that in the book and I make this I draw the comparison you know pets.com and smoke you know pets.com went public with trailing 12 month month revenues of 5 million I don't know if you heard that right five million dollars. [8:16] Trailing 12 months they had been an operating company for under two years I mean how that thing got out you know in hindsight is is is pretty shocking but wait a second go you know go forward 15 years and what came out. To e.com chewy.com went public with 3 billion in trailing sales and you knows the same sort of basic value proposition to Consumers it's just that the market was a lot bigger it allowed for a lot more scale and a bunch of other things came out o like cell phones smartphones cloud computing which allowed companies to scale up at much lower costs and so the markets really were proved out at that you know the time of pets.com there were three unknowns is there really an internet Market are there really good management teams and other really good business models today the first question is emphatically yes they are huge Market opportunities and they've been proven in in the Internet space advertising retail entertainment a lot of different ways you can cut it and there's some business models have generated enormous amounts of free cash flow and then there are yes of course there's always a few select excellent management teams who find that right combination it can be it's proven to be a great path to making money in stocks and chewy has been a stock that I've really liked since its IPO even though it's the next pets.com and that's the cynicism that people be placed in front of it when they went public. This was a very different puppy. Jason: [9:39] Yeah it does it seems like timing it seems obvious but timing is such a big. Part of all that you referenced Peter Lynch and I know you know there's. There's all the old Netflix stuff I actually started my career at Blockbuster entertainment and so in my in my industry everyone makes fun of Blockbuster that we got Netflix stand and all those sorts of things and I always have to point out. You know we sold Blockbuster for 18 billion dollars in 1995 like five years before Netflix was invented. Then it was a good business with a good exit you know every every business has it it's it's moment and it's time and you know the the railroads aren't the investment that they once were either. Mark: [10:28] Netflix is a fascinating story so let me let me let me jump to it a little bit you know one of the things the punchline of I asked people if you're going to remember one thing for my book I hope you'll still buy it but if you're going to remember one thing from my book it's dhq it's not DQ That's Dairy Queen dhq is dislocated high-quality companies and. You know time you mentioned timing I was thinking in terms of stock timing I thought those were your going to take us I think it's very hard to the time stocks but you know you can clearly see when stocks are dislocated I either traded off twenty Thirty forty percent so that's usually you know time if you think it's high quality asset and it dislocates them they all dislocate from time to time even the best highest quality names. That's when you can kind of Step In add the positions by the stock knowing that you in a way mitigated some of the valuation risk as investors your tries an investor you're trying to do two things mitigate valuation risk and mitigate fundamentals risk you know the chance that Revenue falls off a cliff margins get crushed the way you mitigate that fundamentals. Risk is to focus on companies with large Tam's excellent management teams great product Innovation and superb customer value prop and Netflix screen so well for me on those four things I'll just take this off super quickly if you don't mind. [11:42] The industry Vision so let's see Reed Hastings invented or started Netflix back in 1997 Netflix the name itself sort of implies that somehow we're going to be doing some streaming thing and this is a 1997 when it would have taken you four hours to download the first five minutes of Terminator like there was no streaming Market there but yet. [12:02] That was the premise of the company in 10 years later you know you look at the first initial interviews with Reed Hastings I mean this is where he was going to take the company all along so I was just giving him kudos for industry vision and the fact that he was willing to cannibalize his existing DVD business first dreaming business very few entrepreneurs can do that so management you know checks My Box customer value proposition the best way to tell whether a customer a company has a great value proposition is do they have pricing power will do people love it so much that they'll pay more for starting in 2014 Netflix started increasing pricing just about every other year and there's some ads accelerated that's a compelling that's evidence of compelling value proposition third is this product Innovation and you know they just don't have a lot of things not just streaming but there's a lot of these little tweaks that the side like binge watching you know kudos to Netflix for just rolling out new series all at once I mean practically invented binge-watching and of course you know they sort of invented the streaming thing or the people who founded music really did that but but Reed comes in a close close second on that and then you know I'm finally in terms of Tam's large Tam's total addressable markets. [13:13] You can add it up a couple of different ways but you know home entertainment video consumption it's it's a couple of hundred billion dollars in total you know Market opportunity and then who knows these things come along like smartphones and all of a sudden the majority of usage is on smartphones that tells you that these markets could be a lot bigger than we traditionally thought just like Spotify blew out the market for what really could be music advertising revenue and music subscription Revenue Netflix is did the same thing with me with Video subscription Revenue they blew up the tan they made it a lot bigger so that's right you know I love that story about the stories about Netflix I gave him a tremendous amount of Kudos I think the sometimes people under appreciate just because it's kind of a singular company just you know video video streaming I think they I think they don't get enough credit for what they've done and what they could still do because I think there's still one more one more trick up Reed Hastings sleeve and I think it's gaming and he's reached they've received such so much skepticism about this pivot or missing expansion in the gaming but you know management team to figured out dvd-by-mail streaming original content International expansion mount give them the benefit of the doubt that they can figure out an Innovative new way. To deliver gaming and therefore further increase their value proposition you'd want to stick with a company like that I stick with the stock like that. Scot: [14:34] Ever kind of a random question let's say there was I'll pick something at random a company that was Reinventing Car Care and making it mobile and digital would you call that a dhq. Mark: [14:45] I think that yes yes absolutely. Scot: [14:51] All right leading the witness. I do have to give you Kudos because in the Netflix section you do have a Star Wars reference you talk about the Disney death star which is which is appropriate because they now own the Death Star it's got a part of there is one of their IPs. Mark: [15:09] But by the way that was you know there were a couple of Netflix there's a rocky stock Rocky stock here that's right that's a that's a rocky stock for you it's had there were two times they miss Subs because of uncertainty over the price increases and they got some pushback it was an obvious that they had pricing power but they proved it over time and then they've got this great competitor risk with Disney and I think what the market missed on that this is just kind of leaving aside the book of just talking about stock picks is you know people are going to sign up for multiple streaming services now not now not five six or seven but they'll sign up for two or three if there's original content and they have original content I mean there's some things you will you have to sign up for Disney Plus for if you if people are like use God and you know dramatic. [15:52] Star Wars fans of course you can sign up for Disney plus but you know there's because its original content if you want to watch squid game there's one and one only place you can go for that and you know there's going to be another squid game or you know another show that just kind of breaks through the site-geist and by the way that's where Netflix is so I'll leave Netflix aside but I'm so struck by is this company shapes the Zeitgeist whether they can cause a run on chess board sales worldwide with the Queens Gambit a year ago where they can cause more people start studying Korean on Duolingo a language app which I actually like is the stock because they can you know they've introduced this show squid games like when a company reaches the Zeitgeist when they when they become almost like a lucky lexicon like they become a verb like I'm gonna google that or you know it's the Uber of this that or that you know that's that's something special and those are usually stocks that have gotten very long runways. Scot: [16:44] Yeah and I'm here in North Carolina and we have all these MBA we have all these universities and I was actually speaking earlier this week at MBA class over at Duke. And you know I have this whole little joke track that I do where I talk about my first company was profitable and I learned I could never raise VC because get the TV season that's a your profit we don't invest in property companies so yeah I often joke that I've been doing it wrong and ever since then I haven't made a dime. And I kind of thought it was those funny because you kind of. The internet sector was kind of early before SAS where and you point this out where there's kind of you know what we learned is there is an investor that loves Revenue growth and in a way that the opposite side of that coin is it can actually hurt you if you start to make profits maybe share with listeners that that you know probably many of them come from traditional businesses where that sounds nonsensical maybe maybe explain kind of what happened there. Mark: [17:41] Well I want to be I want to be on to get nuanced here which is you know I that chapter that says the most important thing out there is revenue revenue revenue you know for tech stocks and growth stock. But of course earnings and free cash flow matter it's that sometimes the public market is a lot longer term focused than people give it credit for Netflix is a great example that also is Amazon. I mean those those businesses had if you look at near-term valuation PE metrics price to free cash flow there's no way you would have bought those stocks. But what I think long-term growth investors realized is there's this you know when these get these assets that can grow their Top Line twenty to thirty percent Plus. From scale for multiple years like that can that creates an enormous amount of value over time and it's so rare I came up with something of a 20% rule you know it's one to two percent of the S&P 500 that can consistently grow at from scale their Top Line 20% which is like five times faster or six times faster than Global GDP growth so it's rare for good reasons but those companies dramatically outperformed the market because they're rare and it's not like growth and scale solve everything but geez they solve a lot of things I've yet to see it's got you know you go way back on this I'm sure you had these comments like Amazon will never turn a profit my first year on the street. [19:04] There's a person who's not one of the most influential investors out there put his finger in my chest. And said you know Amazon will never be profitable and you know I guess he must have been writing he was so smart but he was wrong because he didn't realize just what how powerful Amazon could be as it's scaled over time I mean you generate billions and billions in revenue and you can you can run over a lot of your fixed costs as long as you're not selling dollars for 95 cents you know if you're you know if you're selling them for a dollar and two cents and then you get scale against your fixed cost yeah scale will solve just about anything and I look at what happened with Amazon and I've looked at more much more recently its bring it up to up to date to Uber Uber just printed its first free cash flow quarter ever even though it's Rideshare businesses like down 40% since Pre-K covid levels how the heck did they do that because it took a lot of costs out of the business and then they had this delivery business that really scaled so look earnings matter it's just that when we look at tech stocks and growth stocks you know especially early on is IPOs they rarely go public. As profitable businesses the question you have to answer yourself is can they be profitable long-term are there companies that are already you know similar business models that are already are that's one way or their segments of the business that are already profitable. [20:19] Is there a reason that scale can't drive profitability for the company and the fourth what I call profitability Action question that detail this in a book is yo Are there specific steps steps that the management team can take to bring the product the company to profitability so I've yet to see a company. [20:36] And I'm sure there are some but I've yet to see one that hit the public markets that couldn't scale itself to profitability now some blew up. Well you know that's because they couldn't hit the enough scale so that's that's kind of my answer to the question of yes of course earnings and free cash flow matter at the end of the day that's what they're going to be valued on but just watch these companies that they really execute well they can take what looks like really aggressive valuations and overtime those valuations can turn awfully awfully attractive and a lot of times the stock wealth creation goes from point A to point B it doesn't start at point B. Jason: [21:10] Yeah the you know it's you mentioned then the Netflix. Effect on the cultural zygous fun fun stat on Queen's gamut it drove the sale of millions of chessboard and caused hundreds of people to start playing chess. I do one of the things that comes out strongest in in the book to me and that you alluded to upfront is sort of the difference between trading and investing. You know I always have people come up to me and they're like hey you know a lot about these retail companies what's a good investment and I'm like. I have no idea can you can you talk a little bit about sort of what you mean by sort of fundamental investing versus trading. Mark: [21:56] Well I sum it all up in the pithy expression don't play quarters I find playing quarters is almost a Fool's game the number of times I get questions you know what should I buy for the quarter and for little sophisticated institutional investors that could be I've got a position in. [22:15] Amazon or Google or Twitter and you know do I should I be you know heading into the position prior to earnings or you know facing back and adding to it more afterwards okay that's a different setup but if you're just playing a company for that quarter pop the problem is quarterly earnings reactions there's two things that drive them. Fundamentals great get the fundamentals right that it's expectations so the quarter trades are really about expectations you may get the quarter right you may be right that Nvidia or Roblox are going to have super strong quarters because I see how many of my friends kids are all over Roblox you maybe well right on that but you have to know you know what the market is actually expecting and numbers can go Revenue can accelerate but if the bar is higher than that then you're going to see these stocks trade off it happens a lot so I just unless you're unless you're a pro less you're in day in and day out. You know working working these stocks and really have a sense of where the expectations are. I think it's just a Fool's game to play play stocks just four quarters instead you know you want to stick with stocks for the you know you want to find an asset that you think is going to be. [23:29] Materially bigger in two to three years down the road and you think it's high quality based on some of the screens I threw out then stick with that name and don't try to play around the quarters and it's in fact sometimes you can use weakness or strength around the quarter to adjust your position but don't use it too initiator close out a position at the then you fall trap to these expectations game that is very hard to participate in if you're just a regular you know retail investor and you can make just as much money just staying invested in some of these great assets. Jason: [23:59] That is great advice and it's I certainly resonate with the sticking with the Investments I am curious though on the other end of that on the really long Horizon you mentioned you've you've been had a buy on Amazon for like 15 years. Wait. Like are you going to have a buying them for the next 15 years is that how I mean like does there come a point when they achieve their potential and you have to start worrying about them getting on the other side of the Hill. Mark: [24:26] Yeah I think you can I think you can one look for the fundamental towel and so I'm going to I'm going to spin over to another stock I talked about in the book Priceline. Which is actually the single best performing S&P 500 stock for like a 10 year period 2005 to 2015 phenomenal stock travel name everybody knows it William Shatner excetera although they're real secret sauce with what they did in European markets but. But that's a company that you know sustained premium growth like they were growing their bookings in the revenue 40 percent year over year for years and years and years and years and that's what powered that that that stock and when it stopped materially ah performed Market was when the growth rate decelerate it below 20%. [25:10] And so I don't want to you know create a hard and fast rule but I do feel strongly about this twenty percent rule 20 percent you know we're close to it you know don't don't Nick me at 19.8% you know could close to twenty percent is unusual rare growth. [25:23] And the markets usually pay up for that and when you see a company over time either because of Miss execution it happens or Market maturity and their growth rates you know kind of slide below 20% then that's when you reconsider your position that's a simplistic rule as a lot of caveats to that when I see with Amazon here is despite the size of this business I think they're still growing 20% for the next five years so in that if that's the case. [25:48] You know the simple rule of thumb is companies that can grow like. They can I like to see stocks that can double in in three years in order to do that you kind of have to do you know 20 to 25 percent earnings growth that's what a Maps out too. And you know you can double a stock in 3 years your handily beating the market in almost all time periods. And so when I see what it'll change my opinion really on Amazon is if I believe that this company is going to go X growth it's going to go you know well below 20 percent Revenue growth I just don't see that in the next couple of years given how much growth they have in retail in NE ws and cloud computing and in some of these really newer areas that I'm really interested in whether they really can crack the code on groceries and they can that's a large opportunity and business supplies Industrial Supplies I think that's a very underappreciated part of Amazon's business so I don't see myself changing my opinion on Amazon although you don't want things that we talked about this earlier that I love to see your founder LED companies that's no longer the case with with Amazon so that's you know at some level I've got slightly less conviction than the in the by case but I'm going to stick with it as long as the numbers prove out right and long as I can see this path that's consistent 20% Revenue. Scot: [26:59] Yeah and this is kind of breaking out of the book thing but since you brought up Amazon it wouldn't be a Jason Scott show if we didn't kind of double click on that what did any thoughts on the Q2 and Q3 earnings feels like they're slowing down a bit and feeling some of the labor and see what we call Supply pain on the show are you are you getting nervous about it or you think it's just a little one of their little kind of investment phases. Mark: [27:23] I called the six billion dollar kitchen sink that's how much lower their guidance was for operating income in the December quarter then then what the street was looking for like she was looking for close to eight billion and they guided to billions six billion dollar kitchen sink and they threw it all in there wage inflation you know you right you drive that route 95 on the east coast and you'll see Amazon Amazon is hiring Billboards up and down the East Coast Seaboard I did it recently so yeah they're aggressively hiring at higher wages that's impacting their margins there still some covid related cost shipping they're just not able to a sufficiently source and bring in product and so they have to bring in product into the the ports that aren't optimized for their distribution Network so just a lot of. [28:14] Positive blowing up now the question you have to ask yourself as an investor is are those are those cost increases elective structural discretionary temporary it's kind of like which of those are they the more that you can make a determination that the cost bikes are temporary the more you stick with the name if you think there's something structurally changed about Amazon okay that's different I don't think there's anything structurally changed about Amazon and certainly not its competitive position and then the last thing what I really like to see. [28:44] Frankly is this company. I mean the level of investment this company is making its distribution Network you know you talked about Facebook earlier they're dumping 10 billion into the metaverse which I think there's a there there but I don't know Amazon is dumping billions and billions into its own Logistics Network like they're doubling down on their core competency you bet I'll stick with that and what they're going to what's going to come out of that is even faster and faster delivery and they're going to prove out this concept what I call shipping elasticity the faster you ship the more that people are going to use you in a more of their of the more of their wallet and per-share you're going to Amazon's going to get so we're going to actually going to Super up one day delivery and then they're going to Super up super same day delivery and I think they'll be able to just grab more and more and offer more and more products to people so I like those kind of investment initiatives so I think a lot of that margin pressure by the way it was really due to these kind of elective investments in the infrastructure they added more distribution capacity the last two years than Walmart has in its history. That's how aggressive Amazon is being an eye you know my guess is that third we're going to see dramatic market share gains from Amazon in the next 12 months so I like those companies that kind of really lean in bendin and the double down on our core competency that's what the Amazon is doing now. Scot: [30:00] Yeah. The Press is making a lot of noise around Shopify versus Amazon and Shopify is kind of amplifying that with they're arming the rebels and everything. Jason Connor makes our I won't say his thing but he's not a believer in that I think it's kind of interesting in there's definitely no love lost between the company's what what's your take on that is that a real battle or is that just kind of genda by to kind of raise awareness for Shopify. Mark: [30:26] You have a quick point of view on that Scott. Scot: [30:29] I think Shopify becomes a Marketplace adjacent thinks that's crazy Jason what do you what I'll let you state your own opinion. Jason: [30:38] Yeah I mean I think Shopify is a phenomenal company and a good executor so I'm not throwing rocks at Shopify. They're to me they're not a competitor to Amazon they don't acquire customers they have no traffic there there. Piece of infrastructure and a great valuable piece of infrastructure but a piece of infrastructure. Doesn't draw any customers in so I call these people that are like oh man they're like Amazon they have all this aggregated gmv and they could sell ads to it and they can you know recruit more sellers because they have this this audience and all these things will they don't have any of those things they don't have a single b2c marketer. In their company and I would argue that's that's been one of Amazon's Court competencies is they've they use the flywheel to build this this huge audience that they get to sell all the. Their goods and services to so I just I don't think. They compete in any in any meaningful way and I think if Shopify were to try to become a true b2c company like Amazon. It would just be a phenomenal pivot it would be you know. Can't you know obviously they have the resources to fund trying for it but I'm not sure that's the best move for them. Mark: [31:57] Yeah I don't so I Do cover Shopify I've been really impressed with them I don't know them as well as I know Amazon but I've been super impressed. With them and terms of the product development and they are just providing more and more services to small Merchants so I think there's an are now bigger than eBay in terms of GM vo but I can never there's not enough disclosure to figure out so where's that GM D coming because I think some of that probably does come through eBay so a little bit of double counting that goes on in there but it's really impressive what they've pulled together whether they can actually aggregate demand in a way that Amazon has I think that's I think that's unlikely I think that's a very hard thing to do it's possible they do have a shop app I just, yeah I guess that's the action question we often ask ourselves do you think you're going to use the shop app to shop. [32:45] I don't think so I don't think people are going to do that but you know if they can get enough people to do that boy they will have really they will have some really circled it that you know because they got the infrastructure okay they're talking about building out fulfillment and doing fulfillment for people and spending a billion dollars on it sorry my friends you're gonna have to spend a heck of a lot more than a billion if you if you really want to you know compete. Because the bar is getting higher it's not getting lower it's getting higher in terms of funeral the speed of delivery eBay learn this the hard way and so shockfights Memphis spend a lot more than that so anyway there's a lot of wonderful things about Shopify and I don't know whether if you listening to slammed on by if you think they can build up an aggregate an audience I don't think they can so does it make doesn't make it a slam dunk by it's it's you know it's a deep three point shot put it that way. And you're not Steph Curry. Jason: [33:41] I think we're going back to the basketball references in the book. Yeah it you know I tend to agree I'm not I don't think the shop app you know has attracted an audience that uses it for shopping yet it's a shipping trapping tracking app at the moment. But the it is funny like there are lots of companies that facilitate huge amounts of gmv so I think of like. Excuse me and Akamai is a. Is a CDN that's that used by almost every retailer to help help sell stuff right and so if you said well what's the CD the gmv of Akamai well it's bigger than Amazons. Um but that doesn't mean that Akamai can compete with Amazon so yeah I don't know. [34:28] I do want to go back to Amazon earnings just briefly because I you know I think a lot of the Slowdown is kind of a covid blip and I don't know if you ever think of it this way but. They're there their times in history when. It feels like the external factors aren't a big influence and and you know some companies perform really well and other companies struggle so you know there could be a year when you see Home Depot doing really well and lows struggling and you say. There's something special about Home Depot that I might be interested in investing in at the moment it feels like the external environment for retail is having a. [35:07] Sort of a consistent effect on everyone right and so you look at the industry average is you look at all of them is on Spears and they all have sort of the same shape of deceleration. That Amazon has so it's to me it's hard to attribute that to some. Some fundamental flaw in Amazon but there is one thing I noticed this quarter that it was interesting and I wanted to get your opinion about because I know as an investor you like seeing companies that have pricing power. And you know of course Amazon famously raise the price of prime a while back and seems like that was wildly successful this quarter. They've raised the price for grocery delivery there now charging ten dollar delivery fees even for Prime members. And then this week we saw that they made a pretty substantial increase to the cost of f ba which is you know the fundamental service used by almost all marketplace hours and they they just raise the price of that by like five percent and I'm curious do you look at that as a good sign that hey. They have pricing power and they're doing so well that they can command those prices or to me it's a potential warning sign because I feel like Amazon is so. Zealous an advocate of the flywheel in the flywheel is all about driving costs down to get scale up I just was surprised to see some of these like price increases in in you know. Especially grocery which isn't super mature yet. Mark: [36:33] Well I'm not sure really of the answer to your question Jason it's a it's a it's a really good thoughtful question on the on the groceries I think they raised it because the unit economics were just not working for them in terms of grocery delivery that's that's my guess they also you know yet to have that get to really crack the code on the grocery business and so I sort of see that as they tried it and it just can't right size the economics of they got to charge more for it so I read that kind of negatively what did the raising fees to sellers. But my guess is it's a mixture of things but it's largely driven that my guess is that this largely driven off of Just Rising. [37:17] You know Rising infrastructure costs have been rising shipping costs I mean Rising the two costs that they called out specifically on the earnings call my recall is correct is our steel costs because of all of that dish construction they're doing with their fulfillment centers and trucking services and so my guess is that they've they're doing is not necessarily the right size the economics is I think the economics are working but because they want to try to keep their unit economics relatively intact. And that's sort of the way I think they thought about the raising the price of prime it wasn't they did it because they could. It's they did because they sort of had to like the costs are rising it's just that what I found interesting in terms of pricing power is van acceleration in in Prime ads you know post that price increase like that and so does Netflix to me Netflix is essentially raise fees use the fees to you know generate more Revenue by more content is like a flywheel that they've worked with their make the service more bringing more users allows them to get a little bit raised money just a little bit more so it's not so much raising fees to extract excess profits it's raising fees to further accelerate growth and the value proposition is strong enough that they can do that and not lose customers that's that's that that there's this is subtle nuance and maybe it's too salty but but I think it's an important it's important difference it's not it's no it's raising pricing not to raise margins it's raising pricing to fuel growth. [38:46] And when you so either way it's good I happen to think you you want to the the better one is the latter one is a more impressive the latter one is more impressive because you're raising pricing just to Goose your margins you know you just put a Target on your back. Scot: [39:03] Reading the book made me nostalgic and maybe we'll do a little bit of a lightning round but one of the companies you wrote about that I kind of forgot about and those interesting was Zulily I remember when they came on the scene and we were all like. They were all blown away by how fast they could just get product up right they had this thing where they could. They could have most of those kids so they'd get like all these little kid models in there and throw some clothes on them take a picture and then like changed outfit take another so they could do something like you know thousand different products an hour or something. What's your recollection on Zulily. Mark: [39:40] She really is that was one of my calls that didn't work and. So I and I learned some lessons from that I think to me the lesson I drew a to do with value proposition they had wonderful cohort disclosure in their S1 when they went public I mean it was truly impressive. And you know the they also raise kind of an analytical question because the first it's not too dissimilar to stitch fix today the first three or four million customers were extremely happy the question is. Were there another three to four million customers that could be extremely happy and the problem that Zulily faced is that it customer value proposition had one major flaw which is that you couldn't return product if you didn't like it they didn't they didn't accept returns oh I'm sorry there were two problems and there was no Speedy Delivery you know you could get stuff in seven days and 20 days. That was good for the first day of the first three to four million customers who are fine with that you break into the mainstream and you mean I can't return something if I don't like it you mean I gotta wait how many days until I get something like that ended up. [40:45] And it was very hard being the survey you really had to go with gut instinct on that to realize in advance that they were going to hit a wall in their growth. Geez when you saw what happened to their growth rate when they went public it was Triple digits six quarters later they were doing 10 percent Revenue growth they hit the wall because the value proposition. Wasn't strong enough and then they end up going going private that to me was kind of a lesson which is you know the. [41:10] Growth was impressive but that value proposition if it's not if they hadn't they didn't have it nailed down and you knew from the beginning I knew from the beginning what the two Falls were I just I didn't know when it would hit them and hit them earlier than I thought so you know it gives us another reason to really focus on how compelling do you think this value proposition is how many you know will that can the can a customer base double given the existing value prop. And that's one of the big lessons if I spin it a little bit I mean that's to me is and Scott you look through this entire history like you know the first decade of the internet the king of online retail wasn't Amazon it was eBay and they had like six times seven times the market cap of Amazon that's completely changed and why is it change and I think in part it's because of the value prop I mean Amazon just beat him on price selection and convenience year in and year out and that really mattered but a more recent example in my book. [42:02] In literally and figuratively is doordash and GrubHub and that's example many people will will know but grub have that great business model wonderful investor Centric business model High margins and doordash had this you know generating tons of losses but they had the better value prop because they had more restaurants selection and the end of the day that they want and they were able to scale up and generate serve reasonable profits over time that was the case where my quick tag line is you know customer-centric companies. Beat investor Centric companies most of the time in market cap and market share Amazon versus eBay, GrubHub versus doordash those two examples really drilled that less than to me. Jason: [42:48] Yeah I've been fighting those companies because you know there. They're like increasingly overlapping with a lot of my Commerce clients and like you know a big. A big sort of disruption and commerce right now is all these ultra-fast delivery services and you know it seems pretty clear that doordash and Uber are both gonna want to play directly in that space so it seems like some of those those sectors are on a collision course to chase that Tam. Mark: [43:15] I think you're right Jason I also think Amazon I mean you're talking about logistics like that's Amazon's competency so whether you need to. Whether you're going to vertically integrate and do that or whether you going to do that virtually you know Foo you know a gig economy Network. I don't know which which is going to work better long-term but yeah and you know it's going to raise the bar and make it more and more expensive for anybody to operate in that in that segment I have a bias that Amazon in the end wins that but it's big enough of a market it's so early stage that you can have multiple winners for the next five years I don't know that you can have multiple winners for the next 10 years. Jason: [43:56] Yeah there was a funny question in the Amazon earnings call someone asked about ultra-fast delivery in the CFO kind of I thought brilliantly threw some shade on it he's like. He said something to the effect of we like where we are and ultrafast like we have one hour delivery on about 178,000 skews right now and we're you know we're going to continue to scale that and I don't know how many people follow this but all of the competitors in this space are are desperately trying to figure out how to do one hour delivery for like 7000 skus. So so like they're you know they definitely are gonna be able to leverage the infrastructure there and I'm sure they're making some big investments in that space too. Another area that's that's been kind of interesting lately and I know you've been following this little bit is obviously there are all these privacy changes and the depreciation of the third-party cookies and especially the IDF a you know mobile privacy changes. That Apple has instituted and that obviously had a pretty pronounced impact on the value of some companies like Snap recently A View you have a opinion there is that. Is that a blip or is that a systemic change. Mark: [45:08] I think it's a big pothole in the road. But it's not there but the but the it's a big pothole in the road but it's not a bridge that it's not a collapsed bridge that get that mountain out. Yeah so poor that hey yes. Yes it is yeah that's it that's pretty I mean that's a big pothole that idea Fay allowed Facebook to offer amazing attribution to millions and millions and millions of businesses and now that's gone and and and to their credit to Facebook's credit they warned about it for a year two snaps discredit they didn't warn about it ever and so that's why their stock went off you know 22 decline 25 percent whereas Facebook stock even the numbers came in weaker than expected you know kind of fell off to the 3% and by the way then is traded up above where it was at earnings time so what I mean very intrigued by is I think it will be a son of that idea of a. [46:12] You know child of idea say I like I think there's so much at stake here both from the advertising platforms like Facebook you know and Google's to some extent a little bit and Snapchat but also for you know the millions of marketers out there who you don't you were able to thank thanks to Facebook use of people's privacy data you know from right or wrong I mean that's what that's what they they did I mean this help Merchants really know which of their campaigns worked and allow them to you know run creative and that creative could be automatically you know a be tested abcdefgh like 8 times 8 different ways in which ever those creatives work best. You could actually beat successful one of them then you can just pivot all of the dollars behind that one campaign you know campaign h for campaign be your campaign e.e. and that's just a wonderful way to help these small businesses you know really succeed and that's been taken away now you know there's I think there's first a little bit of shock shoot I can't get the attribution I had I'm going to pull a my marketing dollars but marketers got a market. [47:13] And I think you're going to see those dollars come back and my guess is that Facebook and other companies are going to find some way to do. Better targeting they may not quite get to idea that a type of levels but they were going to be able to do some sort of audience targeting they also have a lot of first-party data but they'll be able to do it in a way that doesn't that you know respect people's privacy and yeah you'll see those dollars come back so that's why I referred to as a pothole I it's a big pothole it's but it's not that it's not a bridge that just collapsed you know you're going to be you can they can they got stuck in that pothole more than anybody else but you know the cranes there whatever they're getting a tow trucks they're they're getting out of it they got to do some nobody work they'll fix the car and it'll be back on the road in part because they've got the talent to do it but in part because there are millions of small businesses that are given to going to give them the incentive to do it because they'll get those marketing dollars back once they figure out some of the idea that a. Jason: [48:09] Yeah I always like to remind people that are like The Skys Falling on the advertising industry that you know. It wasn't very long ago that we had much worse targeting than than we have in digital even with idea of a I mean targeting used to be deciding which publication you were going to print your ad in. And they still got a lot of money in the advertising industry so like I kind of suspect that that marketers are going to figure out you know the best ways to invest their money even if it maybe isn't quite as. As real-time as people got used to for a short while. Mark: [48:42] I think you're right Jason. Scot: [48:45] So Mark you in the book you recap kind of this awesome 25-year career and you know one of the things I've learned is if you're in the game of making predictions you know that it's kind of humbling but then you kind of slowly but surely get better at it right you never get to kind of you know a hundred percent but over time you get better and like like for example you learned the lesson of. The companies that are customer focused to do better than investor focused think founder based in that kind of as you as you take those backward 25-year learnings and project them forward what are some of the things that you get excited about looking out the next five or ten years. Mark: [49:23] Well in terms of Trends even the next year or two I think whoever solves. Marketing attribution is going to be worth a lot more in two years than they are today just because there's so many businesses so many marketers that will pay for that. So I you know so that's that's kind of a debt that whoever whoever fills in the pothole that's going to be a very valuable company it's going to be a lot more valuable to years and it is today my guess is that there's gonna be Facebook so I'm interested in that then there's thing this thing called The Medic verse which I don't know this is just virtual reality just renamed do a Google Trends search on metaverse just watch that just spiked up in the last love so you know you kudos to the person who came up with that idea may be excited maybe Jason or Scott maybe was you I. Jason: [50:09] It's just a rebranded second life. Mark: [50:12] Okay and. But but you know the fact that it was two things that kind of struck me there's some pretty big companies throwing a lot of big money at metaverse you know Facebook Microsoft there's a bunch of others and then there's this Roblox generation people young people who are perfectly comfortable living in the meta verse in virtual reality and. [50:38] You know participating in concerts safely and you know and shopping and communicating and entertaining and learning. [50:49] And learning through the metaverse and so you know we knows 8 18 year olds you know get out into the real world you know they're going to be perfectly comfortable in the meadow verse maybe not the way you know not the way that we will naturally be but you know though they'll help us figure it out and so so I'm really intrigued by the metaverse I think it is going to take 5 to 10 years because that to really develop and I'm trying to trying to figure it out who the big winners are but but I'm very intrigued by that. [51:18] Yeah I'm also got one of those oculist you know I've gotten two different versions Generations the it's the iterations of the Oculus Rift and you know i-i've always it's kind of like when I first saw the Kindle you know the first Kindle I ever got was pretty darn kludgy but you know I just love the idea that you could just download any book on the your kludgy device will you know whenever you whenever you were in a Wi-Fi area and and I and you and you just saw how that device got better and better each iteration and so I just think about that with these with these virtual reality headsets I mean they're clumpy their clunky their kludgy it's kind of embarrassing to be have a picture of you taking them but you know just you can imagine already know how much they've improved over the last couple of years and just think ahead is it possible the next five to seven years it's going to be just it's going to be like putting on a pair of sunglasses I think that's what we should be thinking about if you can easily put on a pair of sunglasses and and enter the metaverse and have you know share a virtual you know in presence experience that sounds but that sounds odd or not but you can do that, I think a lot of people will do that and you know the education the work applications around that so I'm very intrigued by that. Jason: [52:28] So you're saying that that could be chewy.com to Google Glasses pets.com. Mark: [52:36] Yes yes I love that yes I hadn't thought about that way yeah and by the way I've got my Google Glass here you know I'm. Got that I got that early version I got the Amazon Fire Phone you know but just be the the early failures sometimes see these I mean they're kind of in the right direction I don't know exactly what there's a there's a backstory to Google Glass that we only partially know but anyway they have the concept is there and and you know the big iterations that these products do get better and as they get better easier cheaper lighter cooler you know like Main Street cooler not Silicon Valley cooler then then markets can appear. Scot: [53:17] I think that's something the three of us have in common I think the three of us are probably the only people that ordered and probably still own an Amazon Fire Phone. Jeff Ellis. Mark: [53:29] And I've Got My Socks.com puppet to it's in my office I put the hits I got it as a warning. Scot: [53:31] I have one of those too yeah we all I guess we all have one of those too. Jason: [53:36] That that puppet ended up being the most valuable asset from pets.com sidenote like I don't know if you followed it but there was there was there was a whole intellectual property fight with Triumph the comedy dog and all that stuff yeah. Unattended value unintended value creation. Scot: [53:53] Mark were you you know we've used up about an hour of your time we really appreciate you coming on the show to tell us about the book when's it come out where can people find it do you do you want them to order from that Seattle bookstore that we've been chatting about. Mark: [54:09] So yeah and thanks Scott Jason I've always enjoyed listening to your show I did tell you it beginning I your analysis recently all birds and Warby Parker I took the heart because I initiated Warby Parker as an analyst but I after after I've seen what your thoughts were on it. So thanks for having me on the show and to talk about the book nothing but Net 10 Timeless stock-picking lessons from one of wall Street's top Tech analyst I just like to nothing but net on a big Hoops fan. And my kids are hoops and that's been my email pack lines there's a lot of meaning for me in that that title it is available wherever fine literature is sold it is available on Amazon it's the it's a top bestseller now and in the business category so I've been I've been just it was just a it was a labor of love for me and throw like a chance to talk with both of you about it because you've lived through the sister just as much as I have and it's fascinating the lessons we can draw from. Jason: [55:01] Well Mark is been entirely our privilege and it's a great sign that you know just halfway through your career you had enough material for an amazing book so I can't wait to read the the sequel after the next half. Mark: [55:13] All right I will talk with will do it again in 25 years. Jason: [55:18] I'm booking it right now. Scot: [55:20] Bring our sock puppet are and pets.com puppets in our Amazon Fire Phone. Mark: [55:24] That's. Jason: [55:25] Yeah everyone else will be living in the metaverse at that point in no one's going to get it but it's cool. But Mark really appreciated your time and until next time happy commercing!

Matt Powers and Jeff Sawyer have a combined experience of over 50 years. Having both worked alongside roofing companies throughout their careers, the team decided to formalize TruNORTH Roofing as part of the TruNORTH Construction business portfolio. Today, they service the majority of Connecticut and have established themselves as the trusted go-tos in both the home renovation and roofing industries. They prioritize relationships and they work to ensure that each client feels like the utmost priority. TruNORTH Roofing is a full-service roofing company. Based in South Windsor, Connecticut, the team services Hartford, Litchfield, Middlesex, New Haven, New London, Tolland, and Windham Counties. A branch of TruNORTH Remodeling and Construction, the organization prides itself on prioritizing relationships, delivering the level of service clients have come to expect, and applying their trusted expertise to every project. Ask Jeff Sawyer and Matt Powers why they started TruNorth Construction and they'll probably say, in unison, “relationships.” So it makes sense that their relationship is at the core of the business. Their social media videos showcase their authenticity, the quality of their work, and how you can have fun in marketing your business. Jeff's passion for the renovation and construction industry started when he was young. He was the boy who could be found holding a hammer, helping his father around the house in Connecticut. He studied Architecture and has always been passionate about the design elements and the details that combined, help to take a blueprint and turn it into a reality. When Jeff is not at a job site he can be found scaling the nearest incline with his best pal and pup, Sammy, or catching the current on his paddleboard. One of Matt's first jobs was working for a local roofing company in Connecticut. From there, his passion for the renovation and construction space blossomed. A CT native, he is well known in the area and he prides himself on building relationships while giving back through various community initiatives, a long-time family tradition. He is typically on the front line of the job site, lending his expertise to incoming crew members and clients alike. When he isn't taking in the view from above atop a roof, he is usually hanging out with his son, Chase on the green, court, and/or ice. The dynamic between him and his partner, Jeff is the driving force behind the company's success and the many moments when he is stopped at the local Home Depot by a passerby who is excited to relay a casual, "I know you!" On this episode, we talk about how to positively impact your community, charities, and your roofing business. Links: https://www.trunorth-roofing.com/ https://www.instagram.com/trunorthroofing/ https://www.facebook.com/TruNORTH-Roofing-Inc-101886698743217/ Open Doors Outdoors Mission: To take Veterans, their families and young people into the outdoors for re-connection, healthy activity and healing. https://www.opendoorsoutdoors.org/ For Tips, Strategies, and Free Downloads visit our website and join the Roofing Success Facebook Group: www.facebook.com/groups/1940365569408073/ https://roofermarketers.com The Roofing Success Podcast Text Jim @ (612) 512-1812 – Say Hi! I would love to hear your feedback, pros & cons! Please leave us a review!

Washington Wizards forward Kyle Kuzma had social media buzzing ahead of their game against the Charlotte Hornets last night, arriving at Capital One Arena in a giant pink sweater. Twitter compared his bold fashion statement from everything to a Pepto Bismol bottle to the Pink Panther. Wreaths Across America is on this year on December 18 at Arlington National Cemetery and military cemeteries around the country. We share a preview of local artisans that are at the Downtown DC Holiday Market. Featured vendors include Cannimals, IndiBlooms, Smell of Love Candles, Painted Palettes, Marcella Kriebel, and Turtle's Web. Many big box retailers are closed on Thanksgiving Day including Costco, Home Depot, Nordstrom, and Walmart. Washingtonian Magazine highlights “DC Christmas Bar Queen” Salame Aspiazu. She is designing a Christmas Theme bar in the Navy Yard at the wine bar Maxwell Park. The HISTORY channel partnered with Blue Star Families for “Mission to Honor” rolling up a CSX 1776 pride in service locomotive and train full of toys and educational items to military families at the B&O Railroad Museum in Baltimore. Tommy hosted the evening of fun and festive holiday cheer for military families. HISTORY's awesome new show “Toys That Built America” premieres on Sunday November 28th at 9PM. How you can support Blue Star Families: HISTORY will pledge to donate $1 for every post on social media, up to $25,000, to Blue Star Families when you share a photo, video or nostalgic memory of their favorite childhood toy using #toysthatbuiltamerica and tagging @HISTORY Links: Kyle Kuzma Sweater: https://www.sportingnews.com/us/nba/news/kyle-kuzma-pink-sweater-wizards/k6jsr68iypa916cdffv11vctz Kyle Kuzma Sweater 2: https://twitter.com/Tina77715956/status/1463119974931828737 Kyle Kuzma Sweater 3: https://twitter.com/DirtRacinGirl14/status/1463118230109794313 Kyle Kuzma Sweater 4: https://twitter.com/SosaThaPlug1/status/1463090521056976896 Wreaths Tickets: https://learn.wreathsacrossamerica.org/anc2021 Christmas Bar: https://www.washingtonian.com/2021/11/22/navy-yard-wine-bar-maxwell-park-is-becoming-a-decked-out-christmas-bar/?fbclid=IwAR0H1gNnpC5NZNuFiLXhu9FTNG3pitibsw4X6EbICuWL-SVzTkiLq36MPuw Big Retailers Closed on Thanksgiving: https://wtop.com/thanksgiving-news/2021/11/big-retailers-wont-beckon-shoppers-on-thanksgiving-day/?fbclid=IwAR3oTeeFcmElrZBfIn7mwR4X3LXV3mJttpxFOK1pgzu6hpLXNbZ85nFB_iE Holiday Market Vendors Smell of Love Candles https://smelloflovecandles.com/pages/about-us Painted Palettes https://www.paintedpalettes.com/ Marcella Kriebel https://instagram.com/marcellakriebel?utm_medium=copy_link From Real.Fun.DC. “The Tommy and Kelly Show” is produced in Washington, DC providing news, culture, playful conversation, positive energy, and a dose of morning fun any time. Download the Real.Fun.DC. APP to check out our wide array of programming app.RealFunDC.com Follow Kelly Collis Twitter: https://twitter.com/cityshopgirl Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cityshopgirl/ LinkedIN: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kellycollis/ Follow Tommy McFLY Twitter: https://twitter.com/tommymcfly Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mrtommymcfly/ LinkedIN: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tommymcfly/

We look back at past Sports Business Radio conversations with Mark Cuban (Dallas Mavericks Governor and Shark Tank investor), Arthur Blank (Atlanta Falcons, Author of the book "Good Company" and Co-Founder of Home Depot) and Marc Lasry (Milwaukee Bucks Governor). Three successful pro sports team Governors and visionary business people.  LISTEN to Sports Business Radio on iTunes, Spotify, Amazon Music or at www.SportsBusinessRadio.com.  WATCH these interviews on the Sports Business Radio YouTube Channel at www.SportsBusinessRadio.com. Follow Sports Business Radio on Twitter @SBRadio and on Instagram and Tik Tok @SportsBusinessRadio. Sports Business Radio is powered by Malka Sports (@MalkaSports) and produced by Griggs Productions (@GriggsProductions). Happy Thanksgiving from Sports Business Radio! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Recollections of my early years as a graffiti writer. Subjects discussed include: High school PE class (1988), Subway Art, Breakin' movie, John aka Tank, Frisco Bus Style, Castoner wildstyle tags, Dan-O (aka Wizdom and Omen), The Frontier restaurant, SHARP Skinheads, exchanging blackbooks, KWS crew, tactics for stealing art supplies, the break-in at Langells, racking with Agree, the Garden Section scheme, milk crate towers, the Escape from Home Depot, 1978 Mercury Zephyr skatemobile, racking fat caps, tossing keys as cover, steaks for guard dogs, leather coats on barbed wire, Grey PVC, the garbage can scheme, IGT by Phase2, Can Control, Skills magazine, Tower Records, bypassing security at Hastings, Cek, losing my shoe to a cop, Doc's fat cap business, coke demon, LA color schemes, cutting back, chrome effects, student loan scheme, malpractice suit, booze options, Christmas Eve mission, Custom Paint, Krylon racks, potential bomb, Writers Meeting at The Frontier, CMF vs MHC battle, Agree's war balloons.

Jim Inglis has a 60+ year career in retail including a long tenure at The Home Depot. With his book Breakthrough Retailing: How a Bleeding Orange Culture Can Change Everything, he reflects on his time with the home improvement retailer and, most of all, what other brands can learn from the company's rise, stagnation and rebirth.   During this week's Retail Remix, Jim shares lessons from the retail trenches, including how to:  Create a differentiated brand from the ground up;  Design a culture that employees love;   Tackle logistical issues such as pricing and supply chain; and    Inspire employees to build their skill set and foster a career in retail.   RELATED LINKS  Buy a copy of Jim's book   Learn more about Jim's career 

Part 3 - Late night chat with Australian, David MacMillan who spent years in SE Asia working on US POW/MIA cases. We discuss the capture of US Journalists, Sean Flynn and Dana Stone just weeks prior to the US Military's Cambodia Incursion known as "Operation Rock Crusher" in the Parrot's Beak area. We will go over the locations of the NVA/VC Base Area nearest to their capture with mapping and photos taken from CIA Photographic Reports taken by our U2 Spy Planes. Thank you to MyHeritage for the use of their photo app used to colorize and animate these pictures: https://www.myheritage.com/?utm_source=partner_uspowmiafamilylocating&utm_medium=partner&utm_campaign=uspowmiafamilylocating_hp&tr_funnel=web Find our podcast, Stories of Sacrifice - American POW/MIAs on your favorite podcast player or visit https://www.storiesofsacrifice.org/ How You Can Help: All money raised goes to support our Podcast and our POW/MIA Family Research where we are directly involved in the repatriation of WW2 POW/MIA's. Direct Support - https://paypal.me/JBear213 Monthly Support - https://www.buymeacoffee.com/sospodcast Please visit our affiliate links that help support our Podcast and POW/MIA research. I will earn a small commission at no extra cost to you! Keep in mind that I link these companies and their products because of their quality and not because of the commission I receive from your purchases. All money earned goes to support our Podcast and support to POW/MIA family research. Flipside Canvas - Owned by Medal of Honor recipient Dakota Meyer (USMC). At Flipside Canvas, we believe that art offers an opportunity to showcase your commitment to empowering yourself and others. High quality materials that will last 100+ years. All our art comes stretched and ready to hang on your wall. 100% Made in America using locally sourced and manufactured materials. https://flipsidecanvas.com/?ref=SOSPodcast The Home Depot - Is not only for the Do It Yourself building and construction projects, you have access to over two million products ranging from small appliances to your everyday needs for the home, RV travel to camping. Purchase online and pick up your order at your local Home Depot free of charge or ship it to your home! The sky's the limit on the products offered by the Home Depot! https://homedepot.sjv.io/SOSPodcast FAIR USE NOTICE These videos/audio may contain copyrighted material the use of which has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, such material has been referenced to advance understanding of political, human rights, ecological, economic, scientific, moral, ethical, and social justice issues. This constitutes a "fair use" of any such material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. #SeanFlynn #DanaStone #MissingInAction --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/storiesofsacrifice/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/storiesofsacrifice/support

Supply chain problems continue as container ships pile up at U.S. ports. The number of ships waiting to offload off the Southern California coast just hit a new record. That's despite a new 24/7 schedule to get ships unloaded. There's also a new ‘pop-up container yard' on the other side of the country to help get things moving.Hi, I'm Kathy Fettke and this is Real Estate News for Investors. If you like our podcast, please subscribe and leave us a review.A record 111 container ships were sitting outside the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach on November 10th. According to an Insider blog, that tops a previous record set on October 21st for 108 ships. (1)Not Enough Dock WorkersConsumer demand has been surging and there's been an effort to speed things up but there aren't enough dock workers and truck drivers to unload and deliver all the goods. Insider says the size of the backlog is unprecedented.Prior to the pandemic, there may have been as many as 17 ships waiting to unload. And now, it's typical to see more than 100 ships bobbing around offshore, and huge stacks of containers on the docks waiting to be picked up by truckers.Supply Chain Disruptions Task ForceThe White House launched a Supply Chain Disruptions Task Force last June to address the challenges at ports. Task force members met with local government leaders and companies to determine the cause of the bottlenecks and come up with solutions. The Port of Long Beach began the new 24/7 schedule in September. Los Angeles followed in October. According to the White House announcement, it's possible to move goods at the Port of L.A. 25% faster at night. (2)Various companies and unions also agreed to expanded work hours. Some of those companies include Target, Walmart, UPS, FedEx, Samsung, and Home Depot. The commitment from those six companies will make it possible to move an additional 3,500 containers per week, through the end of this year.Shipping Companies Face Big FinesThat hasn't solved the problem however, and shipping firms now face fines if they don't get those containers moving more quickly. Insider reports that the two Southern California ports will begin fining companies $100 a day for each container that's left on the docks for too long. They have three days to move the containers if they are being shipped by rail and nine days to move them if they are going by truck. Those fines are expected to start hitting companies on November 15th.A global logistics company told Insider: “These containers would move if they could, but it's a combination of warehouse space, trucking and labor issues.” American Shipper says, at the beginning of November, there were about 60,000 containers at these two ports for more than nine days, and they could all be eligible for fines.Ports Running Out of RoomThe government is also working on another potential solution with the announcement of a “pop-up container yard” at the Port of Savannah on the East Coast. The port will be able to redirect federal funds from a budget surplus to build the port. It will be a couple hundred miles inland from the coast along a rail line. That will give the Georgia Port Authority more space for containers that are waiting to be picked up. (3)The worst back-ups are in Southern California however. About 40% of the nation's imports reportedly go through those two ports. But smaller ports, like the one in Georgia, are also dealing with ships that are unloading cargo faster than truckers can take it away.The newly approved bipartisan infrastructure bill includes several measures to improve port operations. Among those measures are new grants and new grant flexibility, along with the Port Infrastructure Development Program to modernize ports and shipping routes. The supply chain issues we've been facing have impacted all parts of the economy. As you know, the housing industry has been heavily impacted by a shortage of building materials. That's caused construction delays and higher prices for new homes, as well as material shortages for do-it-yourself homeowners renovating their properties.You'll find more info by following links in the show notes at newsforinvestors.com.You can also find out more about real estate investing at our website by joining RealWealth for free. As a member, you have access to the Investor Portal where you can view sample property pro-formas and connect with our network of resources. That includes experienced investment counselors, property teams, lenders, 1031 exchange facilitators, attorneys, CPAs and more.And please remember to hit the subscribe button, and leave a review!Thanks for listening. I'm Kathy Fettke.Links:1 - https://www.businessinsider.com/supply-chain-crisis-record-number-of-container-ships-ca-ports-2021-112 - https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/supply-chain-crisis-holiday-shortages-plan-b1954506.html3 - https://sports.yahoo.com/white-house-announces-pop-container-170539918.html

#198: Skeery is nervous about spending Thanksgiving somewhere other than Brooklyn; Brody embarrassed a Home Depot worker in an "I told you so" moment; The boys debate a generational gap over how old you need to be to identify Grimace; An annual heated debate over cooking stuffing inside the bird or out; Brody surprised Skeery at a radio station appearance where there were a room full of non- Brooklyn Boys fans. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com

Nathan and I discuss some of the principals behind BILT's success, one of them being that they measure it by their own customer's success. BILT is a customer experience platform. It operates as an app that provides a 3D assembly experience for customers who need to build a finished item like a grill or bed frame. BILT has worked with companies such as Weber, IKEA, and the Home Depot, to help empower customers and give them the confidence needed in order to complete their project.

Target and Walmart report big earnings but shares slip on margin concerns. Sweetgreen surges 85% on the salad restaurant's first day of trading. And Intuit, Nvidia, Home Depot, and Lowe's all hit new highs. Motley Fool analysts Emily Flippen and Jason Moser discuss those stories and discuss the latest from Axon Enterprise and Bilibili. Plus, our analysts share two stocks on their radar: Farfetch and Peloton. And corporate governance expert and film critic Nell Minow talks ESG, executive compensation, and must-see movies with Academy Awards potential.

Apple surged to a new all-time high after a report that it's moving up its timeline to get its first autonomous vehicles on the road. What it means for the rest of the auto space. Plus while Apple, Nvidia, Home Depot and others are hitting record highs, Alibaba, Peloton, Roku and others continue to struggle. Do you stick with the winners or bet on a bounce back?

With roles at Target, The Home Depot, Family Dollar and now Ulta Beauty, Kecia Steelman, Ulta Beauty chief operating officer, can legitimately affirm, “Retail is in my DNA." “Life has [come] full circle because I'm leading the Ulta Beauty at Target partnership,” said Steelman, who spearheaded the collaboration, on this week's Glossy Beauty Podcast. (Steelman worked at Target between 1993 and 2005 and has been at Ulta Beauty since 2015.) Ulta Beauty at Target, which launched in August and consists of a 1,000 square foot, Ulta Beauty expert-staffed shop-in-shops in Target, is set to reach 100 new shops by the end of this year. The curated assortment of 54 prestige beauty brands is one of the ways that Steelman has facilitated a more convenient shopping experience for Ulta Beauty's existing customers as well as create a new ecosystem of shoppers at Target, said Steelman. Additionally, Steelman has worked to expand Ulta Beauty's digital innovation with elevated curbside and same-day pickup capabilities last year. “We shifted to be focused on self-care, self-expression, and togetherness because that's what our guests needed from us at that time,” she said.

Todd Hartley is the rockstar of remote selling, video marketing, and sales optimization. He's one of Tony Robbins' Business Mastery faculty speakers, trained each of Tony's 74 businesses how to sell remotely, and delivers high-octane keynotes all over the world. His strategies earned his sales and marketing optimization agency WireBuzz a spot on the Inc5000 list, as one of the fastest growing privately held businesses in America. Todd's transformational trainings include: Remote Selling Secrets: How to Use Video to Hook Prospects Attention, Prioritize Follow Ups, and Shorten Sales Cycles Presentation Mastery: How to Present Virtually and Keep Your Audience Glued To Your Content Known for being years ahead of his industry, billion dollar companies hire him to develop their sales and marketing strategies. Clients include Justin Timberlake, MD Anderson and Home Depot.Connect with Toddhttps://toddhartley.com/challenge/https://www.linkedin.com/in/videotodd/Connect with Russhttps://russjohns.com/https://thepiratesyndicate.com/https://nextstepnext.com/https://www.linkedin.com/in/nextstepnext/Live Stream Link - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7DvPnNsrUhoPlease don't forget to subscribe to our YouTube Channel - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCTz6TElo52gMGBrikwfj07A

Big-box retailers like Home Depot, Target and Walmart are well stocked and ready to go for the holiday season. But for smaller retailers and businesses, inflation and supply chain issues are packing a real double whammy. Many are having to balance price increases that won’t alienate customers with creative solutions in order to protect their bottom line. They’re doing things like slimming down selections, cutting hours or adding storage space. We’ll also hear about the Forest Service’s plans for prescribed burns, what needs to happen to meet President Joe Biden’s EV charging infrastructure goals, and how Netflix is showing off its streaming-service might.

Big-box retailers like Home Depot, Target and Walmart are well stocked and ready to go for the holiday season. But for smaller retailers and businesses, inflation and supply chain issues are packing a real double whammy. Many are having to balance price increases that won’t alienate customers with creative solutions in order to protect their bottom line. They’re doing things like slimming down selections, cutting hours or adding storage space. We’ll also hear about the Forest Service’s plans for prescribed burns, what needs to happen to meet President Joe Biden’s EV charging infrastructure goals, and how Netflix is showing off its streaming-service might.

O seu podcast sobre o mercado americano

The Home Depot, Inc., Q3 2022 Earnings Call, Nov 16, 2021

Two big reports out today about consumer spending and retail That's where we'll start with the business news headlines for this Tuesday evening: Inflation be damned...shoppers are shopping; Wall Street bonuses are, well, over the top; Pfizer is back in the news; So too is Times Square but the governor says... Rumblings about the Fed Chair; The Egg McMuffin is 50 and McDonald's has a promotion; Papa John's is changing things up; Dealers are pricing new cars way above MSRP; Home Depot and Walmart report sales; The Wall Street Report; Amazon to pay a $500,000 fine and why. Thanks for listening!  The award winning Insight on Business the News Hour with Michael Libbie is the only weekday business news podcast in the Midwest. The national, regional and some local business news along with long-form business interviews can be heard Monday - Friday. You can subscribe on PlayerFM, Podbean, iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher or TuneIn Radio. And you can catch The Business News Hour Week in Review each Sunday Noon on News/Talk 1540 KXEL. The Business News Hour is a production of Insight Advertising, Marketing & Communications. You can follow us on Twitter @IoB_NewsHour.

Home Depot shares hit record as home-improvement demand continues. Peloton plans to raise $1 billion in stock offering. Natural-gas prices jump as Germany pauses Nord Stream 2 certification. Bitcoin briefly drops below $60,000. Zoe Thomas reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Shares of Walmart fall despite strong 3rd-quarter results and raised guidance. Home Depot hits a new all-time high after a monster 3rd quarter fueled by higher average tickets. Bill Mann analyzes those stories and weighs in on the Green Bay Packers selling $90 million worth of stock in the team.

Chris Kneeland is the cofounder and CEO of Cult Collective. He helps brand leaders develop better ways to engage with customers, prospects, and staff by applying eight common characteristics discovered while researching the most iconic, "cult-like" brands on the planet. Chris has held marketing positions at John Deere and The Home Depot. He was also […]

This week's news: The Home Haunters Awards How is now accepting entries; Party City reports season revenue of $415.5 million; Spirit Halloween releases two new animatronics post-Halloween; Zombie Joe's Underground Theatre Group presents Cabaret Macabre Christmas; Brimstone Haunt to open for the holiday season with A Scary Little Christmas; An interview with the creator of Home Depot's 12' skeleton; Wisconsin school holds Halloween costume drive; Catapult your leftover pumpkins with the Discovery Center Museum; Disney releases the first picture of the Sanderson Sisters from Hocus Pocus 2.

Nathan Foy is founder and CEO of Fortis, nine-time Inc. Magazine honoree as one of America's fastest-growing companies. Fortis provides over 25,000 private, secure trips in 114 countries per year to clientele worth more than half a trillion dollars. These clients routinely ranked Fortis on Gallup surveys as the best in the industry. With offices in Greenville, South Carolina, and Hong Kong, Fortis offers ground transportation to more private jet owners than any other service in the world.   Nathan's first book, What Rich Clients Want: (But Won't Tell You), translates the Fortis experience into a replicable, scalable business model any service provider can recreate. Nathan lives in Greenville with his wife, Pam and their four children.   Questions   Could you share with our guests a little bit about your journey, how it is that you got to where you are today? Could you tell us a little bit about that book? Is there a particular strategy or approach that you take to serve rich clients versus clients who are not rich, you want to share with us how it is this book can be applied to everybody in business? Can you share with us maybe what are maybe two or three things that you've seen emerge as needs that customers are looking to be even more fulfilled since the pandemic? What are some of the approaches that organizations need to take maybe leaders, in order to ensure that your team members are practicing these behaviors or competencies, especially if it doesn't come naturally? Let's start maybe with the first two, professionalism and problem solving. How can you build strengths or strengthen the competencies of your team to ensure that they're demonstrating these behaviors with the customers? How do you stay motivated every day? Could you also share with our audience what's the one online resource, tool, website or app that you absolutely can't live without in your business? Could you also share with our audience, maybe one or two books that have had the biggest impact on you, it could be a read a very long time ago, or even one that you've read recently, but it really has impacted you. Could you share with us what's going on in your life right now that you're really excited about? It could be something that you're working on to develop yourself or your people? Where can listeners find you online? Do you have a quote or saying that during times of adversity or challenge, you'll tend to revert to this quote; it kind of helps to get you back on track or get you refocused if for any reason you get derailed?   Highlights   Nathan's Journey   Nathan shared that it was not intentional in its original conception. So, Fortis as a company began as a prepaid taxi cab card for college students. That was his original idea, was to create a card that students could use for transportation, this was in 2000 and this was the era when prepaid phone cards or prepaid meal cards were all the rage.   And so, he raised money from friends and family, he went up and down the East Coast, he built a network of taxicab companies. And their launch was for the Fall moving season of 2001, almost exactly 20 years ago. And it was going pretty well and then, unfortunately, 911 happened and everything changed. They ran out of money, people weren't visiting their kids for college anymore. And so, they started to adapt.   They sold their cab cards to companies. And then shortly after that, they found their first private jet company and they said they wanted chauffeured cars. And then they adapted into that really in the beginning of 2002. And that's really been their niche ever since.   Your Book, What Rich Clients Want - Strategy or Approach That You Take to Serve Rich Clients Versus Clients Who Are Not Rich   Me: So, in your bio, I read that you have this amazing book called What Rich Clients Want: (But Won't Tell You). So, could you tell us a little bit about that book? Is there a particular strategy or approach that you take to serve rich clients versus clients who are not rich, you want to share with us how it is this book can be applied to everybody in business?   Nathan shared that it's really the result of 20 years of doing this and understanding that the most discerning clients that spend the most never actually tell you what they want, it's on you as a customer service person to discern that. And he thinks while this is a book that could be used to serve rich clients, he thinks the lessons here could apply to anybody in the service business.   So, what the book does is, it outlines basically that there's five steps that one has to proceed two, and two has to precede three. And if those are all there, then you can have a system of service that really leads clients into more than they expected they could get. And he thinks when you have that, then you can really create loyalty that lasts.   Me: Alright, you want to share with us what those steps are?   Nathan shared that the first step is “Professionalism.” And so, just kind of owning the introduction, owning the beginning of a relationship, the first impression is super important. And they give a lot of practical tips to that.   And then the second step is “Problem Solving.” So, actually taking a problem that they have, seizing it and acting as if it was your own and solving it so that they can see that you have competence in what you're doing.   The third step is “Concierge.” So, that's actually not just solving the problem, but anticipating even unspoken needs, so that you can see around a corner and make something happen proactively.   The fourth step is “Security.” So, having a layer of security that complements all of those things, but not at the expense of all of those things is very, very important. And these days, it's more about information, reputation, security, those kinds of things than it is physical security in most instances.   And then the fifth level, the highest level is really “Elite.” And that's when you start to begin to push out the boundaries on what's even possible. You'll know you're at this level when the client starts to refer to your company as a verb, they have clients that call them and say, “Can you just “Fortis” this, whatever that is that you do, can you just do that to this?” And that's a really good sign, they don't know the secret sauce, but they just want you to apply it to what's in front of them.   Me: I like that. I like the fact that you gave that analogy just now that they coined it as a verb. It's almost like Google, like before the age of the internet; Google wasn't even a word, let alone a verb. And now, when people want to find anything out there, like just Google it. I mean, it's just so amazing that 10 - 15 years ago, that word, it just didn't exist, it's just not something people would say.   Needs of Customers That Have Emerge That Customers Are Looking to be Even More Fulfilled Since the Pandemic   Me: Now customer service has been really impacted, customer experiences across different industries, across the entire world, all seven continents have definitely been impacted by the pandemic, can you share with us maybe what are maybe two or three things that you've seen emerge as needs that customers are looking to be even more fulfilled since the pandemic?   Nathan stated that the original environment of it, he thinks really led to us creating not just the standard things, masks and things like that, sanitization of surfaces. But we really tried to say, “Okay, what is kind of a level above that that might be unspoken, but that our clients might desire?”   And the thing that they arrived at was, particularly in the pre-vaccine environment, having a chauffeur contacted two or three days after the trip, for a principal, just to make sure that in the intervening time the chauffeur hadn't experienced any symptoms.   And so, the clients, there are many clients that said, I love that you do that, everybody's got testing, and everything, we've got temperature checks, and all those things. But the one thing is that the person could be asymptomatic and a day or two later get symptoms. And that's kind of next level.   And they had a lot of clients that really, really complimented them on doing that. Practically, another thing that they've implemented as partitions are just a much bigger thing in vehicles now than they used to be. And so, they wanted not only to provide that, but they had to kind of stand up, how do we do this so it doesn't look like you just ran to Home Depot and put it together and make that standard across the 1000 cities that they serve. So that was a fun challenge as well.   Professionalism and Problem Solving, How Can You Build Strengths or Strengthen the Competencies of Your Team to Ensure That They're Demonstrating These Behaviours with the Customers   Me: Now, Nathan, one of the things that your book mentions as it relates to professionalism, you had mentioned the five tiers that are required for you to really deliver that supreme or extraordinary level of service. What are some of the, I would say approaches that organizations need to take maybe leaders, in order to ensure that your team members are practicing these behaviors or competencies, especially if it doesn't come naturally? Let's start maybe with the first two, professionalism and problem solving. How can you build strengths or strengthen the competencies of your team to ensure that they're demonstrating these behaviors with the customers?   Nathan shared that it's a great question. So, he would say before we get into the behaviours, it first begins with mindset. And the mindset has to be that you are honing your craft and not doing a job. And what he means by that is that if you want to make customer service into a career, then you have to make it uniquely yours and be a student of it so that the service Yanique offers is completely one of a kind over time, and only you can be you. But you also have to do that in concert with an overall brand that you're continuing to hone and refine to.   So, they have chauffer partners and they have conferences twice a year, they host them and go over kind of just aligning and making their services better. And that's one of the first things he does is just say, “Are you doing a job? Or are you doing a craft?”   Because, quite frankly, if someone's just doing the job, and this is just here to pay my school bills or this is just something I'm doing in between gigs, they don't really spend a lot of time with them. They don't really seek them out because they're not really going to want to ascend to elite status. So, he thinks that's a pretty important thing, just to begin with.   So, really practically professionalism, there's a lot of basics of how someone presents themselves with posture, appearance, confidence, handshake, eye contact, not just being early to do the job, but actually being early and ready to do the job early. Those are things that he would just say, they don't presume that people know and scold them if they don't know; they kind of assume that they don't know those things, and start training them on it. And that involves extensive use of checklists. And again, they're looking for people that are not offended by checklists, it's not saying you're incompetent, or you don't know what you're doing, it's just if you have the basics completely nailed down, that gives you the freedom to move up to higher levels and a checklists, especially the first level is essentially great for that.   If a client, especially a rich client doesn't like you, they're not going to tell you why they don't like you, they're just going to text their assistant and say, “I don't want to use this person again.” And you'll never know why. And so, the idea that you're going to be assessed on professionalism or clients going to give you input on how to be more professional, they don't have the time, they don't have the desire and it's really got to be on you to own that initial bit so that you can kind of get permission to move up to higher steps.   On problem solving, a real quick and easy way to begin with that is to just look for the most common problems that your clients encounter, and build systems for that so that you can be really ready when they have that. A quick example of that, they have a five star chauffeur for them in Miami.   And over the years, he's noticed people enter the airport, they want to go to a drugstore and then there's a core list of things that they're getting at CVS or Walgreens. And he's created what he calls his magic toolbox, but it's basically in his consoles. So, now when somebody lands and they say, “I just need to go to CVS.” He says, “Well, if you don't mind me asking, what is it that you need because I may just have it here.” And then they asked for one or two items, he has it. And he's immediately established competence with them that goes to a deeper level of trust. And now the whole world of what's open to the client, and what this person's capable of doing has really opened up.   Me: That's brilliant. I love that. That's like giving them what they need before they even know they need it.   How Nathan Stay Motivated Every Day   Me: So, could you share with our audience, how do you stay motivated every day? I can imagine that dealing in a business that is catering to clients who are rich, because of course, rich people clearly, yes, they have choices. But I'm sure their choice of business is a little bit different than a person who is probably on a budget. And so, with that in mind, maybe their demands are higher, their standards are higher and it can be frustrating sometimes I can imagine, especially when you're dealing with somebody who the average person would deem as difficult. So, in managing this business and running it for the many years that you've been in it, how is it that you stay motivated every day and you don't get discouraged by comments or just things that customers may see that makes you even wonder, I don't know if it crosses your mind. But do you ever get to the point where you say, “Why? Why am I doing this? Why am I serving all these spoiled, rich people?”   Nathan shared that a mentor of his once told him that if you're hard on yourself, the world is easy. And if you're easy on yourself, the world is hard. So, he would say it begins with the mindset of he's his own biggest critic. And then they as Fortis are their own biggest critics. And they really lean into those challenges that clients give to them. And then every week they have a company meeting, and they gossip good news about each other, they do recognitions and they're saying not just good things that each of them has done, but really, they're kind of taking the time to go through each thing that's been done that they want to congratulate, and tie it to one of their five core values. And then that just helps to recenter them and “Oh yeah, we do value that. And that's an example of that. And I can learn from that. And if I did something like that, then I'm going to be recognized for that too.”   The second bit, he would just say is that he's a firm believer in making your goals for the year, they actually break them up into six month periods, and making them known because every week or two weeks as a leadership team, they're going over their goals for the semester, it's a great way to just recenter you on, it's not about how he feels, or about this one service issue that they had. Overall, there are these big things that they're gunning for and they're doing that as a team.   App, Website or Tool that Nathan Absolutely Can't Live Without in His Business   When asked about an online resource that he cannot live without in his business, Nathan stated that it's a good question. He would say for them LinkedIn has been extraordinarily valuable to connect with their partner chauffeurs and to their clients. And so, particularly when there was just recently the COVID outbreak, that was a terrific way to communicate up to date information and then vice versa for them to get up to date information. And one thing they learned through that, which, he kind of already knew, but they found that it was even more true than he thought was their global network of service providers are some of the most important people in each location. So, people were like maybe thinking about travelling to Paris, and a phone call to a chauffeur security person in Paris would tell them way more than you could just get on the internet. So, staying connected through LinkedIn was really helpful for that.   Books That Have Had the Greatest Impact on Nathan   When asked about books that have had the biggest impact, Nathan shared that the summer after 10th, grade, he had knee surgery and he loved to play sports, he played a lot of basketball during the summers. And he had surgery right after school was out. And everybody told him, “Oh, it's going to be three to four weeks, and you'll be back on your feet.” And it more or less put him out for eight weeks or most of the summer. And so, he's laid up in bed, this is pre internet and he's getting tired of watching TV and just being lazy and thinking about all the things he's missing out. And so, he got a book that's called Made in USA and it was by Sam Walton, the founder of Walmart. And he just devoured that book. And he thinks that was the book that kind of sparked in him an interest in being an entrepreneur and actually understanding what that could look like and what that can be. And because he had a lot of time to think, set his mind racing that summer when he had nothing to do.   What Nathan is Really Excited About Now!   Nathan shared that he's really excited about the book in the sense that he's not pretending that any of the foundational things that he has in What Rich Clients Want are novel. In fact, he gave a huge amount of credit to Horst Schulze, who is essentially the founder of a lot of these concepts for Ritz Carlton he would say, especially level one and level two things. They lean a lot on the Ritz Carlton experience to learn from that. But then he thinks the neat thing is, is that over 20 years, having learned and distilled these things, and now being able to talk with them, with audiences like yours, he just find that really rewarding, really gratifying.   And in fact, tomorrow night, at their headquarters, they're having their book launch party and he's got old team members driving in from other locations to come in and celebrate. So, it's fun to share the information and also celebrate the hard work that kind of went into making the book happen.   Where Can We Find Nathan Online   Website – www.fortis.co Website – www.nathanfoy.com LinkedIn – Nathan W. Foy Twitter - @nfoyal   Quote or Saying that During Times of Adversity Nathan Uses   When asked about a quote or saying that he tends to revert to, Nathan shared that there's a famous quote from Teddy Roosevelt that he will try to quote, but it says basically, “The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who even if he fails, he fails while daring greatly, so that his place is not among those cold and timid souls who know neither victory nor defeat.”   Me: Lovely, I love it. And how does that quote help you?   Nathan shared that it tells him it's not about only winning; it's just being in the arena and if you're in the arena, you're going to get bloodied; you're going to have discouragements, you're going to have disappointments, but you are daring greatly. And that's something that he thinks is worth doing in our professional lives and in our lives in general.   Please connect with us on Twitter @navigatingcx and also join our Private Facebook Community – Navigating the Customer Experience and listen to our FB Lives weekly with a new guest   Grab the Freebie on Our Website – TOP 10 Online Business Resources for Small Business Owners   Links   What Rich Clients Want: (But Won't Tell You) by Nathan Foy Sam Walton: Made in USA: My Story by Sam Walton   The ABC's of a Fantastic Customer Experience   Do you want to pivot your online customer experience and build loyalty - get a copy of “The ABC's of a Fantastic Customer Experience.”   The ABC's of a Fantastic Customer Experience provides 26 easy to follow steps and techniques that helps your business to achieve success and build brand loyalty. This Guide to Limitless, Happy and Loyal Customers will help you to strengthen your service delivery, enhance your knowledge and appreciation of the customer experience and provide tips and practical strategies that you can start implementing immediately! This book will develop your customer service skills and sharpen your attention to detail when serving others. Master your customer experience and develop those knock your socks off techniques that will lead to lifetime customers. Your customers will only want to work with your business and it will be your brand differentiator. It will lead to recruiters to seek you out by providing practical examples on how to deliver a winning customer service experience!

Plus: Walmart reports higher sales as it raises prices. Home Depot reports better-than-expected sales. Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac will soon back mortgages of nearly $1 million. Trenae Nuri reports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

60 Seconds, you need to know before you go and you need to not feed the bears because that's what people were doing because of China and a whole bunch of other things in Bitcoin land. Bitcoin fell all the way down to 58,000. In London, trading comes back above 60, but boy, it's a big 10% drop over the last seven days. Take a look also at Molen. This is a molecular partners. COVID trial did not go well for them. Shares down double digits. Great trading, no air zone opposite to the upside in zone and in Playboy PLBY Why both of these stocks double digit winners in the pre-market lucid about 17,000 people jumping on that new air. And for that reason, shares are getting a big pump in the pre about 15%. Home Depot and Wal-Mart both be banging and moving to the upside. Remember Jim Jim Cramer lightened up? He didn't get short, so all you haters lighten up on Jim a little bit. Lastly, RXT this is Rackspace. They beat and guided higher. I am Jon Najarian. Isn't it time you learned a little bit more about bitcoin? I mean, I buy on dips. I don't know how you guys play it, but buy on that. That FOMO trade just doesn't work for me. 10:00 a.m. Daily Crypto BytePete's "The Take" 10:30 and 3@3 3:00 p.m. Eastern Time, but you got to be a subscriber if you want it live. And of course, I'll be on the Halftime Report later today. Bang! Let's get some.

Listen to the Daily Global #News from Grecian Echoes and WNTN 1550 AM.  "Respectful and straightforward." A "healthy debate." That's how officials described the virtual summit between President Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping.  The US intelligence community is struggling with an intelligence blind spot as it continues to monitor irregular Russian military movements near the border with Ukraine.  WalMart and Home Depot top earnings estimates

After storms and other climate disasters, legions of workers appear overnight to cover blown-out buildings with construction tarps, rip out ruined walls and floors, and start putting cities back together. They are largely migrants, predominantly undocumented, and lack basic protections for construction work. Their efforts are critical in an era of increasing climate-related disasters, but the workers are subject to hazards including accidents, wage theft, and deportation. “Right now, there is a base camp for the National Guard; FEMA officials in Louisiana are staying in hotels,” Saket Soni, the founder of the nonprofit group Resilience Force, tells Sarah Stillman. “But the workers who are doing the rebuilding with their hands are sleeping under their cars to protect themselves from rain.” Stillman travelled to Louisiana, to the parking lot of a Home Depot, to report on Soni's effort to organize and win recognition for these laborers as a distinct workforce performing essential work. “These years ahead,” she notes, “are going to bring more brutal hurricanes, more awful floods, more terrifying wildfires, and heatwaves—more than any of us is really prepared to handle. … And what's at stake is not just these workers' fates but also our collective shared survival.”

The President is set to sign one of the biggest infrastructure bills in history today. We'll speak with the CEOs of Blink Charging & Siemens USA about the money, the plans and the impact. Plus, we'll speak with a 5-star tech fund manager who saw gains of 88% last year. He'll tell us what he's buying now amid rising rates. And, in today's Earnings Exchange: we'll give you the action, the story & the trade in Walmart, Home Depot and Lucid results on deck.

After storms and other climate disasters, legions of workers appear overnight to cover blown-out buildings with construction tarps, rip out ruined walls and floors, and start putting cities back together. They are largely migrants, predominantly undocumented, and lack basic protections for construction work. Their efforts are critical in an era of increasing climate-related disasters, but the workers are subject to hazards including accidents, wage theft, and deportation. “Right now, there is a base camp for the National Guard; FEMA officials in Louisiana are staying in hotels,” Saket Soni, the founder of the nonprofit group Resilience Force, tells Sarah Stillman. “But the workers who are doing the rebuilding with their hands are sleeping under their cars to protect themselves from rain.” Stillman travelled to Louisiana, to the parking lot of a Home Depot, to report on Soni's effort to organize and win recognition for these laborers as a distinct workforce performing essential work. “These years ahead,” she notes, “are going to bring more brutal hurricanes, more awful floods, more terrifying wildfires, and heatwaves—more than any of us is really prepared to handle. … And what's at stake is not just these workers' fates but also our collective shared survival.”

It's Monday and Alpha Boost is sending in trade ideas in Home Depot and Walmart. Liz and Jenny walk through the various trades and talk about the right fit for different account sizes.Featured Symbols: WMT and HD

It's Monday and Alpha Boost is sending in trade ideas in Home Depot and Walmart. Liz and Jenny walk through the various trades and talk about the right fit for different account sizes.Featured Symbols: WMT and HD

Joseph Wilkins founded ProCreative Studios almost 20 years ago where his team produced infomercials, TV commercials and corporate videos.  Joseph has directed thousands of campaigns for clients including Google, Linkedin, McDonalds, Goldman Sachs, Chevrolet, Home Depot and other mega brands. As habits shifted from television to online, Joseph launched FunnySalesVideos.com in 2017, where he creates attention-grabbing viral style sales videos that entertain viewers into making an immediate purchase.  With two decades experience, hundreds of millions of TV & online views and hundreds of millions of dollars in tracked sales, Joseph has developed 8 simple steps any business can follow to boost online sales. Join us as we explore how any company can increase sales by producing professional, funny videos.

Shlomo Freund is an innovative investor, always searching for new ways to put his money to work. In this episode of Empower Your Inner Millionaire Podcast, he tells us how to "flip" websites! If you've never heard of this money-making idea, listen up. It's no more work than flipping real estate and you'll never have to make a trip to Home Depot. Just like with real estate, you can fix up the website and flip it or buy and hold for a passive income stream. Listen to the podcast Watch the video About Shlomo Freund: Shlomo Freund is a location-independent entrepreneur and has been for the past 15+ years. His lifelong passions for finance, investing and travel lead to the creation of his current business, Free Financial Self, which helps people organize their finances to reach financial independence faster. This allows them to live, work and enjoy life with friends and family both wherever and whenever they like. The end result? Armed with a strong, customized roadmap built around financial and personal lifestyle goals, an increase in individual happiness Resources mentioned in this episode: Link to Shlomo's website Digital assets investment workshop Empire Flippers Motion Invest Flippa

Blinds.com is an incredible business story and Jay is an incredible Founder CEO. In his new book, he talks about the 4 Es...the foundational principles on which his success was built. After he and his team successfully built Blinds.com, he sold the company to Home Depot and continued leading for quite some time after. In this interview, Jay talks about: ---> What generosity looks like to him as a Founder & CEO. ---> A significant story about a time he felt short of his own expectations of a focus on humanity. It's an incredible interview because Jay is so candid and transparent about his own journey From Founder To CEO.

Part 2 - Late night chat with Australian David MacMillan who spent years in SE Asia working on US POW/MIA cases. We discuss remains he found and turned over to the US Government for identification. Today's part 2 we discuss Sean Flynn, son of actor Errol Flynn and Dana Stone who were freelance journalists captured by communist in April 1970 in Cambodia and have never been found. Thank you to MyHeritage for the use of their photo app used to colorize and animate these pictures: https://www.myheritage.com/?utm_source=partner_uspowmiafamilylocating&utm_medium=partner&utm_campaign=uspowmiafamilylocating_hp&tr_funnel=web Find our podcast, Stories of Sacrifice on your favorite podcast player or visit https://www.storiesofsacrifice.org/ How You Can Help: All money raised goes to support our Podcast and our POW/MIA Family Research where we are directly involved in the repatriation of WW2 POW/MIA's. Direct Support - https://paypal.me/JBear213 Monthly Support - https://www.buymeacoffee.com/sospodcast Please visit our affiliate links that help support our Podcast and POW/MIA research. I will earn a small commission at no extra cost to you! Keep in mind that I link these companies and their products because of their quality and not because of the commission I receive from your purchases. All money earned goes to support our Podcast and support to POW/MIA family research. Flipside Canvas - Owned by Medal of Honor recipient Dakota Meyer (USMC). At Flipside Canvas, we believe that art offers an opportunity to showcase your commitment to empowering yourself and others. High quality materials that will last 100+ years. All our art comes stretched and ready to hang on your wall. 100% Made in America using locally sourced and manufactured materials. https://flipsidecanvas.com/?ref=SOSPodcast The Home Depot - Is not only for the Do It Yourself building and construction projects, you have access to over two million products ranging from small appliances to your everyday needs for the home, RV travel to camping. Purchase online and pick up your order at your local Home Depot free of charge or ship it to your home! The sky's the limit on the products offered by the Home Depot! https://homedepot.sjv.io/SOSPodcast FAIR USE NOTICE These videos/audio may contain copyrighted material the use of which has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, such material has been referenced to advance understanding of political, human rights, ecological, economic, scientific, moral, ethical, and social justice issues. This constitutes a "fair use" of any such material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. #SeanFlynn #CambodiaIncursion #MissingInAction --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/storiesofsacrifice/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/storiesofsacrifice/support

Quite often on the show, what you'll hear me say is stuff along the lines of "Hey, you are just a salesperson chasing another check if you are only counting the commission as the real value of closing a transaction instead of leveraging your transactions. When I was selling real estate, the goal of the listing was not to sell the damn house, the goal was to leverage the house for additional buyer leads brand building, and certainly to solidify the relationship with the person that we represented. It's never a matter of just selling a house. So today, Sherry Johnson is going to walk us through exactly what she calls sort of the gold mine pipeline. She's a coach nationally. She's been doing this for years, and she's got a wealth of knowledge. She sold for almost 10 years, then went into leadership and management with a huge company, Howard Hanna Real Estate. There, she grew the sales volume of 750 agents from 600 million to 1.7 billion in four years. Today, she provides solutions for agents, individual agents, teams, large teams, mega teams, and also provides management and brokerage executive level coaching for companies.Three Things You'll Learn in This EpisodeWhy you should be running a business and not being a salesperson chasing a checkWhat the goldmine pipeline system isHow to grow your sales volumeResourcesSherri Johnson CoachingReal Estate Marketing DudeThe Listing Advocate (Earn more listings!)REMD on YouTubeREMD on InstagramTranscript:So how do you attract new business, you constantly don't have to chase it. Hi, I'm Mike way ambassador, real estate marketing. This podcast is all about building a strong personal brand people have come to know, like trust and most importantly, refer. But remember, it is not their job to remember what you do for a living. It's your job to remind them. Let's get startedWhat's up ladies and gentlemen, welcome another episode of the real estate marketing dude podcast, another Friday here, and actually, this show is gonna go live tomorrow. So this is like real time, like, I'm low on shows, and I'm loading up. But it's a good one. I was just on her podcast. And I know the last few weeks, I've been doing a lot more like training and whatnot. But I wanted to bring on a coach. And she's got a really cool system. Quite often on the show, what you'll hear me say is stuff along the lines of like, Hey, you are just a salesperson chasing another check. If you count the real value of closing a transaction that only commission you have on that deal specifically, and not leveraging your transactions, the next one. So when I was selling real estate, the goal of the listing was not to sell the damn house and it was gonna sell fucking house. The goal, the goal was to leverage the house for additional buyer leads brand building, and certainly to solidify the relationship with the person that we represented. Because it's never a matter of selling a house. Like my goal is to sell everyone for houses and under referred into for more relationships that I can read, rinse and repeat the same damn thing. So we're talking about running a business and not being a salesperson chasing a check. So our guest today is Sherry Johnson is going to walk us through exactly what she calls sort of the gold mine pipeline. She's a coach nationally. She's been doing this for years, and she's got a wealth of knowledge. So without further ado, let's go ahead and welcome Miss Sherry Johnson to the show. Sherry, how are you and thank you for joining us.Hey, Mike, thanks for having me. I'm excited to be on your awesome podcast and talk about this. Yeah, it's gonna be to be hopefully one of your best episodes I have, I think.Let's go in. I want you to tell everyone, just brief background, who the hell are you? Where do you come from how you been doing this, and then we'll get into it.Awesome. So I am in Cleveland, Ohio, born and raised, and I've been a real estate broker for 25 years, I'm going to 26 I was a top agent at a company we had two huge independent companies here in Cleveland. So I sold for almost 10 years, I then went into leadership and management with a huge company, Howard Hanna real estate. They're huge. We had, I think I had 750 agents in my territory after managing a couple of offices. Through the goldmine pipeline system that I created, when I was an agent, grew the sales volume of those 750 agents from 600 million to 1.7 billion in four years. And that was done through aggressively coaching and helping agents through the go my pipeline, but also, you know, going after being a listing agent, and as you said, selling three to five houses off of every listing and also, you know, getting clients for life and building a 90% referral base. So four years ago, or maybe now almost four and a half years ago, I started sharing Johnson coaching, which was a life goal of mine since I was 27 years old to have my own national speaking coaching and consulting company. We provide solutions for agents, individual agents, teams, large teams, mega teams, and then we also provide management and brokerage executive level coaching for companies and we are our preferred coaching company for some of the large brands. But at the end of the day, it's all about giving and adding value to agents to help them compete and win at higher level and grow really amazing businesses while working smarter, not harder. And, you know, not getting distracted by a lot of things out there. lead sources can come we're gonna talk about that, where can you go deep and one of those is with your database, or client base, also known as and I think we you know, there's there's lots of ways to do this business. I think agents just need to focus and have a system and a strategy and that's what I'm gonna deliver today for you with the goldmine pipeline. I have two kids by the way, I didn't mention that.Manage that you managed to finally get a couple kids in there through all this.I love my daughter Tori and 14 year old son Matthew, they're like little awesome individual. Many people they're just amazing. And they inspire me every day and I'm a big runner. I run half marathons and I love to run and I love I love real estate. I'm just like so stoked to be here. So thanks. Cuz you're amazing. And you were amazing on my podcast, by the way, sothank you. Yeah, well, um, let's get into it because you're exactly right. When you say there's a system, they're running this business. And I think we're the why so many agents like fail from the beginning is because they don't approach it like a business or have a system to it, they approach it, like you're working in for a sales position, and you're working for someone that hires you to go out and sell stuff each and every month. And you can't run a business that way. It just won't work. It just, it doesn't work. I mean, statistically, and I hate saying that cliche, but 87% of agents fail after five years. And that's because for reasons that's four out of five people don't make it. And I think a lot of it has to do with what they're being taught at the very beginning. Cold calling door knocking and you're burning people out, you're so you're taking like a bunch of sales, people who aren't even really sales, people are trying to mold them into salespeople, and then it just turns into an ugly mess. So let's get into this gold mined pipeline and start from square one, I want you to walk me through sort of give me what are we going to focus on first, and let's go through sequential order, so everyone could sort of follow it,I send out so you are the CEO of your business, you're gonna call yourself CEO, but you have to run out like a business, as Mike just said. And, you know, it's, it's not just gonna happen, like people, I think, get the get their license, and they mistakenly think that everyone in their sphere is gonna use them, which happens at some point, it will happen. But you have to have a plan. And we can't hope that people are just going to use, you can't hope you're going to do this business, you have to actually have a plan and make it happen, and be intentional and on purpose and what the goldmine pipeline is going to do for you. And what's so great about this pipeline, Mike is that it works, no matter what someone's current production is, okay, so if someone's already doing eight or 10, or 15 million or 20 million, they can use it to do 10, or, you know, to grow their business double or triple it, I have agents that are doing 100 million that use this system, everyone on their team is on it. So it doesn't matter what your current production is brand new, or you've been licensed for a long time. So it doesn't matter your years of experience, it doesn't matter your current production, this will create what I love the most which every agent, the reason 87% fail, is they don't ever develop consistent or predictable monthly income and they sell a house one month, don't sell a house the next month. And it's this ugly roller coaster issue. So perfectly stated. It's like, they just don't have enough people. And the biggest thing I've seen over these 26 years of leading and developing agents is that they have like two to three people that they focus their time and attention to over a 30 to 40 Hour Work Week, you've seen this movie, doing research for those three to five people. And they just don't have enough people that are having have conversations with enough people. And so while agents discount the ones who say, I'm not going to do anything for six to 12 months, they don't put them on a list, they never follow up with them. And what I say is opportunities are not lost. We didn't lose those opportunities. Those people went and bought a house eventually and listed their home with somebody else. So opportunities are lost, they go to someone else go my pipeline system will help alleviate that and not have that happen anymore. When you lose that listing. You know, agents will say to me Why didn't believe these people because they said they weren't going to do anything for a couple of months. And two weeks later the house is you know, frickin listed. And there's a sign in the yard or they see an MLS and they're like whiplash thinking How did this happen? And I'm like, Well, you didn't maximize the opportunity. And you didn't overcome their objection to listen, somebody else did. The what the goal my pipeline system will do is create consistent and predictable monthly income, which I love. So you're starting out and you want five grand a month or eight grand a month or 10 or 12,000 a month or more. You can create consistent and predictable monthly income by having more people on the list and taking everybody I mean, do we really care when I meet somebody at an open house and they don't know they started looking, you know, my line is hey, I work with you at your pace and your speed. Whether this takes two weeks, two months or two years I'm not going anywhere. Right and we take out that like Parana pneus of like I only want to work with you if you're ready now and and so when people like that they like that I'm not going to show houses for two years for God's sakes that's another problem people do but I'm saying is keep them on your list because even the two year person is going to sell in less than two years Okay, they just haven't wrapped their head around that yet. So what happens is they agents are spending all their time and attention on these two to three people they consider a buyers and if those things don't pan out Mike what do we have? We have like a big fat wellthis is what happens when you do I mean it's why the peaks and valleys everyone spends time on the two to three you close them you're like shit, I need two to three more. Then you spend two to three months trying to find those two, three more than you rinse and repeat the same fucking thing over and over again. And that's why the average agent only sells six to nine houses. I could trip over six to nine sales a year. But I want to point out something that you said, it's really good. You're right, you have to, it's like, you meet someone in an open house, you have a good conversation, you know that if they were ready now that they would probably work with you, you just either get that feeling or you don't. And same thing, if it comes off a lead online, you're like, hey, you have a good rapport with somebody, Okay, I gotta, this guy's gonna buy a house. But the problem is, he's not gonna move here till about nine months. So How the hell am I gonna stay in touch with them? Listen, folks, if you just like continuously, every time you communicate with them, for the first time that you meet them to the time they're ready, if it's always about work, you're fucking slick salesman, at least in their eyes. And there's a way to humanize and nurture that relationship through other ways that you're not always having to talk about work, like trust me, once you meet someone first, and you establish the point that your agent, like, great, I got your an agent, okay, but doesn't mean that every time you talk to him in the future, you're gonna be like, written by anybody where he saw you already. So think about that salesperson that did that to you. Usually, it's in the form of a financial planner. And every time they come up to you, they just keep coming after you, you're like, your ego ready to go, we're gonna go dinner, like, I know, you're trying to sell me something, and then we get turned off. So I'm really interested to see how you're going to position this Go right ahead, keep going.So the goldmine pipeline will actually cast a wider, bigger net, so that you're having more conversations with more people at varying stages of their home buying or selling process. And so some of those people are going to be a, but that might look like a right now, some are going to be be some are gonna be C and then in the pipeline, where we define a, b, and c is like, A, it's going to be 70. In the next 60 days, they're given Lister or bi, B would be up to six months, and C would be over six months, right? And what happens is we actually take your list instead of Mike, everyone has a list of leads, and we take the list, and you actually monetize the sales value of each of those people. So if you're in an average $400,000 market, and you have 10 leads, that would potentially be listing prospects, even if you haven't even spoken to them yet, you just know they might be a possible listing. And even when you know you're getting 10 of those leads for 100,000 apiece, we're at 4 million already right now, just intend. Now you say okay, Sherry, I've got 20 potential sellers, at varying stages of ready to sell. Now I met 20 times 400, a pop or $8 million. And I haven't even talked to you about your buyer side, potential client relationships yet. So think about this. So now go to page two on the form, and the strategy and we're gonna look at all buyers, okay, same thing, identify what timeframe they're in roughly A, B, or C ranking, and then put a value for them. And when we add that up, and it's 10, we've got another 4 million if it's 20, we have another 8 million. And so if you have 20, buyer leads and 20. Let's do it. So it's many of you do, you're sitting on what I call unrealized business, when you look at it in terms of monetized value, not because we look at people as $1 sign sale, but because if you saw what's on your pipeline right now, and it was $16 million, I think you'd feel like the Rockstar agent that you are or could be, right? So coaching is not making people great. It's actually bringing out your potential of what you have. And you just don't realize youhave given potential.When agents come to me and they say, oh my god, here's a here the two bad examples everybody resonates with. They come to me and they say I have these three things that are happening. And I'm going out of town for you know, four days. I said, okay, can any of them happen before you get them any signed before you leave now? Okay, great. Let me know if you need anything. Well, two of them got listed. When was one was an expiring listing for 350 that got listed by you know, it's sold, actually. The other one got listed. It was 215. And it was that lifted by another agent in the office. She lost that so both those deals are gone. Before the four days are up. She comes into my office. My name is Jane, God bless her and she says you're not going to believe this. And I said why? She said my buyer that was going to write for 450 bought a for sale by owner. And I said, well, obviously you have other people in the pipeline. She said no. And this is what we hear. I was counting on those three things. She's crying, she was counting on a commission. I'm gonna sucks people. This is not how you This is why you are failing. And so to be totally blunt, it's like, oh my god, okay. So now as you said, we have to start over 90 days, two months it takes to cultivate, so then conversely with a better story, so you cannot just have three eggs and The basket people, it just it's not the way to do this business and you'll hate it. It is an up and down financial roller coaster. And again, any one of those blows would have been would have sucked just one of them all three, she didn't have if she had 25 or 30 more people to go talk to you, okay, she could have absorbed those hits. And then and and failures, you know, as out of her control a little bit. But like she could have gone to those other 25 to 30 leads, she didn't have anything in the backlog. So on the on the opposite spectrum. I had an agent come to me, one of the office and she came in and she said, You know, I feel like a loser 15 year veteran. Okay, she said, I feel like a loser. I said, Well, you're not a loser. She said, But I only have four buyers. And I said, Okay, handle the forum, I said, how many people you're talking to about listing their house? And she's like, well, I have a lot of those I said, are touch that have a ton of them. They said, Well, what's a ton? And like she said, I have 25 of those at least. And I said, if 25 listing leads, and you're telling me you're a loser, right? She said, Yeah. And I said, How many of those people are moving out of state? And she said, none of them and I said, Okay, so you have 54 pieces of business right here. Go fill this out, write down the numbers, fill in the blanks write down that value of each one of those potential sale, she came back 12 and a half million dollars. Okay, she's hugging me. She's feels like 10 She feels like 10 million 12 million. And And the truth was she about a 225 average sale price. And what I what she said to me, Mike is this, and this is where we fail again, she said to me, Well, none of these people are asking me to list their house. And I said they're not going to like we know what to do when a lead says Hey, Mike, I'm ready to sell my house. Hey, Cherie, like, I'm ready to go, I already bought a house and moving my leases up, I've already sold my house, I need to do this. Now. We know what to do when people call us. And when they do. What happens for these agents is it shows up in a blue frickin Tiffany box with a white bow on it, it's a gift. It happens once in a while. And it doesn't certainly doesn't happen often enough for people to make 150 or $350,000 a year. So if you want to be an agent that's making more money, you have to go make this happen. And so I said to her, they're not going to you have to add value and get yourself appointments of these people and get them excited about moving and go see their house. And so once you fill this pipeline up, she had, again, 54 pieces of the business 24 or 25, listing leads, and 29 buyer sides. And I said to her, you don't have any dialogue scripts, or talk tracks or strategies to get an appointment. So you need to come to life coaching each come i training and Thursday, whatever it was, and I'll teach you how to get appointments. So we fail, and we suck miserably as an industry at adding value to convert leads into clients and then getting appointments. So if you you could actually work a smaller number of people and just be more effective with a better strategy and get more business than trying to throw you know, whatever.I mean, these are these are conversations. All right. These are. So these are so in would you say within the last three to six months? What's what's timeframe, like how often? What should we call these as like conversations that you guys have had, whether you're buying or selling with consumers, over a periodof what? Well, whatever it takes. So people stay on this list really until they buy or die or tell you to stop calling and most people are not going to tell you to stop calling unless they have bought something. So I followed up with it with a lead from an open house Mike for 11 months, I didn't show houses for 11 months, I followed up with a 45 second voicemail that I left people that said, hey, Sherry Johnson, with XYZ company, I sent you some less days I'd love to show you these houses when you're ready like no this day or this day. They didn't call me they didn't call me. And there are many coaches out there that say after someone goes shoo, you know, dump them after the third time. That's not my strategy at all. If they're just not calling me back, that's okay. I actually would call and laugh and say, Hey, tell me if you want me to stop calling and I will. But I probably won't. I'm gonna I'm gonna call you again next month. I'm going to call you again next month. And what happened is these folks were like, in the 11th month, which coincidentally happened to me November, they said to me, Sherry Johnson, you are the only person that stayed in touch with us. We'd like to listen and sell our house. Can you come over this week now? I was like, yeah, and then I and then here's what's crazy. They listed and bought with me and then less than two years in less than two years they did it again. And that time the house I sold them was for it was a 450 list and they bought for 650 and this is a repeatable and the fortune is in the follow up people it is how long did it take me to make those two calls a month, right? It did. I made two calls. Add value, I stayed in touch. And really those people had I not stayed in touch with them 11 months. So here's what's cool. The Goldmine pipeline is like the Alaskan pipeline, it goes on forever. And you're sitting on a goldmine if you build a big enough backlog of people, like I used to sell 75 houses. And I had about 125 good leads on my list at all times. And so you can very mathematically with my formula, figure out exactly how many people have to be on the pipeline that you're going to convert over, you know, the next 636 12 months, you need business six months from now. So when somebody says they're not ready, that's okay. That's awesome. I actually need business eight months from now, because I don't know where that sales gonna come from. And this is funny, Mike, this actually came from me sitting around as an agent, saying, where's my next deal coming from? I did about three and a half million my first year in 1996, when we still had books, and we weren't online, really MLS books. And, and I was like, where am I getting my next sale? So I would write down everybody, because I'm even remotely talking to you. And then I would write down everybody about buying. And I would add it up. And I would I would be like, Look, I could do 8 million look, I could do you know, it'sfunny, I used to run around the notepad. That's how I kept track, as I said, but the white notepad and I remember having like 10 pages of people, I would just go through those names every day. And I would write my last notes. There's no system of follow up, and it's okay, follow up on this one, or I'd add it to my paper calendar. And follow up on it. So let's get into the communication part. Sure. How are we staying in touch? What's the conversation? Like? Are you reaching out on phone? Are you hitting any given them through email? So let's just take the average person that you have a conversation with, but I think where people get stuck is like, alright, they're not ready. But what the fuck do I say to them during this time? So like, let's get through the nurturing content? And how are we nurturing these people until they're ready, because you can't, you have value but you can't always be like, by you got it, it's there's a thin line, right? There's a you can always just be like, you can't be that slick salesman, but you can also be that non aggressor either, because that also says something. So what is the communicationyou're doing? Once somebody comes into your fold into your environment, they go on everything, right, you get their email, and you add them to your, your, your Facebook group, that's a private group that only your clients and past clients and family friends referral sources are in, you start to build a relationship with them. And, you know, if you identify at the beginning, you say here, I have an exclusive homebuyer guide that has everything I need to know about buying a home, I tell agents to take the explicit homebuyer guide, we give them one, but if you don't, if you already have one, and break that into like 15 emails, if they're gonna buy with you and list with you, you use that campaign and you say, it's never too soon to have me over to look at your house, I'm not coming to list it. I mean, I am coming to list it. But I want to come there first and see the house. Because I add value to the process before you go to Home Depot or hire a contractor. I can tell you, I could save you time and money and tell you exactly what to do with that slight floor in the back hall that you're thinking needs to go because you haven't sold a house in 15 years. And you don't know that today's buyers love slate. So you can add value early on. And then what happens is those people are like, You know what, we met you and now we're excited and the interest rates and this and that, we're gonna move it up, and now we're going to buy and move sooner. So I would put them on a very good email campaign doesn't have to be complicated. You don't have to spend a ton of money on a CRM, you can if you have a CRM, these come with those, you could just develop 16 emails that go out over time, with different points where you would say, you know, I'm still here, I'm if you're looking, if you're ready, still thinking of making a move? You know, for your SI people, I think your follow up, you know, a lot of times people make the mistake of thinking a C person is a C person six months after they put them on the list. And it's like, they could have changed, and you just, you're remembering that you made them a C, but that was six months ago or three months ago, they might see people turn into eight people very quickly. And you want to be the one that maximize that opportunity. So I would I would call them I would put them on an exclusive buyer program. Like everyone says, Well what's so exclusive? Well, it's yours number one and you are different than every other agent. So if you don't know that sit down over the weekend or this tonight and say what am I doing that's different than everybody else. My homebuyer guide was my listing tool like I used it as a prop and it got me more listing appointments because I would talk about the buying side but then I would quickly sort of identify you know, I want to come into your house that helps me to see your house while I'm out looking for a house for you. I can see your room sizes, your furniture, colors, things you love about your house and you You heard about your house. And they're like, Oh, no one's ever done that. That makes sense. And I just say, that's how I do things. I want to come see your house, what's in their house. Now we're talking about listing it. Now we're talking about a time frame. It shortens the sale process. And if you all would listen for like a second, here you are salespeople, like we said at the beginning, and your job is to get appointments, like nothing happens. You're not going to write an offer, not going to write a listing contract. If you don't have appointments in your in your schedule this week, it's not going to happen again. And I don't want that to happen is you have bills to pay and your whole family thing. Sure, you know, outworking and I want you to be in that 13% That's actually making money. So go my pipeline, over time should be carried around with you. And when you get lower, you start to see that you sold everything, if Bill your calendar by going back to that thing and saying okay, well to a bar.Like seriously, just go out to a family party. Okay, get together, like, oh, yeah, you have Thanksgiving, like this time that Thanksgiving, Christmas, Halloween, all the parents that were just trick or treating around the neighborhood's 10 to 15% of the people that you're walking around are moving this year, and all of them have referral for you. But here's what we're talking about is talking about building your audience building your list over time and building the wider net. She mentioned something that was important. The Facebook group, not all communication always has to be about real estate, that drip campaign should references just one touch through emails. But if they're also the Facebook group, or friends on Facebook, she's probably also talking about the news restaurant in the community. Right, right. She's also talking about a picture with her fabulous kids. She mentioned earlier, I'm sure it's mixed and matched somewhere in there. And it all starts by that little homebuyers guide you have what's the hook? That was the what gave you the excuse? So like, do you guys have any tools? Or do you guys have any content you own, you guys have any original content that will position you as an expert, like you have to have the basic tools and know your brokerages site is not good enough, because that's their tool, not yours. And you need your own brand. I mean, that's what people are hiring. Soyeah, it could be it could be educational, you could do a video series on your homebuyer guide, put on your YouTube channel and say, Look, if you're interested this is this is available for a minute already. In the meantime, I'm not going anywhere I work at your pace, your speed if we need to, if we need to move that up quicker, I will. But in the meantime, I'm going to put you into our system. And I'm going to share with you we do stuff on you know community involvement, we do a lot for the community, it's just other stuff outside of buying and selling and you're gonna love it because it's all great information. And it's part of the community, we all live work and play, I think that say, I love having conversations that have nothing to do with real estate, because you're at the center of those. So if you haven't done a networking event where you put four or five or eight women together that could all help each other, you know, do that. You're the, you're the center of those things. And when eventually the someone's gonna say, Hey, how's the real estate market share, and you're gonna start talking about the real estate market, everywhere you go. And like you said, this, you know, I made $18,000 at the carwash because I said real estate and I and I was available. And I I capitalized on talking to someone, which is again, what you're supposed to be doing, you know, if you don't like the word prospecting, I say talk real estate to everyone you meet, everywhere you go, you're gonna bump into people, Kid event, sports event, a work event, holiday event, birthday, whatever, you can make money in this business so easily, if you would just think about serving with, you know, value add a value driven strategy, the goal mind pipeline, what's so cool about this is that on the very last page of the pipeline, we separate the A's from the A, B, and C. And when we look at all A, B, and C, it's a pretty big number 16 20 million, whatever. When you just look at the A's, you're able to now forecast like a business owner, what your sales and listings will look like over the next two months. And ultimately what your cash flow will look like which again, we never see that we agents or make money, make no money, right? You don't have to be in that feast and famine, you can actually look at and say I'm I should, over the next two months, make this and this and now you're saying predictability, predictability, I now am in control of my business and you can make whatever you want. You want to double your business, double the amount of appointments should go on, put more people on the pipeline. And by the way, I almost forgot to say like if someone says they have a referral for you like this one guy friend of mine, Josh said I have a referral and my neighbor wants to sell and we're like in a park There's no way I'm getting that information right then. And I said, great, cool that his neighbor, they live in a 650 plus neighborhood. So I'm going to write on the goldmine pipeline under listing lead Josh's neighbors 650. Why cuz I want to remind myself to call the lead referral source, right? Otherwise, that's going to go through the cracks, I'm going to see that house listed and be like, Oh, my God, I talk to somebody and be pissed at myself. Now, you won't be because you put Josh's neighbor 650 on the go my pipeline sheet as a reminder, as a placeholder until you get the clients actual information. So this system is like simple, but it's brilliant, if I may say so. And I've helped 1000s of people like that we're gonna quit the business, say, You know what, I did this. And now I've already sold 3 million. I mean, we take people from a million and a half to 6 million in one year, we take people from six to 60, and so on. So you know, if you want a copy of this, I'm happy to you know, go to just email me, man, you rock at Sherry Johnson comm. We'll put that in, in your podcast if you want. But I'll give you the system, the form and the ways to maximize it. It is a simple system we have provided also in an Excel spreadsheet for people who like it, most agents don't like Excel. But the bottom line is talking to more people. And using this as this is your list to follow up with every week. And if you can't follow up, because your scripts soccer you feel like you just can't you're dead ending everywhere, then, you know, hire somebody hire coach, though, listen to some free content that is out there.So easy, though. Like, it's so easy, like you can't, if you can't follow up? No, I'm just gonna tell them I quit the business like you're not, it's not gonna work like this is really simple. And I don't want to be the negative Nancy over here. But you'll just be honest, like if this is really simple, so I want to, it's so similar to how I used to run my business back home. So here's what I walk you guys through this. And we'll wrap this up and get Sherry's info. So you guys can get a copy of this thing, you definitely get it. But I used to carry a yellow pad in my back pocket. It's how I got started. At four o'clock in the morning in the nightclubs during bottle service, I'd be getting everyone's drunk email addresses and phone numbers. And when conversations for me to get them to start talking about a house was always asking them what they do first, and they always have to ask you what you do next. And it always opened up the conversation for real estate. So like if I knew that 10 to 15% of the market moves every every night, or every night, every year and every night when I go out. I know that I'm just looking for 10 to 15 people to talk to I don't know yet. What I ended up doing was building an email list and a direct mail lists, just friends and family some conversations with real estate or not. But I would always add them to my direct mail list, which meant they got my next touch each and every month. I always add them to my email list, which meant they got my next touch and I wasn't ever talking about real estate. I was just building an audience and it still worked. I was I was I was wishing people happy St. Patty's Day in town where the bar specials were. I was wishing people happy Valentine's Day. My direct mail pieces were just like toilet humor. Fun facts have nothing to do with real estate. But what I realized is that if you have brand associated on communication, whether it's a shirt, you're wearing a hat, you're wearing the sign and Sherry's video right here behind her I know she has Sheri Johnson coaching, she's not doing that on accident. She's doing that on purpose, because you might not be listening to the audio of this. You might be watching the video and um, she's branding, branding, branding, but that consistent communication, because you're right 80% of those people that you have conversations with, end up hiring the first person they meet with when they're seriously ready. So just because you have that one conversation up front, like it's your job to continuously follow up and you don't always have to follow up in a way that involves them, like hogtied them and sending them into a house and getting them pre approved. Like you could just be in relationship with people but it starts by consistent communication to the same audience over time, not only build your brand, but get those people that you're talking to once to actually come back. Well put Jerry, I love it. Why don't you go ahead and give them your website again, so they can know we'll get this all wrapped up?Absolutely. So you can find us at Sherry Johnson calm and that is Sh e r i Johnson. No t so Sherry Johnson sh t ri johnson.com. If you're listening to this, and in there is a on demand webinar on the go mind pipeline that you can download in a minute and just put in fillable form it'll email the the download of this very strategy as a web. It's on our it's on demand, an on demand webinar. The other thing you can do is send an email to you rock at Sherry johnson.com and ask for the goldmine pipeline and mentioned this podcast if you want or just say I want a copy of the Gulf, my pipeline, we'll send it out to you right away. And we have you know, my podcast is you Rock cherry Johnson, are you rock to share Johnson podcast, which is really fun. You can listen to our exclusive interview with Mike because it was fantastic and it was awesome. And yeah, that's how you can find us love to love to share anything with any of you whether you want coaching or you just want some really good free content, I have a tendency to give out a lot of just helpful staff to help you and if you do want coaching, we're happy to help any of you. You could also see all of the coaching programs on my website.Love it. Thank you Sherry class, give her a call. Look her up guys and thank you guys for listening another episode of the real estate marketing dude podcast. I appreciate you guys each and every month. Why don't you guys go ahead and follow us on social if you'd like to contact us seeing subscribe to the show, follow us on Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, subscribe to that channel. And you know if you need more real estate marketing help, we'll script that and distribute all your video content for you without making you look like a total loser on camera will make you look really really really cool. And I think you're gonna be happy with the results. So why don't you give us a shot? Visit us at real estate marketing do.com real estate marketing dude.com We appreciate you guys listen another episode. See you next week. Thank you for watching another episode of the real estate marketing dude podcast. If you need help with video or finding out what your brand is, visit our website at WWW dot real estate marketing do.com We make branding and video content creation simple and do everything for you. So if you have any additional questions, visit the site, download the training, and then schedule a time to speak with a dude and get you rolling in your local marketplace. Thanks for watching another episode of the podcast. We'll see you next time.

What I learned from reading The General and the Genius: Groves and Oppenheimer—The Unlikely Partnership that Built the Atom Bomb by James Kunetka. Sign up to listen to the rest of this episode and get lifetime access to every full episode. You will: Immediately unlock 223 full length episodes that are available no where else.Get access to every future episode for free.Learn from history's greatest entrepreneurs and apply their ideas to your work.Tap this link on a mobile device so you can install your private podcast feed into your favorite podcast player. It takes less than 29 seconds to set up. You will learn the key insights from biographies on Steve Jobs, Elon Musk, John D. Rockefeller, Coco Chanel, Andrew Carnegie, Enzo Ferrari, Estee Lauder, Jeff Bezos, Warren Buffett, Charlie Munger, Phil Knight, Joseph Pulitzer, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Alexander Graham Bell, Bill Gates, P.T. Barnum, Edwin Land, Henry Ford, Walter Chrysler, Thomas Edison, David Ogilvy, Ben Franklin, Howard Hughes, George Lucas, Levi Strauss, Walt Disney and so many more. You will learn from the founders of Nike, Patagonia, Apple, Microsoft, Hershey, General Motors, Ford, Standard Oil, Polaroid, Home Depot, MGM, Intel, Federal Express, Wal Mart, JP Morgan, Chrysler, Cadillac, Oracle, Hyundai, Seagram, Berkshire Hathaway, Teledyne, Adidas, Les Schwab, Renaissance Technologies, IKEA, Sony, Ferrari, and so many more. WHAT OTHER PEOPLE ARE SAYING:“Without a doubt, the highest value-to-cost ratio I've taken advantage of in the last year is the Founders podcast premium feed. Tap into eons of knowledge and experiences, condensed into digestible portions. Highly, highly recommend. “Uniquely outstanding. No fluff and all substance. David does an outstanding job summarizing these biographies and hones in on the elements that make his subjects so unique among entrepreneurs. I particularly enjoy that he focuses on both the founder's positive and negative characteristics as a way of highlighting things to mimic and avoid.”“I just paid for my first premium podcast subscription for Founders podcast. Learning from those who came before us is one of the highest value ways to invest time. David does his homework and exponentially improves my efficiency by focusing on the most valuable lessons.”“I haven't found a better return on my time and money than your podcast for inspiration and time-tested wisdom to help me on my journey.“I've now listened to every episode. From this knowledge I've doubled my business to $500k a year. Love your passion and recommend your podcast to everyone.”“Founders is the only podcast I pay for and it's worth 100x the cost.”“I have listened to many podcasts on entrepreneurship (HIBT, Masters of Scale, etc.) and find Founders to be consistently more helpful than any other entrepreneurship podcast. David is a craftsperson, he carefully reads biographies of founders, distills the most important anecdotes and themes from their life, and draws commonalities across lives. David's focus is rightfully not on teaching you a formula to succeed but on constantly pushing you to think different.”“I highly highly recommend this podcast. Holy cow. I've been binge listening to these and you start to see patterns across all these incredible humans.”Listening to your podcast has changed my life and that is not a statement I make often.“After one episode I quickly joined the Misfit feed. Love the insight and thoughts shared along the way. David loves what he does and it shines through on the podcast. Definitely my go-to podcast now.”“It is worth every penny. I cannot put into words how fantastic this podcast is. Just stop reading this and get the full access.”“Personally it's one of my top 3 favorite podcasts. If you're into business and startups and technology, this is for you. David covers good books and I've come to really appreciate his perspective. Can't say enough good things.”“I quickly subscribed and it's honestly been the best money I've spent all year. It has inspired me to read biographies. Highly recommend.”“This is the most inspirational and best business podcast out there. David has inspired me to focus on biographies rather than general business books. I'm addicted.”“Anyone interested in business must find the time to listen to each any every Founders podcast. A high return on investment will be a virtual certainty. Subscribe and start listening as soon as possible.”“David saves you hundreds of hours by summarizing bios of legendary business founders and providing valuable insight on what makes an individual successful. He has introduced me to many founders I would have never known existed.”“The podcasts offer spectacular lessons on life, human nature and business achievement. David's enthusiasm and personal thoughts bring me joy. My journey has been enhanced by his efforts.”"Founders is the best self investment that I've made in years."GET LIFETIME ACCESS TO FOUNDERS

You can use mindfulness to help your motivation level. Today I'm sharing 5 tricks you can use to help you with motivation. Here's an example. I bought some tulip and daffodil bulbs and although I've never planted anything like that before, I always think these flowers look amazing in the Springtime, especially after a long winter of cold temperature along with the kinds snow and ice. Tulips and daffodils always cheer me up when I see them in front of someone's house or in a park. So when I was in Home Depot or Lowe's I saw these bulbs and decided to buy them. They've been in my car for a week or more and I started thinking, if I don't plant these, it is going to be too late. Listen & Subscribe on: iTunes / Stitcher / Podbean / Overcast / Spotify Be motivated with these 5 tricks: 1/ Reasons & Outcomes (What do you want to achieve and why) 2/ Accountability Partners (Get others involved) 3/ Organize your thoughts, make a list and post it. 4/ Take action every day. 5/ Enjoy the process (Don't overthink it) Celebrate your successes. Thanks for checking out Mindfulness Mode. Tune in to listen to the rest of the episode. Suggested Resources Book: In the Face of Fear: Buddhist Wisdom for Challenging Times by Barry Boyce App: Insight Timer Related Episodes 574 How To Have Fun With Your Fear; Laura Di Franco 506 Grit, Love, And Fearless Living With Gregory Copploe 359 Turn Fear into Health, Wealth and Happiness; Fearvana Author; Akshay Nanavati 228 Fear Is Not Real Explains Salt Water Buddha Author Jaimal Yogis 189 Surrender To Fear To Reach Peace Says Relationship Expert Erik Newton Special Offer Are you experiencing anxiety & fear? You can get through this. I'm Bruce Langford, a practicing hypnotist. I use hypnosis to fast-track people just like you to shed their inner bully and move forward with confidence. Book a Free Coaching Session to get you on the road to a more satisfying life, feeling grounded and focused. See me an email at bruce@mindfulnessmode.com with ‘Motivation' in the subject line. We'll set up a zoom call and talk about how you can move forward to a better life. Send me an email at bruce@mindfulnessmode.com