Podcast appearances and mentions of joe as

Going on podcasts can be a great opportunity for small business owners. You’re getting in front of a new audience to tell your story and show your expertise. But did you know there’s a whole other avenue you can explore? Kristin Molenaar does, and she tell us all about it! Plus, in Build Something More, she walks us through forming your podcast pitch. (more…) View on separate page Transcript Joe: Hey everybody, and welcome to Episode 207 of How I Build It, the podcast that asks, How did you build that? Today my guest is… I’m so terrible because I just asked you how to pronounce your last name. Kristin Molenaar. Kristin: You got it. Molenaar. Joe: Excellent. Excellent. I’m excited to be talking to Kristin Molenaar. She is the founder of YesBoss. And we’re going to be talking about why being a podcast guest is ineffective for many entrepreneurs. But before we get into that, I do want to tell you that today’s episode is brought to you by three fantastic sponsors: Mindsize, Restrict Content Pro, and TextExpander. You will be hearing about those fine folks later in the episode. Right now. Let’s bring on our guests. Kristin, how are you? Kristin: Hey, I’m doing well. How are you? Joe: I am doing fantastically. Like I said, I’m really excited to talk about this. Because I do feel like for a long time I didn’t take advantage of the fact well enough that I was going on other people’s podcasts and trying to build my audience, things like that. I know that a lot of my guests, this is a platform for them. Basically, what we’re trading here is you are giving me some of your time so I can create good content and I am putting you in front of my audience. So I want you to have people get in touch with you and stuff like that. So hopefully, this will be a good reference for future guests on this podcast and others. But before we get into that—I just said ‘before we get into that’ like three times—I want you to tell people who you are and what you do. Kristin: I run a company called YesBoss. We’re a podcast booking agency, essentially. So we help mostly service-based entrepreneurs, so online service providers, we help them get booked on podcasts so they can generate more leads in just an hour a week. My zone of genius is talking. I like to talk for a living, and we help other clients who like to do that exact same thing. Joe: That’s fantastic. And I’ve got to say you do a good job. I get lots of guest pitches each day and I have a pretty strong litmus test for if I’m going to respond or not or if I’m going to accept the guest or not. And you pass not once but twice or thrice, I think at this point. Kristin: A testament to our service, huh? Thank you for that. Joe: Absolutely. Because you get the pitches and it’s like, “Hi (name), I’m person…” And then like five paragraphs about why they’re so great. And I’m just like, “I don’t want you to just… I want to bring value to my listeners.” I don’t remember exactly what you said in your email but I read it and I was like, “I think this will be insanely valuable for both me and my listener.” Kristin: Well, I’m excited. There’s definitely a formula there. There’s definitely a lot of testing we’ve done to those pitches. So I’m so glad to hear your thoughts on it. Thank you so much. Joe: Absolutely. And thank you for taking the time. I feel like you’ve listened to the show and you knew exactly what I want to talk about. So, you don’t have to say whether you have or not, but it felt that way at least. So you are a podcast booking agency. There is definitely a lot of value in that. So maybe before we get into the main thing that we’re talking about, why should more entrepreneurs go on podcasts? Kristin: I would say that it’s like the simplest sales funnel I’ve ever built in my whole entire life. I feel like as entrepreneurs, you know, especially if you’re an entrepreneur that has ever been on Facebook, you’re gonna be hit with a lot of messages about how to do all the things. And I think what took me a while to really learn because when I first started in this entrepreneurial journey I was floundering for 14 months, and then I found a rhythm that really worked. What I really found is it all boils down to having a sales funnel that hits a few checkmarks. So at the top of that sales funnel is, how are you getting visible? How are you attracting those people? How are you then nurturing those people, selling those people, and retaining those people? So that’s just this basic sales funnel strategy. And there’s all these ways to do that. There’s ads, there’s social media platforms. There’s all these top level things to get new audience attraction, then there’s all these ways to nurture your clients, you know, email lists or people that are on your social media. How are you retaining those existing people and selling? So there’s all these different ways to do this. What I have found though is… I stumbled upon this honestly. When I started doing podcast guesting myself, what I realized is I was getting in front of new people and attracting new people, and forming relationships with a new person. So specifically the podcast host. And what happened afterwards was people were coming to me to ask about my services and they had already been pre-sold. Because the nature of a podcast episode is that you are building that trust factor really rapidly, you are attracting. You’re the nurturing by really sharing all of your genius on that episode. Like you already said at the beginning of this episode, you bring on guests, and you want to highlight all the ways that they know how to do what they do. So you’re providing a platform for me to talk to you about how smart I am. I mean, if you want to put it that way. Joe: Yeah, absolutely. That’s exactly what it is. Kristin: And by the end of the episode, you know how to work with me, you know who in your network to tell to work with me. And then as a ripple effect, so I see this as a secondary thing, as the secondary thing, your audience and the people that are listening to the podcast also know that. So I’ve just been kind of blown away at how effective and fun it’s been. Joe: That’s incredible. I love a lot of what you said there. I mean, if longtime listeners of the show will know I’ve said no trust a million times on this podcast. Because it’s so important. It’s why I teach people how to start their own podcasts to grow their business because it’s an easy way… not an easy way but it’s a fast way to convince people that you are likeable and trustworthy. And people invite me into their headphones every week. So they feel like they know me. And it’s a strong bond. So, when I have a guest on the show, I’m saying I trust this person enough to give them the platform of listeners I have teach me something. I learn something from every single one of my guests. So I love what you said there about how this is the simplest sales funnel you’ve ever built in your life. How do you figure out what shows you should go on? Kristin: I think this is a really good question. I think I’ve got to start it by saying this. I think that most people see podcasts guesting in one of two ways. They see it as a traditional marketing strategy. And that marketing strategy says, “Find the podcast with the biggest audience that you can attract and go there.” And then the other people see this as traditional PR strategy. And the PR strategy says, “Get on the podcast with the biggest name recognition so you can leverage that authority on your website, your social media presence,” all those places. For me, I see it a bit differently. For me, I have realized that being a profitable podcast guest has more to do with relationships than it does marketing and PR strategies. So when I’m looking at what podcasts I want to be on… You know, I looked at you, Joe, I didn’t necessarily look at your audience and who you’ve attracted but like, are you someone that I want to have a business relationship with? Are you someone who has a complimentary or similar message to that that I share? Do our business philosophies align? Do we think the same way when it comes to what we do for our clients? Because I have seen that when I focus on relationships, the ripple effects of every time that I show up are so much greater than what can happen when I just attract your audience. I’ve seen things being invited to be a guest inside somebody’s paid course or mastermind or whatever. I’ve had those opportunities arise. I’ve been invited to speak on stages, I’ve been invited to have JV partnerships, somebody that interviewed me is now an affiliate partner for me, so they make money when I make money. These kinds of things all come from relationship. And when you’re looking just at the person’s audience, you’re really missing out on that relationship aspect. Sponsor: This episode is brought to you by Restrict Content Pro. If you need a fast, easy way to set up a membership site for yourself or your clients, look no further than the Restrict Content Pro WordPress plugin. 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Joe: It becomes increasingly clear now why your pitch to come on this show stood out more than other pitches. Because, again, I really can’t stress this enough. I talk a lot. I try not to talk about myself a lot. When I get a pitch is just like, “Jim baseball, went to Harvard, and was the first of his class and all this and now he’s great. And here’s all the reasons He’s great.” I’m just like, “Cool. What does that mean for me?” I’ve had great people on my podcast, but I want my audience to come away with someone they can feel like they can form a relationship with. So I really love that. Kristin: There’s two things that I want to say to kind of expand on what you’ve just said. It’s the job of the podcast guests to deliver an episode on a silver platter to the podcast host. And that starts with writing a really good pitch. The pitch has got to include talking points that are not all about how I built a million-dollar business with a team of five people. Okay, cool. But what is that episode about? What is the value that you’re going to be bringing to the podcast host audience? So, the podcast guests, they should be focused on the podcast host. What they have to understand is a podcast host is looking for how to deliver the most value to their audience. So you’ve got to deliver to them exactly what the episode is going to be about. Because if I hadn’t written talking points that were valuable to your audience, we would get on this interview and you would be thinking, “Cool, I don’t know what to ask Kristin. I am not sure what her zone of genius is. I don’t even know what this episode is gonna be about.” No one would find value in that episode at all, and that would be me doing you a disservice. Joe: That’s a very generous way to put it. Because I also think it’s the host’s job to tee up things, really good things for the guests to ask. It’s a good back and forth, a good conversation. But like you said, you gave me topics, and I’m like, “Yes, this is really good for my audience.” If we look at the pitch and it’s like, “Yeah, I built a million dollars in 30 days with five people or whatever,” it’s like, “Cool. I want guests that my audience can relate to.” I’ve had really good big name guests, but the episodes didn’t do very well because the guest was not relatable. Whereas some of the episodes with maybe lesser known people, people who don’t have their own giant audience, but delivered huge value… downloads through the roof. So it’s definitely less about who is on the show as much as what you talk about on the show. Kristin: It also hits on the point that your accolades have to have relevance. Accolades for the sake of accolades are not interesting to anyone but yourself. Joe: Yeah, exactly. Kristin: There’s a place for it in the pitch to talk about the things that you’ve done, but the point of talking about those things are to just prove to the person that you have the ability to talk about those talking points. So if it’s where I went to college or something else, there’s no relevance there. There’s no tie into what the episode is actually about or what we’re going to be talking about. Joe: Right. Yeah. Unless my show was like, “People who went to Harvard.” Kristin: There you go. Joe: Especially the revenue one. This is my last ranty point. But the revenue one is always suspect to me, because if you have a million-dollar revenue business and your expenses are like a million in one dollars, you don’t have a successful business; you are making no money. There are at least better accolades than how much revenue your business makes. Kristin: Right. It’s a vanity metric. Joe: Yeah, exactly. Kristin: Revenue is a vanity metric. Joe: Yeah, exactly. Well, that was fun. I have strong opinions and I’m always happy for it to wax poetic about them. But getting back on course here, why should we go on a podcast? We answered how do you figure out what shows to go on. Let’s say now that the listener here has reached out to a podcast and they have successfully landed the guest spot. The topic that you reached out about, the reason why being a podcast guest is ineffective for most entrepreneurs is one that really rings true to me. Because it’s time that you should really take advantage of in some way. First of all, let’s talk about why is it ineffective for most entrepreneurs, then we can talk about how to not make it ineffective. How to make it effective? There we go. Kristin: Yeah, I think that’s perfect. I think that’s perfect. I do talk to people all the time and have said, “I’ve been invited to speak on a podcast and it didn’t yield any results for me. I didn’t get any clients from it. There were no results.” However, that looks to you. And at the root of it, I feel that there’s a common denominator here. And often that is that the person doing the guesting doesn’t really know what they’re offering. It’s probably too wide. I mean, really, this is like a business foundational thing, but it is so essential when you’re getting yourself out there and creating visibility for yourself. Yes, okay, maybe you’re a business consultant, business coach, maybe you’re a copywriter, but those are really, really broad things. You’ve got to know like, what are you specifically doing? So here’s the thing about what I do. People know that I booked people on podcasts. That’s not very wide. That is really darn specific. That same kind of specificity can be for even the business coaches or consultants that offer a wide variety of services, you have to think about what’s your point of entry. What’s the first thing that people do to work with you? What is that one problem or one solution that you can solve for somebody, that very first one that you can solve for them? If you’re a copywriter, I’ve talked to several copywriters, who because they’re really great copywriters and they’ve got great social media presences, they’ve been invited to speak on podcast and they’re like, “But it didn’t yield anything.” And I’m thinking, “Okay, when you got off that episode, did the podcast host, they probably thought that you were really smart, and they would love to work with you if they had some kind of work to give to you, but did they even know what to hire you for? Were they hiring you to write their sales pages? Were they hiring you to write their social media content? Were they hiring you to write emails for them? What were they hiring you to do?” Because there’s got to be that really specific offer that you know how to talk about. The way that I talk to my clients is, do you have a methodology for what you do? That methodology becomes so easy to get in the room and have an interview about how you do all the things you do. So, for me, my objective with a really good podcast interview is I’m able to talk someone else through how to do my job. So essentially, if you’re a DIY kind of person, you could do my job for me. And that’s okay because my ideal clients, the cream of the crop are the people that hear that I know what I’m doing, they know that they don’t want to DIY it themselves, and it becomes a no-brainer for them to work with somebody like me. Joe: Love that. Because something I think a lot of people are worried about, especially when they go on podcasts or when they blog, is that, “Well, if I just tell people what to do, they’re gonna do it, and they’re not gonna hire me.” But that’s not the case. Imagine if you hired somebody to remodel your kitchen. After he walks me through how he’s going to do it, I want to hire him even more because I’m like, “I can’t do this. I’m gonna mess this up.” Kristin: That’s a good example. Joe: It’s the same. I was on a podcast recently where we talked about four ways to monetize your podcast. And I told them everything that they need to do to monetize their podcast. And if they want to go off and do it, they can, but if they’re like, “Wait, I don’t know how to configure this tool that Joe talked about to do it,” or “I don’t know how to set up a membership site with WordPress,” now they know how to get ahold of me because… Well, I don’t want to spoil what you’re about to say, but they do know how to get a hold of me I suspect because of the way you’re going to answer this next question, which they don’t know what they’re offering. How do you begin Build an offering for a podcast? What are the steps that I need to take to make sure I am making the most of being a podcast guest? Kristin: There’s two things. There’s what happens before, which we already kind of touched on, and what happens after. So the what happens before is making sure that you’re writing those talking points that lead the conversation into that. The whole topic that we’re talking about right now is being an effective versus an ineffective podcast guest. You asking me that tees up all the talking points and the methodologies that I have to share. You are asking me questions where the answers are my methodology. Like I’m able to talk about that. This is something that when we work with our clients, we give them a really big questionnaire that’s talking… We ask them to tell us all about how they serve their clients and just tons of stuff. And then we use that information to write talking points that will really showcase their genius in the best way possible. So it all starts there. But then I think what people really miss out on is it follows up by having a connection with that podcast host. And starting that relationship after the interview has ended, after you stop recording, having a conversation about like, “How can I serve your audience? How can I be of value to you?” I think that that then formulates the snowball effect of a genuine relationship and showing up in a way for that podcast host where they know that you’re there for that relationship. Well, I think that some people would think that my answer would have to do all about the methodology and sharing about that methodology. The only real secret there is, when you’ve got to have one? And it’s going to be dependent on what you do. You’ve just got to know how to do what you do, and you’ve got to be willing to have a genuine pullback, all the curtains, talk about all the things. I mean, I tell podcast hosts when I come in, like, “I’m an open book. You can ask me whatever you want.” My mindset is that I don’t have any secrets. We live in a world where you could Google everything. Like me pretending if I don’t tell you you won’t know, who am I fooling really? So you’ve got to leverage on teeing up the conversation and being really genuine about having a goal of a relationship with the person that you’re in the room. Sponsor: This episode is brought to you by TextExpander. It’s a new year and you can start off on the right foot by reclaiming your time. With TextExpander, you can save time by converting any text you type into keyboard shortcuts called snippets. Say goodbye to repetitive text entry, spelling and message errors, and trying to remember the right thing to say. With TextExpander, you can say the right thing in just a few keystrokes. Better than copy and paste better than scripts and templates, TextExpander snippets allow you to maximize your time by getting rid of the repetitive things you type while still customizing and personalizing your messages. TextExpander can be used in any platform, any app, anywhere you type. Take back your time and increase your productivity in the new year. And let me just say that snippets is not all it does. With advanced snippets, you can create fill-ins, pop up fields, and much more. You can even use JavaScript or AppleScript. I can type out full instructions for my podcast editor, Hi, Joel, in just a few keystrokes. Another one of my favorite and most used snippets is PPT. This will take whatever text I have on my keyboard and convert it to plain text so I’m no longer fighting formatting. Plus, if you have employees or contractors, you can use TextExpander to manage and share snippets with them so you all get it right every time. I’ve recently started sharing TextExpander snippets with my virtual assistant. This year, How I Built It is focusing on being productive while working from home. TextExpander is the perfect tool for that. Plus, they’re providing resources and blog posts to help you make the most of their tool and be productive. TextExpander is available on Mac OS, Windows, Chrome, iPhone, and iPad. If you’ve been curious about trying TextExpander or simple automation in general, now is the time. Listeners can get 20% off their first year. Just visit textexpander.com/podcast and let them know that I sent you. Joe: Actually, to your exact point, the exact point that we’re making, I listened to Smart Passive Income some time ago. This is Pat Flynn’s podcast. And he had a publicist on there named Brittney Lynn. And I listened to that episode and I was like, “Well…” I hired her. I hired her to help me figure out my messaging. And she sent me a huge questionnaire and I honestly had to think about it for a week. And I’m like, “What do I want out of whatever? What is my messaging?” Now I have those talking points, mostly around podcasting and a target audience and things like that. I think that’s super duper valuable. I think also something that you’re talking about that I had not thought of, or I honestly didn’t think the conversation would go in this direction, so this is great, is you’re really leaning on the relationship you’re forming with the podcast host. So this is not just a call to action, go to my website/joe to get the free download. It’s like, “I just spent an hour talking to this person. We get along well. How can we help each other?” It’s almost like you’re creating public networking meetings with a podcast host? Kristin: It’s like speed dating for business almost. And I say speed dating on purpose because the idea is that we get past all the fluff. We’re not like, “How are you?” And we did do some of this. I know that you have kids. You know that I have a kid. We did a little bit of that before the interview recorded. But it’s like, let’s get down to like the nitty-gritty of how we’re serving our people and the meaningful stuff about our business to see if like, “Hey, maybe I can support your audience. Maybe you can support my audience.” We’re getting into the really important details that are essential when you’re having a good business relationship with somebody. Joe: That’s super interesting. I’ll ask you this then. This sort of, we’ll say strategy, works pretty well for you because you are in the business of podcast booking. So obviously, you go on a podcast, I like you, I trust you, now you know what the show is about. So if you have a potential guest for me, I am more likely to accept that, right? Kristin: That’s true. That’s true. Joe: What about people who aren’t necessarily in the podcast space. Again, let’s say I make or I fix bicycles or whatever. I keep using that example but it’s like hyperlocal. So it doesn’t really work that well. But let’s just say I make websites. What… Kristin: That one works. Joe: Yeah, that one works. Kristin: I can work with that. Thank you. Joe: Just to give you a really hard exam. How good are you? Kristin: I know, right? Joe: So I make websites, I’m booking myself to go on podcast to talk about making websites, how do I nurture that relationship with a podcast host if they don’t have…” Well, I won’t qualify? How do I nurture that relationship with the podcast host? Kristin: What we have found is our sweet spot is entrepreneurs that serve other entrepreneurs. No, I’m not saying that there is not a viable strategy here beyond that. But for us, that is really our sweet spot, and where I can just talk all day long. Here’s the thing. When you are an entrepreneur and you’re getting in front of somebody who has the same business philosophies as you do, you can riff and get passionate about the same exact things, which I know that you and I can do that. What happens is my network becomes open to you and your network becomes open to me because we know that if this friend of ours or this peer of ours, somebody… Well, I’ll just say it this way. Somebody else that has interviewed me, another podcast host, we know that telling that other podcast hosts that they should meet you, Joe, like, well, they like me and they got passionate about the same things with me as you and I got passionate about. So if they need websites, you’re the guy. And you know somebody in your network that you have hit it off with, they hit it off with you and you and I have hit it off, so they’re gonna hit it off with me. So it’s easy to make those inner network connections. This is where I think that the strategy in my mind or what’s played out for me and our clients is so different than PR and marketing because we’re looking at… You’ve said it. We’re looking at the relationship and we’re looking at, you know, is this somebody that would be an easy person for me to tell my network, “You’ve got to hear about Joe.” But also what that does is… This is not the answer the question, but it just came to mind. Another thing that does is when I go and fulfill my obligation to tell my audience about this interview, because I do think that if you’re going to be a guest, you’ve got to be willing to talk about the fact that you’ve been on the interview, that is bare minimum commitment in my mind, it’s easy for me to write something genuine on LinkedIn, like, ” You’ve got to listen to podcasts with Joe. He and I have so many things in common. These are the things that we talked about.” That excitement that comes from sharing that episode is genuine because of the relationship I felt. I see this as really tapping into each other’s networks. Another example that I like to give is relationship building also opens doors to bigger podcasts, and bigger mediums, and all of those things that you want to look at when you’re doing traditional marketing and traditional PR. So, the example you talked about Smart Passive Income, you know, there’s tons of people that would love to be on Smart Passive Income and they’ve come to me and said, “Can you get me on Smart Passive Income.” And what I say is this. “Look, you don’t just knock on that door and say, ‘Hey, here I am. Can you please have me on your podcast?'” What you do though, is you look at other people that are in his circle, and get in with those people to see who can open those doors. So a great way to drive this home is you don’t go and send a cold pitch to the queen and expect to be invited to visit the queen. However, there are people that know the queen that maybe you can get in with them. And if you really liked them and you have some commonalities there, they might invite you to come meet the Queen someday. This is a long-term strategy and it doesn’t stop at just my network and your network. It ripples. It ripples if you really foster these things. Joe: Yeah, absolutely. I think that’s a great analogy. And it’s proven too. A warm lead is more often likely to succeed than a cold call. If someone makes the introduction for me as opposed to me just saying, like, “Hey, I want to use your platform,” the warm lead is going to work out better more often than not. So we’ve talked about kind of tapping into the network through forming the relationship with the host, and the guest host relationship. Do you do anything to talk directly to the audience? If someone is listening now, they’re like, “Man, I really want Kristin to help me get on other people’s podcasts,” is there a strategy there for that as well? Kristin: On our end, if I’m asked what my call to action is, we do have that backend stuff in place. I will say though because I want to make sure everybody’s expectations are correct, I have found that not as many people wanted to come and get on my email list and take my DIY content. For me, that hasn’t been a huge… I don’t know, a huge success, I’ll say. Some people do end up on my email list but I think that… And maybe this is because my service is very done-for-you that the people who are attracted to a done for you service are interested in consuming your DIY content. Joe: Oh yeah. Kristin: So I think that you’ve got to be really creative about how your content is positioned if you’re a done-for-you service. I mean, you can touch on that DIY but you’ve got to be really concise about it. So for example, my opt-in is a 10 minute masterclass and I had a few clients review that and they were like, “I think it needs to be shorter.” It had been like 13 minutes and I chopped it down to 10 minutes. Because what I realized is, look, the people that want to hire me don’t want to hear me drone on and on. I’ve got to get to the point as quickly as possible. So I think you’ve got to think about that back end offer a little bit. And I will just say my experience has been that, that has not been the most profitable. So, like say 100 people end up on my email list. I am getting more value from meeting two people in the podcast host network than I am from those 100 people that got on my email list. And heck, those 100 people took a whole lot more work. Because that’s the kind of work that you’re like sitting behind your computer trying to… You know, you’re writing the content. For me, that’s harder. Joe: You’re building up. Kristin: Exactly. I would rather meet another podcast host or be invited to speak inside somebody’s paid mastermind or group coaching program. For me, those have gotten just greater impact because the people that want to say yes are quicker yeses, and I don’t have to nurture them as much. So I don’t know. Yeah, you can nurture but it’s not my favorite strategy. Joe: I think that’s a very interesting perspective. Because, again, longtime listeners of the show will know, I’m like, “Your call to action if you have your own podcast or whatever, build your email list, build your email list.” This is from a more product-centric approach for me. I sell $99 courses or whatever. I sell a $9 a month membership or whatever. So the nurturing and the adding value is a bit more important for me. Also, those people are DIYers. So my DIY opt-in is going to work a little better. But for the done-for-you service, I think that’s a really interesting and valuable perspective. Perhaps we’ll dig into that a little bit more in the members show. If you are not a member by the way, you can go to buildsomething.club to sign up. It’s just fantastic. It’s a hoot there. Before we get into tips for the listeners, I am distracted by something in your background. Is that a cigar box? Kristin: It is. It is. My husband and I found a bunch of cigar boxes in a thrift store. I don’t know, five-plus years ago, and I have them sprinkled throughout my house because they’re really great storage boxes, and they’re just kind of industrial and fun. Joe: Yeah, absolutely. They smell nice. I’m a cigar smoker myself. So I saw the box and I was like, “I wonder.” Kristin: Oh, that’s interesting. Joe: Yeah. Fantastic. I don’t have any empty boxes right now, but next time I have some I’ll let you know. Kristin: I mean, they’re perfect for storing things. They look cool in your house. I think so. Joe: Yes, they do. Yeah, absolutely. Sponsor: This episode is brought to you by Mindsize. 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Or if you’re a freelancer or agency who feels in over your head or with an eCommerce build, their agency support plan is built specifically for you. There were a few times in my career where I really could have used that. They’ll take a high stress situation and help you relax while still delivering for your client. So check out Mindsize over at mindsize.com today. They will help you make more money, whether you need an eCommerce store, whether you need to improve your current eCommerce store, or if you build eCommerce stores for others. That’s mindsize.com. Thanks so much to Mindsize for supporting the show. Joe: As we get to the end of this conversation, what are some tips for the listeners that you have? I think we talked a bit about how to get on people’s shows and the things that you should think about before you go on people’s shows. Maybe if they’re starting from square one, what’s one or two things that they should do to make sure they have an efficient podcast guesting experience? Kristin: Talking to this audience, the person that’s never done it before, one of the biggest apprehensions that I hear is, “Am I ready? I’m nervous. When I show up, is it going to be a good episode? It’s gonna get published and I don’t know who’s gonna hear it.” There’s some of those concerns that come with first time guesting. And I know that people that ultimately are going to be fantastic guests still have those apprehensions. I did. So I can totally relate to that. So I want to offer this piece of advice that I feel not a lot of people take into consideration. And that is that there’s still a ton of value in being featured on a brand new podcast. I talked to somebody recently, a podcaster, I was interviewed by her and she told me that she actually likes to be in that first episode because when somebody finds a new podcast that they like, they go way back to the beginning and they begin bingeing it. So maybe that doesn’t help prove by point that you should go after a smaller podcast because the barriers are lower, because I just talked about how everybody’s going to hear it. But the strategy for me has been, look, if somebody is serious enough about their business to decide to start a podcast, that’s a serious entrepreneur right there. You can speak to the fact that building a podcast, it is not a small logistical commitment. It is a big deal to decide that you’re going to be a podcast host. So if you are feeling apprehensive, but want to kind of test the waters, get out there a little bit, I would say there’s tons of Facebook groups, tons of communities of people learning how to launch their podcast. Get in with those people. I think that the barriers might feel a little bit lower because they’re not going to be expecting as much from you because they’re just starting out. You can kind of be beginners together a little bit. But I would also say with that, like, here’s the reality. This is a conversation. Joe, you’re asking me questions, and I’m answering them with things that I can just talk about off the top of my head. I’m not over-preparing for episodes. If you were to ask me things… “Well, here we go.” If you had gone with that bicycle example, I would have said, “You know, Joe, I would love to tell you how I’m smart enough to figure that one out but I don’t know.” Being okay with saying that and realizing like, “I know what I know really stinking well but that doesn’t mean that I know everything. And I’m okay with that.” So it’s just a conversation. Be true to who you are, talk about what you know, and be honest about the things that you don’t know or maybe even your failures. Some of those things are really inspiring as well. Joe: I agree wholeheartedly actually. One of the reasons that this show did so well in the beginning was because we did talk about failures a lot. And I think that makes starting a business maybe less intimidating, right? Because you see the gold medalist win the gold medal at the Olympics but you don’t see the years it took for them to train and fail and break their leg or whatever. You don’t see the struggle as often as the success. And I think that that’s important. That’s great. So get in with people who are learning how to podcast. Remember, it’s a conversation. I think that’s super important. Because some people want me to send them exactly the questions I’m going to ask ahead of time, and I’m always happy to oblige. But honestly, I genuinely don’t because I did a little background research on my guests, I know what you’d like to talk about and I mean, frankly, I’m gonna have any conversation. I talk a lot. I’m an extrovert, I’m from New York, and I’m Italian. So we talk a lot. So I’m most likely going to ask you questions that you’re prepared to answer anyway. I love that. I think that’s fantastic. Then, before we go, I do need to ask you my favorite question, which is, do you have any trade secrets for us? Kristin: Gosh, I’m trying to think of the best way to answer that. The trade secrets. Yes, I do have one. I do have one. So when you are pitching for yourself and you want to find podcast hosts that are in alignment with what you talk about, here’s a really cool insider secret. Find somebody who has done a podcast tour who has a message that’s complimentary to yours. I have a very easy example. I’m all about work less, make more. I offer a done for you service. So this is for people that are not interested in DIY, they’re cool with delegation and spending a little bit more to shortcut things. You know who talks about work less, make more? James Schramko who has a really great podcast and he has been a guest on a lot of other people’s podcasts. So what you can do is you look at that influencer, so James is my influencer, you find all the places that he has previously been featured. And guess what? There’s a gold mine of people that would probably be a good fit for you. Joe: What? That is an incredible… That’s a good trade secret. That’s legit. I love that. Like I said, we’ll talk a little bit more about kind of building your pitch and figuring out your messaging and things like that in the show after the show, the membership show. But for now, Kristin, this has been fantastic. If people want to learn more about you, where can they find you? Kristin: I personally hang out on LinkedIn. And because my last name is spelled with two A’s, got a unique spelling there, when you search me on LinkedIn, I’m the only one that shows up. Kristin Molenaar. So if you’re a podcast host, and you’re looking for guests, I mean, that’s not our paid service but we would be happy to hook you up with some people that have got their act together. Joe: Awesome. Kristin: And then if you’re interested in our services and just want to check that out, our website is yesbossva.com. And that has our 10-minute masterclass that I just briefly talked about here. Joe: Excellent. I will link to all of that and more over at the show notes. You can find those at howibuilt.it/207. Kristin, thanks so much for joining us today. I really appreciate it. Kristin: This was so much fun. Thanks for having me. Joe: Yes. And thank you to our sponsors, TextExpander, Restrict Content Pro, and Mindsize. Thank you, of course, for listening. And until next time, get out there and build something. Sponsored by:Mindsize: Your WooCommerce Partner Restrict Content Pro: Launch your membership site TextExpander: Get 20% off your first year by visiting the this link. Source

Convenience is king. Everyone wants the easiest experience possible, but, they also expect that experience to be seamless and delightful at the same time. When it comes to shopping, ecommerce has been able to bring all those elements together better than in-store retailers. But even though brick and mortar retailers are facing an uphill battle, Joe Jensen believes that they aren’t going anywhere, and there are still massive innovations to be seen to make a more cohesive experience. Joe is a vice president in the Internet of Things Group and the general manager of the Retail, Banking, Hospitality and Education Group at Intel. He is helping brands across all industries and of all sizes become more nimble and data-centric. According to Joe, there are simple changes retailers can implement to solve big problems so long as you’re asking the right questions.. Like, what if you could solve all of your inventory issues with a simple technology that has already been in existence for years? And how can brands leverage in-store experiences as more of an enhancement to customers who typically enjoy online shopping but crave something more in-person?On this episode of Up Next in Commerce, Joe answers those questions and more. Plus, he explains how and why traditional retailers should be utilizing more data just like their ecommerce competitors, and he gives a first look into the technologies that will be making an impact on the future of retail.   Main Takeaways:Curation is the Cure: The role of retail is changing, and the retailers who lean into curated experiences will be able to better meet the new expectations of consumers. Rather than offering a little bit of everything, stores will want to give customers a deep dive into a specific brand experience, because that is what they crave when they are shopping offline.Bring On The Data: When digitally-native businesses start to open brick-and-mortar locations, they insist on having as much data captured as possible about the customers who enter their stores. Traditional retailers don’t want or feel they need the data simply because they’ve never used it before. But the nimble retailers that use all the data at their disposal will be the ones to win even against their data-heavy, digitally-native competition.Incoming Technology: From computer vision to full RFID implementation, technology is going to change the way shopping happens for both the customer and the business. But, don’t expect these changes too quickly. Despite the fact that using RFID technology would solve nearly all inventory issues, many brands are hesitant to implement that wholesale change. Why is that? And what will be the catalyst to finally change? Tune in to find out.For an in-depth look at this episode, check out the full transcript below. Quotes have been edited for clarity and length.---Up Next in Commerce is brought to you by Salesforce Commerce Cloud. Respond quickly to changing customer needs with flexible Ecommerce connected to marketing, sales, and service. Deliver intelligent commerce experiences your customers can trust, across every channel. Together, we’re ready for what’s next in commerce. Learn more at salesforce.com/commerce---Transcript:Stephanie:Hey everyone and welcome back to Up Next in Commerce. This is your host, Stephanie Postles, co-founder at Mission.org. Today on the show we have Joe Jensen, vice president and general manager of Retail Banking, Hospitality and Education Business at Intel. Joe, how's it going?Joe:Oh, fantastic. Beautiful day here in Phoenix.Stephanie:Good. Yeah, I'm glad to hear it. That is a mouth full title, but I feel like you deserve it when you've been somewhere for 36 years, I saw?Joe:Isn't that scary. I didn't even think I'm 36 years old, so it's weird.Stephanie:That's amazing, actually. I want to just start there. Tell me how did your journey begin at Intel and what are you doing today? What's your day to day look like now versus 36 years ago?Joe:Well, I started as a product development engineer at Intel, and I worked in a bunch of different product disciplines as an engineer. My original life plan was really to leave Intel at about year 10 and go to a startup, but by year 10, Intel stock options were so attractive that I ended up being so that fully handcuffed into the company.Stephanie:Yeah. As with most tech companies, I was this close to staying at Google for the same reason. I'm like, "Oh, it's hard to leave. I see my options vesting in year three and five and seven," and you can just extrapolate it out and it'll keep you there. But it's good-Joe:I shifted from engineering to the business side in about year seven, and I've done a ton of different business startups in the company. I think one of the things I'm most proud of, I've started three businesses that were at zero and have hit over 500 million a year.Stephanie:Oh, wow. So what are the businesses that you've worked on?Joe:Two different ones in an embedded space, and then now the Retail Banking, Hospitality. Education is added into that, but that business started, gosh, it started at single digit millions and we grew it to, well, we're the largest business within the IoT space in Intel I can say.Stephanie:That's cool. So tell me a bit about when you're saying IoT, and then retail banking, now education, how do I imagine what you guys are doing for your partners? What are you providing them? What does that look like?Joe:In our space, the IoT space for Intel is really where IT for an enterprise meets the real world. So in the case of retail, it could be digital signs, point of sales systems, inventory management, building management, time clocks, any system that might be connecting into IT. If you go into the manufacturing side, which is in my space, the manufacturing units, it's where equipment data flows in off of manufacturing side flows into the enterprise.Stephanie:And how many opportunities are being missed right now by not implementing? I would say data analytics like you're talking about. When it comes to inventory I know that Walmart for a while was trying to figure out how to track out of stock issues and it was really hard even when they had the cameras going around the lanes because they couldn't see behind what was in front of it. I don't know if they figured it out yet, maybe you know better than me, but what opportunities are being missed by not having this implemented into retail stores?Joe:As an engineer, I really think about root cause and what's the underlying problem, and we really believe that inventory inaccuracy is one of the underlying problems in physical retail. The problem we have is if customer can't find it in the store, it's out of stock. It doesn't matter if it's in the backroom, doesn't matter if it's hidden behind some items on the shelf, it doesn't matter if it's misplaced. If the customer can't find it, it's out of stock. We have data and research that shows that 1% of customers who experience an out of stock will go through the whole journey of they search on the shelf for it, they go track down a staff person to go find it, they dig through the rack or they don't find it. They say, "Hey, hold on. Let me go check in the back." They go look in the back and then come out and then maybe they go to the POS and they look to see if another store has it, or they'll ship it to your house. 1% of the shoppers are that patient.Stephanie:That's me. I'm that 1%. I did that the other day at Pottery Barn. But then I was very upset at the end because I was like, just like what you said, let me look in the back. Not there. Let me look at our partner stores. Not there. Let me look online. Ooh, it's not the size you want. And at the end I'm like, "Ugh. Okay, goodbye. I never want to come back again." I love Pottery Barn, but.Joe:Talk about a study that showed that if a customer experiences that out of stock frustration five times in a store, they stopped going.Stephanie:Yeah, I can see that. So how do you go about solving something like that to get all your systems on top?Joe:It's really tough. I still think RFID is going to play a key role. Japan has a huge labor shortage problem. They just said because of the aging of their population, they don't have enough labor, and the government decided four or five years ago to put a big push on RFID, and they're mandating by 2025, all consumer goods that are sold in China have to come from the manufacturer RFID tagged. They've also funded a kind of research-Stephanie:And that essentially keeps everything inventoried, right? Then you don't have staff to work.Joe:Yes. What happens is you don't even need staff to check out now because consumers will put their items in a basket, step the basket on the checkouts, and it'll read all the tags and then we'll just pay and go.Stephanie:So it's like the Amazon Go store where they're experimenting with, but I don't know whatever actually happened to that. I went into one in Seattle maybe two years ago, but are they still around? What happened with the Amazon stores like that?Joe:They're still running. They do a tremendous amount of business. I don't know how much of it's because of convenience and how much of it is the novelty. I suspect that they're augmenting a lot of that with human capital behind the scenes. I do think that you're going to find retail bifurcating into two types of retail. You're going to see the hyper-convenient side, which is you just want to take all the friction out. How do I take all the hassle? How do I take all the friction out for the shopper? And I think for staples day to day things, you want to go pick up fast food, fast food should be fast. I won't throw the chain under the bus, but there's a new location near our house, and I swear there's a three-hour wait all day, every day.Stephanie:Oh my gosh.Joe:Fast food just isn't that good for me. I'm not going to wait in line for three hours to get my fast food. And so I think on the hyper-convenient side, that's a big part of retail. Then on the other side, we're calling hyper experience. With hyper experience, shopping is an enjoyment and a pastime for a lot of people. And during the pandemic, obviously you can't go to the mall. You can't go shopping like you used to, but that will come back, and that you want to go and get experiences. You don't want to go to department store A and then walk down the mall to the department store B. And if you close your eyes when you walked in, you wouldn't know which store you're in.Joe:Now, if they all have the same assortment, they all have the same brands, they all have the same brand micro stores inside their department store, what's the experience that you're delivering to the consumer? If you go try to find a piece of clothing and it's out of stock, how's that experience? That's not a very good experience. So yeah, it's funny. I had one of my engineers in China explaining how he really has everything delivered. All his groceries, all his food. China is just hyper convenient from that perspective. It's cool and I love it.Stephanie:But they're used to it. They grew up like that, though. I feel like here, if you try and introduce some of those conveniences, it'd be like everything should be done this way. I don't know. I think Americans are a little bit more like, "Oh, that's weird," because we just know we have to do like this.Joe:It's really cultural differences, but I love this quote from him. And he said, "If I'm going to bother to put pants on and leave my apartment, it'd better be worth it."Stephanie:That's pretty great, and true. I feel that.Joe:It's like if I need batteries, do I want to get in the car and drive and go buy batteries? Well, if I do that and go to the store and they don't have that special battery, then it's really disappointing because now I spent 20, 30 minutes going out of my house to go get something because I wanted it right now and then they don't have it. This is why consumers do it a few times, they just start ordering online.Stephanie:Yeah. And I think the product, like you said, has to be worth it. How are you guys thinking about the experiences piece? Because we've had quite a few guests come on the show who've talked about their retail locations and turning them more into an experiential place, where you go there and you've got the certain music, and the vibes, and maybe you've got a yoga class going on over here and you're going there, not just to maybe pick up your product that you did order online during this time period, but you're also going there to maybe experience something that you wouldn't get elsewhere.Stephanie:A lot of people are saying retail's dead and I definitely do not see that happening. I'm like there is pent up demand to go in person and to go into stores, but I do think now there's going to be a new level of expectations of the consumers, not just going to want to go and shop around, they're going to want something else. How do you do that?Joe:I think that the role for retail is changing in terms of what experience means. If you go back 30 years ago, 40 years ago, shoppers didn't know what the new fashions were until they went to their favorite store and they saw what the new fashions were. So you went to your favorite store whether you're a Neiman Marcus shopper or Macy's shopper or a Target shopper, you went to the store to see what's available, what's in now. And there was that discovery and learning and value proposition that that store was giving you by bringing you things that fit your demographic. Today people know what's current as the store learns what's current. It's what the celebrities are wearing between social media and how quick things are in internet time. There is really no discovery value proposition for mass merchandise things.Joe:Where we see real success is curation. So you go to a store that's not a little bit of everything. It's a store that dives deep into a lifestyle or deep into a fashion style or deep into a demographic, and you go there and you immerse yourself in that brand, and then you immerse yourself in what that brand is about. That's the discovery. If you're someone who likes West Elm, and the style that West Elm delivers, you go to West Elm to see things that would be hard to find on your own elsewhere. If you wanted to go find your own curation, it would take you months of time on the internet trying to go discover all that stuff. But you can go to a store where their buyers have pulled that look together for you.Joe:If you're a Pottery Barn shopper, same kind of thing. You go to Pottery Barn and they've curated a set of things that fit a certain demographic and the lifestyle that they're looking for. So I think you're going to see a lot more of that curation. We did tour in New York City a couple of years ago, and the stores that were really doing amazing well were really deep into that curation idea.Stephanie:Yeah. I love that. I completely agree. I'm thinking right now about going into a Crate and Barrel or something like that, and I'm looking to find new things of a similar style, instead of going somewhere that's exactly the same that I can just find online. That's a really interesting take. How are you viewing the omni-channel experience of making sure that's frictionless when someone's looking online and then going into the store and having a good experience online and offline?Joe:I think a few retailers are starting to really get it right. I think in the beginning, omni-channel was a poor band-aid for I'm out of stock in the store, and I think most customers didn't see that as a good solution. I think the right way to think of omni-channel is there used to be a really consistent funnel for how shoppers and the shopper journey went from just initial discovery all the way through purchase, and that funnel, I think, no longer exists. I think people find out about products all over the place. You might see it on a television show. You might hear about it from a friend, you might see it on social media, and your discovery happens in your life. Omni-channel really ought to enable you to easily find something you're interested in whenever you see it, or whenever you want to. There was an old Burger King commercial Have It Your Way, I think 30 years ago.Stephanie:I remember that.Joe:I think the omni-channel today really means that shoppers ought to be able to engage with a brand or engage with a product wherever and however they want to.Stephanie:And I like the idea too of picking up where you left off. Like if I'm shopping online and then I enter the store or get near it, a subtle reminder of, "Oh, hey. You were looking at this and it's actually here on aisle seven," or whatever it is, directing me to complete the consumer journey. But I don't feel like it's there yet. I know we've got beacons and ability to see when people are entering your store and track that, but it seems like not a lot of retailers have fully leaned into that method to make sure that the full experience is cohesive.Joe:Yeah. I think that we're coming from the early days of that. One of my favorite stories years ago, we were shopping for a Tiffany lamp years ago, a couple of years ago, Tiffany lamp. And I searched online one night, looked at some options. We went to a store and we bought a Tiffany lamp. And for the next two months, every banner ad I had on the internet was for Tiffany lamps.Stephanie:Yeah. It's like I'm past Tiffany now. I'm onto the next kind of lamp.Joe:I think that what's happened is there's been too much of trying to use algorithms and online searches and data to try to target individuals with things that you think they might be interested in and not enough focus on helping people build a cart of things that you are interested in. So, for example, imagine if you turn it around for a minute and the brand for an item that you're interested in has an ability for you to put something that you're interested in, in a basket. And then when you pass a store that carries that item, that has it in stock, they flag you that this thing you're interested is in this store, and it's almost turning it all the way around from the store or the brand pushing to having the brand help guide you to where you find things.Stephanie:Yeah, that's really good. That's the kind of world I would like to live in where it actually is helpful and not annoying. I was just speaking with another guest about text messages and how certain retail locations will be like, "Come on in for 20% off," and I'm like, it's not helpful when I'm sitting on my couch, watching The Bachelor. It's helpful when I'm walking into the store and they're like, "Hey, you better make sure you buy that rug from World Market because here's a coupon now. So make sure you finish the journey and you don't just walk in and out." But yeah-Joe:You're reaching to the point that's one of the things I think the retailers especially are missing, and I don't know what a good analogy is, but I think that discounts and sales and coupons are an overused tool and they influence a lot of people, but not everybody. I think that for some people being first is more important than getting it on sale. For other people something scarce and having access to it before it runs out. So I think there's a lot of opportunity, even just convenience. Take a grocery store, nearly every grocery store I've ever been in, they put all the staples in the back, and they run with 19th century's retail logic of, oh, if I make people walk all the way through the store, they might buy some more stuff.Stephanie:Not me, I got blinders on. I'm like I need my milk and goodbye.Joe:It turns out that the convenience stores like 7-Eleven sell a ton of milk. I don't know if you've ever bought a gallon of milk at 7-Eleven.Stephanie:I have, yeah. Hey, my two year old, desperate times desperate measures.Joe:And it's about convenience. So if I were in a grocery chain, in fact, I talked to one about this big chain recently and said, "Why don't you take your house brands of the staples and put them in a section in the front of the store where they're super convenient and mark them up, make them the same price or maybe even a little bit more than the branded stuff." And the answer was, "Well, we tried that and it didn't work." I'm like, "Oh, when did you do that?" "It was like 10 years ago." I'm like, "People have changed a lot in 10 years."Stephanie:Yeah. I'd rather pay more to get right to it. So what are some maybe interesting stories like that, where they have listened to your advice and they've seen good results? Or anything where you're like, "Oh, I remember this one customer did this and they increased revenue a bunch because of this one subtle tweak in the store layout or how they did their products or inventory," or whatever it may be.Joe:We'll start a little bit maybe with I think that pretty much in every case when we've helped a retailer test or try a technology, the results always exceed the indicators that they put forward. And the very be wilderness thing to us is that even though these solutions look to deliver tremendous results and impact, they still don't scale them.Stephanie:I don't think.Joe:Years ago we had a partner that was putting cameras in the ceiling to measure shopper engagement, how long does it take for a staff to engage a customer? And they happen to have as an artifact of that, I won't say the brand, but they had a brand of popular, very popular Cola was in the camera view on the shelf. And they observed that this diet version, this Cola was out of stock almost all the time. So they went to the head of all stores for this giant grocery chain and said, "Hey, I think that there's an opportunity for you to..." Actually it was, I'm sorry, the brand, they went to the brand and said, "You got a not at stock problem in this grocery chain." The guy they talked to said, "Oh, there's no way. I was head of merchandising in Southern California. We have people in that store twice a day checking inventory. Its inventory are stocked twice a week. We are never out of product."Joe:And I'm like, "Oh, really? Here's some video of how much you're out of stock." And it turned out that within a half a day that they stocked, they would sell out and they would be out of stock all day, for two days. The problem we run into is you put process in place and you tell people to follow the process and it may or may not happen. So they look at this and they're like, "Well, there's tremendous value in having this product in stock. It's a driver product for the store." If they're out of stock, and the store cares that they're out of stock. The cost of deploying the solution was probably $30 a month per store, not a huge thing for one of their top 70 driver products, and yet it never scaled.Stephanie:Interesting.Joe:And you feel this thing. There was another one where the labor, they showed this 30% increase in tool sales in a major chain by tracking the staff and shopper engagement and improving that. It was really simple solution. Almost never scales. Now one that we have seen scale, Theatro makes a Voice over IP ear piece set up for staff. So if you go to, I think, well Bass Pro Shops, as an example, who's the one that does jeans and apparel for teams? They all have an ear piece and a radio.Stephanie:Oh, Alister? Gap.Joe:Anyway, it doesn't matter. A lot of retailers use radios, and there's a cost in the radios, and for a parody, they can switch over to this Voice over IP, and this is one where we're seeing people test it, and then in a matter of weeks completely changed all their devices over. The value in that if you look at it, if you're on a radio network, everybody that has an ear piece in their ear hears all the chatter from everybody all day. With this new solution, you can address a message to an individual person. So only the person you want to talk to gets the message. Then there's the ability to ask for stock and deliveries and things like that. So they've also built the ability, some of their customers, if somebody drives up to do a pickup, you order online, pick up at the curb, you don't want there to be a high friction experience. You want to be able to pull up, very quickly have somebody bring your item and leave.Stephanie:So where do you think then the future of retail? What does it look like with all these new... Some of them feel like little tweaks, a radio where you just talk to who you want. To me, some of those things feel little. Are there not enough incentives for these retail stores to change? I know you had mentioned Wall Street maybe beating up on retailers a little bit when it comes to wanting to try new and innovative things. What do you think is holding back retail right now?Joe:I think a big part of it is Wall Street, again, back to that root cause problem. There's a set of retailers that we think of as digital media, and these are brands that started as a purely online brand, and now they're going to open up stores and they realize once they get to about a billion dollars or so in revenue to get to the next level, they've got to go physically open stores or expand their reach.Stephanie:Yeah, like Warby Parkers of the world.Joe:Yeah, exactly. And these digital native retailers, when they come into the physical world, they expect access to the same kind of insights that they've been getting with their online entity. They want to understand how many shoppers are coming in and when? What's the dwell? When people are picking things up and putting them down and not buying them, it's like something in your cart that you took back out. And they come in with a long list of insights that they'd like to be able to get in the retail operation. The question in Intel is how can you help me find people that can bring these solutions or help me deploy these solutions? And when I go to more traditional brick and mortar retail, the conversation is trying to convince them they should have these insights.Joe:So I think that a part of it is the digital natives come from a world of when you're online only, the only insights you have into your shopper is through the data trail they leave behind them. I think if you go to brick and mortar, they're not used to capitalizing and utilizing that data. Talked to one partner recently, they haven't validated this, but they said that the amount of data that Walmart generates in a day would take 26 years to upload to the cloud, being given traditional techniques.Stephanie:Wow.Joe:So there's a tremendous amount of data created in the enterprise of retail every day. And we think with IoT and the cost of compute coming down so much, and the ability to use AI to get insights, you can utilize a lot of this data at the edge without incurring the costs of moving it to the cloud and trying to process it there. I think that if you imagine that you're moving petabytes of data to the cloud, and you're trying to find the needles in the haystack, it's a really big haystack. How about if I just try to sift through the insights real time as they're occurring in the store?Joe:We talked to a major fast food chain who prides themselves on fresh product, and one of their major problems, I won't say what the product is, but they were throwing away 40% of their product to maintain the freshness, and they wanted to have a short wait because they understood freshness was important, and freshness was important for the brand, but they were having a huge product waste problem, and they wanted to use predictive analytics to understand what's happening in the parking lot? What's happening in the drive through and what's my queue look like in the store so they could predict when to put product in the cooker versus cooking it always, and then having it there just in case.Stephanie:Were you guys able to help with that?Joe:Absolutely. That kind of change drives tremendous business cost savings, but also ensures that your product is fresh and that your customers are satisfied in having to wait for product. So when done well, we think these insights deliver not only customer satisfaction, but also tremendous business impact.Stephanie:I mean, that also makes sense for why a lot of the more Legacy Retailers are scooping up all these DTC brands and keeping them separate and learning from them to see like, oh, what are you guys doing over there? And then starting to integrate them into the org to maybe be brought up to speed a bit with how maybe retail should operate from a digital perspective and what are the expectations coming in from someone who's used to that? And how can it get implemented into the org? We had someone on from Kellogg's who said just that. They would acquire different DTC brands, but then keep them off on their own so they didn't get too mixed into the Kellogg's culture because they wanted the DTC brands to stay as their own brand. So they didn't, I guess, turn too corporate if it happens. I don't know.Joe:Maybe not say corporate. I think you don't want to turn them old school.Stephanie:Yeah, exactly.Joe:[crosstalk] We see that same thing, and you mentioned the expectations. One of the ways we explained this consumer expectations, every time you have a better consumer experience on your mobile, better app experience, in the back of your mind, you wonder why every experience isn't that good. I'm old enough that I used to travel where you had to go to the ticket counter to get your boarding passes before you could print it at home, and then they went to kiosk where you could print them at the airport and it was an amazing improvement, and then they went to actually really pretty good apps. So airline apps, you can see if there's a meal on the plane, you can pick your seat. You can do quite a few things, check the status of the incoming flight, et cetera. Airline apps are really pretty good, and I travel a ton and I stay in hotels all the time. Why are the hotel apps worse than the airline apps? Why can't I pick my room?Stephanie:That's true. Why? I'm sure you probably asked them before.Joe:Well, and actually it's interesting. It turns out that the most hotel chains are using a third party service to assign and block rooms.Stephanie:Got it.Joe:So they don't actually have control over that, which is kind of crazy.Joe:And so I think what happens is anytime you have this better experience as a consumer, then it raises the bar on your expectations for every other experience. Cabs were, I've never enjoyed a cab ride. Not once in my life, I think.Stephanie:No, never.Joe:Uber realized early that there was a huge amount of friction in getting ride and people hated cabs. You'd call for a cab, all they would do is throw it on the radio network and maybe a cab responds, maybe not. You didn't have any predictability. When you get to your location, the last thing you want to do is sit there in the cab on the street corner and spend two or three minutes paying the cab driver.Stephanie:Yeah, awkward.Joe:And they understood that there was this huge friction. Well, now that Uber has taken the friction out of getting a ride, consumers see friction elsewhere in their life, and like why do I have this friction? Why is this not as good as an Uber?Stephanie:So what areas do you think are the biggest friction points when it comes to retail locations right now? And what do you wish things were looking like maybe over the next couple of years? What are you guys planning for? Where are you hoping the world will be in like three to five years?Joe:Well, we think that you're going to see a lot more delivery. I think that grocery delivery was very slowly ramping, pick up at the curb or delivery, and with the pandemic, a ton of people jumped in and tried it that probably wouldn't have tried it for a long time. So the adoption curve for that took a real steep spike up, and we don't think that that adoption is going to slow down. So I think that the grocery, and the grocery business is tough. They run really slim margins, and we talked to one major chain and they said, if you pick up at the curb, that they lose $5. And if they deliver, they lose 10 to 15. So the chains have to figure out how they're going to deal with that. There are a bunch of startups that are building essentially dark store technology. So instead of having a retail location with a giant parking lot and a big square footage and employees, they'll end up with a small industrial space with all the same inventory, but some robotics that will pull stuff off the shelf and pack totes.Stephanie:We actually just talked to a company called Wolseley who talked about how they see the future being... They're B2B also for plumbing and HVAC and things like that, but they're like, "I'm not so sure if retail for us anyways is the way to go anymore," instead of just having a small guide shop out front, and then just having a micro fulfillment center or a warehouse in the back, and then they get your stuff and give it to you on the curb. But why do you need to come in for their business anyways and shop around when a lot of times these contractors already know what they want. They don't need to walk around like they would at Home Depot.Joe:It's funny, I was at a home improvement store recently, and I'm waiting in customer service to make a return, and they're on the phone with a customer who very wisely placed an order for like 50 things, probably contractor, but he did an online pickup at the curb order. They were on hold with this guy and they're talking to each other saying, "We don't have the labor to have somebody spend an hour running around the store to pick all these stuff." What a smart contractor? Why not have the home improvement staff eat that labor versus him send somebody? And he said, "Hey, can you please call me once it's all picked?"Stephanie:That's smart. I mean, how can-Joe:And of course they had to say, "Sure." The manager's like, "Yeah, absolutely." So I think what's going to happen is these expectations are going to keep rising from consumers, and the retailers are going to have to figure out how to adapt.Stephanie:Yeah. It seems it's the pricing thing, though. Right now everyone is expecting a curbside delivery or something to be free because it's new and that's the expectation now, but I could see eventually being like, if you want someone to shop for you, just like you would with any of these grocery delivery shopping apps, you're going to have to pay a little bit to have them go and-Joe:But look at it this way. We talked, again, one of these companies building these systems and we talked to a big chain that's testing it. If you go to the normal financial model for a grocery store, big piece of real estate, prime location, huge parking lot, a lot of physical assets tied up. And if you go to a dark store, really cheap, industrial space real estate, so the real estate model's completely different, the staffing model's completely different, and the financials could be such that, and again, I don't know, but it actually might be cheaper to deliver groceries that way. Now, it's a new build add, it's a new approach, but again it's a huge change, but it doesn't necessarily have to mean higher prices for consumers. And I think what's going to happen is some will try to charge more and others will figure out how to go do it in a way that doesn't cost more.Stephanie:That's a good point. I like that. So how do you think about-Joe:It's competitiveness, right?Stephanie:Yeah. Hey, that's economics right there. Someone will figure it out and put the other one out of business possibly, or not. But how are you thinking about new technology right now? I know we were talking a bit about AI and how it's impacting retail and retail workers. What are your thoughts around that or other technologies that are maybe going to disrupt retail?Joe:Well, still really believe a lot in computer vision, and I think one of the things I'm really proud of for Intel is we've always been huge advocates and protectors of consumer privacy, personal privacy. So as a company, our core culture, our philosophy, our lobbying efforts are all around protecting privacy. Our point of view in using cameras in retail, and we've been helping people do this for many years, we only want to do it in a way that's totally anonymous. So it's not like I'm trying to detect Joe when Joe walks in the store. I want to look at the pattern of behavior that this shopper has anonymously, and what have people in the past that had that similar pattern of behavior been interested in, and how might I go send some staff over to do the right thing there. So take me, for example, if we go to the mall and I'm with my wife or daughters, I'm probably hanging out with him and I'm not really shopping. So I'm wandering in the store-Stephanie:You're that personally couch just chilling.Joe:Yeah, or I might be wandering around in the men's department, but I'm kind of killing time, but I'm probably open for somebody to come show me something, because I'm browsing and you could observe that, oh, this person is slowly walking around and looking at stuff. There's other times when I need another white dress shirt for a business trip, and I know exactly which door to park at, that's the shortest distance to the white dress shirts. And I'm walking in a direct line to a section. Computer vision and AI could detect that this shopper's not browsing, don't bother him. Don't send them a discount coupon or don't send him alert to some new item they might be interested in.Stephanie:Do you have retailers right now who are implementing that? Because that sounds awesome and a really good way to personalize to the shoppers coming in. Do you have anyone who's trying anything out yet?Joe:There've been lots of things to experiment and test, a lot of partners building solutions like that. I think the world of privacy right now is way too fragmented. Too many different points of view, too many different state perspectives on it. You've got some places where cameras are banned. You can't use a camera at all. And I think that the governments really need to get their act together and understand how is the data going to be used? How is the technologies? How can it be done in a way to protect privacy? In the implementations, we advocate no data ever leaves the edge, the system. The only thing that ever leaves the system it's account. This kind of shopper did this kind of pattern of behavior. Everything's fully anonymous. Back in the early days, we actually went and talked to governments across Europe where the privacy is even more simple, and every government entity we talked to was totally comfortable with the approach we were advocating.Joe:I think the computer vision that we think is really going to be profound, and it'll be used for mundane things like trying to understand out of stocks or inventory situation. Years ago, I won't say the name of the chain, but there was a study where they're comparing Amazon to a giant big-box retailer. They went to 25 locations of the big-box retailer and bought these 40 items and then they priced it out on Amazon. The headline for the story was Amazon was more expensive than the physical retail location, which was big news at the time because everybody thought Amazon is just winning on price. But the subtitle of the article, the second message was, but 25% of the items on average were out of stock at the brick and mortar retailer.Joe:We happened to be meeting with the executives in that company about a week after that, story came out and their heads were exploding because they thought they had a 5% out of stock problem. And it turns out that they did in terms of it was in the store, but it had a huge congestion of stuff in the back room that wasn't on the shelf yet. And as we dug into it further, we did a lot of work with them using computer vision and whatnot, this is years ago, and it turned out that one of the behaviors they had that they had to try to break is the people stocking the shelves would bring a box of say large size mint shampoo out and they needed to have the small and the large, but they didn't have the small, so they just filled the shelf up in the large.Joe:So when somebody came to look for the small, it's out of stock, and the shelf looked full because they would face it all out so that every front was full of product, but they didn't have all the products on the shelf. It was really because the people stocking the shelves were not following the process and they're being lazy, and that's where we thought to-Stephanie:Use robots then. Robots aren't lazy and they listen to whatever you tell them. So that must just be the way to fix things.Joe:Yeah, maybe. I guess as a tech company maybe that's a good thing for us, but I think that, again, if it's a staple, you just want it to be convenient, and convenient means the fastest, easiest way possible. To me it's like when I run out a catch-up, wouldn't it be amazing if it was just at my door automatically the moment I needed it? Well, we're not there yet, but at some point, somebody's going to figure out how to make my running out of ketchup something that won't happen.Stephanie:Yeah. I thought there were brands or companies working on that to track what's in your refrigerator and then reorder it if it's out. Maybe that never came to fruition and that was more just that [inaudible 00:36:00].Joe:They've been a lot. We actually had some partners who were doing that years ago as well. The challenge ran into it I think is how do you know what's in your fridge? Does the consumer scan all the barcodes? Do you have the discipline to scan a barcode when you run out. These problems certainly aren't easy to solve. We mentioned earlier out of stock, so I'm working at that problem. We worked with probably, I don't know, more than 20 big retailers on trying to see how RFID could help solve their inventory accuracy. Then we would always start with taking one of their stores and we would do a really deep physical inventory. We never found any retailer that had better than 65% of their skews correctly counted.Stephanie:Wow. That's sad.Joe:Then if you want to be able to compete with an online-only retailer who gives free shipping, you probably have to give free shipping, but wouldn't it be ideal if you could deliver all of your stuff from a local store so that you minimize the shipping time, you minimize the shipping cost. But if you don't know what your inventory is, then you take an order assuming you've got really close delivery, but then it's out of stock in the store. We talked to the department store who was really aggressively trying to do this fulfill from store, and they were spending on average 20 minutes per item to find it on the floor.Stephanie:Jeez, if they're taking 20 minutes-Joe:That's [crosstalk 00:37:26], right?Stephanie:Yeah, that's wild.Joe:So they were looking at RFID to try to be able to help with that as well. With RFID, you would know where things are in the store. This is another one too. We talked to, gosh, I'm try to really keep people anonymous here, a head of stores executive who came from a large brand who had a lot of stores, and they deployed RFID in all their products in the branded stores, and they've got their sales go up like 60%.Stephanie:So why wouldn't everyone do RFID? We're talking about Japan's doing it with all their stores now, brands who are implementing it, are taking off when it comes to sales. Why wouldn't people? What's the holdup? Why are more people-Joe:That's the big mystery? So if you can figure this out through your interview, please share.Stephanie:I will have to start asking around. I'm like it seems like a no brainer. Is it hard to get your manufacturers to do it?Joe:I think there's a lot of processes that get touched, is one of the problems. There's your supply chain, there's your distribution center, there's all the staff in the distribution center, there's process changes at the store. So there's a lot of pieces of this that end up getting touched. We talked to one retailer, big retailer, who they made the change on the POS. It was a touchscreen checkout for the staff. They had to do a training class to train people on this change, and it was a two hour training class for like 170,000 employees. And they said it was all extra time. You couldn't do it on the floor. So now you've got 340,000 extra hours of labor to make a simple change on a user interface.Joe:I think when it gets to doing these kinds of changes, what happens when there's a return? What happens when there's a return but the RFID tag is no longer in the item? So there's a lot of things that have to change. I think what's going to happen is we're going to see branded retail do this first because they control the supply chain, and you're going to see some really tremendous results. The example I gave you when they were head of brand and retail at one brand, and then went to another one, the challenge with the second one is they had a lot more suppliers, so they had to manage a lot of factories to supply their stores, even though they were all their own brand. It was still a supply chain challenge.Stephanie:Well, it seems like Whole Foods and Amazon are going to be the first ones that can do it. They've got the ability to, especially with Amazon's operations and processes, and they've got the Whole Foods brand going on. They control all their supply chain.Joe:And the Amazon could decide to spend a gigantic amount of cash modernizing Whole Foods infrastructure and Wall Street wouldn't blink an eye. Kroger could never do that because Wall Street wouldn't let them.Stephanie:That's sad, and also just shows how there's, I don't know. It makes you wonder about how a lot of companies right now aren't going the IPO route, and I get it. I get it hearing and seeing the incentives like that, or lack of incentives of wanting to... They talk about destroy your business to make an even better one and how some of the best companies had to do that, whether it be the Netflix of the worlds. But yeah, it seems like a lot is held back.Joe:What do you mean? Private equity, we're seeing more and more where private equity will come in and the leadership of the company will be in favor of a private equity takeover because it can pull themselves off the Wall Street treadmill for a bit to make these fundamental changes.Stephanie:But isn't it usually a bad sign when PE comes in? Don't most of those companies end up going bankrupt when this happens?Joe:I think there's a couple kinds of private equity. Look at Dell. Not a retail case, but Dell they needed to retool Dell and they needed to not be under the scrutiny of Wall Street for a while, and Dell has done amazing things through the use of private equity. I think if the company is fundamentally unsound, private equity might be vulture capital, where they come in and strip things down to the bones and get rid of it. But I think fundamentally sound business that needs to make changes that aren't really possible to Wall Street, I think this is going to be one of the areas where I think there's going to be a lot of money made where private equity is going to go look at some of these really good retailers that fundamentally have to change. And if wall street doesn't change the model P&L expectations, I think private equity will become a much bigger factor.Stephanie:That's a hot take. I like that. That's very interesting. So if there was some data right now that brands should be collecting at their retail locations, that's not really hard to implement, but they should be doing from the start, what comes to mind? Where you're like, "Right away, you should be collecting at least these five attributes on your customers as they come in and you don't need computer vision. You don't need beacons or RFID, but you should at least have this to be able to give a better experience to your consumer." Anything come to mind?Joe:I think that the thing that is most fundamental, and it's still shocking that all retailers don't do this, and that's just counting your traffic. Not counting it daily, but knowing what's happening with your traffic every minute.Joe:But I think understanding your traffic, that's the most important thing for an online business. What's my traffic? Dwell. How long was this shopper in the store? How long was this shopper on my site? What things did the shopper browse? What was their click path for my online? What was their path in the store? For me, if I were going to leave tech and move into retail, I would start with how does an online retailer excel? And how would I try to get all those same insights for brick and mortar? One of the things to me that... There's a tremendous amount of demand created real time in retail. So we saw one study that says 60% of purchases in stores in the US and Europe are for things people didn't know they were going to buy when they went to the store. So a huge amount of real-time demand. You see something, you like it, and you decide you want to buy it. Well, how disappointing is it when you see something you like and then it's out of stock in your size?Stephanie:That's worse sometimes.Joe:That goes from being a point of excitement. You got a little bit of excitement to buy something and then you're let down. What we would say is rather than having mannequins displaying items that the brand is paying you to show this week. We talked to retail after retailer after two or three days of something on the mannequin that sold out, but they're paid to run it for a week. So they're creating demand for something that's sold out because the contract of the brand said you need to show this item for a week. It's funny. If you talk to a giant apparel brand about this problem, honestly, one of the C-suite executive was like, "Oh my God, that's why stuff's always out of stock in the store." I'm like, "Yeah, you have some flexibility and freedom to the staff to put what they have too much of."Joe:We talked to one major department store chain that made that change a few years ago where they said, "Instead of getting paid to run things on the mannequins, we're going to have our staff every evening look at inventory and whatever they have too much of, put that on the mannequin for the next day." And it's amazing how much they were able to sell through inventory before they had the market down. We would advocate that at the front of the store where you've got posters and prints, maybe it's a department store and it's prom dress season, so you're showing prom dresses on the poster, that isn't really relevant to most of your shoppers. Most girls are not prom dress age. Most moms are not at the age of having daughters that are prom dress age. Most dads don't buy the prom dress.Joe:Put a more simple thing in it. Put a digital sign at the front of the store with a camera that will anonymously look at age and gender. And then if you're really sophisticated, you could say, "Okay, well now I'm going try in inventory system and I have too many of something." Phoenix it was a really dry winter. We have too many raincoats. I see a guy coming in and I've got too many men's raincoats. Throw a men's raincoat on the screen. And even the next step, we can estimate the size of the shopper. So I've got a really big guy coming in, but I'm out of extra large raincoats. Don't show them a raincoat. These subtle things, and it's not like every shopper is going to buy a raincoat, but suddenly putting something that's possibly more relevant on the screen than a prom dress is a great way to use that valuable real estate. That's the kind of thing that an online retailer will do. Like Zulily, they introduce thousands of new products every day.Stephanie:Zulily? Yeah.Joe:We met with them one day at one point, and they said in the morning, early in the morning, they have one landing page, and by 8:00 AM, they have 280 unique landing pages. Then they know what demographic, what bucket you fall in for them as a shopper. So when you go to their landing page at 10 in the morning, you're going to see something that's full of things likely to be relevant to you.Stephanie:We were talking with Lenovo way early on in the show and they were saying they have 85,000 different landing pages going on at any one point. I'm like, "Oh my gosh, how do you keep track of that?" But he's like, "Oh yeah, that's just how you test and know what people want." So it's just very interesting. But I think Zulily though, when they say how many landing pages they have, they are all about talking about being personalized and stuff, but I think a lot of times they just think having a new name isn't being personalized and they count that towards a new landing page. That does not count just saying, "Hi, Stephanie," or, "Hi, Joe."Joe:The way they were explaining to us is if you shop for baby clothes, you often are buying baby clothes, your landing page would have baby clothes on it. If you don't buy baby clothes, your landing page would not have baby clothes.Stephanie:Yeah. That's more personalized. I like that. Very cool.Joe:The key thing here is that this is a journey. I don't think anybody's going to go make all these changes overnight, but there's the ability to start using this information. I think one starting, know your shoppers. It's amazing how many retailers when we talk to them about what are your shopper's pain points? What are your shoppers not happy with? They don't have a good answer, which is really surprising. For me, when we're out trying to define solutions for the market, the first thing we look for is what's a business problem. And if I go into education, what is the problem that educators are having right now that they're worried about? We go into hospitality, what problem do they need help solving? I often tell people at Intel, we have 3,200 PhDs. If we understand your problem, we can figure out how to solve it. And it's amazing how many retailers don't spend time really understanding what friction or what pain points do their shoppers have.Stephanie:Yeah. I think they're going to have to now. I think now with everything that's happened and you had the acceleration of ecommerce, there will be, like you said, new expectations. And yeah, I think the theme is now there's also all these new technology to use and utilize, and maybe implement if it's allowed, but then putting that extra level of human curation on top of it when needed is going to be the way of the future. So use the tech, but also have it curated and have the human feel to it that people are going to miss over this next year, especially with how much we've been at home all by ourselves.Joe:And after people have really radically modified their behavior for a year. A few months it was one thing, but we're coming up on a year where people have had to change pretty fundamentally how they shop and live. How much of that's going to stick permanently? Like I said, I think grocery, and some of those things are going to way more people will be doing that post pandemic than did pre pandemic and they'll stick with it. What else is going to fundamentally change?Stephanie:Yeah, I agree. All right. Well, I know we're running up on time, so I want to shift over to the lightning round brought to you by our friends at Salesforce Commerce Cloud. This is where I'm going to ask you a question and you have a minute or less to answer. Are you ready, Joe?Joe:I am ready.Stephanie:All right. What's the nicest thing anyone's ever done for you?Joe:Oh my gosh. Our twin daughters were born three months premature, and the amount of help and leaning in that we had as relatively young and new to Arizona couple was just staggering. Probably 80 families leaned in to help us, which is amazing,Stephanie:Man, I'm going to come to Arizona. That sounds like a nice spot to be. How old are your twins?Joe:They're 30 today. That was a long time ago.Stephanie:Nice. I also have twin boys, and I'm a twin.Joe:That's awesome.Stephanie:What's up next on your reading list?Joe:I'm really actually studying more around AI and frameworks and trying to get a bit smarter around the nerdy geek stuff. So I don't have any grade to casual reading. For me it's more about the tech.Stephanie:Hey, that's good. Well, I was just going to ask you what one thing do you not understand today that you wish you did? Is it AI, or are there other things that you wish you understood?Joe:I grew up as a silicon engineer and so I'm a hardware person and I'm not a software developer, I never have been. And so I'm really trying to understand the worldview of a software developer more than a hardware person. At least I think I know I don't know everything. So it's almost like the first step of the 12 step program, acknowledging that I don't know everything, I'm there.Stephanie:Well then maybe you want to check out the book I'm just starting to read. I think it's called Ask your Developer by the Twilio CEO. I just started reading it.Joe:That sounds good.Stephanie:Yeah, there you go. If you were to have a podcast, what would it be about? And who would your first guest be?Joe:My podcast would be on how technology is going to fundamentally transform shoppers' lives.Stephanie:I love that. Who would your first guest be?Joe:And my first guest, I would actually like to have Bezos.Stephanie:As do I. Let's go get him. Jeff, where are you at?Joe:See if he can help you with that.Stephanie:Yeah, I know. Is Moore's law dead?Joe:Moore's law, if you think about it purely as Silicon, which is when Gordon created that, it was really a silicon construct. We're no longer on that same track, but at a system level in terms of what a system does for you, we're on a similar curve. One of my favorite ways to explain this is, if you hold up your smartphone, the amount of compute in your smartphone 10 years ago was 100X the volume and the same thing's going to be true. So if you look at this amount of compute today is going to be one-100th the size in 10 years. Or you could say, "Hey, what would 100X?" It'd be a giant server room could be in your phone. And so if you think about it, it's not a matter of if I have enough compute to do something, it's a matter of when I have enough compute to do something.Stephanie:Got it.Joe:And I think that's probably to me the magic of Moore's law and some people really get it, and they really understand that it's just a matter of a few years until the compute is cheap enough to do what you want. We're talking about AI for a minute, if we go back 10 years ago at Intel, we had $100,000 computer workstation on every one of our factory tools and these are $50 million tools. Workstation and a huge number of engineers creating algorithms to optimize our manufacturing. So we were doing AI that was very expensive 10 years ago. Very few manufacturing processes can afford that. You jump forward to today and it's simple and cheap and easy to have that amount of compute, and the maturity of this AI computer environment is so much improved that anybody can really deploy what took an army of engineers and very expensive compute 10 years ago.Stephanie:Oh, I love that. I forget what show podcast I was listening to where they were talking about AI and saying a lot of the stuff that we have today, we had access to 10 years ago. We just didn't have the compute power and the ability to do it, but people knew it was coming. And I'd always be interested to hear from those people who could see the vision and be like, "I just need another five or 10 years of acceleration and then my product will work." It's very interesting.Joe:If you imagine the amount of compute that you can afford, whatever that number is, $1000, $100, whatever, but the amount of compute you can afford is going to double in performance every 18 months. Okay, double, you can imagine that, but you don't realize it's 10X in five years and 10X is really hard to comprehend.Stephanie:Yeah, it's hard to extrapolate things like that. Well, I appreciate you answering that question. I was like, "Hmm, I know Joe will have a good answer for this one, even though it's very maybe off of ecommerce." But Joe, thank you so much for coming on the show. Where can people find out more about you and your work?Joe:Well, I work for Intel, obviously. We do have a retail landing page at Intel. We actually don't sell anything to retailers. All of our work is done enabling suppliers to retail to build better solutions, and I try to spend all my time, if possible, talking to retailers to better understand the business problems they have so I can help guide my partners in building better solutions.Stephanie:Cool. Sounds good. Well, people will go and find you if they have any questions I'm sure then. Thanks so much.Joe:Thanks, Stephanie.

In today’s Solidarity Fridays episode, Joe and Kyle sit down and talk about various topics in the news and dive deep into somatic psychology.  They first discuss Canadian mushroom life sciences company Cybin Corp's recent collaboration with drug delivery company IntelGenx to create an orally dissolvable film to administer psilocybin in controlled doses. This feels to them like the early days in the expansion of cannabis offerings, and how, for people with difficulty swallowing or pill-phobia, this may be the best option for psilocybin.  Next, they talk about a recent study of 65 U.S. Special Operations Forces veterans who took Ibogaine on day 1 and 5-MeO-DMT on day 3 (with surrounding processing and integration time) and the amazing results, including most participants rating their psychedelic experiences as one of the top five most personally meaningful and spiritually significant experiences of their lives. Joe brings up a seldom-asked question on whether non-combat veterans should be differentiated from combat veterans in these studies and therapies.  The last article they look at highlights a study where physicians used a new selective‐dose cannabis inhaler to administer microdoses of THC (either .5mg or 1mg) to patients with great results in decreasing pain without affecting cognitive performance. They talk about their experiences with low dose edibles and how they've seen great benefits from tiny amounts.  They then discuss many aspects of Kyle's area of expertise (and often not mentioned in-depth on this podcast), Somatic psychology. They talk about how breathwork and a session with a physical therapist led Kyle to this practice, the concept of character armoring, William Reich's idea of neurosis being represented throughout the entire organism, how the western mind focuses on the material body, trying to fix things, and technique, how the smallest muscle quivering during a breathwork session can show where work needs to be done, and the difficulty people have in discussing the body- how it's almost a secret language only learned through experience or their therapist's suggestive questions on whether they're feeling a certain emotion or even seeing a color. Notable quotes “Thinking about my early years exploring psychedelics, I was so focused on the mind- the experience was outside of me, the knowledge and the wisdom was in the numinous. And that’s where I was going to find all the answers. ...It wasn’t until I had my first breathwork experience, where it was such a somatic experience- where I was feeling the experience in my body vs. externalizing my experience outside of my body and viewing it more as this thing of novelty- of something I’ve never experienced before. Actually having that experience and feeling it within myself, [I realized] I have felt this before, and it’s inside of me.” -Kyle “[Bodywork] just reveals how much is not immediately available in the day-to-day consciousness. There’s so much happening- so much stored in our body that we just don’t even really have a handle on it. ...My favorite line (which, I’m starting to feel like I’m cheating) is: “Mind is, at the very least, diffused throughout the body.” -Joe “As a culture, we’re so body-oriented at times, right? We think about diet, exercise, yoga has turned more into more of an exercise than a lifestyle or practice. ...We’re so focused more on the physical, material body than the emotional body, and that’s something that’s really hard to tap into.” -Kyle “Try not to set out with some of these goals that ‘we need to change this.’ What does it feel like to just maybe feel some of these things?” -Kyle Links Psychedelics For Seniors: A New Sublingual Option Psychedelic Treatment for Trauma-Related Psychological and Cognitive Impairment Among US Special Operations Forces Veterans The pharmacokinetics, efficacy, and safety of a novel selective‐dose cannabis inhaler in patients with chronic pain: A randomized, double‐blinded, placebo‐controlled trial   Support the show Patreon Leave us a review on Facebook or iTunes Share us with your friends Join our Facebook group - Psychedelics Today group – Find the others and create community. Navigating Psychedelics

What's up everybody? Here's episode 125, where we talk about Rockstar, Doc Strange, and a lot of stupid news we had to catch up on. Enjoy! -Joe As always we'd like to thank our executive producers Ruga and Cody, our VIP badasses Ori and Rupert, and our listeners the world over. You guys fucking rock!

One of the privileges we have as the owners of QLB is that we have a panel of experienced entrepreneurs that act as advisers and also happen to be our brokers. On today's episode, we are hosting our first Podcast Panel, these in-house experts are here to answer key questions regarding buying and selling. Jason, Bryan, Amanda, and David have a combined 40 years of experience in brokering e-commerce businesses and are here to share some great insights into their first-hand transaction experience. The discussion today focuses on the sell side and how human behavior can influence a transaction, balancing being a good seller without being a pushover, and finally on valuation and managing expectations from the seller side. Episode Highlights: Can a seller increase their sales amount just by being a good seller? How to handle challenging sellers and tips for approaching the negotiations with them. Thoughts on where seller behavior fits into the entire valuation process. Some of the principals of a good seller and behaviors they should avoid. Where the line is between two being too private and being proactive as a seller. Ways certain SaaS elements can be revealed in due diligence without giving away too much before the handover. Specific contingencies that sellers can hold onto until the signing. The importance of the buyer/seller face to face meeting. Things sellers tend to put too much emphasis on during a transaction. Staying on for extra consult periods as a way to earn buyer trust and confidence. How to temper unreasonable valuations or unreasonable expectations for what market can bear on the part of the seller.   Transcription: Joe: So Mark one of the privileges that you and I have as owners of Quiet Light Brokerage is that we have an unofficial board of directors and highly successful entrepreneurs that are our advisors slash brokers. And we joke often that most of them are more experienced and smarter and more successful than we are. And I think with the panel that you put together in this upcoming episode it's absolutely true. We've got Jason, Brad, Amanda, and David all sharing their experience as advisors, brokers about how to be a good seller and beyond that with the entire transaction. How did the overall panel go? Did everybody behave and give nuggets of wisdom throughout the whole podcast? Mark: Well, naturally I started this all first well it was a pretty interesting idea. I was talking to Amanda about going to a conference down in Austin where she lives and she was invited onto a panel and she said that she'd be really interested in doing stuff like that. So I thought well why don't we do a panel here at Quiet Light and bring forward some of the advisors that have been working on deals. I mean I think the combined number of years on that panel alone was something like 40 some odd years of experience combined. Joe: As buyers or entrepreneurs? Mark: I didn't even get into the; I have no idea how to calculate that. That'd be a much bigger number. My math abilities stop after about 40, 45. Joe: So everything is 40 years of experience for you. Mark: Well I become 42 so yeah everything is; that's going to be the limit. Every year I add one number to my math abilities. The panel was pretty fun. I didn't know how it was going to go. I didn't know if it was going to be too many people on the panel. I was hoping for some discussion between them and we did get into that. We got some great discussion between people who have been doing this for a really, really long time. I wanted to keep the topic pretty simple and just kind of dig into their actual experience in doing deals. I wanted to find out what are they seeing on the sell-side specifically and working with people; humans that can really influence a transaction by their behavior. How much are they seeing that actually come into influencing the price? Jason right out the gate is like look we can sometimes influence the price but the bigger worry here is having a primary effect. If you're a crappy seller you might make this an unsellable business. And that kind of launched off this conversation of what is it; how can you be a good seller? How do you balance this idea of being a good seller who is open and proactive? David talked about being proactive as a seller. How do you balance this proactivity and openness versus being a pushover? What elements should sellers also not necessarily open up on their business right away? And where should they stick their foot down and say we shouldn't be sharing this? A pretty interesting conversation on that front to see what other people's experience was in these different questions that came up. I didn't lay it out right away. Joe just to let you know I asked them to pick out a URI moving forward for the company and I won't tell you what the result was of that. Joe: So I have to listen to this to get the answer. What was the question again specifically and what wiseass comment did Jason make because I'm sure that's exactly where it came from? Mark: You're going to have to listen. Joe: Alright. What was the question though? Mark: The question was choose Joe or Mark. Joe: To do what? And you're like hosting the podcast so you could totally edit it out and tell them no, no, no, no, choose me so it's…for the audience, I want to know Mark has full editing control of the podcast so whatever negative things said about him were completely edited out. Mark: Well, that's actually not true. I don't touch it, in fact, there's a point in there and I'm hoping the editors… Joe: See he's fabricating he's making this up. It's totally true. Chris and Podcast Motor; they do what he tells them to do. Mark: They're the only people in my life that do what I tell them to do. Joe: You man have seven children, that's the way it is. Mark: Yeah, I guarantee nobody in my household does what I tell them to do. Joe: There is teenagers. Mark: There is a point in there; I hope the editors catch this where Amanda cuts out and I awkwardly interject so we'll see if the editors catch that part. If they don't just bear with it because she's actually giving some really good advice during that point in the podcast. Joe: So you and I always joke about or I always joke about the fifth pillar. You always correct me and tell me it doesn't exist. And for those that don't know the pillars, it's growth, risk, gross transferability, and documentation and I always say there's a fifth. It's an invisible fifth and it's the person behind the business. Who you are and how you behave and what you post on Facebook and what's your LinkedIn profile says and it's silly pictures and things of that nature. It has an impact on the overall value of your business. People are going to stroke a check for enough money that is going to make a difference in their life savings and the risk they're going to invest in their future. They need to like you number one, they need to trust you number one; both a number one. That is so so valuable so I love this topic. I absolutely have to listen to see how quickly they all said your name instead of mine. And then I'm going to have to have another panel on with the other four advisors and see what they say. Mark: Sounds great. Mark: Okay, welcome everybody. We're having our very first podcast panel or panel podcast. I don't know what we want to call this but basically, we have a bunch of people on this podcast here. We have Amanda, Jason, David, and Bryan all joined me for a conversation. We've never done this before so we're going to see how this actually works out. The format is going to be pretty simple, I'm just going to ask questions and pick out different people and see what sort of conversation comes from those questions. So, guys, I'm just going to start off with a very simple question. You've got to pick one personally Joe or me; me or Joe? No, don't answer that. I'm just joking. Don't answer that because I already know what the answer would be. You guys would want Joe. Alright so let's; I want to focus this panel on more seller questions because we obviously work with buyers. I know a lot of buyers listen to the podcast but we work with a lot of sellers as well. And so I want to focus a lot on that. What is it like to sell a business? What are some of your experiences? You guys have a ton of experience working with sellers, preparing their businesses for sale, helping them go through that really difficult emotional complex process of exiting their companies so I wanted to try and tap into your collective wisdom here, get some good information and insights into sellers and that process of actually selling a business. And I want to start out by looking at how much influence a seller can have on the value of their business just by how they act with their business. Let's start with you Jason because you are the longest-tenured member of QLB here so I'm going to start with you. I'm going to ask you just a pretty basic question here and that is do you think that you can increase the amount of money; can the seller increase the amount of money they get out of the exit of their business by being a quote-unquote good seller? Jason: Absolutely 100% but it may not be in the way that you're thinking about it. I don't know that your value goes from a million dollars to a million one because you're a good seller. I think it's more binary. I think it's either a million dollars or zero. Meaning if you're not a good seller I think it's likely to spook a buyer to the point where they simply don't want to complete a deal. So I think it's incumbent to be a good seller, to be ethical, to be honest, and very very important to be transparent. So like any little thing about the business that in the back of your mind you think gee I really don't want to talk about that, that's exactly the thing that the seller should talk about with the buyer. Get it out there. Mark: Yeah. Amanda, I know over the years you've also been with QLB for a really long time, we've worked with all sorts of different people. Some people are really easy and a joy to work with and while not dumping on any previous clients, some people are a little bit more challenging. And I want to take a step back and just say something real quick. When we talk about challenging clients, difficult people to work with, the one thing that's always important for us to keep in mind is I get why some people are somewhat challenging. They've built a business, they have a valuable asset, they want to make sure the deal goes through well. So they have a right to a certain extent to be a little bit more challenging. But what has been your experience, Amanda, when you've dealt with a client that might be a little bit more difficult to work with and maybe a little more abrasive in the negotiations? Have you seen that impact the deal that they're able to get? Amanda: Absolutely. I think it's important to actually take those clients and take them aside and say it's really important to look at the feedback that we're getting from buyers and to be reasonable with their expectations. Otherwise, we're not going to deliver for with the deal successfully because the buyer's feedback is super valuable. If you get a lot of feedback that's consistent and a seller is not willing to hear it, it makes it very difficult to take those items there that could be actionable, make them happen, and then get a deal done. I think that also working with abrasive sellers can rub buyers the wrong way because obviously after a deal is done they have to work with the buyers. The buyers work with the seller for extended period time for training and support and it certainly is concerning if a seller is not easy to work with and has a difficult time getting along with the buyer for that matter. So yes it definitely can impact the deal. Mark: Yeah. And I think Jason your point about it being somewhat binary I think is interesting. At the end of the day obviously, we're valuing the business not necessarily the business owner and so Bryan what are your thoughts on what Jason is saying as far as it being somewhat binary? Do you agree with that or do you think that the seller is just one other element of the entire business mix? Obviously, we're valuing the business on its own to a certain extent where does the buyer fit in; I'm sorry, where does the seller fit into that entire valuation process? Bryan: Yes. So I think Jason makes a really, really good point and I'd like to touch on his point about honesty first [inaudible 00:11:30.1]. I think that's probably the most important quality that a good seller can have. But in terms of sort of being a good seller, being more binary than affecting the valuation I think it can be like this and if the seller is really difficult to deal with then disconcerting there is something that's not happening. But I think that being a really good seller can actually also increase the ultimate value that the seller gets out of the transaction simply because being likable and getting along well with buyers is in my opinion likely to induce better offers, induce better conversations that lead to better offers, and thereby can lead to a better and more profitable deals for the seller itself. Mark: Yeah, I think the only issue that I would just if I'm going to comment on this here would be that the buyer is going to look at a business and look at the element of risk. There's always a perceived unknown of what am I actually getting into here. And if you have a seller who is shifty, if you have a seller who is maybe withholding information or is being just kind of; I think Jason to what you're saying, if they're being really abrasive or just mean or whatever yeah that becomes a very binary sort of situation where if I'm a buyer I don't want to get into that because who knows what's going to happen after the sale. Jason: I find in the real world though it's not necessarily that that a seller is abrasive it's more the word you used is good shifty. A buyer just gets the sense there's something that the seller is not telling me. Are they planning to start a competing business the day after they sell? Do they know that this industry is about to hit a brick wall? Are there issues with the supplier? It's that shifty element more than the abrasive element is what I find in the real world. Mark: I would agree with that. I mean the thing that I think people on the sell-side need to understand is that from a buyer's standpoint risk plays into a valuation perceived or real. It doesn't matter if the risk is real or if it's perceived it's still there. And so if you are giving off a sense of risk to a buyer that's going to play in the valuation that you get. So I guess we can put this out there as a plea to be a good seller; to behave correctly. But what does that actually mean to be a good seller? David I'm going to throw it over to you because I haven't got you in on this yet. And sorry, I didn't get to turn in you in the first question here but I want to ask you what are some ways that you've seen from sellers that make them good to work with and things that maybe sellers can do to maybe reduce that element of risk; that perceived risk that they might give out otherwise? David: Yeah, it's a great question. For me, it comes down to three core principles and the guys have touched upon perhaps the most important one right away which is honesty. And then after that, I think it's diligence and knowledge of your own business to the extent that they understand their own numbers in great depth. They understand the reasons, the trends, the way things happen, the problems that they've had; like fully understanding then business. When you have that and have someone with that level of knowledge come on the call with the buyers it's incredibly reassuring that they have this gross knowledge about their own business. And then to a company both that depth of honesty with expertise in their own business. And you know that's not taken for granted because sometimes many entrepreneurs are running multiple businesses and they haven't had the time to focus a lot on one specific thing. So when you have that knowledge it's really helpful. And then the third piece, of course, is productivity. I think that it's easy to come into a selling process perhaps when you are quite emotionally spent even being in the business for a while and to underestimate that a lot of clients will ask some questions and they will want to go back into past historic information and having like a positive mindset about putting that information and realizing that it's also the benefit of the ultimate end goal of the transaction which is to get the best deal terms. Going at that formula very proactive and positive perspective really just creates that like perfect cluster I think of the best seller like proactivity, positivity, honesty, and diligence. Mark: Yeah, that can be a really difficult line to draw because from a seller's standpoint you hear some of these questions and you think I don't want to share this. But at the same time, you don't want to appear shifty. I mean where do you guys think that line is for a seller when they're going through; especially like initially, right? We put up the listing out to the market. I think Brad who is not on this call recently put a listing on the market and had like 300 inquiries on it. We had to shut things down and that client is going through multiple calls one after another after another. And some of these buyers get on and they start asking some pretty pointed questions pretty quickly. What do you think the line is? Amanda I'm going to throw it to you, what do you think that line is where between being a shifty yet still open and honest and proactive as David says? Because I agree with you 100% David that being proactive makes a big difference. So where would you put that line, Amanda? Amanda: I think it has to do with creating expectations for when you're going to open up certain information and letting them know upfront what you're comfortable with. So there are certain things obviously that you want to keep pretty close to you like your suppliers or certain proprietary information that you just don't want to open up to everybody. And so possibly you say okay I'm going to give you all this information; my financials, this is how I do this, this, and this but creating a timeline of when they'll have access to that information based on certain steps being in place and finalizing the deal. And keeping some of that information towards the end I believe has worked really well for most sellers and buyers because if you have that trust level that you built between the two along the way and then you're just basically following the course of actions that have been set out ahead of time then I think that creates a nice flow. And obviously, that's what we want. We want sellers and buyers to both be comfortable through the entire process so that we can get to that finish line. And so I think it is obviously definitely a fine line. But also when a seller and a buyer are working together and they're meeting in person I think that makes a huge impact in what information is shared because you can just feel whether a person is trustworthy or not and what they're going to do with that information. It often comes across just in energy and so oftentimes the seller will let their guard down just when they get to know the buyer a little bit more. But upfront I think obviously you don't want to give 300 people everything you have for obvious reasons. Mark: Yeah and I think for… Amanda: It's about creating expectations. Mark: I would agree 100%. For the buyers that are listening to this, I think the insights that you can take away from this as well is understanding that. Amanda your suggestion is something that we use quite a bit here at Quiet Light during the due diligence process of ordering your requests and understanding some items are going to be more sensitive than others is a really good tip there. It does a great job of helping that seller get put at ease and from the sell-side is a great way for you to protect your more sensitive data by promising this saying I'm more than happy to share this with you but let's first go through these other items first just in case that torpedoes the deal. Bryan, I'm interested to know what your thoughts are where you think the most sensitive sort of data is that sellers might want to consider maybe safeguarding a little bit more than others. Obviously, different sellers are at different levels of comfort. Some don't want to share a single thing about their business and other people are like I don't care. You can't replicate what I did because I got the magic sauce. What sort of information do you think sellers is kind of the main stuff you would probably want to hang onto until the end? Bryan: Yeah, that's a great question. I think it depends a lot on like I said an individual seller. It also depends a lot on the type of the business and the business model, to begin with. So I think with that with an e-commerce business the most closely guarded secrets so to speak might be like Amanda mentioned the vendors with any any business that depends entirely or for the most part on a single or a couple of traffic sources the seller might hold the details of those traffic sources confidential such as for instance in indication of PPC traffic they might not feel comfortable disclosing their full keyword lists and that copies and so forth in the early stages. So it really depends on the business model. It also depends on the business itself and how defensible the business is. Like you said there are some business sellers who are happy to open up absolutely everything because they are fully sourcing that nobody can replicate the business no matter what they sold on but businesses are different and so does comfort level is different. Mark: David and Jason I'd be interested to know from you are there any elements that you have ever run across that have been off-limits in a due diligence process and if so how have you handled getting around that? For example vendor names, customer names, talking to employees; if you're able to share any details on that please do. And I didn't prep before this so if you're not we'll just move on to the next question. Jason: No, that's fine. Well, one thing if I may I just want to add onto what Bryan said. He mentioned about whether a business is replicable. One thing sellers hopefully are aware of, any buyer that's going to see the information has signed I think it's about a five-page non-disclosure agreement which specifically says they're not allowed to scan for ideas to steal. So if a buyer did that they would be blatantly violating their NDA. And a seller would potentially have legal recourse. So hopefully that will give sellers a little more comfort. In regards to what information is truly off-limits, the thing I found is by the time of closing it all has to come out. But some of it does come out essentially at the closing table. So one of the big areas of sensitivity I found is if a business has employees a lot of times the seller doesn't want to mention the sale to the employees literally till the last minute. The reasoning is it could really make them panic and look for other jobs if the deal doesn't go through. The buyer who might be inheriting these employees will have some obvious consternation. They're going to want to know who's about to work for them; are those people planning on sticking around? That can be a really sensitive area. And I've had situations where it feels like we're a lock on that or some other small issue and it always seems to get resolved at the closing table at the 11th hour when finally everyone feels confident that the deal is actually going to happen. David: Yeah and I think to add to Jason's point it's something that comes to mind a lot. Me over the years that's owing a lot of SaaS deals you can imagine the code base is just a really cool secret sauce component of SaaS business and the buyer very naturally wants to see that annotate to see what kind of code quality is annotations and see what kind of architecture is and that creates a lot of shrikes naturally in the owner right away. And it was an interesting bridge trying to think about how we could do that in a very safe way to get to that point that Jason is talking about which is the eventual reveal at closing. And what we did that's worked very effectively over the years and what we do at Quiet Light is show a snapshot of that code base and just provide enough insight and then a high-level like architectural look so that they can see how this sort of modules are put together. And then just a small snapshot so they can analyze the code based on a very discrete basis. Or also consider using a third party due diligence advisor to come in and review the code base and that way the owner is never really hands-on with it. It's being reviewed by a third-party specialist and there's a non-disclosure agreement in place and so you really can actually go into something that looks like quite a difficult issue and something to verify with a lot of credibility and integrity. So that's one of the ways that we've done most to do that with SaaS. Mark: Yeah I think one of the things I've learned over now 13 years of helping people through this is that during the due diligence process oftentimes a buyer comes in and says I need to understand X. And rather than saying in the due diligence process that I need to understand X they say okay I need to understand X and the way to do that is Y. And so what they say is let's do Y. And the seller says I can't do Y. And then the buyer says well what are you trying to hide, right? And so one of the tricks for you guys that I know you guys have done so well over the years is figuring out what is that X; what is the person actually trying to achieve through this request? What are they trying to learn through this request? And David to your point I'm glad you brought up [inaudible 00:25:11.7] because I was going to bring that up. That's one thing that I would consider to be kind of a non-negotiable. If I had a SaaS business and a buyer came in and said I need to get the codebase I would say no. I don't think that that's reasonable mainly because we can satisfy the same information that you're seeking in a way that does not involve handing over the entire code base through a third party due diligence requests or otherwise. I think there are other elements that could be non-negotiable such as if you have a business that has only five clients. And if the buyer wants to speak to those clients there might be a reasonable request there. But it can also be pretty dicing so how do you overcome that sort of friction in a due diligence process. Jason, it looks like you have something that you want to add onto that. Jason: Yeah I mean just touching on that. One thing we were talking about earlier was being a good seller and the corollary is being a good buyer. But one thing I've encountered on occasion is somebody will have experience with having done other deals in the past; either business acquisitions or dispositions or real estate or something. And a person might have an attitude of I've done a lot of deals; this is the way it's always done. And one message I would try to get out to people is just because you've done a deal in a certain way that's not the way it's always done. This panel has done literally hundreds of deals and probably in dozens and dozens of different ways. So I think Mark what you're saying is try to figure out the core of wants and then get creative about how to supply it is probably the most appropriate answer rather than being rigid and saying this is how it has to be. Amanda: I also think to David's point about bringing a third party to do due diligence and possibly a financial audit or an audit of some technology or code it brings a lot of value because it gives the buyer some time to focus on actually what they wanted to do at a business point or it takes the nuances of the financial load because it's so tedious when you're going through financial due diligence or looking at code. And to have somebody else do that who's professional and experienced with that while the buyer can focus on future opportunities and getting prepped and ready for your transitioning into the business then I think there's a ton of value in doing that. And oftentimes it helps the seller feel more comfortable sharing that information with a third party as well. Mark: I'd be curious to see what experience each of you has had with conditional purchase agreements. I've used them sparingly and just I'm going to take a step back, whenever we do the podcast I introduce something that is a little bit outside the normal. Oftentimes I hear from you guys they're saying why are you saying that now everyone is going to want a conditional purchase agreement. So I'm not necessarily encouraging this but I've used it on occasion when somebody really doesn't want to disclose vendor names or really doesn't want to disclose something else. So we say alright let's put together a conditional purchase agreement where basically this thing is binding conditioned on a very specific term. Have any of you others worked with those? Jason: I mean I think like I said I've had some deals where it really seems like it's either going to close or fall apart at the closing table and they've always closed. It's always whatever is that one condition has been revealed right at the very end. Mark: Yeah, and I think I'm going to wrap this up. Amanda, I think one point that you made that I kind of went right on over is meet in person. If I could give one bit of advice to anyone doing an acquisition on the buy-side or sell-side, get together and meet in person. It solves so many problems. If you can spend a couple of days with that person in the same room going over some of the due diligence materials I think it solves a ton of problems or it creates a massive problem that deals shouldn't happen anyways. And that's an outcome that might be okay if the deal is going to be bad anyway. And so a meeting in person is a great suggestion. It's something that I would definitely recommend. Alright, I'm going to ask and move on to another topic here. Bryan I'm going to move this over to you here and that is talking about what's important in the negotiation. When somebody is looking to sell their business oftentimes what we do is we think well I want to get money out of this. I want to get X out of it. I want to get as much as I can possibly get out of it and forget that there's a lot of elements that you have to negotiate. You have a non compete agreement, you have an employment or consulting agreement on top of that. And there's literally probably about a half dozen different things that get negotiated through the process of selling an online business. What are some areas that you've seen maybe a wrong emphasis from sellers in the past where they might put too much weight on one element of a transaction? Bryan: Yeah there is definitely a lot going on in terms of what makes an offer than just total price of the offer. There are things you mentioned and there are seller notes, equity rules, you mentioned an offer can be structured in so many ways. In terms of wrong emphasis, I think sellers are often a little bit perhaps too much against carrying a seller note especially if it's a small seller note. I've seen this sentiment changing over the recent years though and it used to be the case years ago that most sellers would basically only want to want to deal with good cash offers. It's now getting more and more common for sellers to be okay with a 5, 10, or 20% seller note. And the reason why I believe a seller should be more okay with carrying small notes is because that's what I often explain to sellers themselves is that oftentimes those offers that they get that are structured this way are actually going to have bought them more money at the end than a full cash offer route to the extent that they can even easy to consider the seller note to be sort of a bonus on top of what they get anyway. So they can keep pushing for an all-cash offer but it's likely that this all-cash offer would actually go to turn out to be lower than the cash part of the offer that might go to small notes. Mark: Yeah to that we have a podcast I think it probably would have aired a couple of weeks before this episode here with Shannon Stewart who's a tax advisor on the sell-side. And she has an example of a business that sold for 11 million dollars and that she was able to; the net proceeds increased by 43% largely through deferring some of the payments that came in. And when you're talking about an 11 million dollar deal a 43% increase in net proceeds is not a small amount of money. So I would agree, seller notes and knowing how to structure those the right way is is something. Jason what would you say; is there any element that you think sellers tend to overemphasize when they're negotiating? Jason: Yeah I mean I think like Bryan said headline price gets a lot of focus when in reality it's more about how much are you going to get overtime after-tax that you get to keep. And then I think another thing that gets way too much emphasis is multiple. I think a lot of people get hung up on multiple both buyers and sellers and it kind of boils down more to bragging rights than to a discernible business reasoning meaning ohI sold my business for 4X or whatever so I can tell my friends. The reality is okay let's say you pushed the multiple for your particular industry; let's say you're selling an e-commerce business and they normally sell around three times earnings and you managed to push it to four times like you're taking a lot more risk to get to four times you had to accept an earn-out and it's depending on performance and this and that and the other. Even if you collect it all you're earning what you would make in four years anyway. You wouldn't be selling the business if the sole reason was the money that you're getting paid. There are clearly other reasons otherwise you're better to keep the business. So the big advice I give to sellers is the market will determine the value of your business better than anyone on this panel, better than you the seller, better than any individual buyer. We have thousands and thousands of buyers and for most businesses, we get multiple offers. That's the market. If you're not willing to accept what the market will bear you're better to keep the business than to sell it or to try to push the market beyond what it will bear because it very likely could backfire. Mark: Well Jason you're begging me to go into a question that is also on the list. I'm not going to go there yet because I want to stay on this one here and then we're going to get over to that question to wrap things up here. David, I'll be interested in your thoughts on this as well here. Are there elements; I mean you've got a ton of experience in working with sellers just like everybody here, what are some things that you see people often negotiate maybe more heavily than they should and what advice would you give to them on that? David: Well I think certainly on the emphasis question I would say to sellers when they're reviewing any offer that 50% of the decision; only 50% of the decision should come down to purchase price and terms and the other 50% should be based on the execution certainty of the buyer that's actually presenting the offset. Because there's an ocean of difference between coming out with an LOI for your business and actually closing it. And I think it's part of the; well a huge component of hiring a broker and an advisor to help you take that bridge from there to there and I think it's for me sellers that have been really receptive to guidance and advice at that point whether they should take the focus off the headline price off the headline multiple that Jason is talking about and consider the wider context that is this still going to close because the buyer has experience, for example, they have a readily available source of funding their due diligence requests are miles and miles long they're not reliant on any kind of outside financing [inaudible 00:35:22.8] all of these things introduce risk into the deal and ultimately that's risk needs to be looked at properly in the context of the whole deal so I think that's really important. Negotiating terms, one thing that I always recommend for sellers to be open to is the prospect of keeping the window open for like the minority kind of consulting arrangements after the sale. Honestly, we had enough every business through a standard transition period and depending on the size and complexity that can vary. But I think one thing that's actually really good for sellers to think about is maybe staying on to do like an hour or two a month to just say six months longer with the sale and that goes a huge way with buyers knowing that they just have a slightly longer line which the owner has to ask a half an hour-long question in four months time. And to that point about getting the trust and getting the deal over the way, that's a huge point that I think sellers are sometimes like they're spent and they never really want to spend more time on the business. But just that tiny little time investment for just a few moments goes a huge way towards getting a deal on the way and a great value. Mark: Yeah I would agree to that 100%. I remember when I sold my business now a long time ago they asked me to stay on for six months afterwards and they paid me for it; so a regular monthly consulting fee and at first I was like man this is going to be a pain but what I found pretty quickly is it wasn't. It was really easy. It was very easy money that I was bringing in as a result of that. And it really helped with their transition as well. Alright, we're at 35 or about 30 minutes here on this so we're going to round it out with one last question and this is one that is pretty important to me because I think it's what we all do here. We all earn a living in some capacity through helping people exit their businesses and from our standpoint it can be really easy to treat people's businesses as inventory that we're simply moving. And obviously, we don't ever want to go there because we're all business owners ourselves. We've all been through that. We know what work it takes to build these and then how difficult it can be and how stressful it can be to sell them. So one of my pet peeves that have grown over the years is just hearing people say oh man is this seller I was approaching them I wanted to buy their business they weren't selling it but I was doing outreach and I asked them how much they'd sell it for and man his expectations were crazy. It's a pet peeve of mine so I'm kind of implanting here the answer that I want to hear. Amanda; we're going to go left and right on my screen, Amanda, you're first here. Do you think that there is such thing as an unreasonable valuation or is it only really unreasonable expectations of what the market can bear? Amanda: Well I think both actually I think unreasonable expectations for where the market can bear; I mean when we're seeing that right now. Certainly, we're seeing a lot of growth in multiples over the last two years and there's been a push to constantly drive that multiple. And I think we've done a really good job of doing that. But sellers, of course, have their own expectations on what they think that multiple should be because they hear things from other sellers or they possibly got an offer four years ago from a strategic and they decide to pass that. And that has dried up and gone away and is no longer a viable option. And so I think the market evolves really quickly. And I'm actually one of those people who may have unreasonable expectation professional with expertise and proper data to bring somewhere like that back to reality. And I think that that's; actually, the core of it is having realistic expectations with what the market is; the ability of the market at this time because obviously, that may change in six months for better or for worse. I think that whether the expectations are reasonable is less important than the seller being able to be open to the feedback and coming back down to reality. And I think that makes a lot of difference because we see that quite often where sellers will come in and they think their business is for X multiple but then they're open to hearing what we're experiencing, what we're seeing because we do a lot of volumes and then having those realistic expectations is super important. Mark: Yeah and I think one thing I've been trying to remind people as well especially in the sell-side when we get up into the high seven and eight-figure territory; you brought up Amanda that the seller might have gotten an offer from a strategic years ago but obviously never went through or they heard about so-and-so who got a 6X on their business what they never really hear when they hear these big prices is what was the composition of that offer. How much was there actually cash? How much was equity that can be the phantom value? Jason, I know you have a lot of stories about phantom values in equity, right? And so that's something that we don't hear about. It's like the sports contract of oh my gosh they got o120 dollars but it's only 10 million dollars guaranteed and like it's so much in incentives. Jason, what are your thoughts on this aspect of unreasonable expectations on the part of sellers? Jason: I think part of it depends on how you define unreasonable because I look at myself as an example. Most people say I've got very unreasonable expectations of the value of an hour of my time and I will concede absolutely positively. What I expect to earn is way more than what my job will provide and all that means is I need to adjust how I use my time in order to achieve it. So if you're a person who believes your business is worth a lot more than the market will bear, that's perfectly fine. I just think don't be a seller because the market won't provide it. It's important to understand the people on the other end of the transaction are buyers. They're seeking a certain rate of return. You're comparing your business not only to save alternatives like or I mean to a spectrum of alternatives and various safety like bonds, stocks, municipals, real estate. They're also comparing it to other businesses for sale that earn roughly the same amount. You might have roughly the same growth plans. And it can be really frustrating if anyone is banging their head saying no, no, no, no, my business is special and deserves more when the market simply won't bear it out. I think most of us on the panel have kind of learned that there's a range. There's a spectrum where a valuation could be within a certain range depending on certain factors. Sometimes it's worth it to test the market to put out something at a bit higher valuation just that so you see the seller understands that the odds are going to go down the harder you push. And then one other kind of important point I want to bring up, we talked about this on an internal email the other day. A lot of times a seller will call multiple brokerages; they'll call Quiet Light and then two or three of our competitors and that's perfectly fine. We want you to talk to whoever you want to talk to. But one common thing I'll hear is a seller will say to me how much is the business worth and I'll quote a price. I'll say I think it's worth about a million dollars for the sake of argument and they'll say well wait I just talked to Brokerage X and they quoted me a million two, can you get me a million two? My answer is I don't know and neither do they. It's not the broker that's buying your business. It's a buyer that we've not yet identified and all that all of us are doing is giving an opinion. And in some cases, it can be really detrimental to the seller to try to play brokers off each other because the broker's tendency might be well gee if these three other people told you it's worth more maybe I'm wrong and the price gets bid up in the sellers head. And then when you get to market the buyers; the people that are actually writing the check for the business are like what are you talking about you're way out of bounds? So it's really important to remember who's the decision-maker. In my mind the decision-maker is always the person that's writing the check for your business; sometimes that's the buyer, sometimes that's the banker who's funding the buyer, but you always have to cater to that ultimate decision-maker to figure out what's the true value. Mark: Absolutely. So in regards to the value of your time Jason I appreciate you putting it on a payment plan for this little podcast panel because it is pretty crazy. Alright, David, over to you I want to get your opinions on this. David: I think Jason said absolutely the best. I think the market ultimately informs everyone to pick up on what Amanda said it's all about receptivity to that. I mean you can continue on as a business owner with a maybe like a grand ass perspective of the value of your business for a long enough period of time and as Jason said potentially go with the broker that's gone for a particularly inflated valuation. The problem is as Jason and we all know here is that if you come out way too high you will flop in the market and it will be a long long period of time before you then eventually have to come off the exclusivity pulling down the listing and then return back to market at a later point in time often with another advisor and how many times do we see that at Quiet Light with people coming to us from a very correct or whatever having spent an awful lot of wasted time and to cut in to Jason's point all of our time is valuable and we love the perception of it. If you're a business owner with a great business that you want to exit your time is especially valuable. So that decision right out the gate in terms of your receptivity and so what the market will bear is arguably the most important decision when it comes to respecting your own time and getting a process done and completed and money in the bag. Mark: Yeah, I remember probably about a year ago I was recording a potential client and then he came back and said another broker quoted me and said that they could get me this much and it was substantially higher than what I was going to; what I was quoting him at. He said and he's going to reduce his commission to this. I looked at it and I called him and said yeah you should sign with them. How do you counteract that, right? You couldn't really counteract that too much other than say if you really think they can get that and are being less commissioned then you should sign with them. He ended up signing with me later and we ended up getting a really good deal for him. But I think you guys point about valuations being a predictive exercise is on point. Alright, Bryan, I saved the best for last. What are your thoughts as far as these unreasonable expectations or is it just unreasonable expectations for the market? Bryan: I think Chris and David both absolutely nailed it. And I'm glad that they took the conversation the way they did. I think the market is always going to be brutally honest and any valuation mistakes that are being made, any unreasonable expectations are going to be corrected by the market. But I think the one most important thing on this is it is going to be the market who will buy the business it's not going to be the broker. There's no point negotiating the valuation of your business with the broker because it's not in the broker's power to value your business it's the market that values your business ultimately. Mark: Absolutely I'm going around this out and close it up by saying one thing and that is Jason, you said this in what you brought up, if the value of your business in your head is 10 million dollars but the valuation of the market is 1 million dollars just don't become a seller. That's kind of the result. As far as Quiet Light Brokerage, look I know where the value of Quiet Light is. If somebody came up the street and offered me the value; the market value of Quiet Light I would say no. If they are offering me two times the market value of Quiet Light I would say no. If they offered me three times I would still say no because the value of my head for what this business is worth to me right now is way more than what the market value is. I'm not a seller; not going to be a seller for a long long time. And that's totally fine because I love this business. I love working with you guys. Thank you so much for coming on this podcast panel. Guys give us feedback on this. Let us know what you think. If there's something that you want us to do a panel on as far as topics let me know. If you want it to be specific in industries such as e-commerce or SaaS or content sites we can do that as well. We've got a wealth of experience here with the advisors and we're about to be able to tap into them more with these podcasts. So again, thanks everyone for joining this. Let's do it again hopefully sometime soon. Bryan: Thanks, everyone. Amanda: Thank you. David: Thanks, Mark.

Gary Myers: Hi. My name is Gary Myers. Joe Fontenot: And I'm Joe Fontenot. Gary: We're the hosts of the Answering the Call podcast. Joe: And this is the podcast where we talk to people who are answering God's call. Today our guest is Emir Caner. He's the president of Truett McConnell University. Gary: He talks about leadership, it's challenges, and where he finds inspiration. Joe: And so, here's Emir. Joe: Dr. Emir Caner, you are the president of Truett McConnell University and you've been there for 10 years now, since 2008. So it's really great to have you here. I had a question for you first. We're going to talk about some leadership things, but every single email and then on your website you say three words. Truth is immortal. Emir Caner: Yeah. Joe: What does that mean? Emir: I did my dissertation on Balthasar Hubmaier, who is my hero of the faith, not only for his strengths, but for his weaknesses as well. Ended up living his life the last 14 months before he was arrested and ultimately martyred for the faith, he had baptized six to twelve thousand people, and that's if you can imagine a church that baptizes 150 a more a week, and published 17 books at the same time. Ultimately was arrested and burned at the stake outside the gates there in Vienna, Austria. So his slogan I have plagiarized now some 500 years later. 'Truth is unkillable' is the literal translation from the German. Truth is immortal is the popular translation. It just reminds people that while truth can decay and truth can diminish, it can never die, because like the resurrection it will raise itself like our Lord. And as long as our Lord is raised from the dead, truth itself cannot die itself. Joe: That's a pretty comforting concept, I think, especially since we live in a truth is relative world. You know, truth is not only here, but it's immortal. So, I have a question for you. I was looking at your career and so forth, and something strikes me as kind of interesting, and it's specifically about leadership. So there's a lot of talk about leadership in the world, and all this kind of stuff, but I think a lot of time leadership gets generalized. So for instance, one of the things I found, came across, was this idea that there's a difference between being like number two, and being number one. In an institution, an organization, I'm talking kind of about responsibility and direction, not like in an ego sense. And you take the difference between number two and number three, and it might not be much. What is the difference between number one and number two? This is something ... You know, you're currently the president of Truett McConnell, that institution, but you've not always been at the top, in that case, and so you've had kind of both sides. Can you talk a little bit about some of the things that you've learned in the process of that? Emir: Yeah. Some of it's experiential. I had never intended to be in the spot I am. Never thought I was qualified. Many days still don't think I'm qualified to do so. But before this position at Truett McConnell University, I was at Southwestern Seminary, and helped found the College at Southwestern that's now Scarborough College. I think the number two, the greatest difference, and I gladly fit into that, is I wanted to give unfettered support to my president. And as long as everything, of course, was ethical and theological, even if we disagreed, and ultimately you do. In any position of authority you will disagree with those are in authority, my goal was to prop him up to encourage him and to do what God had put him in that place to do in every way possible, whether it was recruiting students or fundraising, whether it was in the classroom or sitting with students in my office like I do. In some ways there aren't many differences. I think the largest difference is the enormity of the task becomes clear from the chair because you start to realize, "Oh gosh. I've got 300 families who rely on me in order to make a living. I have 2900 students who have a desire in their life, and a call in their life, and in some minute way I am responsible for them as well." And so there is a gravity to the situation that you wake up and you realize ... If you don't realize at that point that you are inadequate, you are probably arrogant, because there is no possible way. The best piece of leadership advice I've ever received came from Dr. Charles Stanley. When he was asked how did you get where you are today? Right? He started first at Atlanta in 1971. Now he's got a potential audience of over a billion. His answer is, "I don't know. All I did was one step at a time." And I think that's a crucial issue of leadership is that those that I wish to emulate most never intended to be there. They only intended to follow the Lord, whatever the path was. And that was truly helpful, because when you get to the chair you start to recognize there's no way of doing this without the grace of God. And not in part, but really in whole, because any decision you make has an impact on every student. And the decisions you make will have an impact not just for tomorrow, but for decades to come. So that's also the joy of the situation, because then you get to see graduates. You get to see them do things far greater than anyone could have dreamed, and that's the joy of it. Joe: Was there a time when you looked at leadership, the way you described it here is almost as follow-ship. You are here to serve. You're here to follow. The one foot in front of the other on the path that God has laid out for you. Was there a time when you looked at leadership more in a, I would almost say stereotypical way? Like a lot of people look at the leader and say, "The leader has a plan, has a path. They're going. We're going to follow them. When I get to that position, I'm going to be the one making the direction." But kind of what you've described is something a little different in the sense that you were here to follow God, right? And so has that become like a change in your life? Did you always look at it like this? Emir: I just really never saw this coming. When I got called to ministry my dream was just to preach the Word. And I think that's enough. It's not just, it is the primary goal even to this day that I do. And then all of a sudden I was asked to become professor of church history and Anabaptist studies at Southeastern Seminary. And that's all I dreamed about in life was just to do that, and I got to do that for years. And then all of a sudden I got a call from Southwestern to say, "Would you think about taking this on?" I'd never seen that coming. So I gladly did that, and we purchased a home. My wife and I had a great church out at Forth Worth. Our family was growing, and young, and I thought, you know, this is it. This is where everything will happen. And then an email came in from a trustee at Truett, and thought, "No. I don't want this." And trustees can tell you even 10 years later, I waited until the very last minute to say yes, because there was no possible way in my mind that I could be what Truett needed. But when you get the unction of the Lord, you have to say yes. And so here you are 10 years later. And there is. There's a great joy. It's not hard living in the mountains of North Georgia. Joe: Right. Emir: Right? It's a beautiful place. It's a contagious place. So many of our students not only come, but they stay because of the mountains of North Georgia. But no. I think there is, Luther Rice Seminary has a professor who wrote a book on followership, and I guess that's part of it. I would only add most books on leadership are written of the perspective that those who have succeeded. I read a lot from those I can learn from who those who in the worlds eyes have failed, but they haven't. There was a missionary out in South America in the 19th century, I think about 1857. They found his diary. He went out to a remote island trying to win the tribe to Christ, and never did. Never won one to Christ that we know of to this day. But his diary says it all. In his diary, his last diary before he starved to death was, "I am overwhelmed by the goodness of God." And I think you can learn just as much from that faithful servant as you can from the successful story. In fact there's a great danger of only looking to those who ... They love the stories of Abraham Lincoln or Winston Churchill. They failed, they failed, they failed, but then they succeeded. But I wonder, would you really read Lincoln, or Churchill, or anyone religious life if they had just failed? And as a church historian, that's what I do. I love to study those who are the forgotten, are the grassroots. Joe: What are some of the main things you've learned from those forgotten? Emir: You know, as a church historian, history ... Less than 1% of history is ever written down. And history that we read, in fact, if you study church history in terms, even as you teach in Baptist life, Evangelical life, Protestant life, we still only teach it from the perspective of the successful. So you teach the church fathers nearly as cleanly as Roman Catholicism teaches of the church fathers of Jerome, Augusta, et cetera. But I look for the grassroots. And it's one of the reasons why I'm a free churchman. It's a reason why I studied Anabaptistica. Why they are our forefathers spiritually, and I would say historically as well is these are the forgotten. They were meant to be forgotten. They were martyred to be forgotten. But those, I think, are the true heroes. And you really can translate that into modern day church life. Where if you think about it, you walk into church, all the accolades goes to the person with the limelight. But the forgotten heroes of the backrooms, of the 3-year-old Sunday school, of the deacon who goes to the hospital. That's part and parcel of how we should look at church history. Joe: I think we're at a little bit of a disadvantage in the one sense of everybody puts the emphasis on the winners, right? Whether it's the person whose standing up at the front, you know, on and on and on. How does a person spot the forgotten who are not "losers" right? But they're the people that are being faithful and so forth, but the world has not validated them? Emir: Many times you can't, right? Because the eradication of history stops you from doing that unless you move into oral history, or you find some forgotten documents. But that's exactly what we should do. When you got The Evangelical Theological Society, there are many good papers being done, but sometimes you sort of get tired of the regurgitation of Martin Luther for the 17th hundredth time of the ... It just becomes insane that they think they found something. I love when you'd stated grassroots you find things you never thought. So for example, with Anabaptistica, one of my professors came over to the States, studied at Georgia Tech, got his bachelors/masters in PhD in aerospace engineering. And he was an agnostic, didn't believe, and then he got saved. And all of a sudden he did a master of divinity and doctorate, and did it in Anabaptistica. He's Italian, French Italian, and so he decided to go study the archives. And that's where I tell people they are. They're in the back rooms of families. They're in the archives of libraries. Every book written about Italian Anabaptists, and they were heretics. All of them. And they basically repeated secondary history over and over again. Well this French Italian then went into the archives and studied, and it was all a myth perpetuated by those who wanted to eradicate their history, call them heretics, because in the medieval times you had to prove heretics in order to put them to death. But you ultimately found is while there were some heretics among them, the vast majority of Italian Anabaptists were orthodox. They were Trinitarian, they were salvation by grace alone and so forth, and they were martyred for the faith. And so when I do my Anabaptist tour, like I'll do next summer, we go to Venice. No one else has done this in an Anabaptist, or the Mennonites don't do this. So we go to Venice. We literally go to the place where they would take the Anabaptists at night quietly, whole families, put them out into the water, drop them underneath the boats, let them drown, come back to dock, nobody knew them again. And one of the honors of being a theologian or historian is being allowed to tell the story of those who are forgotten, just like those guys. Joe: That's amazing. Do you think those forgotten people still exist today? Emir: Yeah. You know- Joe: I mean are alive today? Emir: They're not only alive, but they need to come more to the forefront of, for example, how we do issues of church planting, or ecclesiology. If you go to conferences, there are a lot of conferences on church planting. But church planting in urban Atlanta is radically different than doing church planting in the mountains of North Georgia. And there are different heroes for different situations. And the forgotten man who is sitting out in First Baptist, Lizard Lick, North Carolina, which is an actual city- Joe: It is. Emir: ... is doing as faithful work as the urbanite or the suburbanite that's in the larger church. And I think we've forgotten that the backbone of Southern Baptist life is not merely made up of the megas, but is made up of the smaller churches, and the yeoman's work that's out there, that a man that's in a community of 500 baptizing 30 is just as extraordinary as man that's in a community of 100,000 and baptizing 300. And those are the forgotten. Those are the ones I love to preach for, because you walk in to this remote location. I remember a few years ago I drove up, they didn't even have a parking lot. And they had this auditorium that sat about 300, and you pulled up to grass, and it was packed, and I went in. And doing that, being in Georgia, preaching under watermelon sheds, and old revivalist. I preached at a revivalistic facility that had had a revival service every year except for once since 1812. Joe: Wow. Emir: Those are the forgotten too many times, but I think we have to realize or maybe even re-realize what it means to have that differentiation between the segments of Southern Baptist life as we unify under theology. Joe: How we tell the difference between one of these forgotten heroes, the person whose doing the good work, and perhaps the world is not recognizing them, versus someone who is not, and they're basically sowing the seeds of, or getting what they're sowing. In other words, the difference between someone who is being faithful to the gospel, but not seeing anyone come forward, versus the person who is not being faithful and not seeing? You know what I mean? How do we know the difference between what the world is miscategorizing and what the world is categorizing correctly? Emir: Yeah. You know, I often ask the question in class when I teach on Adoniram Judson, would we talk about him if he had left after five years? Before he saw a convert? Before he saw people come to faith in Christ? And I don't think we would have talked about him. I don't. But the reason I don't think we would have talked about him is not because he was a failure, but because he walked away too soon. The faithful stay faithful. And that's how we need to consider who are the heroes of the faith is not merely by the recognition of success by numbers. I do worry sometimes that we diminish that so much that we're paying the price for it, right? Numbers do mean something. He who wins souls is wise. It's the recognition that someone cared enough to look at me as a Muslin and say, "I want you in church, and I want to you to be saved." On the other hand, the faithfulness is the reason why it's the ending as much as matters as the beginning. I think God rewards on the beginning as well. But the recognition comes, and I tell students, your greatest part of ministry is not when you're 20, 30, or 40. Your greatest ministry should happen when you're 50, 60, 70, 80 years old, because you're building upon the blocks of God's call that at one point you were a pioneer taking down trees, and now your faithful service, you can look back and see God's hand to such a degree that even if God doesn't do anything from that point forward, there's a joy and gratitude that lives within your heart that gives others who are doing the same calling, and encouragement to walk faithfully. Joe: Yeah. That's a very different kind of thinking. That's a kind of thinking that looks 20 to 30 years into the future, not a kind of thinking that looks two years into the future. I mean of course, we always consider- Emir: Yeah. I worry that Southern Baptists are into fads. But I worry about because just like parachute pants, they're going to go out faster than they ever came in, and for good reason. Joe: Sure. Emir: So when I hear statisticians and some leadership pundits say, "But you got to reach the millennials," my mind is okay, I get that. I understand the technicalities, but the millennial generations now gone. Right now you're dealing with another generation. Another generation. The fact of being faithful does not segregate a population into generations, whether that's an ethnic segregation, or whether that's an age segregation. Instead, the person sits in a neighborhood and says, "That 98-year-old in the nursing home is just as important as the 19-year-old in a college right over there." And many times we see successes reaching the younger and we forget what it is to reach the older who are closer to eternity in so many ways as well. And thereby we designate success by the sex appeal instead of by the sacrifice. That's part of what I think can be a problem with an evangelical life. It's not a denigration. We got to reach the youth, right? When in Georgia the number one number of those who are baptized as a youth is zero, we recognize we have a problem with the youth. But the statisticians never say what the number one number is for the older either. We concentrate so much on one generation, we forget the next, and that is not biblical in any regard. So I think the recognition has to be, all right. If you win New Orleans, then you've got to reach those who are in your community, whether that's in Slidell, or whether that's in an urban community. Whoever's around you, God's put around you. In the mountains of North Georgia, it's going to be different. But we have to be in some ways a generationalist church, one that cares as much as about one age as the other. Joe: You know, leadership obviously is about hard choices. We all know that, hard decisions. You said in an interview back in 2011 that a decision for Christ, this is talking about Muslims, could end in being kicked out of the family or even death. You didn't, if I have this right, you didn't have really much of a relationship with your father for most of your adult life because he was a Muslim. You became a Christian and he basically disowned you. Emir: Right. Joe: Do you think that Christians in America, and I'm talking about people, not Muslims, not your situation, I'm talking about just a person who grows up in a "Christian" home, nominal or whatever. Do you think Christians in America have it easier? Emir: Let me go back on something you said first, because I want people to hear this because when you're reaching out to Muslims, and I've taught Islamic evangelism so much now for the better part of two decades. I think people make ... There's a misnomer out that somehow you got to know Islam well to win someone to Jesus, and it's just not true. It's helpful. It's supplemental, but it's not essential. Those who know Mohammed well are not necessarily those who win Muslims to Jesus. It's those who know Jesus well that will win Muslims to Jesus. On the part of America Christianity, I would say we all have it far easier, not merely other Americans who didn't grow up Islamic like I did, but all of us including me, because while I was disowned by my father, I didn't pay the price that so many are paying across the globe. That usually happens, the demarcation line is with baptism. And at that point of baptism they see you as never returning. By the way, the statistics say that 75% of Muslims who become Christian go back to being Muslim. Joe: Really? Emir: Because of the heavy pressure. Because the fact that Islam isn't merely a religion, it's a 24/7 socioeconomic development of religion that involves every part and aspect of your life from the economy, to how you dress, to who you marry and so forth. But those across the globe, and you're starting to see this incredibly rambunctious powerful movement of God in places like Iran. And why I think that's happening is because the persecution is leading to others coming to faith in Christ, just like in the Anabaptist movement in Europe in the 16th century, just like the persecution under Communism, under my wife's country all the way through the Soviet Union in the 1940's through the 1980's is true of Islam today. The great persecutors of the church day are still Communists in China and North Korea and so forth, but are also, it's Islamism. Not all Muslims, because some Muslims come to America in order to leave the traditional elements of the faith. Not radical. I think people forget, it's not radical Islamic theology to put to death someone who leaves Islam. It's traditional. Mohammed said, "Whoever leaves the Islamic religion, kill him." Comes from Bukhari's Hadith. So that's why 85% of Egyptians say that anybody who leaves Islam should die. It's not radical, it's traditional. So it is. But it's where the church also seems to be growing most. I would just add one other thing. I always hear people say that under persecution the church grows the most. And that's true many times in history, but philosophically doesn't have to be true. Our greatest moments in American history with revivals came when we recognized our dependence of God came when we were polarized as a nation. It didn't come under persecution. It came under different elements. Freedom can birth revival just as well as persecution. It's just a matter of what is God's will in that regard. Joe: As leaders, what can we do to help people get to that realization, which I think is the key. As you were saying, persecution brings that realization that we need God, but there are other things that can bring that realization that we need God. As leaders, how do we get people to understand, or how can we shepard people to that point? What can we do? Emir: Yeah. I tell my students there's an old cliched phrase that says Christianity is not a crutch, it's a wheelchair. You cannot be semi-dependent on God, you've got to be fully dependent on Him. I think we wait for God moments. You know, essentially I tell my children, of whom I have three, you have to learn in one of two ways. You either learn through knowledge, which is to desire scripture, right? The reason God wrote his revelation is that we would read it and follow it, period. But unfortunately we are stubborn and fallen creatures, and so the only other way you learn is through experience. So the two ways that you put that into a person's life is that you preach it faithfully from the pulpit instead of opinionations and things of this nature that become so popular in today's pulpits. You faithfully expound the Word of God verse by verse, book by book. You will hit every topic if you touch every verse. For the second part, which is I would say is the majority of our church members, its experience, which means there are going to be God moments where they recognize they need God. There will be a loss of a job, loss of a family member, a brokenness in their heart and their mind. And that's at that point where the pastor, the shepard has to walk in, and he can do one of two things. He can either assuage their conscious and miss the God moment, or he can like a Barnabas convict and encourage at the same time and allow them to see a dependency on God that will become the pilgrimage. And it is. Revivals are an instant. And I study them faithfully. But faith becomes a pilgrimage. Far after the first great awakening was over, people were still walking faithfully with the Lord. They just weren't seeing the numbers they did under Jonathan Edwards in New England, or Charles Finney's Ohio, whatever it may be. That's just part of what I think it's going to take in America, and if we don't learn through this too, I think the intervention of God is just a matter of time, whether we want to see it as a cause or a permission, it really doesn't matter at this point. But when we put ourselves outside of the umbrella of God's protection by disobedience, what else is going to happen besides the consequences of disobedience that happens to a person or a nation? Joe: I've one last question. Anything you would do over? Emir: Ha! Golly! What would you not do over? I don't know. In some ways, as a historian, I would say no because your scars tell your story. In other ways, any disobedience to God, you'd always want a redo on that. I think the greatest mistake I made young in ministry was I thought I was teachable, but I wasn't as teachable as I thought I was. Joe: Oh, that's interesting. How did you recognize that? Emir: You don't. You wait. Joe: In retrospective? Emir: In retrospect. It wasn't as if I was obstinate. It wasn't like I was obtuse in any way. It's just that my confidence outweighed my humility. And looking back, I think most ministers would say, "I wish I had listened more and spoke less." In particular, one of the things I did, and even wish I would do more is, when I got called in the ministry in the 80's, I made it a point to listen to older preachers and actually to attend conferences where I thought, if this jokers near 90, I'm going to show up because he doesn't have long on the Earth. And so I would hear people that no one else today hear, because they're gone. Right? They've graduated to glory and their time with Jesus is now at hand. And I would encourage that of students is if you find those who are older, and they have been faithful in their walk, go listen to them. You'll catch far more than you know. One of the people I bring into Truett, and every time he just rolls his eyes at me, is Junior Hill. Joe: He was here not too long ago. Emir: Yeah. He's 80 years old. Every time he'll wrangle and go, "I don't know why you want an old codger like me." But inevitably after he's done preaching, the line out the door of students is much longer than he can stand. And it's because the students recognize it's not merely he's grandfatherly, I think there's a recognition of the intangible faith that he has walked with the Lord for decades and decades. And that's what I wish I could even do more is just listen to those who have walked the faith for so long. Joe: Well, thanks so much Dr. Caner for coming on the podcast. It's been great talking with you. Emir: Yeah. It was good being here.

Lianna Patch is funny. Not everyone can stand up in front of 150 entrepreneurs and make them laugh, respect her, and want to hire her all at the same time. Yet – that's exactly what she did when I attended the Blue Ribbon Mastermind event in Denver last month (August 2018). When Lianna shares her passion, which is writing copy infused with humor that converts, people make more money. How? Their customers stay on page, get engaged in, and actually read what you write. Oh, and then they buy your product, write reviews and spread the word about your brand. Humor makes people like you. So why not write copy infused with humor? Because you are not funny. Me neither, at least that's what my kids tell me (what do they know…). It is a skill we don't all have, clearly. Episode Highlights: What Lianna does to help clients who come to her with the need for something new. How her techniques to boost add-to-cart conversions as well as purchase conversions. Why it is important to message-match across the board, through the entire purchase and follow-up process. The importance of building the relationship so that if the product is a one-off perhaps that client will be swayed to purchase other items. Lianna shares the biggest mistakes people make when writing online copy. Steps business owners should take to improve copy and what should be first on the list. What makes certain checkouts places that people want to revisit again and again. The importance of grammar and how intentionally not using perfect grammar can work if done the right way. Why Lianna thinks being buttoned up is a thing of e-commerce past. How to grab people's attention with web copy content. Transcription: Mark: Joe you spent a lot of years in the direct response world specifically within the agency world and buying radio ads right? Joe: Yeah. Yes, I did brought a lot of copy. Mark: Brought a lot of copy and this is an area that we're going to talk about today, writing copy. I find for myself when I have to actually write copy it's a completely different mindset from pretty much everything else and it can be difficult to do. Lianna Patch and she is a professional copywriter for specifically conversions right? Joe: Yes Lianna Patch did a presentation at the Blue Ribbon Mastermind in front of 150 entrepreneurs and she writes copy that conversion … calls herself a conversion copywriter which I think is brilliant. I'm sure it's a phrase that lots of people have heard but for some reason, it is brand new to me. Although that's what I did, that's what my contractors did back in my radio days and my online days. But what she did was she infused comedy into her presentation and she infuses comedy into her clients' websites, their emails, their … all of their different campaigns and Mark it works. I'm telling you the presentation was fantastic she gave some examples of what the before and after copy was like and it just made me want to read it. When you go to her website it just makes you want to stay on the website and poke around and look at different things. And throughout the whole podcast, I keep going back to her website and giving examples that I think are just hilarious and make me want to keep reading. And I don't think enough of us e-commerce entrepreneur or SaaS entrepreneurs whatever you want to call yourself infuse the human factor and a little bit of comedy into your content so that people realize you're not just some big corporation that's sending your standard email. It makes a big difference I think. Mark: Absolutely, any time you can get somebody to laugh that's going to loosen them up and also to disarm them a little bit from that and accessible as well. That's fantastic. You need to make sure you send me her website so I can take a look and enjoy some of the copy as well. Joe: Yeah there's some great ideas there you can get right from her website. But this is important stuff, right? Our first line of engagement with our customer is content. There's going to be some visual stuff but there's usually some content as well. So anyone listening that has any online presence or hopes to buy one and do better than the previous owner I would strongly recommend they listen to this entire podcast. Mark: All right, well let's get to it. Joe: Hey folks it's Joe Valley at the Quiet Light Podcast. Thanks for joining us today. Today I have a very special guest, her name is Lianna Patch. Lianna, welcome. Lianna: Thank you so much for having me. Joe: You are apparently funny, you're from Punchline Copy. I saw you … I know you're funny because I saw you at the Blue Ribbon Mastermind. There's no question about being apparently funny. Lianna: Okay. Joe: You said some pretty vulgar sayings in front of a big crowd of entrepreneurs and you could have fallen flat on your face or they all could have laughed out loud. And you did it within like the first 60 seconds and I- Lianna: I did. Joe: We all laughed out loud so thank you. Lianna: I'm so glad. Joe: It made us very comfortable being audacious ourselves so thank you for that. And I've looked at your website and I want you to tell folks about yourself but then I'm going to just like comment on a few things as well. So the for the folks listening instead of me doing that introduction, that fancy thing, why don't you tell us who you are, what you do, and what you're all about? Lianna: Sure. So I'm a conversion copyrighter which basically means I don't just make stuff up I base my copy on customer research and what people need to actually hear. And on top of that, I use humor as a tool to help mostly e-commerce stores and bootstrap software businesses connect better with their customers and retain customers longer. Joe: Conversion copywriter, wow. Lianna: Yeah. Joe: I love that. Did you make that up? Lianna: I did not. Joe: Somebody else coined that phrase? Lianna: I believe we can attribute it to the great Joanna Wiebe. She is a fabulous copywriter. I'm pretty sure she came up with the term conversion copywriting. She's the most well-known one. Joe: Okay. Lianna: And I met her in her first copywriter mastermind. Joe: And we will attribute it to Joanna Wiebe. But conversion copywriter really stands out and tells people exactly what you do. It's pretty quick and pretty direct to the point. Lianna: Yeah. Joe: And you infuse it with humor so I just want for people that are not watching this video on the home page of your website … where is it, it says… oh, I've got to scroll down a little bit, where is it. All right there's something that says something along the lines of … oh my God it's gone I'm on the wrong page. Really. Anyway, it says something along the lines of blank blank blank AF and it's right there in your face funny as AF. And for those that don't have teenagers and don't understand … I'm sorry for those that don't understand what that means ask your teenager because they do. You have a knock knock joke on your website as well and it says “Knock knock who's there and the answer is a shitload of money.” It's all good. It's all funny and it converts. So tell us about some of the experiences you've had with people that have terrible copy and how you fixed it and what kind of impact it has on their end mind revenue which is what folks are really looking for. Lianna: Yeah. My favorite type of client to work with is someone that comes to me and says okay we did the thing where we hired a professional copywriter and we come off like really cool and corporate and solid and we hate it and it's not working and we need to be more personal and funny please help because they already know the value. They already know that humor is going to help them connect better. So one example that I have been talking about a lot lately because it's exciting … and it's an e-commerce brand that sells wedding rings, it's called Manly Bands. And I came in and worked on some of their product descriptions. And they already have a super fun brand. They were already using humor throughout. I like to think of them as like the Dollar Shave Club of wedding rings but their product descriptions were very short. And they were kind of funny but they weren't really converting. So I went in, wrote longer descriptions, which is funny for some people because they think oh short copy is better. People don't like to read, people will read if you give them a reason to. And we made them funny and we made them personable and kind of weird and they boosted conversions almost across the board; both add to cart conversions and purchase conversions. So that was a really great test result to just be able to point to and say “hey look it works”. Joe: That's great it's a … you know I'm old school direct response, I used to sell stuff on radio. We'd write a 60 second spot ad that had to convert with someone actually calling the 800 number. I started in 1997 as I said before but you have to write copy that converts and get an action. So I love the conversion copy and it's measurable. You also talked about not just on the website where people are looking at the product description, not necessarily in the cart things of that nature. But you really if you have a client and can touch every aspect of their branding campaign do you hone in on the and if yes what kind of things do you do? Lianna: I do try to so I work more on the … I work closer to the purchase and post purchase for attention. That's kind of my jam. So I do a lot of emails. And I really feel like emails are one place we can use humor the most because it's the ability to build that one on one connection. You can be so personal, you can be so weird and funny in email and people will … you know even if it's coming from a brand they'll be like I like this. It feels like a real person in my inbox. Of course, it's top of funnel, sometimes you can scare people away with humor if you go about it the wrong way. It just depends on your brand and how willing you are to test those kinds of things. But if I can I'll address all of those touch points because they should be cohesive. There's got to be a message match between the ad, the landing page, the follow up emails, you know the eventual sale or whatever it is that you guide people to. Joe: I think the instinct of an entrepreneur that's building a brand is to give the impression to the end customer. The first impression is to that hey we're a real company, we're doing things in a very professional manner; which kind of may be boring. I just had a business that won on a contract fairly quickly with multiple offers and his customer service emails and responses were “hey thanks for helping the little guy we're here just taking care of my son join us and really … really appreciate it” that kind of thing. Lianna: Yeah. Joe: I think that does resonate. I think using the word feel, it feels like a real person behind the email. Lianna: Yeah. Joe: And really reaches out and helps them quite a bit. So you will touch all aspects of it from … if you can. From the website to … I mean from the email to conversion, would you do follow up emails after the sale as well and work out as well all aspects of it there? Lianna: Yeah. That's actually one of my favorite things to work on. I was just talking to my friend Val Geisler, she's an awesome email strategist about this and we were talking about especially with e-commerce businesses so many people are neglecting the long term post purchase follow up sequence. So someone has bought once and then they just get thrown back into this regular newsletter or sales email cycle. And there's no like follow up and say like hey do you want this product that sort of corresponds to what you bought. You get the review ask emails every now and then or take a survey but there's like two to three emails max after the purchase and then you just get lumped into existing customers. There's no specific long term nurture track to get you back for that second purchase. So that seems like a huge opportunity for most e-commerce stores and for humor because again they've already bought from you once. Now is the time to build the relationship more. Joe: And it's not just spamming them with emails if you're writing good content that's funny and enjoyable and they like reading them. They're probably not going to unsubscribe. Lianna: Right. Joe: Perhaps. Lianna: Right and you can test your sending limits like if you start to see a higher rate of unsubscribes back off; that's not rocket science. Joe: So I did a podcast early in the week with a guy named John Warrilow and he's written several books and he has something called the Value Builder System. And it's all about creating recurring and repeat revenue in your business and I would think that what you're doing is helping build the relationship with the customer so that if they sell a one off product … you said earlier you know hey maybe you might be interested in this too, that follow up email sequence keeps them engaged and maybe perhaps will help them become a repeat customer and buy an additional product along the way. Lianna: Yeah. Joe: [inaudible 00:10:58.9] Lianna: Yes and even if it's something that they might not need to of … I hear this a lot from mattress companies, I've worked with a few mattress companies you know A. they have other product lines. They have bedding and pillows and things like that accessories. But B. even if you move into a different business completely, if you've built those crazy rabid fans they'll follow you to whatever you do next. Joe: So you've mentioned Man Rings was the first one or something like that. Lianna: Manly Bands. Joe: Manly Bands, I love it. Lianna: It's great. Joe: And a mattress company, so I mean very very diverse product categories here. What other kind of physical product companies do you work with? So that people listening can say oh yeah okay she can help. Lianna: Oh yeah, clothing … I like to work with clothing. Honestly, any consumer product I think is really fun. I have to obviously believe that there's a benefit to it. I've had people come to me. Especially in the supplement world, I'm a little skeptical sometimes of actual benefits. So I like to try the product first and say can I get behind this? And if I can then I'll happily write a copy for it not that I can't but I will. Joe: You know I wish we met …. what is it a decade ago now right? I sold my company in 2010 and boy you would had fun with that. I sold a colon cleansing product. Lianna: Oh great. Joe: We started selling colon cleansing on radio back in 2002 and a TV infomercial in 2003. It went 100% online in 2005 and ultimately built a digestive wellness center around it. Lianna: Okay. Joe: But boy you would have had some fun ones. Lianna: Is that like colon cleansing from the outside in or from the inside out? Joe: Well that's from the inside out. Lianna: Okay. Joe: No it wasn't [inaudible 00:12:39.2]. Lianna: That's easier to sell. Yeah, okay. Joe: And it was … you know for those listening I mean you can't … you think what's fun about my product? You can't … you have to be serious about it something like that. We try to be serious about it and I think it was okay. We got lots and lots of testimonials and people would actually love to be … strangest thing ever people, when we produced a TV infomercial we had a producer travel around the country following up people to give testimonials and they'll actually get on camera and talk about their bowel movements and it's just crazy. And you would have had a great deal of fun with it and we could have made more fun of it and made it more enjoyable for all I guess. But I mean you can … from what I've seen [inaudible 00:13:21.0] for your presentation you kind of make every little aspect of it fun so that the entire feeling of the company is joyful and fun. For instance, the 404 redirect that you put up on the screen at Blue Ribbon Mastermind, can you describe that for the people? Lianna: Yeah so that's one of my favorite places where people aren't expecting humor, to just give them a joke or something weird. And this is … what was it called? I think it was eventcenter.uk or something. The site's not there anymore but it's oh no you hit the wrong link this isn't here choose one of our developers to fire. And it's four guys and if you click one of them he puts his head down in his hands and the rest of them looks relieved and then it says oh no he's only been working here for six months. He was just an intern like you're so horrible. And then it redirects you back to the homepage. Joe: Keeps people on the site versus you hit a 404 redirect … oh my god, this guy is terrible and you leave. Lianna: There's so many great ones, NPR has one too that's oh there's nothing here but here's a bunch of other articles about missing things. And there's an article about like lost luggage, Jimmy Hoffa … you know our retirement, things like that. [inaudible 00:14:28.0] for them like. Joe: That's fantastic. What would you say from your experience and the clients that you've worked with, what would you say are some of the biggest mistakes that they make when writing copy? Lianna: One of the biggest mistakes no matter what industry you're in is making the copy all about you. One of the easiest ways to fix that is to go through it and say how many times do we say we or I versus you the reader because they should always know what's in it for them while they're reading. Joe: Ok so back on the focus of the customer, what kind of things have you seen happen when people … if they want to take one, two, or three steps and try to improve their own copy? Is that step number one? What are the things should they do to try to make a big change and what areas should they focus on first? Is it the tagline on their website? Is it the email? Is it something in the cart? What do you focus on first? Lianna: I'd like to focus on whatever is closest to the actual purchase. So that's going to have the biggest effect on revenue if you can improve your checkout, not just copy but UX. If you're using something that's not an out of the box thing like Shopify you might have some serious UX issues in your checkout that you don't know about. What else- Joe: You're infusing humor in the copy in the checkout? Lianna: If I can. Joe: If you can. Lianna: I was just talking about this this morning. It's interesting how things connect. I think it's Shopify doesn't really let you change the form instructions or form auto-fill like the placeholder text in the checkout but that can be hugely persuasive. And it's a great place to run tests because you can just change something like email address to your email address or your favorite email address and that can have a huge impact on conversions. And obviously changing copy on the buy button can have a big impact too. But all of those things come standard or you can't tweak them unless you're a custom coder. And I think even then it's hard to get that stuff developed so I don't know that's been like a pet peeve of mine with certain checkouts. Joe: You want to be able to touch everything and change it and make it better. Lianna: Yeah because there are … I've been through some check outs that are just delightful and it makes you want to keep going even if it's a multiple screen checkout. There's a … do you know Cards Against Humanity? I've mentioned that at the talk. They have actually a fortune cookie company. Joe: Oh they do? Lianna: It's called OK Cookie and the fortunes are horrific. I have one over there that says you will die at an Arby's in Columbus, Ohio. That's the kind of fortune you get from them. But their check out process is just written the same way that all their other copy is which is very informal. Like pop, your email address in here hit this button to whatever and it can be as simple as a verb change to make people think oh a real person touched this. This isn't just a robot that's going to take my money and maybe not send me these cookies that will make me sad. Joe: Again going back to how the end customer feels in the process. Love it. You talked about grammar and that it's not always best practices to have proper grammar. I think … you know I was in the remedial English class in high school. I didn't have Mrs. Henderson I had Mrs. Lane and she was a step down so my grammar is always kind of poor. We were at a friend's house, I've got 14 and 16 year old boys and the neighbor was copied on an email because … it has something to do with the kids, the kids who are here and she asked my son if he'd already sent that. And he said yes, she goes oh there was a grammatical error and blah blah blah. And it's still read very well, it felt good and it was like from a teenage boy. And you can tell it was from a teenage boy. And the intent was good and I never would have corrected it. And she tried to after the fact you intentionally will misspell things and misspeak or misspoke whatever the case might be from what I can hear and what I've seen is that correct? Lianna: Yeah. Joe: Can you talk about that? Lianna: Yes and if it's a weird thing to say because I spent so long as first a copy editor and then a content editor. So I've been like in the nitty gritty line level proofing and the overall structural editing for so long and I was such a stickler for such a long time. And then eventually I had to let go because my heart rate was getting nuts. It just wasn't … that was great for me physically. But I think it's important to do it intentionally so that it doesn't come across as an oversight. So for instance, if you're going to put in a misspelling like I just said gonna, I didn't say going to. Technically you know that's an allusion it's mashing two words together, cutting off the end of a word, that's intentional. It comes across as intentional. Misspelling a word in a subject line can be intentional done the right way. The example that I gave was spelling M-O-R-E more as M-O-A-R because that's kind of internet speak. That's obviously intentional. Even when subject lines do go out with actual unintentional typos they tend to get higher open rates. I just saw one from Wistia they're having an online conference called CouchCon. And there's a subject line with “its” and there should have been an apostrophe in “its” and I marked that unread in my inbox for days because I was like I want to know if they did that on purpose. I don't think they did. Joe: I don't think- Lianna: They got a bunch of replies. Joe: I don't think I would have known if it was proper or not but did I just hear you say that subject lines that have misspellings or grammatical errors actually have a higher open rate? Lianna: Sometimes I mean every … like if you're talking to any conversion copywriter they're going to be like it depends no matter what you ask them. So I have to just give that disclaimer right now; it depends. But I personally have seen it. Lower case subject lines often get a higher open rate because that's the kind of email we receive from our friends and family. We don't bother capitalizing subject lines, especially not title casing each word which I think that's officially dead now in the email marketing world. I haven't seen a ton of emails in my actual inbox so definitely in my spam folder. Joe: You've never inquired on a Quiet Light listing because I know that with my follow up drip campaigns I will capitalize the first letter of each word in the subject line. I need to stop that is what you're saying? Lianna: [inaudible 00:20:21.1] test for you just … yeah start running an alternative version of each of those emails with A. more [inaudible 00:20:26.2] well, if you were to do a true test you would just uncapitalize the rest of the sentence but you can try more conversational subject line. Then I could do a whole thing on subject lines so I like them a lot but yeah making- Joe: So it's the first point of contact- Lianna: Yeah. Joe: And it never occurred to me to chill out a little bit and be more casual even though you know we were … and hopefully anybody listening will take this and apply it to their own business but we are online business brokers. We're selling businesses for a million dollars or whatever the case might be and sometimes we think we've got to be buttoned up and serious. We're working with entrepreneurs. We all work remotely, around the country, around the world in Brian's case and we try to be professional and serious but we can be professional and casual and funny at the same time. Lianna: Yeah. Joe: [inaudible 00:21:09.9] on our subject lines. Lianna: There's a scale I think you don't have to go- Joe: Are you telling me to loosen up? Lianna: A little bit. I mean you … do you have that top button undone? Is that a- Joe: I do. Yeah. Lianna: See we're great, yeah, no tie. Joe: It's hot. Lianna: I don't think [inaudible 00:21:22.6] video so I just look like garbage so you know. Joe: I'm in North Carolina, Lianna is in New Orleans did I say that right? Lianna: No. I'm going to … no. Joe: Say it, give it to me. Go ahead. Lianna: New Orleans born and raised. Joe: You actually have to enunciate it? Lianna: Not New Orleans. New Orleans. Joe: New Orleans not New Orleans. Lianna: [inaudible 00:21:42.3] people say New Orleans. Joe: All right it's New Orleans. Lianna: Never New Orleans unfortunately. Joe: Okay all right. Well, we're both hot and you know figuratively anyway. And that's why I have my top button undone. What other things can people focus on besides of the subject line, some of the stuff in the first point of contact with customers, what other little weird places do you think that they could focus on and try to be a little bit funny or a little more personal that the average person wouldn't look at that you've seen? Lianna: One of my favorite places to look at is copy surrounding a call to action. So any time you're going to ask somebody to do something you should probably be addressing their objections and previewing what's going to come next. And it's really nice to see a human and funny touch around the ask. So I can't member if I mentioned this when you saw me speak but I wrote a call to action to start a free trial for a software product. And normally underneath you would see small text that says no sign up required or credit card required or whatever your information is safe with us that kind of standard objection reducing stuff. We wrote … oh I wrote a copy there that said we do ask for your credit card but it's just because we love online shopping. It's just a little reward for someone reading to feel like okay all right we're good. And obviously, that person has to have a sense of humor because if they take it seriously then they're not going to sign up but who is your target customer is that a person without a sense of humor? No. Joe: Again personalize it, make it feel better. I'm looking at your site now and I must have moved my mouse off the screen and something popped up and it says I'd love to email you and there's three O's in the word love. Lianna: Yes. Joe: Now what is down below there, it says subscribe now and then nah, fam. Lianna: Nah, fam? Joe: What does that mean? Lianna: It's a no thanks, it's another way to say no thanks. So you can just … it's good to know that it's not coming across entirely clear to everyone. Joe: Well. Lianna: It's like you can sign up or no, fam. Joe: But I can tell like a human wrote this which is again exactly what is supposed to happen. And for those again listening and not watching so this … all of you have this exit intent … exit pop ups on websites. This one is personal and funny and I'm actually reading it. Normally I just X out, but now I'm reading it because you spelled the word love wrong, no fam; I don't know what that is. And I believe it's you in the image. Are you drinking coffee out of a box? Is that what's happening there? Lianna: Drinking box wine. Joe: Yeah. So there's a picture of Lianna sitting at her desk, her laptop is open and she's got a box wine up above her head and she's boozing it up. It's very very entertaining and it made me stop and look at it where I go to all of your websites whenever I'm doing work with you and if there's a pop up I generally just quick X as quickly as I can. So very cool just one other- Lianna: Yeah that's a great place the exit intent pop up is so hard to get people's attention and people often think like you know I have only two sentences or I have to cut my offer just $20 off and it has to be no longer than that. But I worked with a client we … this is for my other business SNAP Copy so it's me and my business partner James Turner, we optimized his opt in offer to get people on his list for free planning. He runs a productivity website and the headline that we ended up going with was hey don't leave without your goodie bag. And it was boosted opt-ins by 129% and there was some additional copy and it was a pretty long paragraph of what they were going to get when they signed up. But people read it and signed up a lot more than they did when it said get free planners. Joe: Hey don't leave without your goodie bag and it was an online thing just to get people to sign up and was there like I [inaudible 00:25:19.8] a goodie bag as a swag bag when you go to an event like Blue Ribbon Mastermind. What kind of goodie bag was it? Was it just something you could get electronically? Lianna: Yeah it was a digital goodie bag. It was like free weekly agenda or a free monthly planner. He has a lot of free resources like that. Joe: But he didn't say free gift it said hey don't leave without your goodie bag? Lianna: Yeah. Joe: Simple. You think it's simple but it's- Lianna: Yeah. Joe: People get too buttoned up I think. Lianna: Finding new ways to say also the things that people are already accustomed to because we've seen free gifts so much, we've seen claim my deal a lot. I feel like that's kind of … it's still working because it's very clear but if you can find another way to say something that doesn't obscure the meaning of the copy then it'll get people's attention. And they're like oh I haven't seen that before. Joe: Okay. So pretty simple stuff but not something I think everybody can do. You have a special skill. You're funny, you actually do stand-up comedy as well right? Lianna: I do. Joe: You do. Are you funny? Of course, you are right? Lianna: People … you know I feel like I want to write a bit about that but it might be to hack because there have been better comedians writing bits about that. But someone did that to me the other day she was like so I don't get it you do stand-up but like you're not funny right now. And I was like maybe I'm not inspired. Joe: Ah. Lianna: You're not a good audience, I don't know. Joe: I'm glad I didn't say that. I think what you do is fantastic. You know back to my radio direct response days I would write 60 second ad copy and we would be able to get direct responses; how many people called in when we gave out that phone number after 60 seconds. And so we knew exactly how well the copy worked. You're a conversion copywriter so you found a way to do the same thing and boost conversion when somebody visits a website or open emails and things of that nature. Do you find your clients doing split testing with your copy against with the original copy or things of that nature or did they just say this is really good it's funny let's go ahead and just put that in place and then they see how it works for a week or do they do an actual split test? Lianna: If … so this is like this is where the cobbler has no shoes because I should be making sure that they do that but sometimes my clients are in that stage between small and medium business where they don't really have the team to split test appropriately or like they don't want to learn how to use Google Optimize, Optimizely, or any other split testing tool. So usually it's we see how the control over the original copy was doing then we implement the new copy and it sort of functions as the test and we see what the lift is; the uplift or downlift usually. Usually up. Joe: Usually up, okay. Well, I had an experience many many years ago where we had … when we take the phone calls and someone didn't want to buy the product we would get their name and address and would send them out this simple little trifle brochure. Really simple, black and white or I think there was blue and white and you could tell that it was somebody stuffed the envelope and we hand wrote it and it went out. It was from that person that you talked to on the phone. We had a consultant come in and say oh that's not very professional, we need to step it up, we need to get a multi unfold brochure, colors and charts and graphs and all this stuff and of course we have to print out the addresses and make a professional. And conversion dropped by at least 50% and it was a real eye opener because it was in that personal touch and feel. Lianna: Yeah. Joe: And so I think everything that you said up on the stage at Blue Ribbon Mastermind made me want to have you here because I've seen it firsthand and I know how much a word here and there and a feeling here and there converts. And it's really tough online, it's getting easier and you know hopefully some of your work is being tracked with before or split tested and so your clients know. But I think that all I know is when I go to a site like yours I want to stay on it and I want to look. Lianna: Good. Joe: As opposed to a pop up like I know you got a rubber chicken being cut in half and blood spurting, it's cute and funny so I love it. I think what you do is fantastic. How exactly would people reach out to you? Is it simply punchlinecopy.com? Lianna: Yeah. Joe: Can they get a sort of assessment? How do you work with your clients? Lianna: Yeah so I have different product test services on my site. Sometimes people just need … they want to use me as like an ad hoc email copywriter for instance. They'll come in and like buy one or two emails and they'll say rewrite my abandoned cart email because again it's close to purchase. Or rewrite my welcome email so I get fewer unsubscribes when I add someone to my list. So I have one off emails, I have something called upper cuts which is where I do an audit of your landing page from my heuristic perspective. So I'll take any customer research data that the clients have for these kinds of audits; the more the better. But I'll just look at it and say like this UX is garbage like this photo doesn't open, I can't zoom around the product, the call to action isn't visible enough from far away. And then I'll rewrite the copy line by line. And then I also do custom projects and I've got an intake form there. Yeah, there's a lot of ways to work with me. Joe: Can you be funny in a sponsored ad or a Google ad? Do you work with anybody in those regards? Lianna: I don't do a lot of top of funnel acquisitions. Joe: It's a little tricky. Lianna: I've tried … I mean I've done it. I haven't run ads for my own business in forever. I probably should but I'm the first result for funny copywriter so who needs to? Am I right? Joe: So one other simple clean example is again … and people could just go to your website and go oh that's cool, that's cool, that's cool, and get some ideas. Again punchlinecopy.com but you know folks you probably have a chat now talk to us little thing down in the lower right hand corner of your website so somebody can chat with you. Lianna's has a picture of her. Lianna: It's a bit [inaudible 00:30:59.5]. Joe: A caricature of you and it says you there and it has you looking up over the little pop up bubble as opposed to the standard stuff which is great. Again it's personal and makes it me want to click it just to see if you are there. Lianna: Awesome. I'm not because I'm doing this but I just- Joe: Everybody go to Punchline Copy and click you there and see what happens. Lianna: Or send me an email. Most of the stuff on my site that I think people like the most is just stuff that makes me laugh because I thought it was hilarious to have that little thing pop up in the corner. Joe: I like it. I like it all. Well, I think it would be great if some folks can use your sevices. Lianna: Yeah. Joe: And we have people on that I think can help more than anything else whether that's somebody that is in the process of trying to grow their business and make it more valuable or some of that's going to buy one and tweak it and make more valuable than what they bought it for. And I think copy is so essential because if it converts you are a … again conversion copywriter that just gets them more value for the money that they spent on advertising. Lianna: Yeah. Joe: So it is fantastic, we will put your details in the bottom of the show notes so people can reach out to you and any last minute thoughts on copy that people should think about [inaudible 00:32:18.1] got here? Lianna: I mean I always want to challenge people to just try a joke somewhere. Like take your most boring email in any of your series and go in and add a joke or add an aside, you know add a PS that's kind of weird and see what happens. Joe: Just to see what happens add a PS; I like it. Lianna: Yeah. Joe: Well PS folks thank you for listening to the Quiet Light Podcast, I appreciate it. Lianna, thank you so much for your time. You are awesome. Lianna: Thank you. And so are you. Joe: Well I appreciate that thank you. Links: PunchlineCopy.com Punchline's Facebook Page Lianna on LinkedIn

Rochelle Friedman was a corporate lawyer representing some of the top products and brands in the world. A few years ago she jumped ship and started the Walk Law Firm. Now more than 50% of her business is representing both buyers and sellers in transactions that involved the transfer of an Amazon Seller Account. Because of her specialty and expertise, I wanted to have her on the Podcast to share her approach, and what she sees other brokerage firms in the industry doing. In today's Podcast she covers the risks and pitfalls of transferring an account through an asset sale, and talks about the different types of transactions she sees occur. Rochell also delves into the two big “stomach ache” clauses in a typical asset purchase agreement, and how to address them up front so the due diligence and negotiation process is successful. As you've heard us often say…”don't decide to sell, plan to sell”. The same holds true with legal matters. Make sure you are properly incorporated, that your trademarks and copyrights are up to date and transferrable. All of these are part of the assets of your business, and hiring a firm like Walk Law Firm to review them in advance of a sale is advisable. Episode Highlights: Learn Rochell's approach to transferring an Amazon account. Hint…it is the same as ours. Transferring non-US accounts is the same process. Both buyers and sellers need to be happy at closing, or a deal falls apart. Having a qualified contract attorney truly matters. The same attorney will fight differently if their client is the seller vs. the buyer. There are TWO MAJOR stomach clauses in every APA. Address them early on in negotiations. Transcription: Mark: Joe how are you? Joe: I'm doing good Mark. How are you doing today? Mark: You know ever since you got back from Italy you are kicking my butt again when it comes to the number of interviews you're doing for the podcast. I think like three to one, four to one as far as the ratio is concerned and I'm sure our listeners are ecstatic. Joe: I don't know. I actually have the easy part. I just do the interviews you do all of the stuff in the background so thank you and I appreciate it. I just do the interview. And this time for this show I don't … falsely, folks, I talked to an attorney and it was actually a really good call and here's why I had; her name is Rochelle Friedman, she's from Walk Law Firm and you know look with physical products businesses and the transfer of an Amazon Seller Account everybody has questions about how to go about doing it, whether it's a US based account or one that's international. And I came across Rochelle through some other folks that I worked with and I had a call with her. And I just picked up the phone and I called her and chatted with her. Look she does close transactions for Quiet Light Brokerage, for Empire Flippers, for Website Closers and you guys know who they are so it's okay to mention them right? And I know she does that so I wanted to confirm with her what processes, what she does and shockingly Mark it's the same way that we do it believe it or not. And she goes into detail about it, and she goes into great detail about it. Not only that she talks about contracts in general, she represents both buyers and sellers. She's a contract attorney that came from the corporate world representing businesses, every day household businesses, she was their attorney a very good one in the corporate world last went out on her own and now represents both buyers and sellers in transactions. And I think it's worth listening to. I think it's really really important as you and I have talked about how important planning is. Don't wake up and decide to sell but plan to sell, same thing should be said for an attorney; talk to one. Get your ducks in a row and make sure that you're doing the right thing as you go into your transactions you can do it with confidence. Mark: I'm gonna put you on the spot because you said we're going to address in this podcast episode how do you transfer an Amazon business and how are people doing it pretty much across the board. But for anyone that already knows how to do that or has done that what else do we cover in this episode? Joe: She covers the two big stomach ache clauses in contract negotiations. That being the non-compete and the indemnification clause. I think the indemnification clause is the bigger of the two because we do a pretty good job up front addressing the non-compete. And so if you do that work up front in the client interview and work with the seller on that to make sure they understand what a non-compete is and make sure there aren't going to be any issue is never really a problem. The hard one to wrap your brain around, your hands around is the indemnification clause and what that is from a seller's standpoint. You sell your business you think you're done, you get 100,000 200,000 a million dollars in your bank account and you move on about your merry way. You sleep really well at night because you got a bunch of money in your account. Well, your buyer's attorney is going to have something in there that is going to have them reach back into your bank account and take some money out if you lied or cheated or stole or did anything fraudulent in anyway. Now you should sleep well if everything was done right but if there's anything that wasn't they're going to put that in there. And they're gonna put that in there anyway and the big question is how long is that grace period for? Is it six months or 12 months or 18, and then how much is it for? And Rochelle you know towards the end of the podcast she laughs and she chuckles and she talks about how … well she has one standard when she's representing the buyer and she has a completely other standard when she's representing the seller so it's good to hear from both sides for sure. But the stomach ache clauses are really important in there as well. Mark: That's fantastic. And those are easily interest almost guaranteed at it every time we send out a purchase agreement on those two clauses. Joe: Guaranteed. Mark: You always see stuff. All right let's get in to see what she has to say about all of this including in the indemnification stuff. Let's get to it. Joe: Hey folks it's Joe from Quiet Light Brokerage and today I've got Rochelle Walk from Walk Law Firm on the line with me today. How are you doing Rochelle? Rochelle:     I'm doing great Joe, how are you today? Joe: I'm doing well. I have a sister in law name Richelle so if I mispronounce your name during the podcast at all today that's the reason why. I'm apologizing in advance. Rochelle:     Not a problem at all. Joe: As we talked about a little bit before recording we don't do fancy introductions so if you could just give the audience a little bit of background on yourself. Tell them about who you are and the work you do that'd be great. Rochelle:     Sure. Thanks, Joe. First off all thanks for having me on, I appreciate the opportunity. My background is actually a little bit complicated because I have been practicing law for 33 years but unlike a lot of other lawyers, most of my practice has been as a general counsel or as the chief administrative officer of very large public companies. So most of my time spent as a lawyer has actually been as a business person. And I like to explain myself as a business person who happens to also be a good lawyer. Joe: Excellent. Rochelle:     And when I started this firm I was at the point where I was leaving a major public company, decided I wanted to do something different, and decided I wanted to use the same skills I garnered as a business person and lawyer for really large public companies and turn it into something that would work well for small to mid-size companies. So during my years in my big company world, I worked heavily in consumer products. I was head of license brands for Sherwin-Williams, brands like Martha Stewart, Ralph Lauren, I worked with Dutch Boy, I worked with Thompson-Minwax, Krylon, very famous brands. And then I left there and I was at a company called Oglebay Norton it was mining and minerals. We had clients and customers like Home Depot but we also had heavy industry as clients and lots of engineers. And then ultimately I went to a company called Anchor Glass and it was consumer glass, some of your favorite beverages, as a matter of fact, would be bottled in the glass containers whether you know beer, wine, Maker's Mark you know some famous brands. So my career has always been around famous brands and lots of retail. So when I looked at what I could do seven years ago when I started this practice, I thought about it and said I can really understand consumer brands. I really understand branding. I really understand intellectual property but it's a new world and we need to be able to do it online. And I dove into e-commerce understanding how Amazon works, how eBay works, how Jet works, of course, some of those came later, how Walmart.com as a marketplace work … Walmart used to be my customer at Sherwin-Williams and now here at Walmart.com it's a completely different animal and I dove into that. My practice has always been heavily mergers and acquisitions so about 50% of our practice is the mergers and acquisitions of businesses. And seven years later that has become a huge footprint of Amazon sellers, online sellers, e-commerce businesses that are seeking to flip. Entrepreneurs who have created … you know they have created great brands but in order to take them, to exploit them to the next level they need a lot more bandwidth. And it's, therefore, their time to move out of that business. Having spent a lot of years buying and selling Mom & Pop tank stores for Sherwin-Williams and Mom & Pop paint brands and Sundry brands it's no different, it's just now we're doing it through e-commerce instead of bricks and mortar. Joe: Okay. So about 50% of your business is the M & A side, the other side is what; working with people on intellectual property, branding, things of that nature? Rochelle:     We're like their outsourced general counsel. It can be everything from intellectual property and branding to possibly contracts, employee issues, independent contractor issues, tax issues- Joe: Okay. Rochelle:     Really almost anything they need. Leases, fire agreements, everything you might imagine a general counsel doing. Joe: I got you. So for folks listening, the reason I have Rochelle on the line today is because a lot of you have asked during the buy or sell process if Quiet Light can recommend an attorney. We have several that we work with; Shawn Hussain at the Ecom Law Group is terrific. We work with him often and Rochelle knows him and came across Rochelle and we were talking about the transfer process of an Amazon business. And I know now that you've worked with all of the website business broker firms that are at a high level like Quiet Light and you've been on both sides of the transaction. Rochelle:     Right. Joe: Do you prefer or do you most often work with the buyer of a business, representing the buyer in contract negotiations or do you find yourself on the seller's side more often? Rochelle:     It's really about equal and we don't really have a preference. We're perfectly prepared to work with both buyers and sellers. Buyers and sellers have different needs and one of the things that I think we're pretty good at and just so you know we're a firm of three full time lawyers. We are about to affiliate with a bigger national firm who also does quite a bit in e-commerce and emerging business and we can … I'm not prepared to tell you who and the details of that but that's coming down the pike so we'll have a lot more bandwidth. But what's important about us as we understand the difference between what a buyer needs, what a seller needs, financing it; if both you're a buyer and a seller how it's being financed matters, and understanding how this Amazon accounts transfer. Sometimes transferring the account actually isn't in your best interest or the buyer, sometimes it's the only solution for the buyer and- Joe: Let's talk about that- Rochelle:     You have to assess that. Joe: You know that the listener's ears just perked up because we're talking about the transfer of an Amazon account. Rochelle:     Yeah. Joe: You and I both know as does everyone who has an Amazon account that the Terms of Service says that the Amazon account is not transferrable and that- Rochelle:     Generally. Joe: Right there's a bracket in there that says generally. To me logically it never made sense that you could build an amazing brand on Amazon and never be able to sell that. And I've had experience direct with Amazon and they've proven that they do in fact allow the transfer of accounts but- Rochelle:     Of course. Joe: Tell us, tell the audience, tell me how have you seen an Amazon account most often transferred with the different transactions that you've done with the top websites and business brokerage firms. Rochelle:     Sure you know a lot of times it's very much behind the scenes. If you are actually selling the ownership interest in the business you're not really transferring the Amazon account. Although Amazon may disagree with that but you're really not transferring the Amazon account, you're transferring the ownership interest in your business. And the only thing you're doing with the Amazon account is actually maybe changing an EIN if … depending on what you're buying and if you're getting the EIN of the new business and probably changing where you want the banking to go. I've even had situations where we haven't had to change the banking at all. If you're buying the assets however and you're leaving the ownership interest of the business behind by getting all of the assets of the business you're going to need to go in and possibly change the name of the owner of the account, change the … certainly, the EIN or the Employer ID Number, change the bank account number, and there may be some other things you're going to change as well. But there are some things that we recommend sellers do and frankly, it's better for buyers to help ease the pain of that process. First of all, we've never had Amazon stand in the way. As a matter of fact, if you text Amazon they'll even tell you how to go on and do it. So as much as they say it's generally not transferrable they actually don't get in the way as long as what you're doing is not disruptive. So where will they get in the way? If the IP address of the person making the change is different than the IP address of the person who has been running the account Amazon is going to have a big flag for fraud and they will get in the way and they may shut down the account. What they usually will do is let the sales continue. However, you can't access your account until somebody verifies that it was an intentional change. And they use to give you a couple of weeks to do that verification although my clients are typically through that verification process within a couple of hours. It may take Amazon a few hours to flag you but watch for the flag it's usually going to come to the seller. One of the great ways to avoid any of those issues, if you're using a VPN to access your account in the first place then you transfer the account with the VPN it has all locked in. You're not changing the IP address and that way when you do this transition there is no issue of the buyer or the seller plugging in the information as long as they're all going through the same VPN. Similarly, let the seller make the changes. Generally, the seller makes the changes. If it's a big enough account Amazon may flag it for fraud anyway but within a couple of hours the seller will get that email or will get contact from his or her account rep and that pain will be immediately fixed. We do it all the time and we haven't had an issue. Joe: So do you end up having to have a contact yourself with Amazon if there's an issue or is it just something that the seller contacts them and it's resolved eventually? Rochelle:     So my rule of thumb, leave your lawyers out of Amazon at all times. We may be in the background helping draft the e-mails, helping respond to the emails, they always come from our client who has the most contact with their Amazon rep. Joe: That's the sellers. Rochelle:     We want- Joe: That's the owner of the seller account. Rochelle:     Exactly. We want the least amount of disruption in the communications. Amazon really doesn't need to hear from your lawyers. You just need to work directly with Amazon and frankly, it's a fraud detection problem. Amazon doesn't want to be caught where somebody somehow hacked into your system changed your accounts and you later come back and accuse Amazon of having changed your accounts or having diverted your money. So you can't blame Amazon for what they're doing. You just have to be able to work with them and be prepared for maybe a day or two of disruption. But typically we haven't seen it disrupt sales. Joe: Okay. Rochelle:     We've seen product takedowns disrupt sales but we have not seen that transfer of the account disrupt sales. Joe: Excellent. Okay. Well let's take a few things, we talked about you're seeing the most method text and then we talked about the VPN and then you talked about … well, I want to talk about different Amazon countries so- Rochelle:     Okay. Joe: What I've seen in the transfer process is the same. You know we wrote the 10 steps to transfer an Amazon account in 2016 I think and the process that we see is actual phone calls to seller central saying “Hey look I'm transferring the business, one of the assets of my business to the Amazon Seller Account. How do I transfer control to the new owner?” and they do the same thing you just talked about in Texas- Rochelle:     Right. Joe: They give you written instructions and they'd sent it via email. Rochelle:     Exactly. Joe: Our clients tell us that sometimes they get lucky; in the 1st call it works and sometimes it takes 10 calls. Rochelle:     Right. Joe: At 1st hold on you can't do that and then on 10th oh yeah exactly I know what you're talking about, they do it. I've had some chats with Amazon chats do the same thing but you said text. Now do you mean email, do you mean the chats, what do you mean by text? Rochelle:     I mean the chats. Joe: You mean the chats, okay. Rochelle:     And it's usually the Seller Central chat system and we even have videos and screenshots of the chats that some of our clients have had. Joe: Okay. Rochelle:     Remember with Amazon Seller Central you are dealing with … I'll describe this way my husband describes pizza. It's only as good as the 16 year old making it; when you order a pizza from a pizza parlor the quality control is a little bit lax. Well with Amazon it's not a quality control problem but the experience of a customer service rep is only what that person has had as experience. And depending on how specific you are, on how clear you are on what you're trying to ask them will depend on how good they are at getting it to the Amazon separate instructions and pulling back and telling you what to do. The more experienced reps are very good at telling you exactly how to go into Seller Central and make the changes. Joe: I like that. I wonder if on the chats that the more experienced reps answer the chats versus the phone calls. DO you know if there's any data behind that or is that just an assumption? Rochelle:     No, I have no idea. Joe: Okay. Rochelle:     I have not seen that and I really don't know and remember the chats are being answered by people all over the world. Joe: Okay same as phone call side too. Rochelle:     Exactly. Joe: Okay, good. So just to back up a little bit of what you are saying I've had many many Amazon … Quiet Light Brokerage has many Amazon transactions transfer just that very same way. I personally have a situation for folks listening who or had an Amazon account that had a gold status, I don't know if that exists anymore but it was called a gold status and that meant that. It was old enough and large enough where they had an Amazon representative assigned to their account. So they had somebody they could always reach out to and during that process, they reached out to that person and said “Hey look transfer selling the business one of the assets of the business is my account how do we take care of this?” And that individual went to Amazon legal and said hey look this is what we're doing and Amazon Legal provided a form- Rochelle:     Right. Joe: And all they wanted to know was the name of the buyer. And it's always been a theory that Amazon wants to make sure that those that have been banned are permanently banned so they wanted to know the name of the buyer so to do that search to see if they've been banned. That's all they did was check the name of the buyer and the transfer went through with no problem at all. So just backing up what you said there. The VPN, I had Norman Farrar on the podcast, Norm is an expert in SOP's and marketing Amazon. He guested on many many podcasts. Norm recommended the same thing and for those that are listening that do a lot of traveling to different events and whatnot, you're all at mastermind groups and you're getting advice if everyone is using the local VPN and there's a hundred people that get it sitting in listen to an expert and they get a great idea they'll all log on to their Amazon account using that IP address in the local wireless, local hotel, or whatever it might be- Rochelle:     Right. Joe: The Amazon bots are gonna go crazy and you're all going to get shut down. Rochelle:     Exactly. Joe: So Norm does that. Norm recommends VPNs. Rob Green who does the same thing, high level seller, a lot of podcasts, a lot of speaking all that events. He's got three or four different seller accounts, different VPN for each one so he goes even to a further level. Rochelle:     All of my biggest clients are using VPNs. It is the smoothest, simplest way … as you said it's not just a matter of selling your business and having the VPN set up, it's actually an operational benefit. Because what it also means as you get bigger it's not just one person who needs to get into that account. You may have a team of people who have to go in and do different things at different times. They could be all over the world. But everybody coming in through the same VPN there's no confusion to Amazon bot. And frankly, it's a lot more secure. Joe: I agree. And it's you $10, $15 a month. Rochelle:     Right. Joe: You should be doing- Rochelle:     Absolutely. Joe: Okay. Let's talk countries, you haven't talked about countries yet. Rochelle:     Right. Joe: You haven't said Amazon.com eu whatever it might be. Rochelle:     Right. Joe: Are you finding the same transfer process to be successful for Amazon.com, UK, Germany, France, Italy, etcetera or are you doing something a little different depending upon the country? Rochelle:     So generally we are using the same transfer process. Now one thing that I have to pull out when you are dealing with other countries you may have a V-A-T or VAT or Ad Valorem tax issue and generally that is not transferable. So you are going to need … the new company is going to need to set up their own tax ID in those countries. And there may be a change that has to be made and it may lag a little bit. Typically we use the same process. Most of our clients are driving their business through Amazon.com in the United States. It's a much smaller amount of traffic and a much smaller amount of sales going through the other countries. Although it's starting to pick up, it's starting to get a lot bigger. But we haven't focused as much on those international accounts but we haven't any trouble transferring them either. We just use the same process. There's been no disruption except for making sure that we have the Ad Valorem tax information necessary for those businesses. Joe: Got you. Rochelle:     And it's been pretty seamless. Joe: Got you. Okay, we've experienced the same thing. In regards to the value added taxes for people listening we did a podcast with Alex Lyon- Rochelle:     Excellent. Joe: From AVASK Tax Advisors three weeks ago depending from when this is launched is it. Rochelle:     Right. Joe: Let's put it this way, it launched 1st of June or so. Great detail on how to set it up, what the pitfalls are in trying to do it on your own and the cost associated with it. And we also addressed the transfer of a seller account when to set that up and what comes first. Rochelle:     Right. Joe: And she sort of detangled everything and it's not all that complicated. Rochelle:     Perfect. Joe: Have you had a situation where the seller wanted to keep their seller account but transfer the brand out to a new owner and if yes tell us about it, please? Rochelle:     We have. Actually, we've had it both ways where the seller wanted to keep their account because maybe their seller account had multiple brands, multiple A Sense and they were only selling one set of their product lines, maybe one brand. And if that happens it has to be up front at the beginning of the deal. Everyone needs to understand at the beginning of the deal whether or not the account is going to transfer. And the buyer needs to appreciate that they may not be getting the seller account and frankly sometimes it's not the worst thing. For instance if the buyer is already an active Amazon Seller, the buyer may be very happy to have its current Amazon account just take over the A sense and that is a very smooth transition and it's literally a relisting of the A sense moved over and then the seller account just delist those; takes them off their registry. Joe: The only challenge with it, you know it just piped it's … is the inventory. The inventory in the FBA account, Amazon will not transfer it from one FBA account to another. So you've got to time it so that new inventory is coming into that new seller account. You might leave the older account open, it still sells through that inventory but the new owner gets the revenue or the profit. Rochelle:     And the seller, if they sell through the existing inventory, may do it for the benefit of the buyer. Joe: Yeah. Rochelle:     So that the money still transfers and all of that inventory and we just do an accounting. Joe: Exactly. Rochelle:     You're exactly right Joe that is what happens. Let me give you another scenario and I actually have this scenario right now. I have a seller I represent who has multiple seller accounts and he … they have multiple brands in their seller account and they're about to sell that business. That particular seller account is poorly rated. It has had lots of negatives for a whole variety of reasons part of it's because it's very old and part of it is because of mistakes that were made early on. But the nature of that particular business, the products they sell makes a lot of money but the seller account itself is not great. And the buyer is actually going through the process right now and determining if they would be better off just starting a brand new seller account and not taking that history because again, you're picking up the history of something that isn't really great. Joe: Yeah I guess it's better to have no history if the old history is very poor. But the challenge is let's back up and start with for those listening buyers or sellers if you have multiple brands in one seller account think about that transfer process. Someday you may wake up and say you know what I'm tired. I want to just unload something and put some money in the bank, set something aside so I can see something for the worth that I've done. The best way to do that is to have a clean transaction; you know separate LLC, clean documents, clean financials, and a separate seller account. Rochelle:     Separate VPN. Joe: Separate VPN, exactly. You can have multiple seller accounts, I've talked to people that have six seven different seller accounts. You just have to get permission from Amazon and they will grant it again like Rochelle said at the beginning you just have to talk to the right person at Amazon. Rochelle:     Or … and you have to do it right, you have to keep those businesses as separate businesses with separate seller accounts. They're not going to let one business have multiple seller accounts. Joe: Okay that's good information and it's hard for people when they bootstrap things and they test and certain things take off and they think this is great. Selling a business is more of a challenge and you got to have those things as separate as possible. I can tell you right now if you're going to spend a thousand dollars setting up a separate LLC and an extra thousand a year doing the accounting for it; you know $600 a year for separate Quick Books account you will get that money back tenfold in the sale [inaudible 00:28:26.9] your account so it's absolutely worth it to do it. So in terms of transferring the brand out of an account here's the drawbacks is that your buyer has to have another Amazon account with good or better ratings than the one that you have. Otherwise, your buyer pull is going to shrink and when your buyer pull shrinks the potential value for business shrinks as well. Rochelle:     That's right. Joe: I've talked to many experts and I've named a few whom here that I have talked to about the transfer of a brand into a brand new Seller Account and they all think that's crazy. If it's got … if a good brand is in a good Seller Account you're transferring that to a brand new Seller Account they don't know anything about it- Rochelle:     It makes no sense. Joe: And it's just risky. Rochelle:     Exactly. Joe: I have a transaction that's going on now where the buyer had just purchased an Amazon Seller Account, it happens to be in a different country than the US and has got a great seller rating and they're going to buy another brand and move it into that same seller account into that same country versus taking over their Seller Account. Because the seller feels that there's a risk there that he doesn't want to take on. Rochelle:     Right. Joe: So there's a lot of different ways to do these transactions and I hope that people can hear Rochelle through your communications that you're an attorney that actually thinks a little bit outside the box and understands that there's always two parties that are coming to the table and both have to be happy and satisfied in order to close a transaction. And you agree? Rochelle:     I absolutely agree and you know Joe one of the things that I'd like to talk to people about is, remember it is the Seller Account you're selling and very often that's what's driving the value. But also keep in mind there may be other things you're selling such as techniques or technology that you've invented to support your Seller Account that helps to drive the business to that account. Or possibly even your own know how and they may need you as part of the transition team. There may be issues with a non-compete especially if you're running multiple brands and you're selling one channel or one brand. So as you're getting ready to sell your business you really have to think about what it is you're selling. It's the Seller Account, it's the brand, what else is being sold and can you really sell the things that the buyer wants? Joe: Yeah all of that should be done up front. What … the worst thing to do folks is to wake up and go okay I'm tired I want to sell my business so I'm going to call a broker. Rochelle:     Right. Joe: That's the worst thing that … the best thing to do is to do what Rochelle is talking about and plan it in advance. Think … okay, maybe someday I'm going to sell my business let me just sort of get my ducks in a row. Rochelle:     Right. Joe: Maybe I never will and maybe I'll pass it on to my kids but in the event, I get tired and want to move on I want to be prepared. And you want to think about all those things in advance and have those sort of all those ducks in a row. Rochelle:     Right. Joe: In any contract negotiation let's touch on this briefly, both buyers and sellers you see both sides of the transactions all the time. What other stomach ache clauses that you see in an asset purchase agreement and how do you rectify them? Give me a couple of examples. Rochelle:     So I can tell you the top two are always the non-compete and the indemnification provisions. Those are always numbers one and two sometimes you know in whichever order you want to put them in. But those are the two things that are almost always the most concerning. So the non-compete; the non-compete sounds easy. I agree I'm going to sell my business that sells paint brushes and I promise not to compete in paint brushes. Well, the buyer may be looking at it a little differently. The buyer may say, I don't want you to compete in anything that has anything to do with paint or anything that has anything to do with art or possibly anything that has anything to do with home or other kinds of activities. Very often they're going to look at Amazon categories and they're going to say I don't want you to compete in the category in which the product you sold is in. I've even had a buyer say I don't want you to be a … will compete in any category on Amazon or in any category in which I, the buyer may be in now or in the future. Joe: Definitely nuts because I would tell them they're nuts. Rochelle:     Well, of course, we say as politely as we can. We don't like to queer deals but those are always fight issues. And my suggestion although I know people don't like to deal with difficult issues up front when you're in the dating period but my suggestion is that you understand the non-compete from the start of the transaction and the LOI point. Joe: Absolutely. We put all of that in our client interviews in depth, we ask about the non-compete, we talk to our sellers in detail about it because that is an important part of it from the seller's side. Look if this … the person selling the business is selling class fishing poles and they want to sell that business but still sell fishing poles it's too close and I'll tell them right up front as will any broker at Quiet Light Brokerage it's not going to work. Buyers are going to have a problem with that. I've never had a situation though I got to tell you, Rochelle, where a buyer has made an offer and said that we don't want you to sell anything on Amazon. That's simply too [inaudible 00:34:05.0]. I've never had anybody narrow it down to the category either because if you think about Home and Garden it's just too broad. It's usually been specific to the product and sometimes you know a little bit around that product. Let's say that if it's pick one that is not an actual- Rochelle:     We can talk about your fishing poles. Joe: Sure. Rochelle:     Some people will say nothing in marine so does that mean I can't sell a boat? A boat is really different than a fishing pole. Does that mean we can't sell a [inaudible 00:34:38.9]? Joe: Fishing tackle or things of that nature. I would say that it's … you can you can dance beyond that specific product a little bit but you can't go okay fishing pole and maybe lures but you can't go to boats, right? Rochelle:     Right. And the reason I bring it up is I have had and I will tell you where it is the … a lot of the buyers today are private equity firms. Joe: True. Rochelle:     And they're doing roll ups, and those private equity firms feel like they're buying the expertise of the person, not just the product and they are all over the idea that the expertise of the person could be used to teach or develop somebody else to sell against them. And as these private equity firms are rolling up multiple brands, multiple areas and their diversifying they have gotten very aggressive on this non-compete language. So we actually have seen … this may affect, I saw a language that was so broad that I said we absolutely can't have our client sign it because she couldn't even work at the makeup counter in Macy's. Because Macy's has an online site and even though she'd be working at the store it would be technically a violation. Joe: Right. Rochelle:     And the private equity guy said to me well we didn't mean that. I said well that's your language says though. And he said I see where you're coming from. We were able to bring it back and this is really where the skills of your lawyer and your broker come in. Because the combination of the two helps bring people back to reality but it's important that conversation happens up front. Joe: I couldn't agree more. I find the vast majority of deals go off the rails at some point and the difference between a good lawyer and a good broker and a great lawyer and a great broker is pulling that back on the rails. I think the ability to have open communications and occasionally you know maybe I'm wrong I don't mean to throw you in a category here but- Rochelle:     Yeah. Joe: You know I think attorneys when they respond to an asset purchase agreement and do edits and send it directly via email and make comments. It's vastly different than if they actually get- Rochelle:     Get on a phone. Joe: When they get on a phone and speak to the other attorney, it's- Rochelle:     Absolutely. Joe: You guys are brutal in emails and comments but then when you get on the phone you can generally work things out. Rochelle:     So one of the challenges Joe is that really it's more than there was but today there are very few lawyers who have experience in this kind of business. Joe: Yup. Rochelle:     And the typical document we're seeing has all sorts of stuff in it that makes no sense for an Amazon business. It's got loads of employee representations on employee benefit plans, it has loads of pages on environmental reps and warranties because they've taken the standard ABA form or the standard form they always use and they send it and say this is our asset purchase agreement. Joe: Right. Rochelle:     And people like … and I'll use Shawn Hussain as a great example I do a lot of deals with them, people like us look at that and we just simply white out all those pages. So we start off with 75 pages when we're done it's about 35 and 40 of them were just garbage. Joe: Let's jump to the indemnification clause. Rochelle:     Yes. Joe: Stomach ache clause number two, tell us about that one. Rochelle:     So indemnification, for people who don't understand what it is, it's the clause that says if something goes wrong after the sale here's when and how I might be able not I the buyer may be entitled to get some money back. Or get some protection get some defense. So understood anything that happened in your business prior to the sale of the business is certainly the seller's responsibility. Anything that happens in the business after the sale of the business is the buyer's responsibility. But then there's the foggy world; what about product that was produced by the seller but not sold until the buyer owns that inventory? What about claims made on the websites, claims made in the marketing materials, claims of natural or organic that the buyer is relying on that the seller created, or what about simple … the business didn't do very well? You told me this business is a million dollar a month business but when the buyer takes it over the think tanks, the lightning deals go away. There's all sorts of speculation, the supplier doesn't supply quite as well to the buyer as the seller, and then the buyer comes in and says how do I get money back for this it's not what I expected. It's really really important that going into the deal you understand what the caps and limits are, what's the maximum amount of money a buyer can get back and under what circumstances, and is there a deductible. So for instance fraud; okay everyone understands that if the seller committed fraud, the buyer is going to expect their money back and probably all of their money. At the same time let's just assume that what really happened is that the seller had representation, some warranties and in it it said that the financial statements that are attached are true and correct and it turns out one line has one number transposed, it doesn't change the business, it doesn't change the quality of the business, it is an immaterial mistake, should the buyer get money back? Should they get all their money back for that? Should they get any money back for that? And so that's what I would call a typical representation warranty. Let's assume there was as a result of that mistake there really was a little bit of a material implication. Well, it will … let's say turned into a $10,000 problem, so what should the buyer get for that $10,000 problem? The language and the representation warranties are very important. What we recommend is that going into the deal there be a very clear conversation about the difference between fraud which might mean you get your purchase price back or maybe even the right to unwind the transaction versus an unintentional misrepresentation or mistake or something hiccups that you didn't anticipate. And we recommend that you have a clear cap, what's the maximum amount that the buyer can get back in the event of those issues and it might be we … generally, we see somewhere between ten on the low side and 30% on the high side as the range; that's today's market, as the range for those kinds of indemnifications. We might see a basket, so we might see something that says but if it's all under $25,000 or under $50,000 depending on the size of the deal the buyer gets nothing back. It's just a small de minimus issue whereas if it's hundreds of thousands of dollars of issue there might be a cap on it. There are fundamental representations such as title to the assets and if it turns out the seller sells you something it didn't have title to it, of course, the buyer is going to expect to be completely reimbursed for that. There are questions about whether or not you'll pay for the attorneys. These are provisions that both your broker understands and your attorneys understand. I strongly recommend that you line up an attorney at the beginning of the deal at the LOI for the base of this and you also line up an accountant who and as a seller. Joe: Well in advance. Rochelle:     Well in advance. Joe: Yeah for sure. I hope you have one already for those listening that are sellers you know the four pillars that Mark and I talked about; the risk, the growth, the transferability, and the documentation are all critical. And you can't have that documentation in place without having a good a. bookkeeper and b. CPA to figure out what's going to be and left with after the sale. That's why I don't want you to wake up and go okay I'm ready to sell, list my business, please. Rochelle:     Right. Joe: You want to think about those things in advance. I did a podcast with Dave Bryant from EcomCrew way back on importing from China and Dave talks about how he planned in advance selling his business and renegotiated the cost of goods sold on certain skews over a 12 month period. Saved himself about $40,000 and got that back in a multiple of three when he sold the business so all of these things are really important. As you talk about the indemnification, and as you talk about the non-compete for those listening you know I'm sure some of you nodded off right? Just like you did when I talked about the doing the valuation in cash versus accrual accounting. You can make so much more money in the sale of your business someday if you ever decide to sell or your heirs do when you take care of these things in advance when you plan when you have proper documentation. Now all of that will make these stomach ache clauses like the indemnification, not an issue. Proper documentation in advance of the sale you'll know that you did the right thing with your customers, you know that you don't have any cash and potential liabilities; you know that your financials are correct. That transposing of the number you know is it material, is it immaterial? Rochelle:     Right. Joe: I've never had it happen pretty small if it's immaterial to material. I always go back to things can be worked out for the most part with math and logic. Emotion is the wild card, a good attorney a good a broker will help keep those emotions in check and on track to closing. And I think one of the reasons why I wanted you on the podcast Rochelle is because you seem to apply that math and logic into the conversations that we've had and you realize really really strongly that both buyers and sellers need to be happy. Rochelle:     Right. Joe: Otherwise that transaction is not gonna close. There's no point. A one sided deal is never going to close folks. So if you have an attorney that is fighting tooth and nail for indemnification clause it's going to have the seller not cover anything, not cover any risk for the buyer, it's not going to close. It has to be comfortable for both parties. I always tell a story, I'm not going to tell the full story but it boils down to I will not take on a clients that is married to an attorney that has an attorney's her mother father sister brother that's going to do their contract negotiations because they fight like rabid dogs for things that you know there's one tenth of 1% of it happening but they fight like crazy to make sure that their client, their relative is fully protected. Because they're gonna have to have drinks to that relative at the next 4th of July barbecue. Deals fall apart for those clauses that we've talked about more the indemnification in my experience than the non-compete because again a good broker will handle that upfront and take care of it upfront and it should be both buyer and seller free LOI. Now one last thing on the LOI face in terms of when to hire the attorney Rochelle, our experience is the letter of intent is non-binding and fully contingent on the asset purchase agreements on due diligence and the further detail of asset purchase agreement so we don't recommend that clients hire an attorney for the language in the letter of intent. Because it says right in there is non-binding and contingent on those things. I think as long as some of these points or all of these points are worked out in advance you know particularly the non-compete that it's in there that 9.5 times out of 10 it's not an issue. Occasionally we have a little further negotiation in the asset purchase agreement, would you agree though that you should be hired once the LOI is signed and for the asset purchase agreement negotiations? Rochelle:     Let me frame this a little differently. Joe: Okay. Rochelle:     If you're getting ready to sell your business you should have a lawyer lined up who's taking a look at your business to make sure your ducks are in a row. Make sure if you have supply agreements that they are written signed enforceable supply agreements because if you're planning on selling those supply agreements then they have to have assignable supply agreements. So what I always suggest is just like you have your accountant in your back pocket you ought to have an attorney that you work with that's helped you think through your business. So I actually believe that you need to have a good business attorney lined up early on. Now having said that, 90% of my clients don't even though that is my advice and I wish we would be there. Joe is exactly right we are very often hired after LOI or right as the LOI is being prepared. And the only catch we have with LOI is if you have an LOI that doesn't address indemnification, it doesn't have a cap in it, when we go to do the asset purchase agreement the attorney on the other side will say the letter of intent didn't have a cap, the letter of intent said purchase price because it didn't say anything else. So when you're silent on those terms in the LOI you might have uphill battle. What you could do to protect yourself is to say a … indemnification with cap and basket to be agreed upon in the definitive document. So then you've at least left open the possibility that there's a negotiation to still be had on that topic whereas if you simply leave it silent the buyer is going to say that … I know I'd say when I'm a buyer I'm going to say no no no no no there were it said indemnification there were no caps, there were no baskets. Joe: Yeah, you're going to say different things as the attorney for the buyer than you are for the seller. Rochelle:     Absolutely I'm very good at switching hat, as a matter of fact, I have represented clients who have been both buyers and sellers and they laugh about the fact that my tone changes and the way I look at the document changes. But we do what we have to do for our clients. Joe: Yeah for those listening look like many of you had … you don't want to contact a broker to talk about the valuation of the business or what it might be worth and I've had people tell me that because they don't want to feel like they're committing. You've got to do the same thing with the attorney, I think you should have a call with a broker a year two years in advance just to understand the valuation process and how to gauge what your discretionary earnings are on a monthly basis, quarterly basis, so you get an idea for the value instead of just listening to podcast, instead of just listening to people in mastermind groups and their experiences because the full story is never told. Instead of just looking at listings and oh that's a 2.5 multiple, that's a three multiple, it's a four multiple, you don't get the full story. You can't do it that way. You should have a conversation and have it directly applied to your business and your business only because every business has its own unique qualities. The same applies I think as you're saying Rochelle to having a conversation with an attorney in advance because if there's a problem with the way that you set up your LLC or the trademark or a design or anything like that- Rochelle:     Right. Joe: You should have those things addressed in advance. Well worth it. Do you do any … do you have an hourly charge for that first call? Do you have a free consultation? Do you just talk about business what it … how does it work if somebody wants to reach out to you and have that conversation? Rochelle:     Well we offer a 20 minute free consultation to all new clients. So we do it telephonically, most of our clients are not located. We're based in Tampa Florida which is a lovely place to live and do business. Most of our clients are all over the world. So we do it telephonically or through Skype or some other online method and we offer … we say 20 minutes and sometimes it goes a little longer depending on how in-depth we get. And in that call, we can then talk to you about what you need and how to price what you need. So sometimes what you need immediately is really just a few hours of our time and consultation and we'll bill it that way. Sometimes what you need is for us to dive in … as a firm we will do flat fees, we will do structured fees meaning that a certain price to cover the LOI and other price to cover due diligence a 3rd price to cover the asset purchase agreement and actually do it in phases. We will do capped fees, it all depends on the nature of your transaction and on how well we can get our arms around what you're asking us to do. So for instance, if we're doing it capped fee or a flat fee we're going to be very specific about the services you're getting from us and things that are outside those services might be in addition. If we're doing an hourly rate, of course, we'll have some sort of retainer up front and we will be specific about what's included in those services but you'll be billed by the hour. We try very hard to be transparent and easy for our clients to understand what they're being billed for and how they're being billed. Joe: Excellent. Rochelle listen we're going to wrap it up here, appreciate your time today. Can you tell those listening how to reach you, how do they find you either online or via phone call? Rochelle:     Absolutely so by phone, our number is 813 999 0199 and I am in extension 115 if you press 0 when you call that number ask for Layla and she will set you up with me or one of our attorneys for an additional counsel. And by e-mail I am rochelle@walklawfirm.com And we have a policy of responding to people within 24 at the most 48 eight hours but we're usually pretty good about popping right back to you and getting something set up. Joe: Terrific we'll make sure that that phone number the e-mail address and the website address are in the show notes as well. Rochelle:     Thank you. Joe: Rochelle any last thoughts for those listening that may be either buyers or sellers that you want to share? Rochelle:     I just think in closing that when you think about buying or selling a business due diligence is the most important thing you can do. So even if you're an experienced Amazon seller whether you're a buyer or a seller you need to know who you're doing business with. Get some … if you're the buyer certainly understand the brand you're buying and understand what you're trying to accomplish by buying those brands, what services you need and frankly if you're the seller and you might be taking back seller paper which is a promissory note a seller promissory note you're going to want to know who the buyer is. Make sure you understand are they equipped to run a business like this and if they're not what kind of transition services do you need to provide them so they can hit the ground running. Know what kind of people there are, check them out. If you're dealing with people who are squirrelly get out of the deal in the … before you even sign the LOI. But if you're dealing with good people try and figure out how to make them successful because your success as a seller especially if you're taking back a seller's promissory note or consulting agreement your success is going to be very much related to their success. Joe: I love your approach you know if you're … if you ever decide to leave the law business give us a call. You may be a very very very successful advisor here at Quiet Light Brokerage. Rochelle:     Thank you, Joe, I appreciate that and look forward to working with you again on some transactions. Joe: All right. Well, thanks for being a guest I appreciate it. We'll talk to you soon. Rochelle:     Thanks, Joe.   Links: www.walklawfirm.com Walk Law Firm, PA The Wells Fargo Building 100 S. Ashley Dr., Ste. 620 Tamp. FL 33602 Phone: 813-999-0199 Fax: 813-839-4896 LinkedIn

Good morning everyone! In this episode, we touch on some recent issues and sort of go off on a tangent on related topics. Enjoy! -Joe As always, listen on YouTube here. PS: Don't forget to follow us on social media! We don't post much, but our Instagram is here. This is our Twitter profile, and it gets a lot more updates than any other. Lastly, our Facebook is here. You can also join our community and get some cool perks by becoming a Patron here. We release behind-the-scenes stuff and give our Patrons early access to the podcast on YouTube every week, as well as a special Discord role, so if you're interested, throw us some cash on Patreon.

Alex Lyon from Avask Tax Advisors works with over 2,000 eCommerce and FBA clients. Her role is to help them understand, register for, manage and comply with VAT registrations and payments. Did you know that when selling online in Europe the taxes (VAT) are included in the purchase price? Did you know if you don't increase your list price your margins shrink by the VAT amount? Did you know that if you have a UK company there is a minimum total revenue threshold amount you can reach before you have to collect VAT? Did you know the biggest mistake made by US companies is not registering for VAT, but that you can sell on Amazon prior to having the registration number? If you answered “no” to at least one of the above questions…and plan to expand to Europe, hearing Alex's explanation of the VAT process could be critical to your expansion success.   Episode Highlights: The biggest mistake Alex sees is not registering for VAT, and it is costly! You can sell before being registered, but it'll cost you if you don't increase your prices to account for VAT. You do not have to set up a foreign corporation to sell in Europe, regardless of your overseas location: i.e. US, Singapore, etc. You only collect in countries you are shipping from (there is a caveat). Amazon does not show VAT charges separately in your seller account. The PanEU program makes sense for some, most only register in the UK and Germany. If you don't pay VAT…your Amazon account will be suspended and/or closed (eventually). “Import VAT” is charged on the inventory shipped into the country and paid immediately. “Sales VAT” is charged on the retail price of your goods, and paid quarterly. The UK and Germany are the two largest markets for selling online in the EU. The UK is the easiest to expand to from the US because of language and the challenges of shipping to Germany. Wiring VAT payments can take 4-5 days and a currency account in Europe shortens the wire times. Using an intermediary bank, or currency account, can save 1-3% in exchange rate fees. With Avask, the costs to register for VAT in the UK is about $200 USD, and then about $1200 USD per year. Caveat to costs: “Distance Selling Thresholds”, if met, require more than $1200 per year because VAT is required in countries you do not store inventory in. Transcription: Mark: Good morning Joe. How are you? Joe: I'm good Mark. How are you? Mark: I'm hanging in there. I'm enjoying the weather lately and getting outdoors a little bit not working as hard but we're still recording podcasts. And you recorded one on an interesting topic and something that I think more and more people are having to face that have Amazon businesses and that's some of the tax implications going overseas. Joe: Yes. Actually, anybody who has a physical products business that wants to sell in Europe and it's on value added taxes, oh my God not exciting at all. But did you know real quickly that you know obviously here in the States you buy something and then the tax is added? When you buy something online, or in Europe, UK, Germany, France, Italy, etcetera the price is built into…I'm sorry the taxes are built into the price. So if it's 120$ the item might be 100 but the taxes are 20. And a lot of buyers that ex…by sellers that expand overseas don't quite understand that concept initially and they could immediately start losing margin by not increasing the prices for the value added taxes. A great conversation it was with Alex Lyon from AVASK Tax Advisors they have over 2,000 FBA clients and e-commerce clients throughout the world that sell and need value added tax compliance so really informative stuff. And anybody that's considering expanding overseas should absolutely listen to this because it's not that complicated once you listen to what she says. Mark: What are the consequences if somebody is not taking care of the value added tax? Do you know by any chance? Joe: Yeah absolutely. So they're very-very compliant over there. It's not gray like it is here in the States, its black and white. So the problem is that if you sell in let's say the UK and you're not registered, you're going to be determined. Amazon has to share the information with I think it's the HMRC. They have to by law; they share the details of everybody that sells on Amazon. So the HMRC has access to your sales information and therefore can force you to pay the value added taxes that you should have collected. If you didn't collect it you're going to pay for that out of your pocket simple as that. So you've got two choices: pay for it out of your pocket and lose that 15 to 20% margin and probably make no money at all or walk away and be banned from selling in in Europe on Amazon. Mark: That's significant. I think moving across the ocean to selling in different countries is a huge opportunity for anyone. Buying an e-commerce business that wants to ship overseas that you need to start taking advantage of that opportunity but you also have to go through some of the understanding of what sort of regulations are in play. I think this you know isn't…this is not exactly an exciting topic but you know and I think it's a really important topic for anyone to listen to, to possibly unlock an opportunity that your competitors are not taking advantage of. Joe: Yeah and before we say let's jump into it let me just say this that I've seen explosive growth with people moving and expanding their products to the EEO, explosive growth in particular France. I mean the UK and Germany. And the cost associated with it using someone like AVASK and they're not the only ones who do it, it's not all that expensive. You're looking at maybe 1500 $ to get the ball rolling and get it done right. And you can you can start selling immediately as long as you're registering and then you pay from the date you started selling. It's really not that complicated. There's a lot to it but it's really-really important that if you're going to sell overseas which I think everybody should if they have real growth plans that they listen to the whole podcast. Mark: All right with that I will say let's jump into it. Joe: Hey folks it's Joe from Quiet Light Brokerage and today I've got to Alex Lyon from AVASK Tax Advisors with me. She's an expert on VAT which I believe is value added tax. Something a lot of folks trying to expand their e-commerce businesses over to the UK and beyond really need some help on. So Alex welcome to the Quiet Light Podcast. Alex: Thank you. Thank you, Joe. Hi everyone. Yeah as Joe has mentioned my name is Alex. I am Indirect Tax Client Manager of AVASK. So I've been working here for three years now just helping e-commerce sellers expand over into Europe. So we've got over 2,000 Amazon sellers that we work with. UK companies also companies based all over the world as well. So yeah that's been us. Joe: That's fantastic. Are they all FBA clients (Fulfilled By Amazon) or do they you know sell off FBA as well (off Amazon) with their own e-commerce businesses? Alex: It varies so a high majority of people are FBA sellers just because it's a lot easier to hand everything over to Amazon and kind of let them do fulfillment. But there are quite a large number of Amazon Sellers as well such as shipment from your own country which obviously makes a lot of things easier in terms of the VAT because you don't have to actually declare the sales in Europe because you're not fulfilling from his countries. So yeah it's kind of a majority FBA but we do have MFM sellers as well. Joe: Okay, good. Good. Good. So let's talk about the basics, get things straight here for our listeners because a lot of people here in the states are expanding their Amazon.com accounts beyond Amazon into the European countries and seeing explosive growth. But the big mystery is how to set up the VAT's and how to find an agency like yours to handle it most of the costs associated with it are. So you can start am I getting it right is it Value Added Tax and tell us how it works? Alex: Correct. Yes, it's value added tax. It's the same principle across the European countries but they have different rights and different filing frequencies. The easiest way to explain it would be that it's similar to the sales tax you have in the US. But the main difference would be the way which you include it within the price of your product. So this is kind of the biggest hurdle where people fall over on where they don't actually include the VAT amount within the price of the product which means that you're not actually collecting the VAT from your customer but you still have to pay it to the revenue. So you're essentially paying it out from your pocket if you don't include it. So in the US for someone like myself when I come over I don't realize it works like this when I go to the checkout in sell sites because I didn't know and I'm kind of how…where is this amount coming from. Whereas in the UK you don't know that it's already there in the price of the product so yes its essentially the same as the sales tax but it's more hidden. Joe: So Amazon is collecting that 20% for units built into the purchase price of the product. So if it's 100 $ if the VAT is 20% for instance, 20% is something set aside to pay your VAT…your taxes? Alex: Yes. Joe: Okay. Alex: So you need to list in on Amazon for the straight 120. Amazon won't do that for you. Joe: Okay and do a lot of people make that mistake where they just list their business without bumping it for the value added tax? Alex: Yeah there's a large number of that do. Without getting kind of proper advice on how VAT actually works. So it is…see it's hard enough to in taxes in your own country let alone I'm kind of working out how to do it in a foreign country. So yeah that's a big hurdle where quite a lot of people fall over on. Joe: Okay. So you're located in the UK. AVASK is located in the UK. But I think I saw offices around in different parts of the world, is that right? Alex: Yes that's right. So we've got an office in London and I'm on based on in Winchester which is about an hour south of London. And then we've also got offices in Shenzhen and LA. We try to come over to the US as much as possible as well just because oversea it's kind of US sellers that we've [inaudible 00:08:19.0] work with. So yeah we try and get over to the events as much as possible as well and get that travelling. Joe: So the vast majority of clients as you said are US based clients and they start selling and Amazon.com and then expanded to the European countries? Alex: Yeah, definitely. Amazon is oversea, it's huge in America and it's just kind of been taking off here in Europe as well. So it's a massive market in Europe and I think if you're product is successful and you've been able to make it successive there in the US then there's absolutely no reason why you shouldn't also be able to do in Europe. Joe: Okay. So let's say I own an Amazon.com account, I want to reach out to you what…and I want to sell in the European countries, step one two three can you walk us through that? Alex: Yup sure. So step one is to work out where you're going to be shipping your products from. So most people go with the UK or Germany just because they're the biggest markets, UK is obviously a lot easier because you don't have to translate any of your products. So whichever country you decide you're going to fulfill from you then have to get a VAT number in that country and also an EORI number for all of your shipments. So those two numbers you have to have those before you make a shipment. If you make a shipment without those numbers you're going to get charged import VAT and then you won't necessarily be able to reclaim that back whereas you would if you have the numbers. So that's very important. In terms of the registration process, engaging a UK agent is really helpful because you've got someone who can communicate with tax authorities on your behalf. And that also means that we know exactly what documents are needed for each of the registration. We'll process all of that for you. Once the application has been submitted and you're waiting for the numbers to come through at that point you should start getting your listings up. Working out some shipping quotes and kind of working out all the details on actually how you're going to get your product there and what the listings are going to look like. Joe: Okay. And I just had a conversation with someone that is buying an Amazon business and they were confused about when the VAT was going to be applied. Is it to the amount of products being shipped into the country or is it the amount that's sold? Alex: It's both. So if you're doing FBA you're making a box shipment to an Amazon warehouse. That box shipment you're going to have to declare at customs. So any shipment that's out into a warehouse is going to have import VAT at UK customs charged on it that's assuming of course that your shipment has come from outside of Europe, so most people ship from China or from the US. So import VAT is going to be charged on the cost of your goods. When you put together a commercial invoice of that shipment, that's the amount of the import fees then we charge on also with freight charges and things. Joe: And then what time do they pay that import VAT, when it arrives? Alex: Yeah correct so usually depending on what shipping company you'll go for usually they'll pay it for you and invoice it back to you. But they still have to do your kind of clearance number to create a shipment. Joe: And then do they have to…then they collect that VAT when it sells and they keep it or is it a different…are we talking about two different things? The import VAT versus the VAT that's charged to the customer on the Amazon account is that two different things or it's the same? Alex: It's the same tax but it's computed in different ways. So import VAT is non-cost whereas VAT on your sales is on the retail price of your goods. And they're also kind of declared differently so with the VAT when you [inaudible 00:11:35.18] you pay that in your VAT within each quarter. You don't pay that immediately when you make the sale. Whereas the import VAT, you pay it immediately at customs. And the way that those kind of…they tie in together although they're separately you…it's within your VAT return. So you do your VAT filing every quarter. So every three months you declare the amount of sales you made and then obviously you're declaring the VAT that's due on your sales and then any import VAT that you pay you can get that refunded and it's used as a credit within your VAT return. Joe: And how easy is it within the Amazon seller account to see that money that you've collected and have it match up against what you're going to owe? Or is it not as black and white as I think it would be or is it really relatively easy? Alex: It's gotten a lot better, to be honest. And so Amazon have got a specific VAT report that you can now download so you can see the breakdown. But in terms of the actual…when your customer purchases an item they won't be able to see the breakdown of VAT and the amount that's going to the amount that's going to the revenue. Another kind of stumbling block where a few Amazon sellers fall over where they don't get the kind of proper…do the proper research before is that's that although Amazon take their fees from the money you receive in terms of your sales, the VAT is [inaudible 00:12:49.6] on the total sales price. You can't deduct Amazon fees and then the amount that you actually receive from Amazon is what you pay VAT on it's the total amount that you're costumer is paying you pay VAT on. Joe: Why is there any calculation at all that the seller does? Doesn't Amazon calculate it for you it seems like they would since they know the exact sales? Alex: Yes so, unfortunately, it doesn't work like that. You have to include it. You have to price your product you have to do your pricing matrix. If you're expecting to move due your pricing and then Amazon add the VAT on it…that's not going to happen. You have to make sure you're including them. Joe: Well then I was thinking in terms of Amazon that in your pricing you would say this is my price and then this is my VAT amount it's not done that way you just simply mark it up to 120$ if it's a 100$ item. Alex: Yeah, exactly. Mark out straight away. And you can tell Amazon with the VAT calculation service you can let them know if you've got any kind of reduce rated or zero rated items which will reflect on the actual sales report. But it's not going to affect what your actual retail price is on Amazon and what it's listed as. Joe: Okay. Let's talk about volume. Here in the States, there's a lot of question about when should I start collecting sales taxes and [inaudible 00:13:58.6] and all these different [inaudible 00:13:59.8] unfortunately not black and white yet. It's still very-very gray. I had a situation where I listed a business for sale and asked about collecting VAT and he said well I'm not…I haven't hit that threshold yet in the UK. And I think it was a UK corporation as well, can you talk about thresholds and when and if you have to collect. In different [inaudible 00:14:21.4] what if you're a UK corporation or a Hong Kong Corporation if you're someone at the LOC or corporation here in the States? Alex: Okay, so if you have a company that's incorporated anywhere apart from the UK then you have to register for VAT immediately so that's sale number one whether it's going to have 1$, 10$, or 100$ it's straight away so no threshold whatsoever, you have to be registered. If however, you have a UK company there's a threshold of 85,000 Pounds and that's in terms of a turnover over a 12 month loaning period. So if you hit that within three months you have to be registered if you hit that in 11 months you have to be registered but that's just for a UK company. So if you've got an overseas entity you have to register straight to it there's no threshold. Joe: As far as buyers go, when you and I talked about this and have conversations with buyers when they buy an Amazon account that has a European component to it there's always questions about TMI not going to be collecting during a certain period of time, how do we sign up, how do we get that registered, what kind of danger I'm going to be in. I think you said the other day in a call separately in preparation for this that you can start pricing your products right away while you register and you're not going to…you're not going to lose any grounds or sales while you're registering and then paying VAT down the road a bit. Can you talk about that again a little bit so that…and talk about it from a buyer for perspective. If say someone is buying an Amazon account and taking it over and would reach out to you to register how do they ensure that they're collecting from day one of ownership and that they're not going to…not get themselves in a little bit of trouble? Alex: Well, first of all, I want to make sure, well check whether the Amazon account has already previously been charging VAT. So what we've discussed in terms of the pricing, obviously if you're taking over an Amazon account you're buying that account. And if they haven't been including VAT in the prices, you obviously then need to…the first kind of goal is to straight away go ahead and increase everything by that 20%. Joe: Let me just jump in here for a sec. So that's a consideration when someone…this is for the buyers that are listening, correct me here Alex if I'm wrong but when someone's buying an account and the owner has UK corporation, if they're below that annual threshold of 85,000 Pounds in revenue they're not charging VAT. But if I buy it and I'm not a UK corporation I immediately have to increase the prices in order to collect VAT or leave it alone and I'm going to lose 20% of my sales to the VAT. Is that correct? Alex: That's correct. Yes, so you because you're an overseas company you have to charge VAT on your sales even though they haven't been charged previously. Joe: Okay really critical for buyers to understand that when it's a UK corporation. Okay sorry to interrupt please continue. Alex: Okay so once you have then kind of taken over the company you can actually back date a registration. So say I'm talking over…I'm buying an Amazon account under my US company from a UK company we'll stick to that example. From the 1st of May you know going through the whole process it's taken a couple weeks to actually get everything set up. When if it got to the 1st of June and you still hadn't registered you can then back date that to the 1st of May. So as soon as you know that you're going to be buying the Amazon Seller Central, I would make sure that you're charging VAT to your customers because although you may not be registered you can backdate the registration. And it means that you have to pay VAT in all sales you make previous even though at that actual moment in time you weren't registered but you're back dating registration. Joe: Okay just to summarize. Don't change a thing in terms of prices assuming it's a…let's go with back to the it's a non UK entity so that they're a US entity buying a US entity but they have a UK account to it. If they're charging 120$ now and they're collecting VAT you don't have to change prices at all. Alex: Correct. Joe: You're going to register with a firm like yours and then when it's time to pay for the first time you're already collecting those and you'll go back dating and calculate what's due. Alex: Yes, exactly. Yeah. Joe: And how often do you pay? I think you said was it quarterly? Alex: Yes quarterly so every three months yeah. Joe: And is it the same every three months? Is it the beginning of the 15th of the next quarter is when you have to pay the taxes or is it depends upon when you register? Alex: So you got one month and seven days to actually do the filing and make the payment. As you can fall into different stagger groups in VAT quarters so it's not necessarily you are January to March you can be February to April or March to May. So there's three kind of different groups of VAT filings you could fall into. Your VAT advisor should obviously let you know and would be contacting you when everything's due. In terms of the frequency yeah it is quarterly. Joe: Listen, Alex, as you can see I'm an old guy, got some gray hair here. I fell asleep in accounting class in college. I honest to God I did fell asleep, the next class came in and I think I've told the story again so I won't go to much detail. I don't like this stuff. I don't like this level of detail because of what I do for a living it's absolutely critical as an entrepreneur and know how important it is. Do I have to really…if I'm the guy that's buying an FBA business and it's got European components to it, how much do I have to really know or can I just rely on you guys to do the work for me? Alex: You can definitely rely on us to kind of advice you and let you know. But it is…I do think it's good to know kind of the basics of what you're doing. In terms of Amazon, you've got two different programs so European Fulfillment Network or Pan-European Program. Pan-European Program is great you get to move your stock around to seven different countries [inaudible 00:20:03.1] you're stock is close that your costumers time are positive reasons to do that. But if you just kind of turn that on on your Amazon Seller Central and you'd haven't done any prior research, you won't know that you then actually have to get [inaudible 00:20:17.6] registered in seven countries. You have to do filings maybe month in more than half of these countries. So everything that you do in terms of where your stock is located, where your sales are going will have an impact on your VAT registration, your VAT applications within Europe. So yes it's good you should have [inaudible 00:20:36.6] in there. We'd let you know but don't be completely ignorant to what you're doing and where your stock is going. Joe: Hey it sounds like you just touched on being able to shift from seven different countries in a penny you…there's a lot of potential savings in terms of the shipping costs and fulfillment costs that you're closer to the customer. But you talked earlier I think that if you've got your inventory in the UK or Germany in the two biggest centers that you register for VAT in those countries what if your inventory is spread around seven different countries so you're closer to the customers do you then have to register in all of those countries? Alex: You do. Yeah, as soon as your stock is in that country and you can sell in from there you have to be VAT registered in that country. So VAT is basically payable to the country and is being done close at supply. So if your stock is in a Czech Republic warehouse the place of supply VAT sale when it's going from the Czech Republic to the customer in Italy is going to be in Czech Republic. So being VAT registered in the UK is completely useless. Joe: Okay. Alex: So yeah- Joe: Very much like nexus here in the States if there's 15 Amazon centers theory is that if you have 15 different locations of inventory you have nexus in those states and that's where you collect sales taxes. Not as formal as where you are. Tell us about the biggest hurdles and biggest mistakes that you've seen people make…well that you have in been bringing people to the European countries and selling an FBA. What things are really obvious? What mistakes are really common that people can avoid? Alex: So first one is to not get registered at all. So with that threshold, quite a few people get confused that the 85,000 threshold is applicable to them; sounds really appealing and really lovely so they just don't register full stop. And then when you do get registered you just do it from today's date because [inaudible 00:22:27.3] realize but now I know that I'm going to do it from today. There's a huge amount of compliant checks going on with the revenue in the UK. They are hurdling through every single Amazon account and doing tax investigations. You know we've had to help clients where we're going all the way back to 2012 when the legislation came in that they have to register. So that's kind of six years of taxes you're going to have to go back and pay and if you don't your Amazon can get shut down. So the first kind of hurdle is actually getting registered. It's kind of what you'd think is the most simplest part just to do the application. Joe: Six years of VAT taxes you've had people in that situation? Alex: Yeah. Joe: I would think that in some situations people will just throw their hands up in the air, close the account, and walk away, and not pay the taxes. Alex: Yeah. Joe: Is that something where if you're a US resident where you're going to be found and have to pay those taxes in some way shape or form? Alex: Well you spent a nice six years building up your Amazon account. You've got all of your reviews you know you've built up that kind of brand in the UK so to kind of just throw your hands up and walk away is a big thing to do in the first place. Because even if you opened up a new Amazon account you're not going to have all of those reviews and obviously the name of you as a director of that company when you do a VAT application in the UK you have to state that information and you have to kind of give all of those details of yourself anyway and yeah so you'll have- Joe: So if you're going to walk away there walk in away forever. Alex: Yeah. Joe: Unless they cheat and get around the system somewhere. Alex: Exactly and unfortunately like in the US…so as not like in the US there's now amnesty in the UK so if you think that you're going to be negotiating and kind of say that oh I'll make sure to pay everything going forward so I'll pay a percentage you wouldn't get that and you also have to pay mass penalty as well so it do not kind of sound all that great if you haven't done the right thing to start with. Joe: Okay. So I've talked to a lot of Amazon sellers. I've seen their financials. Some people tell me you know I've done the analysis Joe and it's just not worth the effort for me to sell in Germany and Italy in France and in the UK. It's just not worth it. And I think they're completely and utterly wrong because I've seen the explosive growth. You've got 2,000 FBA clients. What country are you seeing people get the most bang for their buck? What's growing rapidly over there and what country should they pay attention to the most? Alex: UK and Germany definitely. They're just the two biggest markets. France is…does follow very closely but yeah 100% they're the biggest. Joe: Okay. And the easiest of those two might be the UK because you don't have to do translation? Alex: Yeah, exactly. And I'm shipping direct into the UK is a lot easier than it is shipping to Germany. Joe: Okay. Okay. There are a lot of concerns about money laundering. I've heard people talk about this and how complicated it is and on the German side and German FBA accounts. Am I just hearing people with sort of the chicken little mentality that the sky is falling and being really paranoid or is there something to that? Alex: I think sales in Germany in terms of my money laundering and everything is all going through Amazon. So amazon are collecting the funds and sending it to you. You don't need for some representation in Germany so payments go directly to the tax authorities whereas in France you've got to pay to your French advisor and then it goes to the tax authorities so yeah I'm not sure of what grounds. Joe: Do you even know who Chicken Little is or what that theory…okay, I see you just- Alex: No sorry. Joe: Okay. It's a cartoon character here in the States disguised- Alex: Okay [crosstalk 00:25:55.9] Joe: I used that terminology when there's so many people online talking about all the horrible things that can happen when you're own an Amazon seller account as opposed to the reality of how many great things are happening and it's changing people's lives. Alex: I think that's like when you go to a restaurant or you go anywhere, you're more likely to leave a bad review if you've had a bad experience whereas if you've had agood review you probably leave any review at all. I do notice that happen. Joe: A hundred percent, you're absolutely right. One of the things that I see often and I know you guys are AVASK tax advisor so I want to talk about that advisory part and the tax part. But one of the things that I see happen is that sometimes when sellers expand overseas they just take the easy route and they'd let Amazon handle making deposits directly to their US bank account. Whereas other people that take a little bit of time, do some research, still use World's First Bank or somebody else to be that intermediary and the money will go there at a lower exchange rate saving them tens in…tens of thousands of dollars annually. Do you find that to be the case, do you would advise folks to do that and if so what world banks do you suggest they use or look at or is that a service that you provide as well? Alex: Yeah, definitely. So if you kind of first of all from a VAT paying perspective there's…most people have to pay via wire transfer. And if you're getting kind of close to the payment deadline it can take for to five working days for that payment to clear with HMRC. They then if any payment is received late they will give you a surcharge with subtentiative liability and that can go up to 15 cents. So if you've got a currency account located here in Europe the time that it takes for the funds to actually clear and consider the payment to be made is a lot quicker. So that is a big benefit of getting a bank account over here even just a currency account. Joe: Can you define what a currency account is and how it differentiates from a bank account, please? Alex: So it has kind of all the benefits of a bank account and they're very similar but I don't think I mean don't 100% take my word for this. Obviously, it's better to speak to a currency account provider. But you can't hold large amounts of funds in that account. It's kind of like an intermediary way. You're basically doing a transfer and a transfer to your local account. You can't also do things like direct debits and buy out checks and things like that. Joe: Okay. And as I understand it just for people listening that currency account I think Amazon, for instance, may charge you if you are a…may charge you 4% currency exchange. Whereas the currency account you may only be charged 2%. And so you might be…and these are ballpark numbers so you're saving 2% on whatever amount of money is flowing through that. And if it's a million dollars, you do the math on that. If it's 10,000 $ you do the math on that. So I see a lot of people do that as well. That's what a currency account is right? Alex: Yeah. And especially with kind of making payments in Europe in terms of VAT you're going to be transferring your money from Amazon to the US and then back so the UK again so you're kind of transferring it a couple of times and to make that payment. So if you want to incorporate a UK company [inaudible 00:29:08.3] you could have get an actual high street UK bank account which is obviously a benefit of that UK company. You could just kind of grow the funds and leave it in a high street bank account in UK. Joe: Well, let's talk about that for a minute. Maybe I should have asked this at the very beginning and listeners I apologize because this is a question I get offset. You know I'm expanding to the UK, I'm expanding to Germany do I have to set up a UK business with a UK address or German company? Do I have to set those up or can I simply be a US based company selling products overseas? Can you explain, you've got 2,000 clients what are they doing? What do you recommend? Alex: You do not have to incorporate a UK company. It's the majority of people use their overseas company just because it is a lot easier and has less administration in terms of the accounts that you are drawing up each year. It's all just falling onto one company. You've got your CPA in the US. He's doing everything for you. You don't have to hire a CPA equivalent in the UK so ask accountants to do your [inaudible 00:30:03.9] paying your kind of all those tax due filings. In terms of what's actually best is really hard for me to say because it is on a case by case basis. It's you know do you want to build a brand, do you want a UK bank account, do you want to take advantage of the VAT threshold, there's so many factors. It's not one, it's one size fits all, unfortunately. Joe: Okay but the simple answer is for anybody listening if you're US based with a US bank account a US corporation, you do not have to set up a European company a UK company or in Germany that's misinformation. You don't have to do that. You can register for VAT and start collecting and paying and still have your one CPA here in the US. Is that correct? Alex: Yes. Joe: Good. Of your 2,000 plus or minus clients, what are their sizes? I mean you have you got people that are doing you know a million, two million dollars a month in revenue and those that are just doing five or 10,000 $ a month? How does it range and how does it flash out [inaudible 00:31:01.5] so we just know more about you guys. Alex: Yeah, exactly that range I don't [inaudible 00:31:05.4] information but- Joe: Maybe I should have said a half a million a month. Alex: Yeah there's a huge range there is. And that's for the UK companies and also overseas companies. You know we've got a lot of Chinese clients as well. We've got kind of a whole Chinese department [inaudible 00:31:20.6]. So yeah the range is massive. We can help you whatever size. Joe: Okay. Let's say that I'm doing a quarter of a million dollars a month here in the States and I decide I want to expand overseas and I'm going to start with UK and Germany. Aside from my inventory costs and getting the product there, what are my costs for someone like you in setting up VAT and getting registered and compliant and all that stuff? Alex: Well it depends which country you're going for. If it's just one if it's selling- Joe: Say I'm gonna start with two. I'm going to start with the UK, actually I'm just gonna go with one. Let's go with UK. Alex: Okay 150 Pound registration one up fee and then 870 Pounds a year annual compliance and that doesn't depend on turnover. So whatever your turnover is it's the same. Joe: That's pretty cheap, if I'm doing a quarter million a month, 150 Euros a couple of hundred bucks tops and then maybe a thousand US dollars a year simple as that. Who calculates what my VAT is owed each month? Is it me and my CPA or is that part of your 870 5,000- Alex: Yeah we do that. We calculate everything. And you can give us limited access to your seller central we'll go in and download all the reports directly. You don't have to be a part of that process. Your sole responsibility is to make the payment. Joe: Can I just have you make the payment for me if you have access to funds or you just tell me what to pay and I pay it? Alex: No we don't do that. We will tell you what to pay and then you have to make the payment yeah. Joe: This is…okay I'm a little [inaudible 00:32:47.2] I haven't talked to anybody about pricing but to me, this is so incredibly fair and reasonable. Are you guys…is this the standard fees? I mean this is normal cost or you're really expensive or really cheap? What's the situation? Alex: I think that's about average. We pride ourselves over the service that we give kind of in comparison to the actual fees to other providers and things. We don't get too hung up on what the actual charges are in terms of that. What I would say though, I don't want to be [inaudible 00:33:16.2] in terms of that 870. Because if your turnover was in the millions you will be breaching distance selling thresholds to all of the European countries. Joe: You'll be what? Say that again. Alex: Breaching distance selling thresholds, we haven't spoken about that so- Joe: Distance selling threshold. Alex: We'll go into that really quickly. So if you've got all of your stock in a UK company…country sorry company the UK country, UK warehouse and is going to customers in Germany. So UK from a warehouse going to a customer in Germany, if their sales go over a certain threshold to Germany you then have to register to VAT in Germany even though you're not fulfilling from that country. Joe: Okay. Alex: Makes sense? Joe: Yeah, all right. This is the part where Joe doesn't love this level of detail but thank you for that. Alex: It's just that I don't want to be misleading in terms of 870 Pounds you know whatever your turnover is because that's all UK fee. If your turnover is massive you will have an obligation to register in other countries as well. Joe: And if the turnover is massive to probably going to be shipping from those countries to save that fulfillment cost anyway. Alex: Yeah, yeah. Joe: And that's something that they would do the math on and you guys may help them with. Alex: Yeah. Joe: Okay we're running out of time. We're about 30 minutes in which is actually a bit long but this is a fascinating subject, a critical one, and I'm sure some people just they fell asleep because it's also not their favorite which is a shame. Because the number one thing people can do to make their business more valuable is get the books right. Get the details like this absolutely correct. It's going to help with the transition of the business as well as well as the value. Alex thank you so much. Any last thoughts that you can share with people listening? Whether they're buying and selling in terms of what they should do and how they should do it other than just do it and do it right. Alex: I honestly I would just say to speak to someone you know we do free consultations [inaudible 00:35:07.0] if you just give us a call then we can just run through everything with you. There's you know all though we've covered a lot in half an hour it's a lot of information, there are still some things that haven't been mentioned so yeah I would just speak so when I mention we've got all the information for before you completely just jump start in. Joe: Okay. Well, we'll make sure that all of your contact information is in the show notes. Alex: All right. Joe: But for those listening that can't see them there it's AVASK tax advisors that's A-V-A-S-K tax advisors and they do free consultations. I think it's really important as a buyer or seller if you're planning on selling over in the UK. Alex thanks so much for your time today I really appreciate it. Alex: Okay thanks. Thanks, everyone. Links: Alexandra Lyon Indirect Tax Client Manager Skype: alex.avask Email: alex@avaskgroup.com T: +1.213.330.4904; +1.213.256.0537 https://www.linkedin.com/in/alexandragrant4/ https://www.avaskaccounting.co.uk/   James Shayler International VAT Technical Officer Skype: james.shayler16 Email: james@avasktax.com T: +1.213.330.4904; +1.213.256.053

Hey everyone! I feel like by now, I don't need to mention that this episode has spoilers for Deadpool 2, so I've hidden that in this description. So if you haven't seen DP2 yet and want to, know that we do spoil it halfway through. In fact, there are also spoilers for the first one if you haven't seen that one yet. So yeah, this episode is our review of Deadpool 2. Enjoy! -Joe As always, the YouTube link for this episode is here.  PS: Don't forget to follow us on social media! We don't post much, but our Instagram is here. This is our Twitter profile, and it gets a lot more updates than any other. Lastly, our Facebook is here. You can also join our community and get some cool perks by becoming a Patron here. We release behind-the-scenes stuff and give our Patrons early access to the podcast on YouTube every week, as well as a special Discord role, so if you're interested, throw us some cash on Patreon.

Good morning everyone! So here's an episode that kind of brings us back to our roots: just good, old conversation. No script or topic list or anything, just some dudes talking. Enjoy guys! -Joe As always, YouTube link is available here.  PS: Don't forget to follow us on social media! We don't post much, but our Instagram is here. This is our Twitter profile, and it gets a lot more updates than any other. Lastly, our Facebook is here. You can also join our community and get some cool perks by becoming a Patron here. We release behind-the-scenes stuff and give our Patrons early access to the podcast on YouTube every week, as well as a special Discord role, so if you're interested, throw us some cash on Patreon.

Yep, more Marvel shit. That's okay though. Is gud episode. In this one, we have a conversation about the state of the Marvel Cinematic Universe and some things we'd like to see. It's a sort of expansion on last week's episode. We also ramble a bit and go off-topic as usual. Enjoy! -Joe As usual, you can listen to this podcast on the YouTubes. PS: Don't forget to follow us on social media! We don't post much, but our Instagram is here. This is our Twitter profile, and it gets a lot more updates than any other. Lastly, our Facebook is here. You can also join our community and get some cool perks by becoming a Patron here. We release behind-the-scenes stuff and give our Patrons early access to the podcast on YouTube every week, as well as a special Discord role, so if you're interested, throw us some cash on Patreon. Download this episode

Good morning! Joe here, serving up a piping hot fresh episode. In this one, Luke and I go on a long, rambly conversation about Avengers: Infinity War (if that wasn't already obvious). As the title suggests, there are a lot of spoilers, so if you're one of those folks who haven't gotten to see the movie yet, don't listen to this one. That being said: GO SEE IT! It's really, really good! Much love. -Joe As usual, you can listen to this podcast on the YouTubes. PS: Don't forget to follow us on social media! We don't post much, but our Instagram is here. This is our Twitter profile, and it gets a lot more updates than any other. Lastly, our Facebook is here. You can also join our community and get some cool perks by becoming a Patron here. We release behind-the-scenes stuff and give our Patrons early access to the podcast on YouTube every week, as well as a special Discord role, so if you're interested, throw us some cash on Patreon.

Hello hello! How is everyone today? Joe here, dropping off another episode. This is our 50th episode, and we wanted to do something special. So we did! Our buddy Matt joins us for this episode as we talk about random topics, then do a short review of Super Troopers 2. Much love. -Joe As always, you can listen to this episode on YouTube. PS: Don't forget to catch us on social media! Instagram is here, Twitter is here, and Facebook is here. You can also join our community and get some cool perks by becoming a Patreon here.

Good morning guys! Joe here once again, bringing you a mini-episode. This is a short, one-man show that we wanted to release for you guys as a half-assed apology for not recording and releasing an episode this week. Sorry guys! This one-man show features only Luke, recording in his room. He doesn't have much in the way of echo cancellation though, so I did my best to clean it up. It's still a nice recording, so we hope you'll enjoy it. We'll be back next Tuesday with episode 50, where we'll be having a special guest on. Sit tight guys, and much love to ya! -Joe As always, you can listen to this episode on YouTube. PS: Don't forget to catch us on social media! Instagram is here, Twitter is here, and Facebook is here. You can also join our community and get some cool perks by becoming a Patreon here. Download this episode

Ricky Brigante started Podcasting 13 years ago about something he loved, Disney. The Podcast lead to a blog, that turned into a full blown website with over 11,000 articles, 70,000,000 page views, and a YouTube channel with nearly 1,000,000,000 (that's a BILLION!) views. Ricky took his business from a hobby to being an invited guest to Star Wars openings and walking down the “red carpet” in Hollywood. Ricky seemed to have the dream business, yet after a number of years he grew tired of it and wanted to move onto his next adventure. He tried replacing himself first, and failed. In this Podcast Ricky shares his story, his triumphs and mistakes. He talks openly about hiring friends and family, being passionate about what you do, and making an eventual exit from a business he loved. Episode Highlights: Learn how Ricky built a YouTube channel with nearly 1 billion views. Content is critical – and Ricky talks about his approach to the more than 11,000 articles he has published over the last decade. When you need to hire, doing it to right way can add value, or headaches to your business and life. Speaking with a broker about selling your business is nothing to be afraid of. Planning in advance of a sale could bring a lot more value to a business. Why it can make sense to sell a business, even if you love it. https://youtu.be/ivzJQpxwaH8 Transcription Mark: Joe how are you? Joe: Doing great Mark, how are you? Mark: I'm doing well! I understand that you got to talk to one of our clients recently Ricky Brigante, am I saying that right? Joe: You're saying it right Ricky Brigante. He's the founder of Inside the Magic, he started of just a Podcaster literally thirteen years ago, he said “You know what this podcasting looks cool, I'm going to go ahead and talk about Disney”. I love Disney! We're going to talk about that, and within a few months he had thousands of followers and it led to a, an eventual blog which became an eventual website to eventual Youtube channel to an eventual 900 million views on Youtube, I did say “Nine hundred million” that's nearly a billion views, 11,000 articles on the website, something like 64 million views, 17 million views in the last 12 months. Just incredible for volume on the numbers and one of the smartest things he said that he's sharing his advice not just in terms building a content business and the ways that he did it and following his passion, but the fact that he just sold the business, he said something most sellers don't necessarily want to hear which is, don't be afraid to have a conversation with someone like you or me or Jason or Chuck because you're only going to learn from it and he wished that he did that 3 or 4 years ago. Because he feels like he would have sold his business for a whole lot more if he just planned in advance. Mark: Yeah, I mean, you know this Joe, a lot of times when a business owner talks to us, and they're not in the mindset of selling, they hear what we do, they always get defensive. We see this at conferences a lot, they come up to the table and they say, “So what do you do?”, “We help you to sell your online businesses.”, “I don't want to sell.”, “That's okay, you don't need to. I'm not going to sell your business without you knowing, trust me.” Joe: Life happens, life gets in a way, get a great pair, you know, whatever happens. You mature and you realize that “I'm never going to sell my business” is a temporary mind set. You should always build your business with the idea of selling it. I talked to, probably, I asked this question about half a dozen people this week at the show, which is “Do you know what the value of your house is?”, “Yeah it's about this.”, “Do you know what the value of your car?”, “Yeah, it's about this.”, “How's the value of your 401 [inaudible 0:03:19] set?”, “It's about this.”, “What's the value of your business?” Silence. They really don't know, they don't know how to calculate it and in most of those times the most valuable asset that they own is their business. So Ricky talked about that a little bit and he just talks really about content sites, content development, advertising, following your passion, and there's really not a whole lot of tricks to it. No gimmicks, just really, just doing the right thing, and the traffic follows. Mark: I love these interviews with previous clients; I think there's just so much insight to gain from them. I don't have too much more to say, so let's go ahead and get into the interview. Joe: Let's do it. Joe: Hey Ricky, welcome to the Quiet Light Podcast! How are you doing today? Ricky: Wonderful! Thank you very much for having me. Joe: Well it's good to have you on, it's good to see you, yet I haven't physically seen you and people that are listening were actually recording this as well, on video. Haven't seen you since we did the recording for getting your business launched and sold, which is now done. So we're here to talk about that process and more about you and your experience as a content creator a Youtuber, all these things that you've done with some huge members. But as I said in the intro, or as pre intro as we talked, we don't do fancy introductions about people, we want to hear it straight from the horse's mouth so, for everybody listening, why don't you just give us a little bit of a background on you, your backstory, and that kind of thing. Ricky: Absolutely! So yeah, I'm Ricky Brigante, obviously. I started a website, well it was originally a Podcast called Inside the Magic 13 years ago, and at that time, I just freshly moved to Orlando. You know, I was from Florida, was visiting theme parks particularly Disney for my whole lifetime. Going on trips with family and all that. And then I went to school, I went to college, decided to move to Orlando, that'd be close to it all. Then heard of this thing called the Podcast and I got it, sounds fun, I had sort of dabbled in audio video production through my schooling years, and I was like, “Okay I'll just do this for a fun hobby. I'll talk about Disney in maybe 10 or 15 minutes a week, and then after a few weeks I'll probably get bored of it and moved on.” And so, much to my surprise, within, literally the first episode, all of the sudden there were over a hundred of people who tuned in, and I was like, “Oh that's okay, sure, that's not bad.” Started getting emails from people and then get a hundred turned into two hundred and turned into five hundred, and over the first few weeks suddenly was thousands. I was like, “Oh this is, I guess a thing that I'm going to be doing!” So, without going through the entire 13-year-history, essentially the Podcast kept steamrolling like that, eventually got to a point where I turned it into a full website, not just an audio show. Created a blog which ultimately turned into sort of a news site. Around the, not just Disney but expand more of the team that are tamed in the industry, Universal and other independent attractions and over years and years of doing that by myself. It kept growing and I realized I needed help, and so I started bringing out volunteers and then started paying people as more advertising money came in, and along the way, got accepted by Disney and Universal and others to be at grand openings and trying events, and do amazing interviews, and add some pretty fantastic times, eventually, finally realizing “Oh, this is actually a business in the making to more than just me..” So I started hiring people, went through few staff changes and ultimately found an amazing team of reporters that's really selling and impressed me like crazy. After all of that, I finally got to go to a place where I was like, you know I think I've hit where I'm good with this. Everybody's doing a great job and somebody else could probably come in and do a better job that I could know him because I want to pursue everything. That's it in a nutshell. Joe: Well you did it longer than most entrepreneurs. Most do it for six or seven years. Some get tired after two or three but you did it for 13 which is a long time. How long was it before you went from the Podcast to the blog and generating advertising rather? Ricky: For the first, maybe two or three years, there was no revenue at all. It was just a hobby, completely. What I did in my spare time which got increasingly more and more even into my fair time and then I was like “Ah maybe I should throw some ads on this”, and so it started picking up, but it wasn't really until five or six years in doing that, you know. Because this was before Youtube, before Facebook, before Twitter, before blogs really had gotten, you know, become as big as they are. It took a while for, sort of these big companies to realize the value in allowing me to be part of their, sort of, big media festivities and arranging interviews, allowing me access to cover things in a much better way than just some [inaudible 0:08:12] and so at that point, that's when things really started to, sort of explode, particularly with the Youtube channel. That would, sort of always the bread and butter of it. Joe: So let's talk about the youtube channel. I think you've got almost 800 million views on Youtube is that right? More than that actually. Ricky: It's over 900 million now but, I mean it's mine anymore. But yeah, I was getting close to a billion views on the channel which is a lot. Joe: That's really incredible, close to a billion views. Tell us how you did that, how did you.. Did you hire some, who did help you with the Youtube channel? Talk about that a little bit for anybody listening that may have a content site and wants to get that video portion of it. What is the right process and right thing to do there, in your experience? Ricky: Yeah, I'm not sure there's a one right methodology, well it definitely helped that I was joining that very early on, you know, right when Youtube was in its infancy and so there wasn't a lot of content like I was putting out. Theme park related content at that time, so that always helps. You know when you get in early, obviously that doesn't help any of you today, but I think the key, and this would actually be true for Youtube, be true for Podcast, be true for the website, it's to produce really good quality content on a regular basis, and then most importantly, see what people pay attention. Just because you're focused on this one thing, maybe everybody is really liking this other thing that you're doing, that will sort of, not even really, it was an afterthought. You know, it's okay to gravitate towards what people are enjoying most, and just find your path from there. Joe: So did you take.. Did you advertise on your blog, on your website that you had a Youtube channel? Did that start to get the views there? Or you paid advertising? Ricky: Well it was kind of a combination. I never, in the history of the 13 years, I almost never paid for any advertising for Inside the Magic. I did minor Facebook ads here and there, I mean, boost a few posts but other than that, I really didn't do any. It all grew very organically. Fortunately that, what's great about a Podcast, I'm sure you know this, it's very personal connection to a certain sort of viewers, and it allows you to sort of.. They feel they're a good friend of yours and so when you say “Hey, I started this Youtube channel, come check it out”, like “Oh cool! Ricky started a Youtube channel!” not like, “This corporation has tried to do this promotional thing.” It feels like a personal relationship, and as long as you don't try to take too much advantage of that, you know, you treat people like people, not just as products or customers or, you know. Everybody's out there because there you sharing a passion. That's what really came down to, so that shove through no matter which version of sayings I was working well. Joe: So the Podcast really led a lot of people to the Youtube site. Ricky: I think so, at first. That's before it really started. But then Youtube has its own recommendation engine and it found, just a sort of, a life of its own, that there will be people on the Youtube channel that had no idea there was a Podcast, and had no idea there was a website, and there are people on the website that have no idea there was a Youtube channel. It's sort of these individual unique communities that definitely, sort of grew organically, I would say, back when Facebook organic reach was a lot better than it is now, you know, several years ago, that also help drive viewers to Youtube. You know, you used to do all the plays that Youtube video on Facebook and that would show up huge on everyone's feed, and would auto play, and that was a great way to get off, wherein nowadays you can't do that anymore. Joe: Well on that Facebook site, you've got a pretty good following something, like three quarters of a million? a million followers? Ricky: Yeah, almost. Joe: I keep saying you, and it's not you anymore, it's Kurt, the guy who bought it and that owns it. So I'll sled a back and forth here, but three quarters in a million social media followers, almost 900 million video views, I would.. How many actually paid views on the website itself? Do you know? Ricky: Oh gosh. I mean, we were at a height pushing a million uniques a month. Joe: Okay, that's pretty impressive. How did you churn out the articles? I know there were about 11,000 articles at the time we launched the business for sale. How did you consistently write new contents on a regular basis and did you focus on certain keywords for SEO purposes or did you just write good quality stuff and people watched? Ricky: You know that was a huge learning curve for me. I've always been a pretty decent writer but I didn't know what it, I mean I never went to journalism school, I didn't know what it meant to write a specific kind of writing. That is note informational, largely, and telling a story. And I knew very early on that I never, despite doing a Podcast for people just listen to me, [inaudible 0:13:01] on about things. I never really wanted the focus to be on me, it was always about the content, and what I was talking about or writing about, it was the information I was presenting and doing that in such a way, that made people interested in befall story. It wasn't just like, “Here's a little tidbit” moving on. You know it was like, what does that mean? What's the why? I focused on “why” a lot, really. You know, they say that there's that five W's. But to me, “why” is always the hardest question to answer, it's the most interesting question. You know, what's the reason that a designer put this thing on the wall. Why now? Why this place? Why this IP? Do you know there's a million why's people always ask and those are the hard questions that I tries to largely focus on when writing, and in the process, I definitely wrote with an SEO mindset. I didn't write traditional grabby headlines, so much as like Google friendly headlines with a lot of keywords. I definitely tried to write content that had.. If I was writing about a specific new ride that Disney opened, for example, I would make sure to include exactly that particular phrasing of that ride, five or six times in the article so that, you know, those sort of standard SEO tactics, and that works fairly well. It got us a good place when in new cycles. Joe: Were you writing for Google or for the person that was actually going to read it or a combi? Ricky: Definitely a combination. I tried to keep both in mind because I don't want to be illegible. I didn't want to just see like it was this keyword saturated nonsense. So I guess it was a balance of figuring out, “Okay, how much keyword saturation did I need and how long could I make the piece of it that felt very natural?” Joe: Okay. So for those that are developing content sites, really, the way I look at yours and still do is that this is a real legitimate business, in a passionate niche that you care deeply about and share that enthusiasm with others the end result was a fantastic business that's sold at a great price for you and also provided a good living for more than a decade. Ricky: Yeah. Definitely I think the passion is what was the most important about it all and that's ultimately what influenced my decision to sell the business. Because over the years, you know, you do something for.. I did the podcast literally, every week for 10 years I didn't miss a single week and after that got a little burned out on it, you know, the passion was starting to dwindle, and I knew that I couldn't produce my best work if didn't have my heart behind it. Whereas I saw, as I brought on new staff members, their passion was, reminded me of how, you know, when I started. Then I was like “Okay it's time to hand that off” because I have, you know other passions that I wanted to follow in life, and it's time to move on. Joe: Talk about that process a little bit. Let's shift from the development of this amazing content site. This Youtube machine that you built, to the business you decided to sell. I think you and I, prior to listing the business, we've been chatting for a better part of the year I think, right? Ricky: Yeah it was like eight or nine months before we finally listed it, that I first emailed you and at that time you were like “ah you've seen that, you got to work on this, you got to work on that” so.. Joe: Right, and you had made the decision at one point like many entrepreneurs, you're like “okay I'm tired, I'm done, I need to let somebody else to run this”. Ricky: Right. Joe: And you stepped back from it, and you put other people in place. Tell us how that, worked out a little bit. And what your mindset was at that time and how you had to shift afterwards. Ricky: Definitely really challenging process to go from what was largely a one man operation to becoming a legitimate for like a, or a better word “business” it was.. I went through almost three entire staff, sort of setups, before I finally found the right group of people and the right flow and the way that it worked. It was hard for a while you know, It's like I had some really amazing people and they just didn't work well together, and I wasn't able to give it my all to make it work and so then I was like “okay move this person out, move this person in”, it was like a, you know, a chess game, figuring it out, the great pieces next to each other. It was definitely a lot of work. I didn't realize that, in trying to remove myself from the business, I was actually giving myself more works that I had ever done. Joe: You are no longer a writer, a Podcaster, you are really manager of people that were not happy with each other, unfortunately. Ricky: Yeah, definitely, I'm in, and ultimately people were very happy with each other fortunately. So I had to learn how to be a boss, how to be a manager, how to be a, you know, some staffing, recruiter. I have never done anything of these things before so I just figured it out as I went.. Joe: Right. So you built that up, you were a one man trip for a long, long time put staff in place. And then you stepped back from the business and I think that's when we first chatted. You were kind of burnt out and you had stepped away from the business and, unfortunately it timed with your cost going up and some of your numbers coming down. Ricky: Right. Joe: Then the decisions some of the people made and you stepped back in, still wasn't full time, I don't think it was full time at all, by the time we started talking. But the timing of the sale is critically important as you've learned, right? Ricky: Yes, yeah definitely, no that's a good point cause, yeah, I had over staffed and that was impacting the bottom line, tremendously. To the point where there is even a negative month which was not happy to see. So I knew at that point, I was like even if it's not going in the right direction, and makes some drastic changes and yeah, even though I have stepped back significantly for a whole year, I had to jump in full force which of course you know, when you told me to, [inaudible 0:18:40] what I needed to do, I was not happy at all. I get it. But somehow, you know, I found it within myself “Oh my God, if I'm going to do this, I'm going to commit to this idea” and i, yeah, with your guidance which, thank you it helps, tremendously. You know, checking in throughout the months and sort of navigating the.. You know, I've never sold a business before, I didn't know what that process was like, so it helped tremendously for you to be incredibly patient. Walking through the process and eventually I fully understood what it was going to take for you to get there. Joe: Well, let's talk about that for a moment because I've had these conversations a lot and often times I'm tacking myself on the chest and you've got to have the heart to do it. Right? Because it's easy to look at the P&L and the numbers in the trends and say like, Mark Doust told me when I first sold my business through Quiet Light in 2010. He said, “Joe, wait six more months, the trailing, 9, 10, 11, or 12 would fall off and you'd make an extra amount of dollars.” and I did. I waited. You and I had that same conversation and that worked. Dozens of entrepreneurs, what you had, and what's so important for those people listening is the heart to do it. Because you were done, you were tired, you were ready to move on, you set back from the business, and you said “I've got a cash calcu, this is just going to keep generating revenue, these people that run it for me, and unfortunately it didn't work” and the trends took an ugly turn, you stepped in and you fixed it, but we had to give it sometime right? We talked for eight or nine months. So what we did, for people listening, is that we let that time pass, and then we sell at the most recent, six months did it, we absolutely did not do six months times 2 to get the trailing 12. We had to still do the trailing 12 months because every buyer wanted that. Every buyer looked at that, and the business was seasonal. It's Disney right? There's, big events, there's summer times, there's fourth quarter, there's Thanksgiving, Christmas, all those things. So we had to adjust the P&L to what you've been doing the last six months, and do, some things that you don't necessarily want to do, which is proforma stuff. What we did with Math, and logic, and a lot of work on your part, and it worked. We had a couple of offers right out of the gate and of course… Ricky: Surprisingly fast! Joe: Surprisingly fast, but we knew, right? That this is a niche where it's full of passion, where it goes from you and the people that visited, by the millions every month. The couple of people that come to mind, were they passionate about Disney? Or were they just investors? Ricky: Right. Joe: One of them was, very very passionate about Disney. I think he probably visited more than you, right? Ricky: Lately yeah, that's probably true over the last couple of years. Joe: Yeah, so it was a matter of finding the right person for the business and being very passionate about it. But for those listening, we did find an SBA buyers, Small Business Administration, and there were some real benefits for that, and there were never some real challenges along the way, timing wise. Typically, SBA loan is going to take an extra 30-45 days with a cash buyer. In this case, I think we were at least at 90 days, is that right? Ricky: More than. We were pushing a hundred and something. Joe: So we went through Thanksgiving and Christmas so console things down. Ricky: Yeah. Joe: But the whole process took a little long and the communication was a little hard and you were very patient. What was the upside for those who think to having to wait? It was, that you own the business for an extra 45, 50, 60 days and you got that revenue, right? Ricky: Right, well sure . Specially in the business that I've been doing, you know, a lot of that revenue that comes in is on that 30 even sometimes on that 60, so I'm actually still even though we closed a couple of weeks ago, I'm still going to get it after we did additional chat in another couple of weeks, I'm just, from some of that residual, you know, what last, last month that was added on there that wasn't expected but sure, I'll take it. Joe: Right. Alright so, let's talk about what if you could do it all over again, on the business itself. In terms of that transition from being a solo entrepreneur to hiring people, to trying to step back and realizing you wanted to sell. Is there anything you would do differently, for anybody that's listening, that wants to walk down your path and live in it, eventual step. Ricky: Yeah, definitely, and this is probably the case of a lot of people that, you know, okay you're by yourself, you're working like crazy on something that you're passionate about, you want to bring on help. Who do you go to? You go to people you know. You go to your friends, you go to family, or people that feel like family. It's, you work very well with those people at first, but you don't know how that working relationship's going to be and then more importantly, if that yourself, you don't know what the fall out about is going to be. And is there, you know, the challenge of having to tell someone who is a friend, “I don't want you anymore.”, that's really hard whereas you just hire someone out of the blue, a lot easier to part ways, when, you know, make those business decisions that you need to make. So, I definitely realize and I will carry this forward in any business I'm ever involved, will begin with, from in that vision that I would rather hire people that, it's like, that I don't know, or that I only professionally know. That I know they're good worker, and I don't need to try to socialize with them. You know, it was hard for me to transition into that boss role. Never hire someone you can't fire. Exactly that's a very assisting to way of putting in. Joe: Okay, and then in terms of position, the business for sale, looking back, are there certain things that you wish you had done? Ricky: Oh boy, I guess, well, I mean that's inter-relevant to what we were just saying. I wish I had, you know, got rid of some extra people sooner so that I wouldn't have had such, a couple of, you know, poor months that we're bringing the numbers down. I guess I wish I had started thinking about this, like, earlier. That it's not as scary as I thought. I wasn't going to be to just open that conversation with someone like you to understand what it takes to sell a business, what you need to strive for. If I had known that, two or three years ago, I probably could have sold sooner and potentially even at a higher price because I would have been more focused on putting the pieces together without even trying to rush to make that out. Joe: Right. So, I was at the Prosper Show last week and I've said this probably 85 times. Don't wake up one day and decide to sell. Ricky: Right. Joe: Plan to sell. And that's what you're saying, is that if you plan it well in advance, don't be afraid to have conversations with people about the value of your business and what to do and how to do it. You're a mature entrepreneur or professional, no one is going to talk you into signing an engagement letter just to get their hooks and do for commission. Have that conversation, that's what the advices are there for. More people they talk to, the more business they get for themselves as well. So, plan to sell. Don't decide to sell. Think about it well in advance as the other piece of drives that you give. Ricky: Definitely. Joe: Okay, and on the content creation side, you think that, if anybody can pull off you on the Podcast, they should go for it because it gets more personal? Ricky: Yeah, I saw a really funny video going around online, it was from Funny or Die, or College Humor, one of those. Where someone was going to start a Podcast about something in [inaudible 0:26:22] and the whole video was focused on reasons why to shoot and start a Podcast. Say, it was literally called “Your Podcast will fail”, and approximate, it was essentially, there are a lot of Podcast out there. Not everybody wants to listen to you, talk about the way it's set instead of the Game of Thrones, you know. But if you do have a significant passion about something and this is why I think it worked for me, I didn't really set out to make it a business, you know. I did it because I wanted to, because I was going to have fun with it, because I wanted to connect with people, and that's what a Podcast is [inaudible 0:26:51]for. So if your goal is to do anything that's just, “Hey, I'm talking to you because I enjoy it and because I want to bring a connection together.” I think that's a great reason to do it. Not so much if you're just looking to either become famous or make it click bot because you're probably not going to do either one of that quickly. Joe: And you know what you did though, and you're very humble about it. You took a hobby, “I'm going to spend 15-20 minutes talking about something I love.” every week to 11,000 articles, 700,000 social media followers, almost a billion video views. That's pretty huge, so don't go lightly about, you know, you own endorsements, you've done something pretty impressive. What do you moving on to now? what's your next adventure? I think you're staying in the attractions area right? Ricky: Yeah, I have went on really, sort of, unexpected results of doing what I did for the last 13 years was being a, having a tremendous chances to get to know some of the top talent in the themed entertainment industry. From, you know, the best designers that have been there for decades at Disney, you know. People who I really respect and look up to, and people who I've read about in books. And I was like, “Oh, now I get to talk to this person.” It's like I, over, you know. The last 13 years, I've gotten, sort of a, master class in design, in themed entertainment designs specifically. So, I've been so inspired, I went on a way that now I was re-venturing of, to be a creator instead of just a commentator or an observer. So, I've joined a company called Pseudonym Productions here on Orlando to create our own productions. We've actually already done four over the last three years, but now we're really, you know, I'm going to be spending a lot more time, full time, making a, have a more permanent place that we can, you know. People can enjoy what we do year around rather than just a few weeks of their time. Joe: Are you future Walt Disney? Is that what you're saying? Years from now it's going to be you? Ricky: I think our content might a little bit unique and possibly weird side sometimes. More skewed toward the older audiences, but sure. You know, anything's possible and I would love to see what we've started very small good, just like I did with, you know, beginning at a Podcast and that sort of, growing and growing and growing. That's for the next 10 years, and who knows how big this could become if it does, you know, productions running worldwide. Joe: Right, you're passionate about something and based upon your history, I'm sure you'd going to do pretty amazing with it. Will you continue as a freelance writer for the parts of Disney for Inside the Magic? Ricky: Well, I will say that, with the new owner occurred, I already sort of a hand shake agreement that I'm going to come back next year when the big Star Wars land opens, cause I'm a huge Star Wars nerd, I didn't want to miss out on that, so I think I'll pod back in from time to time you know whenever he might need some help or just when I'm sort a beg him to go to some cool event but, for the most part I'm going to try put myself in some distance there. Joe: Awesome, well you probably need some break from it. In time I think you'd probably say to yourself “Gosh I wish I could get in, I wish I could meet that person”. As long as you keep a good relationship with Kurt you've gotten in, Right? Ricky: I sure hope so. Joe: As then next, Walt Disney people will be coming to you anyway. Any last minute thoughts, any advice that you'd give an entrepreneur that's developing a content site, a Youtube channel, in terms of what they can do to do as well as you have. Ricky: Well so, here's a thing that I'm taking forward with me even with Pseudonym Productions, because it's also, you know, we're going to generate contents, a very different type of content, but it's still content creation, and I think it's important to, well, be business minded about it. It's really doing it because you love it, and because you can, as you're saying earlier “The heart for it”. Joe: I think if you start in with a goal of something astronomical and massive from nothing, is a good chance you're not going to get there, in every, not as quickly as you hope you will. But you know it's, write what you know, what you love, you know, whether you're just making a blog or writing something or you're taking photos for Instagram. Do it because you love it and don't early have any expectations. You know, sort of clear your mind, share things that you like and follow, you know, wherever that goes. I mean it's, most of it is free to do you know, everyone's got a phone, everyone's got, you know, their internet connection, just do it, create. You know. Joe: I like it. That's excellent advice. I appreciate your time man. We're running out, I want to make sure that we share some show notes, people to reach out to. What was the name of production company again? Ricky: Pseudonym Productions and the website is pseudonymproductions.com, and that's where all the contact info's listed. Joe: They can reach you there and they should definitely look it up if they're ever heading to Orlando right? As an alternative to Inside the Magic? Ricky: Yeah. Yeah, exactly and we're, you know, looking for partners as well that create awesome new things. So if anyone likes what you see on the website and want to become part of it, reach out. You know, I'll send an email back. Joe: Fantastic. Thanks for your time Ricky, I appreciate it. Ricky: Absolutely. Thank you. Links: Ricky's Next Adventure: Pseudonym Productions: http://www.pseudonymproductions.com LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rickybrigante/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/rickybrigante Personal site: http://www.rickybrigante.com

If you've ever wanted to sell or purchase a SaaS business, listen to this Podcast because Nathan Singh has done both. He sold his own SaaS business in early 2017, only to turn around and buy a bigger SaaS business in December of the same year. He's a former NASA Scientist who out-negotiated a full price, all cash buyer to win the deal and close on a multi-million dollar SaaS website. In this interview Nathan shares how he approached his listing review, initial seller conference call, due diligence, navigating the SBA process and the transition after the sale. Nathan also shares why he feels SaaS businesses are the right fit for him, and what other types of website business models he looked at during his search. Episode Highlights: Learn how to make a buyer love you – and want to sell to only you. Interviews should be conversational, friendly and flow naturally. Nathan shares his SaaS due diligence process for this business. Seller was meticulous using Asana and Dropbox with SOPs and a streamlined process. How to navigate the SBA process and the team he worked with. What was it like to take over a remote team that was loyal to the owner. How he took over the business, worked for three weeks and then went on a three week vacation. SaaS Businesses produce recurring revenue without product working capital. Seller worked part-time and Nathan is planning full-time to expand and growth the business. Nathan purchased this SaaS business with an SBA Loan. Tax returns matching the P&L is great, but not always the case for solopreneurs. Keeping the sale confidential is critical until the APA is singed. https://youtu.be/yj_XkpWdRKs Transcription Mark: Hey Joe, how are you doing? Joe: Doing great today, how are you doing today Mark? Mark: I'm still under the weather. Joe: I had somebody tell me at the prosper show recently that they obviously enjoyed the podcast they came out to pay this compliment, but that he could tell we were in different parts of the country. I'm not sure how, I said “Did you watch” he said “No, I listened”. And he knows that we're in different parts of the country. So where are you in the world just so people understand? Mark: How in the world did he know that? Joe: I don't know. It's your funny accent I think. Mark: I'm up from Minnesota, although people think that Minnesotans have an accent, we do, but especially up north. Not as much in the city. I'm in the Twin Cities the Saint Paul side. If anybody's ever coming to the twin cities just drop me a wine and be happy to get together. Where are you? Joe: I'm just northern shell at North Carolina out in Morris zone North Carolina, and the more people I talk to, there's lots of sellers around here, lots of buyers around here and I've connected to just quite a few so anybody in this area, reach out. Mark: I thought down in North Carolina you guys supposed to have a bit of a twang accent, aren't you? Joe: No, not from here. [inaudible 0:01:47] from here. Everybody moves here because they're too darn cold up north. I grew up in Maine. We fled to the south back in 2006. Mark: Ah, ah. Whoever that was that knew we were in different parts of the country, I want to know how. That's pretty good. Joe: Not only did he know that, he came up to me to thank you and me personally for doing the Podcast, number one, and doing it with Norm Ferrar on SOP's because he got to connect with Norm, and it helped take his business to the next level, and he said it has made a huge difference in his business and his life. Mark: That's fantastic! Joe: Yeah! It's a feel good moment at that time. Mark: We got to be careful; our heads are going to get really big. Joe: I know, I know. Let's talk about somebody who doesn't have a big head but should, because he's a really impressive guy. That's Nathan Singh. He bought a multi-million dollar SaaS site for a million. He has also been a client. We sold his SaaS businesses before. You remember Nathan well, right? Mark: Absolutely! Joe: Well, Nathan is one of the nicest guys, very humble. Former NASA scientist, NASA engineer, and turned entrepreneur. We worked together first on the sale of his business last spring, and then he purchased a multi-million dollar SaaS site I've closed in the fourth quarter. And in review, we're sharing on this Podcast a lot of the things that he did right to make a great impression on the buyer, to out-negotiate all cash buyers to work with the SBA and lender to literally, quote, Nathan is one of my favorite clients of all times from the SBA lender, and the under writer as well. He instilled confidence in everyone all along the way that made him the choice to be the buyer that they approved him overlooking at other buyers as well, and he has just done a great job. Getting the business sold and then he talks a little bit about what he has done since purchasing the business including going on a three week vacation within three weeks of buying a multi-million SaaS business. Mark: Wow that's pretty brave! I don't think I could've done that. Joe: He had it planned, he took it and things went well, and they continue to go well. Mark: That's really good. So I'm excited to listen to Nathan. Nathan is generally, one of the nicest guys I've dealt with in 10 years, and I've dealt with a lot of nice people but he rises at the top of the list of one of the nicest guys. I'm excited to see him in the video, because I don't think I've ever met him in person. Also, more importantly, listen to what he has to say. Mark: Let's go to it! Joe: Hey Nathan welcome to Quiet Light Podcast! How are you today? Nathan: I'm doing well, thanks for having me. Joe: Excellent man! We haven't chatted for a while. I know you've been traveling so welcome back. Listen, we've talked about this briefly but the tradition on the Quiet Light Podcast is that we don't read scripts and do flowing introductions of our guests. We'd rather hear it straight from you so, for the folks that are listening today, can you share some background on yourself as an entrepreneur and where you come from? Nathan: Yes sure. So, before I was even an entrepreneur, I started off doing software engineering, and mostly high level stuff on requirements and project management. Work on department of defense for a couple of years and then moved on to their space operation. So while I was there, I really got the bug, for trying to start my own business that we knew we have an idea what I was going to do, but I just happen to run across somebody who was selling an app and basically started his app and it was a screenwriting program called Scripts Pro, brew that out for a couple of years and then it got acquired, and I was like “I want to do this again” so it just rings and repeat. After that I had an online ordering platform called Order Zen and had the same with that. At that time was actually easy to broker. So I brew that out till what I can do, and then we got that acquired, of course with a seller for that one. Pretty much after that, we became very tight, and I monitored your listings specifically, very closely, and then we came across the listing for Envira Gallery and that's kind of have [inaudible 0:05:57] Basically, that's pretty much the background that I had since industry extinct and that's why I [inaudible 0:06:02] it over to this senior entrepreneur acquisitions have been online businesses. Joe: I think you sort of lightly flew, touched over the fact that you were a NASA scientist. I mean, come on, that's a glowing thing to have in your resume. Let's not make that too light. It's an interesting transition from a scientist working at NASA to becoming an entrepreneur. I guess once you get the bugs, you will get the bugging, and you can't stop. So that's great. So I want to talk a little bit about the process that we went through, and you in particular, went through in buying Syed's business. Syed was a guest on the Podcast as well, as you know. In terms of how it works for you and what we looked at, can you, for the people that are out there looking at businesses and building portfolios of online businesses, can you talk a little bit about your vetting process and how you went about it? Then we'll jump into how you handled the call of Syed and the whole process right through the closing. Nathan: Yeah, absolutely. So the good thing, I mean I had some pretty good time between the time that I sold my last business and the time that I was working. So I got pretty acquainted to what was in the market, multiples they were going for, and the kind of business that sell out. So predominantly I was looking at SaaS businesses. I've been it in before. I love the fact that it was recurring revenue, there's no product I had to deal with, so I really zero in on that as my primary, well, it's more left open to great businesses that had good year over year return, and Syed just sort of filled all those checkmarks. They had great in over a year return, it was growing. In his case there was kind of a lower owner involvement which is great because that allows me to come in at full time and really push at the growth. So those were some of the main key characteristics. But one of the biggest ones, I know that you're familiar with this one. First question I'll ask you is, “Joe, is this taxable?” and I wanted to make sure that was it, because I wanted to leverage my money as much as possible. It may not be for everybody but we certainly list, so I've been trying to pursue SBA business and the loans for a while, [inaudible 0:08:04] And as you know that's not been easy for the last, however many years. But I would say within the last year too, I've seen more qualified banks and qualified SBA folks come in and be able to really take that sort of thing with ecommerce businesses and SaaS businesses, know what they're talking about, and present it to their credit department, and make it happen, and I actually solve with Stephen Speer, he's not even a competitor, he's a guest as well. Joe: That's right Stephen Speer from BankUnited, for those that haven't heard the Podcast, he was a guest. Very informative, as far as lenders go, I'd say Stephen is top notch, the best, and he's an entrepreneur, sort of, himself. Yes he's a lender with BankUnited but he works from home often, more often than not, and lives our lifestyle which is really unique, and he understands ecommerce and so he is underwriter, really important. So for those not familiar with the SBA, it's Small Business Administration. If you're buying a two million dollar business for instance, you don't have to have two million dollars. You can have 200,000 dollars and really leverage your money. But note, is Austin a ten year note which obviously works very well in terms of these online businesses. Let's jump to the first call that you had with Syed. Nathan, can you talk about your objective was on that first conference call would start? Nathan: Yeah, so the objective is pretty much similar as with most sellers, you try to get a feel for the seller and knowing the business with its seller personally. You're going to be working pretty close to this guy or girl. So, the main thing is, I want to understand what Syed does day to day, what is his outlook for the business, you know, kind of that more, the regular things that you'll for even if you're buying a house, and how the thing was maintained. So with Syed, it was really, we talked about this before. He knew early on that I was a gator so that kind of help me knock a little bit there too. Joe: What do you mean gator? What does that… Nathan: For the gator, so quarter gator not [inaudible 0:10:11] it's seminal, it's two different things.. Joe: Did you see the Podcast by the way? Nathan: I heard the Podcast with Syed. Joe: I put the hat on and I have a gator said hold up… There it is right there folks.. Nathan: But yeah, it was really bad to understand, you know, kind of gains and knots in the businesses. I was a buyer, one of the specific things you're looking for is, is there anything I'm missing that wasn't in the perspectives, in terms of, what is the seller doing that if I remove him from this equation, will I still be able to do this? Because that taught something that you will rarely see at perspectives and even on conversation. You're kind of feeling out for that but at the main time, at the main thing, what I would advise, anybody that's listening that's looking to buy a business, because I've been doing this for a while, in terms of talking to sellers, and back and forth, and I've been selling my own business. You don't want this to be a stringent interview where you're just running through all these questions, you want to be very conversational and let it flow. I've gotten a lot of good results by doing things that way. I think that was the main thing, is that we kept it friendly and conversational instead of, “I'm trying to figure out why you're selling this because I don't trust you.” It was just a totally different approach. Joe: I can tell you that, with the conversation that you had with Syed, he has told me that on that call he wasn't looking forward to it being over. He enjoyed the conversation and the things that you had in common like the gators, but more along the line of taking care of the customers, and taking care of your people or your staff first, and he really enjoyed it. Where some of the other conversations that other seller have, they can't wait until it's over. I had that experience with one of the people that called me when I had my business for sale back in 2010. He was rude, he was abrasive, and I did all I could to stay on the line and be polite, and just wanted the call to be over. Even if he made me a full press offer I would have a hard time selling him the business. So that makes a huge difference, I think when you ended the call with Syed, his thought was, “Man I really hope Nathan makes an offer, loves to do business with him, and the people that are using my services and products, and the staff that I have in place, will really enjoy working with Nathan and thrives with him as the leader of the business.” Is that kind of what you were shooting for or it's just natural that you did that? Nathan: You know I think it's a little bit of both, I've sold being on the opposite side and being on Syed's then while I was selling my business, I've come across different buyers and newer party's conversations, when you just talk to them, you're like, this is not the right fit. Even if this guy came with a complete cash offer or whatever it could be, this may not be the right fit. With Syed, I kind of guessing here, I think he was sort of looking, not so much about the deal or the money but he was looking for a right fit because he was worried about his folks that were, i mean these are all permanent employees with no contract, there's really in this business, five of them, and so he really cared about them and he really cared about the customers. A lot of it came from me just doing things that were customer centered, I've always run companies like that, I've run teams that way, and I just sort of mentioned that, I was like, I don't know who else your other buyers are, but this is the way I do things, so I don't know if that fits within your battle, it just happen to be that way, and then I heard later on that these were his core values, and those are my core values, and we just sort of mesh over that. Joe: Yeah, it was exciting factor in choosing you over the, technically, two other buyers. Let's talk about, jump forward to your due diligence process, what was your goal in due diligence, how did you approach it, and how long did it take? Nathan: You know, it's funny. I've done more due diligence in past businesses that was much smaller. I'll sort of elaborate it on line. So the initial due diligence I've coarsely didn't know, returns on profit and loss versus statements and all that good stuff, what you're supposed to do. I did not do as deep with due diligence solely because of the talks that me and Syed did have, and just the reputation that Syed had. So his influence in the WordPress community, he has got a lot on the line. So I didn't really have to worry about him ripping you of and stuff like that. He was really worried about, they going to the right buyers, versus me worrying I've got the wrong seller and the wrong product and… Joe: But you still verified that financials that was to make sure… Nathan: Yeah, the basic stuff was all done but I didn't lose any sleep worrying if it's something was going to happen because, again, there's still background that you've parked over this. When you see that the tax returns are completely reflective with the P&L that got submitted and the perspectives, that right there gives me the warm fuzzy I need as I go forward. I don't have to kick and [inaudible 0:15:00] as much, trying to figure out where am I getting ripped off. You're going more with the mindset, okay the basis is there and everything else should just work flow and it did. But that was the main stuff, it's just making sure that everything wind up with ways that it was. Joe: You only note on the tax returns, for those buyers and sellers listening, Syed had a business partner, so often time with partners, the tax returns and the P&L's are very very clean. When you are a solo entrepreneur, your more things, personal things with the business, it can get a little bit messier. The SBA looks at the tax returns, first and foremost, they'll use the P&L's if it's halfway through the year, and three quarters went through the year, thanks for that nature. But the tax returns are first and foremost, and what they do, their valuations off of. So don't be completely afraid if you're a solo entrepreneur, that you cannot sell a business, then have it be, financed with an SBA loan because you absolutely can. With the lenders that we've worked with, they understand the add tax schedules and the personal benefits that anyone takes, and so do the underwriters within the group that we work with there. So, you didn't worry too much about the due diligence process, naturally, you verified the financials, you had several calls with Syed, and you went through the process with the SBA. Let's jump to that for just a moment, what was it like going through the SBA process and what did you had to do? Nathan: Yeah, the fun thing is that I had actually been through this process with previous businesses before, and so I've actually gone to that fun part of the business. We just had issues and pulled out. I was familiar going in. So first of all, kudos to Stephen, kudos to you, and kudos to Syed for just being an awesome team for making it all happen. That's probably why we had them work speedy close than what's usually expected. But you know, aside from that, I think having everything ready to go, I mean, Stephen was good about that, and pretty much gave me more or less the stuff that I needed in terms of, “These are things on the checklist, you should probably have this done because from my experience I know that it's more of that likely go through”. That helps, because a lot of times, there's always [inaudible 0:17:17] going on, a lot of times the buyer takes a long time to get stuff back. So we didn't really have that issue here. But you know, again, it really mattered. I've worked with SBA bankers before, and it really matters on who it is that you're dealing with. With Stephen's case, he just had everything down. He's done ecommerce, he's done SaaS businesses, there is no “Well how does this work or where is the? So tell me where the hard assets are in the business?” There was none of that. So that kind of straight lined the process really well for all of us. But I think just having that stuff done upfront, that's what helped us get really done at speedy line. Joe: You said that Stephen and myself and the underwriters all worked very well together and Syed and so on and so forth. I happen to have dinner with Stephen and the underwriter that worked on your business, they were both in Charlotte a couple of weeks ago, and they both talked about you being one of their favorite buyers. So for anybody listening, this stuff matters, Nathan brought a business, would that note to the seller, when somebody else made and all cash offer. The seller chose Nathan over that all cash offer at the same purchase price, because he liked Nathan and what he stood for. The SBA lender and the underwriter, both said that Nathan was one of their favorite buyers of all time which makes process easier. They're going to work harder for you when they like you. It's human nature, so really really important to understand that aspect of it. Let's jump now on to closing, training, and transition, and what's taking place since then. I think we closed just before Christmas. By the way it was probably from letter of intent to closing about 50 days which is fairly short for an SBA loan, and we had a full week of thanksgiving in there, so call it 45ish. What's transpired since you close, how was it going, what was training and transition like and so on and so forth? Nathan: Yeah, again, comparing it to the past businesses I've had and worked with the past sellers, it's been night and day. The great thing is that because of the level of business, you know that will add the seven figures, because Syed runs seven and eight figure business above, he's very meticulous. So the first thing he did was setup, you know when they found a project in a drop box to view list. With all other things that his team needed to do for me, everything I needed in there. So that made it a lot more extreme ride then. Again if you're selling your business and you're getting to that point, make sure you have something like that in place, because that's the other warm fuzz and that lets you know that “Okay it's stuff I'm not thinking about as a buyer, the seller informed about for me” and we kind of running through those checklist. So, you know, I would say the transition went pretty smooth, I mean not really that he cuts.. You know, I talked to the CTO, I talked to the CFO, we all had these one on one's where we talked about what they did, so I made sure that I knew exactly what each person role is because I was taking over a couple of people's roles… Joe: How did they feel by the way, the staff, with you coming in and taking over Syed's role? Were they excited? Were they scared? What was that like to tell them that news? Nathan: You know, I think that initially they were, like most transitions, they were maybe a little one sided, just because, there was a lot of grey areas up until the actual deal was inked. So they were a little one sided, they were a little confused about what was going to happen now, they are getting the impression at something else or did I keep the same things they've had. So from my end, it just took a little bit of, getting them all on, talking to them face to face and letting them know, “Listen, everything stays the same, I've liked the way that Syed have done business, I've planned to keep those same things in place, let me know if there's something you're customed to and that is done because those things have all been accounted for” and so I wanted to do it and make sure I went above and beyond what they were expecting what happened after this transition and just kind of talk them down on the fears of what naturally happens when there's a transition even in corporate out and serious stuff. We're good to go now and that's what kind of passed that. Joe: While we kept it confidential, we didn't want to let the staff know that the business was even for sale, until everything was finalized, inked, and really truly going through. That's something all sellers struggle with, when to tell the core people. In my case, when I sold mine, I think I waited until the asset purchase agreement was signed, because she was valuable to me and I wanted her to stick around for me and for the new owner of the business. So that's what we did here, and I know that Syed said you did a great job instilling confidence in the staff and making them feel comfortable. One of the attractive things about this business is it was one of many businesses for Syed so he wasn't working full time on it. How was the workload then for you, taking over the business? Are you working full time early on or you're finding yourself with more than full time? You're working less? What's that situation like? Nathan: Yes, I'll say initially, at first two weeks, just like any transitions, it was pretty much full time. But I had a pre-planned vacation that's about three weeks long, that I have to go to India. So for me, that was a big deal to make sure that I would be able to leave and just do the minor stuff in the background and have some question, to get things while I'm abroad. Joe: So just, you bought the business, we closed, and then you had two and a half weeks of being around and then you went to India for three weeks? Nathan: Correct. Yeah. Joe: And everything still ran smoothly. Nathan: And everything is still smooth. I mean, that was mentioned to me early on and that was again, that was a really attractive factor to know that. You know, I think you've mentioned that you could move and go to the Far East and come back. That's kind of what I did. So, it was good to come back and see that everything was still in place, that the team was, the team was phenomenal, that Syed did assemble. Each individual player plays a major part in what they do, and for that reason they're also very turnkey. That's a turnkey business, turnkey team. So, that's why when I saw where am I inserting myself, it was kind of learning the role to what's already being done. How can I improve, how can I make things better for them, and be the leadership that Syed has been able to provide and do his other businesses. Joe: Okay, so where do you see your workload now? You were working really busy, after just a couple of weeks you went away for three weeks… Nathan: I would say that corporate atmosphere, it's like still checking at 8:00 to 9:00, I'm out by 5:00 – 5:30 and I'm told, you know, the employees do the same thing. Let's not make this a full 12 or 14 hour a day, and I want to balance that, that work-like balance too. Because I came from that kind of environment and I know it pays good. I usually work the eight or seven hours, sometimes nine whatever it needed. Rather than that, at a certain time before my wife comes home or whatever, I'm usually done, closed out, and I'm trying not to think about it. Joe: Well, what are you working on? Syed didn't work in about a few hours a week on the business and now you're working 30-40. Are you fixing broken things or are you working on to projects and growth opportunities? Nathan: Now the great thing is he built a solid foundation so what I'm really doing is I'm working on the stuff that he wasn't able to do, which is the marketing advertising taking that further gain, the PPC's setup, optimizing on the SEO getting the right content writers in to put that detailed information that we really liked, that's been attracting the other folks and traffic. So it's been really centered around the business development, the marketing and advertising stuff, which has really been done, because again, he's got great and recurring revenue, we've got a great organic traffic through Google, so from that right now, it's the going above and beyond the PPC stuff. The stuff that he didn't have to give and didn't really have to focus on because the business is really self-sustained. Joe: Right, so you want to grow the business, you didn't buy it and just collect a check every month, you're trying to grow it so you're putting in more hours. Nathan: Aside from just the business development, it's also providing that the one on one with these folks. I mean again, these are not contracted. These are folks that have certain benefits and they've liked that type of attention and focus from a leadership. So that's what I'm enable to do, I'm enable to gear about the product road map, provide my input to that where we want to go, instead of just kind of them doing whatever, it's done and just see that the money reach the bank, it's not really that. Joe: As far as much, one thing we haven't touched on is where they work from. You've got five employees, are they all working from an office or they're all remote? Nathan: They are all remote, they have been doing that for many years, so again, I tried to focus and know what side has all of you been doing, since Syed has 40 plus employees, they've been doing this for years, and I think Syed began and has been doing it for 14 to 15 years. So I liked that idea, and I liked the fact that they're able to do this with milestones. I don't know, there's no… You know a lot of times, I would just set a meeting yesterday, but some other guy, they own a company here in Houston, and they were like, how do you keep track? I was like, I don't. There's a lot of trust involved, and there's milestones that are set, and as long as these milestones are being set, I don't care where they're working that 40 hours. Joe: What's your favorite software? What system are you using to communicate and track what they do and work with them? Are you using Slack or what are you focused on? For people that are running remote staff that are having trouble with it, what would you recommend? Nathan: Yeah for Slack it's been awesome. I'm pretty new to Slack, I used Skype on my last business. Slack is way better than that so I highly recommend that. We use Zoom, we do a lot of this, the face to face meetings. I think that matters a lot with the remote staff, was getting at Facetime, and again, letting them know you're just not an employee behind the computer that's just in another state. We're talking to each other, we're going to do once or twice a year meet ups. So we do team building activities, that's super important too. Yeah I would say that Slack, the Zoom, and also Asana. Those things are big key to really help with the project management and the milestones we've set, and Github as well for the developers. Joe: Okay, awesome. Alright Nathan because we're running out of time, how do you see the future of the business? What are you looking over that 12, 24, 36 months? You're going to hold to stay, you grow at 10%, you're going to grow 50%, what are you predicting? Nathan: Yeah, you know, I hate to throw a prediction at it right now, I'm happy if we're over the double digits, anywhere in the double digits will do triple digits in over a year growth, I'm a happy, happy camper. I think when possible again, got a great business, great team in place, and there's nothing but upsides so, I'm looking forward to it. Joe: We'll going to have to check in, in the future and see how it turned out. You have any last minute thoughts for multipliers and sellers? You've been in both shoes, you sold, you offer your services, business, you bought one, any last minute thoughts in terms of what they should do or focus on? Nathan: Yeah, I would say the huge takeaway from this and for me has been, you know, when you're doing these buyer and seller conversations, no matter what side you're on, keep it conversational. It's great to have your question beside, but don't run through it like a machine gun and keep it just robotic and mechanical. Because there's a huge human element here involved and this was a prime example that actually happened. Joe: That's great. Nathan, pleasure doing business with you twice now, I'm looking forward to hearing some great news, great success, with Envira Gallery and so on and so forth. I hope that really works out and maybe we can check in, in the future and do another Podcast update and let the folks know how you've been succeeding. Nathan: Yeah, I would love to. Joe: Awesome man, thanks for your time today. Nathan: Awesome, talk to you later Joe. Links: Nathan Singh – LinkedIn GitHub Stephen Speer @ Bank United for SBA Loans Asana – Making Teams Work

Chauncey: Yeah, I can. First of all, outbound links are links that link away from your website to somewhere else. Their main question is, do they make a positive impact? Joe: As a business owner, I would wonder this, and I answer this question to my clients often. I don't want people to leave my website; I want to stay on my website and buy from me. So is it helpful to link them away from my website somewhere else? Chauncey: And at the risk of sounding rude, ultimately, as a business owner, the little things that you want are irrelevant. What you want is success. The answer is it does help you. You have a primary goal and that is for your customers to give you their money either by purchasing your goods or buying your services. Having a primary goal implies that there is a secondary one. The secondary goal of businesses is for your visitors to go about their merry way across the internet. They used you as part of the highway. Do Outbound Links Matter for SEO? on Yoast: https://yoast.com/outbound-links/

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