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Ever wonder what other people talk about with their financial advisors? A new survey of nearly 400 experienced advisors reveals the biggest concerns, challenges, and financial goals their clients are facing today. From retirement planning to healthcare costs to working longer than expected, we're breaking down the key takeaways and how they compare to what we see in our own client conversations.   Helpful Information: PFG Website: https://www.pfgprivatewealth.com/ Contact: 813-286-7776 Email: info@pfgprivatewealth.com   Disclaimer: PFG Private Wealth Management, LLC is an SEC Registered Investment Advisor. Information presented is for educational purposes only and does not intend to make an offer or solicitation for the sale or purchase of any specific securities, investments, or investment strategies. The topics and information discussed during this podcast are not intended to provide tax or legal advice. Investments involve risk, and unless otherwise stated, are not guaranteed. Be sure to first consult with a qualified financial advisor and/or tax professional before implementing any strategy discussed on this podcast. Past performance is not indicative of future performance. Insurance products and services are offered and sold through individually licensed and appointed insurance agents.     Marc: Ever wonder what people are talking about with their financial advisors? Well this week on the show we're going to discuss a new survey of nearly 400 experienced advisors revealing the biggest concerns, challenges, and financial goals that their clients are facing. We'll see how that compares with what the guys see here on the show. Let's get into it this week on Retirement Planning - Redefined.   Welcome to the podcast, everybody. Thanks for hanging out with John and Nick and myself as we talk investing, finance and retirement. And guys, we're going to share this survey. We'll put a link into the show descriptions as well for folks that want to check it out, but want to run some of this information past you guys and see does that correlate with what you're seeing, do you think it's accurate, not accurate, and just spitball and talk a little bit about some of the stuff out here.   The survey was done of nearly 400 experienced advisors all with around 20 years or more of a business, practicing business, so interesting. They didn't really say exactly the age bracket of all the people they were talking to, so there could be some folks that are not necessarily retirement age. They could be younger as well as older, but I want to run down some of this stuff and just get your guys' take on it.   How you doing this week, John?   John: I'm doing well. Daylight savings is messing with me a little bit, but I'm adjusting pretty well. And one of my kids, actually both my kids, they're testing for an honor belt in karate.   Marc: Oh, nice.   John: So they're excited.   Marc: They're going to whoop on you. Be careful.   John: It's funny you say that. They're running around the house kicking me now. It's like I wanted to get them into some self-defense stuff, but now I'm getting kicked.   Marc: So now you got to walk around with some pads on.   John: Pretty much.   Marc: Make sure you're not getting beat up too much. Very cool. Well watch the shins, man. They'll get you in the shins.   Nick, how you doing, buddy?   Nick: Good. We're staying busy.   Marc: He's like, "Good." Well, let's break this down a little bit, guys.   John: That's the sound of a guy that's in the middle of planning a wedding.   Marc: Right? That's what I was just thinking. He's like, "I got to make another decision. I don't want to make a decision." Let's jump into this and we'll see if we can make this easy for you this week, Nick.   So seeking out a financial advisor, the first part of this survey, advisors in the survey said 52% of their clients have sought out financial advisors to help with the retirement planning. About 34% surveyed were just looking for somebody to build wealth with. And in an era where everybody can call themselves a financial advisor, does that strike you as interesting? What do you guys think about that, 52% looking for retirement planning versus 34 just looking for some sort of wealth building, whoever wants to start?   John: Yeah, those numbers seem accurate to me. Well, I guess I'm a little surprised it's not more looking for help with retirement planning.   Marc: Okay.   John: I'd say the majority of our clients are retirement planning based, "Hey, I want to make sure my plan's good. I want to make sure I don't outlive my money." As far as building wealth, that does come up quite a bit, and Nick will jump in as well, but I'd say most of our clients are looking for retirement planning and just making sure they're on track and making sure that they're making the right decisions.   Marc: And it's two different mindsets too, right, Nick? I mean, so you need to decide what it is that you're looking for. I mean, not to say that you couldn't work with a retirement planner who also can help you with some of the wealth building, but it is a different skillset as well. If you're just looking for someone only to help you build the wealth, that's a little bit easier, I would think.   Nick: Yeah, and I would almost, if I were to say maybe put that in other words, we talk with people at the three phases of money as far as their life goes are accumulation or growth, distribution, taking their money in retirement and then transfer when they leave money. And so I would say from that initial, that wealth building, that's most likely accumulation focused. And because so many people accumulate their money while working in their 401(k)s and that kind of thing, I think it tends to be a little bit of a different conversation and it's those people that as you get closer to retirement. So without having ages, it does make it, the numbers are interesting, and I agree with John, I would've thought maybe it'd be a little bit higher from the standpoint of the retirement planning side, but-   Marc: Well, I mean, if you're just trying to grow the money, again the market's been, obviously we haven't had a prolonged downturn, and it's been choppy here lately, but we haven't had a prolonged downturn since '08, '09, so there's a lot of information out there about saying it's a little bit easier to build the wealth. But the preservation stage, which retirement is a little bit more complicated. There's more things going on than just the portfolio.   But with that in mind, check this out. Over half of the survey of financial advisors said the average client asset minimum was 760,000. I found that to be good. I know different areas are going to be more or less depending on the economic state of the area, but when you often hear that people aren't doing a very good job saving for their retirement future, three quarters of a million dollars is not bad.   Nick: It's definitely interesting to see the numbers and how they've changed over the last five to seven years where, and you mentioned it earlier where we've had a long prolonged period of time with the market going up, and so there's quite a bit of people meeting with us or ending up with more money than they had thought that they would or that sort of thing. There's a little bit of concern with that that only lasts for so long and that there's some correction and all that kind of stuff to happen. But absolutely, definitely that puts most people in the wheelhouse of where they need to be to have a successful retirement.   Marc: I mean, it's not bad. John, do you guys have a minimum? I mean, I know different advisor firms do different things. You can't service everybody. There's only so many hours in a day. So you'll hear something where somebody says, "Well, we work with people with 250,000 who have saved or more in assets," or some or a million or whatever. Do you guys have a breakdown?   Nick: We don't have a set minimum that we advertise or market.   Marc: Okay.   Nick: I would say that the majority of the people that meet with us tend to have what many institutions have as their minimum. So in other words, a lot of places will tell people, like you referred to that, they're looking to work with clients that have 250,000 or more just from an efficiency standpoint of trying to make sure that they can service their clients and that sort of thing, and so we end up above that with most clients. But the reality is, is that the conversations that we have with clients are really we don't keep that rule set in stone because for us, it's more of a relationship-based.   Marc: Individually based kind of thing? Okay.   Nick: Yeah, and really it's something we're looking for people that are serious about planning. I would say if you were to draw a line between what we were talking about earlier where a growth or retirement planning in a more broadly focused strategy, so they're focused on that. They're serious about it. We reference like, "Hey, we don't want to convince you that you needed an advisor. We want you to know that you need one and we want to interview for the job," kind of concept.   Marc: No, that makes sense because I mean if you're giving suggestions and someone's not willing to take them, you're just wasting each other's time versus... Yeah.   Nick: Exactly, and we found that that'll waste more time than in theory working with somebody that maybe isn't where they're going to be yet. And also-   Marc: It needs to be a reciprocal relationship.   Nick: For sure. Communication's super important for us because we've also found that we've had people come in that maybe are under that 250, but their parents are wealthy and they ended up being a teacher or something that maybe didn't allow them to save as much money as some sorts of jobs, and they're going to inherit money and they need assistance that way. So I'd say we're pretty comfortable with our process and how we approach that sort of thing and really look for it on a relationship basis, communication basis, and how we all get along.   Marc: That makes sense. And it's got to be a two-way street. I mean, when we do the podcast, it's not designed to turn every listener into a client if they're not already a client, but it is designed to say, "Hey, if it's the right relationship field going both ways, then we're happy to help if we can." That's pretty cool. So that's a good way of looking at that.   John, check out some of these top concerns. Let me know what you think here. So no surprise, number one, outliving their assets, 38% of the people surveyed. That's pretty much always number one, right? Outliving your money.   John: Yeah.   Marc: 31%, generating reliable income streams, a pretty high number as well.   John: Yes.   Marc: Okay. Then it drops off to a pretty stark, down to 12% for a future stock market crash. Now with some context here, this survey was completed at the end of last year, so it was December of '24. Do you think that number's gone up recently?   John: I would willing to bet that number's gone up. I think we were talking about the market, the last real big downturn was '08, and I think in the last 10 years, we've only had two years of the market being down, the S&P 500. I think it was, what, '22 and 2014, I believe.   Nick: I'd almost say that's a leading indicator that there's going to be, it's one of those things. Once people get that comfortable, that's usually when it comes.   Marc: I mean, it's been a while, right? So because nobody's worried about it whenever it's riding high. We only seem to worry about it whenever we're in the middle of it falling a little bit. But the one that really surprises me is all the way down to 8% for healthcare costs. Now if you guys are focused more on helping people with retirement planning and strategies, that to me, again depending on the ages of the people that answered this survey, healthcare costs at 8% seems awfully low because it's pretty costly, and we need to be having those conversations when we're, especially as we're getting older.   John: Yeah, for sure. This one, it is very important, and I think it's same thing we're talking about the stock market where it's been doing well. And when you're healthy-   Marc: It's great.   John: ...you think you're going to be healthy for a long time.   Marc: You don't think about it. Right, exactly.   John: You don't think about it all. It's back of your mind. I'll tell you where we see a lot of people concerned about it is if they had to do some care for their parents. Then it becomes top of mind of like, "Hey, this was a lot that I just went through." And taking care of them or seeing, whatever, if they have to go into a facility, and then in turn that's where we see the most of our clients that are concerned about healthcare costs is if they had to take care of a loved one.   Marc: Nick, according to the survey on that topic, advisors that were surveyed in this, were saying that clients should be more concerned about healthcare costs at around 54% unanticipated healthcare cost. Will you agree with that as well? Because I mean, obviously it comes out of the blue, it can totally derail the whole strategy.   Nick: Yeah, I think part of that is, from an advisor perspective, the whole concept of long-term care, obviously I'd say many advisors have a good grasp on long-term care, but I think it's become increasingly difficult for advisors to help clients plan for that with insurance or certain products that are out there. If we went back 10 years and from, let's just call it 2015 back through maybe 2005, that was the golden era per se for clients to be able to secure a reasonably priced policy from a long-term care perspective. So I think maybe that ties into the concern that advisors have is that at the end of the day it's a really expensive problem that clients can have, but it's also an expensive solution that a lot of clients are reticent to spend on something that may not be an issue, especially in a state like Florida where all of the insurance, people have serious insurance fatigue here.   Marc: Oh, I'm sure.   Nick: So it's a funny thing. The one time I actually answered a soliciting call earlier this morning was from State Farm calling me to, and they asked me if they could shop my car insurance for me, and I said, "Sure, let's try it." And sure enough, it was going to be $1,400 a year more than what I'm currently paying.   Marc: Thanks for the help.   Nick: And she laughed too, and she's like, "Well, can I call you in six months?" I was like, "You can try."   Marc: You can try.   Nick: I don't think you guys are going to come down that much. And so it's just crazy with what people are paying here. And so I think, long story short, I think that really ties into it as well for advisors.   Marc: And I'll hit you with this last one, John. I'll let you start and then I'll let Nick jump in if he wants to. And again, this survey was completed at the end of last year, so you can't take the current market downturn into this conversation. But according to the survey, an average of 63% of clients age 55 or older intended to work to 65 and beyond. 63% of people wanted to continue working up to 65 or beyond, yet only 30% of those clients are actually still doing it. So I guess my question is, does this surprise you that people want to keep working longer? And if so, what are some of the main reasons why you guys are seeing people want to work into their older ages?   John: It doesn't surprise me. I think with the shift really since COVID of being able to work remote, I've seen a lot of people that sit there now thinking like, hey, I work from home. I can travel still and log in. And it's given them a comfort of just saying, yeah, I'm making good money. I can continue to do this.   Marc: Feather than nest some more, right?   John: Yeah, so it's just building up the nest egg and allows them maybe to feel comfortable doing some more travel that they otherwise maybe wouldn't have felt so comfortable doing. We talked about the fears of outliving your assets, so I've seen a lot of that. And then there's a lot of studies out there saying, just keeping sharp of mind. So I've seen that where people are like, "Hey, I don't want to retire because I want to stay active. I want to have a purpose and continue to do things." So I think I'm not surprised by that number.   Marc: Interesting.   John: Because we're having more conversations of people wanting to work longer because they enjoy what they're doing. And with Zoom, it's become very easy to continue to work longer.   Marc: Well Nick, I'll give you this last piece here. 48% of those people feel like they don't have enough saved to live on through retirement. I mean, you're talking about half. So half of the people surveyed don't think they have enough, so that sounds like it just comes back to just not truly having a plan or even really knowing what it is that you've got. They've probably never sat down and really pulled this stuff together so they don't feel confident.   Nick: Correct. I think you nailed it there. The uncertainty of not having a plan and not knowing and understanding what things look like really oftentimes causes procrastination, and then all of a sudden it's 5, 7, 10 years later and there could have been a couple of small tweaks or a couple of small adjustments. I mean, in reality, there's been so many times when within 30 minutes if John and I meeting with somebody the initial time, we can tell three to five things that they could do that wouldn't have a significant impact on their life, but would have a significant impact from a positive perspective on their overall planning. And so whether it's informing themselves and holding themselves accountable or working with an advisor, which we have found, and there's been a ton of studies that have found that having that partner to help guide them through the decision-making process, that there's significant value there and the average rates of return and all that kind of stuff show that because of the decision-making.   Marc: Well, think about what you're going through with the wedding planning stuff. So there was a thing a couple years ago we were talking about, some of the most stressful events we can do in life, one of them was planning for a wedding. One of them was planning for retirement, right?   Nick: Yeah.   Marc: There's a lot of decisions to be made. And so having somebody to lean on I think goes a long way into removing some of that stress because it does get overwhelming. And at some points you're just like, ah, screw it. I don't even know what to do anymore. So being able to talk with guys like yourselves and say, "Okay, look. Here's some thoughts we had," or, "Here's what we were afraid of," or whatever the case is, it gives you that sounding board to bounce some ideas off of and maybe get some reassurance.   Nick: Yep, fully agree.   Marc: Yeah, and so are you having that same problem from the wedding standpoint?   Nick: Right now we're interviewing planners-   Marc: There you go.   Nick: ...and the prices have gone up, so it's-   Marc: But you're looking for help, right, because it's a lot.   Nick: Yeah, absolutely, absolutely.   Marc: John, you don't want to be the wedding planner?   John: No, no. I did that 12 years ago-   Marc: I got you.   John: ...and I want no part of that.   Marc: I got you. Well, all right, guys, good conversation as always. Thanks so much for hanging out. So at the end of the day, I mean you find these surveys are pretty interesting. And I think a lot of this stuff comes back fairly similar each time, is that people are looking for some assurance. They're looking for some clarity in some of these situations, so that's the point of running through the planning process is finding out what do you got, where do you stand and how's it working for you, and do you need to make some changes?   Often people feel like we're going to have to do some major overhaul, and it scares them. But a lot of times when you run through the planning process, many people are in better shape than they realize. You just need some tweaks here and there. So if you want to have those conversations for yourself, reach out to John and Nick and get started today at pfgprivatewealth.com. That's pfgprivatewealth.com. Get yourself onto the calendar for a consultation and a conversation.   And don't forget to subscribe to us on Apple or Spotify, whatever podcasting app you like using. Retirement Planning - Redefined is the name of the show with John and Nick, and we'll see you next time here on the program. Thanks, guys. Take care of yourself.

One book in the Bible is not yet finished – it's the Acts of the Apostles. We're still living in it today, you and I are writing it! I'm 92 – my whole life is trying to live like they lived in the Acts of the Apostles, like Paul, like Peter and John… Because our lives should demonstrate what we believe! It's so important for us to get back to the truth of what we believe, as it is written here in Acts Chapter 1. The Acts of the Apostles is the story of a transformed Church, a Church motivated with a purpose, on fire with the power of the Holy Spirit! The Word of God says Jesus will baptise you with the Holy Spirit and fire. 'In my former book, Theophilus, I wrote about all that Jesus began to do and to teach until the day He was taken up to heaven, after giving instructions through the Holy Spirit to the apostles He had chosen. After His suffering, He presented Himself to them and gave many convincing proofs that He was alive. He appeared to them over a period of forty days and spoke about the kingdom of God. On one occasion, while He was eating with them, He gave them this command: “Do not leave Jerusalem, but wait for the gift my Father promised, which you have heard me speak about. For John baptised with water, but in a few days you will be baptised with the Holy Spirit.” Then they gathered around Him and asked Him, “Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?” He said to them: “It is not for you to know the times or dates the Father has set by His own authority.' (Acts 1.1-7, NIV.)

There are plenty of external factors that often negatively influence our chances of having a successful retirement. But often, failure comes from within. On this episode, we'll talk about some of the common ways people get in their own way when it comes to financial planning. Helpful Information: PFG Website: https://www.pfgprivatewealth.com/ Contact: 813-286-7776 Email: info@pfgprivatewealth.com Disclaimer: PFG Private Wealth Management, LLC is a registered investment adviser. All statements and opinions expressed are based upon information considered reliable although it should not be relied upon as such. Any statements or opinions are subject to change without notice. Information presented is for educational purposes only and does not intend to make an offer or solicitation for the sale or purchase of any specific securities, investments, or investment strategies. Investment involve risk and, unless otherwise stated, are not guaranteed. Information expressed does not take into account your specific situation or objectives and is not intended as recommendations appropriate for any individual. Listeners are encouraged to seek advice from a qualified tax, legal, or investment adviser to determine whether any information presented may be suitable for their specific situation. Past performance is not indicative of future performance. Transcript of Today's Show: For a full transcript of today's show, visit the blog related to this episode at https://www.pfgprivatewealth.com/podcast/ ----more---- Mark: Hey, everybody. Welcome into another edition of the podcast. It's Retirement Planning Redefined with John, and Nick, and myself. And we're going to talk about the secret to retirement success. Here, it is. Get out of your own way. Typically, we are the success or the reason for failure, one of the two, because we tend to muck up the works ourselves by often injecting our emotions and thoughts into these things. And rightfully so, because that's part of it, which I think, again, we're going to talk about the value of working with a team and some professionals like John and Nick, because we tend to get in our own way. And I think we all realize that we do that in many aspects of life, and certainly money is one of those. What's going on, guys? How you doing this week, Nick? What's up buddy?   Nick: Everything's great. Perfect.   Mark: Yeah. Rock and rolling?   Nick: Yep.   Mark: Feeling good?   Nick: Yep. It's great.   Mark: That's fantastic. John, how you feeling my friend?   John: Doing all right. A little upset over the weekend. The Celtics lost game three to the Miami Heat, but there's another game tonight. So-   Mark: Another chance.   John: Hoping that they could tie up the series.   Mark: There you go. Fantastic. Well...   Nick: Yeah. I'll throw in a good gold [inaudible 00:01:01] lightning, our own fire.   Mark: Okay.   Nick: Free nothing as we record this.   Mark: Nice. Very nice. So what do you think about my statement there, getting out of our own way? There's lots of external factors obviously, that negatively influenced stuff in our retirement world. Right? We can't control the markets, but we can control how we react to them. Do you feel like that's a fairly accurate assessment of finding some keys to success sometimes is, getting out of your own head?   John: Yeah. Yeah. I would 100% agree with that. And we're seeing that right now where the market is, it's down year to date. There's a lot of negative news out there and, there's always negative news out there. But there's a lot of things happening in the world and it's creating a lot of fear. And what that does is it really eats into people's perceptions of what's going on with their portfolios. So naturally what's happening is, hey, when is the bleeding going to stop? Do I need to pull out of the market? Do I need to get more conservative? What should I do? So this is really a period of time where, important to get out of your own way and just stay the course.   Mark: Yeah.   John: And we harp on it quite a bit in all of our podcasts, but this is where the plan is essential, because we've had some reviews and people are nervous and rightfully so. But when they see the plan, it's like, how does this 10% pull back, whatever it is at the time, affect your overall plan? And they look at it and they say, oh, it doesn't really affect that much, just yet.   Mark: Right.   John: And when they see that, it's like, oh, okay, that makes you feel a little bit better. See where I'm at. So yeah, 100%, stay the course and definitely get out of your own way so you make good decisions.   Mark: And I think if we're talking with the market being the first one on the list, fear and greed, that's the normal stuff, jumping in and jumping out. And we tend to feel like it's the only thing we can do are these two things anyway. A lot of people, we're going to touch on that in a minute as well, but often it's well, all I can do is the market are cash and the market's scaring, the pa jeepers out of me so let me just jump out, and that's typically when we're making the wrong decision, especially if you don't have a plan. So having a strategy in there, because yes, it stinks when we're losing, we talked a little bit about on the last episode. Everybody's fine with risk when the markets have been on fire for 12 and a half years or whatever, but when they get real shaky for a few months, that's when people tend to get in their own way and allow that fear or greed to jump in there.   Mark: So since we covered that one on your initial part there, John, I'm going to jump to number two. No, go ahead. If you've got something else.   John: Yeah, yeah. One, actually you mentioned greed there and actually, it plays into the fear thing as well-   Mark: Okay.   John: Because, we've talked about the markets running up and when that's happening it's, I only got X percent this year. If I was more aggressive, I would've got a little bit more. So we have had those conversations where it's like, hey, should I get more aggressive? And the answer is no. Go to the plan, look at your risk tolerance, stay the course because when you try to get greedy and then all of a sudden, let's say you do go to a more aggressive portfolio.   Mark: Right.   John: And we have a big pullback in the S&P and in equities and all of a sudden, you're more nervous than you should be because you're taking more risk. And now you start to jump out and you get to that fear stage and you just make bad decisions.   Mark: Yeah. Great point. Great point. Well, Nick, talk to me a little bit about getting in our own way, when it comes to picking an investment or doing something solely because we think it's a tax help, right. It's not part of the plan, it doesn't make sense in other arenas. The idea is, no I'm doing this simply for the tax advantage. Is that a bad move?   Nick: Yeah. A really good example of this would be towards the end of last year, early this year, we made a pretty big cycle in client's portfolios from the growth side of the market to the value side of the market. And so that did cause some capital gains and probably a bigger capital gain shift than we typically have for clients that are in taxable portfolios. But again, the premise was that we felt strongly that moving forward, it was going to be something that benefited them from a performance standpoint, which is the number one priority. And that's really turned out to be the case where really the value markets are down closer to 3% or 4%. The growth markets are down close to 30%. So that's kind of a perfect real world, real life example of, yes, nobody likes taxes, but sometimes taking some gains and recycling the portfolio and shifting to where we think things are going to look better moving forward, is something that makes sense.   Mark: Yeah.   Nick: Taxes are again, something that people don't like and when we want to, we avoid it, but it should rarely ever be the number one priority in any sort of financial decision making.   Mark: Yeah. Don't let the tax tail wag the dog, as the saying goes, don't do something solely for the tax advantage, especially if it doesn't fit well into the overall strategy. And I'm glad that you brought up that point there where, looking at that and saying, hey, we do things, they all work together. There's a lot of these puzzle pieces that ebb and flow and move in and out together. So sometimes you do one thing and it has a ripple effect to another. And that's a great point. So I'm glad you brought that up.   Mark: John, another one on here is the cash conversation. I mentioned a minute ago, people tend to think there's only two options, the market or cash. And when it gets choppy, we go heck with this, I'm getting out and going to cash. And then we can even, maybe even just right now, we might even find this need to justify it by going, well, the Fed's ticking the rates up so I'll get a little bit more in cash, right. Even though it's nothing compared to inflation, but anyway, that can be a bad decision. You're getting in your own way. And then you might wind up just sitting there too long. And I mean, what if you jumped out in April of 20, when the pandemic was happening, we're down 30%, you jump out, you sell, you get your losses locked in and you stayed in cash the rest of 20. Well, you missed a heck of a second half.   John: Yeah. That that's accurate. And that's why it's always important to stay the course, because timing to get back in is almost impossible. Because the rallies up happen really within, if look at historically, it's always a couple of days or a week or two.   Mark: Right.   John: And if you miss it, you miss a majority of it. So important to stay the course. Be in the right risk tolerance so you don't go to cash or something like that. And then we have seen this quite a bit as well with cash in the sideline. And it can happen in an upmarket where we're hitting all time highs constantly, because it's like, hey, I don't want to put this money in because we keep hitting highs, it's going to come down at some point. And then now where it's the reverse, where we're having a pull back and it's like, well I don't want to put the money in because it's currently going down. So strategy against that would be dollar cost averaging into the market. Just piecemealing it and that typically will help some people get back into it with less risk.   Mark: Yeah.   John: And there are other strategies involved, but definitely you got to put your money to work [inaudible 00:08:15] pace inflation and especially nowadays.   Mark: That's a great point for sure. All right. So Nick helped me out here, buddy. I don't want to fall to fear. I don't want to necessarily fall to greed. I don't want to make bad choices from a tax standpoint. I don't want to go to cash and do nothing. Well now I don't know what to do, I'm just stuck. That's number four on my list. We overthink it to the point where we just freeze and we do nothing. And as the song says from the great Canadian rock band Rush, if you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice. So doing nothing is just as bad sometimes as doing something in the wrong way.   Nick: Yes. The overthinking side of things is definitely something I have empathy for people with. It takes me about a month to book a trip and probably sitting down five different times with 20 tabs open each time. So I get the process issue.   Mark: Well, humans procrastinate. Doesn't make you bad, it just-   Nick: Yes. Yeah.   Mark: We all do it. Yeah.   Nick: For sure. But what this does and people hear this a lot from us because we talk about it a lot is, it's the importance of the plan. So a lot of times what ends up happening is, the reason that people are frozen with indecision is because they're worried about their process. They're worried about the outcome and usually the fear of the unknown is more fragile and worse than actually knowing, having some certainty on what things look like, even if they're not ideal. So when we have people that are overthinking things or are really fretting about a certain decision, usually what we try to do is go back to the plan. So hey, let's re-review the plan. Let's look and see what things look like. And one of the things that we emphasize with clients that work with us from a planning perspective, is trying to help them start to make decisions differently.     Nick: And so the way that we do planning, the way that we're able to model out different situations and scenarios, we'll joke with people, let us tell you no. Because a lot of times what happens is people are limiting themselves out of concern of the unknown. And so, let us be your guardrails a little bit, let us be the bumpers in the lane to use an analogy and we'll help you work through these decisions, but instead of worrying about what the outcomes are. It's almost impossible for people to figure out all the outcomes on their own.   Mark: Yeah.   Nick: And so let us help you figure out, let's see the potential outcomes, let's see what we can do to mitigate some of the risks associated with it. And we can really narrow down. And so having that open door policy with clients and having them work with us, to work through these sorts of decisions where, we're a team member versus them trying to figure it out on their own is really important.   Mark: Nah, I like that. And I'm a heck of a bowler with the bumpers up. I'm just saying, so.   Nick: Yeah. Yeah. For sure. It definitely increases the average.   Mark: It did a little, just a little bit. So to check this out, John, let's do one more here on this conversation about getting in our own way. So a friend of mine, super nice guy, we're chatting the other day and this is what he says to me. Tell me what your reaction to this. So he says, Hey, my neighbor and I, we're good buddies. We're the same age. And our house costs the same amount of money, roughly that, where we live here. He's going to cash. And he's like, and I know you talk about stuff on podcast and stuff all the time. He's going to cash and he's advising me to do the same thing. I think it's a good move. And I said, why? Because you're the same age and your house costs roughly the same? Don't you think there's like about a million more things you could base this on?   Mark: So my point being is, is getting advice from people who really don't need to give you advice. I'm sure his friend and his neighbor didn't have any ill intention, but that just seemed like a goofy scenario to me. It's water cooler talk, so many of us do that.   John: Yeah. Yeah. We see that quite a bit where people are, my friend's doing this or like you said, my neighbor's doing this, but we have to constantly remind [inaudible 00:12:20] everyone that every situation's completely different. Something that might be good for someone else isn't good for you. And that's the importance of really getting the plan and making sure all your decisions are based on your plan.   Mark: Yeah.   John: And not your neighbor, not your cousin, not whoever-   Mark: Cousin Eddie. Yeah. Right.   John: Yeah. What we typically find with this is everyone always tells you about their good decisions. Like, oh yeah. I went for cash and this is what happened. They don't tell you when they didn't make a good decision.   Mark: Yeah.   John: It's not exciting to talk about when you lost money or lost an opportunity. So definitely want to leave it to the professionals and not a neighbor, a buddy that really doesn't have much experience in navigating these environments.   Mark: Yeah.   Nick: Yeah. It's the whole wins in Vegas scenario.   Mark: Exactly. Exactly.   Nick: People always talk about the wins and I just want to jump in on this one-   Mark: Sure. Go for it.   Nick: Because one of the things that I've been trying to emphasize with clients as well, especially those that are new to maybe, having an advisor or a planning relationship is that the advice that we're giving for them is the advice that we're giving at that set place and time. And so meaning, people tend to feel more comfortable when there are like general rules of thumb or those sorts of things. And so maybe it's a question like, a basic one that happens all the time is extra payments towards the mortgage or not. And so one of the things we've been trying to really get through people's heads is that, hey, we may be telling you to not do that right now, but it's because we have goals over the next one to three years that we're trying to hit because of X, Y, Z factors. And that might be something that we target three years down the road, but right now, it's more important for you to do these other things, to put yourselves in a better position to be able to do that.   Nick: And so what having that kind of conversation with people have seen the light click on quite a bit, because giving them the situation where, Hey, let's take you and your friend, and let's say that nine out of ten factors are the same, but that one factor can dramatically change-   Mark: Yeah.   Nick: The advice. And so even though you might feel like you have a twin in so many different ways, that one factor can be a huge differentiator on the sort of advice or the sort of strategy that you should have in place from a financial perspective. And really, you hear people talk about, each situation's unique, but really being more specific in helping them realize that has been something that has been helpful for some people lately, especially with the choppy waters that we've been in the last four or five months.   Mark: Oh, absolutely. I mean, you listen to this podcast and there's three guys on here having a conversation, but the three of us need different things for the time of life that we're in and whatever's going on. You two might be similar in age for example, but one's got kids, one doesn't.   Nick: Exactly.   Mark: I'm older than exactly you guys. So there's a million variations could go into what you need individually. So again, I don't think that the neighbors or coworkers or cousin Eddie or whatever it might be mean any ill will, but it's just not the best advice. So again, getting in our own way sometimes is listening to those people who really we shouldn't be listening to. So that's going to wrap it up this week for the podcast. So the secret to retirement success is you and how willing you are to not get in your own way, to make sure that you realize the things that you know, and the things that you can do, and then turning to those people to help you in those shortcoming areas.   Mark: I don't pretend to try to rebuild my car from the ground up, because I have no idea how to do that. Sure, I can change some spark plugs and change the oil, but that's the limit of my knowledge. So I'm not going to tear the whole thing apart and start from the ground up. Same kind of idea. So that's the conversation, make sure that you reach out to John and Nick. If you've got some questions, if you're worried about sabotaging yourself, doing some things you shouldn't be, especially in these choppy waters, as Nick mentioned, it's easy to do. It's easy to let that little fear monster jump up and nibble in our ear. So reach out, have a conversation with the team at PFG Private Wealth, before you take any action, especially if you feel like you need to make a change.   Mark: I think that's a fundamental thing that we do as humans as well. Sometimes we feel like if we're not doing something, we're doing something wrong and often not doing anything could be a good move for your situation, but you need to find out through the process of getting a plan put together or just reexamining the plan that you may already have in place. So pfgprivatewealth.com is how you make it happen. That's where you can find John and Nick and the team at PFG Private Wealth. Again, pfgprivatewealth.com. Pretty easy to remember and reach out to him if you got some questions or concerns, get on the calendar, hit the subscribe button for whatever platform you like to use. Athol, Google, Spotify, so on and so forth. For John and Nick. I'm your host Mark. We'll see you next time here on Retirement Planning Redefined.

There are some important terms you're going to come across as you prepare for retirement. Having a basic understanding of these will help you achieve financial success, so we'll cover what they mean and what you should know on today's episode. And don't worry. We won't go quite so far down the rabbit hole where we expect you to be able to explain how a company's P/E ratio meshes with it's Alpha and Beta ratings to determine how much stock you should buy. Helpful Information: PFG Website: https://www.pfgprivatewealth.com/ Contact: 813-286-7776 Email: info@pfgprivatewealth.com Disclaimer: PFG Private Wealth Management, LLC is a registered investment adviser. All statements and opinions expressed are based upon information considered reliable although it should not be relied upon as such. Any statements or opinions are subject to change without notice. Information presented is for educational purposes only and does not intend to make an offer or solicitation for the sale or purchase of any specific securities, investments, or investment strategies. Investment involve risk and, unless otherwise stated, are not guaranteed. Information expressed does not take into account your specific situation or objectives and is not intended as recommendations appropriate for any individual. Listeners are encouraged to seek advice from a qualified tax, legal, or investment adviser to determine whether any information presented may be suitable for their specific situation. Past performance is not indicative of future performance. Transcript of Today's Show: For a full transcript of today's show, visit the blog related to this episode at https://www.pfgprivatewealth.com/podcast/ ----more---- Mark: Hey everybody welcome into the podcast. Thanks for hanging out with John and Nick and I, as we talk about Retirement Planning Redefined here on the podcast. As always, don't forget to subscribe to us on whatever platform you like to use. Find all the information you need at pfgprivatewealth.com. That's the guys website pfgprivatewealth.com. Lot of good tools, tips, and resources to be found there. We're going to have another conversation today about some financial jargon. This is more kind of investment terms you might want to know or have heard and maybe you want to get a better understanding on, especially if you're sitting down and you're shopping for a professional or something like that. You want to kind of understand some of these things that you're talking about. Now we're not going to go super deep. We're not going to get into PE ratios and alphas and betas and all that kind of stuff, but we're going to keep it kind of high level. So we'll jump into that this week on the podcast, Nick, what's going on, buddy? How you doing?   Nick: Pretty good. Pretty good. Staying busy. We're recording this, just kind of closing up tax season. So happy that that is over for-   Mark: I bet.   Nick: Everybody that is at least not filing an extension.   Mark: Yeah.   Nick: But yeah, it's obviously a lot going on in the world. So it's been keeping us pretty busy.   Mark: Yeah that's true. Very true. John, what about you buddy? You glad tax season's over?   John: Yeah. Yeah. It's a fun kind of hump to get over.   Mark: I like that little pause. It's fun. Yeah.   John: Yeah. So, no, it's good. It's kind of a mark that people have on their calendar, so that's over with, and really we start to kind of get busy afterwards.   Mark: Yeah.   John: Because a lot of people kind of delay meetings until after tax season, so excited to get back at it. And then also excited that NBA playoffs started. So Boston Celtics are playing the Nets right now.   Mark: Alright now, there you go.   John: Gearing up for that, so-   Mark: There you go. Very good. Well we probably should have done a show really on tax planning versus tax preps right after tax season because really tax planning is something you should be doing all year long with your retirement professional anyway, but we're not going to do that this week. Maybe we'll do that here in the next couple of weeks, we'll come up and do something.   Mark: But for now let's talk about some terms that people hear and probably should know. Maybe you know, maybe you have that kind of cursory high level view, whatever the case might be. Maybe you don't. So let's talk about a few of these. Let's kind of start with fiduciary guys. And this is a term that I think people should know. They should know what it is. I kind of wish, and I was thinking about this before we started that our politicians had to do what fiduciaries have to do, right? They have that legal, moral, ethical responsibility to do what's right for their client AKA us as American citizens. I wish our politicians had to be fiduciaries, but either way explain what it is and maybe a little bit of the difference between that and like suitability.   John: Yeah. So fiduciary, especially in our world's investment advisor, it's where the fiduciary is obligated to put the client's best interests ahead of their own. So really looking to do what's best for the client, regardless of any other factors. And what you mentioned there with as far as, how does that compare to suitability, where kind of like a broker has to recommend something that's suitable for the client, so there's a big difference when you start to kind of analyze that is something might be suitable for you, but it might not be the best thing for your situation.   Mark: Right.   John: Or maybe there's other things out there that are better. So fiduciary has the due diligence and say, "Hey, I'm making this recommendation. And based on my expertise, my knowledge, everything I've compared it to this is what I believe is the best for you." And also if there's any conflict of interests for the advisor as a fiduciary, they must disclose that to you upfront.   Mark: Yeah.   John: So one thing, what people really need to do when they're interviewing advisors or kind of taking that step to try to find someone to work with, it's really one of the first questions should be asking. I'd say the good thing is the industry is really going in this direction-   Mark: Mm-hmm (affirmative).   John: Over the last, decade or so. It's really been kind of going, fiduciary, fiduciary, so that's.   Mark: Making that the standard, making it more the standard?   John: Yeah. Yeah, no, I think that's a great point. So if I'm getting this right, then maybe to kind of break this down for people, and Nick feel free to chime in, but so if there's three options available, suitability would say, "Hey, any of these three technically work for my client, but this one actually pays me better or there's a reward of a trip or something like that attached to it." You're not doing the wrong thing by picking that. It's still suitable. Whereas a fiduciary has to go with the absolute best thing for the client period. Is that a fair way to break that down in layman's terms?   Nick: Yeah, I think that's a pretty fair way to kind of break it down and it can get tricky because when you really get into the nitty gritty in theory, people can argue about what's better now versus what might be better down the road and that sort of thing.   Mark: Right.   Nick: But if anything, I think what's important for people to understand is the conflicts of interests, the potential conflicts of interest and where they come from. So, if you're working with an advisor that is tied in with a parent company that has proprietary products, then they're probably not able to function as a fiduciary. So-   Mark: Gotcha.   Nick: Understanding that there's a conflict of interest, a potential conflict of interest, there is just something that people should ask about so that they understand it. It can be from experience just kind of chatting with people. It can get a little overwhelming for people to kind of really drill down understanding the difference between fiduciary and standard versus a suitability standard. But people oftentimes understand conflict of interest. And just to kind of piggyback a little bit on your short little rant earlier about politicians, many people would be shocked to know that many politicians are able to invest in companies even though there may be conflicts of interests.   Mark: Yeah.   Nick: And the fact that's able to happen. And there's some websites that track those sort of things, but oftentimes they're privy to information that will impact a company in the marketplace and they're able to take advantage of it even though, the rest of the country can't do that, so-   Mark: Yeah, I was just even talking financially. In just their basic decision making when they pass laws.   Nick: For sure. For sure. But that's a good example of them not passing laws that-   Mark: True.   Nick: Aren't good for everybody.   Mark: Well and to John's point, so there's nothing wrong with asking, right? When you go in and sit down with someone, you just say, "Hey, are, are you a fiduciary?" Right? That's a fair question, and there's nothing wrong with asking that.   Nick: Agreed.   Mark: Yeah. Okay. All right. So let's move on to the other big term right now that everybody's getting hit over the head with, on a regular basis, and that's inflation. At the time we're doing this podcast guys, the CPI numbers came out a couple of weeks ago for March, pretty ugly. Gross is a term that has been thrown around quite a bit some of these numbers, 8.5% on the inflation, we're talking what 48% on gas, 35% up on used cars, food 13 to 17% up. So inflation break it down a little bit.   Nick: Yeah. So inflation has to do with spending power of money. And so one of the easiest ways for people to kind of think about it is, you mentioned food for example, one of the things that we kind of joke around with people is they were able to a couple years ago, do you remember when you could walk out of Publix and get everything you needed for 70, 80 bucks versus it now costing 100, $120 for the same amount of stuff. And the tricky thing with inflation is that it's there on a consistent basis year to year, but every 10 to 15 years, it kind of creeps up on us. And then we realize, Hey, this is kind of annoying.   Nick: And then obviously we have times we're in right now where there's some hyper inflation and kind of pocket books are getting hit. The one thing that I would say just to kind of pour some water on it is that although there are some real substantial issues that people are dealing with, there are some kind of, I guess, what we would almost call acute factors that are having an impact on it, that we would hope subside to a certain extent within the next year or two. But also there are going to be ramifications that we're already starting to see where the FED is doing things to try to combat inflation, like increasing interest rates, which we're kind of already on the docket, but has been getting pushed down. The cans been getting kicked down the road for a while.   Nick: And so things like mortgages, mortgage rates are now I think mid fives I read, whereas a year ago, closer to three. And I was just having a conversation with somebody to kind of put that in real world numbers. A half a million dollar mortgage at rates a year ago, a half a million dollar financed amount is from a monthly payment standpoint is equivalent to around 370,000 now, or if you look at it inverse half a million dollar mortgage at current rates is going to cost you around $700 a month more than it was a year ago. So that's going to have a real impact on housing prices and a lot of other things as well. So those are some real world examples of how inflation kind of impacts our life.   Mark: All right. So yeah, obviously we're hyper aware, we've talked about it before a little bit, but inflation we always kind of think of, at least I do it anyway, like calories, right? We know it exists and we don't often put a lot of thought into it until it's slapping us in the face, so to speak. And it's definitely doing that right now, so a lot people very concerned about that. So when we are talking about that, what happens is you start thinking, well maybe I should take a little more risk or whatever the case is with my portfolio to try to outpace inflation or keep up with it or whatever the case is, especially in these crazy times. So that leads us into risk tolerance guys. So what is your risk tolerance? And is that a wise move to try to take on more risk to combat something? Usually it's not.   John: No, it's not. And this is one of the most probably important things in building a portfolio that someone should really take a look at, and it's often overlooked. So risk tolerance is, to kind of bring it down to the simplest form is how much loss is an investor willing to take in their portfolio? How much volatility can they tolerate? So one of the things that we do when we are building a portfolio for our clients, the first thing actually is we have them go through a risk tolerance questionnaire to determine, are they conservative, moderate, aggressive? And from there we really help us design the portfolio so that way we can kind of match up the expected volatility of the portfolio with kind of what they could bear.   John: Because one of the worst things you could do investing is jumping around. And I hate to say it seeing a little bit right now I've already kind of feel a few phone calls I'm like, hey what should we do with the market? And if this volatility's already got you nervous and it hasn't really, it's been a pullback but it hasn't been anything too significant.   Mark: Right.   John: You really need to take a look at am I invested correctly because as we all know, as you shift to conservative or to cash, and then the next week the market just rally up and all of a sudden you just lost all. You realized your losses and didn't get to recover from it.   Mark: Yeah, knee jerk reaction is not the best right now. Right?   Nick: Yeah. And I would even jump in with that too going along with what John said where I think we have hit that point where people have forgotten what it's like to have bad markets, or even a normal market cycle of having a negative year. Even during COVID when the markets pulled back, 35, 40%, they bounced back by the end of the year. So it was never really realized. There was a short period of panic, but the recovery was quick, but.   Mark: Mm-hmm (affirmative).   Nick: There's a lot of people that don't remember that hey, there are going to be years where the market is down 10% for the year, the whole year. 12 whole months, so that's something that's interesting that's happening right now that we're seeing. Plus, historically where people would shift would be to fixed income or bonds. And that's not necessarily a safe place right now, either. So we're kind of in this, almost unicorn phase that only comes along every 50 or 60 years where there's not a lot of opportunities in many places. And so there's going to definitely have to be some patience involved-   Mark: I like that.   Nick: In the next 12 to 18 months.   Mark: Yeah. I like the unicorn phase. That's a good way of putting it. It's definitely been interesting, that's for sure. So do you guys kind of with the risk tolerance, is it kind of that number kind of system? Do you guys do that risk tolerance kind of thing where you kind of give someone almost like sleep number, if you will. If you're 100 or if you're a 20, how does that work?   John: Yeah. So how we do it and I've used actually some programs that do that. They give you a risk number based on how you answer questions. We have a set of some pretty good questions that give us an idea of what that person can kind of stomach.   Mark: Okay.   John: And what their expected return is. It's really, when you start to break it down, it's a lot of the same questions just asked differently to really kind of understand how the person ticks.   Mark: Yeah.   John: So we do a real good job of figuring that out. And then as advisors, part of our job is to make sure we put them in the appropriate portfolio based on how they answer.   Mark: Yeah. Because it's pretty easy to say conservative, and you go, what does that even mean? Right? Or I'm moderate.   John: Yeah.   Mark: Well what does that mean? That's probably a wide window, right?   John: It is.   Nick: Yeah. And then I would say one of the things that without it sounding like a commercial for ourselves, one of the things that we do that's a little bit different than some places that we do have what's called like a tactical tilt to how we manage money, where if we do have significant concerns, we will tamp down the risk. So maybe if somebody's normally in a portfolio that's a 50/50 mix stock to bond and what we would consider a moderate portfolio, if we have significant concerns in the market, we may drop them down to 30% on the stock side of things in certain cycles where we have high concerns. So sometimes what we found is that helps allay some fears for some people that there's some proactive potential changes, where if we really feel like it's going to hit the fan, we will make that change.   Mark: Right. Okay. So risk tolerance, another big one then definitely making sure that you're having that proper risk tolerance for yourself, especially in these inflationary times. When it becomes, it's hard to not feel, I think as humans, we feel like if we don't do something, we're doing something wrong or we have to take action or therefore we've made a mistake. And sometimes doing nothing can be a smart move. Especially in volatile times when it comes to a financial standpoint, if you don't know the correct answer, making no move might be a good place to start at least. That way you're not having that knee jerk reaction. And then of course, talk with a professional. Get some advice, and get a good strategy in place so that you know the right moves to make at the right time. Let's do another one here, guys, another technical one, dollar cost averaging, what is that?   Nick: So dollar cost averaging is the easiest example that most people have exposure to on a regular basis. And they don't probably realize that they're doing it is when people are contributing to their 401k. So every two weeks, a certain amount of your paycheck goes into your 401k and you have a set allocation and you are buying in to that allocation at whatever price it's at that point in time. So the thought process with dollar cost averaging is that you are balancing, you're investing over a period of time. Where sometimes you'll be buying at a premium, sometimes you'll be buying at a discount, but the objective is to continually invest and make sure that you are not trying to time the market.   John: And part of that is also what we're finding with the current market where it's at, with people with money on the sidelines, it could be a good way to kind of take some of the risk of putting all your money into the market and all of a sudden it dropping. So there's a strategy to basically say every, if I have 100,000 I want to put into the market every month or so, I'm going to be putting in 10 grand into it. That way, if it does dip down immediately, I only have $10,000 at risk. So dollar cost averaging, as Nick mentioned, most people are doing the 401k, not knowing it, but if you have money on the sideline in a volatile market, or if you're nervous, it is a good way to kind of get money that was on the sideline into the market.   Mark: Okay. All right. Well let's do one more guys and we'll wrap it up this week. Asset allocation, another big term we hear. We probably get that tossed around a little bit. Give us the kind of high level view of what that is. And because often I think people wind up feeling like they have a whole bunch of one thing and they're diversified because they've, I don't know, for example, I've got a whole bunch of mutual funds, so therefore I'm good. So explain what asset allocation is and is that correct? What I just said, is that really diversified or not?   John: Yeah. So asset allocation's kind of taken diversification to a different level. You could have seven different mutual funds, but if it's all the same type of funds, for example, like a large cap growth fund, they're going to do the same thing in reality when the market goes up or down. So when you do asset allocation, you're spreading your money, your portfolio within different asset classes, such as large cap stocks, small stocks that Nick mentioned, fixed income earlier, cash, some alternatives.   John: So what you do there is when you're building a portfolio and again, starting with your risk tolerance and your goals, you determine, hey my risk tolerance is X, here's my goals. I should be in a, let's just call it in income in growth portfolio. Well, what's the right mix of asset classes to make that work and to kind of bring it down to layman's terms here? Imagine kind of cooking, you're making recipe for a pie. The pie has certain ingredients to make it work and make it taste good. And that's basically what you're doing in your investments. It could be 20% large cap, 5% small cap, 20% fixed income, and our job as advisors and wealth management is we build that portfolio for the client if they hire us to do so.   Mark: Gotcha. Okay. All right. That's a good way of breaking that down. You just think about like a pie. So, and who doesn't love pie? So there you go. All right guys, thanks so much for the conversation this week. Good stuff talking about these technical terms, some jargon here. Hopefully we kept that pretty high level and it helped out with some of the things that you might be thinking or hearing. And if you've got questions, definitely reach out to the guys.   Mark: As always, before you take any action sit down. If you're already working with them, maybe share this podcast with someone who might benefit from it. If not, if you've been listening for a while, just reach out to them, have a conversation, and chat with them for yourself. You can find all of it at pfgprivatewealth.com. That's their website pfgprivatewealth.com. They're financial advisors at PFG Private Wealth, which makes a lot of sense. So make sure you subscribe on Apple, Google, Spotify, all that good kind of stuff. That way you can catch past episodes as well as future episodes. For John and Nick I'm your host, Mark. We'll catch you next time here on Retirement Planning Redefined.

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Start your cellular rejuvenation journey today. Support Your Healthy Ageing We offer powerful, third party tested, NAD+ boosting supplements so you can start your healthy ageing journey today. Shop now: https://nmnbio.nz/collections/all NMN (beta Nicotinamide Mononucleotide) 250mg | 30 capsules NMN (beta Nicotinamide Mononucleotide) 500mg | 30 capsules 6 Bottles | NMN (beta Nicotinamide Mononucleotide) 250mg | 30 Capsules 6 Bottles | NMN (beta Nicotinamide Mononucleotide) 500mg | 30 Capsules Quality You Can Trust — NMN Our premium range of anti-ageing nutraceuticals (supplements that combine Mother Nature with cutting edge science) combat the effects of aging, while designed to boost NAD+ levels. Manufactured in an ISO9001 certified facility Boost Your NAD+ Levels — Healthy Ageing: Redefined Cellular Health Energy & Focus Bone Density Skin Elasticity DNA Repair Cardiovascular Health Brain Health  Metabolic Health   My  ‘Fierce’ Sports Jewellery Collection For my gorgeous and inspiring sports jewellery collection ‘Fierce’, go to https://shop.lisatamati.com/collections/lisa-tamati-bespoke-jewellery-collection.   Here are three reasons why you should listen to the full episode: Learn about the Breakthrough Experience and how it has changed thousands of lives. Discover how to prioritise and determine your top priorities. John shares his secret to retaining Information in the quickest way possible.   Episode Highlights [05:00] About John Dr John is an educator, researcher and writer. He has spent over 48 years helping people maximise their potential. John wanted to know what allows people to do extraordinary things. That's why he distilled information from great minds throughout history. He made them into practical things that people today can use.  John had speech and learning challenges as a kid. At a doctor’s recommendation, his parents took him out of school and put him into sports. After having a near-death experience at 17, Paul Bragg inspired John to overcome his learning problems. With the help of his mom, he eventually learned how to read.  Listen to the full episode to learn more about John's inspiring story! [15:42] How Surfing Changed John’s Mindset Surfing has taught John that people are not going to excel without perseverance and commitment.  John converted his determination for surfing into persistence in reading.  [17:57] The Breakthrough Experience The Breakthrough Experience is a philosophy and program changing lives globally.  This system teaches you how to prioritise and structures life by priority. It breaks through limitations and helps achieve life goals.  John teaches people to use any experience, even challenges. These are catalysts for transformation and progress.  John has helped people learn how to prioritise to get their breakthrough experience in different areas of life. These include businesses, careers, health, relationships, among others. Lisa relates the Breakthrough Experience philosophy to when her mom had a severe aneurysm. [24:14] John Shares a Miraculous Experience At 27 years old, John handled a family with a son in a three-year coma. The family went to different hospitals in Mexico and the United States. However, they found none to help their son. They then went to John, and he thought of a maneuver to help the child. However, the treatment also came with significant risk. Listen to the full episode to find out how John helped a child get out of a three-year coma. [33:34] Jesse Billauer’s Breakthrough Experience Jesse Billauer, a surfer, decided to go to the Breakthrough Experience after a surfing accident.  At the time, he was depressed because he was physically unable to surf.  After the Breakthrough Experience, he learned how to prioritise and what his top priority was. Jesse became determined not to let anything stop him from surfing. Jesse developed a way to surf as a quadriplegic person. He taught others how to do the same.  [38:58] Herd Mentality in the Sciences New ideas are violently opposed and ridiculed. That's why people fear going against the norm. People who aim to survive follow the multitude. People who want to thrive create a new paradigm.  Each person can excel at anything if they focus on that, not on others' opinions.  [41:37] How to Prioritise John made a list of every single thing he does in a day over three months. He then placed multiple columns next to that list. The first column contains how much money each task produces per hour. The second column contains how much a job inspires him on a scale of 1-10. He also considered the cost and the time spent on each activity.  After doing that, he prioritised the activities that made thousands of dollars. He also focused on ones that scored ten on the inspiration scale.   John hired people for the low-priority tasks. This choice allowed him to be more productive in his top priorities. Within 18 months, his business increased tenfold. Listen to the full episode to learn how to prioritise and about investing in your top priority.  [56:19] How John Stays Looking Young John is almost 67 years old. However, Lisa describes him as someone who looks like a teenager. John doesn't eat junk. He drinks a lot of water, has never had coffee in his life and hasn't had alcohol in over 48 years. Doing what you love every day also slows down the aging process.  [58:03] Some Lessons from the Breakthrough Experience Nothing is missing in you. When you compare yourself to others, you'll try to live by their values or get them to live by yours. Both of these are futile.  Sticking to your values and priorities is key to resilience and success. People are different from each other, but no one is better than the other.  If you don't empower your own life, others will overpower you.   Your mission is something that you're willing to get through any means necessary. [1:06:38] How to Get Your Amygdala Under Control The amygdala is associated with emotions and the "fight-or-flight" response. Because we have neuroplasticity, we can remodel our internal system.  Perceiving challenges and feeling shame and guilt trigger an autoimmune reaction that attacks your body. Every time we choose to live by the highest priority, the amygdala calms down. The prefrontal cortex is reinforced. [1:12:03] The Mind-Body Connection Our psychological processes also affect our physiological processes.  People are used to blaming external factors. They don't take accountability for the things they experience.  John uses the example of when people get symptoms after eating unhealthy food. They don't face the fact that they brought it upon themselves.  Our bodies do an excellent job of guiding us. That's why we should learn how to listen to them. [1:18:13] The Journey to Financial Independence There is nothing evil about having money.  John believes that you can be a slave to money, or you can be a master of it.  Nothing is stopping you from doing what you love to do. [1:21:28] How to Retain Information Teaching what you've learned is the key to retention. Teaching compels your mind to organise ideas and reinforce them.  Teach the concepts as soon as you've discovered them. Don't wait until you're an expert on the subject. Resources Gain exclusive access and bonuses to Pushing the Limits Podcast by becoming a patron! You can choose between being an official or VIP patron for $7 and $15 NZD per month, respectively. Harness the power of NAD and NMN for anti-ageing and longevity with NMN Bio. Related Pushing the Limits Episodes 135: How To Make Better Decisions Consistently 183: Sirtuins and NAD Supplements for Longevity with Elena Seranova 189: Increasing Your Longevity with Elena Seranova Connect with John: Website | Facebook | Linkedin | YouTube | Instagram ‎The Demartini Show Demartini Value Determination Process The Breakthrough Experience program Join John's The Mind-Body Connection course Learn more about Jesse Billauer and his story. High Surf: The World's Most Inspiring Surfers by Tim Baker The Time Trap: The Classic Book on Time Management by Alec Mackenzie and Pat Nickerson  Brain Wash: Detox Your Mind for Clearer Thinking, Deeper Relationships, and Lasting Happiness by David and Austin Perlmutter The Top Five Regrets of the Dying: A Life Transformed by the Dearly Departing by Bronnie Ware   7 Powerful Quotes ‘I'm an educator, a researcher, a writer. I do a lot of interviews and filming for documentaries. I've been spending 48 years now on doing anything I can to help human beings maximise their potential.’ ‘I love studying and learning anything I can from those people that have done extraordinary things and then passing that on.” “I love anybody who's done something extraordinary on the planet in any field. I love devouring their journey.’ ‘No matter what the teacher was trying to do, I just couldn't read. And my teacher and my parents come to the school and said, ‘You know, your son's not able to read. He's not going to be able to write effectively’ because I wrote kind of backwards.’ ‘Well, I'm surfing the cosmic waves now. And in surfing big cosmic waves, radio waves that are big waves. Yes, that's the move from water waves into electromagnetic waves.’ ‘And so the Breakthrough Experience is about accessing that state. And breaking through the limitations that we make up in our mind and transforming whatever experiences you have into “on the way” not “in the way”.’ ‘She said that there was something that took over me, I can't describe it. It was like a very powerful feeling — like I had a power of a Mack truck. And me? I don't know how to describe it.’   About Dr John Dr John Demartini is an author, researcher, global educator and world-renowned human behaviour specialist. Making self-development programs and relationship solutions is part of his job. Among his most popular programs is the Breakthrough Experience. It is a personal development course that aims to help individuals achieve whatever goal they have. As a child, Dr John had learning challenges and could not read and write well until 18 years old. He has now distilled information from over 30,000 books across all academic disciplines and shares them online and on stage in over 100 countries.  Interested in knowing more about Dr John and his work? You may visit his website or follow him on Facebook, Linkedin, YouTube and Instagram.   Enjoyed This Podcast? If you did, be sure to subscribe and share it with your friends! Post a review and share it! If you enjoyed tuning in, then leave us a review. You can also share this with your family and friends so they can achieve their life goals by learning how to prioritise. Have any questions? You can contact me through email (support@lisatamati.com) or find me on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and YouTube. For more episode updates, visit my website. You may also tune in on Apple Podcasts. To pushing the limits, Lisa   Full Transcript Of The Podcast Welcome to Pushing The Limits, the show that helps you reach your full potential with your host, Lisa Tamati, brought to you by lisatamati.com.  Lisa Tamati: Welcome back to Welcome back to Pushing the Limits. This week, I have Dr John Demartini. He is a world renowned speaker, teacher, educator, researcher, medical doctor. He's written I don't know how many books, countless, countless books. He's an incredible, incredible man who teaches literally thousands and thousands of people every year in his breakthrough experience. The information that you're going to get in this podcast could change your life. So I've given you a fair warning. He's an amazing, incredible man that, and I've talked to a lot of incredible people but this one is really next level, he started out as a big wave surfer in Hawaii, way back in the day. Even knew Laird Hamilton and people like that. Had learning disabilities and could hardly read or write, and yet managed to overcome all these things to become one of the greatest scholars that there is. He's read over 30,000 books. He has distilled the knowledge from people right through the ages, through leaders and philosophers and stoics and scientists. He's an expert in so many different areas. He teaches people in business, he teaches people how to overcome massive challenges in their life. So I really hope that you enjoy this episode. It is going to get uncomfortable in places because we’ll talk about really being accountable, really understanding our own physiology, and just so much more. An absolutely amazing interview. So I hope you enjoy it.  Before we head over to the show, just reminder, we have our patron membership for the podcast Pushing the Limits. If you want to join our VIP tribe, we would love you to come and do that. It's about the price of a cup of coffee a month or two. If you want to join on the premium level, we would love you to come and join us. Support the show. Help us get this work out there. We are passionate about what we do. We want to change lives, we want to improve your life, we want to improve the lives of others. And we need your help to do that to keep the show going. So please, head over to patron.lisatamati.com. Check out all the premium VIP member benefits here, and support the show. Be a part of this community, be a part of this tribe. Help support us and reach out to me or the team. If you have any questions around any of the topics or any of the guests that have come up. We would love to hear from you. Any feedback is always welcome. Please always give a rating and review to the show as well on iTunes or whatever platform that you listen to. That is really, really helpful as well. We do appreciate you doing that. And as a reminder, please also check out our epigenetics program. We have a system now that can personalise and optimise your entire life to your genetics. So check out our program, what it's all about. This is based on the work of hundreds of scientists, not our work. It has been developed over the last 20 years, from 15 different science disciplines all working in collaborating together on this one technology platform that will help you understand your genes and apply the information to your life. So check that out. Go to lisatamati.com and hit the Work With Us button and you'll see their Peak Epigenetics, check out that program. And while you're there, if you're a runner, check out our Running Hot Coaching program as well. Customised, personalised training plans made specifically for you, for your goals. You get a video analysis, you get a consultation with me and it's all in a very well-priced package. So check that out at runninghotcoaching.com.  Now over to the show with Dr John Demartini. Well, Hi everyone and welcome to Pushing The Limits. Today, I am super excited for my guest. My guest is an absolute superstar. Welcome to the show. Firstly and foremostly, thank you very much for taking the time out today. Dr John, I'm just really excited to have you. Whereabouts are you sitting in the world? Dr John: I am in Houston, Texas. I'm in a hotel room in Houston, Texas, even though it shows that I've got a library.  Lisa: Yeah,I love that background. That is a fantastic background. Really great. Well, greetings to Texas and I hope that everything is going well over there for you. Today, I wanted to talk about you, your work, the breakthrough experience. Some of the learnings and the exciting mission that you've been on for now. For 47 years, I believe. Something crazy like that. So Dr John, can you just give us a little bit of a background on you and your life and what you do on a day to day basis? Big question. Dr John: I'm an educator, a researcher, a writer. I do a lot of interviews and filming for documentaries. I've been spending 48 years now, over 48 years, on doing anything I can to help human beings maximise their potential, their awareness potential, and achieve whatever it is that they're inspired to achieve. So that could be raising a beautiful family to building a massive business to becoming fortunate or celebrity, doesn't matter. It's whatever it is that inspires them. I've been studying human behaviour and anything and everything I can get my hands on for the last 48 years to assist people in mastering a lot. That's what I love doing. I do it every day. I can't think of any else I'd rather be doing. So I just do it. Lisa: It's a bit of a role model for me, Dr John, because I think what you have achieved in this time, the way you've distilled information, I mean, you've studied, last time I looked on one of your podcasts, that was over 30,000 books, probably more now. And you've distilled the information from great masters throughout history into practical things that humans today can actually benefit from. Is that a good assessment of what you basically have done? Dr John: I'm writing right now a 1200 page textbook on philosophers and great minds through the ages. I summarise it. I love studying and learning anything I can from those people that have done extraordinary things, and then passing that on. So yes. Right now, I'm actually, I just finished, I’m just finishing up Albert Einstein, which is one of my heroes. I had a dream when I was young. When I saw that E = mc² drawn on that board, I wanted to find out where that board was. I went to Princeton, and met with Freeman Dyson, who took over his position at Princeton in 1955. Spent part of the day with him and we're talking on cosmology. I wrote my formula on that same board, exactly the same place, because that was a dream that I had since I was probably 18, 19. Lisa: Wow, and you got to fulfill it and actually love it. Dr John: Yeah. Took me a bit of time. So what? But yeah, I love anybody who's done something extraordinary on the planet in any field. I love devouring their journey and their thinking. That's every Nobel Prize winner I've gone through and every great philosopher and thinker and business leader and financially or spiritually, to try to find out and distill out what is the very essence that drives human beings? And what is it that allows them to do extraordinary things? So I wanted to do that with my life. Most of the people I get in front of want to feel like they want to make a massive difference. They want to make a difference in the world. They want to do something that’s deeply meaningful, inspiring. And so yeah, we're not 'put your head in the product glue and let the glue stick' and then pass it on.  Lisa: Instead of having to reinvent the world, why not? So Dr John, can you give us a little bit of history though, because you're obviously an incredible scholar,have an incredible mind. But as a child, you struggled with learning and with reading and writing.Can you give us a little, how the heck did you go from being this kid that struggled with all of that to where you are today? One of the greatest minds out there.  Dr John:  Yeah, I definitely had some learning challenges. I had a speech challenge when I was a year and a half old to four, I had to wear buttons in my mouth and put strings in my mouth and practice using all kinds of muscles. Went to a speech pathologist. When I was in first grade. No matter what the teacher was trying to do, I just couldn't read. My teacher, and my parents would come to the school and said, 'You know, your son's not able to read. He's not going to be able to write effectively,' because I wrote kind of backwards. 'I don't think he's going to mountain and go very far in life, put him into sport.' Because I like to run. And I did sports there for a while. But then I went from baseball to surfing. I hitchhiked out to California and down Mexico and then made it over to Hawaii so I could ride big waves and I was doing big wave and stuff when I was a teenager. So I didn't have academics. I dropped out of school. I was a street kid from 13 to 18. But then right before 18 I nearly died. That's when I met Paul Bragg, who inspired me one night in a presentation. That night I got so inspired that I thought, 'Maybe I could overcome my learning problems by applying what this man just taught me. And maybe someday I could learn to read and write and speak properly.' That was such an inspiration, such a moment of inspiration that it changed the course of my life. I had to go back. And with the help of my mum, I went and got a dictionary out, started to read a dictionary and memorise 30 words a day until my vocabulary. I had to spell the word, pronounce the word, use it with a meaningful sentence, and develop a vocabulary. Eventually doing that 30 we would, we wouldn't go to bed. I didn't go to bed until I had 30 new words, really inculcated. My vocabulary grew. And I started to learn how to do the reading. It was not an easy project. But, man, once I got a hold of it, I never stopped. Lisa: And once you started to read, you didn’t stop. Dr John: I've never stopped. I've been a voluminous reader now. You know, 48 years. Lisa: That’s just incredible. Dr John: I can’t complain. Lisa: So was it a dyslexia or learning disability? I just asked because my mum was a teacher of children with dyslexia and things like that. Was there specific ways that you were able to overcome the disability so to speak? Dr John: Yeah, I just, sheer persistence and determination to want to read and learn. I remember, I took my first, I took a GED test, a general education high school equivalency test. And I guessed, literally guessed, I close my eyes. I said this little affirmation that Paul Bragg gave me that, 'I'm a genius, and I apply my wisdom.' And some miraculous thing made me pass that test. I didn't know how to read half the stuff that was on it. I just went with my intuition and guessed. And I tried to go to college, after taking that test and had the test. I failed. And I remember driving home crying because I had this idea that I was going to learn how to teach and become intelligent. Then when I got a 27, everybody else got 75 and above. I got a 27 and I thought, 'Well, there's no way it's going to work.' But then I sat there and I cried and my mum came home from shopping, and she saw me crying on the living room floor. She said, ‘Son, what happened? What's wrong?’ I said, ‘Mum, I failed the test. I guess I don't have what it takes.’ And I repeated what the first grade teacher said, 'I guess I'll never read or write or communicate effectively, or amount too much. I guess I'll go back to Hawaii and make surfboards and surf. Because I was pretty good at that.' And she said to me something that was a real mind bender. She put her hand on me and she said, ‘Son, whether you become a great teacher, philosopher and travel the world like your dream, whether return to Hawaii and ride giant waves like you've done, return to the streets and panhandle like you've done. I just want to let you know that your father and I are going to love you no matter what you do.’ Lisa: Wow, what a mum. Dr John: That was an amazing moment. When she said that, my hand went into a fist of determination. And I said to myself, ‘I'm gonna match this thing called reading and studying and learning. I'm gonna match this thing called teaching and philosophy. And I'm going to do whatever it takes, I'm going to travel whatever distance, I'm gonna pay whatever price, to give my source of love across this planet.’ I got up and I hugged her. And I said to myself, ‘I'm not gonna let any human being on the face of the earth stop me, not even myself.’ I got out of my room. And that's when I decided with her help to do the dictionary. That was an amazing turning point. Lisa: And I can feel it, the emotion and what a wonderful mum you had. I mean, what a perfect thing to say when someone's down. Dr John: It was the most. If she hadn't said that, I might’ve come back to surfing. I might  be a surfer today. Lisa: Which would have been a good thing as well, probably because surfing is great. Dr John: It didn’t make money in those days. I'm in the mid 60s and 70s, early 70s. But,, now, the guys I served with, Laird Hamilton and- Lisa: Wow. He's a hero is amazing.  Dr John: Both Ben Aipa, Gerry Lopez, and these guys, those are the guys I served with. And so those guys went on to be incredible. Lisa: I wasn't aware of that. Dr John: I lived at the same beach park in Haleiwa, where Ehukai Beach Park is, near Pipeline, between Rocky Point and Pipeline. Laird Hamilton was dropped off by his mother there and lived there on the beach. I lived up on where the park bench was. We lived right there and I saw him on the beach each morning. He was seven, I was 16. He was going on seven, I was almost 17. We live there at the same place and Bill Hamilton saw him out there and grabbed him and took him in and trained them on surfing and found his mum and then married the mum. That's how I became. I hung out with those characters. Lisa: Legends. You became a legend in this direction and they have become a legend in a different direction. Dr John: Well, there's a book out called The High Surf by Tim Baker. That’s from Australia. He wrote a book on people that rode big waves. And he said, 'I'd like to put you in there.' I said, 'Well, I didn't go on to be the superstar in that area like these other guys.' He said, 'But I want you in there because you became a legend. Lisa: Became a superstar. Dr John: Yeah Lisa: Do you think that there's, you know, I come from a surfing family. My brother's a big wave surfer in New Zealand. I've tried and failed miserably, stuck to running. I was better at it. But do you think there's a correlation between the mindset that you developed as a surfer? Because going in those big waves is scary. It's daunting. It's frightening. It's challenging. It's teaching you a lot. Is there a lot that you took from that for this journey that you've been on? Dr John: Yeah, I didn't surf anything more than 40-foot waves. So I think that was about as good as about as big as you get back in the 70s. At 70s is when I was- Lisa: Oh, just a mere 40, it’s okay. Dr John: Well, 40-foot waves was the biggest thing out in outer reef pipeline was the big thing. They hadn't had tow-in surfing yet. That was just, that wasn't begun yet. So there was that idea, we had to catch those waves. That was not easy because they're too big to catch. you got to have big long boards, and you got to really paddle to get into those waves, and it's usually too late. But I think some of those, I used to surf 11 hours a day sometimes. When you're really, really committed to doing something, that's... Einstein said perseverance is the key to making things happen and if you just stay with something. So, if you're not inspired to do something, enough to put in the hours and put in the effort, and you don't have somebody that you can bounce ideas off of, kind of mentoring you, you probably are not going to excel as much. But I did that. And then I just converted that over into breeding 18 to 20 hours a day, feeding once I learned to read, so I just and I still voluminously read I mean, I read every single day. Lisa: That is incredible. And so you've taken that big wave mindset a little bit over into something else. So obviously, everything you, do you do to the nth degree, we can probably agree on that one. Dr John: I'm surfing the cosmic waves now. And in surfing big cosmic waves, radio waves that are big waves. I move from water waves into electromagnetic waves. Lisa: Wow. Now, you run something called The Breakthrough Experience, which you've been doing now for 40 something years. This is a philosophy and a system and a program that really changes lives and has changed lives all over the planet. Can you tell us a little bit about what you've distilled from all this information that you have in your incredible mind? And what you teach in this course, and how this can actually help people? Today, right now listening to this? Dr John: Well, the breakthrough experiences, sort of my attempt to do with what that gentleman did to me when I was 17. I've done it 1121 times into that course. I keep records, and I'm a metric freak. Every human being lives by a set of priorities, a set of values, things that are most important. Lisa: Podcast life. Dr John: Welcome to it. I thought that was off, but I didn't quite get it off. But whatever is highest on the person's values, priorities, whatever is truly deeply meaningful to them, the thing that is spontaneously inspiring for them to that they can't wait to get up the morning and do.If they identify that and structure their life by priority, delegating the lower priority things and getting on with doing that, they will build momentum, incremental momentum and start to excel and build what we could say is a legacy in the world. And so, the breakthrough experience is about accessing that state, and breaking through the limitations that we make up in our mind,  transforming whatever experiences you have into 'on the way' not 'in the way.' So no matter what goes on in your life, you can use it to catalyse a transformation and movement towards what it is that you're committed to. And if you're not clear about it, we'll show you how to do it because many people subordinate to people around them. Cloud the clarity of what's really really inspiring from within them, and they let the herd instinct stop them from being heard.  I think that The Breakthrough Experiences is my attempt to do whatever I can, with all the tools that I've been blessed to gather to assist people in creating a life that is extraordinary, inspiring and amazing for them. And if I don't do whatever it takes in the program, I don't know when it's going to be. I've seen six year olds in there write books afterwards. I've seen nine year olds go on to get a deal with Disney for $2.2 million dollars. I've seen people in business break through plateaus. I’ve people have major issues with relationships break, too. I don't know what's gonna be. I've seen celebrities go to new levels. I've seen people that have health issues that heal. I mean, every imaginable thing, I’ve breaking through. I've seen it in that course. And it's the same principles applied now into different areas of life. In any other area of our life, if we don't empower, the world's going to overpower something. And I'm showing I want to show people how to not let anything on the outside world interfere with what's inside. Lisa: And you talk about, it's on the way, the challenges that we have to look at the challenges that we have and ask how is this going to actually help me get wherever I am. And this is something that I've managed to do a couple of times in my life really well, other times not so good. But where I've taken a really massive challenge, I had my own listeners, I had a mum who had a massive aneurysm five years ago, and we were told she would never have any quality of life again, massive brain damage. We know that's not happening on my watch. I'm going to, there is somebody in something in the world that can help with her. And this became my mantra that I was going to get back or die trying. That was that total dedication that I brought to her because of love. When you love someone, you're able to mobilise for the last resources that you have. And that nearly bloody killed me as far as the whole effort that went on to it, and the cost and the emotional costs, and the physical and the health and all the rest of it. It took me three years to get it back to health, full health. She's now got a full driver's license back and a full independent life back and as my wonderful mum again. And that was coming from a state of being in a vegetative state, not much over a vegetative state at least. Hardly any higher function, no speech, no move, be able to move anything. Dr John: That’s a book there. That's a book or a movie. Lisa: It's the book. Dr John: That's a book and a movie for sure. Lisa: Exactly. And this is very powerful. Because I saw this and when you're in the darkness, everybody is telling you there is no hope, there is no chance. And these are medical professionals who have been to medical school, who have a hell of a lot more authority than you. You just go, ‘No, I am not accepting it because that alternative means death, basically, decline and death in being in an institution. And that is not what I'm going to answer. I'm going to find somebody who can help me’ and I did. I found hundreds of people, actually, and this is what tipped me into doing what I'm doing now, is finding world leading experts to give me the next piece of the puzzle for her and for the people now that are following me so that I can help empower people, not to be limited by the people who tell us we can't do something. It's because that means basically they don't have the answer. Not that there is no answer, is my understanding. And they were right. It was the hardest thing I've ever done. But I did it and my mum is alive and she's well, and that book. I really want to empower people with a story. I see that same like they're obviously your passion. What you went through with your learning problems when you were young and your mum standing beside you has actually propelled you into this lifelong journey that I find absolutely fascinating because that passion, and I can see that passion in you, is still very much alive 48 years later because you're doing what your priority is. Dr John: I'm definitely doing what I love doing. It's interesting that your story reminded me of something that happened to me when I was 27. If you don't mind, I'd like to share this. So I graduated from my professional school. I had a bit of a reputation there of being kind of the taking the cream of the crop clients, patients that were turned down everywhere else. I just tackled it, see what we can do with it. And I got a family from Mexico, with a son that fell three stories off an apartment complex onto the ground on his head. He went into a coma, been in a coma for three and a half years. And the mother, they assumed he was dead a few times, but there was still a breath. There were still something. It wasn't a strong breath. You couldn't see it but you could put a mirror in front of you and get a little bit of breath out there. So he wasn't dead. And he had decerebrate rigidity. So his whole body was so rigid that when I saw him, you could lift up his feet and his whole body would rock. It was so stiff. His hands are like this. A classical decerebrate rigidity. And he had gone to, throughout different hospitals in Mexico, where he was from, and nobody checked them. They came to America, they went to the Medical Center in Houston, which is the largest Medical Center America. And they got rejected. No one would accept it. There's nothing we can do. They went out to the professional school that I'd gone to. And they said, ‘We can't do anything.’ But we know this interesting character. West Houston, if there's anybody that would try something this guy might try, who knows? And they sent him to my office. I remember when they came in, they carried him wrapped up in a white sheet, and laid him on the armrest of the chairs on my office. I looked out there and I saw this Mexican man and woman and seven or eight other kids in a family. I'm in this. At first, I didn't know what this was, this thing wrapped up in this sheet. They came down my hallway and I saw him going down the hallway. And like, ‘What on earth is this?’ Then they unveiled him in my exam room. And there was this 58 pound tube in his nose, coma case that was so stiff. It was ridiculous. I mean, he had gauze on his chin and his hand was rubbing on it and to protect the chin from having an ulcer. It had an odor to him in the head. It was just nothing. Just stare. He just sat there. But the mother and father said, ‘No, he's still alive. Please help.’ So I didn't really have much to do an exam with. So I got him, we took him in and did a film of his spine and his skull from the history. We found his foramen magnum, his skull was jammed down on a spinal cord and his spinal cord is up in his foramen magnum. This opening in the bottom of the skull. And I thought that night, when I was developing those films, and I looked at that I thought, 'I wonder what happened if I lifted that skull? If I've got that off? It could? Could something happen?' And I was scared because you just don't do that. He could die just instantly. I sent them over to this health food store to get him some liquid vitamins and minerals and amino acids to try to get nutrients in him because they're feeding him beans and rice with liquid. It was just crazy. So the next day came in. We had four doctors on a preceptorship visiting my office, one doctor that was working for me, one assistant, the seven or eight kids plus him and the mother and father in this little room. It was packed. And I said to him that I saw that on the film something that might have make him, help. I don't know, I can't guarantee it. But if we, if I did a particular manoeuvre, it might open up the brain function. And the little woman held on to her husband and she said, 'If he dies, he dies. If he lives, we rejoice. But please help us. We have nowhere else to go.' Lisa: Yeah. Wow. Dr John: She said that there was something that took over me, I can't describe it. It was like a very powerful feeling, like I had a power of a Mack truck in me. I don't know how to describe it. And I had this manoeuvre that we could do this, what they call the Chrane Condyle Lift, that can actually lift the skull up the spine. And I said to myself, if I'm not willing to have him die in my hands, I can't raise the dead with my hands as a little quote that I learned from an ancient healing philosopher. And I thought, 'Okay, we're, I'm going to take the risk, and just see what happens.' Because, I mean, I don't know what to do. I'm just gonna do it. Because I mean, they've got no place to go and I only took a rip. As I lifted that skull with this powerful movement. He came out of his coma. He came right out of the coma. He screamed, and this whining noise you couldn't. It was not coherent. It was just this whining sound. The whole family went on their knees, they were Catholic. They just went to their knees and prayed. I was blown away. I saw the four doctors one of them ran down the hallway and vomited, couldn't handle it. The other just stared. And here's this boy squirming on the table. I walked out to let the family be with the child for a minute and just sat with one of my doctors. We sat there and just cried. Because we knew that the spinal cord expressed life in the body. But we didn't know what would happen if we took the spinal cord, it just scanned off. Theoretically, it could kill you. But there was some still life in the spinal cord. Anyway, this boy went on to gain 20 pounds up to 78 pounds. We took him off the tube, we got him to move, we had everybody in the family take a joint in his body and move his joints to remobilise him. Sometimes I think we probably tore some ligaments doing it. But we got mobility. And this boy came out of it. And I have a picture here with me of the boy actually graduating from high school. Lisa: You’re kidding me? Why is this not an? What is not? Why have I never heard the story?  Dr John: I don’t get to share it too often. I didn't many years ago. I haven't practised in a long time. But all I know is that that was a moment that you just, it's probably like you had with your mum when you saw incremental progress. Lisa: Yeah. Just grind. Dr John: And I think that that's a metaphor. That's a metaphor. It doesn't matter where you've come from, doesn't matter what you're going through, doesn't matter what you've been through. What matters is you have something that you're striving for. And are you willing to do some incremental movement towards that? What else just said is, he's got a diagnosis. Diagnosis means through knowledge, supposedly, but it could also mean die to an agnosis. You don't know. Even the doctors don't know. But the reality is,  he came out of the coma. And I had over the next few months, I had some amazing cases of a boy that was blind and couldn't walk, and all of a sudden see and walked again. I had a boy that was paralysed quadriplegic, was able to walk. I mean, I had some amazing stuff happen. When you're willing to do what other people aren't willing to do, you're willing to experience when other people don't get to experience. Lisa: Yep, it is just so powerful. And I'm just absolutely blown away from that story. Because, I mean, I know with my mum who was only in a coma for three weeks, and had stroke and so on, and in the specificity and the things that I've had to deal with. The whole vestibular system being completely offline, she has like a rag doll, having to read, programming her from being a baby, basically, to being an adult, within that three year period with a body that is now like 79 years old. And the doctors going like, your brain can't change that much. And in just going, I'm going to keep going. I'm only listening to people who tell me I can do something, I'm not listening to anybody who tells me I can't do something. And this is something that I've really integrated into my entire life like as an athlete, doing stupidly long ultramarathon distances. I was always told you can't do this, and you can't do that. It's impossible. And I was like, 'We'll see.' I'm going to throw everything in it. And that was my passion at the time have now retired from doing the stupid distances because I've got other missions on in life. But whatever it is, is always the big mission. And then everybody comes up against people who tell you, you can't do it. This is one of the biggest limiting things that I see. Dr John: That's what Einstein said, greatness is automatically pounded by mediocre minds.  Lisa: Wow. Dr John: I had a boy, a boy attend my breakthrough experience, who had a surfing accident and became arms and legs not working, He could move his neck. He got a little bit of function slowly into the hand that was about it, just a tiny bit. And I remember a man wheeling him in and having them kind of strapped to a wheelchair. I knew the father and I knew his brother. There were doctors who were colleagues of mine. And they brought him, they flew him literally from Los Angeles over to Texas to come to the breakthrough experience. I remember him looking straight down really depressed, suicidal, because he was a surfer and he was on his way to being a great surfer. If he couldn't surf, he didn't want to live kind of. I remember getting on my knees and looking up at him at this chair, and I said, 'It all determines inside you what you decide. I don't know what the limit you have in your body. I don't know what you can repair. I don't know what you can do. I don't want to say you can't. But all I know is that if you're going to, you're going to have to put everything into it. You're gonna have to have no turning back kind of attitude. There's got to be a relentless pursuit of your master plan to serve.' His name is Jesse Billauer. He made a decision at the Breakthrough Experience that nothing was going to stop him from surfing again, nothing. He is really, in the room was absolutely applauding him. The before and after in that weekend was so astonishing that it was tear jerking. Well, about 17 years ago, 16 half years ago, I had the opportunity to get, I was living on the Gold Coast of Australia. I had many homes in New York and different places. But I had one in the Gold Coast of Australia in Aria, lived in the penthouse of Aria. And all of a sudden, I found in my entrance of my penthouse, which you only can get into with my key somebody from downstairs, put it in there like mail, a DVD video of a surfing movie, called Stepping Into Liquid. And when I pulled that up and put that in there, there was Jesse Billauer, surfing. He found a way of using his head muscles, and designing a special vehicle, a transport system, a surfboard. He had to have somebody take them out into the water and push him. But once he got on a wave his head movements were able to ride and he was riding like 12 foot waves, which is 20 foot face waves. He was doing that. And he was an inspiration. He became friends with Superman who had quadriplegia and they became friends and he created a foundation to do something but he taught people how to go surfing as a quadriplegic. So when the wise big enough to house take care of themselves, you've proven that in your book. What little I've done in my life compared to some of these kind of stories is just astonishing what I see sometimes people do. I mean, mind blowing stuff that people, that determination to overcome that are absolute inspirations. Inspiration is a byproduct of pursuing something that's deeply inspiring and deeply meaningful, through a challenge that people believe is not possible. That's inspiration. Lisa: That's how we grow as a human race. We have these amazing people that do incredible things. And these stories, I mean, these are stories that aren't even out there in the world, in a huge way. There are hundreds of these stories and thousands of these stories and miraculous stories. These are the things that we should be talking about. Because why are we not studying the outliers? Why are we not? When I look at my book, or my story, which I share publicly and not a single doctor that had anything to do with my mum ever asked me, 'Well, how did you do it?' Nobody is interested in why she has not taken the normal path as long gone. Nobody has asked me what did you do? People do. My audience want to know why. The people that follow me, etc. But nobody that was involved in that case. And I see that over and over again.  Dr John: It's forcing him to face their own, you might say, belief systems about what they've been taught. There's an educated awareness by the herd and then there's an innate yearning by the master. The master transcends the herd, if you will. You can be a sheep or a shepherd. The shepherd is the one that goes out and does things that the sheep are not willing to do. But then once they do it, they'll rally around it. They are there watching you to be the hero instead of becoming the hero. Lisa: Wow. And why is it in the medical fraternity that there seems to be a very big herd mentality, like no one is scared to step outside of their norms, and they get slammed. I see this in academia and in science as well, where people who have brilliant ideas and hypotheses and studies and so on, they just get slammed because it's outside of the current paradigm.  Dr John: William James, one of the founders of modern psychology, said 'To be great…' And Emerson followed in suit, 'To be greatest, to be misunderstood.’ William James basically said that the majority of people fear rejection from the multitudes because that was survival. People that are into survival follow the multitude. People that are in thrival create a new paradigm. At first they're going to be ridiculed. They're going to be violently opposed to Schopenhauer and Gandhi said, but eventually becomes self-evident. And you're either following a culture or building one. The people that do that build a new culture. They build a new culture of idea. Emerson said in his essays on circles, 'We rise up and we create a new circle of possibility. And then that becomes the new norm until somebody comes up and breaks through that concentric sphere with another circle.' It's like the four minute mile. I had a gentleman on my program the other day who is striving to be the fastest runner in the world. He's got bronze and silver medals, but he hadn't got the fastest running. And he's not stopping. He's working sometimes eight to 13 hours a day on this project. I believe that the way he's so determined to do it, and how he works on it, and he doesn't need a coach telling him what to do. He just does it. He's inspired to do it. He'll be the fastest runner, he won't stop till he's the fastest runner in the world. And that’s determination, that to be great at that one thing, find that one thing that you really target like a magnifying glass, on that you become the greatest at that thing.  Mine was human development, human behaviour. I want to have the broadest and greatest width of information about that. That's my one thing. But each individual has something that they can excel in, if they just define it, and give themselves permission at it, and say, thank you but no thank you to the opinions. The opinions are the cheapest commodities on Earth that would circulate the most as a use value. There’s ton of those. But those opinions aren’t what matter. It's not you comparing yourself to other people, it's you comparing your daily actions to what's deeply meaningful to you, and the highest priority actions daily, that’s what it is. Lisa: How do you, this is a problem that I face, get to a certain level of success and achievement, and then you start getting lots of offers and opportunities and so on, and you start to lose the focus. You get distracted from the things that are happening in this day and age where the internet and everything that ends up like I get the shiny object syndrome. And say, 'Oh, this is an extremely interesting area of study, and I should go down that path. And then I go down that path, and then I go down that path.' It is adding to the whole picture of a general education. as someone who studied as much as you have, you've obviously encompassed all of these areas. But I think what I'm asking is, how do you find out what your highest priority is? And how do you get a team around you, so that you're not limited? I think there's a lot of business people that are listening to this, me included in this, who has struggling to get past a certain ceiling because the area of genius is one thing that they love and excelling at, and you'd like to spend all of your time doing that. But you're stuck in the groundhog day of admin and technology in the stuff that you hate. And not busting through because financially, you can't delegate to people. You also got to find people that are a good fit for you who can do the jobs, and then also have the finances to be able to break through to that near next level. Can you talk to that about? Dr John: Yes, absolutely. When I was 27 years old, I was just starting my practice. I was doing a little of everything, anything and everything, just to get the thing cranking. I had one assistant that I hired. But I realised I was doing way too many trivial things. And that'll burn you out after a while if you're doing stuff that's not really what your specialty is. I went to the bookstore and I got a book by Alec McKinsey called The Time Trap. I read this book. As I read it, I underlined it and extracted notes like I do. I decided to put together a little sheet for it. I'll share that because it was a goldmine. I made a list of every single thing that I do in a day, over a three month period, because each day I had sometimes different things to do. But I wrote down everything I might be doing in those three months in a day. I just wrote them all down. And I don't mean broad generalities like marketing or this type of thing or radiographs or whatever. I mean, the actual actions. The actual moment by moment actions I do in those categories. I made a list of those and it was a big list. And I looked at it. Then right next that list, every single thing I did from the time I woke up to the time I went to bed, everything —  home, personal, professional. I wanted to know what my day looked. I want to be an honest, objective view of what am I actually doing with my day. Because if I want to create my life the way I want, I've got to take a look at what I'm actually doing because if I'm not doing things that give me the results, no wonder I'm not getting there.  I made that list, and right next to it, in column number two of six columns is how much does it produce per hour. Which is a measure of actually meeting somebody's need as a service and people willing to pay. How much is that produced per hour? And that was humbling because there are whole lot of stuff that I will do without pay. I was minoring in majors and majoring in minors. I was doing all kinds of stuff that was just cost, no return. I stopped and I looked at that, and that was humbling, and frustrating, and a bunch of stuff went through my mind. I mean, I just, but I had to be honest to myself, what does it actually produce? I extrapolate. If I spent two hours on it, what is it per hour? Cut it in half. If I spent 30 minutes, I’d double the number to get an idea what it is per hour. There's a lot of stuff that was not making anything and there was a few things that were making a lot.  The third column I wrote down, how much meaning does it have? How much is it that makes me inspired to get up and do it? I can't wait to do what people can't wait to get. Those are the things I want to target. So I looked at it on a one to ten scale, how much meaning it was. I made a list on a one to ten scale of every one of those items, how inspired am I to do that? And there's a lot of stuff on there that was not inspiring, that I didn't want to do. I thought, 'Hell. I went to ten years of college for this?' I made this list and I put this one to ten thing. And then I prioritised the tens down to the ones. I prioritise productivity down from the ones that made thousands of dollars an hour to nothing an hour. I just prioritise them. And then I looked. There were some that were overlapped, where the thing that was most meaningful and inspiring match where it’s most productive. I prioritise that based on the two together. And that was really eye opening. Then I went to the next one because I realised that if I don't delegate, I'm trapped. Then I put what does it cost? Every cost. Not just salary, but training costs, no hiring costs, parking costs, insurance costs, everything. What is the cost of somebody excelling at doing what it is I'm doing at a greater job than me? What would it cost? On every one of those items? The best I could do? I had to just guess on something, but I definitely did the best I could.  And then I prioritise that based on spread, how much it produced versus how much it cost. Then I put another column. How much time am I actually spending on average? The final column, I wrote down, what are my final priorities with all these variables? I did a very thorough prioritisation system there. I sliced those into ten layers. I put a job description, I put a job description on that bottom layer, and hired somebody to do that but bottom layer. It took me three people to get the right person because I had to learn about hiring. I didn't know how about, hiring. I finally got the first person there, and that was free. That allowed me to go up a notch. And then I hired the next layer. What I did is it allowed me to go and put more time into the thing to produce the most, which was actually sharing a message of what I was doing publicly, with speaking. Public speaking was my door opener. I just kept knocking out layers.In the next 18 months, my business tenfold in increase in income and business. I had 12 staff members and five doctors working for me in a 5000 square foot office from under 1000 square foot original office in 18 months. Because I said goodbye to anything that weighed me down. Anytime you do something that's lower on your values, and anytime something hone your value value yourself and the world values you when you value. It's waiting for you just to get authentic and live by the highest values, which is your ideological identity. The thing you really revolve around you. Mine was teaching, so I call myself a teacher, right? So whatever that highest value is, if you prioritise your day and fill your day with high priority actions that inspire you, it doesn't fill up with low party distractions that don't, because it's now you're allowing yourself to be authentic. And it doesn't cost to properly delegate if you get the right people, and you go on and do what produces more per hour, it doesn't cost it makes sense. Lisa: That's the hard part, isn't it? As is growing. Dr John: You do your responsibilities. Go do the thing that knocks down the doors and goes and does the deals and then go and let them do all the crazy work. Like when I was 27, that's the last time I ever wrote a check or did payroll or looked at bills. I never looked at that again. Because that's a $20 an hour job and I could make way more speaking and doing my doctrine. So I thought, 'I'm not doing anything that's going to devalue me ever again in my life.' I've never gone back. 38 years, I've never gone back. Lisa: So systematise. This is a thing here, where I have a bit of a problem, a bit of a chaos, right? Dr John: I'm an ignoramus when it comes to anything other than research, write, travel, and teach. I'm useless. I'm not. I do jokes and say when I'm having I want to make love with my girlfriend. I tell her. I put my arms around I said, 'If I was to organise and have Hugh Jackman or Brad Pitt take care of lovemaking for you on my behalf and things like that, would you still love me?' One time if she said, 'No, I will still love you more.' I'm joking. That’s a joke. But the point is that if you're not delegating lower priority things, you're trapped. Lisa: And this is the dilemma, I think, of small businesses is giving that mix right and not taking on people before you can go to that next level. Dr John: But you go. You go to the next level by taking them on if it's done properly. Lisa: If it's done properly, because I've- Dr John: You want to make sure. That's why I have a value determination process on my website to determine the values of people I hire because if they're not inspired to do what I need to delegate, that's not the right person.You gotta have the right people on the bus, this column says. I have to be clear about what I can produce if I go and do these other things. And me speaking it, and doing the doctoring on the highest priority patients was way more productive financially than me doing those other things. So once I got on to that, I put somebody in place just to book speeches, and just to make sure that I was scheduled and filled my day with schedules with patients, it was a updated day and night. I've never gone back to that. I only research, write, travel, teach. That's it. Lisa: That's my dream. I'm gonna get there. Dr John: I don't do it. What's interesting is I became financially independent doing that because of that. I learned that if I don't value myself, and I don't pay myself, other people aren't going to pay me. If they're waiting for you to value you add when you value you, the world values you. You pay yourself first, other people pay you first. It's a reflection, economically, there. And that's what allowed me to do it. Because financial independence isn't for debauchery and for the fun life, in my opinion. It's for making sure that you get to do what you love because you love it not because you have to do it. Lisa: And having an impact on the world. But if you're stuck doing the admin and the technical, logical stuff, and the crap that goes along with the business. You're not impacting the world like you want to be impacting. Dr John: Weel, the individual that does the administration is impacting the world through the ripple effect by giving you the freedom to do it. Lisa: Exactly. Dr John: If that's what they love doing. That’s not what I love doing. But there are people that love administration, they love that stuff and love behind the scenes, I love doing that. Finding those people. That's the key. Lisa: Finding those people. I's given me a bit of encouragement because I've been in that sort of groundhog days I had to get through the ceiling and get to the next level of reach. Dr John: I finally realised that the cost of hiring somebody is insignificant compared to the freedom that it provides if you do your priority. Lisa: If you get your stuff right, and know what you… Dr John: Because the energy, your energy goes up the second you're doing what you love doing. And that draws business to you. Lisa: Absolutely. I mean, like doing what we're doing. Now, this is my happy place.  Dr John: We’re both in our element. This is why we're probably going to slow down. The point is, when you're doing something you love to do, when you're on fire, with kind of an enthusiasm, people come around to watch you burn. They want to see you on fire.  Lisa: I mean, they do, they do. And I've seen that in times in my life where I've been preparing for a big race or something, and I need sponsors. I just go out there.  At the start, I didn't know how to do a sponsored proposal, I didn't know how to do any of that fancy stuff. I just went out there and told the story. And by sharing the story, people were like, 'I want to get on board with this. That's exciting.' People would come on in and and when you don't know, one of the things that I've found in life is the less you know, sometimes the more audacious you are. When you actually h

In 2008, the economy had tanked and John McDonald was left at a crossroads. Rather than withdraw into comfort, he took the opportunity to do something a bit crazy. John was a woodworker who spent time at trade shows, and someone once suggested that he make cabinet doors that fit with IKEA cabinets. With nothing to lose, John launched Semihandmade to do just that. Now, a decade later, Semihandmade has seen consistent double-digit growth year over year and has been featured in countless blogs, interior design social posts, on the feeds of influencers worldwide, and in the homes of tens of thousands of people. On this episode of Up Next in Commerce, John tells the story from start to finish, including how he built a successful ecommerce custom cabinet model on the backs of the IKEA brand, and how he’s now launching into the DTC space with the first US-made custom cabinet DTC offering, BOXI. From finding the right partners, to building an omnichannel approach that doesn’t handcuff your resources, to challenging yourself to strive for more, you’ll learn something from John and his story that just might help you level up your ecommerce business, too.  Main Takeaways:Perfect Partners: For ecommerce brands taking on an omnichannel approach, there is no reason to tie up a lot of your resources into retail spaces and showrooms. Instead, exploring partnership opportunities with other brands in a similar category might be a mutually beneficial way to expand your brand, the brand you partner with, and offer an in-store experience to customers who seek one.Meeting the Moment: The world of home furnishings and interior design is changing rapidly, especially as A.I. and VR technology enter the marketplace. With that tech, users are gaining more flexibility to design their own spaces without leaving home, which means there is an opening for DTC companies that are tech-first. Step Up or Step Out: You can’t let competition scare you, let it inspire you to raise your game. By surrounding yourself with the best and forcing yourself to compete against them, you have to level up to simply survive, and succeed expectations to grow your business in a meaningful way.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. Welcome back to Up Next In Commerce. This is your host, Stephanie Postles, Cofounder at Mission.org. Today, I had the pleasure of chatting with John McDonald, the Founder and CEO at Semihandmade and also Boxi. John, welcome.John:Thanks for having me. It's great to be here.Stephanie:I'm really excited to have you on. Before we get started, I was hoping you could give me a little background, and for anyone who doesn't know what Semihandmade is and also Boxi, how did you start it? What is it? How do I think about it?John:Sure. Semihandmade is a company that's been around, I guess, just over 10 years now. We're based in Southern California. We make doors that fit IKEA cabinets. What that means is, if you want to buy a kitchen, bathroom, closet media system, IKEA, for the most part, gives you the amazing flexibility of not buying their doors. For a kitchen, you'd buy the cabinets, you'd buy the interior components. Then we have over 40 different options from entry level doors to some really high-end, one-of-a-kind offerings.Stephanie:I love that. Do I think of it like white labeling? You take IKEA's [inaudible] and then you can add like rose gold fixtures on it, yeah?John:Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. The credit, obviously, goes back to IKEA. This is an ever expanding ecosystem that's been around probably for 15 years now. People that make amazing slipcovers that you can put on their sofas. People that make furniture legs, companies like us that make fantastic cabinet doors. It's a way to get a really high-end look for a really mid-level price.Stephanie:Cool.John:I'm even fortunate to grow quite a bit with that.Stephanie:That's great. How did you come to this idea?John:I'm always honest and clear that this was ... It's a spectacular idea that somebody gave to me.Stephanie:Who gave it to you?John:I think his name is David Stewart. I think he's a photographer. Look, I'm 53. I don't know if I'm older than a lot of the people you talk to.Stephanie:A little.John:I came to things a little bit later. I had moved to California from the East Coast when I was 21. Well, wanted to get rich and famous, work in the film business, didn't really have any kind of plan, bounced around with that, was writing, not making any money like everybody else I knew waiting tables. Then I woke up in my early 30s and said, I got to do something with my life. It was post 9/11, which is a wake-up call for a lot of people. I tried a bunch of different things. Then I somehow landed in woodworking and furniture making at first and cabinetry. I got good at it.John:Through the late '90s and early 2000s, that's what I was doing, Southern California based custom furniture and cabinetry company called Handmade. I worked hard. I approached it like a business into my late 30s, which was different than a lot of other people I knew, the craftspeople, spectacular artists, but just no head for business, no interest in business. I always looked at it like as a business like any other. That's what I was doing through, again, the early 2000s. I was networking and blogs just started to happen. I was doing a lot of woodworking shows but also design shows. At one of those design shows in 2008, I think somebody came up to me, this guy randomly and said, "Have you ever thought about making doors for IKEA cabinets?"Stephanie:Was that something that others were doing? Why did he have that idea? Then was like, I'm going to tell John to do that.John:It's interesting. Again, I always want to give credit where credit is due. On top of him, there was a company called Scherr's based in North Dakota that has been making doors for IKEA cabinets just a little bit prior to that. People are always making their own doors as well. It is because IKEA lets you not buy doors when you buy their kitchens. I don't know why he mentioned it. I think part of it was because when I did those shows, it was a show called Whelan Design, which is a great show in Southern California at the time and back when Dwell magazine was really in its heyday and just an iconic brand.John:I was always like the one off independent company. It was me and all the big brands. It would be like Kohler and Caesarstone and Sub-Zero. I was there alongside them with my little custom furniture setup. I don't know if he took a liking to me, but we just spent that day, the Friday and then the following day just talking about it. I had no idea what he was talking about at first.Stephanie:That's awesome. Then for people listening, I know when I first heard of your brand and was looking through it. I'm like, oh, it's just like a small thing, a big thing. Then I was looking through some of the stats and you've been named like the fastest growing private company every year by Inc. magazine [inaudible].John:Well, yeah, one of. Yeah, one of many. Inc. 500 originally, we've been on that list, I think, six or seven years now.Stephanie:You've had double digit growth for almost a decade, year every year.John:Yeah. It's exciting. It's, again, one of many things. I try to be candid and clear, but I never expected this. I never thought in a million years I'd be doing this. Every year that we were fortunate to grow, even my ambition or dreams, it got bigger. It's like get to a million, get to two million, get to five million. It's been exciting. Believe me, I don't take it for granted. That's why I enjoy doing things like this, because I always ... At 40, I was newly divorced. I didn't have any kids at the time. I have a son now. He was nine. I lived in my shop for a year, because I got divorced.John:I didn't have anywhere to live. I had options, but I wanted to hide. I lived in my woodworking shop. I lived on my sofa with my dog. I just said, I got to do something else. It was a huge wakeup call. Then that's when the conversation I had, I think, six to nine months prior. It was like, maybe I should try this. Again, in terms of the second acts in life, whatever, I was 40 and had no clue. 10 years later, more than 10 years later, it's different.Stephanie:Yeah, that's very inspirational. Cool to hear about and cool to see where you can start and where it can grow to. How did you grow the company? From starting out where you're woodworking, you're building stuff, and then you're like, okay, I'm going to buy IKEA stuff and make it better. How did you get in front of people and be found in general?John:Like anything, Stephanie, it's like you look back on it and as much as it was, a long journey at times were so challenging, whatever. You get through it, and you gloss over it. It's only when conversations like this that I do get an opportunity to look back. The reality was, again, I had a nice custom furniture cabinetry business. I had some really good clients. I work with some good architects and designers. Then in 2008, the market tanked. Everybody went in the dumpster. I had to do something else. Things had slowed down.John:I started saying to a couple designers and architects, "What if we try to do integrate some IKEA cabinetry into the custom project." Because at the end of the day, a box is a box, and you're just going to see the outside of the beautiful panels and the doors. There were a few people that took a chance on that. That's how it ... It's like anything. I was 100% custom in 2009. Then it's like, okay, you can start mixing it in and starting to organically ... I don't even know what kind of ... I wasn't doing advertising. Blogs had just taken off.John:Apartment therapy had seen see me at a design show and written about me, which was amazing. That was a really big deal. L.A. Times did a story on me, which is incredible. Yet it was always organic. Through 2010 and 2011, it became, okay, now we're doing half custom, half IKEA. Then every year, it's a little bit more headed towards full IKEA. The truth is, I don't know when it was, maybe 2013, when it was fully just making doors for IKEA. It was fun. It was always a steady progression, always growing every year.Stephanie:Yeah, sustainably growing, which is a lot different than a lot of the brand.John:Yeah, profitable every year. Beginning, doubling every year, which, again, was not what I expected. Part of that, what's funny too is I have a lot of incredibly supportive family, but also friends, guys that I grew up with. When I was in California at 21, or 22, or 29, or whatever, they were amazing. They love me. They were supportive, but they probably had no clue where I was headed. I didn't either. Now, it's fun. I gave them a hard time constantly about the fact that they probably gave up on me.John:Not in a bad way, but it's just ... I mean, I do think that there is a time to cash in your chips. It's great to have dreams. There was an interesting like Scott Galloway kind of thing recently about if you should follow your dream. His overly simplistic thing is definitely do not follow your dream. Because unless you're willing to pay your bills to start because following just exclusively your dream can be incredibly impractical. The people that you admire, suddenly, the people that I admire weren't these head up in the clouds kind of people. They worked really hard. I geek out on founder stories, things, podcasts like this. I'm fascinated by that. It's never an overnight thing, or at least it's rarely. Again, I'm 53 now. This is all house money.Stephanie:Wow, that's awesome. When you started, getting more money, you're doubling growth, more revenue, obviously. Where did you invest? How did you think about investing that? Because I'm sure you're like, woo-hoo! I'm going to go have fun now.John:No.Stephanie:No?John:It was never like that, no. It's interesting. I would say I like nice things like some people do. I'm pretty frugal. In terms of the business, everything lives inside the business. I had a partner at that point. Up until three years ago, we made everything in-house. I was the original guy making the doors and packing them up and then shipping them in New York or different places. Then my partner at the time, Ivan, came on board. He was the guy cutting the doors. Now, we were fortunate to grow.John:Eventually, we had close to 35, I think 35 or 40 people that were working in production. Up until three years ago, we topped out at 75 people and half of them were making products. Now I'm proud to say we don't make anything in-house. Everything, it's made around the US, some at the top manufacturers in the country. That was a huge shift. To answer your question, everything is in the business. That's why you see revenue numbers are different than other things.Stephanie:Yeah. What were some mistakes maybe that you remember where you're like, ooh, I would have avoided this if I were to do it again, or especially in the more maybe the past five years or something. Not early on when you're just ...John:Right. If we're going to say 10 years ago, the mistakes that I made were unavoidable in the sense that I was creating this out of thin air. Ivan and I were just making stuff up as we went along. We were two guys. He's a little bit younger than me. He came out from Boston. I came out from Philadelphia to be writers. In some ways, no business starting this kind of business. In the last five years, it's probably the mistakes that I've made are ... I don't know, maybe waiting too long to really build up the team, which is not to say that we didn't have good people, we did.John:Part of my job now is just looking at the next 12 months and 18 months and say, hopefully, where are we going to be? Where do we think we're going to be? What are we going to need then? As someone who is ... Again, I think pretty honest about their limitations or whatever, we only thrive with people that are smarter, better, or more experienced than me. That's one of the biggest changes in the last at least six months, where we really just hit the gas and brought in some really amazing complementary pieces.Stephanie:Yeah, cool. How do you think about building on top of another company? What if IKEA changes their cabinet line or does something different, did that ever worry you, building a business that's ... I mean, a lot of businesses are built on another businesses, obviously. How did you think about that?John:We've always been after market. With IKEA, it's pretty well documented. We've gone up and down with them. I think in most ways, they appreciate what we do. Certainly, it's undeniable that we sell kitchens that people wouldn't normally buy if we weren't available. They also, I think, hate a little bit that we're there. I don't know this is arrogant or anything to say. They're not going to change their model because of us. They're never going to not sell doors. Even if they did, I would say to people like, "Then just buy the doors that literally cost $2."John:Then we'll pay for them and recycle. Their model is that a la carte wide range of pricing. We've always been respectful. Again, I have immense respect for them and what they built. It's extraordinary. Even when my fiancé and I moved into a new house and it's like going there, buying the basics for the house, it's just nobody can beat it [inaudible].Stephanie:Yup. I'm doing that now as well. I think, like you said, you're opening up a market that they probably wouldn't have access, otherwise. When I'm about finishing this house now, I honestly would not have thought to go to IKEA to get cabinets. I don't know. Then when I saw you guys, I'm like, oh, well then you can have the finishings and the colors and the things that I actually want. I don't actually care what a cabinet is like inside or behind the scenes, but I care about how it looks. A lot of the IKEA stuff does look like you know sometimes.John:Yeah, it's understandable. Because at that scale, you can't get that fancy and creative. This is the part where I drop names, just in the sense that what I do love is we work with some really cool people that do make IKEA more accessible. It is people like Karlie Kloss and Coco Rocha and all kinds of celebrities and high end designers and influencers. They, more so than us, have normalized IKEA. That's good for everybody. If design is supposed to be democratic and accessible to everybody, there's nothing more accessible than IKEA. Obviously, Amazon, Wayfair, and things like that.Stephanie:Walmart? Walmart is coming back. I have bought rugs now, a little egg wicker chair. It's from following influencers. I'm like, Walmart is coming back.John:You're right. It's funny, because the same thing with my fiancé, Stephanie. Yesterday, she was looking at different coffee tables. She said, "This is ... " She showed me a thing. I was like, "That's awesome." She said, "Oh, it's like the Kelly Clarkson line." I was like, "This is great." It's true. Look, certainly, you can make the argument that some of that stuff is more disposable and it's going to go into a landfill and less sustainable. I understand that. The reality is, not everyone has the same access to disposable. If you can get cool stuff, it's reasonably priced and it lasts for a few years. I don't know. It's hard to turn that down.Stephanie:You mentioned that you partner with influencers and celebrities. How does that relationship work?John:Yeah. I think that's always been a huge differentiator for us, one of several things. From the start, I always felt no self-consciousness about reaching out to people. Whether it was blogs, I would say, "This is what we're doing. Here are some photos. I'd love for you to write about us." Or even influencers. The biggest one and the one that we worked with the most is Sarah Sherman Samuel. We've had a door line with Sarah for three years. That's a situation where, god, I think 2014 or 2015, she reached out and said, "Hey, I bought a bungalow in Venice. I love IKEA cabinets.John:I wonder if we could partner on some doors." We did a small collaboration, gave her a tiny discount. She painted the doors. She styled everything. She took photography. The kitchen went completely viral. It's one of those kitchens that is everywhere. I think a really cool Farrow & Ball paints, brass and mixture of this light green and white. That just opened the door to all these other relationships. People saw that and started reaching out to us. It's been an amazing thing. The truth is, we've gotten to a point where we've had to pull back on that because it's just a different way to market the brand. It can be expensive. It's definitely grown us, there's no doubt about it.Stephanie:Have you thought about Netflix series? I'm just thinking, wow, they should be on a home remodel type of show. How perfect is that? People always trying to do amazing things on a budget on like the HGTV [inaudible].John:Yeah. We've talked about that stuff in the past. I like that stuff. Again, I don't know. I do think it's interesting our growth. That's how I always look at things, behind the scenes of how businesses grow, especially within that. I do like someone we haven't worked with in a while, the Studio McGee, the Netflix series, which is great. That's really interesting, especially after listening to another podcast like our friends at Business of Home, where ... I left the podcast with so much more respect.John:Because my interaction with them was a long time ago, and then I just see the photos and the beautiful stuff. Just the growth that they've had and the behind the scenes, and again, hearing their story is really extraordinary. I enjoy watching that stuff. I don't know if I want to watch this. I get sick of hearing myself talk. Maybe if it's everybody else, that might work.Stephanie:Yeah. I was just thinking like, wow, that'd be a really good partnership strategy. I always bring up the Container Store partnership that they had on the Netflix series and just how much Container Store sales went up after that series.John:[inaudible]Stephanie:I can see why, same thing with cabinets and stuff.John:Yeah, it's interesting. Because even that, again, I'm a lot older than you, but in the early '90s, whenever Trading Spaces came on and that was huge like ...Stephanie:I watch Trading Spaces, just to be clear.John:I mean, even in the '80s, the godfather of that is like Bob Vila in this old house. That's definitely before your time. That was restoring amazing New England homes and stuff. It was master carpenter, Norm. I think Norm Abram is absolute craftsman. That was the start. Then you had Trading Spaces. Even now, you would have thought, after 10 years, that goes away, and it hasn't. That's the thing. Is it the ladies like Home Edit and stuff like that? I don't know. It hasn't evaded, it just only grown. Obviously, Chip and Joanna Gaines and the dynasty that they have built. It doesn't show any sign of stopping.Stephanie:Yeah. It seems like the world is now just moving to a more curated collections like I'm going to look for someone who knows my style, so I don't have to waste time looking at everything. Whereas before, it's like, oh, I'm going to go to Target to get this, and then I'm going to go to Dollar Tree to get this. I make it up. I think, 10 years ago is very much about DIY, but all over the place. Now, it's like, okay, I'm going to follow Chip and Joanna Gaines, their line at Target, whatever that is, and follow the people that I know are my style and be ready to immerge myself in that brand.John:Yeah. The interesting, whether it's the 180 to that is the amount of growth that Restoration Hardware has had, where it's just almost like meteoric, being a complete luxury brand and selling the whole experience. It is like the Ralph Lauren of today, and now as they move towards hospitality restaurants and sounds like hotels. Part of your brain thinks, man, you can't sustain that. How do you keep growing? There is a market for that. Even when you watch the Studio McGee, their services are not expensive. Amber Interiors, who we work with, people like that, incredibly talented, at the really high end of the market. They keep growing.Stephanie:Yup. Tell me a bit about your omnichannel approach. I saw that you had showrooms around the country. Then you're, obviously, online as well. Now you're moving into DTC. How do you think about keeping a cohesive story of your brand but also expanding and reaching a lot of people on different channels?John:I guess the biggest challenge, if it is the biggest, it's just the fact that what we're selling comes at a higher price point than the average online purchase. We sell certainly, if you're doing a GODMORGON bathroom vanity, that then may cost $150, $300, $400. We're selling cabinet doors and panels and complementary trim and things like that that can cost $3,000, $5,000, $20,000. Again, it's not buying a pair of Warby's or an Olay bag for a couple hundred bucks. There's a lot to it, a lot of back and forth. Excuse me.John:Showrooms we're always a part of we've got to show people our product, especially when we're asking them to spend that much. The benefit of IKEA is, even though they're still a privately held company, there are only, I think, less than 60 around the US. What I could say to people to say to you, Stephanie, or wherever, like you're in New York, go to one of the five local IKEAs. Then come into our mini ... I never want to call it a showroom, because it could be 200 square feet. It's got some cabinetry in it. It's got door samples, things like that. There would be a whole experience.John:I would always say, if you want to see a kitchen, go to IKEA and you can see 15 kitchens or see 20 kitchens. Want to see the doors? Come see us. We've had that in New York, in Brooklyn, in Chicago, obviously, in LA, Minneapolis, a bunch of different places. Again, trying to be reasonable about that. I don't want the overhead of signing leases if I don't have to. What we've typically done and we will continue to do even more so is partner with other great brands. It is like a multi-brand approach.John:With our lighting friends, with hardware companies like Rejuvenation, Fireclay Tile, upcoming collaboration with Caesarstone, it's partnering with Cambria in the past. It's just saying, let's do this collectively. Because the kitchen is, as someone said to me, "The base purchase, if you're fortunate to have him as a house, there's a car, and then maybe there's your kitchen." We're trying to grow the company that way. We started what I think is an amazing ... I got to [inaudible] blog anymore. It's that. [inaudible] stories that launched last summer.John:That was the idea that I wanted to bring together all these great writers, great content to help promote the brand, of course, but also expand us, again, to make that cliché to becoming a lifestyle brand. On the one hand, it would be enough to have a really successful cabinet door company. I just think we have the opportunity to do so much more. That's what something else we can talk about, is this brand Boxi, which is going to launch at the beginning of March. That really is direct to consumer. That's our own product, no IKEA. That's a whole different thing for us.Stephanie:Alright. Let's move there next after my one thought. I've many ideas when talking to you now.John:Awesome.Stephanie:What about having like partnering with IKEA on their AR app or developing your own AR app, instead of having to have a showroom, being going to IKEA, pull up your phone, and then you can swipe through the designs of ours, and you can see exactly what that trim would look like, what that doorknob or whatever, so then you eliminate showroom.John:It is interesting. Look, the thing with IKEA, they have partnered with people in the past. Obviously, places like Target have done an amazing job of that completely. As you said, Walmart too.. It always seem like the natural fit with us. If you were going to do it with anybody, it would be us. In terms of AI, yeah. IKEA has been slow and is put a huge push in the last couple years of their online presence and their economy. They have an app they launched last month. What we are doing with the new brand is working with a 3D AI company called Skip. It's going to launch in the next few months. That lets you basically not go in showrooms.John:There are ways to order this new line of cabinets, and one of them is to make an appointment and someone comes to your house and 3D scans your room. Then you design remotely. With 80 hours of AI and machine learning and everything else, it's compressing that and then presenting you with design options.Stephanie:That's cool.John:That's where we're headed. All has changed dramatically in the last year. COVID or not, it was headed towards that. The new iPhones have the camera technology where you can almost do that. Maybe in 12 to 15 months, you don't even need a guy to come to your house. You can do it with your iPhone. They're already pretty close.Stephanie:Yeah, I think it's fair. I have a little tape measure app on my phone and it says, okay, scan the whole room. You do that and then you can measure everything. The placeholders all around the room for you and [inaudible].John:Yeah, it's fascinating. Even brands like Primer that launched last year, which do the work with other brand partners, and you want to click on like the Hygge and West Wallpaper, you can hold it up to your wall. They'll show you different swatches and things like that. It's interesting. For us, yeah, that is part of what we think is a differentiator. IKEA is always going to have massive brick and mortar. Even though they move in some cities towards smaller footprints, it's still footprints that are 20,000 to 150,000, as opposed to 300,000. There's another cabinet line that's launching.John:It just launched, it's got a 30,000 square foot showroom on the East Coast and 100 kitchens. You go in and wear the AR or the VR goggles. That's completely different because you're looking at some space that has nothing to do with yours. It's kind of what you're saying. The point is, things are changing so fast. With Boxi, it is saying, can you make this as DTC as possible? The caveat being, it could cost $10,000 to $15,000, to $20,000. It's not like ...Stephanie:Okay. Tell me what is Boxi then since we [crosstalk].John:Boxi is the first American direct to consumer cabinet brand. It's a cabinet system for the entire home. It's basically taking the last 10, 11 years of everything we've learned from IKEA and saying, let's try and offer something. I don't know, if it's ... I don't want to say better than IKEA. Because again, I've huge respect for them. It's a more complete package. Certainly, the quality is there. The accessibility is there. One of many things that we're going to improve on is the fact that Semihandmade customers have to go to IKEA first.John:It's a two-part process where you've got to go to IKEA. You've got to order the cabinets and hardware. Then you've got to order the doors from us. Thank God that they do, but especially in the last year, IKEA, like a lot of people, has suffered horribly with supply chain issues. We have customers now, unfortunately, it's January, they're hearing, cabinet boxes might not be available for three, four, or five months because ...Stephanie:I ordered a couch from Pottery Barn and four months out. [crosstalk] order, I just didn't look, I guess.John:As a business, on a personal level, that annoys me because I want ... That's a whole thing. We have such ridiculous expectations because they're easily met or they have been up until now. Not to blame Amazon because that's too easy. I'm a hypocrite about Amazon too. With Boxi, we're saying, no big box stores. Somebody can come to you, things ship, leave the factory in a week. Part of what we're doing, you're from Palo Alto, I don't know if you're born there, but it's almost like an In-N-Out Burger West Coast approach. Meaning we're going to do a limited number of items, and we're going to do it great. If you want ...John:What they do is they're great. What's interesting about that is they ... I think just little background on burgers. I think the founder was best friends with Carl Karcher who started Carl's Jr., another big West Coast place. In the '50s, they open hamburger stands right next to each other. The In-N-Out guy's thing was always, I'm not worried about competition. You're welcome to open across the street from me, next door, or whatever, because I'm just going to bury you. I'll just be that much better. Not like in an obnoxious, overly competitive way. Just like, this is going to raise our game. With us, with Boxi, yeah, limited selection, fast turnaround ships in a week, never need to go to a big box store. It's built in the US at a really competitive price point. That's the idea.Stephanie:I love that it's built in the US. I think that a lot of companies right now are bringing things back into the US and some are struggling seeing how expensive things can be and what was happening overseas and maybe how it's just different here. What did you guys learn from IKEA that you're taking with you? Then what are you discarding where you're like, we're going to do this different though?John:Again, in some ways, I learned everything from IKEA. Look, I learned a couple things. One of them is you can't compete with them in terms of pricing. That's the most basic thing. I always say like, with Amazon, the same thing, you can't ... I mean, then the turnaround lead time. Up until recently, with COVID, you could buy a kitchen today and bring it home today. Nobody else could do that at a crazy price. Best of all, really high quality. IKEA, to their credit, pretty much every year, as long as I can remember, the last 10 years, is right at the top of like J.D. Power customer satisfaction in terms of quality, customer service, things like that.John:You could complain about certain products from IKEA and their quality, but their kitchens, I think, are inarguable. As much as I'm not affiliated with them directly, I always get defensive when people would slag them. Because it's also understanding that the product that they offer, and this blows some Americans minds, but it's a particleboard core with a melamine skin, a three-quarter melamine box. That standard in the entire world for kitchen cabinets. The most expensive cabinet brands in the world are constructed the same way.John:In the US, that's less the case because 70% of the market wants a frame around their cabinet. It's literally a face frame cabinet. The European style that IKEA is called frameless 32 millimeter. Again, I've learned everything. We're deeply indebted to them.Stephanie:Well, is there anything that you're changing though now that you are exploring DTC that's [crosstalk]?John:Yeah. We'll always have the ability. With Semihandmade, one of the differentiators were ... You'll always have this when you're smaller, we're microscopic compared to them. It's just being able to be nimble, to be able to get more custom, to be able to offer certain versatility that they could never do. Limited run doors, ability to do appliance panels for really anything. The Semihandmade, we could always do that. We can do upgrades with matching ... We used to do open cabinets that match your doors and things like that. We do less of that now.John:With Boxi, what will be interesting is because the hope is anybody to scale and to have short lead times, quick turnaround, we're not going to offer as much customization. We've learned like what ... In terms of people's taste. We have eight doors, which are basically the biggest sellers for Semihandmade. It's basic white, gray, black, and some wood tones. It's not saying like we have at Semihandmade of 45 choices. That's fun to me. Because if anything, you can have too many options and that is paralyzing.Stephanie:Yup. Just going to say that I appreciate when things are curated or you showed me something cute and I'm just like, "I'll have that." Whatever that is, the white, the gold, and the brown, perfect. That's what I want. Not choose every single piece of it. Which I think is for a lot of ecommerce, that's what I've heard throughout many interviews, is don't give so many choices, show people what you think or know that they're going to want based off of preferences or how they're interacting with your site or whatever it may be.John:That's part of if there'd been multiple challenges with getting Boxi off the ground understandably. I think the biggest one is like you said, with even a call today, there was seven of us on the screen and I said, "If the seven of us were the typical technology guys or girls that knew nothing about socks, but we're launching a socks brand, we wouldn't bring all this baggage to it about what we thought we knew." With Semihandmade, we have all this great knowledge, but some of it can get in the way with the new brand.John:Because the new brand, for it to really work, you can't do all the customization. There are certain things that Semihandmade where we'll make exceptions and we'll do things. Of course, you always want to service the customer, first and foremost. It's just recognizing that if the goal is for this really to take off and grow, which I think it will, we have to be a little stricter, a little more brand fidelity, like say, this is who we are, this is how we get to where we want to go, and then stick to that.Stephanie:Yeah, that seems tricky. Having two different hats where you and your team are like, we know what works, this is what works, we build a company that does this. Then having a slow creep where you turn the other brand into the same thing. Like you said, you have to really be strict about creating a whole new company with a new vision and making sure everyone's on board and not just let the old company creep in and [crosstalk].John:I think in some ways too, whether in a good way or a bad way, the fact that we've been fortunate to have growth and success for Semihandmade, it's either made it easier or harder to get the new venture off. Because it buys you certain time. If we were a startup, we raised funding. We've got 18 months to runway all these different things that will be different. Probably, things have taken longer. On the other hand, we wouldn't have been able to do it. When this launches, what we leverage is, yeah, it's 10 years of Semihandmade. It's 25,000 projects. It's incredible.John:We have 2,000 semipro designers around the country that are champing at the bit to offer this. It's relationships we've got with Rejuvination and Kaff appliances and Caesarstone that are going to be partners. I continue to remind people and even myself like if we were a startup, we'd never have this stuff. We wouldn't have five, six amazing influencer projects that you're going to roll out in the next six weeks with the new launch. You'd be launching and then keeping your fingers crossed.Stephanie:Yeah, yeah. Okay, cool. Alright, so let's move over to the lightning round. The lightning round is brought to you by Salesforce Commerce Cloud. This is where I'm going to ask you a question and you have one minute or less, prepare, get your water, [inaudible], shake it out, do what you got to do. Alright, are you ready, John?John:Yup.Stephanie:Alright. What one thing will have the biggest impact on ecommerce in the next year?John:That's great question. Do I have a minute for this?Stephanie:Yeah, a minute.John:I think it depends. I'm cynical about the fact that in some ways, yeah, a lot of companies have taken off, Instacart and things like that, but even like Wayfair. I was reading Bed Bath & Beyond today. I think the question is whether or not that'll be sustained. When life comes back to normal, which hopefully, inevitably will, certainly, people will be more inclined to shop online. There's no doubt about that. The world is changing. It's not going to go back. There are companies that have gotten a little frothier or whatever that I think that artificial is going to wear off. It's normalized.John:It's great. There's stuff I would have never done. Even with not ecomm, but with Zoom, we hired a new president, Beth and Molly, who runs marketing and stuff. I hired three of our highest people remotely. They're based in New York. I would have never done that. I would never trusted people or trusted myself. Now, it's normal.Stephanie:Yeah. I was slow with grocery delivery and curbside pickup. It forced me to do that because I was the one who always want to go to the grocery store, look around with my friends, whatever it maybe. Now, I'm like, oh, I don't really want to go there anymore. There's no point. I'll save my time and do other things.John:It is amazing. To me, it's more interesting to see how those people make money. That's the part where it's one thing to do great revenue. Obviously, profitability is a thing, unless it's not your money, unless you have a thing too. When it is your money, it's much more of a focus.Stephanie:Yeah. We just had someone from Intel on who was saying that they work with a hardware store and they're struggling because contractors were coming in and placing 40, 50 item orders for curbside pickup.John:All of it?Stephanie:Because they're like, why would I send in my contractor and paid him to be there for two to three hours when I could just have you all do it. They're struggling with trying to figure out the program because they weren't really expecting them.John:Yeah, that's interesting.Stephanie:I'm like, that's scary. What's the nicest thing anyone's ever done for you?John:Business wise or otherwise?Stephanie:Anything, whatever comes to mind.John:I guess the biggest cliché was my son's mom having my son. That's probably ...Stephanie:That's a good one. Having three kids, I appreciate that answer.John:I mean that from heart.Stephanie:Yeah, that's a good one. What's up next on your reading list?John:I constantly have five or six books I'm reading. That's interesting too, whether it's because I pursued writing for a long time. I haven't made the jump to eBooks. There are few writers that I correspond with on Twitter. Twitter is another thing that I didn't use that much before this. I've asked them like, "Well, what's the feeling on eBooks? Is it like cheating or whatever?" Of course, these guys and girls want to sell books. They're not considered cheating if you buy their eBook. The response I got from a bunch of them was, it's best in some ways for nonfiction.John:I read tons of nonfiction. I'm reading Say Nothing, which is a story about the troubles in Ireland. I'm finishing a great book on ecommerce called the Billion Dollar Brands book, something like that. That's spectacular. I've got so many. I'm reading a book on Chinatown, the making of the movie. I love a lot of different things. It is mainly. It's less fiction now. It is more nonfiction.Stephanie:Very cool. What is your favorite cabinet design? What's in your house?John:My house, it's interesting. Because in my house that I share with my son who I split custody with, we have a more contemporary kitchen. It's walnut. It's unique. We sell a fair amount of walnut and it is one of a kind. Every kitchen is different. That's a little more contemporary, even though it's wood. It's contemporary. In the house with my fiancé, where she lives, that's a more traditional. It's a shaker kitchen. It's got some really pretty hardware. I guess I'm very particular about what I like. In general, even when we she and I have arguments about furniture, I just say like, "Buy something quality and it'll fit with everything else." I know it's a copout, but that's where I'm landed. I love eclectic as long as it's nice quality.Stephanie:Yeah, cool. Alright and then the last one, if you were to have a podcast, what would it be about? Who would your first guest be?John:That's a great question. I like a lot of probably IKEA. I like a lot of different things. Even podcasts, same thing. I didn't listen to before, frankly, a year ago. I listened to one the other day. Marc Maron was really talented, funny guy who've been doing podcast for about 10 years. He had this guy, Daniel Lanois, who's a big time record producer, did U2 and all kinds of amazing people. I was amazed at the depth of Maron's knowledge of music. I don't have that. I don't know. I like diverse things. I don't know if I could do it.John:Because I like to think I'm a good listener, but I'm probably not because I'm always ready to say something. Obviously, like in your spot or whatever, to do it well, you should be listening to people. Again, I love screenwriting podcasts. I like anything. I like news, podcasts.Stephanie:Okay, so it'd be a little bit of everything. I like that. That's cool.John:I could do this kind of thing. If we're talking about remodeling, if anything, would always have an edge to it. If I were going to do a show, that's the thing. I gravitate less, maybe not towards Gordon Ramsay, but like Anthony Bourdain. There would be an edge to it. It wouldn't be ... Even when I was inside people's houses, I don't know if I was combative. I had very strong opinions about with architects and designers and homeowners and what I thought they should want. The one thing I don't like is when it's all sweet and sacristy and artificial. Totally with an edge.Stephanie:I like that. That sounds good. Alright, John, well, this has been a pleasure having you on. Where can people find out more about you and your work?John:Sure. Semihandmade, we can do semihandmade.com. Then Boxi, which launches March 1st, is at boxiliving, B-O-X-I-L-I-V-I-N-G.com.Stephanie:Okay, thanks.John:I appreciate the time. This has been great.Stephanie:Yeah. Thanks so much for coming on. It was fun.John:Thanks for having me, Stephanie.

Billion dollar companies rely on competitive intelligence to stay ahead in their markets. What lessons can the rest of us take from how they use CI to make better decisions? This week on The Inbound Success Podcast, Cipher Systems VP of Marketing John Booth talks about what competitive intelligence is, and how companies can use it to inform decision making. Cipher's customers are some of the largest companies in the world, and they have highly specialized units dedicated exclusively to competitive intelligence. Not every company has the budget, or the team, to support that, so John explains what the rest of us should be looking at, and how we should use information about our competitors to develop marketing and business strategies. Highlights from my conversation with John include: Many marketers use the terms data, information and intelligence interchangeably, but they are very different things. Intelligence is the product of analyzing information and data, and it requires people to do it. There's also a lot of confusion around the difference between business intelligence, market intelligence and competitive intelligence. BI is the information you have within your own business, whereas MI is the information about what is happening in the market.  Competitive intelligence is information about your markets and also your competitors and how that influences your ability to sell within your markets or deliver the services that your business does. There are three kinds of software tools used in competitive intelligence: 1) Generic tools like Sharepoint or Google Alerts that can be used or many things: 2) Specific tools like Klue that are built to fulfill a very particular need, such as sales enablement; and 3) Purpose-built tools like Cipher's Knowledge360, which are built specifically for competitive intelligence professionals. Before any business engages in competitive intelligence, it should start by developing a deep understanding of its differentiators, strengths and weaknesses. Resources from this episode: Connect with John on LinkedIn Visit the Cipher Systems website Listen to the podcast to learn more about competitive intelligence and how businesses both large and small can use it to get an edge.   Transcript Kathleen Booth (Host): Welcome back to the Inbound Success Podcast. I'm Kathleen Booth and I'm your host. This week, my guest is none other than my husband John Booth. Welcome John. John Booth (Guest): Well, I mean, it only took 150 some odd episodes for me to get an invitation. Kathleen: Saving the best for last. So I don't know if my listeners know this, but John and I, so John and I used to own a marketing agency together for 11 years and somehow miraculously, we're still married. And when people ask me what he does now, I always say he does the same thing I do just at a different company. He is also a vice president of marketing. He is VP of marketing for a company called Cipher Systems, which is in the competitive intelligence space. So John, for those who may not know you, who may not know Cipher, can you just tell my audience a little bit about yourself as well as about Cipher systems and what it does? About John Booth and Cipher Systems John: Sure. So as Kathleen said, I was a part of our digital agency for about a dozen years or so. And before that I held different sales positions started out in the staffing world and then held lots of different positions there. But since Quintain, I have joined Cipher systems and Cipher is a small, there's probably about 20 of us now, competitive intelligence firm. John: And we'll give to the definition of that because it's, I think it's very important. I see a lot of similarities in the competitive intelligence to what I saw in the content inbound marketing world maybe 10 years ago. So it's it's a, it's a developing industry and I think more and more people within the organizations, particularly certainly larger organizations are finding the need for, and using competitive intelligence today. But so we have a classic kind of services side of the business. And, and then in addition to that, we have a technology or a software side of the business where we have a software platform. It's a cloud based competitive intelligence platform that acts as a knowledge management system, as well as the competitive intelligence tools for all of your competitive Intel and dashboards and reports and newsletters and, and information like that. Kathleen: And what kinds of companies does Cipher work with? John: So Cipher works with large organizations. So our ideal buyer has more than a billion dollars in revenue. Typically at least 5,000 employees, they're headquartered in the United States and they operate in industries that have one or one of two key kind of characteristics. The first is they're either highly regulated. So think financial services, insurance, healthcare, or the industries are incredibly competitive. So think about things like technology government contractors those types of industries. So those are, those are kind of the, the ingredients that make for the need for competitive intelligence. Kathleen: So side note, I just think it's really funny this doing this interview because I am interviewing you like I don't know the answers to these questions already. But everyone listening doesn't so I still need to ask them. So one of the reasons I wanted you to talk about who you work for or with the kinds of companies you work for is that, it's the thing that I have found interesting, kind of watching as you've worked there is that prior to you working at Cipher, you know, I was familiar with the field of competitive intelligence, you know, roughly but there are such different levels of it, right? I mean, the stuff that you guys do, like you were saying, it's really big companies that have, you know, the stakes are high. They have a lot to lose. It's highly competitive or regulated or this or that. It's serious business. And they have teams of people whose jobs are just to do competitive intelligence. And then you have like the kind of competitive intelligence that, that smaller companies do where you're like, I've got a Google alert on my competitor, you know, that sort of thing. And so it's, it's very interesting to me the different shades of it. So segwaying from that, you mentioned defining competitive intelligence. So like how do you guys see it? What is it, how do you define it? What is competitive intelligence? John: So so there are a couple of key definitions, just so the audience and, and the two of us are on kind of the same page here. So the first one is the difference between let's define data, information and intelligence. So an example of data might be the number three. Okay. So that is data. Alright. Information is a series of data pieces. So an example, a pretty example of information is a streetlight. So a streetlight has three different colored lights, right? Red, yellow, and green. All right. And so when red is on, I stop when yellow is, I slowed down or hit the gas. And when green is, I continue on my way. So that is, so that is information. So there's several different data points there. There's the number of lights, what the, the, the meaning of those lights. Intelligence is the product of analysis. So intelligence requires people today. So so you might hear a lot of the impact of artificial intelligence on competitive intelligence and market intelligence and things like that. So today, intelligence requires a human being to perform some type of analysis and deliver some types of insights to the business that's intelligence. And that is that's what has value. So just simply gathering information, there's no value that's delivered to the organization. It's not until a person actually applies the filters and understandings and kind of teases out what this might mean that there is any value delivered, and that is intelligence. So then I'm going to define three other terms that are often kind of used interchangeably. And they shouldn't be much like a, when we had our agency often found that people would use marketing, advertising and PR interchangeably, when, as marketers, we all know that those are completely different you know, services and they mean different things, but to the lay person, they kind of get interchanged interchangeably. So competitive intelligence market intelligence and business intelligence are often interchanged kind of the same way. So let's use business intelligence. So business intelligence, we define that as the, the information that the business intelligence is based off of information on your business. So if you think about if all of the information that we have within our four walls of our business, that is our business intelligence. Okay. So if you manufacture something that might be how many widgets that you can manufacture in an hour and how many people you need and the profitability of those widgets, et cetera. So business intelligence really means focused on your business, right? No external sources or information, it's all internal data. Market intelligence is just that it is the market. It might be trends in the market. It, it might be consumer behavior and how consumers are responding to certain trends or, or things along those lines. And then competitive intelligence is information about your markets and also your competitors and how that influences your ability to sell within your markets or deliver the services that your business does. Kathleen: So earlier you mentioned that competitive intelligence requires people, but you guys sell competitive intelligence software. So like, how does that work? John: Because software, obviously it doesn't have people in it, but so think of it as think of it as this. What's a good analogy? So if I am a marketer and I have a tool like HubSpot, which we love, because it allows me to host my website, allows me to post and schedule my social. It allows me to have my content and edit it and do keyword work. All of that helps me with my marketing strategy and deliver a strategy. So you wouldn't buy HubSpot and say, Oh, well, HubSpot is going to do my marketing strategy. It's, you know, it's going to, you know, help me be a better marketer. Yes. But it still requires people to deliver that strategy. You know, you you're using a tool. Yes. but the tools can never, they, there are at least the tools today can not replace what an analyst, a researcher, a strategist, a person, a marketer, could be a product marketer. You know, what a person does. What kinds of tools are available to support competitive intelligence? Kathleen: And I feel like there's this vast array of tools out there for competitive intelligence. Like I mentioned earlier, it's everything from a simple Google or all the way up to a platform like you guys have that is used by huge corporations. So maybe you could speak to like, kind of what that landscape looks like. John: Right. So one of the one of the things that we're trying to educate people that are looking for tools are the different types of tools. We believe there are three different kinds of tools out there. There are what we call generic tools, and those are tools that are typically they've been built for a different purpose, but they're often adopted or adapted to a competitive intelligence use. And a good example of that is SharePoint. So SharePoint wasn't built for competitive intelligence, but SharePoint is, it can be an adequate kind of knowledge management source. It can, you know, you can have teams adding information to it and downloading information. You could even, you know, use some of the collaborative features there, et cetera. And so that's like the use of a generic tool. And then you have your your second type of CI tools, a tool that is built for a specific really for a specific person purpose. And, and an example of that is, so there's a company, one of our competitors, Klue. And they do a very good job of sales enablement. So if you have a large sales team and you want to empower your sales team to close more deals, and you want to give your sales team the resources that they need to have the right information at their fingertips, when they're on calls and and kind of, and, and sell against other competitors, they're a great tool for that. And then you have the third category, which is kind of that the tool that is built specifically for competitive intelligence and, and those are tools that do primarily three things. They gather information. So they're going to allow you to aggregate information and that information could come in from newsfeeds. It might come in from subscriptions to information, the research that you have it, it might be internal documents that you have kind of those business intelligence documents that we talked about. It might be information that your sales or marketing team uncovers maybe during the course of their day. So one of the things that, that we help companies with is most companies have just, just dozens, if not hundreds of nuggets of information within the organization, but they just don't have the ability to give it visibility. So, you know, it's, you know, the salesperson that knows what he's up against for a particular deal, because the prospect shared this with them and it's sitting within his inbox and he's the only person that has access to his inbox. So the product marketing team that is getting ready to do the roadmap for their product, can't see what the customer, the prospect is looking for because they don't have access to this information. So that third tool allows all of this information to go into it. And then with our tool, we use artificial intelligence and natural language processing to automatically tag this information. And we use semantic learning for it to identify things like location company and individuals by reading through and analyzing the, the, the content that you're adding to the system. So, there are those types of tools and, and it's interesting. We did some research a couple of years ago. The pharmaceutical industry is by far kind of the most advanced commercial, competitive intelligence kind of industry. Most other industries, they're still kind of developing CI practices and, and most outside of the pharmaceutical industry. And I kind of call that life sciences. So not strictly just pharmaceuticals. Most organizations have I think it's like 1.2 people working on their CI. So not big teams, not, not at all. How can marketers use competitive intelligence? Kathleen: Yeah. It's so interesting. It's such a specialized field. I feel like you know, now coming back to kind of, the focus of this podcast obviously is inbound marketing. So a lot of marketers are listening and this can seem very unapproachable because like, for example, if you guys, you work with really large companies and they have these dedicated people let's start with what, how are those companies using competitive intelligence and how is that helping them make better business decisions or get better results from their businesses. And then we can kind of bring it back down to, for smaller companies, what are ways they could begin to approach this? So let's begin some like actual examples of how this plays out. John: Okay. So so I think that that, that the marketers marketers today, this is, this is my own belief. I believe they're, they're waking up to this need for competitive intelligence because your inbound marketing is no longer delivering the results that you were seeing before. So for just about a decade or so, we have as marketers, we've been really focused on the content I'm creating and attract, creating content, solving problems, answering questions, et cetera. And we've been rewarded with that with prospects and customers and results, and kind of the, you know, Marcus shared approach. They have questions kind of, you know, answer their questions and, and, you know, you'll be rewarded well. In the beginning that was really, really successful because there were fewer people doing it and, and the people that were doing it for the most part were really doing it. You know, it's not until much later that you're downloading the ebook and it's actually just 18 PowerPoint slides with two bullets on each slide and has nothing to do with an actual book. So we have to, as marketers look for things that are going to give us results. And so, as we were focused kind of internally on what we're talking about, what our prospects and customers are talking about, we're really ignoring what was going on in our market and our competitors. And so we were ignoring these macro issues. And so competitive intelligence is kind of the other side of the equation. So you know, you've take your prospects and your customers, and that's one piece of success. And then, but, but you can't do that in a vacuum. Those that do SEO work understand that. So you find out what your teams are, you know, what you want to rank for and what your competitors are ranking for. And then you do SEO work to help change those rankings. Well, your competitors, don't just sit still. They're also looking at what's going on in the market and looking at the actions that you're doing. And so, you know, we found this need to to address, well, how do I understand what's going on in the marketplace and how do I position myself against my competitors or the other options that that my prospects and customers have. So that's a long roundabout way of explaining how companies are using competitive intelligence to better deploy their resources. And so when, when you're doing this before, you can get to actually doing competitive intelligence work, you have to have a really clear understanding of your differentiators and, and your vulnerabilities. So that's where, you know, somebody who wants to begin doing competitive intelligence work, I would challenge them to to, to sit down and do the, the work on how are you different from your competitors, you know, and, and where do you have overlap and where is that overlap? Where does that lead to, or where could you be vulnerable because of that overlap? What impact does competitive intelligence have on businesses? Kathleen: So the larger companies that you guys work with, obviously have that part figured out. They, you know, they have their teams in place, they understand their differentiators. So when they undertake competitive intelligence, how are they using it? Like in practical terms to get better business results? Do you have some case studies or some success stories or anything like that that you can share of how, like, how does competitive intelligence produce better outcomes for these companies? John: Yes. So this was this was a very kind of rude awakening coming from the marketing agency world where you know, you have clients and you're working with clients and you're doing great work for them. And you ask your clients, Hey, you know, would you mind providing a testimonial, a quote, being a part of a, you know, a white paper case study you know, sharing your experience and, and usually it's, Oh yeah. You know, they're very supportive of that when you are in the competitive intelligence world, nobody wants to talk about the tools that they're using, what you're doing for them, because by nature of it, you are, you know, you're giving away intelligence for your competitors to use against you. Kathleen: You know what other industry is like that? Cybersecurity. I know that, of which you speak. John: So let me, I can talk in some kind of in general terms. So we estimate and Cipher has been around for 20, 25 years. We estimate that most most people doing CI work spend about 70% of their time gathering and organizing information. If we go back to the definitions that we had of data, information, and intelligence, data and information add zero value to the business. So you're spending 70% of your time on things that have no value add to the business. Only 30% of your time is on the analysis, developing the insights, you know, all of that information that your CI consumers, whether it be your sales teams, your, your C suite, your product development team, your marketers, they all need this information, but the bulk of your time is spent gathering it and, and organizing it. And, that is because your business is complicated and information comes in lots of different forms, and some of it is structured. And some of it is unstructured. You know, you have information internal reports. You have, as I mentioned before, you have emails that are received from salespeople. You have teams that are out in the field and going to trade shows and seeing you know, what your competitors, their messages at their trade show boots, you have competitor websites that are changing and messaging. And so so what our tool does is it automates a lot of that. For example we have many customers before they started using our tool Knowledge360, that would have 18 number. And some of them would have more that would manually go out to competitors' websites and look at their websites and look for changes in their websites. And that could be pricing changes if you're in an industry or, or, you know, a market that is price sensitive, you want to know about those changes. And, you know, it could be messaging changes. So by using a tool like Knowledge360, we can automate that. And so the tool goes out, it gathers the information. It says, Hey, this page has changed. It highlights the, the, the new information, you know, and, and that's, that's there in one color, it highlights the information that has been changed or removed and another color. And now an analyst can take a look at that and say, Oh, this is really meaningful. You know, so that's, that's an example of how are a tool like ours or how anyone can use competitive intelligence. So, to monitor the messaging that your competitors are using, or if they have a pricing page, you know, you can, you can monitor that for changes in their pricing. How do companies use competitive intelligence? Kathleen: So it sounds like the tool itself can be used to save time to streamline the process, but like, what are these companies doing with this information? How, like, why are they spending all this money on competitive intelligence? What is it doing things successful? John: So if you think about this so it's helping them be successful by giving insights and providing this intelligence that your decision makers are looking for. And ultimately, hopefully you're, you're enabling them to make better informed decisions. So if you think about think about someone that has you know, you're wearing glasses, but they have blinders on, and you can only see right in front of you. And you're making your decisions based on your field of vision that is just in front of you. Now, you take those away and you have a wider field of vision, and you have more information. You may, you may make a different decision. Kathleen: What's an example of something, a marketing thing that I might do differently based on the information I would find? John: So here's, here's an example. So if I have a, let's say I'm a nationwide company and I compete with someone on the East coast. Okay. And they're a good competitor. I went against them. Sometimes they went against me sometimes. But I have offices on the East coast and also on the West coast. Well, if I had a CI department, one of the things they might be monitoring or looking for is job postings with my competitors. So if all of a sudden, one of my competitors is posting a sales manager position in the Seattle market, and they're not in the Seattle market. And one of my key customers is in the Seattle market. Oh, that's something that I want to know about because it looks like my competitor is coming into, if they're going to invest in building out a sales team, putting an office in Seattle. Now, all of a sudden, my sales people that have only had to deal with maybe the competitors that were in that local market without this East coast competitor, they now need to be aware of this new competitor coming into the market. And that may change how we position ourselves. It may change how we price things. It may change, you know, the terms of her contracts. It could have all types of different information, you know, of, of business decisions that we make. How Cipher uses competitive intelligence for itself Kathleen: So I'm assuming that you guys are, as I like to say, drinking your own champagne, because I don't like the phrase eating your own dog food. So how does Cipher use competitive intelligence? John: So so we use this fantastic tool called Knowledge360. It's very comprehensive. We have several dashboards that we use. And one in particular that is called our competition crusher. And so with our competition crusher dashboard, it's a feed of news announcements on it's a feed of social. It has intelligence that our salespeople gain talking to prospects and customers. Our marketing team will add information like messaging changes that we might see and all of this battle cards. So if we know we're going up against a particular competitor, we want to, you know, we want to draw attention to these benefits of using our product. And, and if we know that there are gaps, you know, we want to ask our prospects about, you know, the gaps that we know our competitors have. So, that's one example of how we're using it to kind of gather all of that information, organize it in a way, you know, and the beauty of using something you're using a tool that provides dashboards is the dashboards are updated in real time. So unlike, you know, most people, if they have any experience or exposure to CI work it's typically a part of the, you know, quarterly sales meeting. And there's somebody that comes up that says competitor ABC is doing this. And then, you know, they share the PowerPoint deck and, you know, a quarter later another report comes out, but there's a lot of time and a lot of change that goes on between, you know, the publishing of those two different reports. And, you know, you may make different decisions having a dashboard that's always on always available, always monitoring. You're always getting the most up to date information. And so we share that with our leadership team, our sales team, marketing team, customer, all of them add to, and, and consume information from those dashboards. Prediction markets and the future of competitive intelligence Kathleen: And then real quickly, because I feel like this could be an entirely other podcast episode. I feel like with competitive intelligence, you're looking at things that have already happened, right? You guys have something I find fascinating, which is this other side to your business where you can do much more predictive stuff. It's super cool. And you have something called predictive markets. So can you, somewhat quickly because we are coming up on our time, just give people a sense of what I mean, cause that's really like competitive intelligence looking into the future, if you will, or trying to figure out what's gonna happen in the future. So how does that work? John: So that is really cool stuff and it is relatively new. So Cipher systems and another company Consensus Point, we merged towards the end of last year. Consensus Point is a a research company. So as competitive intelligence professionals, they gather information and they do research. You have two primary types of research yet. Primary research and secondary research, secondary research being research that's available to anyone and those might be market reports or things that are publicly available and anyone has access to those or they're not restricted. Primary research is research that you do, you hire someone to do on your behalf and that's information that you have. And that if, if done correctly and on the appropriate things could be a competitive advantage having this primary information or more information about a particular topic. Well, what you're talking about is predictive markets research. So if you think about primary research, most people are familiar with polls and surveys. And so that is a traditional kind of primary research method that is it's, it's very effective for certain things. It's also riddled with problems for other things, for example human beings in general, we are very poor predictors of our own performance. So you know, just ask anyone with a child and ask them how bright their child is. Nobody is going to tell you that their child is below average average, you know, they're Oh, you know, top 1%, 10%, 5%. Well, that's not true because most of us are average. Kathleen: That's why it's the definition. 90% of us are not in the top 10%.  John: That's exactly right. So what a prediction market is, is it is think of a market, probably one of the most common is the stock market. So, you know, the stock market is a platform where people have are placing wagers on whether or not, you know, the value of a company is going to increase or decrease. So if you think about this, and this is a great book that I'll have to give you. It's by a poker player. I'll give it to you so you can add to the show notes, but basically if you ask somebody, you know, do you think Apple stock is going to be higher than it is the value of it is going to be higher in one month from today's point you know, you might say, yes. Okay, well, how much are you willing to bet it's up? So if you put real money, your hard earned money, like how many shares of Apple stock are you willing to purchase at today's price? Check out "Thinking In Bets" by Annie Duke John: You know, and it is, are your beliefs, do they change? So a prediction market is, you are using the social behavioral characteristics of individuals and their collective kind of wisdom of the crowd, thinking about whether or not the probability of something becoming true or taking place. And so that is a much more accurate indicator of actual events that happen than simply asking someone in a survey or a poll. So now, what we're so excited about is the two of those together. So now you know, our platform, not only do we help aggregate information that you're gathering and do that analysis on it, we are now adding this research component to the tool as well, so that you can do your research. You can, you know, you can store it within one central repository and you can make it available to the organization as it needs to be Kathleen: Cool. And I know you guys are using it for things like trying to predict what the world post COVID is going to look like and all kinds of other really interesting forward looking applications. So thank you for sharing that. Kathleen's two questions Kathleen: We are now coming towards the end of our time, so I wanna make sure I squeeze in my couple of questions that I ask everybody. The first is, of course we are all about inbound marketing on this podcast. So is there a particular company or individual that you think is really killing it with inbound marketing right now? John: Let's see, you know, I I just recently became aware of a tool MarketMuse. I think that they're doing a very good job with their messaging, kind of very classic, kind of inbound marketing freemium model, et cetera. So I would say that they're one company that does a really good job of inbound marketing. And I have to say then another one that comes to mind and you know, full disclosure here, I'm a customer and and a big fan of Databox. I think Databox, and Pete Caputa's doing a phenomenal job there. He cranks out more content and they use their chat panel to support customers and are really all about helping customers solve problems. And they're, they're doing a fantastic job. I think, of inbound marketing. Kathleen: Yeah, Pete's awesome. And fun fact, he was a very early guest of this podcast. So if you want to get some insight into how Pete does marketing, you can listen to that episode with him. And I will put that link in the show notes. Question number two. The biggest challenge I hear marketers share with me is that so much changes so quickly in the world of digital marketing. So how do you personally keep yourself educated and up to date on everything that's going on? John: I have a hugely unfair advantage being married to a fantastic marketer who is constantly scouring the interweb for the latest and greatest tool and slacking me at home because yes, we have our own personal Slack channel for our youngest son and Kathleen and myself. But, selfishly I rely heavily on what you share with me. Kathleen: Well, that's a valid answer and it's true. I mean, it's so funny. So we're sitting here, it's during the COVID pandemic and of course we're still working from home. So I am up in my office, which is on the second floor of our house. John is in his current office, which is smack dab in the middle of our kitchen. And we are Zooming with each other from two rooms away and yes, we Slack each other from two rooms away all week long. So we are the big old marketing nerds that do that. How to connect with John Kathleen: All right. If somebody wants to connect with you learn more about Knowledge360, ask you a question about competitive intelligence. What is the best way for them to connect with you online?  John: I would say the best way to connect with me is via LinkedIn. John Booth, like the guy that shot Lincoln, but not related. And if you want to learn more about Knowledge360, you can go out to Cipher-sys.com or TryK360.com and learn. You know what to do next... Kathleen: Awesome. I will share that in the show notes. Thank you for joining me, John. I know you have a busy day. We are recording on a Sunday and I'm pretty sure there's like some kind of house project that you want to be working on instead of recording a podcast with me. And if you're listening and you learn something new and you like what you heard, please, head to Apple podcasts, leave the podcast at five star review. That is how other people find us. And I would really appreciate it. But that is it for this week. Thank you, John. John: Thank you, Kathleen. Kathleen: And happy father's day. Because we are recording on father's day. You're the best for doing this for me. Thank you. Alright. That's it for this week. Thanks for listening everyone.

Today is the start of a multiple part series on social security. We'll be discussing topics such as the state of the fund and reforms that are aimed to help the program and more, so tune in and catch up on social security.Helpful Information:PFG Website: https://www.pfgprivatewealth.com/Contact: 813-286-7776Email: info@pfgprivatewealth.com----more----Transcript of today's show:Mark: Hey gang, welcome into another edition of retirement planning redefined with the boys from PFG Private Wealth Financial Advisors, John and Nick, once again here on the program with me as we talk about investing, finance and retirement. Always go to the website and check them out at pfgprivatewealth.com that is pfgprivatewealth.com. While you're there, subscribe to the podcast. Give us a like and check us out and all that good stuff. Subscribe to it for past episodes as well as future episodes. And of course anytime you hear anything, you've got a question or concern, give them a call before you take any action. 813-286-7776 is the number to call. If you hear a useful nugget of information and you want to learn more, again, reach out to them at (813)-286-7776. Guys, I hope you're doing well this week. Nick, what's going on man?Nick: Yeah, we're doing well. Staying busy for sure. Today what we wanted to do is kick off a multi session on social security.Mark: Okay. Cool.Nick: And we just want to let everybody know. We know that some of the people that'll be listening to this will have become familiar with us through either the more comprehensive classes that we put on around town or via a financial wellness workshop. And social security has been one of the hot topics for a long time and it continues to be as it is more in the news with the different pressures and some of the funding issues and those sorts of things. And then obviously with everybody, so many people and so many baby boomers getting closer to retirement, although we will be getting into it fairly comprehensively in this session, we just wanted to make sure that everybody knew that if they were interested in having us come in, whether it's some sort of association or an employer based kind of program, we like to do the lunch and learns or some sort of financial wellness workshop.Nick: And we've got about a 50 minute session that we'll do on social security. And from the feedback that we've gotten, it's been one of the most positively embraced sessions that we've done. So we just want to let people know that if they wanted a more comprehensive overview on this or they thought it might be beneficial for their employer or fellow employees or coworkers, that that's something that's available.Mark: Awesome. Yeah. When we get into that we'll have this multi-part series on the podcast regarding social security. And again, as Nick mentioned, if you want to talk with them, (813)-286-7776, (813)-286-7776.Mark: John, how are you man? You doing all right?John: I'm doing great. How are you doing?Mark: I'm doing very well. Thank you for asking. And you know, Nick got us all set up there for the conversation. So what do you say we dive into it? How does it work? I mean, what's the crux of the whole social security situation here we're looking at?Nick: Most people are obviously familiar with the fact that they are eligible for social security and they pay into the system, but not a lot of people are familiar with how it all works and ties together. We always like to start off in explaining people how the program is funded. A lot of people have seen on their pay stub where it might say FICA and they're not really quite sure what that is. But out of that 7.62 that comes out of your paycheck for those FICA tax is 6.2% of that is for social security. And one of the things that we have found over the years is that many people are not familiar with the fact that the employer also pays in 6.2%. Some people have this idea that the program is fully funded by the government and really it's fully funded by them and their employer.Nick: Letting them know that about 12.5% of their income each year is going into the program towards them is something that is important for them to understand. And for some of the higher income earners, they may have noticed at a certain point of the year that their paycheck gets a little bit bigger. And usually that's because payroll tax is capped, so people no longer pay in on earnings over ... In 2019 on earnings over $132,900. And as we talk a little bit about some of the things that'll change over time with the program, one of the things that's in the news the most is that cap and removing that cap so that it's similar to Medicare where people will pay on, no matter what their earnings are, they will continue to pay into the system.John: That cap's actually been going up aggressively. You know, I think a few years ago it was $112 Nick, and I think now they've jumped it up to one $132.Nick: Yeah, yeah. They've definitely been indexing it up faster than inflation, that's for sure.Mark: Yeah. And depending on what happens in the elections coming up next year, you know, depending on who gets in, there's conversations that that 6.2 could be raised as well. So if you're still working, so that could go up substantially as well.Mark: How much can somebody expect guys? I imagine that's a big question that always comes up is, what are we looking at? I know you can get your estimates, obviously, from the website. They don't even send those little papers out anymore I don't think. They used to send them out every year, then it went to every five years. I'm not sure if they even still do that.John: They do occasionally, and I'm not sure the exact how often, but I know that from our classes we're starting to have guests say, yeah they're getting the statements. But it's based off of your earnings record. And one thing that's important to understand, it's actually your highest 35 years. So a lot of people when I first started working, I think the first year I was 18 I made like $12,000.Mark: That's pretty good for 18.John: You're [crosstalk 00:05:20]. Yeah, exactly. Your highest earning years are really later in life, once you hit your 50s and 60s. So that's important to understand if someone's thinking about retiring early to make sure that they look on the statement and see, Hey, what years do I have that are significant in here? Because if I stop working my last seven years, you know the benefit that I'm seeing on my statement's actually going to be less.John: Because when you get your statement, what it shows if you continue to work up until that age, not if you stopped. So that's important. Another thing we tell our clients and anyone that comes to our classes is to make sure that you look at it, see if there's any zeros in there. Because if you do have zeros in your highest 35 that will actually bring down your benefit and that's something you may want to consider maybe working a couple of extra years to make sure that you maximize your social security retirement benefit as best you can.John: And you're right, you can go on social security.gov and pull up your statement. They'll ask you a lot of funny questions. What was the color of your first car? Most likely most people get locked out unfortunately, but it's good to go check it out if you haven't done that in awhile.Nick: Yeah. Another thing to just make sure that people know from the standpoint of those highest 35 years is that's in relation to the cap. And so you know that cap that we mentioned earlier, that $132,900, it's in relation to that. Just because there may have been a period of time, we've seen it in some circumstances, where maybe somebody took some time off to stay home with the kids and then they're returning to work and before they took time off they were making a higher income. And although, from a pure dollar standpoint they may be making more dollars now as in relation to the cap, that may not necessarily be the case.Nick: That highest 35 earning years is in relation to that cap. And with how social security date change the mailing out of the [inaudible 00:07:04] and that sort of thing, we absolutely recommend that people, although it can be a little bit of a pain from the process, to really get logged into the site, make sure they understand how to access that statement, make sure they understand how to read that statement. Especially from the standpoint of people that we have that are self employed. We have them double check their statements to make sure that their income is being correctly recorded because they may be paying in their self employment tax, which is essentially payroll tax. Making sure that that's recorded properly so they're going to get the benefits that they're entitled to down the road.Mark: Yeah. Now guys, I've heard through the years that if you see those zeros on there like John mentioned that that's not really on the social security to fix that. That falls back on you in trying to follow up possibly with past and employers. Like if you know you earned something in a given year and you're seeing a zero, is that still how it is? Is that the way that it goes? Do you need to talk with the social security office about that or do you need to track down that past employer?John: You do need to reach out to them and Nick's, I believe, grandfather did that and Nick can share that story.Mark: Oh, all right.Nick: And this was years ago, so I don't know any details on it, but my grandfather was from Cuba and so he had a natural distrust for the government. And when he was a professor at the University of Rochester and when he went to retire and file for social security, he did not agree with the amount. And due to his non-trusting nature, he happened to have every pay stub that he ever had in the basement. And so he was able to figure that out. Luckily now we have things that are more electronic and we do have people try to keep some sort of record and haven't had anybody recently deal with that in any sort of deeper way.Mark: That's good.Nick: But usually a tax return will help. And tax returns are one of the things that we have people ... We've got a portal for clients and we have them upload those tax returns so that they can be a really good resource down the road in case there's any issues.Mark: Well that's cool. Yeah. I mean I'm 48 and I think about myself and I think God, if I had to go back and figure out who I worked for when I was 20 and what they owed me or whatever, or what I paid in, I don't know where I'd start. So that was awesome that your grandfather actually kept all that stuff. Because I know that for a lot of people that would be definitely a challenge. But that's just something I thought about and I wanted to bring that up and get your guys' opinion on that.Mark: So if you're talking about things that are really important to people, obviously a big question for boomers, and I'm sure you get this at the wellness events that you do and just in general is the constant question of the health of the fund. Is it going to be around?John: Yeah, that is a 100% the main question we get at the workshops and also when we're doing planning for clients. But as it states today there's actually a surplus and the fund is actually growing. There's roughly $2.9 trillion in it and when you say trillion it doesn't really in reality mean much, we have no idea what that actually equates to.Mark: It sounds like a lot.John: [crosstalk 00:09:56] Surplus, it is a lot. But the surplus is about $3 billion a year between money that's coming into it through the payroll taxes and also the interest earned on the balance. Just to kind of give some people some numbers because they're always asking. In 2023, 2024 that surplus actually will stop. So it's actually going to be going into a deficit and then in 2034 the fund's basically exhausted and then it's just going to be paid through basically money coming in through payroll taxes and then the money's going to come out. An then in 2034 when that happens, based on the numbers, the estimates, is looking like there's going to be a 21% reduction of benefits. So you're going to get 79% of the benefit owed to you. And again, that's if no changes happen, which we'll we're going to go into shortly. Nick will start it up where we're talking about some of the reforms that already have been happening and that will continue to happen.Nick: And we do tend to ... Some of these will probably be repeated throughout the series about social security. And earlier I mentioned the increase in max earnings, removing that cap. That's probably one of the lowest hanging fruit from the standpoint of people getting on board with making higher income earners continue to pay into the system. Right now, the earliest retirement age that somebody can collect benefits from is 62. So that's an age, especially with the longevity of people's lives and people just living longer overall, that 62 will probably start to increase. I'm sure people will be grandfathered in at a certain age or certain, your worth and before it will be grandfathered in, but-Mark: It seems like that's a really-Nick: John and I suspect that our-Mark: Yeah, that seems like the easiest one too for a lot of things. Right? Just push it back for people under a certain age, like 50 and under or something, just push it back.Nick: Yeah. And social security ... The trickiest thing and probably one of the biggest reasons that not much has been done with it is because, frankly politicians are worried about not getting voted back into office, so-Mark: Yeah, it's a political poker chip for sure.Nick: They [inaudible 00:11:53] can down the road and try not to tick people off at least to a certain extent. So raising that initial retirement age from 62 probably upwards of ... They'll probably ease it in, but I wouldn't be surprised if John and I, our initial retirement age is closer to 65 or higher.Nick: They've talked about doing means testing from the standpoint of if people have a certain amount of income on that they wouldn't collect their social security. I think that one will probably be a little bit more difficult because usually that's income focused and honestly there's a lot of ways around that.Nick: But another thing would be that cost of living adjustment, and that's been tinkered with a little bit really over the last decade as inflation stayed low for a little while and interest rates were really low. But that could be something that they adjust. But realistically what we think will be the easiest things to do will be to take up on the payroll tax, potentially have employers put in a slightly larger percentage than the actual employee. It's something that they can do. Increasing that cap or the earning cap or removing the cap in general, and bumping back that initial retirement age, are all things that we think will be a big deal.Nick: The other thing could be the, really the increases, the percentage increases that social security provides for people that defer taking their benefits. So if they wait, any year after full retirement age, there's an 8% increase. And so that's something that'll probably drop as well.Nick: The good news is that this is pretty actuarial and really all you have to do is math to figure it out. It's just going to take people being willing, people being the government, being willing to make the changes.John: Yeah. And they've already, in 2015 they actually closed some of the loopholes which we've been seeing a lot of in planning some strategies that people were using are going away, which helped the program out. They're already doing some things. And the big thing that ... One of the things Nick talked about was the cost of living adjustments. To me that's one of the ones we need to keep an eye on because when we're doing planning, it really helps out the plan when you have some type of guaranteed income that actually goes up with inflation.John: Historically, social security has gone up about 2.6%. It's been low over the last five or six years due to inflation, but that's actually a pretty nice benefit when you look at what you start with at let's say 66 and what you end up with that age 85. It's a big amount. When you look over that 20 year period.Nick: Probably the one people want to fight for the most to maintain from the standpoint of anybody that's likes to be active or have a vested interest in the topic, that cost of living adjustment's really, really important for them.Mark: Absolutely. Well, let's take that point and segue into an offer for you guys. If you're listening and you want a free maximization strategy and the social security guide to anyone who emails in, just email john@pfgprivatewealth.com that's john@pfgprivatewealth.com. Again to get that free maximization strategy and social security guide here on the program.Mark: And I that's going to do it for us this week on the podcast guys. Really good information to start this week, talking about social security here on the show. We're going to continue on, as Nick mentioned earlier on, and do a multi-part series on this next time here on the program. We're going to talk about integrating social security into your retirement plan, making that part of the plan and some things to look for and think about in regards to that.Mark: You've been listening to retirement planning redefined with John and Nick financial advisors at PFG Private Wealth. Again, that's PFG Private Wealth and that you can find them online at pfgprivatewealth.com and subscribe to the podcast while you're there. Don't forget to email John if you'd like to get that social security maximization or give him a call at (813)-286-7776. If you've got some questions about your own social security, get on the horn with them. Come in for a consultation and a conversation. (813)-286-7776. This has been retirement planning redefined for John and Nick. I'm Mark and we'll see you next time.

In this episode, we  hear from John “Tank” Miller of Delaware. A Family Advocate and father of a 19 year old with mental health challenges, John discusses his mental health advocacy through social media and how he uses “Tank Mentality” to provide those with mental illness encouragement every day. Become part of the Tank Mentality Movement: Follow on Twitter @tankmentality  Follow on Facebook: tankmentality/ Transcription Female Voice: Welcome to Ask the Advocate. Where mental health advocates share their journey to advocacy, and what it has meant for their lives. Ask the Advocate is a Mothers On The Front Line production. Today, we will hear from John 'Tank' Miller of Delaware. A family advocate and father of a 19-year-old son with mental health challenges. John discusses his mental health advocacy through social media, and how he uses Tank mentality to provide those with mental illness encouragement every day. This interview was recorded at the 2017 National Federation of Families conference for children's mental health. [background music] Tammy: Hello. So, we're just going to begin by asking you to introduce yourself, and telling us a little bit about your advocacy organization, and what you do. John: My name is John Miller from Delaware. I am a father of a 19-year-old with mental health issues. I'm here today to talk about my movement, Tank Mentality. Tammy: Yeah, I love the name. Why don't you tell us a bit about the name? John: Well, about the name, the name actually was the origin of me, and that came from playing football. 9th grade year, I had a football coach who lined me up, and I was excited. I was just putting on pads for the first time as a high-schooler, and we ran a drill called Oklahomas. The object of Oklahoma is to not get tackled. Tammy: Sounds like a good incentive. John: So, I grabbed the ball, and the rest was kind of history. I ran through my whole entire team, and it got to the point where he was like, "Nobody can tackle you. We're gonna call you Tank." And, that's when Tank was born. Tammy: And how do you see Tank as transferring to mental health? John: Because as a tank, you're in the front line. Tammy: That's right. John: On the front line, you're going to take some punishment. So, on the front line, you have to have that armor. So, I incorporated Tank as far as mental because everything in life is mental. Tammy: That's right. John: So, you can't do a thing without thinking of things. So, it's just was one of those things where I'm like, "You know what? This thing is bigger than me. And, it started with me, but it's not going to end with me." Tammy: Awesome. So, tell us a bit how you got involved in advocacy, to begin with. John: Well, I got involved with advocacy, it was something that I was naturally doing. To give you a little background about me, I work as a restaurant manager. Because being a manager as you know, you're managing a bunch of teenagers and younger people, so you're always molding young leaders, and you're supervising them, but at the same time, you're kind of like, as I say, growing them. So, I actually listened to a lot of their challenges, their stories, and seeing some of their strengths and weaknesses, and I was using my advocacy to help them better. And, it was just something I was naturally doing, and I had the opportunity to do it as a professional. It was just like a smooth transition because I'm like I'm already doing this. Tammy: Right. I love it that though because you say that like that's so natural. I'm not sure all restaurant managers are thinking of themselves and their role as developing young people. I think that's pretty remarkable that you, even at that point, that's how you were seeing it. I have to just point that out, I think that's remarkable and wonderful that you took that on. John: Well, that goes down to my upbringing. My grandmother put that into me as a young kid.

In this episode, we  hear from John “Tank” Miller of Delaware. A Family Advocate and father of a 19 year old with mental health challenges, John discusses his mental health advocacy through social media and how he uses “Tank Mentality” to provide those with mental illness encouragement every day. Become part of the Tank Mentality Movement: Follow on Twitter @tankmentality  Follow on Facebook: tankmentality/ Transcription Female Voice: Welcome to Ask the Advocate. Where mental health advocates share their journey to advocacy, and what it has meant for their lives. Ask the Advocate is a Mothers On The Front Line production. Today, we will hear from John 'Tank' Miller of Delaware. A family advocate and father of a 19-year-old son with mental health challenges. John discusses his mental health advocacy through social media, and how he uses Tank mentality to provide those with mental illness encouragement every day. This interview was recorded at the 2017 National Federation of Families conference for children's mental health. [background music] Tammy: Hello. So, we're just going to begin by asking you to introduce yourself, and telling us a little bit about your advocacy organization, and what you do. John: My name is John Miller from Delaware. I am a father of a 19-year-old with mental health issues. I'm here today to talk about my movement, Tank Mentality. Tammy: Yeah, I love the name. Why don't you tell us a bit about the name? John: Well, about the name, the name actually was the origin of me, and that came from playing football. 9th grade year, I had a football coach who lined me up, and I was excited. I was just putting on pads for the first time as a high-schooler, and we ran a drill called Oklahomas. The object of Oklahoma is to not get tackled. Tammy: Sounds like a good incentive. John: So, I grabbed the ball, and the rest was kind of history. I ran through my whole entire team, and it got to the point where he was like, "Nobody can tackle you. We’re gonna call you Tank." And, that's when Tank was born. Tammy: And how do you see Tank as transferring to mental health? John: Because as a tank, you're in the front line. Tammy: That's right. John: On the front line, you're going to take some punishment. So, on the front line, you have to have that armor. So, I incorporated Tank as far as mental because everything in life is mental. Tammy: That's right. John: So, you can't do a thing without thinking of things. So, it’s just was one of those things where I'm like, "You know what? This thing is bigger than me. And, it started with me, but it's not going to end with me." Tammy: Awesome. So, tell us a bit how you got involved in advocacy, to begin with. John: Well, I got involved with advocacy, it was something that I was naturally doing. To give you a little background about me, I work as a restaurant manager. Because being a manager as you know, you're managing a bunch of teenagers and younger people, so you're always molding young leaders, and you're supervising them, but at the same time, you're kind of like, as I say, growing them. So, I actually listened to a lot of their challenges, their stories, and seeing some of their strengths and weaknesses, and I was using my advocacy to help them better. And, it was just something I was naturally doing, and I had the opportunity to do it as a professional. It was just like a smooth transition because I'm like I'm already doing this. Tammy: Right. I love it that though because you say that like that's so natural. I'm not sure all restaurant managers are thinking of themselves and their role as developing young people. I think that's pretty remarkable that you, even at that point, that's how you were seeing it. I have to just point that out, I think that's remarkable and wonderful that you took that on. John: Well, that goes down to my upbringing. My grandmother put that into me as a young kid.

In this episode, we  hear from John “Tank” Miller of Delaware. A Family Advocate and father of a 19 year old with mental health challenges, John discusses his mental health advocacy through social media and how he uses “Tank Mentality” to provide those with mental illness encouragement every day. Become part of the Tank Mentality Movement: Follow on Twitter @tankmentality  Follow on Facebook: tankmentality/ Transcription Female Voice: Welcome to Ask the Advocate. Where mental health advocates share their journey to advocacy, and what it has meant for their lives. Ask the Advocate is a Mothers On The Front Line production. Today, we will hear from John 'Tank' Miller of Delaware. A family advocate and father of a 19-year-old son with mental health challenges. John discusses his mental health advocacy through social media, and how he uses Tank mentality to provide those with mental illness encouragement every day. This interview was recorded at the 2017 National Federation of Families conference for children's mental health. [background music] Tammy: Hello. So, we're just going to begin by asking you to introduce yourself, and telling us a little bit about your advocacy organization, and what you do. John: My name is John Miller from Delaware. I am a father of a 19-year-old with mental health issues. I'm here today to talk about my movement, Tank Mentality. Tammy: Yeah, I love the name. Why don't you tell us a bit about the name? John: Well, about the name, the name actually was the origin of me, and that came from playing football. 9th grade year, I had a football coach who lined me up, and I was excited. I was just putting on pads for the first time as a high-schooler, and we ran a drill called Oklahomas. The object of Oklahoma is to not get tackled. Tammy: Sounds like a good incentive. John: So, I grabbed the ball, and the rest was kind of history. I ran through my whole entire team, and it got to the point where he was like, "Nobody can tackle you. We're gonna call you Tank." And, that's when Tank was born. Tammy: And how do you see Tank as transferring to mental health? John: Because as a tank, you're in the front line. Tammy: That's right. John: On the front line, you're going to take some punishment. So, on the front line, you have to have that armor. So, I incorporated Tank as far as mental because everything in life is mental. Tammy: That's right. John: So, you can't do a thing without thinking of things. So, it's just was one of those things where I'm like, "You know what? This thing is bigger than me. And, it started with me, but it's not going to end with me." Tammy: Awesome. So, tell us a bit how you got involved in advocacy, to begin with. John: Well, I got involved with advocacy, it was something that I was naturally doing. To give you a little background about me, I work as a restaurant manager. Because being a manager as you know, you're managing a bunch of teenagers and younger people, so you're always molding young leaders, and you're supervising them, but at the same time, you're kind of like, as I say, growing them. So, I actually listened to a lot of their challenges, their stories, and seeing some of their strengths and weaknesses, and I was using my advocacy to help them better. And, it was just something I was naturally doing, and I had the opportunity to do it as a professional. It was just like a smooth transition because I'm like I'm already doing this. Tammy: Right. I love it that though because you say that like that's so natural. I'm not sure all restaurant managers are thinking of themselves and their role as developing young people. I think that's pretty remarkable that you, even at that point, that's how you were seeing it. I have to just point that out, I think that's remarkable and wonderful that you took that on. John: Well, that goes down to my upbringing. My grandmother put that into me as a young kid.

The Jews and Gentiles listened to John— Because his life made his message believable. The question is, IS MY LIFE BELIEVABLE— When unbelievers observe my life, do they see someone sold out for Jesus Christ? Does my wife or my husband or my children see— A BELIEVER who walks the talk... or do they see a wishy-washy weak follower of Jesus who puts God on the back burner who isn’t interested in knowing the truth— nor following it. If you’re NOT serious about your faith in God— It’s time to get down on your knees and repent of the sin that’s hindering you—and your prayers.

Xiaohua: Toilet paper or toilet tissue is something we don’t really appreciate until we don’t have it. Did you know an average person uses 1.6 meters of toilet paper per visit to a public convenience? A recent study focuses on toilet usage patterns for the city of Shanghai. So, really? Is that how long every person wants in every toilet use?Heyang: Well, it sounds like an excessive amount of toilet paper that is used by people and, I think partially because it is free. And when you have the free toilet paper in the cubicle, I think sometimes people just use it for whatever reason. And it could be, well, kind of a big burden for the government as only for that 1.6 meters of toilet paper one uses , it costs 0.084 yuan. But when you do the math in this survey, there is more than 24,000 visitors in these 39 public toilets. It amounts to more than 700000 yuan a year, used just on supplying those toilet papers. It is a lot of money and it is not good for the environment. I think, yeah, having free toilet paper is great but it should be used in moderation.John: yeah, yeah, I agree, and in fact, someone is asking why don’t they just have the toilet paper outside the cubicle, as we see in many places here in Beijing? I think the issue there is that it’s easy to be misused as well. I mean look in study... in Shanghai, what they found was that people use it for everything to dry their hands, to clean their shoes, even to remove stains from their trousers. It really does not matter where the toilet paper is, people are so going to use in that way. However, if it is inside the cubicle, that means you are able to use the appropriate amount, if you wish to do so, right? My problem that I have is when I use the bathroom, and the toilet paper outside the cubicle, I have to take more than it is probably necessary because...Xiaohua: Because you can’t just come out again and take some.John: Yeah, I don’t know how much I am going to need, and I don’t want , you know, to run out before everything is clean. Right?Heyang: How could you not know how much you need to use? (John: Because, because, every...)in the ball park, you know, number one or number two, you just know...John:I mean I don’t sit down for number one, (Xiaohua: exactly), but it is difficult to say sometimes you think it’s gonna be a messy one and it’s clean and sometimes you think is gonna be clean it turns out to be messy. So in order to make sure...Heyang: Eew John Eew!John: I’m just talking about the reality....Xiaohua: Actually John has a point. (John: Of course I do) The thing I noticed is when using CRI’s toilets, sometimes I noticed that, well somewhere else too, that there is a hanger for you to hang bags and things. But usually(John: Toilet paper)...toilet paper are hung there...so it is probably clean, because you know, who would hang used toilet paper on the hanger?(John: It is probably clean, but...)But I’m not gonna use it because (John: You don’t know.) it is just...it is just weird. (John: It could have been hanging there for days, accumulate all sorts of particles...) What’s the mentality of someone who just hang up toilet paper there? If you cannot use it up, you just take it away for God’s sake.Heyang: Really? I hold exactly opposite view on this. I’ve always thought “oh great, someone is just conservation minded...John: They are, they are conservation minded, but Xiaohua is a bit too hygiene minded, perhaps.Xiaohua: But will you actually use it?Heyang: Yeah, I’ve used it.John: She just said that she used it. She uses it every time apparently...Heyang: OK, anyway, so I think it’s really important that people use the right amount. And...John: Exactly, which is why you need toilet paper inside the cubicle. Heyang: And then you get people who actually steal the rolls and, you know, to prevent that from happening, right?John: That’s the thing. So the question right now that Shanghai is asking, is free toilet paper or not free toilet paper? Perhaps a different question should be asking is free toilets or not free toilets? And when you go inside, you can get as much toilet paper as you want, but you are paying to get in and it is covering the costs of the toilet paper and is covering the costs for the maintenance. And the thing is that paid for toilets from what I’ve seen at least, they ended up being a lot more cleaner, and much more hygienic than free toilet.Xiaohua: They do, basic because there is someone managing in it and cleaning it, all the time...Heyang: And the last thing, so when next time you are using the toilet paper, don’t forget there are two and a half billion people on the planet who can’t even have this available for them. So keep that in mind. Don’ t be wasteful. Xiaohua: Something good to remember. Certainly don’t steal the roll.

Today we talk with John McIntyre, a fellow email copywriter. First we begin discussing email marketing and take you deep into both of our processes for creating emails that sell on autopilot. Then we make a dramatic shift and get into a philosophical discussion about life, the addiction to money and why "constantly striving for higher revenue" is a unfulfilling way to live life for most people. In this episode we discuss... How to overcome objections using stories, case studies and more... Why "tips, tricks and hacks" do NOT work... Why templated systems don't work for most people... Why segmentation is the key to better email results... An epic discussion on why most entrepreneurs live un-fulfilled lives... Resources Mentioned  www.McMethod.com The Millionaire Next Door (book) Want To Work With Me? Visit http://www.JeremyReeves.com or email me at Jeremy@JeremyReeves.com Enjoy! Transcript Hey, guys. Welcome back to another episode of The Sales Funnel Mastery podcast. Today, I have a guest on the other line. His name is John McIntyre and he is a fellow marketer, he's an email copywriting specialist and basically, focuses on writing emails. I was actually on John's podcast a couple of weeks ago and when that goes live, I'll give you the link to my podcast. So I thought that I would get him on my podcast and expose you guys to him and how he thinks. So instead doing one of the boring introduction that everybody does, I'm just going to let John tell you who he is and how he came to be and what he does and we'll take it from there. Jeremy Reeves: So John, how are you? John McIntyre: I'm doing good, Jeremy. How are you? Jeremy: I apologize. I was just taking an extra (00:57). I'm good. So tell us a little about yourself. John: My name is John and I'm from Sydney, Australia. Though, I actually live in Thailand. A lot of people find that quite interesting. I grew up in Sydney, but I ended up in the Philippines, working. I did some marketing for a beach resort there. A nice, gorgeous resort on the beach which was a "tough life" as you can imagine. I still remember, this is when I just getting started with the agency that I have now, I'd still remember, every morning, I'd wake up and I'd get some coffee from the resort and they were right on the beach. So I'd grab a white plastic table and put that right next to the sand, right beneath two coconut trees and I'd get a big extension table from the restaurant and run it out to my table, out a seat there, and I'd set my laptop up and have breakfast, drink my coffee, and do some work, sitting under a coconut tree and just this bright beach (01:52). Jeremy: Sounds torturous. John: It was a tough period a lot. I worked really hard. Jeremy: Nice. John: So that was when I started around then I started learning copywriting, doing some email stuff, some sales letters, all the usual stuff. And around that, I started, I guess what you may call an 'agency'. What's becoming is we ended up moving to, after a year in the Philippines, I moved to Thailand. I had a conference that I went to in Bangkok. The big group went to Chiang Mai, which is an hour north of Bangkok on the plane. And I've been here ever since, which is two and a half years now. It just kind of whizzes by and this is what I do. I started as a copywriter, just doing bunch of different stuff and eventually realized that most people were coming to me for email stuff and basically thought that, you understand as a copywriter, you need a thing. So my thing was going to be email marketing and I decided to call myself the "Auto-responder Guy'. And that was a year ago, eighteen months, something like that. That was a really good decision. It worked out really well in terms of what it's done for the business but it's actually funny right now, I'm actually working with building out a process of bringing out bigger clients. And none of them having any idea what an auto-responder is, they don't think in terms of auto-responders and email marketing, they think in terms of leads and database and conversions. I'm slowly going through a slight transition. I'm trying to decide whether to drop the whole Auto-responder Guy things and go for more of that lead conversion angle. But time will tell. So that's what I do, man. I write emails, I set up similar stuff to you, I just come out form a slightly different angle. Jeremy: Okay. Nice. So tell us about The McMethod. What's your process? I know one of the things you do is write ten-part email sequences for clients and you have your McMethod that you sell as a product. So tell us about your methodology for the writing the emails and the process that you go through. John: Sure. So the first time I did this, I know this guy who's like a tropical MBA and it's about moving to the tropics and doing some business stuff, learning how to build a business. Anyway, so he was the first guy who hired me to write some emails for him. And what I came up with was where I will send an email every three days, ten emails a month and so what that morphed into was, you might call it a productized service (04:23) coming to me for a 10-email sequence. So we jump on the phone (04:27) their business and then I'd give him his ten emails and do it like that. It's fairly streamline, very easy to deliver. I've got guys that work for me to do (04:36) the bulk of the writing which is quite useful and (04:39) the way I do that is because it's productized like that, it makes it quite easy to do. And then we got a product which is called The McIntyre Method which is a four-week video training program on how to create your own ten-email sequence. But the idea, really is as I've grown, I've realized is that there's no ideal length, there's no ideal set of emails. If you really have a problem and you've got different solutions to solve that problem. So what I do now is there are sequences where I do ten emails since that's what a lot of people know me for, but also bringing in a lot more custom stuff. So depending on the problem, sometimes, someone really needs three or four emails, sometimes, it's going to be quite a lot more than that. So probably we're looking at today, we're looking at a proper sales funnel of something like fifty emails, I think. If you're really going to talk about emails. So you see (05:37) the process how it happens. Jeremy: Yeah. So that's one of the things that I've learned is everybody comes out and they need different things. In fact, I just had a client he just signed up maybe a week and a half ago or so and he came and he wanted A, B, C, D. I told him he needed less than that which you usually don't hear of that often. He was going like, "Oh, this guy had that so I need that." For this business, and where he's at, he didn't really need that exact thing. It's funny. People need different things and a lot of people start out like I'm going to provide this is in their service, and then it comes to being more like a custom job. So tell us when you're writing out those sequences, it doesn't really matter what the length, if it's ten or if it's fifty or anything like that. What's the big goal that you're trying to achieve when you're writing out these sequences (besides sales, obviously)? John: Right. I mean, ultimately, yeah. It does (07:08) but if people come to me and they think "Well, it's going to be the best subject line, all the best talk, all the best story." it's really (07:15) because at the end of the day, the only that really matters is are you solving a problem anyone actually cares about? And if the answer is 'Yes', well, great. Then you're in business. So now you need to understand as much as you can about the person you're trying to sell something to and as much as you can about the solution. This takes years and years to develop. This isn't something that you can sit down and do a brainstorming session and you've got it. I was reading an article about to go from 1 million to 10 million to 100 million with a software start-up. And often, it'll take them months or if not years just to get what they call 'Product Market Fit'. You might say it's a terminology from the start-up world but the idea if you've really got to a point where you can fit the product to the solution that you're offering to the exact needs that the person who's buying it. And sometimes that's going to mean changing the product, sometimes it's only going to mean changing the copy. And so the reason why you got to understand all that first is because that's what drives the copy. So when you sit down to figure out "Well, we got this prospect here, he's 37 years old, he manages a team of developers, and he works at a corporate company like Microsoft. And what he's trying to achieve is time management." And so there's our prospect. He really needs to leanr how to manage his own time and the time of his team. And then the other side, you got your product which is a software app for time management. It starts with understanding exactly what John Smith over here who works at Miscrosoft what his problems are, what his challenges are, what he really needs out of the product that you're offering him. Once you've got that, then you can go and build the product. Because ideally, the product's driven by John Smith's needs, otherwise it's not going to work for him and once you got that product, and assuming you got those two pieces worked out, because this is the thing, a lot of people come after that. It was kind of really interesting, I was at a marketing conference in the U.S. last September. And one thing I find, maybe this is just me being an Australian, coming from the outside direct response world but it seems a bit everyone always talks about hacks or how to optimize your sales copy, how to get a better funnel. Very rarely, does anyone ever say "Is this business worth having in the first place?" Jeremy: Yeah. John: It's funny how I always come back to this question of like that's the 99% of the battle is, are you selling sh*t that someone actually cares about? That's in a nutshell. But assuming you've got that, assuming you've nailed that or you're in the process of nailing that, how are we going to come up with the same auto-responder or any kind of marketing pieces you think about. I think about like you're on a bridge, you're on (10:01) and on one side of this (10:02), you've got his prospect and he's John Smith, he's got his problem that he needs to track the time to himself and his team and do it accurately and a bunch of different problems like that. And on the other side of the (10:13), you've got your product (10:17). And this could be an ebook on how to save time, it could be a software app, it could be a DVD series,. One thing I'm going to say is that the product doesn't really matter as long as it solves his problems. We've got this. Prospect on once of the (10:28), and the product on the other. The way I see it, the goal of any marketing piece is just to bridge that gap. So when I say bridge that gap, is that you're really going to sit down and list why wouldn't John Smith buy that in the first place? And step number one, he doesn't know what the hell it is, he doesn't even know it exists. So step number one, is making John aware that there is a solution to his product. Now let's say he went to John and say "Here's my solution. Do you want to buy it?" he's going to be like "Well, No. I got no idea who you are." Alright, so there's one objection. He doesn't know who you are. So your auto-responder needs to: Number one, get his attention. Because without his attention, he's not going to know who you are. So that's more of a traffic issue. But then you need to establish the authority otherwise he's going to be like "No, I don't trust you." then he's going to be like "I trust you but I know anyone else who's used this. Do you have any stores? Is there anyone else using this or am I the first person? And it's like therefore you need testimonials and case studies. And so what happens is once you understand what John's all about and what objections he might have, what's really stopping him from making that purchase in the first place? Then you have a list of five to ten main things. Main problems, main objections that you need to handle before he's going to buy that product. And the auto-responder just becomes a bunch of emails or a series of emails, could be a straight sequence, could be segmented in bunch of different ways, but the main thing is it's knocking out each of those objections in as many different angles as possible. Jeremy:Nice. That's a really good point. When I worked with clients, I actually have a 'she', it's like I call my copywriting researchee and it has twelve pages long of information that I fill out based on the avatar of the person and the demographics and the market and the competitors. One of the things on there is I write down a sheet of paper all the objections I could possibly think of and then as I'm writing the copy, whether it's a sales letter or an email sequence, I literally cross off each objection to make sure all of them are hit. The same thing with benefits, because you can create sentences and paragraphs that overcome the objection and then transition into giving them the benefit. I wish I had an example at the top of my head but I don't. So it's good to actually write it down rather than just having it in your head and hoping that you hit all of them. John: Absolutely! Part of the product that I've got to teach the people how to do this, is you make a list of these objections and then you just down. When you write your emails, you write an email for this objection, and then you write for this objection, and then you write for this objection. It's really that simple. Jeremy: Yeah. Let me ask you, what are some of your favorite ways of overcoming those objections. Do you use outside proof or anything like that to overcome those objections or do you just tackle them directly? What are your favorite ways to overcome the objections? John: To be honest, this goes back to understanding John Smith, your prospect. Like for example, my buddy calls me up and he says "Hey, we're all going out tonight for dinner. Do you want to come?" and I'm like "No, I can't." and then he just starts saying stuff "Oh, come on, man. you don't need to work tonight. It's The Friday night. We're going to go out." but low and behold, I wasn't even working in the first place. That wasn't the reason I couldn't go. So what he's done there is he's hit the wrong objection. This goes back to you doing sportsh as a 5 levels of awareness. You've really got to take the time to understand where someone's at in that awareness cycle. And this is from someone who's got no idea that you have any problem to someone who's aware that he has problem, aware that there's solutions out there and he's really just looking between solutions. And every layer in between that is five main layers, although five ways that he splits it up. as for how I do it, with email, storytelling is really the biggest thing you can do with emails. It fits perfectly. But ultimately, you really need to know if the trust is the issue, then you're going to need case studies and you're going to need proof. Maybe trust isn't the issue. Maybe the industry is so well-established, that he doesn't actually need trust. He believes you, he just wants a better price. So what you need to write is you need to have a special offer, where it's a time-sensitive offer for a lower price. It really depends on what angle you're going for. this is why sometimes it's hard. It's much fancier if I can get on a podcast and say "Well, Jeremy. I've got this three-step system..." Jeremy: Yeah. John: Gurus do this all the time. But it's total crap. There is no formula to do it. Jeremy: Like you're saying before, it's the same with little tricks and things like that and little hacks and all that kind of stuff. Most people are trying these weird, little hacks and tracks, but they don't have the basics in place. They're trying to do all of those but they're missing the stories, they're missing the case studies, they're missing the understanding who they're talking to. Like your example before. You're saying giving them the wrong objection. I can't tell you how many email sequences that I'm on and they're like "Do you suffer from this?" or "Is this your problem?" (16:20) notes actually not even close. One of the things you can do to overcome that is segmentation. What are your thoughts on segmentation and writing emails to more, say, you have a 10,000-person list segmenting based on their interests, maybe website behavior, like what pages they visited, so you know more about them. What's your experience on that? John: The reason I'm laughing right now is that I've been so bad at segmenting for so long. It's something that's changing right now. For example, the traffic that goes to my site is probably two main segments. I could split them up in a bunch of different ways but the two main ones are people who want to learn how to write emails themselves and become a copywriter and get their own clients. Maybe they just took off their own business and on the other side is people who had a business and they don't have time to write themselves, they need to hire someone. So it's taken me the longest, it's so easy to do and I did this recently, actually. But it was so easy to set up so now what happens is if someone signs up, the first thing that happens, is the next page is just like "Alright, you're almost done, before I could set you up your email sequence, your tips, answer this question - when it comes to converting more leads to business, would you rather write an email or convert the leads yourself or hire an expert to do it for you?" And so what happens after that now, based on what they say in response, I, then send them a custom sequence. So obviously, an example here would be like, the people who sign up, who want to do it themselves, they're really interested., they want to have a lifestyle, they want to have an automated business, they want to have passive income, email marketing, auto-responders. And on the other side that really want to hire an expert, they're mostly likely thinking about leads, leads, databases, conversions, revenues, then I'm really thinking about email marketing and auto-responders and quick my job and travel kind of thing. And already, I'm so glad that it's already been making a difference. I wish I got started doing this segmenting earlier because I've got a list of thousands of people and I only know the ones recently who are actually interested in hiring someone. Jeremy: And it really is good. There's a lot of ancillary benefits that go along with that. Like number one, you are able target them better and talk to them better and do all the things that we've been talking about the last twenty minutes. Another is your deliverability goes up because your open rates and your click-through rates, and all of your email stats increase so then that gives the email... I don't know the tech behind it. John: The email gotsky. Jeremy: Yeah, the email gotsky. It's like a self-fulfilling prophecy, the higher your opening click-through rates, the higher, they say "Okay, well. You're sending relevant.." It's kind of like Google. You're sending relevant content to them, so I'm going to increase your reputation and that in turn gets better deliverability, so then more people see it, and it keeps that cycle continuous. Same thing with cleaning out your list. Everybody always wants a huge numbers list. This is something I am lacking in too so I can't really harp on anybody for doing this. But cleaning out your list, like looking at people who haven't opened your emails in the last three months or two months or six months and putting them into a re-engagement campaign and not sending to them. If you have a (20:16) to your list that hasn't been engaged in the last six months and then you put them on a separate list and start sending only to people who have been engaged, your open rates and click-through rates are going to go up by roughly 30% and then again, your deliverability goes up and the whole cycle continues. So one question, it's not exactly with auto-responders, but what is your opinion on a lot of people just want to grow their business but I feel like they don't really know why. It's like "Oh, I have to hit seven figures." And my question is why? Why do you want to hit seven figures, or eight figures or six figures? And a lot of people really don't know the answer. What's your opinion on people just growing businesses versus having an actual reason for hitting a specific number to be able to afford a certain lifestyle or anything like that. I know this has nothing to do with emails but it's... John: No, I love this question. This is something that's been on my mind a lot lately because I live in Thailand - Chiang Mai, Thailand. I lot of people live out here because the cost of living is quite low. And when I got here, I was probably a lot more budget-conscious when I first arrived. Now it's I don't have a budget, basically. And if I tried to live the same kind the way I tried to live here, I'd eat out all the time, I'd have great apartment in the best part of the town, taking regular trips to all sorts of places. This weekend, we're doing a dirt bike trip two days way up in the mountains. So one day up, one day back. Renting bikes, all the gear. And one day, I've been chatting to a couple of friends (22:14) today is this idea where when you get into business, especially this whole copywriting, just this whole entreprenuership thing, the whole hustle and grind and who's working the most hours and who had the best product launch, it's so glorified. I feel like it's a one upmanship game where everyone's trying to do better, very few people really stop and get a hang on - do you really want that? Is this really what life's about? Just hanging out? And who can put in the most hours and who can split test and who can build the biggest business because I don't think it is. But you never want to say that because it's kind of sacrilegious to say that like a business in marketing form, Facebook groups or some webinar. Like, no one would ever come out and say "No, I don't want to make seven figures." Jeremy: Yeah. Oh, I do. Like, I say that, I mean. John: Right. Interesting is I'd like to have a start-up that does a $100 million. Like, I'd love to have a copy like that but the more I think about it, I'm reading another book by Felix Denis it's called 'The Narrow Road'. Jeremy: Yeah. It's a good one. John: Yeah. It's (23:34) but I mean. I'm reading (23:37) in one of his essays he mentions that if you want to do a start-up and you want to build and make more of like a $100 million company. But the example was basically they were cramming thirty years of your working life into four years and so doing that means your life is work for that amount of time. And it's not as simple as that, it's not like you do it for four years and you bail, you go for four years and you go public, then there's a bunch of more mess, and the works gets even bigger and your health suffers, and it's going to be quite hard to manage any kind of social life, let alone a marriage or kids or anything like that. We're often sold the dream and we sell each other on this, this dream that you can have anything you want and it's just not true. It's kind of like you can have anything you want but you can't have everything. What I think about me for me personally, I enjoy living in Thailand. It would be easier if I was in the U.S Timezone, for example. But I prefer living out in Thailand. There's cost with that. Or it would be very hard to have a start-up out here. Or I like going to the gym and taking off to the gym for two hours, couple times a week. Or taking an afternoon off. Like today and yesterday, I took a nap in the park. Read a book, took a nap, you're just here, you don't feel like working, you're just like sweet! All I can chill, read a book, take a nap, listen to the birds, and if you're going to build a million dollar company or a ten million company, those moments, when you get to do a lot of that stuff, become a lot rarer. But no one's willing to talk about that. Jeremy: Yeah, I know. It's something that I'm really focusing a lot on in my life, like I've hot the point where I don't "need" more money. I'm taking care of everything. Like, my lifestyle, I do pretty much whatever I want to do which now I'm limited because I have a one and two-year-old. But I've been thinking about this a lot lately. And it's like, my kind of growth strategy is I want to continue growing just because I like the challenge of it, but I keep a criteria that I work up until 3:30. Usually 3:00. 3:30 is like my max end time in the afternoon so I'm growing as much as I can and focusing on net income, not gross. I don't care about gross, whatsoever. But focusing on net, what I actually bring home and can write checks with. But I won't work past 3:30. That's my criteria. I think it's good for people to have criteria. Maybe you work really hard during the week, you take the whole weekend off. I made a new webinar. It was a two to three weeks ago and people's excuse for the whole workaholic thing is "My business is my passion." So I work constantly for that and my response is always "Man, you must live a boring-ass life because if you have one passion, that must be awful." Like, why would you want to live life with one passion. Working is my passion. I love working, I live writing, I love coming up with strategy and all that kind of stuff. But I do that for the third of the day. And then I get spend time with my kids and spend time with my wife. I do the same thing, if I just don't feel like working in the afternoon, I'll take a nap, or I'll go out back and work out, play with the kids in the yard, go for a walk. You have to ask yourself why? I want to double my business this year - why? John: Eventually, like, one thing I've found and this has been fairly common of the guys I know in Thailand is no matter where you live, if you go to business, eventually you're going to get to the point where you make enough money to do all these you want and save some money, like you've covered all your bases. Then it's like "Well, I could keep working hard and there's wrong with that and it can be really fun to work hard but the bigger question, and this is the one I've been trying to work on lately, is (28:22 - 28:24) but for the most part, life is free and amazing. Like, I'm traveling around and I'm 25. So I'm like young, got this cool stuff going on, but then it's a bit like "Well, now, what now?" It's fun to have a mission and I enjoy the challenge of doing the business and growing your business, but I don't want to do it all the time. So the question becomes "What does it mean to have a good life, to build a good life?" And the answer's going to be different for everyone and I'm still figuring it out what that means to me but in many ways I love my job, I love working hard, I love the challenge, I love getting in the ring and having a go but I don't think grinding on the laptop all day, that I won't do. I agree, if someone's life is just working, I don't know how that fun that is. Jeremy: I know. I never got that. For me, I think I'm a little bit lucky in the sense that as my kids were growing up and as Katie was pregnant, that's when my business started taking off and I wasn't already a workaholic before kids, it kind of happened in lock step. I think I'm a little bit lucky in that sense that I was able to cement those values at the right time. Because let's just say you had kids at 35. And from 20 or 25 to 35, you were a workaholic, you were building a big business, it's hard to break out of that and I understand that. But I also think that a lot of people use it as a crutch, it's like "Oh, I have to..." Here's a good example, I have one client, she has a three and a half billion dollar business, the personal income is very high, more than anybody ever needs, she can have an awesome lifestyle, but I've been harping on her. I'll try not to say too much information so people won't know who is but I've been talking with her lately and she just e,ailed me last week and her husband booked a vacation for nine days away, they're taking free days because I introduced her to Strategic Coach, the free days and all that kind of stuff, where you take the day off where it's zero business. There's no email, there's no thinking about business, no talking about business, like no business whatsoever and she emailed me that she and her husband booked 9-day vacation away and there's no cellphone reception or anything like that. And she said that she hasn't had time away from her business since 2006... John: Wow... Jeremy: But it is possible, she went all those years and she was just stuck in that rut of just working and working and working and working and what broke her out of it was her daughter, she's really sick, she got like a tick (31:52) illness, I think (31:53) disease, I would imagine. And so she's in the hospital a lot, like one of her flares up, she has it really bad, apparently. So this client, she's like "I can't like I have anymore because I need to be there for my daughter." So she finally made the decision to make less money and scale back the business so she can have more free time. It's interesting. I think it's definitely worth thinking about for people. And on eof the things that helps with me, I know exactly how much money I need ti have my "perfect dream lifestyle" plus have enough savings for like long-term financial independence (32:46) real estate and all that. Plus, I always leave in a buffer, for like, kind of the just in case and then taxes and then everything. But I have a specific number that I'm trying to reach and I'm not quite there yet, I'm starting to get close but I'm not quite there yet but I have a specific number that when I hit it, it's like trying to hit that number without working longer and that's my thing that I came up with that works really, really well for me. So everybody should just think, map out your dream lifestyle, exactly how much money you need and then work to get that. You can probably do with a lot less, by the way. You really don't need that much. John: This is like a fascinating thing because like this is... This is the (33:40) I've noticed about businesses is a lot of people want to get into it to make more money, to have a better lifestyle, they're often one of like good financial sense, look at investors, anything to do with money and economics, is one of the best things you can do is just learn to spend less than you are. While earning more can help and you can have a better lifestyle and all that, like (33:59) today, actually. I was online, that was a lady's site, multi-level marketing something, the testimonial was like "We started making all this, we bought a new house and we bought a new car." that's one of the worst things you could've done. Jeremy: I know. John: Because that cements, that's enlisting yourself, because I'm assuming they probably would have up'd the house payments, up'd the car payments, because people have consumer mentality. At a certain point, you're going to realize this what's pretty much living in Thailand is getting this experience of having a huge amount of wealth without spending that much money for it. You kind of realize, well, there's not much difference. I stayed in $300 a night business hotels in Bangkok and afterwards, it's a nice hotel and it was cool and everything but it's really not much different from a $50 a night hotel. Jeremy: Yeah. John: I like motorcycles. I could buy a Ducati for $35,000 but then I'm like "I'd get another bike for $7,000" and it's going to do %99 of the same enjoyment for way less or even better I can just rent a motorcycle every week, whenever I feel like going, then I don't have to deal with licensing, the registration, I don't have to deal with insurance or any of the stuff and I can have a bike anytime I want I want to go and ride it. Jeremy: One of the things that helps with that is getting rid of your ego. John: Yeah. Jeremy: If you're buying stuff that's more high-end, it's almost always because you want other people to see that you're successful. And maybe that pisses some people off but that's the truth of it. John: Have you read 'The Millionaire Next Door'? Jeremy: Yeah. That was a good book. John: One of the lines that stuck with me (35:47), he basically said that "At a certain point, you've got to choose, with the money that we all have, you got to make a choice between how you're going to spend the money to acquire social status, which is basically buying high-status items like nice cars, houses, watches, clothes, anything that makes you look better as a person, or you're going to use that money that you make to prioritize wealth-building which means investing and saving and living in a worse neighborhood, buying second-hand cars, and not buying expensive shoes." There's a choice and people don't realize that they're making a choice when you go buy a new house or a new car or something nice, you're prioritizing ego and social status instead of wealth. I think if some people think about it, they might realize because this is what I think about like I like social status too. I'd love to have a Ferrari but what's more important to me in the long run where I'd rather have the wealth. I think I'd rather have the wealth and freedom than the Ferrari. Jeremy: Yeah, and with the wealth, like a view of $10 million sitting in the bank, it's peace of mind. Then you can go out and buy a Ducati or whatever. But get the wealth sitting in the bank first. And start (36:59). I was doing some Funnel Days in Florida. I went in and rented, for my car, because I've never been a car person, when I was a teenager I was into the Riser kind of car, the little like the Eclipses and the Hondas and all that, they're all loud, the Fast and Furious kind of stuff which I this is absolutely embarrassing now, but I sued to be into cars but not really that much, so when I was in Florida, I was like, "You know what? I'm going to see what it's like to drive a really fast car." So I got this high-end Mustang and I was like it's cool driving around in it, it makes you feel like a big hotshot and it's fast and it's fun and all that kind of stuff. But it's just not worth the extra you're going to spend. I have an expensive car, I have a Tahoe but because we have kids and we need the extra space. We always have strollers in the car our other car that we have is an Equinox which is not really expensive but it doe the trick. It gets you from A to B and it's not this big, fancy, high-end car. And the same, the Tahoe, it was more expensive but we needed the space. we needed the extra seat in the car, we needed the trunk room for the strollers and stuff so it's a pretty practical car but most people don't need big, giant cars like that. but it's interesting what people spend their money on and why they spend their money that stuff. John: Yeah, really interesting. Jeremy: Wait. I know the conversation kind of took a pretty wild turn from emails. I apologize. My voice, if it's starting to get hoarse, I've been battling a cold now for like ten days and it refuses to go away. But yeah, it was a pleasure talking to you. Before we head off, thanks again for everything. But before we head off, tell everybody about who can benefit from getting into your world and what do you have to offer people? John: Sure. So what I do I mean (39:38) the email marketing stuff, so if you want to learn emails better want to basically convert more leads into customers, that's what I do. So if you head over to my website that I operate from is www.TheMcMethod.com. There's a bunch of stuff there. I've got a podcast. I'm almost up to 100 episodes and every episode is an interview with a marketer, like Jeremy, which should be live in a couple weeks. I've got Perry Marshall, John Carlton, John Benson, Russell Brighton, some of the biggest guys in the industry and exactly what their marketing strategies are. Honestly, that'll be the best place to start but there's obviously, I sent that email tips which he heard a little about the funnel here. And there's a community and coaching and all that sort of stuff which you'll see in the back end but I'd say the place to start would be to check out the site and have a listen to the podcast, if you like that, join the list, and hit me up. Jeremy: Yeah. Sounds good. Alright, thanks everybody for listening. As always, if you got value out of this, share it, and write reviews on iTunes because that helps to get more people listening to the podcast, make sure to send it to your friends, and colleagues, anybody who would benefit, head over to JeremyReeves.com. If you have any questions or you would like to work with me or check out any of my products or go to www.TheMcMethod.com to check out John's stuff and we'll talk to you next time. John: Sounds great, Jeremy. Thanks for having me. Jeremy: Alright, thanks. Have a good one.