Podcasts about so jason

Is your agency as profitable as it could be? Are you successfully forecasting agency finances? Nate "Agency Dad" Jenson has built his business around helping agency owners drive profitability. Nate is a certified management accountant and internal auditor who focuses on offering the tools and accounting practices necessary for a thriving agency, with his business Agency Dad. On his second visit to the podcast, Nate talks about forecasting and the importance of managing the future, instead of wishing you could change the past. He explains why you, as an agency owner, are very in tune with your business and can make a pretty good forecast of where it will be in three months. He also offers valuable advice on how you can take that first step to start managing the future. 3 Golden Nuggets Having a plan is the 1st step. One of the questions Nate gets the most from agency owners is “when should I hire a new team member?” You need to do your forecasts, he says. What are your sales going to be in the next 3-6 months? There are a number of methods you can use to make that forecast, like linear regression. He recommends the Dilbert method, where you sit down and write down what do you think sales will be in the next months. Most agency owners are pretty in tune with their business and can make a pretty good estimate of what a few months in the future will look like for their business. You'll never be exactly right. The important thing is to be looking forward. Have a line of credit. Even with forecasting, you can find one month you don't have enough money for payroll. Of course, no one wants that, but you have a lot more options if you catch it weeks in advance. You have more time to make some adjustments, reduce expenses, or take a loan. Jason always advises mastermind members to get a line of credit, even if they don't need it, for those cases. You may think you don't need it, but things may not be that good a few months ahead. It's better to have it than to go through the embarrassment of missing payroll. Your team may start jumping ship, and finding the right talent is not easy. Fixed vs. variable. You should really understand the difference between fixed costs (payroll, rent) and variable costs (sales commissions, direct media spend). Nate advises moving your fixed costs into variable costs. The more you do this, the easier it is to be profitable. Basically, if you can change those fixed costs to variable, your breakeven number goes down. And so as soon as you hit this number, you're going to hit that profitability sooner each month. So your sales can be lower and you're still going to make more money. Subscribe Apple | Spotify | iHeart Radio | Stitcher | Radio FM Stop Focusing on the Past and Start Managing the Future Jason: [00:00:00] What's up, everybody? Jason Swenk here. I am excited for another episode. On today's episode, we're going to talk about why it's important for you and how you can actually forecast your agency so you can actually be more profitable. I have a repeat guest, Nate, who is amazing at all of this, and let's go ahead and jump into it. Hey, Nate. Welcome to the show. Nate: [00:00:29] Jason, thanks for having me on again. I appreciate it. Jason: [00:00:31] Yeah. I'm excited to have you back. Uh, so for the ones that haven't checked out, the, the first episode that we had you on, uh, tell us a little bit about who you are and what do you do? Nate: [00:00:43] All right. So I'm Nate Jenson, uh, the owner and founder of Agency Dad. Our, we're an accounting firm. We focus on helping, uh, marketing agencies become more profitable. That's really, that's really, our niche is how do we, how do we drive profitability? Uh, we don't do any tax work. We don't do anything like that. We do bookkeeping. We do, uh, financial reporting. So everything we do is geared to make you more profitable. Jason: [00:01:06] Well, we all want that, right? Because I think too many agency owners always focus on, you know, just top-line revenue. Hey, Jason, I want to make it to the million mark. Then I want to make it to the eight-figure. Mark. I'm like, well, what's the profit? Nate: [00:01:20] Yeah. If you could work less and make more, I would rather just have a lower top line and more profitability. So… Jason: [00:01:28] Exactly. Well, let's, let's talk about like, are there, like, how can we create forecasts? Because, you know, I think a question I get asked often, and I think as you do as well, like, can I afford to hire someone? Or what does it look like when I need to hire someone next? Like how do I figure that out? Nate: [00:01:47] Yeah. That's, that's probably the question I get more than anything else. Can I hire somebody to, when do I hire somebody? And if somebody asked me that my, my response is, well, what are your sales going to be in the next three to six months? And if we can't, if we can't answer that, then we really don't know if we can hire somebody. So, so for me, the forecast is where you start. Jason: [00:02:06] And so if that's where we need to start for, like, what is our sales look like for the next three months? How can we forecast that out? Nate: [00:02:14] Okay. So there's, there's a lot of methods, right? Uh, if you're like me and you're really into accounting, you can use linear regression. You can use exponential smoothing. There's a lot of, kind of analytical tools like that. If you're an agency owner and I say linear regression, you're probably tuning out and... Jason: [00:02:33] Yeah. I kinda, I kinda almost passed out when you use those big words cause I've never heard those before. Nate: [00:02:39] Yeah. So there's, there's a method that, that… If you're an agency owner and you just want to sit down by yourself and, you know, do your own forecast there's a method I would recommend. And I've, I've heard it called different things, but the term I like is the Dilbert method. So if you're familiar with Dilbert the comic strip, uh, there's a lot of, uh, let's say questionable business practices used in that comic strip. Uh, but the idea is you sit down and you basically say, hey, what do I think it's going to be? You know, what's my best guess? And so I've actually found, Jason, most agency owners are pretty in tune with, with a lot of the ins and outs of their business. You know, so I can do, I can do the linear regression, but if, if someone says, hey, I happen to know that every December our sales go way down, because you know, the seasonality of the business. Uh, a business owner or an agency owner, they can, they can say, well, my, my sales were, you know, they're 500,000 in November. I'm expecting them to be, let's say 400,000. Just because that's what happens. And for a, for a simple kind of first pass, I think that's a totally appropriate way to set up your first budget or your first forecast. Jason: [00:03:51] True. And then now that we kind of set out the future forecast for sales for the next quarter. What's the next step in order to, you know, making sure we're profitable or when we can actually hire? Nate: [00:04:04] Uh, similar again, if you're using the Dilbert method already, uh, the next step is… Think of a forecast, like your profit and loss statement, right? You look at your PNL for the prior month, what did I sell? What are my costs of goods sold? What are my expenses? And so you're setting up a PNL, but it's in the future. What about, what am I going to sell? What are my costs of goods sold? What are my expenses? Okay. Get your rent, get your payroll and get all that in there. And what am I expecting my profit to be? And it's hilarious, Jason. A lot of people will say, hey, well, I'm, I'm, I'm not good at this. I don't really know how to do this. Uh, having a plan is, is, is the first step, the, the number of times that I've actually set up a forecast for a client and I've come back to that client and said, hey, if everything goes according to plan, you're going to lose $10,000 a month, right? Uh, that it, that happens all the time. And the one thing that we know about a forecast is it's going to be wrong. No matter what it is, it's going to be wrong. You're going to be high. You're going to be low. But if you, if you do the forecast and your plan is to lose money, you know, you've at least got to take some action, make some changes. Jason: [00:05:17] Yeah. You know, one of the things that we did, uh, that I think is really easy for all of you guys listening, is we had our bookkeeper export out all of our expenses on a spreadsheet. And literally, you know, like, like you were saying, and then we had, like, we basically put out 12 months, so he said January, so here's what it is fixed. And then we copied that all the way through December. Then we added a couple of columns to the spreadsheet above and said, well, here's what we think we're going to bring in revenue. Kind of like what you're saying for the quarter. And then we could play with the model, uh, because then we did all, you know, we put in the easy formulas, you know, minus income minus expenses, and then, you know, divided that by, you know, to figure out our profit margins. So if we wanted to hire someone in the future, let's say three months from now, we would put in their salary under payroll. We would add them in there. And then it was really easy to figure out going, well, man, okay, we can afford this person because we look like we're bringing in, you know, a million more dollars this quarter and we can afford to do this, this and this. And it still keeps our profit margins at X. Is that what you're saying? Nate: [00:06:37] Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Um, you can always go deeper, right? You can always go and say, hey, we can't afford it, but should we afford it? Should we maybe look at raising our prices before we do it and so forth? There's all that stuff. But just for a first pass. Yeah, exactly what you said as you build out your model, say, it's say it's only three months, right? Maybe it's the year, but maybe it's just a few months. And you say, hey, we're making this, you know, this net income at the end of the, each of those months. Like you said, play with the model. What if we add one person? What if we reduce expenses here? What if we can get one more client? And again, you're never going to be right, right? It's just a forecast, just a guess anyways. But if you're looking forward and you, you can play with that model and say, can we hire, can we, uh, you know, can we, should we reduce our rent? You know, should we not renew our lease? All these kinds of things. Uh, you've just got to look forward. So many, so many people manage just historically, right? They see how did we do last month? Oh, we didn't do as well as we thought we would, well, what are we gonna do different this month? Well, let's just, let's work harder, right? That's not a plan, you know, you, don't working harder is well… You're gonna just gonna work yourself to death. And that's when you say let's get more revenue because we don't really know why we're profitable or not profitable. Jason: [00:07:52] Yeah. I, I remember one time I came into, you know… we used to do our budgeting and our forecasting really not existed. And I remember coming, looking at the bank account right before I went into a leadership meeting and I was like, holy cow, this is the lowest it's ever been. And I was like, we're not going to be able to make payroll in the next two weeks. If nothing changes. And we were able to, we made payroll for all 12 years. Um, we just made it that one. But after that I realized I needed to do forecasting and build a performer out to really show me, is it like… Because you're always going to have in the future. Like if you do this modeling, right, you're going to see where you actually start losing money where you don't have money, right? And it's just about how far out is it, and then it gives you that time of going, wow, man, I got six months to get my act together in order to make a major change. Especially if a big contracts about to end. And that's going to take a really big dip in your income. You know, let's say, Nate, you probably deal with, you know, these, this all the time where some clients have a huge contract, that's like 40% of their revenue. Nate: [00:09:16] Yeah. Yeah. For sure. And, and when, uh, when business comes in kind of in a lumpy way like that, uh, that's much harder to, that's much harder to deal with. Um, like one of the things as I was preparing for this podcast, and I was thinking about… Is there's really two kinds of, of revenue that I see and predicting the revenue for each of those kinds takes a different sort of mindset. One is the retainer revenue. If, you know, if you have a book of clients and you're like, hey, I know who my clients are and how much they pay me. Your revenue forecasting is actually pretty easy. And if you have, uh, you know, if you have, your, you know what your payroll is, uh, it's pretty easy to say my retainer is enough to cover my payroll, my other expenses, and so forth. If you're a more project-based, you know, say you're a web developer, uh, you're, you're much more reliant on, hey, how much business do we think we can pick up in a given month or a given quarter? And it's interesting, Jason, I've actually seen, I don't know if, I don't know if I'd call it a trend yet. But I've seen quite a few of my clients who are on that, uh, in that project-based kind of revenue. They've actually, as they're doing their forecasting and I'm helping them with their forecasting. Some of them have actually moved from a, uh, traditional employee type model on the expense side to contracting a lot of that. Because… Yeah, well, yeah, predictability. When your revenue is so lumpy, it's very nice to have your, your, uh, cost be a lot more variable, you know? Even if a contractor is more expensive per hour… Might be cheaper overall if your revenue is, is way up and way down. Jason: [00:10:59] Yeah. You know, the, the other thing, I have a lot of mastermind members that… In the past couple of months, and even right now, they're going through acquisitions and they're getting bought. Uh, like I'm thinking of one of our masterminds Dean that just sold maybe three months ago and… uh, you know, very successful business, you know, in the multimillion-dollar range. And he never really did forecasting. He never put a performance together. And when they actually, and this is why it's good too…  Especially if, if you guys are listening both, it's good for predicting out and profitability when you need, and to make yourself a little more relaxed rather than that volatil… volutary…? Nate: [00:11:41] Volatile. Jason: [00:11:43] Yeah, there you go. Big words I can't say. I went to Florida State, guys, come on. Um, but uh, all the people that are looking to buy you are going to look for the future cast. And they want to know because that's what they're buying sometimes. And if you don't know it, that's going to send up red flags. So for your sanity, for your predictability, and especially for, if you want to be able to potentially sell one day, please make sure you do these on a regular basis. Nate: [00:12:17] Yeah. Yeah. Well, it's again, it's driving that profitability right? Managing to the future instead of just wishing you could change the past. Um, but, Jason, there's something you mentioned a few minutes ago that I wanted to get back to. You talked about that time when you were almost out of money for payroll, right? We actually, and I recommend this as well, but we actually do for our clients, uh, multiple kinds of forecasts. So the first one is the PNL forecast, but we do a separate cashflow forecast. So we'll usually have that, like a rolling eight week forecast. And the payroll is a perfect example…. Is if it's, if it's Monday morning and that's when you run your payroll and you're out of money, you're like, do I have personal money I can throw in the business? Do I have a really good banker friend that can somehow can be aligned really fast? And even if you do, you know you're going to pay through the nose on that rate to get the money. Uh, it's, it's a totally different experience if you're looking ahead and you're like, oh my gosh, eight weeks, our bank account goes negative. Uh, what can we do? Well, if you need to get a loan, you have eight weeks to get it. But you can say, hey, maybe we can reduce expenses. Maybe we can not take that owner distribution I was planning on. You have a lot more options. So the PNL forecast is where it all starts. Uh, but you need to take that and go to the next step and say, how's my cashflow going to change based on, you know, based on my expectations of sales and expenses and so forth? Jason: [00:13:43] Yeah. You know, um, that reminds me, I tell our mastermind members and I tell people in agency playbook, the first thing I want you to do is get a line of credit. And they'll be like, hey, Jason, I'm good. Like, I got a ton of cash I can operate for over three months. I'm like, things are not always going to be that good. Um, and so get a line of credit when you don't need it. And so if you ever do come into hard times, you don't have to miss payroll and you don't have to be embarrassed. Because if you miss payroll and you tell your employees and your team that, or your contractors, they're jumping ship. And finding the best talent is very, very hard. And I always say, get a line of credit. I don't care if you don't need it. Like, I think we tapped into it one time when we actually need it. And then here's the other trick with the line of credit. They will cancel it all the time if you never use it. So every month I would just take out like 5,000 for one day, put it back in so they see some movement. Because it doesn't cost you anything, if you don't use it. Nate: [00:14:49] Absolutely. Totally right. So it's, but the point is, I think you, you have that use it when you need it. Uh, have, you know, get it before you need it, like you say. But just, you've got to look forward, again, the number of times I've seen people who they just, they have no idea where they're going. They just know where they've been or where they are. And, and then they want to know, hey, should I do this? Should I do this? And should I do this? You got to look at the future. And I, I know this can be an overwhelming thing for people. And that's why I say, hey, if you can't do a 12 month forecast to a three month forecast. You know, look at your sales for three months and then once a month, sit down and add on that next. That's gonna, that's gonna get you way ahead of where you are if you're not even doing that. And it's just a great place to start. Jason: [00:15:35] So awesome. Well, Nate, this has been awesome. Is there anything I didn't ask you before you tell the listeners about this cool, special offer? Nate: [00:15:46] Uh, let's see. I would have one thing I guess, and this isn't just with forecasting. This is with, you know, kind of bookkeeping and reporting in general. One thing I wish my clients understood more, uh, when they, when they became clients, was the difference between what a fixed cost is and a variable cost. Uh, if you have a lot of what we call it, fixed costs, and that's a cost that just you pay every month, it might change, but it doesn't change because you sell more. So you have rent, you have insurance, uh, you have your payroll and things like that. A variable cost is a cost that does change with sales. And so if you have sales commissions, that's going to go up the more you sell. Any direct media spend obviously is going to go up the more you sell. Uh, so if you're contracting your work, that kind of stuff's going to go up the more you sell. Uh, the more you can move your fixed costs into variable costs, the easier it is to be profitable. Because the more fixed costs you're like, I've got to sell this much every month just to break even. And then when I go above that and that's my profit. If you can change those fixed cost to variable, uh, your, your breakeven number goes down. And so as soon as you hit this number, you're going to hit that profitability sooner each month. So your sales can be lower and you're still gonna make more money. Jason: [00:17:06] Awesome. Yeah. You know, I, I didn't really learn that until kind of the very end and, uh, you know, it, it makes a big difference, so, uh, great advice. Well, Nate, this has all been amazing. Um, if people want to know more and you know, possibly work with you and, uh, because they they're like me, they look at numbers and they go, uh, dizzy. Um, what can they do to reach out to you? Nate: [00:17:32] Oh, thanks. Uh, first of all, one thing we actually do is we... We take most of the numbers and we put them on charts, graphs, and we make them really easy for people to just see a picture and understand it and move forward. So that's number one, but if they want to get a hold of me, uh, agencydad.money is our website. We do have a free offer for your listeners. It's agencydad.money/freeaudit. And what we do is we actually do an audit of their financials, uh, comparison, compare their financials to some industry benchmarks. Jason: [00:18:03] I like that. Yeah. You guys better take Nate up on that offer. That's uh, that's crucial. I mean, because we all want to know where we stack up and where we actually need to go. So make sure you guys go there. Say the URL one more time. Nate: [00:18:16] It's agencydad.money/freeaudit. And, just because of the topic of this podcast, I'll mention  that's a third, a forecast that we do is we actually forecast people's metrics. So they can see in the future, if their metrics are getting out of whack, based on what they should be. Just another way to give us a red flag on something. Jason: [00:18:38] Awesome. Well, everybody go check out that and get that free audit. And until next time, have a Swenk day. Nate: [00:18:45] Thanks, Jason.

Jason Hartman joins us to talk about how young investors can navigate the current housing market and succeed. We cover inflation - what it is, what it does, and how you can use it to your advantage as an investor; how to think about debt; his favorite asset class; his strategy for financial perpetual motion; and how to think about mitigating risk. Jason's Site: https://www.JasonHartman.com Free Book: https://www.PandemicInvesting.com  --- Transcript   Before we jump into the episode, here's a quick disclaimer about our content. The Remote Real Estate Investor podcast is for informational purposes only, and is not intended as investment advice. The views, opinions and strategies of both the hosts and the guests are their own and should not be considered as guidance from Roofstock. Make sure to always run your own numbers, make your own independent decisions and seek investment advice from licensed professionals.   Michael: Hey, everyone, and welcome to another episode of the remote real estate investor. I'm Michael Albaum, and today I'm joined by a very special guest, Jason Hartman. Jason is the founder and CEO of the Hartman media company, as well as the Jason Hartman foundation. He's a longtime real estate investor, and also host of the creating wealth podcast. And Jason's gonna be talking to us today about some real estate tips and tricks he has, as well as how to use inflation to our advantage. So let's get into it.   Hey, Jason, super excited to have you on the show today. Thank you so much for taking the time to hang out with us.   Jason: It's my pleasure, good to be here. And we're going to talk about one of my favorite topics, that is a topic most people hate, because they don't know how to use it. for their benefit. We're going to talk about how right all the listeners today and the viewers can use it for their benefit. And that is inflation.   Michael: Ooooh, dun-dun-duun! So before we jump into it, I would love if you could just share with everybody listening and watching who you are, where you come from, and kind of what your background is.   Jason: Sure, sure. Happy to do that. So I've been in real estate since I was 19 years old, I got my real estate license, my first year of college, purchase my first rental property at 20 and a half. I was about to get my license right before my 20th birthday. And I've been doing it ever since I've owned a lot of single family homes. Over the years, I've had a couple of big apartment complexes, 139 units, 125 units, 120 unit, mobile home park, and then you know, just a bunch of single families and in some other stuff like that I have not done any Self Storage, investing. But long term rentals are really my thing. And I know your company helps people with long term rentals, we had your founder on my show before. And and so does my company. So we're in the same space. It's a really big space, and a lot of people just love buying rental properties, rightfully so, you know, I like to say it's the most historically proven asset class in the entire world.   Michael: Yes, yeah. I couldn't agree more. I couldn't agree more. So that's awesome. Do you really done a lot of different things? And I'm just curious, which, which is your favorite asset class? Having seen a bunch of different ones?   Jason: Yeah, you know, that's a good question in the the answer, the real answer is it depends. And why do I say that? Well, I think the best asset is the good old fashioned humble single family home, that really is the best one, all things considered. However, you know, it is a little bit harder to scale it. So if you're a really wealthy investor, you may want to do bigger properties, bigger deals, and fewer of them.   However, in recent years coming out of the Great Recession, we've seen big institutional investors that own 10s of 1000s of single family homes, as you all know. And so that is being scaled pretty effectively by major investors. So you know, it can scale, you just need to treat it like a business have systems in place. One of our investors, you know, I'm not sure the exact number he's up to, but I think he's up to about 70 or 80 houses through our network. And he wants to go to 500 doors in single family.   Michael: Wow.   Jason: You know, I do think single family really is the best one. I think it appreciates the best, I think it's the simplest, and for most people, it's the best thing. But But again, if you've got billions of dollars to deploy, I understand that you may not want to mess around with, you know, hundreds of 1000s of single family homes.   Michael: Maybe a bit too slow, too cumbersome.   Jason: Yeah.   Michael: Love it. Awesome. Well, Jason, can you just give everyone a super simple definition, in your own words of what is inflation? Because I think this word gets tossed around by a lot from people. People love using it. People love to sound smart. But for everyone who might not be super familiar with it, just what is it at its basic form?   Jason: From an economists perspective, the real definition of inflation is just simply increase in the supply of money. Right. But what does it really mean? That's the important thing. And that's the real answer to your question. So, first of all, let's understand how it occurs, in most cases. Milton Friedman, the late great economists, who I'm a big fan of but some people don't like him. He said inflation is everywhere and always a monetary phenomenon. Meaning that there are two major influences on inflation. One is monetary policy, which means the central bank, the Federal Reserve, how they deal with money increases and decreases in the money supply. That's monetary policy.   On the other hand, fiscal policy is the policy of the government. It's the way the government taxes and spends. So when it comes to monetary policy, when the supply of currency units is increase, in our case, it's dollars, right. But it could be yen pesos, Brazilian reals euros doesn't matter, right? Whatever that currency unit when the supply of it increases, you have this effect of more, in our case, dollars, chasing a limited supply of goods and services.   And so naturally in any free market without major distortions, and we can talk about that in a moment, if you like. The price of those goods and services will naturally increase as more currency units chase them, they go into the market and they buy them. So when people feel richer, right, when there's a wealth effect, the value of their real estate goes up their stock market holdings go up. There's a wealth effect, right? They feel richer. So they spend more they spend more freely when they feel more comfortable. And if they think the future is rosy and optimistic, they'll spend more. If they think the future is going to be scary and contractionary, then they'll spend less they'll rein in their spending. And so that will tend to cause deflation versus inflation. Right. So I hope that answers your question. Sorry, for the long answer.   Michael: No, it absolutely does. It absolutely does. It's great. And so why is that something that real estate investors should concern themselves with? Or is it something that real estate investors should even concern themselves with?   Jason: Well, it's interesting that you use the word concern, because most, in most cases, concern would be a bad thing. And for most people, inflation is a bad thing. However, for real estate investors, it's a really great thing. And as much as I philosophically do not like inflation, as a real estate investor, owning income property, I love inflation. Okay. So this is where philosophy and just personal interests diverge, right? They really do.   I don't like inflation, I philosophically disagree with it. I don't think the central bank and the government should cause it, I think it hurts most people. But from a self interested perspective, I'm going to figure out and I'm going to help teach investors how to figure out how to align their interests with the two most powerful forces the human race has ever known - governments and central banks. And so most people from a sort of amateur level, say, well Real Estate's a good hedge against inflation. Why do they say that? They say it, because the price of real estate tends to go up with inflation, or a little better than inflation. So it hedges it, right.   So if inflation is, according to the official stats of the consumer price index, the most widely used metric for measuring inflation, the CPI, if the CPI is just say, for example, at any given time, 3%. And housing appreciates it 6% Well, then you beat inflation, right? You beat it by 3%. And so you're better off, right? You're exceeding inflation. And that's the hedge. That's the amateur view.   But the more advanced view is sort of explained in a phrase that I trademarked many years ago. And it's a mouthful, so I'm just gonna warn you it's a mouthful, and that is inflation induced debt destruction. Say that it's fast. Inflation induced debt destruction, or IIDD. Right. And what that really addresses is this hidden wealth crater, this beautifully hidden wealth creator. When you use leverage when you use a mortgage on your properties, then you're borrowing the money based on today's value. But you are actually not even you were tenants because we outsource our debt obligations to our tenants. Right? Which is another great thing about income property. You, we or our tenants pay it back in cheaper dollars. So that is really a beautiful thing. And that's inflation induced. That destruction, I can unpack that a lot more if you like, depending on how much time we have.   But when I started in this business about 18 years ago, hoping people invest in properties nationwide, I really wanted to come up with some new thinking, some new ideas, some things that made my philosophy of investing unique stuff I hadn't heard before, stuff that really just came out of my own head. And then I did find some examples of some of these techniques out there in the world. And the only one I really heard even alludes to the concept of inflation, which is debt destruction was Sam Zelle, who is a big billionaire real estate investor, who owns a bunch of office properties and apartment complexes and, you know, he's he's a wall street type an investor. And he alluded to this idea about, I want to say maybe 15 years ago, it's the only time I ever heard anyone really allude to it back in the time when I was talking about it, where he talked about his company equity office that owns office properties, how they borrow today's dollars, and pay them back in tomorrow's cheaper dollars. Right. So that's, essentially inflation does that destruction?   Pierre: So Jason, I think the common understanding is that inflation is a wealth distribution from the everyday person to those closest to the money because those closest to the money generation are the ones who get to spend it before the prices in the market react to it.   Jason: Yeah.   Pierre: How is there? You have a different way of thinking about this?   Jason: Yeah, no, that's what you said is you nailed it. Okay. So what you what you just address is something that an economist about 250 years ago named Richard Cantillon. postulated, and it's been called the Cantillon effect. Because the insiders, the banksters, Wall Street crooks, you know, they all have access, that the politicians, frankly, they all have access to this money before it hits the streets, if you will, and before it creates inflation.   So, you know, the folks at Goldman Sachs, for example, they basically, since they're on the inside of the game, right? They know that the money is coming, because they're consulting with Jerome Powell, and the other elites, right. They know what's coming. And they can buy up assets, before the effect of the inflation of those asset values has really happened largely in the market. Now, they'll usually continue to basically dollar cost average into a market as those prices are rising. But the little guys, the fools will be the last in. And, you know, that's, that's what, how it works, right?   And it is a wealth transfer, not just because of the Cantillon effect, which you just mentioned, but it's also a wealth transfer, just because of the way inflation works. So inflation is this insidious, hidden tax, that destroys the value of purchasing power of our savings, our stocks, or bonds, and even our equity in our real estate, because that's all priced in today's dollars, but today's dollars keep devaluing through inflation, right? If inflation is, and just to use that, well, let's do it. This one, let's say, say 10%, inflation occurs, whether that occurs in one year or three years, who cares, right? It happens, right? 10% inflation happens.   So if we own a million dollars in stocks, or a million dollars in bonds, or a million dollars in the bank, we just lost $100,000. Because the value those are denominated in dollars, and the value of those dollars is 10% less, but guess what? What if we have a million dollars in mortgages, and our mortgages have now been devalued? By 10%? Well, that's great. See, it destroys the value of everything denominated in those currency units, so in dollars, and thankfully, it destroys the value of debt too.   So beautiful thing when you're a debtor. So the lesson is, use mortgages, use leverage prudently, don't pay off your properties. You know, I had a question from one of my podcast listeners, the other day, emails me and says, Hey, Jason, should I sell one of my rental properties and use the the equity in that property to pay off another rental property? And I said, No, you should use my refi till you die plan and you should leverage them both to the highest possible value pull cash out and buy another property with that cash from the refinance.   Remember, there's no tax on borrowed money. So this is why my other technique called refi, till you die is a good technique for people, right? Because they take advantage of more inflation do set disruption. And of course, you know, you have to use this with some degree of prudence obviously. Right. But it is a it is a very powerful wealth creator.   Pierre: It's kind of a reversal of the wealth transfer kind of your you're absolutely right. It is. And you know, what's interesting, too, is you started off this conversation asking kind of what it means to young people specifically, and I'm not sure why you brought that up. But, you know, a lot of young people are interested in real estate investors, millennials, Gen Z people. And the interesting thing about inflation is that it is the most powerful method of wealth redistribution, most people think taxation is the most powerful method, but it's, that's not true.   The reason is, is because taxes are too obvious. Right? We all know, if our tax bill went up, there will be people rioting in the streets voting politicians out of office when they raise taxes, right, you know, the first George Bush Read my lips, no new taxes. Well, he lost the next election, because you know, that was the reagan is faced with that one, he gave it to the Democrats, right? And raise taxes.   And so, but inflation is something subtle, right? It's something people don't really notice, they sort of do, but they don't really understand why it's occurring. And they just kind of don't get it most people, right. And so it's a very powerful method of wealth redistribution, because it's subtle. It's sneaky, it's covert. But also, it transfers wealth and redistributes wealth, from lenders to borrowers, as we already talked about. But it also redistributes wealth from old people to young people.   Why is that? Well, I'll tell you why. In most cases, old people have hopefully savings, they own stocks, they own bonds, they have money in the bank. Hopefully they do. Hopefully they do, right. And young people typically don't have many assets, they just have a lot of debts. And so they get the advantage. It's an intergenerational wealth transfer without anybody passing away and having an inheritance, right? Because inflation just automatically transfers that wealth from people who have savings stocks, and bonds to people who have debts, because those debts are reduced through inflation induce debt destruction.   So if you're a young person, and you have a super high mortgage, and you have big student loan debt, and you financed both of your cars, so you're a young couple, right? You financed both your cars, and you've got some credit card debt, which is the worst kind of all right? I'm not recommending any of these consumer debts, obviously. But if inflation comes along, it will reduce the value of those debts and allow you to pay the lender back and cheaper dollars. But those aren't ideal debts. The reason real estate debt is ideal. Well, not real estate, rental property income property debt, is because it's self liquidating debt. We don't pay our own debt back. Right, our tenants pay it back. So we basically delegate the responsibility of the debt to people all tenants. Isn't that a great e quation.   Michael: amazing equation. Amazing equation. And I love the the refi till you die. model. That's great. We had a 1031 exchange, Ron, he said, you know, swap till you drop. So very similar methodology   Jason: Swap till you drop, I love it. That's good.  I am going 2 1031 exchanges on my own properties right now. And I agree with you that the 1031 exchange is a great tool right here.   Michael: I'm in the middle of one myself, and it's Yeah, the best thing since sliced bread. So Jason, I'm curious to get your thoughts because everyone always talks about, maybe not everyone, always, I'm over generalizing here. But a lot of people often talk about leverage and being responsible with it. And so what I'm hearing is that the more leverage you can utilize, the more advantageous it becomes in the long run because of inflation. So how should folks think about balancing that with not over leveraging themselves?   Jason: Yeah, good question. And it all depends first off on the person right and their personal situation. First off, right. But secondly, if you buy good properties, and we like we like to help our clients buy properties in linear Our markets. So we don't like these high flying trophy markets that have big fluctuations in pricing in value, right? We like slow and steady. You know, it's like the old parable, the tortoise and the hare. Okay? You know, it's slow and steady wins the race, right? The reliable properties in these reliable markets, mostly in the southeastern United States right now, that would be the example of it, and what I call linear markets, okay.   And so you have good properties with good cash flow characteristics, and, you know, appreciation is not very reliable, but cash flow is pretty reliable. It really is, even in in times of recession, cash flow is pretty reliable, you know, mostly, you collect the rent, mostly people pay in, you know, the money comes in, I mean, not always, but most of the time, it's pretty reliable.   So, good properties, good, linear markets. And using as much leverage as you can, which typically is not more than 80%, you got to put 20% of your own money into the deal. In most cases, you know, it's self liquidating debt, because the tenant pays the debt. Right? So I would never recommend consumer debt of any time. I don't recommend, you know, auto debt, although, you know, auto, that's pretty cheap. And if you finance your car and use that money that you would have done to pay for a car in cash to buy a property, I think that actually is a good idea. Okay.   Michael: Yeah.   Jason: But don't go out and get a super expensive car that you can't afford, right? That's the first lesson to that. student loan debt is terrible. I think it's a complete scam. And colleges are are just basically creating debt slaves. It's awful what they're doing. But that's a whole whole nother rabbit hole,   Michael: I can say we do a whole nother podcast on that.   Jason: We can I have opinions.   Pierre: So just going back to that younger investor, say they're just starting out, real estate has a pretty high barrier to entry for So to get started, how should younger investors be thinking about getting into real estate? Should they be saving their money for a down payment? Or should they be kind of taking bigger risks and playing in the stock market to build up that?   Jason: Yeah, well, you know, I'm never gonna be a huge fan of the stock market. You know, I, I like to say, Wall Street's the modern version of organized crime. Okay, you know, your Look, I mean, the point is, you're just putting your money, your financial future, your savings into somebody else's hands, right? When you buy properties, you're a direct investor, you control. Right, you you own it, you see if you understand it, but it does take more attention, right, you gotta pay attention to anything.   You know, if you're investing in stocks, you better be paying attention, right? I mean, the one way you are sure to lose or not get maximum return, at least, is to not pay attention, right, you can never just delegate this responsibility to somebody else. So in terms of saving for that first property, and the high barrier to entry, well, it's not really that high. I mean, you can buy a decent rental property with 25 or $30,000. Down, it's higher than it used to be for sure. But it's not impossible. And, you know, we have investors in their 20s, that are vying through our network. And, and they're doing it and, you know, you'd be amazed at it's like the old saying, most people overestimate what they can do in a year. And they massively underestimate what they can do in five years. So just living prudently and saving money for that first property. And, you know, letting that first property go to work for you paying attention to it, being a good manager of that property. And, you know, you'd be surprised in just a few years how things can really change.   You know, you buy a second property, we have an interesting calculator that we use for our clients. And it actually one of our clients kind of developed it, and then we expanded on it quite a bit. And that calculator basically shows people how to create a perpetual motion machine using real estate. And you might have heard about the old tales of how everybody, you know, in the late 1800s, I think it was was trying to invent the perpetual motion machine. And it's,   Michael: I can create it.   Jason: Yeah, it can't be done, at least not so far, right? Because energy, you know, has entropy to it, right? And it just loses its power. So you can't create a perpetual motion machine. The law of physics won't allow it, right. But with finance, you can. And basically, as you build your real estate portfolio, you use the cash flow from those properties, and use the appreciation from those properties. And then you get to a point where you do your first refinance, and use the proceeds from that refinances, tax free proceeds to buy another property. And this ultimately can create this perpetual motion machines. Absolutely beautiful.   Michael: That's incredible. That's incredible. I love that.   Jason: Yeah, we've got a calculator that actually shows people that where they can put in their own numbers, their own plan, how much they have to start with and, and create that perpetual motion machine.   Michael: That's great. As an engineer, I just love the analogy. You know, reformed engineer rather?   Jason: Yeah, yeah, yeah. What kind of engineer?   Michael: So I studied agricultural, but I used to work as a fire protection engineer for almost nine years. It was a lot of fun.   Jason: So if you if you if you got a student loan, that's a useful degree, right? People are actually hiring engineers, right. But they're not hiring for a lot of these other crazy things that there's they're selling fake, useless. putting people into you know, $100,000 worth of student loan debt.   Michael: It's, it's terrible. That's quite, it's like there's a whole generation of people that have a mortgage, they just didn't get a house included with their mortgage. You know, it's, it's ridiculous. Yeah.   Michael: It's it is crazy. It is crazy. Jason, I'm curious to get your thoughts, kind of on two separate investment vehicles. One is I don't have a big fan of the stock market, but curious to your thoughts on index funds. Because a lot of folks say, well, that's a great place to park money. So you don't have to be very active in it, kind of set it and forget it. And then alternatively, syndications, where you're involved in real estate, but not direct ownership.   Jason: Okay, so first off, you know, I have something called the 10 commandments of successful investing. And I must tell you, our 10 commandments has helped 23 commandments.   Michael: Funny how they keep growing.   Jason: You know, we got more. Yeah, so we're up to 23-10 commandments now.   Michael: Love it,   Jason: You know, we do math, government over here, okay. Funny math. Because, anyway, so commandment number three has really resonated with a lot of my podcast listeners and YouTube followers. And commandment number three is, thou shalt maintain control, you know, in other words, try as much as possible in your life to be a direct investor. Because when you are not a direct investor, you don't directly own the asset in which you're investing your money. You leave yourself susceptible to three major problems. Number one, you might be investing with a crook. And we've all heard about the scandals on wall street or Enron WorldCom   Michael: The Madoffs.   Jason: There's so many, Bernie Madoff. I mean, yeah, you know, global crossing. I mean, they're, you know, how long How much time do we have, right? There's just you know, that that Coffee Company in China, what's it called? luck in coffee? You know, there's so many stock market scams, it's unbelievable. So we know about that. And in real estate, there's certainly a lot of scams with syndicators, scamming people fund managers scamming scamming people, right? You know, most people aren't getting scammed. But, you know, there are certainly a good number of crooks out there.   When you're a direct investor, you can avoid these problems, right?   Number two problem, assuming they're honest, they might just be incompetent. And you'll lose money because they're either dishonest or stupid. Right. And that's no fun.   The third problem, assuming they're honest and competent, they take a big management fee off the top for managing the deal. And, you know, we've all seen these ridiculous salaries on Wall Street, as the shareholders are losing money, but they're still paying themselves big bonuses, right? It's just these things are not correlated, like they should.   Michael: Right.   Jason: And so so these are the problems you leave yourself susceptible to, don't directly invest in Listen, I'm not a direct investor, anything, everything I sell, okay, I mean, I have a lot of direct investments. But I have some non direct investments too. You just got to trust the person you're doing it with or the company, you're doing it with their competence. And their, their honesty. Right. So So that's, that's part of it. And then you've just got to look at the deal and see if they're charging ridiculous fees, you know, acquisition fees, disposition fees, management fees, are they using your money in the fund to go out and raise money from other people? Well, I mean, I don't know. Should that be an expensive the funder? Is that like an outside business expense, right? Yeah. So these are, these are questions you have to ask and do due diligence.   Michael: Yeah. Yeah. makes total sense.   Jason: But as far as index funds, the answer your other question. You know, it's, there are a lot of people who say and a lot of they have a lot of evidence for it. But you know, like anything, it's debatable because you can slice and dice things a million different ways that the index funds beat these highfalutin fund managers that charge big fees, right. So just by the index, there may be some wisdom to that.   Michael: Yeah. Yeah.   Pierre: Just thinking about risk taking on, you know, how to mitigate some of the risks that are inherent with taking on this debt, with an we're kind of depending On the government inflation to capitalize on that, what are some other risks that are inherent in government action? Like, there's a lot of talk about when people are deferring their mortgage payments, they're going to lose their homes when the government assistance stops, like, what are some ways to protect yourself.   Jason: Protect yourself? So, I mean, look at everything has risk, there's nothing risk free, even putting your money in the bank is very risky, because well, it's actually not risky. I know for sure what's going to happen with your money in the bank, you're going to lose it to taxes and inflation, guaranteed. Guaranteed loser money in the bank. Okay. That one is, is the guaranteed loss, right? Everything else has a risk, it could go up or down, right. And, you know, there's risk and everything, there's political risk.   So if you are investing in a blue state, the political risk is pretty significant. People are leaving a lot of these places. I live most of my life in California, and California has become a more risky environment with the political environment, they're New York, risky, right. And the other states, they're more business friendly, or a lot less risky. In fact, they're benefiting from the migration that's occurring out of these more or less left oriented places.   So there's political risk, and the political climate can change over time, right? For example, Texas, has always been very business friendly. But that's really kind of changing a little bit in Texas, even right, especially in Austin, which is a great city are really neat city. But politically, it's getting kind of risky here. So these risks are inherent.   But one thing that can really help directly when we're talking about risk in real estate is this. It took me 19 years to discover this, and I've been teaching it for a long time to it's called the Hartman Risk Evaluator. And basically, what the Hartman risk evaluator does, is it shows people by using what I call the LTI ratio, we've all heard of the LTV ratio, the loan to value ratio, right? Hey, you know, we'll give you an 80% loan, you need to put 20% down, that's the LTV ratio, right when you're getting a new loan, but the LTI ratio I invented, and that stands for land to improvement ratio.   So when people buy a property, they usually consider it to be just one thing, but it's really two major items, there is the land. And then there's the improvement for the house or the apartment building sitting on the land. So that's the LTI, the value of the land, versus the value of the improvements sitting on the land, the LTI ratio.   And the Hartman risk evaluator basically shows people that the higher land value markets are much more risky to invest in. And the higher improvement value ratios for that LTI ratio skews toward high improvement value and low land value are less risky to invest in. And I can give you an example of that, that I use personally in my own life. And this is kind of how I discovered a good way to mitigate risk on real estate. One of the first properties I bought out of state when I lived in California. It was interesting, because I was buying two properties at the same time. One was a home for myself in California.   And this was about 2004, I think, and I was buying this house in, in Orange County, California, and it was $815,000. And I was buying another house across the country for $159,000. So you know, you really see the difference there. Right? It was a rental property, that $159,000 pose. And I had this girlfriend at the time, and she was her mom was a new home sales. And she was telling me not to buy this $815,000 house because she just didn't think it was a very good deal. Right. And so we broke up. I bought the house anyway. And there you go.   But I also bought the other house across the country for 159,000. And here's what was interesting. My insurance broker Jennifer was insuring both properties. So she had an office in Irvine, California. And I remember she reached out to me and she said that the out of state property, we're going to give you insurance for $135,000. And you're your personal residence we're going to give you insurance for and I can't remember that one as well. I think about $200,000 Okay.   So basically, we all know the insurance company only insures what the improvement sitting on the land because the house burned down the land walls be there, right? So they don't insure the land value they just insure the house or the improvement. So what's the point of that, what does that tell us? Well, here's what happened. I bought both houses, moved into my personal residence, have a rental property out of state. And here's what happened, the personal residence went way up in value in the first year, even while they were building it, it went way up in value before it was finished. And before I moved in, so it was a great deal, I loved it.   And I moved into the house and about a year went by and I noticed the houses in the neighborhood really going up in price. So I called up my lender that did the original loan and I said, Hey, I think I want to refinance this property, pull some equity out and buy more rental properties. They sent over an appraiser the appraisers name is Eric, I tell you that for a reason. Because he also came back following year appraisal again. And that $815,000 property is now worth 1,300,000. And I thought, Wow, it's only been a year and my property went up. $485,000, do I ever love real estate, and I heard you, but that was in a cyclical market in Orange County, California, a risky market.   So I refinanced the property and pulled some cash out, I bought some more rental properties nationwide. And I really started thinking about that, because when I got the insurance on that property, on the out of state property, they told me, they were going to give me $135,000 worth of insurance, meaning by deduction, the land value was only $24,000. And in the California property, the land value at the time of purchase was about $615,000. So if, if the improvement value goes up, it will only go up by a small amount based on the cost of the construction materials.   And also what happened to the price of lumber went way up, came back down a little bit, etc, etc. But land value is just all over the board. It's not at all logical. land value goes up a lot, and it goes down a lot in rapid succession. And so the risk evaluator basically shows you that the risk is in the high land value markets. And it's a little bit hard to explain this without illustration. But look at it this way. If I've got $600,000 in land value and a property, and that goes down by 50%, I'm going to lose $300,000. And if I got $24,000 in land value in a property, it goes down by half and lose $12,000. The improvement cost is much more stable than the land cost. Because builders won't rebuild more properties if they can't make a profit.   So yes, there are times by during the Great Recession in 2008 or so that properties did sell below the cost of construction. But at the same time properties were selling for half to a third of their land value their prior land value. So the the price of the improvement of the building sitting on the land gives us a stop gap of where it will hold the value much better than high land value markets.   So I hope that makes sense. Again, it's hard to explain without illustrations and slides. But the moral of the story is high land value. cyclical markets are more risky than low land value linear markets. That's the moral of the story. And also, coincidentally, those low land value linear markets have much better cash flow than the high land values.   Pierre That's fantastic.   Michael: That makes a ton of sense. That makes a ton of sense. So I'm curious, Jason, what did you do with that 1.3 million place in Orange County? Did you refi to I mean, you're clearly alive. So not till you die. But did you keep it or did you get rid of it?   Jason: Yeah. So I did, unfortunately, keep it. And I kept living there. And the next year, Eric came back and appraise the house again. It was the exact same appraiser. And he said,   Michael: Good ol' Eric. Yeah, good ol Eric. I have bad news for you, Mr. Hartman. Your house is now only worth 1,215,000. So I lost $85,000 in a year. Okay. But I was still way up. And I still stupidly kept the house. And I stayed there and I kept living there. I wanted to move but frankly, I was just too busy to move. I wanted to move out of state. That's sort of a major decision. And I finally did get out of the Socialist Republic of California about 10 years ago. I'm glad I did. You know, California is beautiful. It's great place but I just don't want to pay the taxes. I just had it.   And so I moved to Scottsdale, Arizona. I lived there for six years. And now I live in Florida. And I just every time I move I lower my tax rate and so for 200 state income taxes. And so I kept the house, and I ended up selling it for only about $100,000 more than I paid. I should have sold it sooner and made $485,000. But you know, I just didn't. And I was just too busy with my business to really manage my real estate, my home as an investment really, really well.   But the moral of the story is, that's a cyclical high land value market, the cost of improvement when I sold it for $915,000, about 100,000 more that I paid, the cost of the improvement did not go down. It actually cost more to build that house seven years later than it did the day. I bought it seven years earlier. But the land value had gone down. Well, it was still up above what I paid for it. But it was still much a lot lower than the peak, which was 1.3 million.   Michael: Got it. And the reason that the property the improvements would have cost more to build seven years later when you sold it was because of inflation, right?   Jason: It just inflation. Yeah. Yeah. Well, it was actually that's a that's a good point, Michael, it was inflation. But it was also inflation caused not just by bad fiscal and monetary policy, but inflation caused by a huge economic and construction boom in China, and to a lesser degree, India, they were just sucking up these raw materials, these commodities used to build houses.   And so if you think about it, another principle I teach is called packaged commodities investing or assembled commodities investing. And what that is, is, if you think of the houses you buy, or the apartment buildings you buy as commodities, just packaged up, right, you know, what are they they're glass, steel, lumber, concrete, petroleum products, copper wire, you know, etc, etc, labor, energy, all these things go into building a house.   And so that's what you're really buying. When you buy in low land value, good linear markets, like we invested. Like, if people go to my website, if they want to see a list of linear markets, just go to jasonhartman.com, click on the Properties page, those are all linear markets, okay, that we'd recommend investing in low land values, high improvement values as an LTI ratio. And you're basically a commodities investor.   And the neat thing about these commodities guys, is they are not attached to any one currency. These commodities, whether they be lumber, concrete, petroleum products, copper wire, they don't care if you're buying them in dollars, yen, Euro, pesos, whatever, it doesn't matter to them. They're they have intrinsic value, and they're used worldwide. And every human on Earth needs them. Because they are the ingredients of the places we live, the places we work, and the places we interact with all day. It's every building is made of these things.   Michael: Interesting. That's a really interesting way to think about it.   Jason: Packaged commodities investing.   Pierre: Yep, that definitely answers my question. Thank you.   Michael: Jason, we want to be super respectful of your time here. Any additional questions for Jason?   Pierre: Just tell our listeners where to find you, link them to your channels?   Jason: Yeah, thanks. So I'm on my podcast is called The Creating Wealth Show. And you can get that just look up Jason Hartman, wherever you get your podcasts, my website, jasonhartman.com. I've also got a special gift for your listeners and viewers. And that is a book a little mini book that is free. And what we did is we took a lot of my strategies that have been teaching for many, many years, and we adapted them to the crazy times we're living in. And that is available totally for free at pandemicinvesting.com, that's pandemicinvesting.com, and it's a small book on pandemic investing that you get right away. It's just emailed to you right away. for free.   Pierre: We'll put that in the show notes as well. So   Jason: Thanks.   Michael: Yeah, can't wait to take a read that sounds awesome. Because he has you mentioned that we are in a bit of a crazy time here.   Jason: You know, it's a really weird time and a lot of things that people expected. I think, you know, it's hard to even remember, try to think back how things were, you know, what, 16 months ago? Right? I mean, just think of what you thought back then. And everybody listening to this. Think of what how you were thinking back in, you know, maybe, I don't know, March of 2020. A lot of people just thought the world was going to end. Right. The economy was going to collapse. You know, there were riots that summer. You know, cities were being destroyed, burnt down. Windows broken, you know, massive looting and all kinds of crazy stuff going on in and and look at what really happened.   That's a lot different than most people would have thought it's counterintuitive, right? Yeah. But it is a wealth transfer. And a lot of people are still suffering. And a lot of people haven't even noticed how bad it is going to get. So it's it's uneven, it's unequal, and it's unfair. And just, you know, for people listening to your show, I know that you're trying to do it, and I'm trying to do it for my audience. You know, we're just trying to help as many people as possible, understand what's happening, and understand really how, how they're being played by the system. And inflation is hurting those people. And if you don't do anything about it, if you don't follow these techniques, you will be the victim rather than the victor.   And but you can you can succeed in this environment, just by aligning your interests with these two most powerful forces the human race has ever known. What are they governments and central banks, they have standing armies, they have aircraft carriers, they have police forces, they have missiles, and you know what, it doesn't matter what we think, or what we believe or whether we philosophically disagree. I do. You know, if they don't care, okay, they're gonna do what they're gonna do. And they have all the power, so we better align our interests with theirs, and follow the same business plan they're following. And that's how we'll succeed.   Pierre: Fantastic.   Michael: Love that Jason, thank you so much for coming on this and sharing this was this was really great. Really, really great stuff.   Michael: Hey, my pleasure. Thanks, everybody.   Michael: Thank you.   Pierre: Thank you, Jason.   Michael: Thanks, take care. Talk to you soon.

Everyone is familiar with the concept of networking. But how many people actually implement it to grow themselves and their businesses? In this episode of Making Chips, Jim, Jason, and I dive into how networking has impacted our businesses in unexpected ways. To hear the good, bad, and the ugly—give it a listen! Segments [0:18] Check out ProShop ERP for more information on manufacturing software! [3:04] Learn what's happening at ZENGERS [3:51] Nick welcomed a baby boy to his family on June 27th! [4:54] Boeing Slows Dreamliner Production After New Manufacturing Issue [9:17] Can Networking Change Your Manufacturing Business? [12:41] How networking has changed Jim's business [16:10] Amper Technologies machine monitoring systems [16:54] The Making Chips Network of Manufacturing Leaders [20:59] Should increasing sales be the objective of networking? [24:41] A working relationship built on mutual interests [26:15] Ad-hoc networking: Keep your ears to the ground  [28:58] Accelerate your digital transformation with Xometry [30:09] Networking is like growing a 401k Networking is what brings us together today I think it's important to point out that networking is why all of us are here. It's why we all know each other and host a podcast together. But where did this partnership start?  Jim was spending money at ZENGERS and was a great customer for them. So Jason loosely knew who he was. Why did Jim purchase from ZENGERS in the first place? One of his friends—a production manager at a shop—recommended ZENGERS. One would've thought that's how their relationship started. But it wasn't.  Jason and Jim were both asked independently to be on an AM radio show at 6 am on a Saturday (the time slot when you know only serious entrepreneurs and business owners would be awake and listening). Jason was talking about creating a vision for your company and Jim talked about social media marketing for manufacturers. They were both impressed by each other, their business acumen, and how well acquainted they were with the industry. They realized they'd make a great combination and the podcast was developed from there.  The question is—without networking, would they have gotten the opportunity to speak on the same radio show? How networking has changed Jim's business Jim had a strategic vision for networking for his business. He became a member of the Technology and Manufacturing Association (TMA) who had recently hired a marketing manager to help machine shops with their marketing. Jim got on the phone with him and they got along. He became instrumental in helping Jim develop networking within the association.  Jim was asked to join a young leaders group where he was able to meet like-minded people. He knew if he committed his time to networking and building relationships within the community, that he would grow in some capacity. He didn't know where it would take him but that he'd walk away from networking events learning more.  If you go to a networking event and leave feeling like you learned nothing, you're doing something wrong. You're either in the wrong place—or not asking the right questions.  Jim also joined the Greater O'Hare Association and the Valley Association. He met great people in all of them. Networking is a great way to listen to other people and learn from their experiences.  The Making Chips Network of Manufacturing Leaders Some of our Making Chips sponsors have been a great way for us to realize connections across the industry. Amper can help you better understand your shop and help you solve problems on your shop floor. Nick, our guest on a previous episode, also works with Amper. It was a game-changer for him. Nick had emailed me a year or so ago and I hadn't followed up with him. Luckily, Jim met him again at a networking event and we all got back in touch. Another sponsor, Xometry, asked us to be part of a focus group consisting of manufacturing leaders. This shows that Xometry cares about their network. How often do companies hire a credible third party to dig into discovery? How often do they dig into their segments to find out what they care about and need? They got a third party to investigate and find out what's happening. They wanted to re-engineer their value proposition to serve their customers better.  In the Xometry focus group, we heard that four of the individuals were all ProShop ERP users—and had heard about them through the Making Chips Podcast. These leaders all loved ProShop. It certainly gave us more structure for our processes. You'll become more efficient, productive, detail-oriented, data-driven, and results-oriented.  They heard about ProShop because Jason and Jim had the courage to create a podcast just for the manufacturing industry. I joined them because I'm just as passionate about the space and I know that this show delivers valuable content. People tend to think networking has to be about growing your business and making connections to make sales. Why is that the wrong mindset to have? What mindset should you embrace instead? Learn more by listening to the whole episode! BAM! – Nick Resources mentioned on this episode Get The Boring Bar Newsletter - Text CHIPS to 38470 to subscribe! Boeing Slows Dreamliner Production After New Manufacturing Issue Amper Technologies machine monitoring systems Greater O'Hare Association Michael Gaunce YG-1 5th Axis Connect With MakingChips www.MakingChips.com On Facebook On LinkedIn On Instagram On Twitter On YouTube

Jason Bressler and his father created the Phoenix Metro Chamber of Commerce with the mission of helping members make connections that grow their businesses and benefit the community. So Jason can teach you some things about networking. For example, at an event, “If I meet two great people, that's a win,” Jason says. “Set your expectations realistically. Don't go in saying I'm going to meet a hundred people and then you meet two and you think what did I come to this for? Go in with the mindset that ‘I'm going to be me: genuine, real, honest, sincere.' People will appreciate that and want to be a part of you and your organization.” ______ Rise Grind Repeat Podcast powered by EIC Agency ______ Hosted by Dustin Trout Produced by Andrei Gardiola __________ Check out the full video episode at: https://bit.ly/3dlwjnJ https://spoti.fi/2Mgfpe6 https://apple.co/2MiQdUv For more information visit our website at https://eic.agency/ We are also on Instagram @EveryImpressionCounts

This week the HomeBhoys return without Marty Flynn who is on holidays. So Jason, Joe and Scott are joined by Steven McGowan aka McGoo to talk Big Ange, fan media presser, new signing Osaze Urhoghide, Moi leaving, Griffiths one year contract extension, Scotland in the Euros, FC Miidtjlland, season tickets, the end of the Lawell era, McGoo becoming an anti-facist hero overnight and of course the normal tangents. Enjoy! Hail Hail!

On today's show, I'm joined again by my friend Matt Olpinski for our coaching call with side-hustler-turned agency-builder Jason Frostholm. After working on the side for years, Jason and his wife finally decided to take their freelancing full-time and build an agency together. That was right before the global pandemic. Now, after a year of eating into savings, they've used word-of-mouth to build up some good relationships and they have the beginnings of a solid client base. But, as any agency-builder knows all too well, word-of-mouth marketing can be finicky and unreliable. So Jason wants to improve his marketing and sales to build a more predictable client pipeline. The problem? He's a bit of an introvert.  So today's episode becomes all about promoting yourself and your business even when you're introverted like Jason.  Get your own on-air coaching call We'd love to feature your business and offer some free on-air advice for growing your business. To see if you're a good fit, click here. Leave us a review on Apple Podcasts: If you enjoy the show, can you do us a favor and leave us an honest rating and review on Apple Podcasts? We'll love you forever. Click here to leave a review. Support our sponsors so we can keep airing new episodes: GoodLife Clothing — Essentials for Modern Living. Offering ultra-premium essentials to ensure you always look your best even when you're at your most comfortable.  LinkedIn Jobs — Find the right person with LinkedIn Jobs. Blinkist — Acquire knowledge from top non-fiction and podcasts, so you can learn anytime, anywhere. 4books — Learn the key concepts of the best business books, to read or listen to, anywhere in just 15 minutes. Go to your AppStore or Google Play and download 4books now. Dripify — Premium learning platform for entrepreneurs. SolidGigs — Get more freelance jobs. More Recommended Listening: This show is a part of the Podglomerate, a company that produces, distributes, and monetizes podcasts. We encourage you to visit the website and sign up for our newsletter. We suggest you also try other Podglomerate shows about entrepreneurship, business, and creativity such as Rocketship.fm and Creative Elements. Podglomerate Privacy Policy.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Jason Kao arrived in Taiwan a short while ago to get back to his roots. So Jason, a licenced teacher figured that with his teaching skills it would be a great opportunity for him to come to #Taiwan​ and start the next chapter in his life. One of the cool things that #JasonKao​ decided to do was create a YouTube channel and document his journey so that he could share it with everyone! So join us tonight on our first ever move to Tuesdays where we will munch on spicy wings, have a pint and share Jason's Story on the #EddyLive​ Show Sub to the channel: www.eddy.live Taiwandering with Jason: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCFZj...

Welcome to a brand NEW episode of "Back Talk with Bauer” ! Episode #50 "A Conversation About Lego"So Jason is a newer fan of my art and we got to chatting. He informed me that he has an amazing sounding job at LegoLand!!! So you guys know I had to get him on the show! We got the green light from the Lego powers that be. This was an amazing conversation with Jason and pretty inspiring for me. Make sure to follow Jason on YouTube and Twitchtwitch.tv/horizonsmanhttps://www.youtube.com/channel/UC1qrOWiCSA3tt3oRen5yi1gJBauerart.com is where you can find more about the podcast, the artwork, graphic design, and more. Like the art on the walls? Click the SHOP tab. Click the MERCH purchase my designs on t-shirts and more. You can also support the show by the Virtual Tip Jar!Paypal.me/JBauerartIt helps keep the lights on and the cameras rolling in the Creative Cave!  Subscribe to the show on your favorite podcast apps including Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, Amazon Music, Spotify, iHeart Radio, and more! Make sure to subscribe to the HWWS Web TV YouTube Channel to catch previous episodes of the show and to check out an entire network of amazing shows at Youtube.com/user/GarrettPomichter Thank you to our amazing sponsor Kingdom of Comics in Melbourne, Florida. Check out the shop at Facebook.com/kingdomofcomicsshop/ and you can even put in an order through the FB page for those out of town fans. Make sure to let them know Back Talk With Bauer sent you. Support the show (http://paypal.me/JBDezigns)

Episode 215 -- After Fernando Tatis Jr.'s massive extension was announced, Joel Sherman pointed out that their infield is now being paid close to a billion dollars over the life of their contracts. So Jason takes a look at how they compare to another famously expensive infield, the A's $100,000 infield of the 1910s. Jason goes position by position comparing each player and giving little historical tidbits and comes up with which infield holds the edge. Our combatants are Manny Machado vs. Home Run Baker, Fernando Tatis Jr. vs. Jack Barry, Eric Hosmer vs. Stuffy McInnis, and Ha-Seong Kim vs. Eddie Collins. Follow the show on Twitter and Instagram: @LockedonAs Follow Jason on Twitter: @ByJasonB Email us any questions: LockedonAthletics@gmail.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Jason is an engineering graduate who reinvented himself as a podcaster and chronic illness/disability advocate after developing fibromyalgia and postural orthostatic tachycardia syndrome (POTS). He is the host of Discomfort Zone, a podcast featuring immersive stories on chronic illness and disability that showcase our vulnerability, wellness, and resilience. He and his guests find comfort by turning towards discomfort, welcoming it, and laughing at it.  Jason is the youngest of three kids and the proud uncle of his nephew and niece. He was born and raised in Toronto, Canada where he currently lives with his Mom and Dad. On occasion, he helps with the dishes and does his own laundry. In his spare time, he can be found throwing grapes in the air, trying to catch them in his mouth, dropping them, dusting them off, and trying again.     s8e9 Fibromyalgia and POTs TRANSCRIPT Lita T  00:08  Hello, and welcome to another episode of podcast dx, the show that brings you interviews with people just like you whose lives were forever changed by a medical diagnosis. I'm Lita, Ron is not with us today. Jean  00:20  And I'm Jean Marie. Lita T  00:21  Collectively, we're the hosts of podcast dx. And today's show, we're talking about Fibromyalgia, POTs and chronic fatigue syndrome with Jason Herterich. I hope I'm getting that right. He'll correct me in a minute (laughter) Jason is the host of a podcast called "The Discomfort Zone", and co host of the podcast, "Invisible, Not Broken". He's joining us today from one of our favorite cities, Toronto. Hello, Jason. Thanks for joining us today. Jason  00:35  You are Yeah, thank you so much for having me. I've been looking forward to this. Jean  00:56  Thanks. Yeah, actually, I just saw Margaret Atwood was posted. She was cleaning up trash outside of her, you know, on along the street in Toronto. And it looked a little bit chilly. Lita T  01:08  Yeah, it's it's chilly here too. Jason  01:11  It sure is. Jean  01:12  Well, Jason, before we get into your diagnosis, and that, I'm just curious what led you to hosting your own podcast. Jason  01:20  So it was really organic, how it happened, I had fallen really ill in 2016 and 2017. And one of my friends just suggested that I should get into listening to podcasts, I had become very, very ill. And I spent about 22 hours a day in bed. And I couldn't even handle looking at a TV screen, Jean  01:42   Mhhmm Jason  01:42   because I had such severe headaches. And so naturally, podcasts you don't have to look at, you can shut your eyes, you can just listen to them, you can tune out for a little bit. And I got really, really into storytelling podcasts especially. And they they were really wonderful in the way that they help expand. Essentially, they allow you to empathize with people at a much deeper level. And I really loved that aspect of it. But I realized that there weren't, there was a very low representation of people who are chronically ill, and disabled in storytelling podcasts. So I just sought to create my own. So I got into so I started in 2017, after I started to recover, and I started producing stories about my own chronic illness experience. And I tried to make them just very immersive stories using sound design  music and sound effects and everything to really try and engage as many people as possible. And so I've been doing that ever since. Jean  02:46  That's fantastic Lita T  02:47  Yeah, sounds great. Jean  02:48  And what are some of your favorite podcasts at the moment? Jason  02:51  Oh, yeah, I got a whole ton of I got a whole ton right here. Um, yeah, one of my favorite recently has been "Your Hustle". It is Have you guys heard of that before? Jean  03:01  I, I. ehh... it sounds familiar. Jason  03:04  Yeah, so it's a podcast that is produced within the walls of San Quentin penitentiary in California. And I don't know about you. But before whenever I think of inmates, they're often depicted as scary criminals who are devoid of any remorse. But really, when you get to hear their stories, you just get to understand them at a deeper level to empathize with them. And it really leaves you with this feeling that anyone is capable of rehabilitation. So that is one of them. Another one that have been hooked on lately "Unlocking Bryson's Brain". And it is a story of a Canadian man who takes listeners inside his family search for a diagnosis, treatment and cure to his son's rare brain disease. So yeah, it's it's really fascinating as like, this really incredible mix of storytelling, medical mystery, disability rights, and gene editing science. And then And then lastly, "How To Be A Girl" is a documentary of a mother raising her transgender daughter. So yeah, just just to keep this brief. At the age of three, her child told her that there was a mistake in her tummy that and that she should have come out as a girl. Lita T  04:23  Oh wow! Jason  04:24  So it just yeah, it navigates there. As the girl gets older, she starts going through school playdates. And when the mom has romantic relationships, so they just have very raw conversations. And I think the daughter is is my favorite part of it. It just really goes to show how incredibly wise children can be. Lita T  04:49  That's amazing. Jean  04:50  Yeah, those will be adding those three to our list. Lita T  04:52  Oh, for sure. Jean  04:54  Yeah. Lita T  04:54  I love that. Jason  04:55  Yeah I couldn't, I couldn't recommend them. highly enough. Lita T  04:58  Love it. Jason, how do you balance living with a chronic illness? Actually several chronic illnesses and hosting your own podcast? Jason  05:09  Yeah, it's it's an ongoing struggle. What has been most helpful for me is I try to make active decisions throughout the day. So I will leave alarms on my phone to just remind me to pause, whatever I'm doing consciously think about what I will do next and check in with my body see, like, do I need to take a break? Should I go out for a walk? Am I having trouble concentrating? Because usually, that's a sign that my symptoms are starting to kick in? Or, you know, do I have any obligations later in the day that I need to reserve spoons for? So really, it's an ongoing process? I try to get a little bit better at it over time. But yeah, I'm not perfect. (laughter) Lita T  05:58  Yeah, I can....  I can understand that, Jason  05:58  it's something that... I continue to struggle with. Lita T  06:00   yeah, I do the same thing with I use my phone a lot. I have early onset Alzheimer's. And I use my phone constantly to, to remind me to do things. And just to keep me in check and make sure that the day is going smoothly. And I don't end up with anything surprising that really kind of goes be into a tailspin, basically. Jason  06:25  Yeah, yeah. If you use too much early in the day, it can throw you off, Lita T  06:29  right. Jean  06:30   And we also use tech, we have watches that have a light diode that takes your pulse ox and pulse rate on a regular basis. And actually, it vibrates when you're starting when your stress levels are increasing. Or when you've been sedentary too long to kind of give you just that reminder, either to take a deep breath or go take a walk. Lita T  06:50  You Right, right. Jason  06:52  Wow, that's, that's actually incredible. I'm gonna have to get the name of that afterwards from you Lita T  06:56   It's one of the Garmin, I know it's a Garmin, but there are several Garmin, we got it. Yeah, we'll put a link on that for our website, Jean  07:04  or send you a message. Yep. Lita T  07:05  Yep. So Jason, I understand that you've been diagnosed with several different really complicated and difficult diagnosis. Fibromyalgia in itself is rough. myalgic encephalitis horrible. And POT's, could you tell us what symptoms lead you to seeking out medical care? Jason  07:27  Yeah, so this all started out just over nine years ago, it's wild to think it was so long ago, but I was a fourth year student at University studying engineering. And I was very, very active. At the time, I was a triathlete. And, you know, I was about to graduate and had my whole life ahead of me. And then one day during an intramural game of basketball, I caught a rebound, I twisted and pass the ball up court. And in that moment, I strained a muscle in my abdomen called, what is the name of it, intercostal, sorry, brain fog here. I strained my intercostal muscles, and they are muscles that are used for breathing. And so unlike if you break your arm, you can put it in a sling, and you let it recover, and it naturally gets better by itself. But with these muscles, it is really, really painful. And it is it's made even more complicated by the fact that you can't rest and recover from it, Lita T  08:30  Cause you need to breathe. Right Jason  08:32  Yeah, it's not easy to treat at all. And so essentially, I had to take a week off of school spent the entire time in bed. And when I went back to school, I was so far behind that, essentially what happened is I my stress levels were so high from having to work so hard. And my pain levels were already really high from the injury. And when you get pain and stress, the two just build on one another, you're more stressed out because you're in pain and you're in more pain, because you're stressed out. So it creates this positive feedback loop. And so over time, my brain just became sensitized to pain. And I as a result as well, I'm not getting any restorative sleep, so I'm just tired all the time. And so it was something I sought medical care for quite a while ago, but it wasn't until so. So the injury happened in 2011. I didn't receive a diagnosis until like 2014. And so yeah, there at that point, they were really really debilitating symptoms. Jean  09:40  I'm sorry to hear that. Lita T  09:40  And was that basically the Fibromyalgia that kicked in at that point? Jason  09:45  Yeah, it was fibromyalgia and myalgic encephalomyelitis as well. I don't think at that point. My POTs symptoms had begun showing themselves my POTs symptoms. I started to I believe, later on in 2015 is when I started I get dizzy and all that. And yeah, it's it's one of those things where I know a lot of these chronic conditions are interconnected. So you catch one, you're more likely to catch another, and, and so on. Jean  10:13  And so I think because of all the overlapping symptoms, it's hard to get a differential diagnosis. And establish that. Jason  10:21  Yeah, yeah. Makes it a lot harder Jean  10:24  and, and you said it took a while to get that diagnosis. What were some of the tests associated with that? And I hear you have a tilt table story for us? Jason  10:33  I do. Yeah. So I was just very dizzy all the time. And I would find that my heart raced whenever I stood up. And so one day when I was in my neurologists office, he did a quick check. So for your listeners, POTs is characterized by a heart rate increase of 30 beats per minute when you go from lying to standing up. So this was something that my neurologist did a quick check in his office, and I tested positive and this in that test in 2015. And so he referred me for a more comprehensive test called the tilt table test, where essentially, they tap they strap you to a table. And it's, it's slowly adjust from horizontal to vertical. And at that point, my symptoms were very severe when I got in, it was 2016. And just simply lying on the table put me in debilitating pain, even before the test began. I believe my heart rate was around 100 beats per minute, before it even started when Usually, it's around 60. And so they that we started the test, but it's supposed to be a 45 minute test. But 15 minutes in, I was just in such debilitating pain just from being uncomfortable on the board that they actually had to stop the entire test. And I just thought that it was going to be an inconclusive results. Lita T  12:01  Mhhmm Jason  12:01   But they ended up sending a report back to my doctor saying that I tested negative for it. Lita T  12:09  Oh? Jason  12:09  Which, to me is Jean  12:10  Not quite the same thing. Lita T  12:12   Yeah. Yeah. Jason  12:13  It didn't seem right. And I pleaded with the doctor, you know, I said, I explained to him how they had to stop the test early and how my symptoms had gone haywire before they even started the test. But my neurologist, kind of just discounted what I had said, and he accepted the results. And he completely ignored me. And I think I yeah, I believe anyways, it was only a few months ago, or earlier this year, when I just simply redid that very first test when you just simply go from lying to standing up. And I had the heart rate increase. And a new doctor that I've been seeing a cardiac specialist told me that I do in fact have POTs. So I guess the moral of that entire story was that I I guess, I guess the issue was like the rigidity of the medical system and not stressing the importance of the patient voice there, it was very clear to me that there was systematic error within the test that made the results completely meaningless. Jean  13:17  I'm sorry to hear that. I also had a tilt table test. And the technician that was performing my test to get me at a baseline for them to start actually was telling me very interesting stories and trying to keep my mind off the fact that we were there for because I think even going in for their test because it it can be a stressful process. And it is like a disconcerting kind of activity to be going through. A good technician is worth their weight in gold because they can try to keep your mind off the fact that you're there for that test and Lita T  13:57  and she was in pain because Jean  13:59   right Lita T  13:59   we had just flown out to California to Stanford for the test and on the landing or just Jean  14:06  some luggage hit me in the head. It wasn't a big deal Lita T  14:08  just prior to landing  the the flight attendant open the hatch on top, from where she was sitting and luggage fell out and hit her. And she had already had a neck and a head injury. So but she was tense. Let's say Jason  14:10  Ouch! Jean  14:23   But it's vital Lita T  14:24   she was tense. Jean  14:25  I think it just shows how important every individual in the medical system is Lita T  14:29   right Jean  14:30   And how much of an eff... you know how much they can Lita T  14:32  put you to ease Jean  14:33  Yeah, they can put you at ease and it takes someone who really cares about the person, you know, to accomplish that and I think we need more people out there that actually care about people and it does it makes a significant difference. Lita T  14:46  I'm hoping that all of the future medical people in the world are listening to this podcast Jean  14:50  we do have a lot of medical students listening Lita T  14:52  Yes, pay attention to your patient Jason  14:55  Yes that really is important. Yeah, paying attention to the to the To the individual not just simply seeing them as as a patient. And yeah, I think I believe I've heard the term white coat syndrome. Lita T  15:10  Uhhuuh Jason  15:10  My mom was telling me how she always used to test really high on blood pressure tests. Whenever she was in the in the, to see her doctor, and that was simply because just the fact that she was getting it tested would always just stress her out. Lita T  15:25  Right Jean  15:26  And it, Yeah. So if you have someone that puts you at ease that that can be very helpful, but inconclusive or incomplete test is not a you know, a completed testing. Lita T  15:35   No. Right. Jean  15:36  Sorry that you had to go through that. Lita T  15:37  Right. Well, I'm glad you finally got it, sorted out. Jean  15:40  Thank goodness, you know, you advocated for yourself, and were able to find a physician that would listen to you as well. Lita T  15:45  That's important. Well, I'm not sure if there are misconceptions about POTs. But what would what do you think the most common misconceptions about Fibromyalgia are? Jason  15:56  I would say that it's all in our heads. I have heard, I've heard that many times. I think that people who are not familiar with chronic illness, have a tendency to discount other people's suffering and their pain and their fatigue levels, simply because it's invisible. And and I think so many people have it in their heads that they just have it in their heads what somebody will look like who is suffering, they mistake what they're familiar with, as acute pain, where it's this very intense feeling. And people are gritting their teeth, with chronic pain, which is something that people have adapted to living with over years and years. And we still experience it all the time. But we're not necessarily showing it. We simply learned to internalize it, and try to focus on how we can best live with it. And then one other big misconception with fibromyalgia. I think a lot of people see it, and a lot of doctors actually think it only affects women. It is predominantly women, but men can develop Fibromyalgia as well. And I'm living proof of that. Lita T  17:12  Right right Jean  17:12  Yeah, we have interviewed other other men with fibromyalgia. And we were kind of shocked to hear that. That's the that's a popular misconception, Lita T  17:22  right Jean  17:23   Because I never imagined you know, that that would be something that would affect. Yeah, but okay. I have two questions for you. How are you currently being treated? And are your conditions? Is there a in the future? You know, do they anticipate that these are things that can be like, Is there a cure out there in the future? Jason  17:42  Yeah, so in terms of being treated, I know it's different for everybody. But what I have found most effective is simply a self treatment plan. So for me, I focus on eating a good diet, lots of vegetables and fruit. I getting the right medication for me that that took many years to find the right one for me, mind being amitriptyline. Everybody, things work differently for everybody. And then also incorporating some mindfulness where I just work, breathing, paying attention to my body sensations, tuning into my body throughout the day. And then, for me movement as well. That's been really huge. For a while I was doing Tai Chi, and I was even doing a waterbase tai chi, they had a program down at the hospital, I went to where we got to go through all the movements in this group atmosphere. And I found that really empowering as well. Just knowing that other you're in the pool with other people with chronic illness, and you're all going through the same thing together. So yeah, just overall that and having a good sleep hygiene, I turned off all my devices an hour or two before bed every single night and I try to just relax, I will even turn off all the lights in my on my floor and just have candlelight so that I can help relax my mind. Lita T  19:09  Well that's good Jason  19:10  So those are Yeah, those are the main treatment plans. And then in terms of fibromyalgia, Fibromyalgia being curable. I know that a small portion of patients do experience full remission. I don't personally focus on curing my illness, it would be really nice if it happened. But I remember my occupational therapist, one once told me not to make dead people goals and dead people can't feel any pain. So I can't if I can't fully control how my pain levels are I try to focus on what I can influence and work to be coming. I guess just work towards improving functionality. And then I've generally found that when my functionality does improve that my pain level usually follow suits as well. Jean  20:02  That's fantastic. Lita T  20:02  Yeah, that's good... Jean  20:03  that's very inspiring. Lita T  20:04  Right Right, for sure. Jason  20:05  Thank you. Lita T  20:07  Do you have any advice for someone that has been recently diagnosed with a chronic illness? Jason  20:12  Yeah, I think finding your social support system is really, really key. For anyone with a chronic illness, it can be very, very isolating. I think a lot of us who are chronically ill have friends drop out of our lives for whatever reason. It's not personal, it's not a reflection of you. And I've just found that it's best to focus on whoever has stayed. And just let them know regularly how much their support means to you and get involved with the online community I found that can be helpful as well. Lita T  20:48  Well, that's good advice. Jean  20:49  Yeah. And it sounds like you've established a really nice rapport with everyone in your podcast network as well. And you guys have a, you know, a great group there and produce some really quality podcasts. Jason  21:03  Yeah, that's been wonderful. Just connecting with so many people connecting with listeners hearing from them. Yeah. Jean  21:09  And what other role have your friends and family taken over the course of this journey? I know your parents have been very important to you, right? Jason  21:18  Yeah, they've been super Jean  21:19   it was a very leading question. Lita T  21:21   (laughter) Jason  21:21  Yeah, yeah. they've they've been huge. My parents. Now I fell very ill, as I mentioned earlier, around 2016. And around that time, I didn't have the ability to even take care of all my medical stuff, like getting prepared for appointments, keeping track of all that stuff, going to pick up all my medication, doing my research on all the different medications or the different tests that I was being sent for. So really, my mom ended up handling, essentially, all of that, in addition to being my full time caregivers for a couple of years, and I mean, even now, I've improved quite a bit. But even now, I have to rely on them quite a bit for meal preparation and other tasks, when I'm not able to handle them myself. And then, in terms of friends, oh, sorry, I should also just mention my I've got a lot of other family members who have been really great, especially my sister, Lisa, she's been amazing and always checked in on me whenever I was really feeling down. And then in terms of friends. I, yeah, I am incredibly blessed in that area too, in that when I was really sick. And there's a period of about eight months where I didn't, I only left bed very infrequently, and was very, very depressed, had thoughts of suicidal ideation, and all that. And there wasn't a span of time of more than two days, when I didn't get a visitor coming by, to just check in on me, and to come hang out with me. It's not the most exciting thing for my friends to come and do and, and sit by my bedside. And often I would barely even be able to contribute to the conversation, it would be them mostly doing most of the talking. So they were really my lifeline. And they were a huge reason why I was able to keep going and until I was able to receive the proper supports to allow me to recover. Lita T  23:31  That's excellent. Jean  23:32  Yeah that's, that's wonderful. I'm glad that you have those people in your life and that they've been so supportive. Jason, with the pandemic and everything that's been going on, you said you used to, you know, be able to go to the gym at the hospital. How have How have things change over the course of the past year? And what modifications Have you made to, you know, still stay active and do things? And, you know, in keep in contact with friends and family, when everything has been in lockdown? Jason  24:01  Yeah, it's been a lot harder. I've been doing zoom like a lot of other people for keeping in touch with people, for just keeping in touch with friends, but I do get zoom fatigue like everybody else, probably quicker than everybody else just due to having headaches and everything. Yeah, in terms of what else? I've been lots of phone calls. I've been doing social distance walks where I'll meet up with friends and we'll just all walk six feet away from each other Jean  24:33  (giggle) Okay Jason  24:33   six feet or more. Jean  24:34   Okay. Jason  24:35  And that's been a really good way to just keep in touch while also getting some exercise getting some fresh air. Yeah, not being able to go to the pool has been kind of tough. That's one of the things I really miss. That was a huge part of remaining social and, and all that and remaining active as well. And yeah, yeah, I've been fortunate I mean, I'm in Toronto here. For a good part of the pandemic, I have been able to have a small social circle. So I've had my brother, his wife and their kids within our social circle. And so yeah, being able to hang out with like a three year old and a two year old as they always make you feel young, and that is really improved my spirits. Jean  25:24  Yeah, there, children can be, and and pets and everything can be a great distraction. Lita T  25:28  Wait a minute, children and pets, you can't ball them up in the same thing. Jean  25:32  Well we do chicken therapy, where we go to see the chickens, Lita T  25:35 yeah we do, we do Jean  25:36  nothing makes you laugh harder than watching, you know, chickens fight over a tomato, because it kind of looks like you know, some sort of weird horror movie and yeah, okay. Lita T  25:45  (laughter) Jean  25:46  Okay, sorry, I'm, we're getting way off topic. Lita T  25:48  (laughter) Jean  25:50  Jason, what additional advice or tips do you have for our listeners. Jason  25:54  So, I would say, to just do your best job advocating for yourself. Or if you can't find a family member or friends who can, or friends who can, our medical system isn't... that the chronically ill often fall through the cracks of our medical system. So unfortunately, you do need to do some of that work yourself in terms of do your research before appointments, come prepared to every appointment with a summary of your recent medical history, and any questions you have for your doctors and any potential tests that you'd like to request. So you really have to become your own advocate there. And another thing is just find something that makes you happy, I know that our lives don't look the same way that they did prior to becoming ill. But it doesn't mean that I guess over time, we can develop the ability to adapt and find joy in different ways that we never could have imagined before becoming chronically ill. So yeah, find whatever, do whatever makes you happy. Lita T  27:08  That's great. Jean  27:09  Yeah wonderful advice Lita T  27:10  right. Have you always lived in Canada? Jason  27:14  I always have. Yeah, Jean  27:15  You can hear from his accent Jason  27:16  I live with my parents. Lita T  27:17  No, no, I  was just curious. Because, you know, like, now we're kind of comparing apples and oranges, you know, the medical system in the United States compared to the medical system in Canada. And I think that we have the same problems here. And it is very important to always go to your doctor's office prepared. And like you're saying, do your research ahead of time. Because you know, you go to a doctor's office nowadays, and you're given like a minute and a half, Jason  27:44  Yeah Lita T  27:44   you know, you don't have a lot of screen time with your doctor. Jason  27:47 Yes Lita T  27:47  So you have more you can do ahead of time, the better. Jason  27:51  Yeah, and I've noticed that doctors really appreciate it when you can give them like a 30 second briefing on everything that's happened with with your health, since they've last seen you it's a way for them to digest everything really quickly, and then be more efficient with your time. So I think that they really appreciate it as well. Lita T  28:11  Right. Right. That That could be a career field. Jean  28:14  Well, and I think Lita T  28:15   No, I mean, like just just in order to teach people how to go to the doctor, Jean  28:20  right? Well, maybe it could be included in your high school health class. Lita T  28:24  Right. Okay. (laughter) Jean  28:25  And I think nowadays, a lot of technology can also come into play where you can track your, you know, your headaches, and you can track your symptoms, and you can actually give your your physician or healthcare provider an actual, you know, a synopsis and a screenshot of what is actually happening with you on a day to day basis, because when it is a chronic illness, I think it's hard to quantify it. And I think Jason  28:34  Yeah, Jean  28:48  and things can help. Jason  28:50  I think that stuff is is so great, too. And I've noticed, I noticed that before I started doing any of this, like tracking my medical history, I would go into an appointment. And so often, it would depend what I would say to the doctor would depend on how my day was going. If I was feeling depressed that day, it would just seem like everything is so completely bleak. And I would send that message to the doctor, whereas like, they would get a much more accurate depiction of what my recent medical history was if I was able to Yeah, like as you were saying, go in with any kind of metrics or anything that you've been tracking over time. Lita T  29:26  Sure, sure. Well, Jason, how can our listeners learn more about you and your podcast? Jason  29:33  Well, they can listen to my podcast "Discomfort Zone" on whichever podcast app they use. They can also go to "Invisible Not Broken dot com" to find my podcast, as well as all the other shows in our network and you can find me on social media. My handle is D Zone Podcast. Lita T  29:52  Okay, excellent. Jean  29:53  And you guys have a wonderful website and a well rounded collection of podcasts. So we're very impressed. And we're hoping to one day grow up and be more like you.  (Eh Ha!) Maybe? (laughter) Well, at least Jason  30:06  You guys are great the way you are. Lita T  30:08  At least we're staying active. Jean  30:09  Yeah. Okay, Lita T  30:10   mentally. (laughter)  Well, Jason, thank you very much for taking the time to talk with us today. Jean  30:15  Thank you, Jason. Jason  30:17  Thank you so much for having me. Lita T  30:18  You're welcome. If our listeners have any questions or comments related to today's show, they can contact us at podcast dx@yahoo.com through our website, podcast, dx.com and Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, or Instagram. Ron  30:32  Please keep in mind that this podcast is not intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis or treatment. Always seek the advice of your physician or other qualified health care provider with any questions you may have regarding a medical condition or treatment, and before undertaking a new health care regime, and never disregard professional medical advice or delay in taking it because it's something you've heard on this podcast Jean  30:57  till next week.

This one is dedicated to my brother Tanner. He has taken the leap to entrepreneurship and man I know how tough that move is. So Jason and I are gonna give you all the nitty gritty about being in business. Enjoy! @callawayconstruction605 or callawayconstruction605.com

How kind are we here at From The Basement? We provide you with not one, nor two, but three opportunities to catch our latest episode, and keep up with all things entertainment. And that third -- but not least -- option is this, the podcast version of our weekly radio show. And boy do we have a podcast for you this week! Jason and Shawn review the latest Small Town Monsters documentary: The Mothman Legacy. This is the production company's first true sequel, and explores in greater detail the story of the infamous Mothman. Is this doc perfect Spooky Season viewing? Stick with us! And stay tuned, as The Basement Boys throw down with the second volume of Netflix's Unsolved Mysteries, Adam Sandler's seasonal comedy Hubie Halloween, and Shudder's horror anthology The Mortuary Collection. Plus Shawn took in the grisly Friday the 13th fan film, Vengeance, Mike S returns with another horror-themed review, and Jason provides the weekend entertainment rundown. Oh, and there's a new Die Hard movie out... kinda sorta. So Jason and Shawn gotta talk about that. And you can hear it all right now, by pushing play on the player below.

​Jason shares how he became cash strapped and burnt out as the company grew and what he did to recalibrate his day-to-day role and grow value before he sold the company to a strategic buyer. What You Will Learn in Today’s Podcast Interview: How rapid growth can consume your capital and cash Strategies for deciding what work you love and who you should hire to help with the rest Why clearly conveying your mission and vision to your employees is valuable for success Jason’s framework for helping clients, The Three I’s: Issue, Impact, Importance Why you should delegate the outcomes rather than the tasks How implementing strategic systems and processes within your organization can allow you to take a step back from the day-to-day tasks The importance of having a plan on your own terms for life after the sale of your company How building your company with a clear end goal in mind gives you choices How being intentional about what you want as your goals should drive how you build your business The importance of building a valuable business in order to have options The different ways you can exit your (management) role in your company and your ownership. For example: ESOPs Private equity recapitalization Podcast Summary: In today’s episode, entrepreneur Jason Swenk shares with us how he grew and sold his 8-figure digital marketing agency. Jason founded the business after freelancing for many years and describes himself as an accidental agency owner. After 12 years of growth, hiring over 100 full time employees, and working with clients like Hitachi, AT&T, Coke and Legal Zoom, Jason found himself exhausted by the business and with less freedom than he had BEFORE he became an entrepreneur. He was strapped for cash, making less money than expected, and was working on the day-to-day things he disliked.So Jason decided to recalibrate his relationship with the business.Jason set up new systems and hired the necessary people in order to focus on the areas he enjoyed the most. By taking a step back to get clarity on what his vision for the company was, he shifted from an accidental business to a scalable AND sellable organization.Jason shares with us how he worked himself out of the business, why he decided to sell and what life was like working for the buyer... and how to avoid some of the mistakes he made (emotionally and financially) in the sale. I’m excited to share the conversation with you today because Jason clearly explains the value of growing your business in orde

Jaime O'Connor is a digital strategy nerd who is dedicated to helping brands understand their growth opportunities in the digital landscape. Her windy path to building Inspired Focus Digital has included selling scrunchies in 4th grade, a grocery delivery business, a social enterprise that bled itself dry, and an event operations company. She has also built marketing teams at venture-backed organizations and bootstrapped products brands that achieved 6x growth and 8 figure success. She has worked with major organizations like the NFL, NCAA, USA Cycling and growing brands like Pro Challenge, Silipint, Happy Hair Brush and Savor Beauty. She is on a mission to educate up and coming brands with the knowledge they need to level up and play in the professional arena.   Thank you so much for listening! WE ARE SO GRATEFUL!!!! Our Sponsor:  Multifamily Foundation If you are serious about learning how to buy apartment buildings then don't wait, go to www.multifamilyfoundation.com and let us help you build your foundation. Investing for Lifestyle and Legacy: https://www.yarusiholdings.com/ Our ENTIRE Podcast, Books and Health Suggestions: https://www.amazon.com/shop/yarusiholdings Subscribe To Us On YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC1SuXB01d14DC8ZnEWpRQdQ?sub_confi rmation=1 Subscribe To Us on #Libsyn: http://multifamilyfoundation.libsyn.com/website Subscribe To Us on iTunes: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-multifamily-foundation/id1484177595   Transcription: Hi everyone. And welcome again to the Jason and pili project. I am so excited because I am with Podmax Global today. We are streaming with them and I am so excited to be here. Part of this group, they put me together with the amazing Jamie O'Connor. Jamie O'Connor is, you know what? I am going to actually let her tell you about what she does because she is fantastic. Hi, Jamie! Hey Pili, how's it going? So glad to have you like I was telling you before off camera. You're my new best friend. Please tell all my listeners why? Well, I think it's because you mentioned that I really like to focus on helping people build brands. Um, and for me, that doesn't mean, uh, pretty colors and nice logos. It really is talking about who you are and not truly authentic core way and who you want to be speaking to in that authentic way in building trust and relationship. And I do that mainly by supporting my clients on the paid advertising side of things. So handling the Facebook and Instagram pieces, but I've, um, built brands myself. This is my, my agency's my fourth business. So I've owned my own eCommerce stores. I have helped, um, product based businesses grow to seven and eight figures. I've worked with NCAA and SL before. Um, I like to joke, I actually took the entrepreneurship red pill before I was able to know better. So I saw   here, you start, you started selling scrunchies in the raid. I probably, you know, if, if there had been an internet in the fourth grade when I was in the fourth grade, I'm sure I would have bought them from you. Yeah. Yeah. So, I mean, it was, it was my classmates and my, I think it was the yeah, fourth grade class. I would like sell them at home and sell them to my friends and my classmates. I had no idea at the time that I was like a little entrepreneur. Um, I think I also started, you had a little shack in my backyard. Um, and I set up an office when I was 10 and I created like a mom's helper business. So I could like watch her while mom was home. So I apparently it was just like born into via, so I love this. So you were a born entrepreneur, you have helped so many people along the way, build their brands. Let's dive a little deep into that. So say, okay, you bring me on, we have a great conversation about how you can help me. How would that conversation go? Yeah. So, you know, we work with brands and companies that, or I guess I should say first, we work with companies that wants to build a brand that wants you. They want longevity that want to build something that actually has a legacy behind it in whatever way that means for   you. So I don't work with people who are dropshipping out of China or like want to be a flash in the pan because I don't feel like I can make an impact and a difference in my own world by helping people. I thought I want to help businesses that are trying to create an impact themselves. So first and foremost, that's usually where any conversation I have starts. And I'm a, I'm a really big believer in what I preach, which is authenticity and honesty and transparency. And so I'm like that from the very beginning, whenever I'm talking to anyone and you know, if you're not there yet, because we focus on the heat advertising side, if I'm just starting to talk to somebody, um, I'll be really honest. Like if you're not there yet, then I'll give you the resources. You need to figure out how to nail down those pieces of your business, your brand, to, to take it to the next level so that you can actually be successful when you start to invest money in getting your name out there. Because so many people want to do that as their quick fix, they want to, they want to, you know, start spending money on, on advertising before really they're ready. And all that's going to do is expose your cracks and expose the things that maybe show me where your company is broken or your product is broken, um, in a more accelerated   fashion. And a lot of times you can fix some of those cracks, fix some of that foundation ahead of time, and then be that much more successful when you decide to like invest money to move the needle. I want to pinpoint the hashtag truth, all the truth that you just laid out for so many people out there you are. So right when you say like, if we were to just jump in new company, even like some of the older companies that have been there and they haven't fixed those cracks, once you get yourself out there and you get your I'm sure once they have a conversation with you, you get up people in a very, very big way. If there's cracks in your foundation, if there are, if you're don't, if you don't have your foundation set, I am so sure. Like you said, marketing will just show your cracks in a very large way to vary very large audience. We have this conversation, you figure out that my foundation is very stable that I just need to build. Now I need to like make the house nicer. I have the house started. It's like the, all the sticks are, I should know better than sticks, but you know what? I need the framings up. For some reason my mommy brain doesn't want to work today. The framing's up. Maybe I have supply with slapped on, but you come in. What's the next step after   that conversation? Yeah. I mean, of course this is my favorite time, because most of the time, if you are in that place, then you at least no exactly who you want to be talking to you. And if you don't, then that's something that we can work through because you've, you you're like on the edge of it, you figured it out. So typically when we're at this point, then we are first doing basically a really deep dive brain discovery. I had the amazing pleasure opportunity. I don't know, to work with I'm a marketing genius last year, and really learn from his guidance and his tactics, his name's Ron Lynch. And he, um, has been behind really some of the greatest like selling and marketing campaigns that have ever happened. Um, he worked with Billy Mays and Oxyclean and GoPro. And so I got to learn from him how to really deep dive into who is, who is the target market, who is the persona that you want to talk to your avatar, if you will in marketing speak, um, what are their pinpoints like, what really makes them tick and what are the aspirations? Where do they want to go? And then how do you loop your product, your service, whatever it is, or when we're working with a client. So if it was you, how do we loop in what you were providing to those exact people in a way that's going to resonate with them   in a deep, fulfilling way that they want to work with you. They want to find out more about you. And so that's the first step in our process is we really dig deep into that so that we create, um, what we like to call our word document, essentially. It's like, it's the thing that you, as the client, us as your agency partner, and honestly, anyone else who's going to talk, touch your marketing can use as kind of your lighthouse. This is the thing that's going to guide. Any decisions you make when you're putting yourself out there in a really public way. And so it guides copywriters and creatives and ad buyers, and what kind of targeting you want. And it creates this really cohesive foundation for everybody. So that not only are we all on the same page, but we're all moving towards the same target basically. So that's kind of, that's the next step that we take. That's usually the first month of working together. What we really focus on. We'll do. Um, I guess one piece that is important is because we're ad buyers as well. We do test this with data. So we test the messaging that we are making, the assumption that your target consumer is going to care about. And we get real data to prove it's going to work before you go spend tons and tons of money. And that's one of those pieces that we see happen. So   often it's like, okay, I'm ready to dive in. I'm ready to spend money in advertising and making investment, but we actually don't have anything yet to really prove it that this is what's going to work. So we really take their approach from the angle of being a strategic partner, to anyone we work with that we want your business to be successful. We don't want you to dump tons and tons of money in and just see what happens. We want this to be a long lasting relationship, and we want your company to be a long lasting company. So we'd rather take the time, find the answers and then say, okay, we've got this, let's ramp it up. So how do you test the market? Just to dive a little bit deeper if you don't mind me asking. Cause that's actually a little bit of your core secrets. No. You know? Okay. So before getting into that, one thing I will say is that, and I think this has been a huge reason why we've been successful in my agency and we don't really lose clients, but also in just getting clients, is that I don't believe in hoarding my knowledge and my information. Like I believe, yes. I knew we were best friends. Um, I'm sorry that like we should share the knowledge. There is an abundance of opportunity out there and we hear the knowledge. I am not afraid to like share my tactics with   people and then you go out and use them because honestly, that's how I got to where I am is learning from people doing it myself. And that's the type of person I am. So if you're the type of person who's like, okay, I want to try that out and figure out if I can do it, then awesome. Go do it. Because honestly you're not my client. Anyway, my client is the business owner who doesn't have time and doesn't want to be doing this stuff themselves. So go ahead, go do it. And then come talk to me and we'll have a combo and we'll figure out like who you should go after in the market or how I run my systems in my business. So anyway, that's a total tangent, but my, I love tangents and my, my smile. I mean, for everybody, that's watching this on YouTube. My smile is as wide as the screen right now for my podcast listeners. I am smiling really big because my mindset is the exact same. Give it all away. Who cares, who takes it, let their ships level up because chances are they're going to come back and level up your ship. So give it all away. Okay. So what was my question again? Actually do the data testing. So goodness, you know, this is, I think people don't actually realize this incredible opportunity that we have. I mean, you hear bits and pieces about the fact   that small businesses have these opportunities that we'd never have before for through the social platforms like Facebook and Instagram and YouTube to get their name out there, but the level of information and the level of data and targeting that we have is so incredible. It's beyond anything that we ever could have imagined. Now there's probably some data conversation to have in there that is about how much information is available, but we don't need to have that conversation. We can, we could go down that rabbit hole and I, you know what, I appreciate it, it's it is what it is now, but let's continue down the rabbit hole. So that's the thing is that, you know, we, as, as business owners, as marketers, we can find the right people at the right time now. And so for a very small amount of money you can take, well, we do is called message block testing. So we'll take, okay, we think this is the pain point of the target market. So we find the target because it's available through Facebook is usually how we use it. Um, and we'll put these messages just at very low dollar amounts up to maybe 400 impressions. And we just see which ones resonate without giving them a call to action, which ones get people to engage in some way to click on that information. And it tells us, okay, this message resonates. This one does it, the solution resonates this   one doesn't and therefore we can then create kind of a bigger picture of what is going to connect. And then that can guide creative. It can guide copywriting. It can guide camp, overall campaigns, all of those things, if you do it for a very small amount of money early on, and then do it again and again and again, just, yeah, that is amazing. You just clued me into, uh, like something that we can both share with the audience is Instagram already tells you, if you have a business page on Instagram, Instagram already tells you which, which posts you do that get the biggest hits. And I just realized that I wouldn't have, but to put the two and two for marketing standpoint, unless you had just said that, so people rewind or hit that button. That'd be winds every like two minutes back, two minutes back and listen to everything that Jamie just shared, shared. And do it go to your Instagram accounts, go to your Facebook accounts and see what Facebook tells you about the little, the little ones you don't have to default to actually, like you said, you don't have to spend a couple billion dollars and figure out which ones hit. Oh my goodness. Thank you. That's huge. So let's dive in. Oh, well, one last piece of that is that it depends too on if you're an established business and you already have like raving fans and people, you can   put these messages or look at your existing posts either way, whichever way you want to do it in front of your existing people. And that's not much more effective because those are the people you already know are your exact audience. But if you aren't an established business and you're trying to figure it out, you can find two things, both like your, what you think your target markets are and what messages resonate. And maybe, and I had this happen with one of our clients. We did this testing with, they were so off on what they target market was what it turned out. They thought that they were this like weightlifting brand in this light, bro, hang out at the gym brand. But actually people saw them as a wellness brand. It was a different market and a different message than they had been spending a year marketing to. So yeah, there's a lot to, lots of glean from that. The thing is, and I get this from, I follow what's his face, Gary V a lot. You don't know what content is going to hit. You don't, you don't know. Even if you think at your target market brand is something. If you've been putting out certain content has been hurt, hitting a certain type of person, and you don't know it, that's a huge amount of just people that you are not targeting and helping even more. And like people like Jamie can help you   find that, Oh, listener of mine. So listen in for more. So Jamie, take me further down the rabbit hole. We do this test and we find out exactly who my target customer is. What's the next step? Oh man. Okay. So, um, now we have our messaging, we have our, um, targets and we have our, our, essentially our lighthouse strategy, our word document, ready to go. And everyone's on the same page. Wait is a great place to be. And honestly, if you are looking at working with any kind of agency out there, I highly you to be asking these questions about, are you, how do they make sure you're on the same page and how do they make sure that they have a really strategic plan in place to help you grow your business? Because, um, I have gone through my fair share of agencies on the client side myself, and it was not common practice. And I think every business deserves. Do you have that level of treatment? Um, even say those questions one more time for the listeners. Yeah. So I would say asking, how are they going to keep you on the same page so that you all know that you're going the same direction? Um, and how are they going to make sure that you are staying aligned as they grow as well company with you, hopefully, and then as you grow and the directions that you're going and not all agencies   think about the bigger picture that way they don't really always look at the chemist can say very key focus in their area. Now, if you have a team that is able that there is like, we have the thing, we just want you to do the one small section then great. But most small businesses need a little bit more of a partnership than that. So I think it's worthwhile to dig into those, um, pieces of the, of that relationship. So yeah, Mmm. Basically from this point is when we get into building what we call the full funnel. So sales funnel, um, which, you know, outside of marketing land, the idea behind the sales funnel is that you are driving people that have never heard of your brand before. So that's your cold audience. Those are the people that they may be problem aware. Mmm. They may be solution aware, but they don't realize that you have the solution. So you're introducing your brand to them. Um, and that is your top of funnel. That's your cold audience. And that's how we essentially capture people to come in and get them, introduce you. So that they're like, Oh, I've been thinking about that. Or I didn't realize that that would be a solution, but I'm going to, I'm going to start to like pay a little bit of attention. Then we get into your middle of funnel. So you're driving anyone who engaged in a somewhat significant   amount of way, um, in that top. So your top can be typically it's not your organic post cause your organic posts on Facebook and Instagram. And, and honestly on YouTube, if you're putting content on YouTube, um, it's going to people who are subscribers or, or maybe they're finding you via search, but that's going to be what we consider warm cold is the ways that you're getting out there, getting in front of people who wouldn't happen following you. So warm audience. This can be that combination of all of your, again, Eric. And then on the paid side, we are basically building, um, Omni presence for you. So we, we work with people who are willing and want to create content. Um, and that, and we essentially put money behind the distribution of that so that people are seeing many different layers of who you are and what the value is. You bring the authenticity and that builds trust. And they're seeing that on a regular basis and this isn't sales pitches. Now you can drop a few in there when they make sense, but this is really building a relationship with them. So I really like in the sales funnel, well, the advertising sales funnel to dating the cold audience is the first day. You, you are asking them to grab a coffee with you when you see them in the bar or in an online chat or whatever it is you're going to do. You're   not going to ask them to marry you in that very first instance. Now don't get me wrong. We all probably know some crazy person who like got married in two weeks and like that, that works. So there are those people and you do occasionally have to have those things at the top and not the middle where you're like, Hey, let's get married right now. And somebody out there is going to say, yes, that's it just, it happens. So you don't want to leave those people off the tape while you want to talk to them. But the majority needs to go through building a relationship with you. Yeah. So that's where your middle of funnel, your warm audience exists. And then at your bottom of funnel, these are the people who have regularly been engaging with you. They're commenting on your ads and your posts there subscribing to your YouTube channel. They're going to your website, they're doing the things that are indicating I'm really into you. And I think we take this to the next level. And then you get to ask the question and you get to make the sale. Because at this point they want to be with you. They will see what the opportunities are to actually take it to the next level. And so, whatever that is, if you're an eCommerce brand, this is where you are. Um, putting an ad in front of somebody that just added it to the   cart, but they, their kid yelled at them and they walked away or they got deed or whatever. Um, and you're saying he don't forget to come back. We're here, blah, blah, blah. Or they looked at products, those kinds of things. That's what those ads would look like. If you're, um, lead generation or consulting or a digital product, this would be a little bit of that hard sales pitch of like, you should get on the phone with me because I'm new, changed your life in these five ways or whatever it is essentially. This is where we build all of that out. And we're doing a lot of testing. We use that middle of funnel to do a lot of the testing of the messages that we've figured out from that early testing phase. Now we're testing that in a, in a more cohesive, holistic way with, with beautiful creative and video and content and copywriting and all of those things put together and finding the ads that are like taking off. And then those are the ones that were putting in front of those cold audiences. Because like I said before, if you are, if it's resonating with the people who are already engaged with you, then it will speak to the people in your cold audiences that maybe don't know you exist, but you're going to see that ad and be like, Oh, how'd they now? I mean, we've all had that experience, right? We're   like always, Oh, were they just in my head? How does Instagram know? I need to color my hair? Oh yeah. Cause I pissed post pictures all over. Yeah, exactly. And that's the thing is that, so now we have this opportunity, right? Where these platforms have an obscene amount of data on you. We can figure out how and who we want to speak to. And if we have that perfect marriage of, of how we actually speak to the things that you're experiencing and what you want right now, and then we have the platform that puts it in front of the right person. It's like, boom, they get me. So I love it because we've seen it as consumers. We see it all the time on Instagram, on Facebook. And we see like my, my instance with the color dye, I'm saying that story because I actually bought hair color off of Instagram because I try to a couple of weeks ago on Amazon, apparently Amazon shares their info with Instagram and Instagram knew I needed here at color. And after getting like, I wouldn't say bombarded by, I saw a few of their ads with like, I'll try it. I'll go down the rabbit hole. I'll press the buttons. I was like, well, I already pressed all the buttons for about 10 minutes. Here's my credit card. Boom. I'll get my, I'll get my hair color back. Oh yeah. Yeah. So it works completely works. And   you Jamie, and this is for all my listeners. Jamie knows how to do that. All that because I know you, Oh, my listener have been just like me. You seen that ad on Facebook. You're like, Ooh, that's a cute dress. Or, Oh, that's an awesome cologne or look at that awesome. Put in the whatever. And you've thought about it and you've followed them and you're going to go back to them. And that's how people like Jamie do their work. So Jamie inception into your life. It's, it's an amazing thing. I know we could, like you said, we could go into the whole like data thing, but you know what, as a business owner and a connect consumer, I'm actually kind of thankful for it. I mean, there's stuff that I'm sure. I don't want these people to know about me. We don't know personal information about you. So that's good as a business owner. And I know most of my audience are business owners or thinking about it or are entrepreneurs are hard or, you know what, maybe I have a fourth reader out there that's watching this and they're like, I want to sell sprint cheese. The thing is like, you need a team and Jamie can be a part of that team. So Jamie, I want to also talk to you cause we still have a little bit more time. I want to talk to you about content creation. Because a lot of   people I know as I was starting to go into the marketing thing and when I hired my first market marketing professional, we actually didn't get along because they were like, okay, now you have to create all this stuff. I'm like, wait, what? You don't do it all for me. So what I have to do these things now, what exactly. But let's talk about the content creation because I actually love it now. Like I love creating content, but for those of you, and I know you're out there, talk a little bit about content creation from a professional. Yeah. Well, I mean, first and foremost, I relate, so I myself, same boat as you. I love it. Now I have my own podcast that is focused on the entrepreneurial journey and I love creating it. I love being a guest, but for a long time I was so resistance. And so I empathize heavily my clients on that front. Um, but the interesting thing is that again, the opportunity that exist right now and really that has existed over there. The last five to 10 years is pretty incredible for small businesses to be able to get out there. And what's become really prevalent. This kind of crazy time that we're living in at this particular moment is that the, the playing field is level. We have celebrity, he's literally recording their nightly shows on their iPhones and broadcasting it to the world. So fantastic. It's pretty   amazing. So like right now, I think it won, honestly, the playing field has been leveled for a long time, but for a lot of us, if it was hard to really wrap our heads around that and believe that to be the keys, but it's, but now it's like in our face, it's so true that you do not need to have an amazing setup. You do not need to have a, you know, thousand dollar camera or a production crew or any of these things to create content. That is just, I mean, it's not true. Like quite literally, um, since you have a YouTube channel, like I think I bought this mic, um, for 60 bucks on Amazon and I got this ring light for free, um, from one of my coaches and like I'm in my living room. There's nothing that should hold you back. So production is off the table. So that's gone now. I think one of the things I have found myself and then with my clients that really is another roadblock is what content to create and what, what should I be talking about? What should I be putting out there? And the first thing is something we've already been talking about so much is authenticity. Like, who are you at your core? Why do you do what you do? What is it that you do? Why did you get to where you are? Those are all pieces of content that we   can create. You can literally sit down and write 10 different items in those categories. And all of the sudden you have content. You know, if you manufactured goods or you have an office space behind the scenes type things or magical how to use, um, all of those kinds of pieces that display your knowledge or display who and what and why you are, those are all things that can create one minute, 10 minutes snippets without having to think too deeply about it. And quite frankly, the way that the world works and how quickly we're moving. My biggest piece of advice is like write down those things, create that list. I actually, I have a, um, a list that I will give your listeners and we can talk about that or way a guide to create essentially your first 24 pieces of content topics. Um, and that can put you in a spot where, okay, now I have 24 pieces just start creating it because the reality is is we set, okay. The first time that we recorded a video or did whatever we're going to do, I'm sure I could dig in and find some graveyard ones that just make me crazy. My husband, and I'll call ours the dark ages, but it's still, Oh my gosh, they're all still there. And it doesn't matter. And you know what? It actually makes you that much more relatable because we've all been there. So, you know, don't   be afraid to put it out there and the more you do it, the better you're going to get. And eventually it's going to seem like you've been doing this your whole life. So that's, you know, and it gets buried. We're moving so fast in this digital age. It doesn't matter now. I mean, if you get on and you say like inflammatory things or things that aren't that great things don't get buried, don't get buried. But again, you know, well, I guess this goes back to the very first thing I said, which is, I like to work with people who want to leave a legacy. And so honestly, somebody who does that, it's probably not someone I'm going to work with anyway. And it is what it is. So don't worry about it. If you, your authentic self is a good person that wants to leave an impact on the world. Then the biggest thing you need to do is just be out there, be out there, be authentic, get your message across. And for those people, again, I'm going to come back to this because there's so many people who are against content creation. You need to create content. If you are, I believe this. Let me, let me know if you believe this. Okay? So Jason, I have this conversation online all the time. We think everyone's a brand. Everyone is a brand now because you want, if you are on social and even   if you're not, you're, you're going to be somehow. But if you're on social, you're a brand. If you try and get a job, people are going to look at your social media content. If you are a business owner, people are gonna look at your social media content. So you are a brand, whether you like it or not. So the content that you are already creating, whether it's putting pictures of your dog, cute doggie, by the way I watched him go around. He's like, mommy's not paying attention. I'm going to go up on the couch. What was I talking about? Cause I started talking about your dog and that was a whole content creation on its own. So if you're creating content about your dog, great as so cute. If you're creating whatever you're posting, you're already posting content. So why not use that authentic self to push it to just another level of positivity and, and whatever it is you want to push out into the world? Do you agree? Oh, absolutely. Totally. I mean, we hear stories all the time of people getting or losing jobs because of social media content that they put out there. So without a doubt, it's true. I mean, I have my husband like is not anywhere on social media, except he is on social media because I post pictures and I'm not social media. He is out there. Um, and that is it's, it's true of yourself, but   it's true. Especially if you're an entrepreneur and a business owner, the reality is, is that one, your customer is already out there. You might as well put out there some level of authenticity to control that conversation so that people are seeing who you are at your core. And that is just going to create a halo effect around it. And you know, you can run an advertising funnel without having that content. And you can create some like simple ads or whatever, but it's becoming a saturated market. And without that content out there, and without that, that piece of it to build off that authentic, just to be, to build authority, to build trust, you're just another one in the marketplace. People want that connection. They want to connect with you. No matter what you sell, you could sell sports drinks you could sell, you could sell. I don't know, scrunchies. As I said with my scrunchie, not really a cringy my head headband. So whatever you sell be you, Oh my goodness. Be you. And I love this conversation that I had with you. I would love to talk and talk about content and marketing, and I'm sure there's so much more you can share, but if you could just share one more thing and was the only thing that you could leave my audience with, what would that be? I would say that one of the, and we've touched on this a little bit, but   one of the most important pieces, and one of the biggest downfalls I see of companies is, is making the assumption that whatever they're selling or whatever they're doing can benefit this mass general amount of people. And one of the best things you can do that will help you create that content and will help you actually be way more successful is really figuring out exactly who you want to be talking to exactly who you want to be working with and, and speaking to them. And this, this is something that then helps you in so many ways, because you're going to answer those questions and figure out what content to say, but you can go on and think about that person. Like they're an actual human being, put them into a human person that you can think of and create a video where you're talking to that person. And if you do that, if you don't assume that everything is or that your product or your service can help so many people. And if you talk to that one person, you're going to be excluding all these other people. If you, if you get rid of that notion and you really focus on exactly who you want to be talking to, actually creates so much more authenticity. It creates so much more effect in a positive way to attract the people you really want to be talking to. And it creates focus for you in where you're   going with your marketing. Wow. You just spoken to my heart, everyone who's listening. I know I already told you to rewind, but rewind again. Seriously. You need to relisten to that. Cause Jamie just gave you a tidbit of information that could change your business right now, figure out who your audience member is. You're one person put a face to that person, put everything to that person. What's the person's job, everything. What does the person smell like? And talk to that person. And it will attract people because now you're being so authentic. Cause you're having this one on one conversation with your audience. Thank you so much, Jamie. This is the best conversation before I let you go. Let's talk about too. I think it's two things. How can people find you and where can get, where can they get those 24 content topics? For sure. So, um, for your listeners, I've created this page, this guide it's inspired focus, digital.com/jp projects. And if they go there, I have a guide that essentially walks them through 24 questions that they can answer that essentially will create 24 pieces of content. Um, and simply get the ball rolling, to be able to have all of this content and on there as well. If they do want to find out a little bit more or take it to the next level, they can, um, call with my team to just talk a little bit of strategy. So I   encourage you all click on the link. It's going to be below and give Jamie a call. Even if it's just to have a 10 minute conversation about marketing, she's going to Uplevel your life with one phone call. And I hope, I hope this gave you so much, so much value cause I know it did for me. Thank you so much, Jamie so much fun. It was such a blast talking to you about this and for my listeners out there, I am so grateful to you. If you enjoyed what you heard today, please rate, review, subscribe. It would, I would hug you for that. And thank you. Thank you so much for joining me on the day's NPV project. Again. Thank you to Jamie. Bye. Now join us for your second cup of coffee. Every Monday through Friday at noon live every day, bring us our best content we've done so far. Super excited, super engaging bunch of great guests. We're here to answer your questions and so appreciate listening. Make sure to check this out. Can't wait to see you. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

C Level with Chris DeBlasio - Guest: Jason Waters of JW Finanical Group I talk about that a lot with with entrepreneurs that want to start their own business. You don't need to know everything. You don't have to be an expert on everything. Understand what you're really good at and surround yourself with people that with skills you're not so great at. So you can build a really good team. So today on C-level I am excited to have Jason Waters a really good friend of mine. Fractional CFO and mortgage expert Jason Waters. What is good man? How are you doing? - Hey, good to see you. Thank you for having me on here. - Hey thanks for coming out. I also want to add he has an amazing show you guys, got to check it out it's called Cash Flow. He talks about finance, he talks about how to navigate through difficult situations and difficult with the economy and all this other stuff. You guys definitely check out that show. So Jason, you and I have been friends for a long time but give me so your background for our audience here. - Yeah sure, so I used to be a banker. I was a Bulldog, you see on my shirt. Actually, I was someone who actually does what they majored in, which is finance. And so I am rare and one of my favorite parts was corporate finance and how corporations are structured financially. So I got a job as a commercial banker right out of college. I did that for almost 20-years, working for large banks, small banks, until the time came where I left banking, or banking left me.

Title: The Elk Scenario with Jason Phelps    Show Notes: As a designer of elk calls, Jason Phelps from Phelps Game Calls has a lot to say about how to talk to a herd of elk. The weather, the time of day, even the pitch of your call, will all help how responsive a bull is to you. Jason shares some tips for how to prod a bull to respond, and when you should press your advantage during the hunt.   For Jason when he’s hunting, he’s looking for certain responses from the bull. He wants that rut-crazed bull coming at him. Since a lot of his hunting has been done in the Northern US, he knows some of the ways he does things will be very different for other hunters in different parts of the US.   When the sun starts to rise, you should be able to hear the elk. So Jason puts in a little extra effort to plan to hear the elk the night before to pinpoint their location. The elk are creatures of habit and will do the same thing day after day until they’ve been bumped or disturbed.   As a 90% bugle caller and only a 10% cow caller, Jason talks about his strategy for attracting their attention. He talks about when he chooses to use the cow caller, and why he prefers the bugle caller so much more.   Jason cut his teeth hunting in southwest Washington, some of the wettest woods anywhere. That constant rain can impact the length of the rut, and requires some creative strategies to work around that problem. Rather than describing some more effective calls that he’s discovered, he demonstrates them for me.       What’s Inside: To start the rut, sometimes a little creative bugling is all that it takes. Jason always recommends getting as close as possible before starting to call to the elk. Warm weather and dry weather will definitely affect the elks’ behavior. One of the best times to hunt elk is after a midday rain, according to Jason. Jason demonstrates some of his most responsive bugling calls.     Mentioned in this Episode: Days in the Wild on itunes Days in the Wild on Podbean Phoenix Shooting Bags Phelps Game Calls   Short Description: Experimenting with bugling sounds can improve your chances of prodding an elk to respond to you. Jason Phelps from Phelps Game Calls uses bugling to challenge a bull, find a herd, prod a response from cows, and enrage the elk he wants. He talks about how hunting in the rain affects elk season, and he demonstrates some of his favorite bugling calls.   Tags: elk hunting, elk scenario, bugling elks, bugling bulls, finding elks, elk hunting in the rain, tracking elk, location bugling, start an elk rut  

You can't discuss building a business without discussing building a team. But there are some interesting questions worth exploring before plunging into a fixed system for hiring, training or firing team members. In this episode, we dug into some questions to define the who and the how - the trade off between finding skilled people versus the skill of creating a simple process. Not least, we draw on Jason's corporate HR background, which, added to the ecommerce experience both hosts bring, gives added depth to the discussion. You'll learn Why Elon Musk can spend 80% of his time doing the job he loves the most - and run a massive business at SpaceX!"Who vs. How" - is it as simple as - hire great people?Who your first employee should be - it may not be what you think!How quality standards impact your hiring and managementWhy you have to know yourself firstWhen NOT to delegateClassic delegation mistakes Jason and Michael have made! Websites Freeeup.com - ready-trained e-commerce-ready VAs/virtual team membersOutsource School - how to find, hire, train & Manage VAs/virtual team by Nathan Hirsch and Connor Gillivan Note: some of the links above may be affiliate links. We are highly selective in who we partner with. We only link to resources we know well and have vetted for our listeners. Also we've committed to plough any affiliate income into making this podcast ever better for you ,our listener! Episode transcript:​ ​  Transcript Email Download New Tab TEAMS INTRO [00:00:00]Teams INtro RAW 1 Michael_V: Ladies and gentlemen, we are here to talk about teams today. So Jason, I know you have got a lot of experience in this. I didn't realize until we'd had a conversation about this recently, that you started your career in human resources and you had over eight, 10 years experience in that outside of the eCommerce space. So I'd love to hear your thoughts on the topic. Tell me about teams. I love this topic. Um, yeah, I did, uh, start my, my career as a compensation analyst and mostly I was writing job descriptions for a couple of years and then became what's called HR generalist where I worked with, uh, marketing department managers in a large [00:01:00] organization and help them hire fire. Uh, team bill. Do you know, uh, problem solving in terms of org chart work and that kind of thing? Lay offs. Uh, I was a hatchet man. It was the best of times and the worst of times in many ways. And I love the topic of teams a lot. Uh, it's one of the most challenging aspects of, I think a building. One organization is how do you do your, your staffing, right? How do you do your teams? And so I'm, I'm excited for us to jump into it. Um, little anecdote to get us started. I think maybe it would be helpful, my, uh, hero in a way, I guess lately as Elon Musk, just because of what he's creating. And I heard an interview with him on Joe Rogan's podcast it's amazing podcast. Um, Joe Rogan started by saying, well, there was a part of the conversation where he said, I don't understand. How you can possibly Jason Miles: do Tesla Space X. Neural language is a big company now. I mean, and the boring company, which is a tunneling company and, and whatever else he mentioned, like, [00:02:00] you know, all of these huge projects, not just projects. I mean, these are massive companies. . Elon Musk. Basically, his response was, yeah, I don't know. I don't know what you mean. Any in general when it's trying to say like, how do you do it? How is it possible to have that many organizations? And Ilan said, well, I don't know what people think I do, but I spent about 80% of my time on really hard engineering problems and trying to figure out engineering, uh, you know, issues to resolve. And , you could see in Joe Rogan's face and in his mind as I was watching on YouTube,

Offer your clients something they can rely on whatever the outside circumstances. Listen to business tips from Carl Gould your #70secondCEO. Read full transcript: Hi everyone, Carl Gould here with your #70secondCEO. Just a little over a one-minute investment every day for a lifetime of result. You want to have some sort of offering that provides a club, bundled services, memberships subscription and then ARR and MRR is just annual recurring revenue. You know, pay me once in the beginning of the year and you get services all year, and then it just automatically renews unless you tell us otherwise or monthly return recurring revenue. All right, and so let's have all three premium offering, right sideways strategy come on in you can you can get one session for free, you know or down, you know, you could be part of this club. For example, here's a good strategy for all of you memberships and subscriptions. All right. So Jason, John right you have your have clients that pay you per month you can and there's like, you know, I have to put whatever it is I have with you on hold. I know that if I you told me that if I lock in this membership price and as long as I don't break the contract you will honor the price for the rest of my life. I can lock it in for a lifetime. Like and follow this podcast so you can learn more. My name is Carl Gould and this has been your #70secondCEO.

Today I welcome Singapore-based Global Amazon and eCommerce seller, Jason Tay! So Jason's journey started after he left his History Teaching job to create a business. Eventually discovering Amazon via a packet of noodles, he tried private label in 2013 and hasn't looked back. Interestingly, in spite of his enormous success, he still places little […] The post TAS 093 : Jason Tay – Little bets pay off big on Amazon appeared first on The Australian Seller .

In this episode of the Healthy, Wealthy and Smart Podcast, I welcome Jason Van Orden on the show to discuss personal branding strategies. Jason helps thought leaders to reach a larger audience with their ideas, create new income streams from their expertise, and build business models that align with their values and goals. As a consultant, trainer, and strategist, he draws from more than fourteen years of researching top Internet influencers and experimenting with his own personal experience. His experience includes creating multiple successful brands, launching over 60 online courses, teaching more than 10,000 entrepreneurs, generating seven figures in online course sales, and 8 million downloads of his podcast. His mission is to help visionaries with impactful ideas to connect with the people they serve best and the problems they can most uniquely solve. In this episode, we discuss: -Three keys to good brand positioning -How to overcome imposter syndrome and position yourself as an expert -The magnetic messaging framework -The compounding effect of your impact on the world -And so much more!   Resources: Jason Van Orden Website Jason Van Orden Facebook Jason Van Orden Business Page Jason Van Orden Twitter Jason Van Orden LinkedIn Jason Van Orden Instagram Impact Podcast Free Gift: https://impactdownloads.com/messaging   For more information on Jason: Since 2005, Jason has worked with over 6000 students and clients, teaching them how to monetize their unique brilliance with content marketing, scalable courses, and automated sales systems. Many of his and students have built multi-million dollar businesses and have become top authors, bloggers, podcasters, and speakers in their field. In September of 2005, Jason co-founded the first ever podcast about internet business and online marketing. It quickly became one of the top business podcasts in the world. To this day it’s one of the most profitable podcasts on iTunes — having generated millions of dollars in sales directly from his podcast. Jason has spoken around the world at some of the biggest conferences (such as CES, National Association of Broadcasters, New Media Expo, and many others) teaching how to use Internet media to launch and grow influential personal brands. In 2006, he wrote the bestselling book, Promoting Your Podcast, in which he was the first to “crack the code” for optimizing podcasts to get maximum exposure on iTunes. His work has been used to teach marketing at the university level and has been referenced on sites such as Forbes.com and Entrepreneur.com. He also practices what he preaches, having created world-class, influential brands of his own.   Read the full transcript below: Karen Litzy (00:01): Hey Jason, welcome to the podcast. I am so happy to have you on today. Jason Van Orden (00:05): Well it's great to be here. Karen, thank you so much for having me. Karen Litzy (00:08): Yes, and as you know, I've been a fan of yours for a while and as my audience knows, I actually took your course on how to kind of juice up your podcast last year and I thought it was super helpful. So I want to thank you for that and I sort of raved about it to my fans on social media and here in the podcast. So it's such a, it's going to be so great to have you on today. So, yeah, thanks. And today we're going to be talking about if creating an irresistible brand and then once you have that brand, how do you create sources of income? Because of course we all want to make a living, we all want to help as many people as we can while we're doing it. But the first question I have for you is, what is your definition of a irresistible brand? Jason Van Orden (01:04): Sure, yeah. Good question. So in the work that I do, you know, I work with people who have expertise that they want to get out there in a bigger way and you know, some kind of message, some kind of stories. So you know, they really want to be recognized or known or even just increase their own ability to help and impact and reach people with what they do. So just to let people know, I'll be talking mostly in the vein of what a personal brand is. I know sometimes we would hear a brand and we think like Coca Cola or AT and T and certainly there are much bigger brand companies as well, but we also don't want to confuse it with brand identity like logos and like your letter head. And certainly, you know, those are assets that get used in order to maybe establish a recognition of a brand. Jason Van Orden (01:49): But really, yeah, what we'll be talking about and how I define as much more about like how are you perceived in the marketplace, especially by those that you want to reach and do business with you, you know, the people that you want to serve and that you want to perk up, pay attention, and listen when you've got something cool to share or sell or you know, offer as help. So, it has to do with, you know, them seeing, you know, here's who you are, here's what you do, here's who you help and here's what you have to offer to them. And hopefully those perceptions are accurate and complete and compelling so that you successfully can get their attention and move them towards doing business with you. So that's kind of an in brief how I would make some of the specifications of the word brand to make sure that we're clear about what we're talking about. Karen Litzy (02:38): Yeah. And I think that's really helpful because I think you're exactly right. When people think of brands, they do think of those big international, huge brands, like you said, Coca-Cola, Nike, Apple, which is certainly a brand. But I think for the sake of the audience listening to this, they want to know about that more personal brand identity that you were talking about. So let's talk about how to create that. So how do you create this sort of irresistible brand that you want your ideal customers, you want to be perceived as something that is so necessary for them. How do you create that? Jason Van Orden (03:21): So yeah, there are three pieces to having a good brand positioning. And, and by position, I mean, again, establishing that place in the marketplace that you want to sit. And so the first is to know like, okay, well here's who I ideally want to reach and serve and being very clear about that. I mean, there's an example I use for instance, digital photography is, I have a recently a client I was working with, who wanted, you know, a successful digital photographer wanted to get out there and help other digital photographers. You know, had great career, great clients and projects and things, and he knew there are a lot of people who kind of knew his work and wanted to be, do some of what he had been able to accomplish. And so, you know, I was like, okay, great. Jason Van Orden (04:09): I want to build up my brand more and not just you know, do this. This work where I got hired to go and do thermography and digital photography. And so I said, well, we need to get very clear about who do you want to help with these skills. Is it the already established professional? Is it the somebody who wants to make that jump now to being a professional, you know, they've studied and they've, you know, pretty serious hobbyist or something. Or do you want to help people who just have an iPhone and wanting to take more beautiful pictures with their iPhone? Like these are all different audiences, but under that umbrella of digital photography. So it's being very clear. And sometimes that's specifying a specific demographic though it needs to go. I think even in much, much deeper than that. Jason Van Orden (04:51): And you know, are there certain age groups, but the biggest thing to really understand is what are the outcomes or results that you want to help them to reach? I think it's really important to define the target customer, the intended customer in that way. Because when it comes down to it, I mean their age and their gender or these different things might help you if you're running ads and want to know where to reach them. But really ultimately the way you want to define them as it's like, Oh, these are their unfulfilled needs. These are what are the things they're actively looking for. These are the pains they're experiencing or the goals that they haven't met that they would like to meet. And those are the things that I can help them with, which is the second piece. Jason Van Orden (05:35): Once you know the ideal customer that you want to reach and serve, the second piece is, Okay, well how do you want to serve them? What are you going to deliver if you are there specific ones of their pains that you want to help them with or the unfulfilled goals that you want to help them with. And we call that, you know, the value proposition or the thing that you are presenting to them, whether, you know, and might be as services or products or other things we can get. It's a into that later. But so it's who are you serving, how are you going to serve them? And then there's also this third piece that's just who you are. And particularly in the work that I do and helping people with their personal branding there's a lot of noise on the internet and it can feel sometimes if you are somebody who ever does post on Facebook or put something out there and maybe you're hoping people might see it, it's easy to feel like, Oh, that's just going to get lost in this sea of sameness. Jason Van Orden (06:31): And so many people saying different things or the same seemingly the same things. And it's knowing that as tried as this might sound, you know, we each have our unique perspective, our unique approach, the experiences we've been through. We have our you know, our approach to things to bring to the table. And in the same way, here's my vision for people who want to have a personal brand is that in the same way that Spotify now has really trained us to be able to find whatever we want to listen to. I mean, whatever genre, whatever into your popular music like you can, there's a vast catalog and now it's not about what 100 CDs you own. It's like now you like near infinite choice. And so you have these very personalized playlist and stuff and Spotify is insanely good at them. Jason Van Orden (07:19): Making recommendations for us as well in that same way, be thanks to the internet over the last 10, 15 years, all the other myriad of problems and populations who need help out there and in solving and guidance, you know, there's a slice of the world that's looking for your approach, for your flavor. You are that hidden gem of a band on Spotify, quote unquote, right. So it's something about the way you show up and make them feel they're present the information or guide them or the values you have or some kind of shared meaning or something where you know, you seem a lot like they, you know, you've been in the place that they have in the past and they resonate with that. So that's the third piece of the personal brand is knowing what you bring to the table in those ways. Jason Van Orden (08:06): And it just really owning and realizing that you do have that perspective that many people will want to specifically hear from you.   Karen Litzy: Okay. Wow. Okay. So I am going to recap that really quickly. So first you're where you want to be clear about who you want to serve. Then you want to be clear on how you're going to serve them. And then who are you and what do you bring to the table? I mean these are, I feel like number one kind of getting clear about who you want to serve. I don't know for me that's probably the easiest of the three. But getting, I think drilling down to who are you and what do you bring to the table that can be kind of difficult to pull out of yourself. Do you have any tips for the listeners on how they might be able to do that? Jason Van Orden (09:04): Absolutely. For me, I'm being totally selfish, absolutely not a problem. It can be hard to uncover those things. And one of the reasons why is that we often don't see what is interesting or special or valuable because it's commonplace to us and you know, and then just get old human nature. We haven't yet imposture syndrome or just feel like, Oh to like, you know, say, Oh, I'm strong in this area. Just feels not humble or something. So, you know, these things get in our way of seeing what we have to offer. And so in the work that I do, I have a lot of exercises and frameworks and things that I walk clients through to help them uncover and discover the different parts of their voice and that we're talking about. So I'll just drill into to one area here that I think is really important. Jason Van Orden (09:53): Like I said, very noisy on the internet, but if you can get this, this sense of resonance resonances, you know, if you've ever you know, maybe you've been seeing it in the shower or something happened, just hear it just the right note and it's just like, Ooh, it just gets really big. And because you hit just that right note that in that space sounds really big and that's what you want when somebody comes across you and your message. So here's a little framework in my research about personal branding, I've seen a lot of work. I've seen a lot of research I've done out there about the importance of purpose based brands. And when I say that I'm talking about companies like whole foods or Patagonia, there's a very specific identity. They stand for certain things. They have a certain vision of the future. Jason Van Orden (10:38): They guide their company according to that. Their messaging community, certain things in a very clear and compelling way. And that's just two of many examples I could go to. And the research is clear that that leads to more loyal customers, repeat customers, you know, fans and advocates that share your stuff with other people. And this is what consumers want today. Thank goodness. You know, I think 10, 15 years of some really just like shenanigans in the corporate world, not only I dimension, just upcoming generation of millennials, that purpose based stuff has gotten really, really important. So what does that mean for you? How can you you know, if you're feeling driven by all this, you probably do have some kind of purpose inside you. But what does that even mean to like clarify and communicate that? So here's a little framework that I have. Jason Van Orden (11:23): I went and I study kind of the work I've done helping build personal brands as well as some of these companies and what they do. And I came up with five elements. I'll just briefly go through, I call this the magnetic messaging framework and it is one of many facets he can pull up to really find that uniqueness about you. So first thing is beliefs. What do you believe at the core that drives the core of the work that you do? What do you believe about the world? What do you believe that maybe goes counter to what is popular, you know, wisdom in your industry. What do you want the people that you want to reach and serve? What do you want them to believe after they've worked with you or come across, you know, your offerings, what do you want them to believe about themselves and about the world? Jason Van Orden (12:04): So I'll just use myself as a quick example here. I have this belief that we do need more people out there building that personal brand, rising up and owning it and going and finding that slice of the world that they can help. And if we can have a ground swell of that will solve a lot more of the world's problems than if we were just to leave it to, you know, big corporations, big organizations, government, whatever. I mean, Hey, they have their part to plead to. But this is a wonderful opportunity the internet has given us. And that's a belief that I have one of many that drive my work. Second of all, vision, what is the vision you have of the future? I'm not talking about just a vision statement for your business and all that might be important, but paint a picture like this is the future I want to see and work for and create. Jason Van Orden (12:44): I'll give you an example from another woman that I was coaching where she is in the health. And actually she was in the dieting, you know, what you'd call even the dieting industry and she has as a recently in last couple of years, stop using that word at all. She came across some research and things. She said, that's it. I gotta stop talking about dieting when it comes to the women I'm working with, you know, with helping them love their bodies and different things. And, you know, she decided I have to take a completely different approach and she now believes it has this vision of the future where like we get rid of the dieting industry or that world, it may seem like a huge daunting task, which is like, we absolutely need to take that down. It is not serving us well. Jason Van Orden (13:22): So that's, you know, a big vision thing. It's bigger than her. And when people do business with her, they are, they also see themselves as being a part of that and people want to be part of something bigger. Again, going back to companies like Patagonia or whole foods, there is a certain vision you know, Patagonia is all about like the sustainable future, right? So what does that vision you want to create? So beliefs and vision, value, we always talk already talked about it a little bit as being very clear about what you offer to them, what's in it for them if they do business for you. The fourth thing is contribution. So what do you bring? What does your work do that goes beyond the monetary exchange and the value exchange with your customer. I mean, that's important and they pay you and you render a service or give them the product or whatever the case may be. Jason Van Orden (14:04): But how does that contribute to the community or the industry or even the world at large? And I'd like to think that in the work that I do helping elevate all of these thought leaders that it contributes in that will solve more of the world's problems. I mean, I'm not claiming that myself, I can go in and help enough people to solve all the world's problems, but I'll make more of the dent if I help more people find with their ideas and their expertise, the people in the problems in the populations they can help the most. And so that's how I see my work contributing even beyond what it does for directly to my icons, my customers. And then the final thing is a reason why you do what you do other than making money. And for me, once I was one simple example is I see it as a compounding of my own impact and specifically working with people who want to have a personal brand and be a thought leader or get their ideas and things out there in a bigger way. Jason Van Orden (14:58): It's like, well, Hey, it's like compound interest. I help you know, a person they go help 10 or a hundred or a thousand. Then I helped another person and they help 10 or a hundred or thousand. And so that's a reason why I do what I do besides money or the freedom directly benefiting to me. So those five things, beliefs, vision, value, contribution, and reason why, if you flesh those things out and then talk about them in your content and your keynote speeches with your clients in your marketing, in your say on your website, on your about page, on your social media, now you're going to be creating something that really has a uniqueness around it. And that's one key way to do that. Karen Litzy (15:35): That was great. Thank you so much. And I really loved that end piece. How you finished on that? That concept of compound interest. Yeah. Because oftentimes we don't think about what we do as effecting the, we kind of only think about it as I am working with a patient and I make a difference in that patient's life. Right? But I'm not thinking that because I made a difference in this patient's life. They were able to make a difference in their children or their parents or their friends or their family because they're going out and doing what they're meant to do because I help them do that. Karen Litzy (16:18): And I just, yeah, I just, I love that concept and I don't think I've heard it really put quite that way before. And I think it's just wonderful to think about it that way so that when, cause oftentimes as healthcare providers we can be a little shy, I guess it could be the word or uncomfortable with asking for monetary exchange for what we do. Right, right. And yeah, a lot of times, especially in healthcare, you're tied to that insurance system where, you know, you're waiting for the insurance to pay you or you could have a cash based business where the patient pays you directly. But so often there's this shyness or this inability to kind of ask for that monetary contribution. And I think people get so fixated on that that you forget about all the other stuff that you're doing. That sort of compound interest that you said goes beyond that monetary amount. Because I think if people see that, then the monetary amount, yes, we need to make a living, but people will be like, yeah, sure, here you go. I get it. Jason Van Orden (17:33): Yeah. Right. And when they understand yeah, and it definitely comes across again, by the time they do business with you, with this kind of messaging. Yeah. People, not only are they just like identified with you and like, no, I want, I want you, I want to be the one to help me. But yeah, they understand that and whether it's conscious or unconscious and says, yeah, this idea of like, Oh, I'm also part of something a little bigger than me here. This is cool. You know? And that's what people want these days. Karen Litzy (17:59): Yeah, absolutely. Well, now let's say we fast forward. We have gone through that framework. We feel like we have a good solid footing on what our brand is and our messaging. So let's step into now how to create sources of income from that messaging. And that messaging, of course, is using our expertise. Jason Van Orden (18:28): Yeah. So when it comes to creating different sources of income, there's one key asset to be very clear with. And then I can share another four-part framework. I'm big fan of frameworks and we've actually covered some of the pieces of that framework which are being very clear. So there's four pieces to coming up with some kind of offer. When I say offer, it could be a service, it could be a product, you know, something that you're offering to people to buy and exchange value with you. So the first piece is well, we already talked about knowing very clearly who your ideal audience, customer client is. And then the second piece is being very clear about understanding the outcomes and the results and the unfulfilled needs. What's most important to them, what's top of mind? What is their, what I call their tooth ache, pain and other, they literally have a two thing. Jason Van Orden (19:18): But I use that as an example because if we have a tooth ache and it's not going away, we're going to call the dentist and go get it checked out. Right? It suddenly becomes a top of mind thing. So how do you know what that is? Well, you go when you talk to them. I'm always encouraging my clients to go and do market research in the form of having conversations with people who fit the description of their ideal person, the person that they want to reach. And this could be current clients or past clients are also just people who aren't, haven't done business with them. But you know, for you, Karen could be listeners of your podcast or people who are on your email newsletter list and you know if you regularly get on the phone with them and it's not to say like, Hey, I have this idea for a product. Jason Van Orden (19:59): What do you think? It's really to listen a lot and ask good questions to hear about their experience. You know, what are they dealing with? What are they trying to accomplish? Why haven't they reached that? That's the big thing is why haven't they been able to do that thing that they want to do yet? What myths and misconceptions are they maybe dealing with? What questions do they have? What's not? What knowledge gaps, what tools do they need to acquire, what have they tried before that maybe didn't work for them? So you know, the better you understand their experience in this way, then you as the expert can, you'll see the through lines, the thread that draws the jury, that ties these conversations together. And you can kind of like read the tea leaves so to speak and go, Oh, okay, I'm seeing something that's missing here. Jason Van Orden (20:36): Or something that I think that I could do in a particularly helpful way. And then at that point, you've got, you know, those first two key components, your ideal customer and their ideal thing that's really important to them. And that's, we're going to come up with a great, a great offer. Now to get a little more specific at that point, you as the expert have some kind of process and this is the third piece, some kind of process for helping them get from a to B. You know, so if you're a physical therapist, I mean, I, I'm not claiming to know that much about physical therapy, right? But like I've done some before. I had a knee injury and then you need to get some range of motion back. Right? So the third, the physical therapist I went to see, you know, immediately, you know, it was assessing and everything and then in her mind was, you know, going, okay, yeah, here are the things we're going to need to do to do over the next several weeks. Jason Van Orden (21:25): Then a process to bring that to bring that about. I have a certain process that I go through to help my clients, you know, figure out what their personal brand is or you know, create and launch their first online pro, you know, I different. And so if you're very clear about what that process is and particularly kind of your unique approach to it, again, going back to what's unique about what you offer that process now is something that you can wrap in a variety of what I call experiences, which is the fourth piece. So we have the ideal client or customer, we have their ideal outcome. We have your process for helping them reach that outcome. And now it's just a matter of wrapping it in different experiences. Now, here's what I mean by that. If we imagine a spectrum and on one end of the spectrum is kind of your, what I call your high end high high touch offers. Jason Van Orden (22:13): So that would be, you know, as a physical therapist, the hands on one-on-one work as a consultant, as a coach showing up one-on-one or the, you know, so it's much more nuanced and direct and people are going to pay more for that kind of experience and expertise on the other end of the spectrum with clients that I work with is something that would be like purely hands off. Something like a digital course for instance, that you know, somebody can buy the so, you know, say I went online and I'm sure there's a lot of physical therapists can be like, Whoa, bad idea. You need to actually go to a physical therapist and understand that maybe you know, putting aside my ignorance about all of the physical therapy, you know, maybe then as a thing, after they worked with you for several weeks or whatever, there's some, you know, downloadable set of videos that then they can go through on their own at home or you know, whatever it is that you're wanting to help people with. Jason Van Orden (23:02): So that's at the other end of the spectrum, purely digital do it themselves. And then there's everything in between and you're basically asking yourself three questions. It's like, okay, how are people going to get access to me through this offer? And so, you know, is that going to be direct one on one? Is it going to be, maybe there's some kind of, you know, a lot of my clients end up performing some kind of like group Q and a or coaching calls, whether they can help a group of people at once. It's kind of like, you know, your Lyft or Uber share ride. If the driver has three people in the car, they're getting paid by three people as opposed to one person. Right? So that's a, you know, how do they get access to you and finding a more scalable way to do that. Jason Van Orden (23:38): The second thing is how do they get access to the information? And that might be, you know, through like you did that podcasting course. I did that, the information, there was a series of group calls, several people on a call and I was doing those trainings and then saying, here's where you can walk away now and the action steps and what to do next this week with what we've talked about. So how do they access the information or the knowledge or the tools? And then the third question is how do they access each other? And this is a powerful thing and wrapping in an experience. Because if you have a lot of people showing up, have similar goals and desires, it's actually you really valuable for them to be a part of a group of people who are working towards similar things and normalizes, you know, the issues that they're dealing with. Jason Van Orden (24:22): And they can get insights from others who are in the same place as they are. And this is where we see things like Facebook groups or LinkedIn groups or Slack you know, channels or ways that your clients can actually talk to each other, which again, it's huge value without your direct input. Other than that you connected them. So when you have those four pieces, the ideal client, their ideal outcome, your process for getting them there and then deciding of what is the experience, you know, now you can craft. And the cool thing about knowing clearly what that process is and maybe take that first piece of the process that's like an assessment piece or whatever the first step is. And you can make that a smaller product and make it lower price. So it's easy for people to go like, okay, yeah, I'll say yes. Jason Van Orden (25:04): Did that baby step into doing work? You know, or experiencing your expertise in some way. And then all the research tells us they're likely that way. More likely now to do business with you again and spend more money with you at that point. Or maybe you decide it's time to write a book. Okay. The book is maybe an overview of your process or you get invited to do a keynote. It's like, okay, there's, well here's one slice of my process, one, one, one piece of what I help people with. And that can be the basis for that for that keynote. Or maybe you decide, okay, now I want the entire process packaged up as a group coaching type experience that happens over eight weeks online or a two day workshop or right now you can, you can play with it in a lot of different ways, but that process is a really important asset. So those are your four steps and kind of how all those pieces come together. Karen Litzy (25:51): Awesome. Well, I love a good framework. So thank you for that. And there's one thing that you said as you are kind of going through that framework that I just want to back up and touch upon is that idea of being an expert. So oftentimes, and again, you touched upon this as well, is that feeling of imposter syndrome and things like that. Is that feeling of, am I really the expert? Like there are people out there who might have more experience than I do. How can I put myself out there as the expert? So what do you say to that? Jason Van Orden (26:29): Well, there probably are plenty of people out there who have more expertise than you. There always will be there. People have there have more expertise or experience in marketing branding to me. But again, it goes, there are too for people to do business with you. It's about trust. And trust is actually made of two components. It's made of credibility, which, you know, that's expertise. Have you, you know, done the hours of mastery. You've gotten the degree if you need it or whatever. It goes into that credibility. Have you gotten results for people before? And we lean on that a lot and that's okay. It is important. But then likability, credibility plus likability is trust. And often that likability is even more important than the credibility. Now again, you need to be able to deliver the results, but what does that likability, well, that goes back to resonance and for some reason, I mean, I think we've all, you know, I could have gone to one physical therapist and been like, yeah, something just doesn't drive here. Jason Van Orden (27:16): I need to go to another whatever for whatever reason. Right? And at that point, it wouldn't have been like, which one has more experience? It's like, which one do I vibe with? Or if you've ever gone to like hired a therapist or something like that, right? Just to kind of give a little more of an extreme example. But so that's one thing I would say. Another thing is that you know, if you do struggle with impostor syndrome, a great Google search to do is imposter syndrome celebrities. And you're gonna see a huge list of like Tina Fey and Tom Hanks and Maya Angelou and people who are like stories. Like, why are these people like doubting themselves? They're like, amazing. Then another thing that I would say to that is, you know, that process of going and having those conversations with your marketplace, those can be very energizing and actually confidence boosting. Jason Van Orden (28:04): Cause as you're talking and hearing their experience, it starts, you start going seeing it's like, Oh yeah, I can help with that and start getting excited about it and wanting to do it. And so that's another, you know, little anecdote to that. And in the end it's, you know, you don't ever have to be claimed to be something that you're not, you know, you very clear and you know, again, what your strengths are, where you can create results to what extent, and there are going to be people that just decide to work with you for a number of reasons. And it's not just going to be price or geography. Sometimes it might be, but again, if you know, that resonance piece comes in a lot too. So there's a few different things. And then the last thing is all I can say is like, go back to my belief that it's like, look, there's so many people in this world, 8 billion plus lots of problems to solve. Lots of people looking for guidance and help. So, you know, be that one specific band on Spotify, be that one person that knows that slice of the world is looking for. I'm going, you know what, you're the person I've been waiting for to hear this from. So how can I work with you? And that's what we're going for. Karen Litzy (29:08): Perfect. I love it. Now as we wrap things up here if you could leave the audience, although I think what you just said was probably, I shouldn't have even asked this question, but I'm going to ask it anyway because I want you to be able to kind of give the major points you want people to walk away with from this conversation, even though there were so, so many, I took a lot of notes. Jason Van Orden (29:34): Yeah. I mean, I'll just punctuate kind of the big point. And, and with just a very brief anecdote or story, and that is like back in 2008, I got a phone call from a woman in Austin, Texas. She had a child, she was pregnant or no, she had two kids at the time. And she, both of her pregnancies had been very high risk. In fact, she had gotten put on bed rest, you know, or you have to stay there for months and I'm sure that's gotta be so stressful. And it was a really difficult time for her. She from the African American community and she just found that particularly in that population, the resources for high risk pregnancies were really under like the date. There just wasn't enough of them. So, you know, fast forward, she's got her two healthy kids, thank goodness everything. Jason Van Orden (30:19): And she's like, I want, I need to share my experience and my story, you know, she's even gotten, you know, gone and gotten some what's the word I'm looking for, you know, accreditations or even, I can't remember exactly what she, you know, went and trained in, but she definitely got some that credibility expertise part, but then she also wanted to share her story. And so she said, can you help me launch a podcast? I said, yes, absolutely. So she hired me to coach her and consult her through that. And you know, fast forward a few months, or maybe it was a half a year or so, and she started getting emails from people in Ireland and Australia and Oman in the middle East. And you know, this one woman and in Oman said look, I gotta thank you for helping. Like save my child. Jason Van Orden (31:04): I hadn't, no, when I found out that I had to be on bed rest and there was this high risk of losing my pregnancy, like I didn't know what to do and where I live, there really isn't like what much support or empathy and so your story, your podcast, your perspective, your expertise gave me the strength, the will, the knowledge to be able to get through that difficult time. So what I'm trying to punctuate there is like how many of those connections are waiting for you out there, the listener, you know, who's listening to this right now and whether you reach them through a podcast or a blog or videos or through social media or speaking or whatever the case may be. There are absolutely those stories. You know, that that story can be true of you. And that's why I do what I do is to multiply that phenomenon that I've seen time and time and time again over the last 10 or 15 years. Karen Litzy (31:54): Yeah, I mean you just, you never know who's listening or reading or watching and you never know how the words that you say can truly, truly affect another person. And that's a great exit story is a great example of that. Jason Van Orden (32:10): And I don't know if you can hear a little bit of music, Karen? But somebody is having a dance party with their car suddenly. So that's not just me like, you know, winding down our interview with like, I'm going to do a saucer. Karen Litzy (32:21): You're in a play, you're going to play yourself off at the Oscars. Just slowly playing yourself off. That's so thoughtful. Well, actually before you exit, I have one last question. So I ask everyone this, knowing where you are now, in your life and in your career, what advice would you give to yourself as that young guy straight out of school? Jason Van Orden (32:49): Yeah. Well wow, that's a big one. I mean, I think what I would say is that, you know, you're only scratching the surface when it comes to what's possible for you and especially in getting to know yourself. So just, you know, keep searching, keep looking, keep discovering and uncovering the layers of yourself. And because, you know, that guy thought he was going to be an engineer for the rest of his life and so many other, I'm such a different person now and that's good. I mean a lot of growth and hard things and went very different directions than I thought, but it would just be that encouragement. It's like, look, you're just getting started and thinking is going to be very different. But you know, keep, keep digging and hoping and pushing and even when it gets hard. Karen Litzy (33:35): Great advice. Thank you so much. Now Jason, where can people find you? Jason Van Orden (33:40): Yeah, so I actually have a new podcast where we dive into stuff like this. It's a podcast called impact, a subtitle, how to build or how to grow your thought leadership brand and business. And so you can check that out and find it on all the major directories or at jasonvanorden.com. And then the one other thing I'll mention is if you go to magneticmessaging.download, you can download, you know, I went very quickly through those five aspects of the messaging, but you can download the framework, it's like a full guide with questions. Take you through that and if you want to dig into that exercise some more. So that's magneticmessaging.download. Karen Litzy (34:20): Awesome. Well thank you so much. And just for everyone listening, we'll have the links to everything that Jason just said. So his podcast, his website and the magnetic messaging over at the show notes for this episode at podcast.Healthywealthysmart.com. So if you weren't taking notes like I did, don't worry one click and we'll take you to everything that Jason just mentioned. So Jason, thank you so much for taking the time out and coming on the podcast. I really appreciate it. This was great. Jason Van Orden (34:50): Yeah, so much fun. Thank you Karen Karen Litzy (34:52): And everyone else. Thanks so much for listening. Have a great couple of days and stay healthy, wealthy, and smart.   Thanks for listening and subscribing to the podcast! Make sure to connect with me on twitter, instagram  and facebook to stay updated on all of the latest!  Show your support for the show by leaving a rating and review on Apple Podcasts!

Part 1: Taylor Brown is the author of Pride of Eden and previous novels Fallen Land, The River of Kings and Gods of Howl Mountain. He’s also big into big motorbikes. He joins us from Savannah, Georgia to tell presenters Paul Waters and Stevyn Colgan how he immerses himself in the environment he sets his stories - whether it’s the southern African veldt, the Florida swamps or the islands of Georgia. And how short stories are at the core of his novels. We loved reading Taylor’s writing, but it was We’d Like A Word listener Jason Grubbs who introduced us to each other. So Jason joins in the podcast all the way from Michigan state, USA. Sit back, close your eyes and listen to conversation about deep time, power animals, lore of lions, tigers, leopards and elephants, big game poaching and exotic animal rescue, mythical beasts and hoaxes and the end of the world as we know it. And not forgetting the Georgia Pig Man, The Florida Swamp Ape and the Altamaha-ha. ***** We also enlist comedian Robin Ince of the Infinite Monkey Cage podcast to celebrate The Cottage Bookshop in Penn, Camilla’s Bookshop in Eastbourne, Goldsboro Books in London, Lemuria Books in Jackson Mississippi, and E. Shaver and The Book Lady bookstores in Savannah, Georgia. Get in touch if you frequent or work in a lovely bookshop - we love to tell listeners about you. (*** NB: Apologies for sound quality dips in this episode. We usually do everything face to face with alcohol or a cup of tea, but are getting used to new fangled ways of commuting remotely online. Hopefully we’ll get better at it.) We'd Like A Word is a podcast and radio show from authors Paul Waters and  Stevyn Colgan. We talk with writers, readers, celebrities, talkers,  poets about books, songs, lyrics, speeches,  scripts, fiction and  non-fiction. We go out on various radio platforms at least once a fortnight and every other Thursday on podcast. Our website is www.wedlikeaword.com -  which is where you'll find information about Paul and Steve and our  guests - and details of the radio stations that carry We'd Like A Word.  We're also on Twitter @wedlikeaword and Facebook @wedlikeaword and our email is wedlikeaword@gmail.com - and yes,  we are slightly embarrassed by the missing apostrophes. We like to hear  from you - your thoughts,  ideas, guest or book suggestions. Perhaps you'd like to come on We'd Like A Word in person, to chat, review, meet writers or read out passages from books. . .

Part 2: Taylor Brown is the author of Pride of Eden and previous novels Fallen Land, The River of Kings and Gods of Howl Mountain. He’s also big into big motorbikes. He joins us from Savannah, Georgia to tell presenters Paul Waters and Stevyn Colgan how he immerses himself in the environment he sets his stories - whether it’s the southern African veldt, the Florida swamps or the islands of Georgia. And how short stories are at the core of his novels. We loved reading Taylor’s writing, but it was We’d Like A Word listener Jason Grubbs who introduced us to each other. So Jason joins in the podcast all the way from Michigan state, USA. Sit back, close your eyes and listen to conversation about deep time, power animals, lore of lions, tigers, leopards and elephants, big game poaching and exotic animal rescue, mythical beasts and hoaxes and the end of the world as we know it. And not forgetting the Georgia Pig Man, The Florida Swamp Ape and the Altamaha-ha. ***** We also enlist comedian Robin Ince of the Infinite Monkey Cage podcast to celebrate The Cottage Bookshop in Penn, Camilla’s Bookshop in Eastbourne, Goldsboro Books in London, Lemuria Books in Jackson Mississippi, and E. Shaver and The Book Lady bookstores in Savannah, Georgia. Get in touch if you frequent or work in a lovely bookshop - we love to tell listeners about you. (*** NB: Apologies for sound quality dips in this episode. We usually do everything face to face with alcohol or a cup of tea, but are getting used to new fangled ways of commuting remotely online. Hopefully we’ll get better at it.) We'd Like A Word is a podcast and radio show from authors Paul Waters and  Stevyn Colgan. We talk with writers, readers, celebrities, talkers,  poets about books, songs, lyrics, speeches,  scripts, fiction and  non-fiction. We go out on various radio platforms at least once a fortnight and every other Thursday on podcast. Our website is www.wedlikeaword.com -  which is where you'll find information about Paul and Steve and our  guests - and details of the radio stations that carry We'd Like A Word.  We're also on Twitter @wedlikeaword and Facebook @wedlikeaword and our email is wedlikeaword@gmail.com - and yes,  we are slightly embarrassed by the missing apostrophes. We like to hear  from you - your thoughts,  ideas, guest or book suggestions. Perhaps you'd like to come on We'd Like A Word in person, to chat, review, meet writers or read out passages from books. . .

Part 3: Taylor Brown is the author of Pride of Eden and previous novels Fallen Land, The River of Kings and Gods of Howl Mountain. He’s also big into big motorbikes. He joins us from Savannah, Georgia to tell presenters Paul Waters and Stevyn Colgan how he immerses himself in the environment he sets his stories - whether it’s the southern African veldt, the Florida swamps or the islands of Georgia. And how short stories are at the core of his novels. We loved reading Taylor’s writing, but it was We’d Like A Word listener Jason Grubbs who introduced us to each other. So Jason joins in the podcast all the way from Michigan state, USA. Sit back, close your eyes and listen to conversation about deep time, power animals, lore of lions, tigers, leopards and elephants, big game poaching and exotic animal rescue, mythical beasts and hoaxes and the end of the world as we know it. And not forgetting the Georgia Pig Man, The Florida Swamp Ape and the Altamaha-ha. ***** We also enlist comedian Robin Ince of the Infinite Monkey Cage podcast to celebrate The Cottage Bookshop in Penn, Camilla’s Bookshop in Eastbourne, Goldsboro Books in London, Lemuria Books in Jackson Mississippi, and E. Shaver and The Book Lady bookstores in Savannah, Georgia. Get in touch if you frequent or work in a lovely bookshop - we love to tell listeners about you. (*** NB: Apologies for sound quality dips in this episode. We usually do everything face to face with alcohol or a cup of tea, but are getting used to new fangled ways of commuting remotely online. Hopefully we’ll get better at it.) We'd Like A Word is a podcast and radio show from authors Paul Waters and  Stevyn Colgan. We talk with writers, readers, celebrities, talkers,  poets about books, songs, lyrics, speeches,  scripts, fiction and  non-fiction. We go out on various radio platforms at least once a fortnight and every other Thursday on podcast. Our website is www.wedlikeaword.com -  which is where you'll find information about Paul and Steve and our  guests - and details of the radio stations that carry We'd Like A Word.  We're also on Twitter @wedlikeaword and Facebook @wedlikeaword and our email is wedlikeaword@gmail.com - and yes,  we are slightly embarrassed by the missing apostrophes. We like to hear  from you - your thoughts,  ideas, guest or book suggestions. Perhaps you'd like to come on We'd Like A Word in person, to chat, review, meet writers or read out passages from books. . .

In this episode, we discuss the Star Wars: The Mandalorian casting of Michael Biehn. However, we could not do the show like we usually do because of Covid-19. So Jason calls Randy because who knows what that guy has. Who knows what either have them have honestly.  Michael Biehn cast in Mando. Biehn details on his role in the show.  Robert Rodriguez directed a Mando episode.  /Film had the scoop Ahsoka was in The Mando.  Deadline plagiarizes MSW via their corporate policy and many others before finally recanting after the story has died.  Fantha Tracks was right about the triangular radar dish on the Falcon in The Rise of Skywalker. 

Evil Bikes, best known as an MTB company, bursts onto the gravel scene at the end of 2019 with the Chamois Hager model.  With an aggressive geometry and dropper post, the bike immediately turned heads.  We talk with Evil Bikes COO, Jason Moeschler about the design philosophy and intention  Evil Bikes Website Evil Bikes Instagram Automated transcription (please excuse the typos). Good day everyone and welcome to the gravel ride podcast. I'm your host, Craig Dalton. I needed to take a minute this week and talk to you about the podcast. I've been doing it for two years now, having produced over 50 episodes. I very much appreciated the time you dedicate to listening every month and how you've shared the podcast with friends. The community has really grown, which has been super exciting and I'm super privileged to be part of that journey. As you guys explore and continue to be passionate about gravel cycling, one of the things I've been grappling with is the cost structure of producing the podcast. You may recognize that this isn't a full time job for me, but I am incurring costs on a monthly basis. Every time I put out episodes from hosting to editing to transcription and my time in general and I've been grappling with what to do about those expenses as we sort of pass into our second year. I thought about putting some of the content behind a pay wall or putting some episodes behind a pay wall, but that really just didn't make sense. At the end of the day, I want to provide information and audio content to those of you who are interested in finding out about events, race organizers, and hearing from athletes that are participating in the sport. So I came back to the idea that I'm going to need to start offering some advertising slots into the podcast and I'll try to keep them short and I'll try to keep them up front and not interrupt the content too much, but I wanted to just get out in front of it and let you guys know that I'm just doing this really to offset the costs and to be able to invest a little bit more into the podcast, into distribution, and into all the great things that I hope we're providing to the world. So as with everything I do, I definitely want your feedback, so feel free to shoot me a note of, Hey, that you're doing the right thing or BU this is really disappointing me. I'm always open to feedback and looking forward to hearing from you guys. So with all that said, I did want to tell you about our first sponsor cycle Oregon. I've spoken about the state of Oregon a couple of times on the podcast and we've certainly had guests from that area. I love the state for riding. I've spent time on the Oregon timber trail, mountain biking at fat tire Fest and bend riding in hood river. And I think my very first gravel event was actually up in Oregon, so I was super stoked in connecting with the team up at cycle Oregon. They're a nonprofit organization that has been transforming individuals and communities through cycling. So why are they here on the gravel ride podcast? Well, it's not too big a leap to understand that cycle Oregon who's been putting on events for I think a couple of decades, they are going to be highlighting some of the amazing gravel roads around the Thai Valley. Yeah, it's Ty like titanium, but not spelled that way. They've got a great two day event, which I think is kind of a cool format. They're camping overnight. So you'll be camping with all the, all the different riders and they're organizing two back to back gravel adventure days out of that Valley. So for those of you looking for ways of spending an entire weekend doing an event rather than kind of just a one day hit at a race, this cycle, Oregon gravel events, which is coming up here in may is a great alternative. I can't tell you how cool that area looks. It's kind of nestled below a hood river and above bend in the state of Oregon. So check that out on the map and definitely go to cycle oregon.com because they've got some video about the event that they're producing. You can register right there for the event and if you put the promo code T G R in your registration, the team up there as promised, a little special treat for our listeners. So go check them out. They're investing in gravel, they're investing in adventure for our community. So it's another great way to spend a weekend. This may again, that's cycle oregon.com for more information. So speaking of sweet adventures, I've got a rad episode for you coming up. We were fortunate to sit down with Jason Moseler from evil bikes talking about the Shammy Hagar. This bike burst onto the scene in November last year and really sent shockwaves through a lot of the gravel press as they were taking what was seen as a radical approach to gravel frame construction and geometry. I'm not going to say too much more because I want Jason to explain the concept to you in his own words, but suffice it to say what I thought going into the conversation is not what came out of it. Jason and the team up there at eval have a real clear vision on why this approach is great for gravel cyclists and believe they've created a really amazing platform for people to go out there and explore. So with that said, let's dive right in. Jason, welcome to the show. Thanks for having me. Right on. Jason, could you start by telling the listener a little bit about your background and a little bit about the company history? Yeah. personally I race mountain bikes professionally for 22 years. The whole time I race, I worked also so 11 years at a bike shop 10 years with wilderness trail bikes, a little bit of home-building sprinkled in between there and and now I've been at eval for two and a half years. Evil was founded in 2008 and really didn't start selling bikes until 2014 with the launch of the following, the 120 millimeter full suspension, 20 Niner. And at that point the whole mountain bike industry was the, the, the whole industry. The ship had turned to 27.5 inch wheels and then all of the sudden eval lands this super aggressive, super playful, long, low and flack 29 or bike in it. It just like stopped the industry in its tracks. And from that point forward, evil has, has been looked at as this, this kind of game changer of a design and geometry company. Yeah. I encourage the listener to go out and check out the website and check out some of the history of evil. Cause I do remember that time period and it was like boom, here is a bad ass mountain bike coming to market. That's kind of a little bit different and a bit different in all the right ways. So it's an exciting time For sure. And you know, the, the fact that it was a 20 Niner and the fact that it had a really never before themed geometry was one thing. But then you had evils design language in the frame, the actual industrial design and it looked like nothing anyone had ever seen before. And that that same design language has plopped forward to the bike we're going to talk about today, the Shammy Hagar gravel bike. Yeah, I think it's interesting and you know, some people may be scratching their heads, why are we talking about full suspension mountain bikes for the first few minutes of this podcast. But as we've often talked about, you know, the gravel bike market, there's a, there's a spectrum. There's, there's starting with a road bike and adding a little bit of tire clearance and we've kind of talked about that as being called the road plus category. And then there's the other end of the spectrum. And I think we, one of the things that comes up time and time again is depending on what terrain is out in your backyard, your idea of a gravel bike can be radically different. So in December, you know, just a, just a couple of months back when you guys introduced the Shammy Hagar, it was like boom. It was another one of those moments where someone was saying to the industry and to the consumers, Hey, here's a different perspective. We're thinking about a rider that's maybe coming from a different geography and has a different idea about what writing is, looks like it's not, you know, simple, pleasant gravel roads that people were riding on 28 see tires. This is a different kind of animal. So can you just talk a little bit about the Shammy Hagar at a high level and then we'll get into some of those details that make it a different performing bike. For sure. Yeah. So when the Hagar was designed, we really didn't want to exclude people from the road side. We, we didn't want to make this a mountain bike and there's some key features in the bike that every rider that likes to peddle will appreciate. The first thing is that the seat angle on, on the Shami it's at the forward edge of the UCI C2 bangle position. What that means is that your pedal position is there in relation to the bottom bracket. It's not some, you know, crazy steep mountain bike seat tube angle that, you know, the full suspensions are using to, you know, take advantage of all the kinematics and everything. It's really a, a road huddling position. When you look at the bike from the side, it looks really long and it is really long. But what we've done to accommodate for that length in the peddling position is that we've flapped a really short handlebar STEM on there. We're, we're shipping the bikes out with a 40 millimeter to 60 millimeter STEM. And so what that short STEM has done is put the rider essentially in the same pedaling position that they're used to on their road bike. So we have essentially given a road rider, if you will, the optimal peddling position, a handlebar and handlebar position that they would really appreciate so that they're not excluded. But then on the extreme side, we link them the wheel base. We dropped the top two way down. We don't sell this bike without a drop or post. So all of the sudden you have a bike that can get your center of gravity really low, allow you to get your weight back and descend really comfortably. Yeah, I think that, you know, those are some of the things, if, if you're not driving or listening to this while you're riding, check out an image of the bike because it is striking some of these things. But as you're describing it, Jason, I know you've guys have put a lot of effort into making it feel as if you're in a sort of traditional gravel bike position. Ultimately, however, the angles are going to play out quite differently in terms of how the bike's gonna perform. Particularly descending, I imagine. Exactly, exactly. When you look at the overall schematic of a Shammy Hagar versus when we look at when Eagle looks at other gravel bikes there, to us, they're all very similar. And in general, the Shammy, Hagar, the wheelbase is about a hundred millimeters longer maybe even a little bit more. And what has happened to the rider position in relation to the front rear axle? Is that in relation to the axle? The rider, sorry, the wheel axles, the rider has moved back and down a little bit, but again, like I said, that pedal position is is maintained. Now a lot of people look at the Shami and they're like, Oh man, there's no way that thing is gonna turn. It's, it's gonna feel floppy. What they don't realize is that the bike has a very custom fork, very custom actual, the crown measurement, custom offset which was developed by Dave Weigle. Day wiggle comes from the mountain bike side. People probably know about him, but if there's one person that knows how to make a bike handle good, it is Dave Weigle. And so he's got his paintbrush all over this bike. And so what you'll discover is that he's, he's adjusted this thing to where it doesn't have any steering disadvantages. It doesn't have any cornering disadvantages. In fact, you end up, you know, the faster you go cornering the, the more you realize, wow, this thing, it's, you just keep finding more potential with it. Yeah. If I'm understanding you correctly, if you're sort of shifting your body weight back a little bit because they've got the shorter STEM, how does that translate to cornering performance off road? Well so when you look at the Shami, the top tube is dropped way down and it also has the dropper posts. So if you drop that seat posts, all of the sudden that seat isn't in your way. And so you can get your weight down way down. Like nothing you've ever felt before on a regular gravel bike. And what that does is it allows you to get your center of gravity down which allows you to keep the wheels more planted on the ground. It just, it like being down and low. Is, is what allows you to get your weight low and get more traction to the tire and also not feel like you're top heavy. And like, you know, if you hit an obstacle, you're gonna buck yourself over the bars or something. So that, that sloping top tube really along with the dropper post really lets the rider get their weight down and low. And then the other part of that equation, and you've probably seen this with a lot of, with a lot of your listeners, is that most gravel writers these days, and I, and I hear this from a lot of my colleagues, they say, you know, I don't use the drops anymore. I just use the top of the hood. And that's my comfortable position. But in our opinion, the top of the hoods is a very scary place to hold on to. When you're trying to negotiate something technical, when you're going really fast, we also feel that the drops are very uncomfortable. For the same reason you get your front, your front end weight is just disproportionate when you're in your drops on a standard gravel or road set up. If your front wheel hits an obstacle, your your way wants to be thrown forward with the Shammy, you drop your seat post and all of a sudden because your body is lower, your angle of attack going into the drop bars is much better. So all of the sudden you've got this amazing position to use your drops. They actually feel good to be in the drops. Not only that, but your angle of attack towards your brake levers and your shift gears in the drops is like nothing you've ever felt on a, on a standard gravel bike. Typically it's very hard to, to strike a good balance of good hood position when you're holding to the top and good hood position. When you're in the drops and reaching for the brake lever, how's your, you can get your, your weight low on the rear of the Shammy. With the feet dropped, all of the sudden there's this whole new world of accessibility using the drop bars. Yeah, I have to say those are some really important takeaways and as listeners know, I'm a big fan of the dropper post and I can see in the design of the Shammy Hagar how you really get down low. And it's interesting that you mentioned kind of that the hoods versus drops because I was, it was riding yesterday and descending here in mill Valley and, and just thinking about how better the position was with my saddle really dropped with the dropper post, kind of my hands felt very comfortable and planted and my weight was was low. So when it got steep I didn't feel like I was getting flipped over the bars. And I think your point about, you know, a lot of riders descending on the hoods is absolutely spot on. It's crazy. And I, I see people, mostly people in my rear view mirror that I'm passing who are descending on the hoods because there's just no way you can keep the control with just really effectively your, your thumb part of your hand being the only thing that's effectively gripping and holding you onto the bike. Exactly. Exactly. And now the other thing to consider with the Shammy Hagar versus a typical gravel bike. Sure you can throw a dropper post on a typical gravel bike, but the typical gravel bikes, the triangles are bigger. A lot of the bikes out there, they're their road bikes that are trying to be gravel bikes or they're gravel bikes that are trying to be cyclocross bikes. But the common theme is that the triangle's pretty big, so you can't fit a very long dropper on there. And so the cause of that, you just can't get as low as you could get on the Shami because the frame is organically, way lower. So you can just get yourself way, way lower. And that gets you way more wheel traction. It gets you the ability to lean way further back when you are going really fast. But that dropper posts and not compact frame, that's only part of the equation. When you take a typical gravel bike and you put a dropper post on, you're still dealing with the, the how do you, how do you say it? The, the road bike style front end. What I mean by that is you typically have tow overlap. You typically have a very short amount of trail. You typically have very steep head two bangles. And so those three things combined, they still make for a really sketchy descending experience. Compare that to the Shami where you essentially have a following MB mountain bike front end on this thing to scare with. It wants to attack aggressive stuff and that's what you get with the riding position of the Shami is you, you've essentially been given, we've, we sprinkled in all the benefits of mountain bike geometry to help descending feel more comfortable and safe on, on our gravel bike. And then have you designed it around a specific wheel size? Yeah. We, so this bike holds a 700 by 50 tire. So effectively a 29 by 2.0 and that's what we spec it with. And we've had a lot of questions of, well, Hey, why, why don't you, you know, promote like a, a road plus like a six 50 by 47. And our answer is well, cause you can use a 700 by 47. It to us it's just like a mountain bike. The bigger wheel is better. And so that's kind of where we're trying to scare people. I actually worked at WTB when the road plus tires were created and what we were doing there was working with consumers and bike brands that had road bikes that had some extra width and the chains days where they could take this road plus wheelset throw it on their road bike and you know, have a bike that goes off road much better and still does on road pretty good. The height of that six 50 by 47, the tire is essentially the same as a 700 by 30 road tire. So, you know, tired of feet tube, your clearance is good. You just need that chain stay with. But again, that's, that's taking a road bike and trying to make it you know, go off road better the evil Shammy Hagar, we, we're not trying to be a road bike. We're not trying to be a cyclocross bike. We're, we're trying to be the best gravel bike possible. So do you, we talk a lot and we've talked a lot about sort of descending and cornering. How, how do things play out when we're climbing? So again the climbing position, the peddling position is exactly what a rider would want. It's, it's exactly comparable to their road bike or their current gravel bike. So feed angle saddle for AFT, all that adjustability is, is just like what the rider is used to. Same as a bar position. So measuring center of the seat posts to center, the handlebar handlebar height below the saddle height. All of, all of those measurements that riders appreciate are achievable. Say you're a very traditional road rider who when measuring from the ground you'd like your handlebars to be about seven centimeters below your saddle height when also measured from the ground, you know, like a very aggressive kind of pro road position. You can actually do that with a Shammy Hagar. You can achieve that position. But here's the awesome thing. When you start going downhill, you're not stuck in that position. You can get the seat way down and all of the sudden you've turned yourself into a rider who had like, you know, a pro road position and now all of a sudden you can go downhill with the seat post down and you're in like the most Aero position you could ever, you could ever obtain because you're so low. And you know what you see with the pro road riders as they you know, their seats are up and they, they get their weight or they get their body in front of the saddle and then they drop themselves down on the top tube. Like this super dangerous riding position. Well, imagine just slamming the seat all the way down to the seat color and you can actually keep your weight back a little bit into a safe zone. I'm pretty much positive that this bike will out descend any road bike. I have all these dreams of Peter Saigon riding this thing and you know, he already smokes people, but I can't even imagine what that guy could do on this bike. No, I hear you. I, it was funny, as you're starting your description, I was imagining like the, the Chris Froome sitting on the top tube dissent position and how that just doesn't work for gravel, but you can effectively get there if you've got a long dropper, you can just be sitting comfortably on the saddle. Totally in control and totally low. Yeah. Yeah. And I'm, I'm curious, you know, if we will, we will see these dropper posts on the, in the pro Peloton for exactly the reasons you're talking about. Now that I've been hooked on our dropper post, if I go back to Europe and I'm descending off of Alpe d'Huez or some classic climb, I would definitely want to drop her post on my bike. Totally. There are some technology that has taken time to break into the let's say those of us and I'm, and I'm one of us that appreciate lightweight. We appreciate efficiency. We appreciate you know, the ability to go from point a to point B quickly go uphill quickly. You know, disc brakes is one of those things. For cross country, mountain biking, dropper posts. I mean, they're, they're just starting to break in there. And for gravel, I think you know, bellow news just did a podcast not too long ago where they were, they were saying dropper post isn't appropriate for gravel. It's just not needed. We really hope that this bike shows people that it actually, it's not just a needed, it's, it's incredibly beneficial. Yeah. I think that's what's really exciting about people taking bold stabs at what gravel bikes should look like. Whether it's what you guys are doing or some of the forays into suspending mountain bikes. I think it's opening people's eyes that the things we're trying to do on these bikes are different and fresh perspective, whether it's coming from the mountain bike world or outside. The industry is very much warranted in this moment in time. And it's giving people a lot to think about and shaking up the establishment in a big way. For sure. And there's other, there's other stabs the devil took as well. For instance, the short STEM mountain bikers is known now for 10 years, that long STEM are not beneficial. So we didn't go halfway. We went all the way down to mountain bikes STEM. And we did that because day wiggle knows how to correct the geometry to make the bike steer correctly. So there's, there's no reason to leave STEM length on there. It's, it's silly. The other thing is we, we just, we used 160 millimeter rotors on this bike. The, the main reason being is while you've effectively got a a mountain bike geometry for going downhill, so you're going to catch yourself going faster. So you need better stopper. So one 60 rotor standard across the board. And then another thing that some people scratch their head over is that we used a 30.9 feet post diameter. The reason we did that because you use 30.9, you can get any option of feet post that the entire world of dropper posts is your oyster. If you use 27.2, your, your weight loss is minimal. And all of the sudden you're heavily, heavily restricted over, you know, your seat post choices. Another big question we've gotten is front derailer compatibility and we left that on there. We left it on the Shammy. We want the customer to have all the options. For some people this bike might need almost mountain bike Gehring. And at the same time they might want, you know, a really high gear similar to a road to a road bike. So, you know, this bike could effectively be both of those bikes in the same ride. And so we wanted to really keep things open for the rider. Yeah. I think one of the things that struck me when I first saw the design of the bike was, you know, people often were in the early days of gravel biking, we're saying, Oh, we're just going back to a 1990s hard tail mountain bike geometry. And obviously over the decades the mountain bike geometry has shifted and all the ways that you've discussed the slacker head angles, the shorter stems, and my, my first gut reaction was, Hey, maybe these guys are just cut through that journey because of the mountain bike experience and put us at our ultimate end goal. And all gravel bikes are gonna look like this in 10 years. I don't know the answer to that, but it's certainly interesting to kind of think about it in that, that framework. Yeah. You're, yeah, you really bring up a good point. This bike is not compatible with a front a front suspension fork. And there's some thought behind that. Had we made it compatible with the suspension fork, you would essentially have a hard tail mountain bike with drop bars and a suspension fork. But we weren't trying to go there. We wanted to make the lightest, most felt best ascending gravel bike we could. We're, we're not trying to make a mountain bike here. We're, we're really trying to make like a tried and true gravel bike. That, you know, is just, just that it's, it's great for riding these dirt roads. It, of course, that'll handle, you know, it'll handle single track good too. But make no mistake, it's not a mountain bike on a single track, on smooth single track. You're good. But you know, if you're riding rough stuff like ride your mountain bike for sure. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. It's definitely one of those those lines that I'm sure you guys were super conscious of. It seems like you've, you've built the bike also to be ready for adventure. I noticed a lot of islets to, to Mount bags and whatnot to add. Can you talk a little bit about that angle? Yeah. We we didn't want any limitations on this thing. As far as being bike packable. So we gave it every amount that it could have. Fender mounts. Without heavy modification to the fender, you can fit 700 by 40 a tire with a fender on the bike with heavy modification of offenders in the rear. If you actually cut the fenders around the chain, stay a little bit. You can actually run the fenders with the full size 700 by 50 tire. We have employees that are using this bike as a commuter bike. Their daily driver, they've got a bike rack mounted to the back. You can, you buy an optional fee caller that allows the top brackets of the bike rack to Mount to the seat color. The bike has one, two, three, four, five, six water bottle cage mounts on a medium through extra large and five on small. And then it has, it has the ability to hold pretty much any bag that you want. So one of our ambassadors free ride legend led Brown sheet just returned from a bike packing trip in Thailand. And she's kind of our, our first test. We all have like, how heavy can you load this thing down? And as it turns out, I mean, it, it, it's as good of a bike packing bike as it is a gravel bike, you know, the, the roads really crossed there. And there was no disadvantage for us to add all of those mounts. You know, there's, there's not a huge weight penalty or anything, so it's just great. It, it makes the bike a lot more universal I think for, for the end consumer. Interesting. And I had heard on some earlier interviews you did that there was some resistance internally to bring a gravel bike from such a strong mountain bike company. Can you talk a little bit about that journey and where the rest of the team is that with the Shammy Hagar at this point? Yeah. so you know, evil really is focused on making really awesome mountain bikes. That's, that is everyone that works here, that is their passion. And so, you know, some, so much so that it doesn't seem like there's room to enter another category, but there is, there is a whole other section of our that is focused on making just the coolest bikes possible and it's not, it's not relegated to mountain bikes. And there was definitely some fear within the staff that evil might shoot ourselves in the foot for launching a gravel bike when launching a gravel bike instead of a mountain bike because, you know, people are always looking for what is the next mountain bike coming from evil. Our, our primary owner, Kevin Walsh, he's our design director. He's our branding director. You know, he was very stable footed through this whole thing and you know, never wavered. He was very confident that this was really going to be a category changing, maybe category creating bike that it, that it truly had benefits that really needed to get out there. The, the market needed this, the end user, we believe needs this bike. So now that it's launched, now that the staff has gotten to ride a lot of the tests and wheels and everything you know, the, everybody gets it and everybody is universally excited about this bike and, and excited to ride it. And a lot of what was there was the, the, the negativity was the thought of, Oh, we don't want to make a gravel bike. Those things stink. Like I, we've written those and they're, they're not good. They, they didn't get the full concept of what the evil gravel bike was going to be. And so we've really, we've changed our employees thinking of what a gravel bike is. Yeah. I'm optimistic that this is a category expanding bike. You know, I've long held the belief that, you know, a lot of the gravel market growth has been from road riders who are discovering the value of being off road, which is something as mountain bikers we've known for decades, right. That there's just joy of being away from the cars and having this sense of adventure. So you're getting a lot of road athletes who are just dipping their toe in gravel. I feel like this bike may be one of those bikes that a mountain biker could look at and say, Hey, I've been hearing about gravel. I like the idea of maybe going a little farther or doing a different style of riding. Maybe I'll dip my toe in the water and grab this new Shammy Hagar bike. And ultimately, you know, you're going to draw athletes from both sides. I've seen plenty of my road friends who ended up starting with a sort of very gentle road plus bike and now are up to, you know, 47 millimeter tires on their, on their next generation gravel bikes. So it's really fascinating to me. And, and, and I, I love the idea of bringing more people into the market and getting some mountain bikers to join us in the gravel parade. For sure. For sure. And that's what we really wanted to try to pay attention to with this bike is we weren't making it for just Mount biker and we weren't making it for just road rider. We gave road riders all of the, the handling that maybe they don't know they need. But this bike is, it's just so much safer to ride when you're off road with no negativity related to pedaling position. It's also light. So there's, it also, it also holds, you know, 700 by 40 tires, just fine. Heck, we even, we ride this bike with road tires. You can actually slap 700 by 30 like the WTB exposure tire 700 by 30 road tires on this thing. And man, it is, it is so fast it, and you've never felt a bike, so good going downhill on road corner. It's incredible. So yeah, like for me personally, I keep a second wheel set on hand with, with road tires for if I am going to go out on a road ride. And again, you've got that road position. And then for the mountain bikers they've got this super lightweight rig. You know, it's, it's, it's way lighter than, than what you can get with a mountain bike. And they've got that, that familiarity that, that feeling of home with the geometry of the bike. So yeah, basically they can get they can just go faster. You know, on the open road. They've got the benefit of the multiple hand positions on the drop bar. And then they've got their drop receipt posts, which you know, 10 years ago mountain bikers didn't think they wanted. But you know, now it's like it's uncommon to see a mountain bike without it. Yeah, exactly. Well, I appreciate the deep overview. I feel like this is one of those bikes that you want to hear from the designer. You want to hear from the company, you want to hear other riders perceptions of it. And I know you guys have done a good job of getting it out there underneath some people who can document what they're feeling and validate what you're talking about because a, it's a really interesting model. Definitely everybody's listening. Go check it out on the web, check out some of the videos to get a sense for all the things that Jason's has been describing because they've really put together a, an interesting model. So Jason, thanks again for the time. Yeah, thanks so much for having me. It was my pleasure. Okay. What a fun conversation with Jason. I love talking about the Shammy Hagar. It's such an interesting design. As someone who comes from a mountain bike background. I was kind of really drawn to a lot of the things he was talking about and I can't wait to spend a little time on the Shammy Hagar here in mill Valley dropping off Mount Tam. I think it's going to be an exceptionally fast bike for me in this neighborhood this week on can't let it go. I want to talk about my experience with the post carry company travel bag. It's one of those bags where you pull the fork off the bike in addition to the handlebars and you can get it in a really compact portable setup and here's the thing, you can travel with it on the airlines and likely avoid any airline travel fees. I used the bag maybe three times last year and not once did I get dinged for it. It kind of looks like an oversized massage table and that's my company line should anybody ask. But this post carry bag has just been a joy to avoid those $150 fees. You get on a lot of airlines, so check out their websites. I know there's some other competing bags in that genre as well. I definitely recommend it. If you're going to travel more than two to three times a year, it really makes sense financially to grab one of these bags. So that's it for this week. If you have any feedback, please shoot me a note@craigatthegravelride.bike or hit me up on social media channels. Happy to hear from you. As always, ratings and reviews are appreciated. You'd be surprised how the algorithms out there on the podcasting web will share the pod and get us in front of new listeners with that. Until next time, here's to finding some dirt under your wheels.  

The AWOI Club is back! Both Ori and The Will of The Wisp and Nioh 2 are now out! So Jason and I give our first impressions for each game. If you hear loudness it is because Jason was struggling with a boss fight. Oh boy! We also discuss Covid-19 and how isolation could open the door for games to be played as they can be positive influence in so many ways and how we are all taking safety precautions at the . We also discuss Crunch methods for certain upcoming video games such as Naughty Dog's The Last of Part 2 and how they appear to be working around the clock just to make sure the game comes out in May. We also discuss the cool virtual library made in Minecraft! Also shots fired at me for not being able to get an Animal Crossing Switch. And More! Please be careful and take care of yourself during your isolation. We love you guys. Gen's Lolipop Chainsaw Count: 15 Recommended Games Gen: Rise Of The Tomb Raider for PS4 Xbox One and PC. The Lion King for all current consoles and Super Nintendo. Jason: Nioh and Nioh 2 for PS4 Brittany: Divinity Sin for PC, PS4 , and Xbox One Stone: Fall New Vegas for Pc, PS3 and Xbox 360 Perry: Ori and The Blind Forest for PC, Nintendo Switch and Xbox One. Ori And The Will of The Wisp for Xbox One and PC Follow the Podcast Facebook Page!: https://www.facebook.com/theawoiclub/?eid=ARA96L5_b5wj9XpGyImP5BOVDvOmN9jOmn0p65Nx-DzRNxfk7JIQIZ4T4kojg74pRQ1N_9wgskRVM_mm Follow Jason on Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/readysetqq/videos Follow Luke on Twitch: Readysetgg Follow Gen on Social Media: https://www.facebook.com/genallyx Follow me on all platforms: https://twitter.com/agentplatypus23 The Song is from the new hit game Ori and The Will Of The Wisp out now! It is performed by Gareth Coker! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LZGvYT63tic

Have you ever thought “It’s too late for me to change careers or pursue my passion?”After moving his family several times around the midwest, Jason Holtman landed what he thought was his "dream job” as the assistant athletic director for academic services at a Big Ten school, the University of Wisconsin.But just a couple of years in, he realized something - he wasn’t happy, and he noticed it was affecting other areas of his life like his health and family relationships.Jason knew he needed a change in his life, but he was now into his 40s, had a wife, two kids to support and a mortgage to pay.After spending 20 years in higher education, he was ready for something different.So Jason decided to take a big risk and pursue a career as a full-time entrepreneur. As a real estate agent, Jason would have no guaranteed income and no benefits.Still, he made the switch, and he closed an astonishing 36 deals in just his first year as a full-time agent.Jason said he realized his previous two decades working in academics weren’t a waste, but in fact they gave him what he calls “transferrable skills."If you’ve ever thought about making a career change, especially when the timing seemingly isn’t right, you’ve got to listen to this episode, as Jason breaks down what he did to make a change that ultimately led to more fulfillment and happiness in his life.If you get any value out of this episode, it would mean the world to me if you would share this episode, subscribe to the podcast and give it 5-star review to help the show grow and reach more people.Resources Mentioned:BOOKS"The One Thing," by Gary Keller and Jay Papasan"Atomic Habits," by James Clear"The Compound Effect," by Darren Hardy"Make Your Bed: Little Things That Can Change Your Life...And Maybe the World," by Admiral William H. McRavenPODCASTSThe ONE ThingBigger Pockets Real Estate PodcastBigger Pockets Business PodcastBigger Pocket Money PodcastPositive University PodcastConnect with Jason:Email: jason@pureintegrityhomes.comInstagram: @jhamms23LinkedIn: Jason Holtman

So Jason, you’re telling me that CHAOS is a good thing for my business? And my answer to your question is a resounding… YES! And I’m going to show you in this short and powerful podcast, exactly how chaos is a great thing for your business and exactly how easily you can capitalise on it in your business too. Stop reading this now and press play. See you on the inside.

Dealing with probates and tax delinquents requires a little bit of care and finesse, which Jason Lucchesi from No Flipping Excuses, is happy to provide. He opens up about all of his tips for chasing down leads in this podcast, and how to navigate the difficult conversations you have to have with people as they’re dealing with the loss of a loved one, or losing their home. Marketing himself to folks with quit claim deed, AOD, or deeds with the name “trust” on them are just a few of the ways that Jason finds probate leads. Most of the time these leads are older folks who are looking to downgrade from their big house after their partner has died. Jason’s built a relationship with local attorneys who know he’ll purchase a home quickly and fairly. Jason shares the tools he uses to purchase data, and he points out that in non-disclosure states, this information may not be online. Building relationships with elder care professionals and county clerks help him work around some of those limitations. Many times people who are selling off a house after death aren’t just trying to sell the house; they want to sell the contents of the house too. So Jason’s had to accommodate these kinds of sellers, but it’s been surprisingly beneficial for him. Tax delinquencies are another tricky situation because many of these folks are on a fixed income with no hope of fixing their situation. Jason shares with me the kind of questions he asks them to determine if he can help them with tax assistance, the very stringent requirements of a tax payment plan, and how he helps homeowners find a better situation. You might have to navigate probates and tax delinquency deals with thoughtfulness, but the high-profit margins make them worth your time. What’s Inside: —How you can use LinkedIn to find real estate investors, and the job titles you should search for. —How to handle tax delinquencies with a bankruptcy attached. —What to say to a bereaved spouse about selling the house. —Using county records to find tax delinquents. —How to handle tax delinquency with a mortgage attached. —The importance of building relationships with eldercare professionals.

This episode, we’re talking about people who are coming to Pittsburgh, whether it’s for work or just visiting.We’ll break down a report that suggests the city might be a better fit for tech workers than the mecca of the digital economy, Silicon Valley (gotta love our standard of living). We’re also talking about a recent article that probes the need for a new hotel at the convention center. (Hint: The answer isn’t very simple.)In between, we welcome the Breaking Brews Podcast’s host Jason Cercone for a chat about the business of beer and Pittsburgh’s place in the industry.This episode is sponsored by WordWrite:Centuries before cellphones and social media, human connections were made around fires, as we shared the stories that shaped our world. Today, stories are still the most powerful way to move hearts, minds and inspire action.At WordWrite, Pittsburgh’s largest independent public relations agency, we understand that before you had a brand before you sold any product or service, you had a story.WordWrite helps clients to uncover their own Capital S Story – the reason someone would want to buy, work, invest or partner with you through our patented StoryCrafting process. Visit wordwritepr.com to uncover your Capital S story.Logan:You are listening to the P100 podcast, the bi-weekly companion piece to the Pittsburgh 100, bringing you Pittsburgh news, culture, and more. Because sometimes 100 words just isn't enough for a great story. Logan:Hello, and welcome to a brand new episode of the P100 podcast. You're here with myself, Logan Armstrong, and co-hosts Dan Stefano and Paul Furiga. Guys, how are you doing?Paul:Great, Logan.Dan:Emphasis on the co-host there. You're the host with the mostest there.Logan:I try to be. I do what I can, but-Paul:Yes he does and he does it well.Logan:I get my mostest from the people I'm surrounded with. On today's episode, we're going to be examining tech jobs in Pittsburgh, and there have been a few recent articles for some vying to leave and some vying to stay that you may have seen. So we're going to be talking about that and seeing how Pittsburgh ranks compared with cities and metros around the country in tech jobs.Logan:Then we're going to bring in our good friend Jason Cercone from the Breaking Brews podcast. He takes a drink from breaking, excuse me. He takes a break from drinking beer and talks about the business side of it.Paul:Wait a minute, that wasn't in this segment. There was no beer drinking?Logan:Unfortunately no.Logan:We asked him about it and he said that he'd be happy to rejoin us.Dan:Logan, let's remember we're talking to the CEO of our company within the office, so no. There's no-Paul:Well that's fine. Let's chat.Dan:We don't have a video of this, but if you could see the winking eye. No, there is no-Logan:No beer during this segment.Dan:Drinking during this segment.Paul:Of course not.Logan:Okay, and then finally we're going to wrap up with what's missing from downtown.Paul:Oh.Logan:Indeed, mysterious.Paul:Question.Logan:That's right. You'll have to stick around to see what we're talking about, but we're in for a great episode so we hope you stick around.Dan:I hope it's not my car or anything.Paul:Okay guys, time to do one of our favorite things on the podcast. Talk about Pittsburgh getting another great national ranking.Dan:Another list, right?Paul:We're on another list.Dan:Yeah.Paul:This one's a good one. Although, if you're in the Silicon Valley area, maybe not so good.Dan:Right.Paul:A couple of weeks ago, Wallet Hub, which is an online service provider that looks at financial things, very popular with millennials.Dan:They make many lists.Paul:They make many lists of many different things. Top places to live in the country for tech workers. Pittsburgh, number five. Silicon Valley, not so high, which caused the San Jose Mercury News, which San Jose's a community that's smack in the middle of Silicon Valley, to write sort of a cheeky little article. Pittsburgh is better for tech workers than Silicon Valley? Question mark. Well, yes, if you want to live affordably, apparently it actually is.Dan:That's completely accurate. Yeah. The Bay Area, it's got to be one of the highest costs of living-Paul:It is actually.Dan:In the country.Paul:It has the highest cost of living in the country. And Logan, you were looking inside some of the rankings, and Pittsburgh ranked in the top 15 in a number of categories, right?Logan:Yes. So the three categories were professional opportunities, STEM friendliness, and quality of life. And Pittsburgh ranked 13th, 14th, and 11th in those, respectively. And some of the reasons that places like San Francisco and the Bay Area didn't rank so highly is that they would rank very high in one or two of these categories. So for example, San Francisco ranked third in both professional opportunities and STEM friendliness but then ranked 63rd in quality of life for reasons we were alluding to earlier. So it's good to see that Pittsburgh ranked in these lists as being as an all around. Maybe it's not top five or the best in STEM friendliness or professional opportunities, but it's well-rounded and our quality of life here is, according to this list, far better than some of our counterparts.Paul:And certainly as the community here has continued to transform, and I'm thinking now of Uber, and Apptive, and Apple's got a good presence in the city. Facebook's virtual reality company, Oculus, is wholly sited here in the Pittsburgh region. We're trying to attract more tech workers and we've got these great university programs, CMU and Pitt at the head of the pack, but others as well, where we're building this tech community. And I guess it does still surprise people in the more traditional communities, but it's legit. There's something going on here.Dan:Right. For better or worse, Pittsburgh will always kind of bring that blue collar atmosphere, that blue collar mentality, a bit rough around the edges. I talk about it all the time, but my wife's family, who, they grew up in California, they all lived in California for a while. They came to Pittsburgh here and they said, "Wow, I had no idea it was this green." So there's always going to be a bit of a stigma that the city carries around, but I think these lists show that to that the news is catching on here. And Pittsburgh is basically known now for the meds and eds and now tech. The reputation is definitely growing here and starting to overcome that stigma.Paul:That perception.Dan:Yeah. But there's ... Well, not to be Debbie Downer or play devil's advocate here, there are still the legacies of that history here that carries on, especially in our environment.Paul:Yeah. We still have work to do, that's for sure. I can remember when I first moved back to this region from the Washington DC area. I had a job in the south side and what is now South Side Works was still a working steel mill, and as I would drive across the Birmingham Bridge every morning, the smell of burning coke was my appetizer before breakfast.Logan:Morning coffee.Dan:That'll wake you.Paul:And there's been plenty of coverage, and legitimately so, that we still have environmental problems in the region. And certainly one of the reasons why the Bay Area, Silicon Valley, is disadvantaged on a list like this, is because there's such a huge economic disparity there. It's the most expensive metropolitan area in the country. Ours is not. Part of the reason Pittsburgh's so affordable, the collapse of the steel industry and heavy industry. So there's all this housing stock and we didn't have the kind of inflation maybe that a place on the coast like San Francisco has had, but we have economic disparity too, and that's something that we have to work on too.Dan:Right. I think that's being recognized now. We talked about a couple episodes ago here, that the city is starting to take a hard look at itself, especially in terms of the racial inequalities that exist here.Paul:Yes.Dan:Again, the three of us aren't the best people to speak to this. We don't live the same experiences that a lot of people do in this city, but we can play a role by listening and being active and playing a part in recognizing that. And trying to create opportunities, being part of the solutions here. It's going to take a long time for Pittsburgh to completely shrug off some of the legacies that came from the 20th century here, some of the stuff that might be dragging down the city, but we can do it.Paul:We absolutely can. And if we can, we'll put in the show notes, there have been a couple of interesting public source articles that have dug into some of these issues, and I was reading-Dan:Quite a battle in tech, here.Paul:It was a battle in tech, and there's one written by a fellow named Noah Theriault, I believe that's how his name is pronounced, and he's at CMU. And the conclusion of this article, which you found, Dan, I thought was really interesting. He said "Here many of us who come here for opportunities in the city's universities, hospitals, and tech firms, do so in a state of willful ignorance. We take advantage of the low cost of living, we relish the walkability of the neighborhoods. We gentrify. Many of us smugly believe that we are the city's rebirth, the salvation from rust and blight. Too few of us learn about the historical and ongoing realities that make it most livable." And I think that's something that's really at the heart of what we need to remember. It's great to be on lists like this, but really there is no Nirvana -Dan:Right?Paul:That exists among places to live in this country. We have work to do too.Dan:It's hard to put a number on somebody's personal experiences here. I think that's the crux of what you were talking about there.Paul:Exactly. Exactly.Dan:All right. We're here with Jason Cercone. He's the chief brand officer at Breaking Brews, also the founder there and they're a content network and digital resource platform for people in the beer industry. Not only that, he hosts the Breaking Brews podcast, which takes a pretty unique look at the beer industry. They focus a lot on the business side of things. So Jason, thanks for being here.Jason:Thanks for having me guys.Dan:Awesome. Okay. As we mentioned, what you like to do with Breaking Brews your podcast and kind of spins off of your business. You look at a pretty different side of things in the spirits industry, in the alcohol industry there, that people don't think of all the time and that's actually selling the stuff and getting it out there, right? Yeah.Jason:Yeah. What I discovered was there are a lot of podcasts dedicated to drinking beer and reviewing and having fun and those podcasts are all great, but I wanted to bring something different to the podcast world. And I started looking at the fact that we don't have a ton of podcasts that are dedicated to the business side. Which talks about sales and marketing and distribution, all those different facets that are very important and very critical to the beer world. That was where it really started to ... or where I really started to make it take off. And I talked to a lot of industry professionals that felt the same way. They said when they're cleaning kegs and doing some of the horrible work that goes on in the brew houses that they want to put on a good podcast and listen to something that they can learn from, and that was the resource I wanted to put out there for them.Dan:Right, well the industry's really exploded as far as the craft production or the craft beer segment goes. I think ... I'm just looking at some facts here from the Brewer's Association, retail sale dollars of craft beer in 2018, I think the most recent year of stats was $27.6 billion. You said you've seen that since you started the Breaking Brews podcast yourself, you started about four years ago, or is that just your business?Jason:Breaking Brews itself started back in 2014. This is actually my third iteration of a podcast. I actually did one, like I was saying before, where we just sat around and drank beer, and that got old after a while.Dan:Why aren't we doing that right now?Jason:That's a very good question. I know. I was quizzed on that when I walked in the door, why I didn't bring beer and I'm starting to regret that.Dan:We'll just have our first kegger podcast, here.Logan:Yeah, well that'd make for some good conversation, that's for sure.Dan:That's a great idea.Jason:I'm always happy to come back for a second round if you guys want me to bring some-Dan:Right.Jason:Good drinks.Dan:Great idea. But yeah, as we were talking about the industry is just enormous right now. We're seeing that too in Pittsburgh, right?Jason:Absolutely. Yeah. I mean when I started things in 2014, there was probably maybe a dozen local craft breweries and now you look at the landscape, there's over 50 throughout the region. It's incredible. So many of them are doing great products and getting it out to bars around the area and also creating an awesome taproom experience too.Dan:Why do you think that is?Jason:Pittsburgh loves its beer, man.Dan:Yeah.Jason:But overall I think that ... I mean we haven't ... we hear the talk about the bubble a lot and has craft beer reached its saturation point. And I've always been a firm believer that we haven't even come close because we're not even close to the number that we had, or number of breweries we had before prohibition.Dan:Yeah.Jason:I mean we're creeping up, we're getting close, but the population of all these different cities and states across the country is so much higher. And when I go out to events and I do samplings and I talk to beer drinkers, a lot of folks still really aren't aware of what's going on in the craft beer industry. So there's still a lot of education that we can provide and that was one of the main drivers of Breaking Brews was putting some education out there so people can better understand what's going on in the industry and what's going on with these products.Logan:That's an interesting benchmark that you mentioned there that the number of brewers before the prohibition. Is that a common milestone in the craft beer business? And are there things that were happening back then that are happening now? The same way?Jason:I think it's, it's obviously changed a lot in regards to how beer is made. Brewers have pushed the envelope to the furthest degree possible and then a little bit more. You see a lot of crazy ingredients going into beers that probably pre-prohibition they weren't putting donuts into stouts and Twinkies-Logan:What were they doing?Jason:Breakfast cereal. I know it's like they weren't living their best life at all. However, a lot has changed. It's just the question of people's tastes have changed too and it's what do they want? And that's what these brewers are constantly trying to stay on top of, is what does the beer consumer want to drink today? And that's why I think you see such a variety out there in the market.Dan:Is it fair to say that it's easier to start a brewery round now or at least, somebody can be in their basement and actually trying to kickstart their own beer?Jason:That's probably the biggest misconception is that it's so easy to start a brewery because it's like any other business.Dan:Look, I've seen the Drew Carey show and he had a brewery in his basement. I know how this works .Jason:That's one of the big problems when you see some of these breweries that come out and their beer really isn't that great. They're standing around with their friends in a circle and all their friends are drinking their beer saying, "This is the best beer I've ever had. You need to start a brewery." And that's all well and good, but if they don't have a business sense that goes along with making a good product or even a subpar product, if they don't manage it properly, it's just not going to succeed. So it's just like anything else. I think that the barriers to entry are a little bit less because a lot of people have done it, but the smart thing to do would be go into it knowing that it's a business and you have to do all the things that you would normally do to run a business, or partner with somebody that can handle that end of your business for you.Logan:Partner with someone like Jason, Jason Cercone.Jason:I am for hire. I am here if anybody needs assistance. I'd be happy to help.Dan:Have you ever, you yourself, have you ever actually started ... Well maybe not started your own brewery, but have you ever brewed your own drafts?Jason:I've partnered and done some collaboration beers with a few different breweries across town. I did an event last year where I partnered with Yellow Bridge Brewing out in Delmont. I just went out and brewed with them for the day and I was able to say that I helped and I call that a collaboration. And I've done that with a couple of other breweries too. And that's fun. I mean that's the brewing side of it for me. I've always been more of a beer drinker and I like to obviously talk about it and promote it and market it. Brewing it just wasn't really something I wanted to do full time. It's a hard job. I think that's where a lot of people look at that like a glamorous thing and brewers will tell you, those are long days. It's very industrial and they work their asses off to put together a good product. End of the day, they are dog tired.Dan:Sure.Jason:So yeah, important. If you're going to be a brewer, know you'll be working hard.Dan:Right. We talk about hard work there. We're talking about having a good business sense. What do you see are some of the secrets to say these successful craft brewers and the people that maybe ... even some of these breweries that say are smaller, let's think about Southern Tier years ago, nobody knew who they were. Now they've got their own brewery on the North shore and what are some of the secrets to some of these businesses that have made it?Jason:I think it's understanding how to grow and being very deliberate about it and not trying to just shoot the moon right out of the gate. Obviously you have to establish a loyal fan base and make good product at the same time. But if you try to go too heavy, if you're a small local brewery and you try to make a statewide distribution, your number one priority, chances are you're not going to succeed because you don't have the liquid to supply the markets. So there's a lot of different aspects that you have to look at, but probably the most important is to use a popular phrase of our time, stay in your lane, and understand what it takes to build that brand from the ground up.Jason:Don't try to get too far ahead of yourself before you're ready. And then once the time comes where you've established that brand, then you can start looking at ... popular thing now other than distribution is looking at secondary spaces. We're starting to see some breweries in the Pittsburgh area open up secondary spots so they've proven that their brand is good enough to support it and we wish them the best in carrying that out.Dan:Who would you point to as some really good success stories in the Pittsburgh area then and what they've done successfully?Jason:Oh man, that list is long.Dan:Yep.Jason:Yeah. One of the breweries that I work with, the Spoonwood brewing in Bethel Park.Dan:I was there just this weekend.Jason:Awesome. What'd you think?Dan:I loved it. It was my second time there. I had a great time.Jason:Yeah, they're doing great beer. Great food. It's a great tap room atmosphere. You really can't ask for much more than that. They've been ... they're coming up on five years.Dan:Wow.Jason:And I've been working with them since pretty much the beginning and we've been building that brand and we don't do a ton of distribution, but a lot of the beer that we put out there ultimately was just to build that brand and give people an opportunity to taste it. To where they might say, "Wow, this is in Bethel Park. I'm going to go down there and see what else they have to offer." Another brewery I work with is Four Points Brewing out of Charleroi. They've ... just under two years old at this point, actually just about a year and a half now and they're killing it. They're doing some great beer and then you've got a lot of the names that people hear of all the time, like your Grist Houses and your Dancing Gnomes and Voodoos and Hitchhikers of the world. Again, we could sit here and do a whole podcast where I just rattle off the list because there's a lot of good beer happening.Dan:Well, you're in luck, our next segment, we're going to list breweries for the next 25 minutes. All right.Jason:Yeah. Close off with reading the phone book.Dan:Exactly.Jason:Riveting radio.Logan:Now you've learned a lot of these techniques and methods. You have over 20 years’ experience in marketing and sales. Did that start off in beer, or and if not, how did you navigate into the beer industry from that?Jason:That was ... I mean that was broken compasses for days, man, that was ... No, it did not start in beer. I've been working in the beer industry – counting what I did with starting Breaking Brews – for going on six years now. I sold cell phones right out of college, landed at Enterprise-Rent-a-Car for several years after that. Ran Hair Club for Men here in Pittsburgh for about four years. And with Breaking Brews, when I started it, it was ultimately just to build something that I felt was a good resource that could teach people how to gravitate to these beers in a very approachable way. Because as I learned, a lot of people just weren't aware of what was happening around them. So I was able to parlay my skillset from all my years in the professional world into a business that now I can help the breweries and help the different businesses that I work with do sales and marketing and create a good customer experience. All those good things, all things that are very important to building a good brand.Dan:Bring it back a little bit locally here to ... Pittsburgh I feel like is ... we've got a pretty special relationship to beer here. And it's some pretty big names in terms of, you think of Iron City, Duquesne, there's obviously Rolling Rock used to be around. How do you feel like the city's adopted and adapted to this craft brewing? I don't know if you could call it a Renaissance because it hasn't been around until right now, but this upsurge right now that people are ... they are doing with craft brewing.Jason:Yeah I think with the breweries now, I mean obviously as we spoke about earlier, we've got over 50 across the region now. It says a lot for the fact that people are going to go to a good brewery regardless of where they're at. It's become very neighborhood centric where you look like an old neighborhood pub, that's in some respects, being replaced by the local neighborhood brewery. You're seeing them essentially on every corner, quote unquote. And I think that helps with the fact that these guys are able to grow their brands so well because then it expands beyond their neighborhood as well. But yeah, we have a very rich history here in Pittsburgh with beer going back years and years back to ... I mean, Iron City was the beer.Jason:And I think now you're starting to see more of a shift towards the craft brands and many of them have been here for ... You look at East End, they've been here for 15 plus years now and they really were setting some good trends for what could happen and how people could gravitate towards a craft brand. Same with Penn Brewery. I believe 1986, was when they hit the scene. So a lot of good things have come along that have really helped push it forward. And now Pittsburgh is becoming one of those hot beds and I shouldn't say becoming it already is. And probably our closest rival in the state, just like everything else, is Philadelphia. And I think both of us have a tremendous beer scene that we can be proud of.Dan:Yeah. I think if you ever see a Penguins, Flyers game, it looks like more than a few people have beers.Jason:Well now, you see breweries have gotten in with the rivalries, like Grist House, and I'm forgetting the brewery that they partnered with out of Cleveland, they did a Browns, Steelers rivalry beer.Dan:Oh did they really?Jason:Rivertowne and Sly Fox had partnered up a couple of years ago for the stadium series. And they did a ... Glove Dropper was the name of the beer. And they worked together on that and sold it in both markets and worked out really well.Dan:All right Jason, well thanks so much for being here with us, for everybody at home. If you're listening, make sure to visit. If you're interested at all about starting a brewery and perhaps finding ways to market it and get it out to the world, you can go to breakingbrews.com. Look for Jason Cercone and also look for Breaking Brews podcast. You can find that on all the major platforms including Apple podcast, Stitcher, Google play, Spotify, iHeart, all the big ones where you can find us. And Jason, thanks so much for being here.Jason:Thanks again guys. Appreciate it.Logan:Sure thing.Dan:Great.Logan:Centuries before cell phones and social media, human connections are made around fires, as we shared the stories that shaped our world. Today stories are still the most powerful way to move hearts and minds and inspire action. At WordWrite, Pittsburgh's largest independent public relations agency, we understand that before you had a brand, before you sold any product or service, you had a story. WordWrite helps clients to uncover their own Capital S Story. The reason someone would want to buy, work, invest, or partner with you through our patented story crafting process, visit WordWritePR.com to uncover your Capital S Story.Paul:It's now time to talk about the biggest building that is not in the downtown skyline. We are talking about what is known in the travel trade as a headquarters hotel. In other words, if Pittsburgh were to host a very large convention, a large hotel would be designated as the headquarters hotel. In many cities, this is a large hotel that's attached to the convention center.Dan:Right.Paul:And that typically has somewhere in the neighborhood of a thousand rooms.Dan:Right.Paul:Pittsburgh – yinz don't have one of those n’at.Dan:Oh, they do have a hotel connected to the convention center, right?Paul:Yes, yes. We do the Weston and actually Dan, I'm glad you mentioned that.Dan:Yeah.Paul:Because in the original plans for the convention center development, that hotel was supposed to be about twice as big as it is and if it were, it would be the size of a headquarters hotel.Dan:Sure. Well, I think that is, it's interesting that you're bringing this up and I think we rewind a little bit. The reason we're bringing this up is, on February 3rd, in the Post-Gazette, Craig Davis, who used to be the CEO of Visit Pittsburgh.Paul:Yes.Dan:Yeah. Visit Pittsburgh is the local-Paul:It's the Convention and Visitor's Bureau in part supported byPaul:Our tax funds and they promote the city to businesses like conventions.Dan:Right, yeah.Paul:But also to leisure travelers.Dan:Draw people into the city. Yeah, it's important. Yeah. This article, what it did with, again with Craig Davis here, he had a piece of parting advice for Pittsburgh is how Mark Belko, the writer introduced this and he did a really nice job with this piece. Craig wanted to build a convention center hotel.Paul:Right.Dan:And that's what we're talking about here. And there's a lot of back and forth about whether it should be done, whether ... what kind of impact it would bring on the city here. And he had some really good information about it, yourself, but a lot of people, they want to see more here. And that's what we're talking about today.Paul:Right. So in the tourism and convention industry in Pittsburgh, this is the third rail of politics. Nobody really wants to talk about it. And I look at this article in the Post-Gazette, Visit Pittsburgh, great organization. Craig Davis, very effective leader and he's been hired to run a similar organization in Dallas. Smart person. He's in Dallas now, so he can kind of say, what maybe he couldn't say before when he was in Pittsburgh. And for people in his business, his line of work, you need to have a convention center hotel. The thing is, to build that would cost about, Oh, kind of like the same amount of money to build PNC Park or Heinz Field.Dan:Right? Yeah. In this article here, they have an estimate of $350,000 to $400,000 a room to build.Paul:Or in other words-Dan:That's all.Paul:Yeah. $240 million.Dan:Right. That's for a 600-room hotel.Paul:Exactly.Dan:Yeah.Paul:It's a lot of money. And it was not easy to get PNC Park and Heinz Field built. There was actually a referendum on the ballot one year that failed. It was called the Regional Renaissance Initiative. I mean we put renaissance in the name of everything, don't we? And it was after that, that a deal was brokered. A lot of critics said behind closed doors and smoke-filled back rooms that wound up producing Heinz Field and PNC Park. There doesn't seem to be a lot of political appetite for spending that kind of money, again.Dan:Right.Paul:On something like a convention center hotel.Dan:Again here, Mark did a great job with this article here and he put it pretty succinctly here. He said, "In recent years, Davis' pitch has landed with all of the enthusiasm of a root canal."Paul:Yes.Dan:I don't know about you guys, I get too enthusiastic over root canals, but I suppose not many other people do, but the article does bring up a good point. That there's been a recent hotel building boom in the region, in the downtown area, particularly across the river. Some other smaller hotels that have cropped up here and there, the Marriotts and whatnot.Paul:Many. You could throw a rock from where we sit right now, we can hit the Monaco.Dan:Absolutely, yeah.Paul:Throw it across the way, hit the Embassy Suites. We've got the William Penn, which has been here for a long time. The Drury is in the old federal reserve building.Dan:Right and that's just a block away from the convention center. But the kind of full service hotel that, again, this is from the article here that Mr. Davis would see here, that would require huge public subsidies. And that's-Paul:Yes.Dan:I think the sticking point that it comes down to.Paul:That is the third rail part.Dan:Whether we want this here and I think it's one of those things where you balance. You say, "How much are these conventions going to be worth compared to the costs, the investments that you have to make in a city here." And it could take a while until the scales tip one way.Paul:Well, and what's very interesting about this is, there are statistics, there don't seem to be any statistics readily available to say, "Yes, Pittsburgh, you should do this." What we tend to fall back on, are a couple of really great seminal events. First was the Bassmaster Classic several years ago. And still of course people who don't know Pittsburgh want to depict it as a smoky mill town. And we had this freshwater national competition for bass fishing. And it went off really great. And that's led, as Mark Belko's article points out to Visit Pittsburgh getting into seeking sports events. And we've had, I can't believe this, I didn't even realize this number, 22 NCAA championship events have been held in Pittsburgh and we've got more coming.Dan:Yeah. Just recently they had the National Women's Volleyball championship out here.Paul:Yeah.Dan:And I think a big part of that comes down to, they now have a world-class arena to do it in.Paul:Yes.Dan:Where Civic Arena definitely showed its age after a while.Paul:Right.Dan:That plays a different part here. But certainly the downtown hotel building boom assists with that.Paul:Absolutely. Absolutely.Dan:Convention centers is ... that's a little different. And again, I think what, Craig Davis is trying to say here is, having it connected to the convention center, people love that. It's very convenient just to grab an elevator, have a little sky walk over to the convention center. It's not always a feasible immediately though, it's nice to think of these things, but it's hard to find room for it. And whether you're going to supplement what is already there or again, it takes money.Paul:Well, my point about Bassmaster, the other thing that happened of course was the G20 in 2009. Those two events put Pittsburgh, reputation-wise, on a world stage. In the article, Mark Belko talks about Milwaukee, which is a nice enough town and they have a baseball team that has a better record over the last decade of a postseason-Dan:They spend more than the Buccos, but that's a-Paul:They do.Dan:That's a whole other podcast.Paul:However, in terms of the hotel market, not quite the same size as Pittsburgh and they're getting the Democratic convention this year.Dan:Absolutely.Paul:Why does Pittsburgh not have that sort of convention? And if we did, aside from the monetary benefits of the convention itself, what would it do for the city in terms of raising the reputation even more and bringing more convention business to Pittsburgh? It's hard to say. It's also hard to argue that it was really cool to have Bassmaster or certainly the President and world leaders for the G20. That was awesome exposure for Pittsburgh. This is kind of a question of how much is the region willing to spend? And apparently it's going to have to spend something, in order to create that kind of environment.Dan:I think what's important when you look at these national conventions, particularly in the political arena, that is strategic by the parties too.Paul:Oh yes.Dan:Wisconsin's very important in this upcoming election to the Democrats. As is Pennsylvania.Paul:Right.Dan:But they were also in Philadelphia not that long ago, so do they want to spend so much more time in Pennsylvania and look, Wisconsin, the people ... whenever they do the Monday morning quarterbacking of that election, they did not spend all the time there. So it's ... they're showing ... it's a quite a statement that they are spending the time in Milwaukee for this upcoming convention. But it also shows that if Milwaukee can host something like this, then, so can Pittsburgh.Paul:Why not Pittsburgh, yeah.Dan:I think Pittsburgh actually held the very first Republican convention that was back in the 1860s or so. And we had the hotel rooms for that one, I guess. You know.Paul:We did.Dan:Yeah.Paul:Well, country was a little smaller then.Dan:Indeed. Yeah.Paul:Might be a difference, but I think this is a topic we're going to come back to again, so we wanted to put it out there for everybody. Again, props to Mark Belko and his article and the truth speaking, shall we say, of Craig Davis. We'll have to watch the skyline and see where this one goes.Dan:Well, most importantly, just as a final coda to this, and Mark's article did describe this a bit at the end, for the leaders that want to see this kind of change, that want to see a hotel down here, they have to show their work. It has to be ... You have to come to ... with studies from respected institutions, respected people, who are proving that, "Okay, hey, when Milwaukee hosted this type of thing, if they had a hotel here, this is the impact that they would have got."Dan:There are other areas here in Louisville and Columbus that are building hotels. What will those hotels do for their ability to draw conventions? Are they stealing them from Pittsburgh? You have to come up with that information. You have to present it to the leaders, not only in our government, but the community to approve ... like, "Hey, okay, some of tax dollars should go to this."Paul:Absolutely.Dan:And if you can do that, if you can convince enough people, then maybe it happens. But that stuff takes some time too.Paul:Well, and just a final thought on this since Craig Davis left Visit Pittsburgh, they are engaged in a search for a CEO. So I would expect that once a new CEO is named, one of the first things that we should be looking for, is some thinking around this topic.Dan:Absolutely.Logan:And we are well beyond 100 words today. Thank you for listening to the P100 podcast. This has been Dan Stefano, Logan Armstrong, and Paul Furiga. If you haven't yet, please subscribe at p100podcast.com, or wherever you listen to podcasts and follow us on Twitter at Pittsburgh100_ for all the latest news updates and more from the Pittsburgh 100. 

Chill Factor is a movie with the tag line, "Two guys, one bomb, and a whole lot of ice cream." It has Skeet Ulrich. There is also a UPS truck involved. It's hard to follow the dumb plot if you are incessantly talking about other movies, tragedies in Los Angeles, and feeling superior. So Jason and Todd get lost. They get really, really lost.

Over the years we've noticed people getting caught up in the idea of selling something and limiting their own potential.  So Jason and I are tag-teaming this podcast and bringing our combined experience to the mic.We're breaking through the BS sales gimmicks you may have already tried, and we're going to teach you how to love what you're selling and how you're selling it, so you can make it rain.We'll be peeling back the layers of salesmanship and guiding you through the ways in which you can genuinely build relationships, form deeper connections, and sell from a place of truth to improve your numbers and love your job!

So Jason saw Knocked Loose 5 times in a fucking week.Also went to Invasion Fest in Sydney.So have a listen to a wild week of killer gigs.Links:@wwdotw - Facebook@wwdotw - Instagram@wwdotw - TwitterOnce again our into is Passion by SteadfastCheck them out on Spotify here - https://spoti.fi/2Hn2Nz5Our new Outro is thanks to new friend of the show Adam SuraceSupport the show (http://Paypal.Me/wwdotw)

Over the years we've noticed people getting caught up in the idea of selling something and limiting their own potential.  So Jason and I are tag-teaming this podcast and bringing our combined experience to the mic.We're breaking through the BS sales gimmicks you may have already tried, and we're going to teach you how to love what you're selling and how you're selling it, so you can make it rain.We'll be peeling back the layers of salesmanship and guiding you through the ways in which you can genuinely build relationships, form deeper connections, and sell from a place of truth to improve your numbers and love your job!

- Trending on #Twitter is: #CNNisTrash and #NeverWarren. Did #CNN deliberately attack Senator #BernieSanders to set up Senator Elizabeth Warren for success? Wait until you see and hear the footage from this week's Dem Debate. Plus is #Bernie joining #Trump in calling the media #FakeNews? - #ConspiracyTheoryThursday: The #AustraliaBushfires. Reports say it's been burning since September 5th of 2019 and has destroyed thousands of homes, killed literaly a billion types of wildlife and has taken the lives of 29 people. But what is not being reported? Like how did it all start and more importantly why is happening for this long? Jenna Bonacci joins us once again fill us in on what the mainstream media is not putting out there. #ConspiracyTheory - Can you walk around #Walmart and with all the items they have on the shelves, make a homemade bomb? One lady did and ya gotta hear what the security officer ended up doing. Plus, why is it just Walmart that attracts such unique individuals? #PeopleOfWalmart - #Clarksville, last night 3 men where shot in an apartment complex and friend of the show Cam Williamson was nearby. Let's go over what happened and what to do if you hear a shooting in your neighborhood. #CamWilliamson - #MeetingClarksville: Tangi Smith of Woman Elevated. She is the founder of a non-profit that has a mission to assist #WomenVeterans in acute crisis BEFORE they become #Homeless and/or #Jobless. They assist with - temporary housing - counseling - job placement - resume writing - interview practice - credit repair - financial counseling and so much more. Let's found out what they have done and how we can help. #WomanElevated https://womenelevated.org/ - Scoop Clarksville. Jason Steen and his team report the news that the mainstream just doesn't publish. So Jason joins up to cover this week's Scoops Clarksville's headlines. One involves a McDonald's, One involves a Walmart and one involves a high speed chase at a Shell Station. Plus, why did Jason get a phone call asking him to stop reporting some information? #ScoopClarksville #TalkRadio #Politics #JoePadula #Veterans #FortCampbell #Comedy #LocalNews --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/joe-padula/support

In this special edition episode of the Suite Spot, we discuss the recent 2019 Phocuswright Conference in Fort Lauderdale, FL. Host Ryan Embree is joined by VP of Product & Technology, Jason Lee, and Customer Success & Operations Manager, Edwin Pomales, to discuss key takeaways from the event. Listen as Jason and Edwin share their perspective on the conference’s theme “Are We There Yet” and the relationship between technology and the hospitality industry. They also describe some of their favorite hospitality startups which competed at the conference. This episode is a great resource for hoteliers looking to see what technological advances and innovations are on the horizon for industry in 2020 and beyond. Episode Transcript Our podcast is produced as an audio resource. Transcripts are generated using speech recognition software and human editing and may contain errors. Before republishing quotes, we ask that you reference the audio. Ryan Embree: Welcome to Suite Spot, where hoteliers check-in and we check out what's trending in hotel marketing. I'm your host, Ryan Embree. We're here with another episode today, a very special edition. As you know, at Travel Media Group we are at the forefront of the industry and love to attend all of the conferences and events that surround the hotel and hospitality industry. We have been attending the Phocuswright conference now for many years. So we always like to do kind of a recap of some of what we learned, some of what we saw, what we think is on the horizon. So with me today is Jason Lee, our Vice president of Product Development and Technology and Edwin Pomales, who is our Client Success and Operations Manager, both who attended the Phocuswright conference in early November. So they are with me today to kind of talk about the Phocuswright conference, some of your key takeaways. Edwin, this is actually your first time going to the conference. For our listeners who might not have heard of Phocuswright before or who have never attended this conference, can you give us some of your input from a first-time attendee? Edwin Pomales: Absolutely. I think Phocuswright is a hospitality-focused technology-focused conference where every segment of travel is represented from flight to transportation to hospitality and hotels. Being a first time visitor to the conference was great insight into the consumer focus that every branch and every segment of hospitality is trying to figure out and really try to cater to. So it was a great experience. Ryan Embree: So it's a unique intersection, like you were saying, you know, you've got your OTAs there, you also have your hotel brands there, even sites like TripAdvisor are all attending, so it's very, very interesting to get everyone's input, but it's all kind of centered around that technology aspect of the industry, which as we know is very important and quickly changing. So Jason, that kind of swings it over to you. You know, you're an experienced veteran, who has gone to the Phocuswright conference for many years now. Can you give us maybe the difference from this year's Phocuswright in comparison to years past? Jason Lee: This year the theme or the kind of main title was "Are We There Yet" kind of a pun on like a kid in the back of a car asking if we're yet. But in this case, it's, is the hospitality technology side of things there yet, in terms of creating connected travel? And so you heard a lot of different companies talking about the connected traveler. And so basically like Edwin said, the conference represents all these various aspects of travel, but I think the infrastructure that holds all that stuff together is funky. And so sometimes the connected traveler gets, they get like maybe halfway there in terms of flight and hotel, but the rest of it is kind of funky. And so, it's a lot of the OTAs we're talking about this, a lot of the other technology partners going into brands all talking abou...

BONUS EPISODE Sam couldn’t make it to our latest recording session. Luckily however, he walked through the door just is we finished. So Jason, Tom and George ran some of the topics past him we’d discussed in our conversation... full episode out soon. Remember we want to hear from you, so send in a message and be part of the conversation at anchor.fm/notanotherelection Fact check us, ask a question or offer your own opinion, we’d love to hear from you. Also! We’re now on Apple Podcasts so if that’s where you get your podcasts, search not another election and subscribe for more mildly informed chat and opinions on the general election. If you have a sec, drop a little review to help us reach a wider audience. Thanks! Stay tuned for our full episode coming soon! --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/notanotherelection/message

It's the day after Judgment Day, as in the day after Halloween, but that doesn't mean those fine purveyors of genre entertainment are taking the day off. No sir! There's a podcast to deliver to the masses, and deliver it Jason and Shawn shall! This is the final extended cut podcast before The Basement Boys go prime time, bitch! That's right: From The Basement takes over the weekly 6 p.m. spot Friday nights on Radio NL 610 AM Kamloops starting Nov 8! So Jason and Shawn use this episode as a "dry run," making sure they don't swear, stay within the 22-minute time slot, things like that. Oh, and they explain the rules of being on the radio, as there are many. Can they abide by these guidelines, or do they crap the bed right out the gate? Stick with us! And stick around, as there's much entertainment to discuss. The boys talk the latest in the Streaming Wars between Netflix, Apple TV Plus (which hits today) and Disney +. Who will be the victor? Hard to say. And Jason and Shawn catch up with the latest movie trailers and clips, because that's the point of this show. Add a new DVD review from Mike S, this morning's segment from the mighty Radio NL 610 AM Morning News, plus a few other shenanigans, and you've got yourself an extended cut podcast. Push play, and enjoy! And don't forget to tune in Nov 8 at 6 p.m., only on Radio NL 610 AM Kamloops. A podcast version of the show appears on the Saturday morning.

So Jason has literally travelled all over the world this past year whilst doing his work, I had a chat with him to find out how all of that is going.

Jason Momoa was the FIRST one to audition for GAME OF THRONES and the LAST one cast a year later. His cousins impact on his life helped him make a strong choice that ultimately landed him the role. But it took him a few years and a couple of classes to trust his instinctive strong choices and learn how to "audition". BAYWATCH discovered him in his native home of Hawaii among a 1300 person cattle call. Jason responded to a radio call announcing the audition that would pay him more than the daily rate of folding T-shirts at the family owned surf shop. Jason's unique look has always made him a different choice but also made opportunities few and far between. So Jason, with many of his close friends, formed the production company Pride of Gypsies which has made Jason into an all around film maker, writing, producing, directing and acting. Jason will always be remembered for his unforgettable role as Drogo in season one of GAME OF THRONES. Currently, Jason is Aquaman in the DC Comics JUSTICE LEAGUE and AQUAMAN in 2018. Check out Pride of Gypsies' BROWN BAG DIARIES, ROAD TO PALOMA and BRAVEN. LINKS: Jason Momoa on Instagram Margie Haber Studio Game of Thrones Trailer Jason Momoa's audition tape for Game of Thrones Justice League Road to Paloma

Your co-hosts Jenna-Caer Seefried and Steven Langenhuizen bring you our new segment within the Pacing and Racing Podcast where we do post-race coverage and pre-race analysis with the insight and perspectives from the professional triathletes. Now in today’s episode of the Triathlon Sideline Chat we get to speak with Canadian Up and Comer Jason Pohl! Now Jason has taken the Triathlon scene by the storm the last few years. With his professional IRONMAN Debut in 2017, he has come a long with recently coming in 9th overall at IRONMAN Brazil, as well as a top 5 at a very competitive Gulf Coast 70.3. Now, what makes Jason so unique is how optimistic and passionate he is about the sport. If you follow him on Instagram you’ll realize how motivating and optimistic he is and you can really see his passion and love for Triathlon! So Jason just finished racing IRONMAN Brazil, so we’ll get to hear all about his thoughts going into that race as well as how he felt during and after! Now Steven also just got back from a weekend down at Eagleman 70.3 where he is able to share with us some incredible insight on that race, and Jenna finished up Victoria 70.3 race as well so we will be sure to break down those 3 races and talk about all the highlights, in this episode! Now to finish off today’s podcast, we keep you up to date with what’s been going on over on the ITU side of Triathlon with some big races over the last couple of weeks and some big events up ahead!

Jason Flanagan is the Design Director of leading and award winning London Architects Flanagan Lawrence, where he leads a team on diverse projects including performance arts centres, acoustic structural and urban master plans—including that at Wembley, hotels, spas and residential projects and commercial offices. Jason has a special interest in acoustics and sound, and one of his most innovative projects is Soundforms; the first ever mobile acoustic shell with the capacity for a full orchestra. Soundforms was used as the official bandstand in the Olympic Park in 2012. Jason’s work is also on site with the iconic Riverside Studios in London—providing highly flexible and state of the art Digital Arts Centres. He was also the Director responsible for the conversion of Shepherds Bush Pavilion into an award winning hotel. Jason is changing the way we look, feel, and listen to structures in London and beyond. “I was interested in partly the mixture of the technical side and the creative side—I mean the alternative would’ve been to study art, but I don’t think that would’ve quite worked (laughs) in quite the same way.” [6:44] Sound reached out and gripped Jason while studying for his degree in his third year, which was the first time he got the chance to design a theatre. He also got to go experiment in an echo chamber—an echo free space, a space so silent all you can hear are the inner workings of your own body. [ 9:37] Perhaps Jason’s most unique work in London was the mobile performance acoustic shell—a project that went on to appear at the Olympics in 2012. This project didn’t start normally. It came out of a conversation with a conductor, Mark Stephenson, where he explained that a lot of places he and his performers had to play weren’t acoustically desirable—like outside in a tent, for example. So Jason went about starting to design a reflective and mobile acoustic shell—a project that would go on to be called Soundforms. After making the designs, they were able to set up the company, patent the shell, fund raise, and build their first prototype. While lightweight and mobile—a full-sized version has been commissioned for San Diego’s harbor and will be a permanent installation meant to accommodate a full symphony orchestra. “One of the most enjoyable parts of any project is that early part of the design where you actually don’t know what it is you’re doing. Where you’re still searching—at that moment everything is possible.” [20:20] Flanagan and Lawrence doesn’t just make acoustic shells though. They’ve renovated the Shepherd’s Bush Pavilion into the Shepherd’s Bush Hotel, as beautiful late 1920’s cinema which used to be the largest in Europe and was damaged in WWII. The research that goes into maintaining a historic legacy and incorporating a building’s past, to the present, is astounding. Jason makes sure their designs keep in mind the heart of the original space, and a lot of the features in the foyer are echoes of what was originally there. Riverside Studios is another project the company is undertaking—they are recreating the three studios and orientating them so they face out towards the river. They also have projects around the globe where you can be sure Jason is using his imagination and artistic talent to create unique spaces to captivate and inspire all who see and enter them.   Links Flanagan Lawrence (https://www.flanaganlawrence.com/) Twitter (https://twitter.com/flanlawarch?lang=en)   Support this podcast

Listen to part 2 of 4 of my keynote presentation from FHL. During this part of the presentation, I start diving deeper into how to create your irresistible offers. On today’s episode you will hear part 2 of 4 of Russell’s first presentation at Funnel Hacking Live 2019. Here are some of the super awesome things you will hear in this part: Hear Russell give ideas for a written offer, an audio offer, and a video offer, that are all super easy. Find out why it’s so important to not be a commodity and how you can avoid it. And see why Russell always has several things he can use to bulk up his offers. So listen here to hear the second part of Russell’s keynote presentation at this year’s Funnel Hacking Live. ---Transcript--- Hey everyone this is Russell. Welcome back to the Marketing Secrets podcast. I hope you enjoyed the first 25% of my keynote presentation at Funnel Hacking Live. During today’s episode I’m going to start diving deeper into actually how you create an offer. We talked about so far the fact that the offer increases the value, you have to have amazing offers because that’s how you decommoditize yourself and how you make people desire and lust and go crazy for the thing you’re trying to sell. So the next thing is like, “Okay, that’s cool Russell, but you know I’m selling physical products, and I’m doing this or whatever and I don’t know how to bulk up my offer.” And the easiest way to bulk up offers is with information products. So the next section of my presentation, I started going deeper into exactly how to create information products. I walk through nine different ways that I think you’re going to enjoy. We’re going to kind of go through nine different ways, and then do a couple of potential exercises and things like that, and then we’re going to move into story. So with that said, I’m queue up the theme song and jump into part two of my keynote presentation. So the question is, how do you do that? Some of you guys are like, “I sell this thing, how do I make it sexier? How do I make an offer?” So the fastest way to increase an offer is to bulk it up by adding other types of information products. So I’m going to go through a couple of ways you guys can create quick information products to bulk up any offer without actually having to write a book. Does that sound like fun? Alright cool. So I’m going through 3 different things you can do. Number one, there are written words, but I’m going to show you how to do that without actually writing any words. Number two is audio and number three is video. This will give you guys ideas so no one will be able to say, “I can’t create an offer, Russell.” With these things I’m going to show you, you can create millions and millions of offers. In fact, if you start looking at everything I do, you’ll notice there’s always one of these three things I’m using to bulk up my offers every single time. So the first are written things. So the first thing I want to show you guys is, how many of you guys would love to have a book but you don’t want to write a book? Books are the most painful part of anything I’ve ever done, ever. By far. So this is a book that was a crowd source book called chicken soup for the soul. How many of you guys have read Chicken Soup for the Soul? How many of you guys have read one of the 8 million versions since then? The most amazing thing about this book is that they authors who wrote this book didn’t actually write any of the words in the books. Isn’t that great? Yet, they still made millions and millions and millions and millions of dollars. The other day my son came into my little office, it was Bowen again, he came in and he saw this book and he said, “Dad, is that your new book?” and I said, “Yeah.” And he said, “You wrote another new book?” I was like, “Well, kind of.” And he’s like, “What do you mean kind of?” I’m like, ‘Well, I wrote the title and that was it.” He’s like, “Did you cheat?” I’m like, “No, I didn’t cheat. I have 30 people who’ve got Two Comma Club awards write how they would get a two comma club award if they could do it again.” He’s like, “And then they just wrote the chapter?” I said, “Yeah, then I put it in a book, then we sell the book.” And he’s like, “But you didn’t write anything.” I’m like, “I wrote the title. It’s a really good title.” And he’s like, “I don’t think that’s a real book dad.” I’m like, ‘No, it really is.” How many of you guys inside whatever business you’re in could find a whole bunch of experts in whatever it is, and you could write a book like this? This book alone, we did the very first launch of the one funnel away challenge where we gave this away, and we closed it down for like four months, people were auctioning these things off. Someone sold one for over $500 on eBay. People were going crazy for this book. Now when we’re launching one funnel away challenge again, we’re like, ‘you guys get this book.” And people flip out. People buy just because they want the book, and I didn’t write a word of it. So think about this, how could you guys like, Chicken Soup for the Soul trailblazed it for us, I trailblazed it for you, how could you guys do that same thing in your market? Find people around you and be like, “Let me interview you,” do 30 of you, or 20  of you, or 10 of you and put together and make a book. There’s a million things you could do with that, but it’s a fast, easy way to create a book but you don’t actually have to do it. Number two way to get written books really fast is to compile examples of stuff. How many of you guys have read my 108 Split Tests book? This is literally just screen shots of 108 of our split tests and people go crazy for it. How many of you guys are doing stuff in your business or whatever it is you do, where you have this byproduct? We weren’t planning on selling this, we were just doing split tests and it takes screen shots of the split tests and eventually two years later we’re like, we should just put these all in a book. We just compiled a whole bunch of examples and we sold it. This right here, how many of you guys are members of Funnel University? Every month we find a couple of funnels, we compile them, talk about them, and show them to people. Not my funnels, other people’s funnels. We just find the cool ones and we show them and put them in a newsletter. How many of you guys have seen this book, the 74 Funnel Swipe File? None of you guys have seen it yet. Another product coming out soon to a funnel near you. Same thing, we’re just compiling cool stuff. How many of you guys have seen cool stuff before? You should just compile it then, make a book, and then it’s amazing. More people have probably read this book than my other books that I spent years slaving on to write, and they’re like, ‘Oh, this is better.” One of my favorite ones, this is kind of a tricky one. How many of you guys have heard of the public domain before? This is where Walt Disney got all his ideas by the way, he never wrote anything. He just went to the public domain and he’s like, “Oh sweet, someone wrote a story about a beauty and a beast, or about a snow princess, or about all these things.’ He found public domain stories and produced movies out of it. Anything that was written pre-1923 in the United States is in the public domain and you can republish it as your own. One of my friends, Matt Furey, he took this old 1914 wrestling course, Farmer Burns, published the book and made over a million dollars selling that course. Have any of you guys read Think and Grow Rich? Master Key Systems? Tons of the books that you guys know and are aware of are all in the public domain, you can republish them. There are two places I go for public domain stuff. Number one I go to Gutenburg.org, everything on Gutenburg.org is on the public domain. They just publish, there’s like 50,000 ebooks there, you could find one in your market, you can take it and republish it as your own. The second secret, I go to eBay and eBay in the non-fiction book section, you can search by year, so I search by year and I start typing keywords in my market. And you will be amazed at how many amazing books that have been written that people are selling on eBay for $1.50, that you can then republish and sell for whatever you want. Bundle inside of your offer to quickly get amazing books. Okay, so there’s three fast ways to make books. Crowd source them, compile a bunch of examples, or go in the public domain. Okay now here’s a concept I need you guys to understand as we move from the first three to the next three and beyond. This will make this whole process simpler for you. The concept is this, people will spend more money for the exact same content packaged in a different way. I’ll say it again. People will spend more money for the exact same content packaged in a different way. When I first started this business, I remember going to events like this and the speaker, it seemed like every single time some speaker would say, “Who here has read Think and Grow Rich?” By the way, how many of you guys have read Think and Grow Rich? Which is in the public domain by the way, so you guys can all publish and make Think and Grow Rich for Dentists, Think and Grow Rich for Surfers, Think and Grow Rich for whatever, it’s ready for you. But anyway, I kept hearing that so I went and bought the book and I was like, I’m so excited to read the book, and I put it next to my bed stand and it sat there for months and months and then years. And every time I’d go to an event, they’d be like, “Who read Think and Grow Rich?” I’d raise my hand, well I haven’t actually read it. I have it, someday I’ll read it. And one day I remember feeling guilty and I went on eBay and I typed Think and Grow Rich Cd’s and someone was selling the CD course of it. So I bought the CDs, go it in my car and for the next 3 weeks, I started “reading” Think and Grow Rich in my car. What’s interesting about this, the book Think and Grow Rich cost me $9.97 on Amazon. The CDs cost me $97 on eBay. So I literally paid ten times more money for the exact same thing packaged in a different way. Was there any difference between the book and the audio? It was literally word for word. Some dude read the book and then it became CDs and I spent ten times as much. This is the lesson for you guys. How many of you guys read the Dotcom Secrets book? How many of you guys read the Expert Secrets book? Why are you here then? Everything I know is in those books.  I got nothing else. Oh, because it’s packaged a different way. Does that make sense? I want you guys all to understand that what you have you can package in so many different ways, and because of the experience, how it’s being fulfilled, all those things, it shifts the value of it. This is way more valuable than a $10 book, this experience being here. So I’m going to shift over to audio now. This is a book that we republished, this is in the public domain, it’s called the Life Work of Farmer Burns. I had my father in law get a microphone out, he read it, we turned it into a CD and started selling, this is ten years ago, started selling this book on CD. So you can find a book, you can read it, you can have somebody else read it, find the book in public domain, find something like that, and make an audio book.  A very simple, easy way to do it. Number two is you can interview others. So this is a book, how many of you guys have read this book, by the way?  I know all our Two Comma Club X members, I sent you guys a copy of it. Everyone’s like, “This thing is bigger than the phone book.” It’s one of the best books ever. I remember when it first came out, David Frey, where’s David at? So David got it and he’s like, ‘This book’s amazing.” And he called up Vince James’ is the author, and he interviewed him for a whole bunch of stuff, and he made a whole audio course out of it, and Dave’s a genius, so I should just do what Dave did. So then I called him up and I said, “Hey can I interview you too?” and he’s like, “Sure.” So I interviewed the guy who wrote this book. The guy made, he was a 20 year old kid and made a hundred million dollars through direct mail selling supplements. So I called him on the phone and I interviewed him and he let me interview him for six hours. When it was done he was like, “You can have the rights to the audios, I have the rights too. We can do whatever we want with them.” I’m like, “Sweet.” So then like 2 years later I launched it and this actually became my very first ever Two Comma Club Funnel. I made a million dollars selling interviews of the interview I did with this guy who wrote the book. Is that amazing? So how many of you guys have ever read a book before? How many of you guys could call the author and be like, “Hey can I interview you?” And if someone’s like, “He’s too famous, he wrote all these big books. He’s never going to interview me.” I’m going to tell you the life of an author, if you guys really want to know how it works. They geek out on a topic, they spend their whole life writing this book and they’re so proud of it and they’re so excited. And then they tell their spouse or their family and friends and they’re like, “Okay. That’s weird.” And they’re like, “Oh, nobody cares.” And then there’s an audience who gets the book and they love it and read it and they’re like, “My people did read it.” right. And then somebody calls and they’re like, “Hey, that book was amazing. Can I interview you?” The person is like, “Yes, you can.” Just so you know. They want you to talk to them. They want to share this stuff. It does not happen enough. If you went to Amazon and find the top ten authors of books in your market, I guarantee you 9 out of 10 will get you on the phone that fast. Or you can actually, I don’t know if Jason Fladlien is here this year, but Jason gave me an idea that was brilliant. He was doing an offer and this kind of ties back to the story we’ll talk about here in a minute, but he was doing an offer where he was selling a funnel course and he was like, “I want to interview someone who did ecommerce funnels. Well, Trey Lewellen has got the highest grossing ecommerce funnel right now inside of Clickfunnels, I want to interview Trey.” So he calls up Trey and he’s like, “Hey, can I interview you?” and they’re friends. And Trey’s like, “Sure man, you can interview me.” And Jason’s like, “Well, I need to wire you some money first.” And Trey’s like, “No, don’t worry about it. I’ll do the interview.” And he’s like, “No, no, I need to wire you the money because otherwise there’s no value in this interview. And Trey’s like, ‘What” so Trey’s like, “Whatever.” So Jason wires him like $5000 and he does the interview and then when you see when Jason is selling his product, he does the stack and goes through the stack, “Number one, number two, number three….” He’s like, “Number three right here, do you see this right here? This is the guy, he’s the number one ecommerce seller in Clickfunnels. He had a funnel that did $20 million dollars in six weeks selling flashlights and I wired him $5000 to interview because I wanted to find out, he does interviews but I wanted to find out the real stuff, so I paid him $5000 to interview him. And that interview you guys could have.” All the sudden that bullet point in this stack slide went from, “Oh it’s an interview.” to “that’s worth $5000 now.” The value instantly shoots up. So interviewing people is huge. In fact, when I launched the 10x Secrets course I had my offer and it was good and I was like, “How do I make this sexier?” so the first thing I did is I interviewed a bunch of people. I interviewed this man right here, where’s Myron at? Everyone loves Myron. Anyway, I interviewed Myron, I wrote a bunch of people who I learned how to close from stage from. I interviewed all of them, plugged that into the course, increased the value of the course. So interviewing people is huge, for any product. I don’t think there’s a product I put out that I don’t interview people. I do it even if it’s my product. I’m like, “Who are the 10 other people I can interview who have done something similar?” because all those things increase the value of what it is I’m selling. And then the last audio one is compiling hard to find podcasts, and audios and things like that. If I told you guys, I’m like, ‘Hey, my favorite podcast is Mixergy, you guys should go listen to it.” How much value is in that? Not much, right. But if I was like, “There’s this one interview that Andrew did and in the interview he started talking to the guy and he literally, the guy showed three different websites that were the key to ‘blah, blah, blah’ and I listened to those things and found the websites. I never knew they existed. I started doing the thing, and that’s how we got Clickfunnels to whatever.” If I tell you that, you’re like, “Oh my gosh, I want to hear that podcast.” I’m like, “Cool, when you sign up for my thing right now, I’m going to give you a link directly to that podcast so you can find it.” You curating stuff for people there’s value in that. YouTube videos, I’ve done it tons of times with opt ins where we’re like, “Opt in here to get a free video from Robert Kiyosaki teaching the number one tax strategy for middle aged Americans.” And I just found a video on YouTube of Robert Kiyosaki teaching the number one thing on whatever, and that’s what I give people when they opt in. So you curating stuff you think is cool, can be bundled into offers as well. Okay, so there’s the audio ones. Really quick, so audio books, interviewing other people and compiling hard to find audios is a big thing. The last one I’m going to go through really quickly is video. There is a program, how many of you guys here use Windows? How many of you guys use Macs? Holy cow. Okay, there’s a program. If you are using Windows you should be using Camtasia, if you’re using Mac, use Screen Flow. This tool has made me and probably most people more money than anything else on earth. It just records whatever is happening on your screen. So you make a presentation or slides, or literally the very first version of Funnel Hacks training, the one that got us from zero to ten thousand customers, I had a word document opened on the screen with my notes, on the right hand side, I had a little picture. I just clicked record on Screen Flow and I talked for an hour as I read through my outline. We did like $10 million plus dollars in sales, and that was what the product looked like. “But Russell, I have a professional video studio.” You don’t need one, just get a microphone, screen flow or camtasia, record your screen, have a presentation and just teach it. It’s super easy, it’s simple. It’s like the easiest thing in the world to do. Number two video thing, just get your iphone out. Literally you can just get your phone out and just make videos. Where is Rachel at? Is she in the room right now? We were on, did you finish the course, by the way? Can I talk about that? So Rachel, we were on this little cruise thing after the 10x event and she came up to me and she’s like, “I have an idea, it’s going to be a course called Selfie Secrets” Am I going to ruin this? “I’m going to record the whole thing on my iphone.” And then she the next day, recorded the entire course on her phone teaching the entire course, which is amazing. And it was all on her phone. Okay, so how many of you guys have a phone. You have everything you need. You guys should all buy her course when it goes live. And the last thing is you should throw a workshop, teaching people stuff. You don’t even have to speak, you can bring other speakers to teach for you. When I first got started, I didn’t have any product to sell. So the first thing I did, I threw a workshop. And it was really exciting to have a workshop, I was pumped about it, but I had nobody coming and so I emailed my tiny list at the time and said, “I’m doing a workshop, it’s $5000 a ticket.” And then the first day nobody bought, and the second day nobody bought. And the third day one guy bought. And at first I was like, “Yeah!’ and then I was like, “Oh crap, now I have to do a workshop and there’s only one person coming. This is awkward.” Then luckily 2 other people bought. So I had three people buy. I was like, “Okay, now we have a workshop with three people.” So I called everybody I knew, my friends, my family, everybody. I was like, “Okay, I’m doing a workshop, people paid to be here. You have to come and just sit in the audience and don’t tell them you didn’t pay, because I need this to look good on video or it’s going to be super embarrassing.” So we set it up, we had it all set, and it was like not like this, it was really bad. We literally had curtains, the windows behind me were too bright, so we got sheets from the bedrooms, and electrical taped sheets over the, it’s so bad. But we recorded and that became the very first course I ever sold, the videos from us at the holiday inn, with electrical tape over the sheets, literally behind me the entire video and it looked amazing. So throw a workshop, even if nobody comes to it, or just invite your friends. Do something at your house, bring people in, just record yourself teaching your thing, and you can bundle that really, really quickly. So for videos, we’ve got screen captures, iphones, and workshops. So here’s a quick recap of the nine ideas. Crowd sourcing books, compiling examples, public domain, audiobooks, interviewing, compile hard to find audios, screen captures, iphones, and workshops. Tons of easy ways to do that quickly. So what I want to do right now, is I want to actually, I’m trying to think if we should do this or not. I’m going to let you guys do this on your own, but in your paper that I handed out, I have this little section here for you guys to figure out, what are potential products I could bundle inside of my offer? This is something we do all the time. Every time we have a new product that comes out, I talked about this last year, we have bat meetings. We literally send out a bat signal to voxer to everyone on our marketing team, we all come on zoom, from wherever they’re at around the world, and they get in front of a whiteboard and we’re like, “What could we create from this product? We could put this in it, and this…” and just start dumping out as many ideas as we can. So now you guys have, let’s say I’m selling this product, “what else could we do?” “We could interview this guy, I could compile these things here, I could do this, I could make a video, I could do a workshop, we could do….” And all these things you can quickly create to turn this into an offer. Now really quick, I guarantee I know the number one thing going through some of your heads right now is, “Russell, that’s cool for all the coaches and the consultants and the info product people, but not for me. I’m different. I sell real stuff. I sell physical products.” Or, “I have a local business.” Or whatever your excuse is right now. I want to shatter these excuses because the biggest thing that’s going to keep you guys from having success over this week, is the thought of, “Oh, this doesn’t apply to me.” I’m excited, I think either tomorrow or the next day, we’re going to have Jaime Cross who’s going to be coming up here and speaking. Jaime is amazing because two years ago she came to Funnel Hacking Live, she was sitting in the audience, and she sells soap. And I was on the stage talking about webinars. I’m doing this huge thing about webinars and stories, this whole thing. And every other ecommerce person, I’m guessing, in the audience is like, “This is not for me because I sell physical products.” And Jaime said, “How could I make this work for me.” Twelve months later she’s on the stage getting a two comma club award. Twelve months later she’s onstage sharing her story with you. She took this concept of the webinar and made an ecommerce webinar. She took it and didn’t say, ‘This isn’t going to work for me.” But “How can I make this work for me?” And shifted some things and made it work for her and blew up her company. I’m so excited for her to tell her whole story. But I want you guys thinking the same thing. So I’m going to some examples right now. This is a product that I sell. This is a physical product called Viagon. How many of you guys have ever seen this before? The three people on my team. So back in the day when I launched 15 companies in a year, which is a horrible idea, don’t do that, one of them was this thing right here. I had a friend who had this company and he was getting in trouble and this little machine here, if you start getting a cold sore, as you as you feel it, how many of you guys get cold sores? You feel it tingle, you pull this out, if I can open it. This is a new one so the seal hasn’t been cut yet. Alright, then you peel the seal off. Alright so when you open this thing up, when you feel the cold sore coming on, come on. There we go. Alright you open it up and there’s these two little electroids, and you take and push the button, and let’s say you have a cold sore, you put it on your cold sore, and somehow, I don’t know how, some scientists figured out something. It’s actually patented and everything. It goes in and zaps the cold sore, destroys it, kicks it in the face and destroys it and the cold sore never shows up. Isn’t that awesome? How many of you guys want one of these right now? Really, I gotta get my funnel back up. So this is a physical product I sell, right. And you’re like, “Well Russell, I don’t sell information. This isn’t going to work for me.” But imagine if I did this, how do I turn this into an offer? This is a physical product, it does what it does. It’s just a thing. And the guy who I buy these from, he sells it to other people, so I’m not the only one. It’s a commodity. There’s like 30 other people who sell this same thing, only mine’s better. So for me, how do I compete over everyone else, when everyone’s got the exact same thing, it does the exact same thing. So I have to turn this from a commodity into an offer, because if it’s a commodity, I gotta be like, “He’s selling it for $150, I’m going to sell it for $130.” Then the next guy says, “I’ll sell it for $120.” “Crap. $110.” “$109” “$105” Boom, boom, boom, soon this thing is like $90.95 right, retail. That’s the problem when products are commodities. Or I could say, “Okay, this is amazing. This helps with cold sores, but what else could I do with cold sores? What else could I do? What else could I do?” I could go on Amazon and be like, “Cold sore cures and remedies.” And I guarantee there’s people on Amazon who have written books on how to do cold sores. I could message one and be like, “Hey man, you are the definitive expert on cold sores, can I interview you talking about all the tricks you know how to prevent cold sores from happening? I’m sure there’s stuff in your diet and exercise, right?” like, “Oh yes.’ So I get him on the phone and I interview him, now it’s like, “Okay, when you buy from anybody you get the same thing, but when you buy from me you get the cold sore inhibiter, plus you also get the interview with this dude over here who’s the number one highest stars on Amazon, writer of a cold sore book. You get his book as well, plus my interview where I actually interviewed him. And then number three, there are 7 supplements I’ve found that help get rid of cold sores. 7. There’s a whole bunch of people who claim the supplements, but there are actually 7 that work, and there’s two that work almost instantly. The second you feel a cold sore coming, you pop these two pills, gone instantly. And I wrote a report about those, because I want to make sure you get the right ones, if you get the wrong one, you get the right product but you get the wrong brand, you are screwed. So I’m going to show you the 7 supplements as well. So you get this first, plus you’re going to get the interview with the number one expert in the world, plus you’re going to get the 7 supplements, the actual brand names, where to buy them, how to get the discounts to all the 7 supplements. And the next thing you’re going to get is, blah, blah, blah.” I take a physical product and I’m bundling information around it to increase the value of the thing. So it doesn’t matter if you’re selling information or not, if you’re selling physical products, it’s the same thing. Information is the easiest way to bundle this. The problem though with infomercials, the only way they bundle is like, “If you call now, I’ll give you another one for free.” That’s what almost all ecommerce people do. It’s like, that’s good but its, “Now I got two of these things. So I have cold sores I can have one at my house and one at my office. That’s kind of weird.” But if I bundle with information products, it doesn’t increase the cost to you at all, but dramatically increases the value. Now when I’m competing with the 30 other people selling this, I can sell it for higher and people will still buy from me versus everybody else because my offer is better than theirs. Another good example of this is my friend Mr. Stephen Larsen. How many of you guys know Stephen? So this is a good example for any of you guys who are like, ‘I’m here Russell, but I don’t have a product yet.” So Stephen he has his own products, but he’s also an affiliate for Clickfunnels, he’s an affiliate for a bunch of other things. So we did the one funnel away launch, the 10x launch, a couple other things, he said, “Okay, Russell already created an amazing offer that he’s selling, but there’s a thousand other affiliates that are all selling this product as well. Everyone’s doing it, so how do I compete against this.” He said, “Okay, here’s Russell’s offer, how can I make my own offer to make it better?” People always ask me, “How can I make money as an affiliate, Russell?” The first thing you do is you don’t sell the product that they’re already selling. That’s like, “Buy Russell’s thing.” That’s like number one on your list, then it’s like, “Now I need to make my own offer.” How many of you guys bought the one funnel away challenge from somebody and then bought it again from Stephen later because you wanted his bonus? Okay how many of you guys have bought twice from Stephen because you wanted the new bonus the second time? There’s a lesson in this. So even if you don’t have a product yet, that’s okay. Find someone else with a product and then, “How can I now make an amazing offer? What could I bundle together to increase the value of this offer so people buy from me versus somebody else? Or if they did buy from somebody else, they’ll also buy from me because my offer is so valuable.” Alright, so this is kind of the exercise for you guys to start doing. Going through here and listing out all the different ideas you can have. So tonight, this weekend with that paper I handed out, start writing out these things, start putting them out there, and start putting as many as you can think of, and make it, the biggest problem you can have is you’re kind of putting in your potential products that are going to make an offer, is to be like, “Oh, that’s not going to work. That’s not going to work.” When you start it, be creative. When we first did this probably 12 years ago, we sat in front of a whiteboard and we were doing this and we were like, we were at a point where we needed a funnel to save us from everything. It was the bottom of everything. We were like, ‘We have to make the most irresistible offer ever or else we’re shutting the doors.” So we sat in front of a whiteboard and I’m like, ‘Okay, what can we give them? Okay, they can fly to my house and I will give them a massage and feed them food, and then we’re going to do this, and then we’re going to do this….” We made all this crazy stuff, we had it all on the whiteboard, and then we started saying, “What’s the offer actually going to be?” and we’re like, “Well, pretty sure my wife would be mad if I come to my house and had to give them massages. So let’s not do that one.” But it was there. And then it’s like, “Well, what if we did this and this…” It gave us the time to brainstorm and then from there we start pulling things over to actually make an amazing offer. Anytime I create a new funnel, new thing, I’m always looking at creating an offer, with as many potential things as possible, then think, “What can I actually create?” pull them into my little stack slide and it’s like, “Now I know what I need to create to increase the software.” Now, one thing I want to mention is well, the reason why I have a whole bunch of things as well is because there’s more than just one offer in every funnel. You guys understand that? So I need a lot of stuff that I can give away. So if you look at this right here, there’s an offer on my ad. I’m trying to get someone to click on something. So I’m like, “Click on this thing and I’m going to give you your free report.” There’s an offer happening there. Luckily that was one of my ideas that I already created, because I can now pull that down and it becomes this. Then they land on my landing page and I’m like, “I need their email address, I’m trading them. What am I going to have? Well I have something up here I’ve already created, potential products. I’m going to give them my interview with so and so.” “Give me your email address and I’ll give you an interview with so and so.” Boom there’s the next product. Then it’s like, “Now buy this product, I’m going to give you these 5 things.” Then my upsell is these three or four things. I think so many of us go into this thinking, “Okay, here’s the product I’m going to sell and I’m going to try and build a funnel around it.” And it’s like, no, no, no. Understand that it’s like, you’re looking at more of how do you serve your customers? What are all the things you could possibly give them to do that, and then you’re breaking down the different parts of the funnel. Okay, alright, come back to the hook, story, offer. So that was the offer section of this part.

This episode of The Life Stylist comes to you straight from MindBodyGreen HQ, the home of all things healthy living. Our guest and tour guide through the world of wellness is Jason Wachob, CEO of MBG. Excruciating back pain led Jason to yoga – and that opened the doors to a whole new world of physical, emotional, and spiritual health. So Jason started studying wellness science, and he realized that being healthy isn’t eating low-fat cottage cheese with Splenda every morning. Who knew? True wellness is a blend of mental, physical, spiritual, emotional, and environmental wellbeing – and all of these things are interconnected! That’s why MindBodyGreen is one word, not three. You can’t meditate and eat organic all day and then throw toxic products all over your body. It just doesn't work. We get into everything from the (sometimes questionable) marketing within the wellness industry to monetizing a fulfilling passion to the questionable promotion of psychoactive drugs as a path to enlightenment. It’s a fun and eye-opening ride, so strap in and get ready to learn.   Topics Discussed In This Episode: The latest and greatest happenings at MindBodyGreen Why Erewhon and Whole Foods aren’t the beginning and end of wellness How to begin monetizing a passion project Growing from 0 to 10 million unique visitors a month Why it’s so exciting that we’re living in a time where Eastern wisdom is meeting Western medical science The future of medicine is functional How you can avoid getting caught up in the dogma of what you’re eating (and why that’s  a problem) The good and bad of supplements: marketing vs. efficacy How Jason reduces stress and relaxes What’s up with the CBD industry? Why going outside of yourself through psychoactive drugs or “medicines” isn’t true wellness How people justify things that are fun as good for you The best high in the world How Jason and his wife navigated the conception and birth process What you can do to encourage brain health and cognition – without taking anything! The yoga teachers who helped Jason heal his back   More about this episode. Watch it on YouTube Connect with Luke on social media to learn how to take your lifestyle to the next level, plus catch exclusive live interviews & events: INSTAGRAM - @lukestorey // https://www.instagram.com/lukestorey/ FACEBOOK - https://www.facebook.com/MrLukeStorey/ TWITTER - @MrLukeStorey // https://twitter.com/MRLUKESTOREY YOUTUBE - https://www.youtube.com/c/LukeStorey THIS SHOW IS BROUGHT TO YOU BY: ALTERRA PURE. This show is all about optimizing your lifestyle, and part of that is optimizing your sleep environment. I’m super stoked about the new bedding company Alterra Pure. Insane high quality, truly organic, pesticide-free, non-GMO cotton sheets and bedding. A lot of stuff in the market is actually pretty fake. I’ve done a lot of research into it. Alterra Pure is legit, I’m using them on my bed, they are insanely high quality. What’s also great about this company is that they support the environment, social sustainability and are absolutely transparent. 15% OFF when you use coupon code LIFESTYLIST at https://www.alterrapure.com/?aff=2. AND... TO BE MAGNETIC. Lacy Phillips is a manifestation advisor that specializes in unblocking low self-worth. Following a simple formula based on psychology and neuroscience, this isn’t your typical woo-woo manifestation process. It's about tapping into the subconscious through Deep Imaginings, a form of hypnosis you reach through deep meditation. It’s approachable, quick, accessible, and you can do them from your home. Use the code LUKE for 10% off at https://tobemagnetic.com/luke. AND… Beekeeper’s Naturals. Superfoods from the hive - amazing! Beekeeper’s Naturals brings you the highest quality products from the hive and nurture a greater awareness for saving our bees! That is why their all-natural health-boosting products are made with the purest ingredients from sustainable apiaries full of healthy bees. Each of their products has been rigorously tested to meet the highest potency standards. Use code “LIFESTYLIST” for 15% off at http://bit.ly/2GgJRPO. HELP SUPPORT THIS SHOW! Starting and growing a podcast requires a ton of time, energy, and money. Do you appreciate this information, and want to support my mission to deliver as much life enhancing information as possible to as many people as possible? The easiest, and most effective way you can help is to do this: Go to Lukestorey.com/support and donate towards show production costs Subscribe to the show by clicking “subscribe” in iTunes Write us a review in iTunes Share this show with one friend right now You’d be amazed how much these four simple steps do to help us grow! Here’s the magic link for reviews in iTunes. Or, if you want to get there yourself, you can follow these instructions. Thank you from the bottom of my heart for listening and joining me on this journey we call life

The craziness continued this week. So Jason and Max are back but alone. Big nerdy weekend with Guilds Of Ravnica’s pre-release weekend. Jason ended up teaming up with someone other than Max to defeat Max and his partner, also beating Rondell in the fantasy football league. Anyway on today’s podcast it’s a crossover of 3 Geeks and Podcastalypse now. We discuss the new DC Universe App, Joker Vs. Harley Quinn, PG-13 Deadpool is coming, plus on the podcastalypse side we discuss Brett Kavanaugh, a high school gives controversial ethics quiz. Plus so much more. If your not into the non geek stuff don’t worry the episode is split and your given a nice warning. So please enjoy. Please rate and review Check out all of our other projects and affiliates down below. www.youtube.com/3geeksnetwork www.3geeks.ninja https://www.patreon.com/3geekspodcast Email Us 3geekspodcast@gmail.com or tweet at us @3geekspodcast https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/3-geeks-podcast-network/id973263717?mt=2 --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/3-geeks-podcast/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/3-geeks-podcast/support

If your interested in making better decisions, solving problems, getting the best out of yourself and your team and managing your time more effectively, this is the podcast for you.  My guest, Jason Howlett is the Co-founder and change agent @ Manpremo.  Jason’s passion is helping people develop, with the purpose of increasing well-being and actualising potential. Jason uses applied science (neuroscience, psychology and physiology), combined with data, to optimise brain performance and build change competency. For the past 8 years, Jason has been working with organisations and their employees on programmes that develop Leadership and Talent; Well-being; Strategy Implementation; Mindset and behaviour change; Resilience/Grit in individuals and teams. Before focusing his work on people, their mindset and behaviour, Jason worked in IT for 7 years. Jason studied Applied Positive Psychology at the University of East London and has a degree in Computer Science from Royal Holloway, University of London. Jason is a certified Personal Trainer and Lifestyle Coach. Podcast Transcript: Well thank you Jason, again, for joining us, and Jason's gonna share brain science and highlight what leaders can do to really maximize their personal leadership based on what we know about some of the science in the brain. He's done a lot of work with leaders over the last several years. So Jason, why don't you tell us what's important for our audience to know today. Thank you Jill. I'm going to focus on looking at a data driven approach to increasing the performance of our brain for personal leadership. We're gonna focus on a subset of the brain functions. We'll look at what's commonly known as the cognitive or executive functions of the brain. These are things that help us to get things done, so they're critical for us being able to plan, to learn, the ability to solve problems, make decisions, and essentially to also control ourselves, to manage how we manage our impulses, but also our emotions. These cognitive or executive functions are also crucial in us building competencies, whether that be leadership competencies or any other particular functional competencies that we wish to learn. Now these functions are there to help us, but they are not there all the time. We do not have an infinite resource that fuels these functions. They depend on several factors being in place. There's two key areas of these factors that we need to consider if we really want to have the cognitive part of our brain fully switched on. The first part is looking at the physical needs. The very basics, which we all know we need, which is sleep, rest, fuel, bio nutrition, and movement. So these things have been proven through neuro biological research to be key in switching the cognitive functions on. To give you an example, if we look at sleep, which is really the number one example from the physical needs, just by trying to maximize a good seven to eight hours of good quality sleep will increase our ability to learn by a minimum of 40 percent. It will also decrease the amount of stress we wake up with, which will decrease the amount of anger and fear that we have. But there are a whole host of other benefits that sleep provides. Because essentially, sleep is the number one factor to help us to learn and memorize things, but also to of course repair and restore the functions in the brain. Another small example is movement. We know that movement's important for our heart and our lungs. But in terms of our brain, there's two key things that regular movement does. It first of all increases the circulation of blood to our brains, which brings more oxygen and nutrients to our brain. It also helps to increase neurotransmitters, which are important for the brain's function. But secondly, regular movement helps to increase factors that help the brain to develop and also become more plastic. In crude terms, you can say the brain is plastic, the brain can change. It's the term called neuroplasticity. But regular movement helps to increase this ability. This is key when looking at behavior change, or again, learning new things. These are two examples of the physical needs, sleep and movement. But let's look at the other group of factors. The other group of factors are our social needs, and these needs are also extremely important. They are things like feeling safe in the environment that we're in, feeling accepted, that we have a sense of belonging, that we have the recognition we need, but also a certain amount of autonomy, ability to have control over what we say and do. These needs, both the physical needs and the social needs, are really crucial to have in place so that our cognitive brain is fully switched on. And essentially a lack of these needs causes the brain to trigger the threat response. This is really important, because when the threat response is triggered, i.e. what we commonly know as the stress response, something that causes us to want to fight or to flee or to freeze. This response puts the brain into a self preservation mode, so it no longer really cares about anyone else other than our own survival, and we become very reactive. The key thing here is that we don't just become reactive, but our cognitive functions that I mentioned before, like planning, learning, problem solving, decision making, they're offline. So the ability to control yourself is offline. So you will act much more under any sort of anger that you may feel, your ability to solve problems, make decisions, to plan, they're also offline. So you become much more primitive in how you behave and act when these needs are not met. We can monitor these needs and actually simple ways. And today if I focus on the physical needs first, we can, by using simple wearables, but of course also medical grade devices, we can monitor the stress recovery balance in our body, which has a direct link to the functioning of our brain. To keep it simple, there is a science of heart rate variability, and heart rate variability just means the variation in time between each beat of your heart. If I was to measure someone's heart rate now, and it came out to be 60 beats per minute, the assumption would be, well, there's 60 beats a minute and there's 60 seconds in a minute, so there must be one second between each beat. But the reality is this is very dependent on how activated or stressed you currently feel. For 60 beats per minute is quite a low recording, but what could actually be happening, because the heart rate is quite low at 60 beats, is that between the first beat and the second beat, maybe there is a second. But between the second and the third beat, there could be 0.8 of a second. Between the third and fourth, it could be 1.2 seconds. The variation is very small. It's within milliseconds. That's not easy for us to measure ourself, but there are devices that you can very simply use, watches, bands, and also medical grade, electro based devices that can measure this heart rate variability. And essentially the lower the variability, the more stressed you are. So that means that using these devices, you can monitor what are the events, situations, or people that cause significant stress, and what are the events, situations with people that promote my recovery? Because going back to the analogy before, when the brain is experiencing stress, the cognitive functions, like planning, solving problems, decision making, they are inhibited. So if we can learn, if we can trigger us self awareness on what is basically draining resources, we can help to better manage that. And this isn't about measuring yourself a life, it's just about triggering awareness. To take that a step further, of course, this would involve regular reflection and for you to actually monitor the output from the watch or medical device you use. So what we've essentially done is built an app that takes all of the input from your wearable, and it also takes in input from your calendar, and it then notifies you over the week on what are the events, situations, that have caused you particular stress, and what are the events that have caused you particular recovery. Using this, you get a better stress recovery balance, and therefore you're better able to keep your brain switched on when you want it to be. I think that's an important point to make here, especially in leadership. You cannot be switched on all the time. I've worked with some people and organizations that even have in the signature always on, and the key thing is is that it's scientifically proven that the cognitive aspect, even if you're not stressed, cannot be always on. The brain goes through periods of what's called task positive and then task negative action. You can think of the task positive like focused attention and the task negative like mind wandering. And it's very important that the brand can go through this cycle of focused attention and mind wandering. I think the key message is that this is about triggering self awareness around, okay, what can help me to optimize my brain performance when I really need to be at my best, and the other things that I can do before I face a situation, like having to either sit down with my team and deliver a good or bad message. It's about when I've got conflict management, managing ambiguity, when I've got to influence people, any of these kind of key behaviors where you really want to be switched on, you know what you can do to prepare for that. But you also know what to do when things do get tough, when you do feel particularly stressed. You have simple techniques, and we're going to go through some of those in a minute, that you can use to very quickly reduce the stress and increase recovery so that your cognitive functions come back online again. This is quite individual, hence why we use devices to really work out an issue, what works for who, because we do find a lot of people already think they know what helps them to relax, but when we measure them, their heart tells a very different story. For example, watching TV. It might feel relaxing, but it's actually a quite stressful, quite activating I should say for the brain, and especially not a good idea to do just before bed because of the way that it reduces the production of melatonin in the brain, and of course that being the key rest and recovery hormones, so your sleep quality is reduced. But there's a whole host of different factors that people can learn about so that they know just the one or two key things to look out for and the one or two key things to practice. They can build a habit around it to to better manage the stress. Thank you. Can you tell me, if we don't have one of those wearables on us, what are some things that we can notice that are happening that are giving us triggers, our body giving us triggers, that we might be in a stressful situation and need to self reflect a little bit? Yes, a super question, Jill. Whenever we experience stress, the biological factors that will let us know, and that's why think it's also important that we don't become dependent on devices, but we learn that if we can tap into the fact that our heart rate is rising. Or maybe we don't notice the high rate, but we notice our breathing rate has increased. Or we feel suddenly our pulse. Literally, we become more aware of that in our head, because we suddenly realized tension in our head. Or sweaty hands. This kind of unease would be the easiest way to say it. Suddenly you feel that tension or unease. That's a great trigger to say, "Okay, let me pay attention to what's happening right now. Let me be more present with myself so I can face whatever it is. Whether it's external, being caused by the environment around me or the people around me, or whether it's my own thoughts or feelings inside." Does that make sense? It does, yeah. I think that sometimes we just don't even realize it's happening, and later we might look, or we might even look at, are our fists clenched, or like you said, sweaty palms. Those are things that I think are important to notice, that that means your body's telling you if we want our cognitive to work effectively as leaders, that's not going to help us. Yeah. It's a super point, and I think that's where time to reflect or a mindfulness space practice, somewhere where you train your brain's ability to have focused attention and to become more aware of what your triggers are or what are the causes of the different things that you're feeling, so essentially emotional awareness and emotional intelligence. This is a key factor in you reducing the time of what's called the amygdala hijack. Or essentially, keep it simple. Let's say someone says something to you that triggers you, and essentially it triggers the stress response. Your brain will launch this response in literally milliseconds. And it can take a little bit of time for your cognitive brain or your consciousness to become aware of the fact that now I'm stressed, now I realize that I'm clenching my fists or I have muscle tension up in my neck. It can take a little bit longer for that to become aware, maybe a second versus a split second. It's a short time, but the process of having time to reflect, on mindfulness is a great way to build that awareness of the fact that something's happening, and then to use emotional regulation or a technique to work with the trigger of the stress. Is there a mindfulness practice that if I'm in the moment and I'm noticing that maybe I'm getting ready for a presentation or getting ready to have a difficult conversation, what's something that I could do fairly quickly as a leader to get my physical back in line and those less stressed so I can think through the way I want to? Yeah, that's a great question. It's quite individual, but what we've found to be the quickest way for most individuals to reduce stress and switch their cognitive brain fully on is simply to sit there for as little as two to five minutes and to follow the following rhythm. You take a nice slow deep inhalation for a count of three, and then a nice slow exhalation for a count of normally four to seven. This is where it's very individual. It depends. But you essentially need to exhale over a longer period than you inhale. What that does is it triggers in your nervous system the rest and recovery response, and that's been proven. If you continued that for five minutes, you actually empty your bloodstream of cortisol, the stress hormone. But even within just two minutes of getting awareness of your breathing, you can change a body from what's called a stress dominant state to a rest and recovery dominant state. That would be the most simple one. Other people like yawning. That's also something that would trigger the recovery response. But I think the breathing would. That simple rhythm, in for three, out of four, is quite easy once you practice that a few times, to do that even in a crisis situation, because you don't even need to close your eyes. You can be in a meeting and practice that and bring more power to your executive brain. Yeah, I love that you said you can even do it in a meeting without closing your eyes, right? Because you can do it without people noticing, but you're getting yourself back. Because sometimes we go into meetings where something triggers us. Yeah, I mean, that's a nice short practice that people can use. You talked about physical needs and social needs. You gave us a nice tip around physical and what's going on in the brain around that. From a social needs perspective, can you talk a little bit more about that? Yeah. I think the key thing with social needs is that first of all, we need to consider the environment that you're in. We're gonna have a lot higher access to our cognitive functions when our brain is not launching a significant stress response. But that depends on us actually feeling safe. So are we in an environment where there's a constant threat? Some organizations have a zero failure culture, sometimes for good reasons, many times for maybe not so productive reasons. That is something that will ... You know that if you make a mistake that you're fired or penalized, and of course that will mean that you are constantly moving around in a mild stress response, which will inhibit the brain cognitive functions. Again, you can work with that. For mission critical situations where you really need to have zero failure, there are of course ways you can work with a case ... The belief system of the people that are doing the work to reduce that. But let's talk about the more general sense. You've got, first of all, a sense of belonging. We're social beings. It's very important for us to be in an environment where we feel like we belong, because we are beings that depend on each other. As much as we like to be independent, we really do thrive in group. Just knowing that the people around you respect you for who you are, and that you feel that you get regular recognition, helps you to feel like you belong, and that key social need basically helps to reduce stress. On the other hand, if we in a situation where we basically don't get that regular feedback or recognition, then we don't really know where we are. We don't know whether we are doing a good enough job. Are we really meeting the needs of the people around us, and are we also, which is kind of a key thing for our sense of meaning, is are we actually doing something that matters? Are we actually using our time to serve others in some shape or form? Having awareness of that is something that's key to reducing stress. I think what's key here is to think about a meeting situation, because it's in meetings where we tend to have the greatest trigger of our emotions, especially when we're in meetings with people from all different departments. Maybe we don't know everyone in the room, especially if we're meeting them for the first time. What our brain does in that situation is it's constantly scanning to see, okay, well ... Other people listening to me, do they respect me? What do they think of what I'm saying? Am I getting any recognition? The brain is constantly scanning to see if these things are met. So often people are sitting in a meeting room, but even if it's a short meeting, their cognitive functions can be inhibited if they are really feeling that they are not a part of the group, or that they're not being listened to or appreciated. So a simple check in, starting a meeting with a one or two minute check in where people literally share what's at the top of the mind or to use eye contact throughout the meeting. Having meetings where each person has maybe even a short time to share, but everyone shares the key things that they need. That's also making sure that there is an agenda for the meeting. Right, so what do they need, what is the information they can give, do they need to seek approval, but that everyone does get a chance to talk, and that they're listened to, just helps to increase that sense of belonging, respect and recognition. Otherwise people would be in that meeting and they'll be seeking to preserve themselves. So self preservation behavior versus wanting to behave to benefit the group. The tips that you gave, the things that leaders can do if they're running the meeting ... Yes. You said start with a check in to see what's on their mind. Tell me a little bit more about that. What would that look like? Because I could imagine some managers would say, "Oh, I don't have time for that." So tell me what that would look like and help us understand the benefit. Yeah, that's an important point. I think as a leader, what's really key when you get to that meeting is that, of course, you reiterate the direction, why do we have a meeting, what's the purpose of it, what do we want to get out of it, so that that brings everyone into this current point. But I think a check in's important because these days meetings are the second biggest waste of productivity after absenteeism. And the reason for that is, one, they normally have too long, two, they don't have a specific purpose or agenda, and three people go back to back with meetings, which by the way, in your second meeting, you would have lost up to 60 percent of your previous meeting or more without having a short break between the meeting, because again, your cognitive functions cannot, one, retain all that information, but two, your brand needs a break. You need to get this stress recovery balance. A check in is a way the leader can basically give each person as little as a minute to say what's at the top of their mind. And this depends on the size of the team and how close you are. But let's say it's the leader's own team. Here is the sharing. Whether it's a good or bad feeling, you don't have to share why you have it, it's not going into your personal reasons, on the fact that you had a bad start to the morning because you had an argument with your partner. It's not to go into those specifics. But it is important to, especially for the leader to start, by saying what's at the top of their mind. Because what this builds over time is transparency and trust. Trust is number one for a high performance team or a well functioning team of any kind. Especially on the days where everyone can sense that the leader is not at their best. And by the way, again, being social animals, people don't need to say things for us to realize that there's something wrong. Body language, tone of voice, all these things give out subtle messages that there's something wrong. And I think what's very powerful is when a manager shares that, "I'm not at my best today, it's nothing to do with you." That's key, saying that it's nothing to do with you. "But not quite feeling at my best today, so don't take that personally." It allows people to see that they can be human beings in the workplace, and also, especially from an employee perspective, is they're not going to tread on eggshells thinking that it could have been them that caused the leader to not feel at their best. The last point on the check in which I found quite interesting is to simply share what is one thing that you feel didn't go well since the last meeting and why, and what is one thing that went very well since the last meeting and why. Some people call this success of failure, but I don't think you need to use a strong term as failure, but it gives a very short term for the person to reflect on. Some people like to focus on work, or it could be both work and at home. But what is one thing that didn't go well, what you learned from it, and one thing that went really well and what did you learn from that. That's a nice way of having a check in. Probably gets everybody's brain into a more relaxed state to sharpen the cognitive ability and that executive ability of the brain. Yeah, I agree. So Jason, you've talked about the data driven approach to help us with our cognitive or executive function of the brain, and that part of the brain when we plan, make decisions, control ourselves. Especially our emotions to make sure that we're online. You talked about physical and social needs around that and gave us a few tip. What else is important for us to know about making sure that we're able to get the best ... We're able to use our cognitive and executive function so we're effective through the day? I think as a leader, again, what is a really nice practice to build up throughout the day is regularly giving feedback and seeking to receive it as well. Because the nice thing about regular feedback is that you build the self esteem and self worth of the person that you're providing it to. Even if it could be feedback where you feel they could do better, but you're really giving them awareness on how they can grow and develop. Whether it's feedback on something that's gone well or could have been better, you're giving them attention, you're being present with them, and that builds their self worth, and also their self esteem of course. But what it does for you as a leader is it also builds their respect for you. I think this habit of giving and receiving regular feedback is a really nice way of keeping your employees' brains fully switched on and also your own. Because as I mentioned with social needs, the self esteem and self worth for the individual will help them feel safe, feel recognized. That will fully switch their brain on. The fact that they respect you as a leader will give you that feeling that you're also actually functioning well and providing them with what they need. So you also feel a sense where your self esteem will increase, and therefore again, your brain will not be in a stress response. It will actually be in a mode where it's increasing these executive functions. Jason, do you have a specific example of a leader that you've coached, or how you've used this personally to become more effective at switching on that cognitive part of our brain to make better decisions and plans? Yeah. Let's start with what is most likely the most [inaudible 00:28:24] effective for myself, but also for whether I'd estimate over 90 percent of the leaders and people that we've worked within organizations is that it really starts with putting aside time to reflect, and during that time that you reflect, to look at the way that you're also going to be spending your time with the week ahead. So doing this either on a Friday and looking at the next week, or doing it on a Monday morning for the current week. But really not just reflecting on what did you do the previous week, what are the key priorities you have coming up for this week, but also where in calendar have I already set specific times to practice recovery. Whatever works best for me. Have I set specific times as a leader to have the one on ones that I need to have? That time to reflect with others. Not just reflection on your own, it's reflection with others. The other part is ensuring that you also have your other physical needs met, so where are you getting the movement that you need? Where do you have your mindfulness practice, or simply having time to be yourself? That reflection period, which can be as little as 15 minutes on a Friday or Monday, that is one of the most important factors that we've seen making a difference, because that's also ... If you build a habit around that, that is like a chain reaction that promotes all of the other things that you would like to build. Again, a habit around mindfulness or a habit around increasing the time you have with your employees. So that reflection is important. To help people start that habit, we use a tool that basically attracts people's time management. It's completely confidential, so it's not shared with their colleagues or anyone else. But they can use that to look at, okay, how are they spending their time, where do they have back to back meetings, and where do they not spend enough time with the right people, i.e. their own team, with the leaders in the other departments and so on. So you can use that as a way to build that practice up. The key point, with technology aside, is to build that habit of reflection. I love that you said 15 minutes, do the rear view look at the week, and then plan for your week ahead, making sure that you've got time for movement, and you've got time for recovery, and not having those back to back meetings that often leaders have, or sometimes they take pride in having. And of course, yeah, it's also about the 80/20 rule, right? If you do that 80% of the time, it's really gonna pay off. I think that's another thing that's challenging, especially as responsibility grows for leaders, because it's always they don't have time. But that's the thing with finding the right habits. Because I really believe, I mean it's a key philosophy of mine, that if you can automate the key behaviors that drive the greatest success for you, you have way more capacity to do the things that are new or you haven't done before, you need to learn. Because up to 45% of what we do every day is habitual. It's completely automated by, yeah, let's just say the unconscious part of the brain. And that's really important for us. But we need to practice the behaviors before they will become habitual. And we also need to make sure they're small enough to repeat. If we can start to practice that over time and not punish ourselves too much when we miss it, then we will be able to automate more of these key things and have way more cognitive capacity or performance to address the new or unexpected things that come up in this volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous world. That's one thing we'll never have more of is time. It's fixed. Yeah. Exactly. Good point. Thinking about those habits. What is one thing that a leader could do or potential leader could do right now that's going to make them more effective at making better decisions, planning, getting control of that cognitive executive function? I think the number one thing, to be quite honest, it's simply to prioritize sleep. This goes back to the physical needs. I can of course add one that people can do at work in second. Well, some companies here in Denmark actually can sleep during the work day. But the number one is sleep, just to work - and very specifically here - work with the one hour before bed, because that hour is a very important window on which you can impact the percentage of recovery and quality recovery that you get during yours. A lot of people will spend that hour by working, using their phone, or essentially using devices, and all of these devices emit blue light from the screen and decrease, as I mentioned before, the production of melatonin in the brain, and will really decrease the percentage of recovery you're getting, especially the deep sleep and REM sleep. So switching out television> But when you really need to be your best, no alcohol, actually no alcohol at all during the day would be ideal for your sleep, but especially after 4:00 in the afternoon. I mentioned devices, but those last little looks at the phone or email is a really bad idea during that hour, because even though the short look at it will not be enough for the blue light to maybe have an issue, the thought process that that triggers, especially if you see an email that means that there's an emergency has occurred or something you're going to face tomorrow is gonna be something that is demanding, subconsciously your brain is going to be working with that. That's very activating. Getting rid of devices and using that hour to simply either read a book, quality conversations with your partner, catching up with a friend, but actually using something that will help you to wind down. It might be a nice cup of herbal tea. I mean, this is quite individual, but for the majority of the people we see, reading a fictional book or a Kindle that's not back lit is a really nice way for them to allow their natural recovery process to kick in and get a good quality sleep, and that's the number one thing for your brain performance. Good quality sleep. The other tiny tip, which is super simple to implement, which I think has had one of the biggest effects throughout the day for both leaders, but for any employee, is to put in their calendar for ... Well, you can try it right after the call now, but if they're going to be at work tomorrow, to actually put in their calendar specific time. Just block out as little as five to 10 minutes as a private event so no one else can book them, and practice that breathing I mentioned before, where you're breathing in for a count of three and out for a count of four. Because that's one of the fastest ways to regulate your stress recovery balance, and you don't need any devices, you don't need to close your eyes. You just need the trigger to do it, which could be as simple as a calendar reminder. Those are wonderful tips. Sleeping and breathing are two things that we do every day. Hopefully, yeah. And honestly, simple things to maximize that, to help us think more effectively and really get more control over ourselves can go a long way. Well Jason, it's been a pleasure talking to you. Thank you so much for sharing your insight, and the great data and research about the brain and how we can really be more effective in planning and making decisions. I wanted to give you one last opportunity to see if there's anything else you'd like to share with the group. First of all, thank you to you Jill for the invitation. Appreciate the talk. You're welcome. The only other thing that I will say is that again, it's important to find what works best for you. And as you mentioned before, sometimes technology can help, but it's not something that anyone should depend on. But it's taking the time to build your own awareness on what are the things that are really draining my resources and what are the things that are gaining my resources is a great starting point on which you can then use to build the personal leadership. And that I think is critical when leading others, because it all starts with leading yourself. The greater the self awareness and self management you have, the greater your ability to be able to be present and to be able to know what to do to lead others. Think that would be the closing point. Great. Thank you. Well, I appreciate your time today and your tip, reminding us the best way to lead others is lead ourselves first. Thank you very much. You're welcome, Jill. Thank you. CLOSING: I hope that you have enjoyed this and can start using some of these great techniques to create more cohesive teams.  Make sure to subscribe to be alerted to ongoing podcasts. I work with leaders and their teams to apply these concepts, grow themselves, their teams and their business.  Schedule a free 30 minute consultation here to see if I can help you, your team or your organization.  You can reach me, Jill Windelspecht, directly by email at jillwindel@TalentSpecialists.net and visit my website at www.TalentSpecialists.net. ADDITIONAL RESOURCES: Manpremo: https://manpremoperformance.com/ Article on increasing brain performance: https://beatyourbest.manpremoperformance.com/posts/brain-performance-1505845 Article on building change competency: https://beatyourbest.manpremoperformance.com/posts/change-competency

Each new season it's important for me to evaluate what my priorities are, how my routines are working, and what I need to change. As I head into the fall, I can sense that there are several big areas that I want to revamp. Join me as I take some great advice from my friend Brittany and share what I'm working on for this year: Listen to the Podcast: We also recorded this blog post as an audio podcast. If you want to listen in instead of reading, click play below or do a combination of both  And don’t forget to subscribe to the podcast in iTunes.  Right click here and save-as to download this episode to your computer. Think through those big priorities for your day  Our new homeschool routine. For September it will be our conference Making sure I am sticking to our grocery budget and meal planning efficiently Carving out time for Jason and I to talk, and most importantly right now, have some fun together! Better routines overall: meal planning and grocery budget and especially my spiritual disciplines  Does your schedule reflect your priorities?  This is something that both Jason and I have been trying to work on this Summer. I honestly feel like I've been in some sort of survival mode for about 3.5 years now. 3.5 years ago I was pregnant with our second set of twins and our first set were 2. Then we had them, then when life was calming down and they were 9 months old, we found out we were pregnant with Magnolia. She was born in January 2017 and once life started settling down as she got older, I had some challenging health issues with my hormones and chronic fatigue. As I am now coming out of about a year of figuring out my health issues, I'm starting to feel like I can jump back into things again!  So I'm excited as I face the Fall. I need to remember to add things in slowly, very slowly. Because my personality is the type to want to jump in with a whole new schedule with every second blocked out and allotted, but I know that isn't realistic or practical.  So while there are many things I want to revamp, I need to start slow. So the first thing we want to change immediately is bringing back a better morning routine. So to achieve this, we need a better evening routine. For us, they go hand in hand! So Jason and I are both working on these two changes to help everything else!  What am I wasting time on now?  Honestly, my biggest waste of time right now is just not being intentional. Letting the nighttime hours slip by, then it's too late, then I can't get up early, etc. I am letting my schedule happen to me instead of scheduling it. Now of course, especially with little kids, I can't schedule everything and a lot of what I do can change at the drop of the hat.  Is there a disconnect between what you want your priorities to be and what they actually are?  During the actual conference, the next thing that Brittany does is show you on screen how to actually build those priorities into a manageable schedule which is really cool! But we don't have time to share that part on the podcast today. So let's move to the next topic which is her second deep dive session on how to deal with distractions when planning your priorities and routines.  Dealing with Distractions  Leave plenty of margin! I use to over schedule down to the minute or 15 minute blocks and it use to work reasonably well for me. But now with kids, that simply does't work anymore! Good advice to leave margin and plenty of white space.  Leaving room for joy and spontaneity This might be my favorite suggestion yet! I am a scheduler and a go go go person. And while raising my kids, part of this can be good and organized and other times I need to be flexible and joy filled as I raise them. We try to leave open blocks of time throughout our day and week where we can have a picnic on the lawn, enjoying an evening at the park while we eat dinner, etc. 

Each new season it's important for me to evaluate what my priorities are, how my routines are working, and what I need to change. As I head into the fall, I can sense that there are several big areas that I want to revamp. Join me as I take some great advice from my friend Brittany and share what I'm working on for this year: Listen to the Podcast: We also recorded this blog post as an audio podcast. If you want to listen in instead of reading, click play below or do a combination of both  And don’t forget to subscribe to the podcast in iTunes.  Right click here and save-as to download this episode to your computer. Think through those big priorities for your day  Our new homeschool routine. For September it will be our conference Making sure I am sticking to our grocery budget and meal planning efficiently Carving out time for Jason and I to talk, and most importantly right now, have some fun together! Better routines overall: meal planning and grocery budget and especially my spiritual disciplines  Does your schedule reflect your priorities?  This is something that both Jason and I have been trying to work on this Summer. I honestly feel like I've been in some sort of survival mode for about 3.5 years now. 3.5 years ago I was pregnant with our second set of twins and our first set were 2. Then we had them, then when life was calming down and they were 9 months old, we found out we were pregnant with Magnolia. She was born in January 2017 and once life started settling down as she got older, I had some challenging health issues with my hormones and chronic fatigue. As I am now coming out of about a year of figuring out my health issues, I'm starting to feel like I can jump back into things again!  So I'm excited as I face the Fall. I need to remember to add things in slowly, very slowly. Because my personality is the type to want to jump in with a whole new schedule with every second blocked out and allotted, but I know that isn't realistic or practical.  So while there are many things I want to revamp, I need to start slow. So the first thing we want to change immediately is bringing back a better morning routine. So to achieve this, we need a better evening routine. For us, they go hand in hand! So Jason and I are both working on these two changes to help everything else!  What am I wasting time on now?  Honestly, my biggest waste of time right now is just not being intentional. Letting the nighttime hours slip by, then it's too late, then I can't get up early, etc. I am letting my schedule happen to me instead of scheduling it. Now of course, especially with little kids, I can't schedule everything and a lot of what I do can change at the drop of the hat.  Is there a disconnect between what you want your priorities to be and what they actually are?  During the actual conference, the next thing that Brittany does is show you on screen how to actually build those priorities into a manageable schedule which is really cool! But we don't have time to share that part on the podcast today. So let's move to the next topic which is her second deep dive session on how to deal with distractions when planning your priorities and routines.  Dealing with Distractions  Leave plenty of margin! I use to over schedule down to the minute or 15 minute blocks and it use to work reasonably well for me. But now with kids, that simply does't work anymore! Good advice to leave margin and plenty of white space.  Leaving room for joy and spontaneity This might be my favorite suggestion yet! I am a scheduler and a go go go person. And while raising my kids, part of this can be good and organized and other times I need to be flexible and joy filled as I raise them. We try to leave open blocks of time throughout our day and week where we can have a picnic on the lawn, enjoying an evening at the park while we eat dinner, etc. 

HOLY COW!! Allen and Rachel are chillin' on the beach, but the show needs to go on!!  So Jason has called in two amazing friends to talk about all things Geek!  Darth, who has been on the show twice before returns for another dose of madness as he explains his GEEK for the The Black Farm Book.  Our newcomer is Papa_Grumps, who brings his special brand of GEEK for No Man's Sky and Ready Player One!  This and SO much more! KOGO!!!     

Hey Weight Loss Nation! www.TheWeightLossNation.com It's Tuesday......and that means it's a Tampa Bay Tuesday! Today.....I'm doing a restaurant review! I visited the Bamboozle Cafe. in downtown Tampa. I was with my friend Jason Hewitt, who hosts The History of Branding Podcast. We had been out all day taking pictures and I was STARVING! Luckily, Jason says to me....."Hey.....are you hungry?" I quickly reply, "I'm starving!"   Then Jason says, "What do you feel like?" I tell him...."I don't care, as long as it's healthy." So Jason says....."Let's have Pho." I'm like....."What the hell is Pho?" It's Vietnamese soup." I'm like is it healthy?" Yes! I'm like....ok...let's go. We head over to the Bamboozle Cafe which is located at 516 N. Tampa Avenue, Tampa, FL. It was a beautiful day in Florida, so we ate outside at a cafe table. Our waitress, her name is "Bee" just like a Bumble Bee, comes out and hands us a menu. I look inside the menu and I have no idea what the hell any of the dishes on the menu is. I see chicken, pork and beef on the menu, but the other ingredients..I have no idea. Our waitress Bee comes out and Jason tells Bee this is the 1st time I've ever been to a Vietnamese restaurant and what would she reccommend that I have to eat? Without hesitation....Bee says...."Definitely the Pho Bo with Oxtail." I'm like what is Pho Bo? Bee tells me it's a Vietnamese Beef Broth Soup with long, rice noodles, spices, bean sprouts, chilis and jaleopena peppers. I'm like...."ok....I'll go for it." The Pho Bo was actually very good! Hard to describe! It has an Earthy, savory, sweet at the same time kind of taste. Can't put my finger on it. The Pho Bo was fresh, the basil was on a sprig and the noodles were just made that afternoon. The Pho Bo was very, very healthy! Very good! I have to give Bamboozle Cafe a BIG 2 Weight Loss Nation Thumb's Up! Great job Bamboozle Cafe! I am going to go back and order an entree and interview the owner for a future podcast. Here's the information for Bamboozle Cafe 516 N. Tampa Avenue                                               Tampa, FL Hours Lunch  M - F   10:30 - 4:30pm Saturday 11:30 - 4:30 Dinner M - F  5:00 - 10:00pm Closed Sundays Email -  info@BamboozleCafe.com Enjoy Bamboozle Cafe Nation!   Want to learn more about Weight Loss Nation? Check us out at Weight Loss Nation Thanks for listening! LIVE a long-term healthy lifestyle!

I have a conversation with Jason Anderson, Senior Director of Marketing and Communications at Capital Impact Partners in Washington, DC. This is the first podcast ever recorded in a Wholefoods Supermarket, and I know it's the first podcast recorded in the Wholefoods Supermarket in Pentagon City, Virginia. The reason we're here today is there's a tap takeover by breweries from Richmond, Virginia, and I'm joined by Jason Anderson, somebody I've known for a long time who is a really fantastic communicator. Jason, welcome to the show. Thank you, Mark. So your current position? I am the Senior Director of Communications and Marketing at Capital Impact Partners. Fantastic. Now you've had a really fascinating career. We'll talk about your education, and then you worked for CNN. So tell me about how you got into communications and what drove you towards a communications career to begin with? Yeah. So I grew up in Southern California, and went to Claremont McKenna College where I actually majored in Government and Literature. I actually had an opportunity to attend USC for a broadcasting degree but decided that I wanted to really get the fundamentals of a hardcore political background. Because really my goal at that time was to get into political journalism. And that ultimately fulfilled itself by joining CNN for about 10 years where I literally started as what they called a video journalist, a VJ, at that time. Making roughly $15,000 a year. Killing it. Killing it. And there we did everything from running the camera to running the teleprompter with paper scripts. Which is something in this day of digital age if you think about it. And even robotic cameras, which we didn't have back then. But there I saw a number of fascinating things, really cut my teeth on what journalism was. Learned how to edit videotape, learned how to produce a segment and did a whole number of things with them, but ultimately decided after a number of events, ultimately concluding with the Monica Lewinsky episode in Washington DC, that I decided it was time for me to move on and pursue some of my more personal goals along with journalism. Which was at that point thinking about the environment. That's wonderful. And so after a decade or so at CNN where you focused on political and other reporting, you moved over to the non-profit world. Tell me about that transition. Yeah. So I saw an opportunity at an organization called Conservation International, which does international, non-profit environmental work in communities all across the world, and the opportunity was to take my journalism skills and apply them to public relations. How do we take the things that we do as an environmental non-profit and translate them into actually what news is, and serious news not just marketing, and talk to reporters about covering that news? So I did that actually for a division of Conservation International which was called the Center for Environmental Leadership in Business, and it was really thinking about, how do we work with corporations to reduce their environmental footprint, to contribute to the things that we were doing at Conservation International and translate that all into good. You know ultimately, the public relations part in a sense was marketing, in a sense was how do we drive fundraising, how do we drive other corporations to do good things?  How do we put pressure on the organizations that we're working with to do more good things? But ultimately, it was a really fascinating experience. And then after Conservation International, you stayed in the non-profit world? I did. At that point after 10 years of working at the global sphere and working with Fortune 500 companies like McDonald's, like Starbucks, like Walmart to change their footprint and actually do some interesting marketing things with them. I really wanted to focus more in on local communities. And I found a small organization doing really fascinating things called Rare. And they would actually run marketing campaigns in local communities and these are hyper-local communities. Places you've never heard about or can't even find on the map in Indonesia, in Africa, throughout Asia. And what they would do is, they had the ability to take over the radio, take over the newspaper, create mascots around essential message because you have that hyper-local opportunity to not talk about a product, but to talk about environmental conservation. And perhaps it's water, perhaps it's a species, perhaps it's pollution. And you get folks really thinking about ways they can change their practices locally and using mass-media to do that. It was fascinating to watch how that would happen. Now again my job wasn't to do that work. We had specialists with a whole theory of change and the use of psychology, but my job was to get people interested in what we were doing. So again ... Were they trying to change behavior? Behaviour change, exactly. That was at the core of it, which you can do in a place like that. Much harder where we are in Pentagon City to get people to recycle the cups that they were drinking from these fine, Virginia breweries. But you can do it in these awful places and getting donors interested in thinking about that was part of my job. So give me an example of one of the projects that you worked on. Sure, so we worked in a village in The Philippines where they essentially had no fish, which is a problem when fish is what you rely on to eat. So we had to really go in ... Was this because of over-fishing? It's over-fishing. So ... So you really needed to change that behavior or you'll never fix the problem. We needed to change the behavior of over-fishing. So we created a mascot called Malloy. And Malloy was sort of central to this media campaign. He appeared in billboards. He appeared in local restaurants. He appeared in the newspaper. He appeared in local parades that you might see down our main streets. And eventually people got the message. I need to think about the fact that I can't go out every day, 24-hour days, and fish. I need to think about okay, how do I fish responsibly with everyone else who needs to feed their families and also maybe some of the companies who are coming in and using us to buy fish to sell to distributors? And eventually, the metrics showed an uptick in that particular region in terms of number of fish available but of course fish take a couple of years to spawn and reproduce and create a viable colony. But we are starting to show that halfways to guess that was happening. Then you move [inaudible] to Capital Impact Partners. Different mission, but also in a nonprofit world. Tell me about their missions. Capital Impact was sort of my way to come back home. This is after the great depression, after the big financial crises that we all faced. And I thought to my self, certainly, there's a great [inaudible] outside of our boundaries, but then, in the United States, we have a lot of communities that are suffering, and how can we help them recoup from what has happened to them. And so I joined what's called Capital Impact Partners, it's what's called the community development financial institution, which is a long-winded way of saying, "Where are the good guy bankers?" We are a bank with the mission behind us. So we make loans to other nonprofits essentially, hospitals, healthy hood ventures, education, or people and organizations that are really trying to change the paradigm in their communities. But because they're operating in low-income areas, big banks won't finance them. So you can't build that house center, you can't build that grocery store that'll sell healthy food, you can't build the apartment that'll have affordable housing. Big just won't support it. We will, that's our mission. That's the risk we take, and in fact, we don't measure our end of the year success by our profit, we measure it by how many desks are being built for students, how many more affordable housing units have been built. That's really tangible good in the community. Yeah. What drew me to it is, they were interested as more than just a lender because they [saw all of it?], just bringing money into a community wasn't going to do it. So we had to be [inaudible] so we had to bring research, we had to bring a team that would develop programs that addressed this systemic issues being faced and think about how to do it differently, how can we do it this way and instead of the old way. A classic example that we use is around the nursing homes system. You put people into institutional nursing homes, nothing changes, people grow old, they get sick, they eventually pass away. What we've decided was, there's got to be a better way. So how do you go in, and develop a different type of nursing home that's as a community where you'll have your own room, where you go to a kitchen that feels like your home, where you communicate with the outside world? It's called the greenhouse model. We were able to deploy it in multiple states across the country, and it's become a real success. But it really shows that money is one thing, creating systemic change is a whole different paradigm, and that's what really drove me to the organization. So how do you tell that story in a way that's going to [inaudible] and engaging to people who either might be in a position to support it or might be a potential customer or beneficiary? Right. No. It's something I struggle with each and every day because we don't just working agent, we work across seven sectors. And how do I tell that one story to people in seven sectors, whether they want to borrow money from us, or change a program, and then how do I elevate that story to ... [inaudible] to interruption. Is it possible to tell a story that reaches different audiences and is equally compelling across different sectors, and people who have maybe different motivations, and [inaudible] paying attention, or do you have to tailor the story based on your audience? So I approach it from literally story telling. What is good storytelling? And that begins with someone who really has to overcome a barrier and how do they overcome that barrier, which is, if you think about any Hollywood movie, and I just took my kids last week to see Black Panther. Yeah. Me too. Yay. Good movie [laughter]. How do they overcome that barrier of the mineral that they are trying to mine and save the world? Are we saving the world? Maybe. So one of the things I did was when I came into the organization about three years ago was to create a story section to the website. It doesn't market our learning activities, it doesn't market any of the other kind of programmatic activities we do, what it does do is tell the stories of the people it was serving. So in the greenhouse model, we literally sending a photographer, journalist. He spent a couple of weeks with these residences, and he told their stories to a series of photo captions. And it's sort of that heart versus brain effects. How do I [inaudible] in your heartstrings to really get you understand this is what you're doing at this kind of visceral level. And we know. I mean, we know from theory that we also know from the experience that you can make a really, really good logical argument that makes perfect sense to the brain, but if doesn't have that emotional impact, it doesn't matter, people might not even pay attention to it. So if you don't make that emotional connection, you need to be able to follow it up with a logic. But sales are made through emotions. Donations are made through emotions. People care about emotions. They want to follow it up with logic to prove to themselves there's nothing else that their emotions were sound if that makes sense. So [inaudible] make an example of that. We could talk about the greenhouse model as here are 10, 12 group homes with individual rooms, it serves maybe 30 to 50 percent of the residence around Medicare. That's great. I mean, honestly, that's a fact that's excellent. Again, there was a guy named Ervin who we talked to. His wife, basically, she didn't have the capabilities of living in the same room because she could become violent. So what he would do is he would go while she was sleeping and literally cuddle up with her at night, and sleep with her, and then wake up in the morning, get up, and go back to his own bed. And she wouldn't know but now we have this opportunity to show this individual who is still able to be with his wife in their old age at a time when they went to the traditional nursing home. She actually might be institutionalized, but this was not the case. [inaudible] able to let them empower them to keep their relationship alive for months or years harder than they're normally would have. And I was so proud as a person in marketing to tell a story that value that relationship. That's wonderful. Which I don't often get to do. Okay. So, all right, you just got my heart strains, right? Yeah [laughter]. All right. So now I'm ready to make a donation which is sort of [inaudible], right? I mean, you want to make that emotional connection, and want to get somebody walk into your want to understand it and feel it, maybe feel it first. Then understand it, then get involved, and support it. So, thinking about when you were going to school, when you were starting your career, what do you know now that you wish you had known then? I think it is the personal aspects of what I do. Drilling down into emotion and storytelling. I went to a school that valued-- I went to Claremont McKenna College, which was mostly an economics school. I was sort of an outlier as someone who wanted to do nonprofit work. And so there it was research, it was analytics, it was data. Which was great, because it got me thinking about those things, because I never really thought about those things. But somewhere I knew deep inside me that there was still emotion and story that drives us. Maybe that was I was drawn to USC, because of their film elements and all of their production elements. Toss up whether I should've gone there or not, but ultimately I think that now is what makes me a successful marketer, is driving story versus data. Because I could easily talk about, we're a lending institution at our heart. Before I came, we talked about, oh we financed this building. Oh, it's 26,000 square feet. It's in this area that has a 200% under the certain net worth for individuals. Government data, and I can't remember. I can't think of it, because it doesn't drive me. I wanted to [inaudible] that building. And that's your proof right there. Right. Who goes to school there? Who now has a home there? Who's getting health care in that building? That's what I care about. And one person's personal story can negate reams and reams and reams of paper of statistics and facts. Absolutely, yeah. And I do think that you need to back it up, with the ultimate, we have the great story of Irwin, but I could tell you any number of stories. There's a woman who was once homeless. She went to a health care center that we helped finance in San Francisco. [inaudible] San Fransisco, does that mean health care? Well, there are huge amounts of homeless people in San Francisco who have no access to equitable health care. Now it's part of the mission of this-- now she got off drugs, she got off alcohol, and she has now literally a board member of this hospital because they want a certain amount of their patients to be on the board. That's not data, that's a story, that's a person's life who has changed. But the data ulitmately, we still need to talk about. This hospital went from an alleyway to a building that serves 20,000 patients, who are uninsured possibly, and so they now have healthcare. That saves X amount of health care dollars. Yeah, so you need that data to back up the story. So for somebody who's an aspiring storyteller, regardless of the medium that they're interested in, what are the things that they need to know, what are the skills that they need to develop? You need to be emotionally involved in your projects. One, the word I always give to people when they think about communications and all of the things and the tactics and all of that is what is your authenticity? You can have your strategy, you can have your tactics down, you can have everything to a T, but if you're not authentic, it's not going to resonate with people. And ultimately, that's going to  you may get a-- the phrase is, "Fool me once it's on you. Fool me twice it's on me." Authenticity is the same way. You may fool a donor or funder or an investor a couple of times but ultimately they're going to get it. So make sure you have an authentic story to tell. And then don't be afraid to tell it from the rooftops. Just yell it, scream it, promote it, put it on video, put it on social media. Don't be afraid to be hyperbolic. If it's authentic, it's real. Right. I think that's really wise council. What tools do you use that you absolutely can't do without? Well, I'm old school, so I use a lot of pen and paper. We've been experimenting with a tool called Trello which is a kind of electronic tool for project management. I think you do need an editorial calendar of sorts because it allows you to be proactive versus reactive, especially for someone like me where I have multiple sectors to promote. And all those sectors need to ramp up into corporate objectives around social and racial justice. I need to think ahead about, "All right. We've got this day coming up. We've got this conference coming up. We've got this project coming up." How does that react with everything else that we're doing? So that the messaging can be funneled up to, kind of ultimately, what we're trying to talk about. What advice would you give for somebody, who is either starting school or starting their careers right now, who's interested in following a path similar to yours? So I may be antithetical to most people. I did not get a background in marketing. I did not get a background in communications or any of this stuff. I'm not saying that's not valuable. I got an education in what I loved and what I believed in. At that point it was government and literature. Now if you think about it,  I know work in finance so-- and with a stop over, a 15 year stop over, in the environment. So I was just say be passionate. Explore. Which also comes with a lot of self learning reading everybody else's e-newsletters, websites, understanding what they do. And there was some self learning about what does the consumer journey look like. What is the donor persona look like? All of those things so that I could apply kind of what I had  hints of in my brain and make them very [tactical?]. That's wonderful, so these last two questions are sort of fun ones. What's the dumbest thing you've ever seen somebody do in communications and marketing? All right. So off the top of my head I can't think of the dumbest thing I've seen. But I will say that it's funny watching an organization I left, and I will not name them, reuse a tactic that we used. And used to sort of minimal effect. It felt like an organazation that was out of ideas and was just trying to think about, "All right, we'll just reuse that in a different way," Without really undersanding what can be we actually achieve with this. It was a social media campaign about investing in a certain project and who knows in terms of the actual tangible value of it? And I'll pick another which is another organization that I work with, do a multi-million dollar campaign. Hollywood superstars, literally Hollywood superstars - I can't name them because they would give me away - using cutting edge multimedia techniques, putting this out on every communication channel possible, but ultimately almost no [inaudible]. I've heard my superstar say this. I'm interested, because I've heard it in three or four different ways. Now what do I do? Well, what I do was give 10 bucks. Yeah, we're not going to have anybody. But I take your point that you need to craft your strategy and your tactics based on the existing situation, which means whoever is working in communications marketing needs to be acutely attuned to strategy and organization. They need to understand the situation, and they need to bring something fresh and creative. It's not sufficient to continue to rehash what might have been a great idea before, but's already played out. Yeah. And I'll also add to that. The idea that you're going to run into a CEO who thinks that they can create a movement-- and God bless you, if you can create a movement, do it. And don't not try. Definitely try it. But go in with what is what the market research of what the general public says. And I'll take the environment for example. So I did that for 15 years. And creating a movement for the environment was always top of mind of CEO for marketing. You can affect any environmental space, 5% of the population, with what we call the dark greens. And they will give a ton of money. You cannot affect the 95% of the population to give their $10, which will equate to billions if they did it. And if you said, "Oh, hogwash," think about yourself. I'm an environmentalist, and I do all the right things. I compost, I recycle, I drive a Prius ... Yeah. Me too. We might actually be parked next to each other [laughter]. But are all of these people going to give their 10 bucks? It's been proven time and time again that that's not going to happen. And that's for children's charities, it's for multiple charities. I would say the one example would be the Bucket Challenge. I have the Ice Water Bucket Challenge ... Ice Bucket Challenge. Okay. Let's talk about that for a minute. I know we're doing my last questions, but let's talk about that for a minute. I heard the woman who was on-- I can't remember the organization, which there in itself, right, should tell you something-- talk about the Ice Bucket Challenge, made millions for that in a short amount of time. We don't talk about them anymore. It was actually not self-constructed. It was an anomaly of a guy-- I think it was multiple sclerosis? Yeah. I think so. Or ALS, maybe. ALS -- who did it. No affiliation to the organization. He sent that video to three or four people, and it literally went viral. The organization literally had no idea how to harness that or what to do with it. They just rode the wave. And year one, they made X number of dollars. Year two, they tried to recreate it, were unable. Of course, because the underlying dynamic was not theirs, and it's since morphed into the cinnamon challenge and the Dadbod challenge and something else that somebody's going to come up with. But there was an authenticity in the original Ice Bucket Challenge that people loved. Which made it powerful. Which made it powerful. And you can't create that. Sometimes you just have to ride it. Well, right. And you can't program or [inaudible] morality. If you're lucky enough to do something that goes viral, awesome. But don't count on it. That should not be your main strategy, because it's so unpredictable and so unlikely. Try. Try. But try with caveats to your CEO or your chief marketing offer or whomever that you're not getting a ding for that if it doesn't happen. Yeah. Absolutely. Okay. So the last question I asked you was, without outing anybody individually [laughter]-- no. The dumbest movie you've ever seen in communications-- what got around? What's something that's remarkable, that's memorable, that you think is particularly powerful and well-done in the way of marketing, communications, public relations? I had a boss who stressed ad nauseum about the power of visuals. And to me back then, I was like, why are we agonizing over one photo over another? And I think the best example I think to give of that is if you watch the movie about Steve Job, where he talks about the 57 shark that he used in his powerpoint. Now I mean that's sort of an example, but what it shows is - and it goes back to storytelling - people are very visual. Iconography goes way back to when we lived in caves. That tells you something. So something about visuals and thinking about your powerpoint presentation with 100 lines of text per slide. No. Stop it. Steve Jobs did presentations. It might not have any text. Changed my life. And now we're gold. Yeah. In fact, have you ever read Presentation Zen that Garr Reynolds does? Phenomenal book. Read that. Yeah. Read it. Yeah. A piece of advice that I give to people who work for me is, you're going to get a lot of information about a particular project. And they're going to want data, they're going to want analysis, and they're going to want all this stuff in their communications. But what do we all do? I call it the finger-up analogy. You flip your Facebook, and you just finger up through your phone. You're swiping up, or you're scrolling up and down, or you're swiping left and right. Maybe you're swiping right, if that's how your thing is. But you're swiping. You're swiping. And you're reading quick and fast. What catches your eye? If you're reading at all. You're looking. Right. You're looking at visuals, and you're getting maybe 50 characters of text. You got to boil down your message to that to really communicate well. Yeah. I think you're absolutely right. So Jason, thank you so much for being on this episode of Better PR Now. Yeah. Thank you so much. Appreciate it. And that wraps up another episode of Better PR Now. Really want to hear from you. Let me know what you think about the podcast overall or about this particular conversation. Like to know what you think about recording on location. I know there was a lot of noise. But let me know. Was it too distracting? Was it okay? I want to hear from you. And also if you have any questions about public relations, marketing, or corporate communications, let me know, and I'd love to address those in a future episode. Also I want to remind you about a special offer that we have from the official transcription partner from the podcast, TranscribeMe. You can get up to 25% off their transcription services. Just go to https://TranscribeMe.com/BetterPRNow. That's it for this episode. Look forward to visiting with you again on the next episode of Better PR Now.

EP121 - Shoptalk 2018 Recap Part 1 ShopTalk is an annual trade show held in Las Vegas focused on retail and e-commerce innovation.  In it's third year, it has become the fastest growing can't miss event in our industry.  This year 8,400 industry professionals attended the event (up from 5,400 last year).  The 2018 version took place March 18-21, 2018 at the Venetian in Las Vegas. There is so much content at the show, that we've divided our recap into two parts.  In Part 1 we cover: Macy's Keynote Target Keynote Amazon Go Keynote Future of Grocery - Moderated by Jason Goldberg Zia Wigner Keynote (Global Chief Content Officer for ShopTalk) Ulta Keynote Nike Keynote Ocado Keynote Pinterest Keynote Fresh Direct Keynote Facebook Keynot Don't forget to like our facebook page, and if you enjoyed this episode please write us a review on itunes. Episode 121 of the Jason & Scot show was recorded on Monday, March 19th 2018. http://jasonandscot.com Join your hosts Jason "Retailgeek" Goldberg, SVP Commerce & Content at SapientRazorfish, and Scot Wingo, Founder and Executive Chairman of Channel Advisor as they discuss the latest news and trends in the world of e-commerce and digital shopper marketing. Transcript Jason: [0:25] Welcome to the Jason and Scott show this episode is being recorded on Monday March 19th 2018 I'm your host Jason retailgeek Goldberg and as usual I'm here with your co-host Scot Wingo. Scot: [0:38] Hey Jason and welcome back Jason Scott show listeners Jason and rare time when we're together and this is actually the second week in a row so pretty exciting where live live live here from the Venetian in Las Vegas. Jason: [0:53] I know I feel like I have won the lottery getting to hang out with you this much. Scot: [0:56] I know you're you're a very lucky man that's all I can say. Show listeners we are we recording this at the end of the day on Monday consumed 2 out of 4 days of content so I can call this the shoptalk halftime show. And the show this year is really dense and we thought it be important to give you guys, real-time update of what we're learning about the show some of the more interesting ass, so that we can kind of have at least have two updates with me actually put a third depending on what kind of content comes out in the next couple days so. Just a quick overview of the show this year it looks like the attendance is about double I think we decided Jason is that right, so I think they're saying somewhere north of 8400 attendees definitely feels like it the show outgrew the Aria and is now at the Venetian, I'm in I guess it used to be called The Sands conference in your butt and now they caught this fancy Palazzo or whatever it is Conference Center. And another thing that's really interesting this year is they've added a couple of new tracks there's there's a grocery talk track which I know is near and dear to your heart so there's this kind of acknowledgement that groceries undergoing digital change really kind of in a bike. Not only that but actually on the show floor and then there's a whole track around Ai and machine learning which is been one of our favorite topics. The the big me coming from the vendor world the show floor is absolutely huge this year last year there was like these little mini meeting room kind of things and this year they went full show room and they've done it I don't know the square footage of that but it is as big as. [2:32] Shoptalk it's as big as shop.org it's his maybe half the size of a retailer I would say. But for a shows for sure you're having an exhibit floor it's pretty impressive I would say that. You know they've done a really good job with that another thing I really like is it under that they've done is a lot of the food and then to get to the general Keynotes you have to walk through the exhibit floor, I and the vendors are well aware of that and they are lined up and ready for ready for action that's who hugs so that's that's interesting and any other kind of, the macro things you want to talk about that you notice this year before we go into the details. Jason: [3:12] I mean just said the one interesting thing the way they were arranged the the exhibit floor is in these sort of subject-matter Pavilion so there's like. AI Pavilion that you know is largely companies focused on a and a grocery Pavilion so if. If you're looking for a particular type of vendor they've sort of Consolidated those all together which I like I think it makes it easier to find relevant stuff. And then. If you're a retailer you could come to the show for free if you agreed to take a certain number of meetings with vendors so the program that other shows have done that I've never seen it done on the scale they've done here so they. Paid for a bunch of retailers to fly here in the end their hotel rooms they arranged a bunch of meetings with vendors and as big as the trade show floor is there's a whole huge back half of the trade show floor, they just all these meeting tables that are like speed dating between exhibitors and vendors and it's it's a little bit like Tinder, the vendor had to say they wanted to meet with this particular retailer in the retailer had to say they want to meet with this particular vendor. Scot: [4:23] Double opt-in. Jason: [4:25] Exactly. Scot: [4:26] Swipe left swipe right. Jason: [4:27] Yeah and so the the BD people for my company we did several those meetings and felt like they were all all valuable in in favorable so. It's approximately. Scot: [4:38] Does that come with the exhibit space or is it kind of separate. Jason: [4:40] Yeah there's a bunch of bundles you could buy that were like this amount of space in this mini meetings. Scot: [4:45] Is there a popular in Europe I know are European Folks at Channel visor participate in these meetings and always felt weird from the US perspective that you were kind of like. Paying for the vendor to meet with you but I. They've always worked worked out pretty well for your PIN folks it's interesting to see them kind of bring that over date they did just do their European show shoptalk I wonder if that's something a best practice they brought over as part of that. Jason: [5:09] Actually it does appear so they did a Europe shoptalk last year and it and they cancel that show so I didn't get to go I assume it wasn't. Quite as well adopted as the u.s. won and now they're calling this the global show and they're trying to get all their European attendees to come here. But you're you're absolutely right like they could have definitely lifted some of those best practices and I frankly I came here a little skeptical about the meetings because. There there were some logistic hiccups weeding up to it like if a vendor opted-in and we opted in but it didn't fit in one of the time slots they had available. I think we bought more meetings than we got so they had to give us some credits back and and not to sound too vain but where. Better known brand than a lot of vendors on that floor so if they struggled give us the meetings we bought you could imagine some smaller lesser-known vendors. Scot: [6:03] But it seems like the space was constrained not the demand. Jason: [6:07] Exactly yeah and then like once we got here it sounds like it went real well so agree with you like this feels like one of the few shows in our space that's vibrant and growing. Scot: [6:19] Yeah yeah and that's what sticking to some of the content highlights I got in late Sunday night super late and then you were here all day so why don't you could get off and tell us some of the highlights from Sunday. Jason: [6:30] So I am in back taking residency here in Las Vegas I'm here for 16 days. In the hotel room that you and I are sitting in right now so that's a new experience for me and Sunday night had some good key notes that I was looking forward to hearing the first one was Jeff can that who's the CEO of Macy's. And so he was talking about some of their progress they had their first. Favorable quarter and I want to say like 11 consecutive quarters and and so you know he was very optimistic that that they're there. Turn around program that they called the North Star is starting to work since we talked about a couple of the the upcoming initiatives they have a program they're calling growth 50 which is essentially. They selected these 50 Macy's store. The Dare going to. Put all of their best practices and capex investments into in 2018 in the idea is to see which of those things work best and deploy them into all there the rest of the Macy's Fleet in 2019. So it'll be interesting to figure out what those 50 stores are and keep an eye on them. Scot: [7:40] What does 50 stores are and keep an eye on them and it goes Herald Square. Jason: [7:45] Seems to be somewhat shocking of that was not one of them. Scot: [7:48] Does that mean like the giving up on the other 50 is at Macy's shutting stores. Jason: [7:54] Closed a bunch of stores but they're still in business will check me on this but I don't want to say that it's going to be like 2000 store so that it's still a lot of stores and what you don't do is just. Do a bunch of expensive things and I'll mm hope they work so so picking 50 stores as Pilots kind of makes sense. Scot: [8:11] , complex offline av-test. Jason: [8:14] Yeah as we caught a match Panel test actually but that's sort of the original Navy test. So that's interesting they announced that they are deploying mobile scan & go check out to all their stores by the end of 2018 so what that means is. You've installed at Macy's mobile app you you scan the items you want to buy. For it on the mobile app and you walk out without ever having to get in the checkout line if there's loss prevention tags on the apparel which there is on a lot of the apparel. You have to walk by a security desk show on a digital barcode on your on your phone and they'll remove your tags but that potentially eliminate. What date Macy says is the number one complaint about Macy's which is hard to find a cashier or too long a wait in line. So they were they were pretty bullish on that. Scot: [9:13] Surfin you're doing that or that's just like part of their point of sale and stuff. Jason: [9:16] They did not disclose that they were partnering with the vendor to do it it seems like something they built or not ganic Lee you are you are absolutely right there are third-party vendors that you can hire to facilitate that for you but. I somewhat suspect that Macy's is not using a third-party to implement it another one that was interesting to me and I haven't seen the meteor really pick up on this year. But he talked about their desire to clean up their promotional calendar and. Scot: [9:43] Sounds familiar. Jason: [9:44] That's retail code for we want to get away from all of the crazy promotions were doing and he specifically said we want to eliminate the need for a Shoppers to do quote on quote Macy's math. To figure out how to get the best deal. Scot: [10:01] This is longtime listeners will know this is kinda killed JCPenney right. Jason: [10:04] Even more more funny it it absolutely kills Ron Johnson's 10-year JCPenney they were highly promotional he tried to dramatically clean up their promotional calendar and. Just didn't work. A time a lot of us criticize Ron Johnson because we were pointing out that retailers like Macy's had tried this in the past and it didn't work for them so it's even more ironic. That Macy's that has frankly past experience trying to move away from from promotional pricing models is going back to it and we we talked on listener question shows about the fact that. Everyday low prices seems like the future pricing and because of transparency these promotions aren't as appealing as they once were. But it's really hard to shift once you have a customer base that used to promotional pricing. Scot: [10:53] Now so Terry Lundgren so he is transition. His big thing was to add that discount store inside of Macy's but I didn't hear you saying about that is that stole, is that the kind of makes sense if your have this discount like Dollar Store jammed inside of Macy's or TJ Maxx is probably more appropriate analogy then I think it does make sense to then you could have at least kind of a, a way of balancing out the promotional things is that still tragedy but or or is that off the table. Jason: [11:21] I I think that still is a strategy Macy still does have these off-price stores that I think the most Perfect Analogy is that are you notice or to Nordstrom Rack equivalent but they were mentioned it all in the keno. So either you like they didn't double down on it or say they're moving away from it you can interpret moving waste and promotional calendar that you know they're there. Trying to Jack the margins up in the main line Macy's stores but you're exactly right like they could be to differentiate it from the discount concept Moore, so we'll have to see how that plays out the next keynote was Target so this is Brian Cornell is the CEO of Target there another retailer that you could kind of say is in the midst of. Turnaround strategy and he spent he did a couple interesting things about his was a little more. West tactical in the Macy's keno and he talked a lot about. The their migration to digital and how they've embraced digital and he he talked about this he didn't called The innovator's Dilemma. That's essentially what it is he's like you know there's this natural inclination when you have all these stores in the stores are profitable in these new shopping behaviors come in to say you like why would I ever invest things that discourage. Customers from going to the store that that's just your natural instinct. And he claimed that like Target had overcome that instinct and was now short of embracing. [12:55] Digital and they were largely converting the stores in to fulfillment hubs and that they they ship something like 70% of all their eCommerce orders from the store. Brought on stage with in the CEO of shipped which is a logistics company they just bought. You said that they bought them specifically because they wanted to be the first national retailer to offer same-day delivery in all markets. Scot: [13:19] And then just last week they announced they're growing that out and more stores. Jason: [13:24] So I think their intention is to get eventually get it in all stores that are also experimenting with curbside pickup which we've talked a lot about here. So a lot of interesting things there and then he pivoted to another topic that I think is going to be very common this year which is there they're doubling down and reinvestment in owned brands. And this used to be the thing we call private label the the purple an hour when they talk about own brand they're talking about Brands they created offense. That in some cases they even sell it other other channels of distribution I'm so potentially sell on Amazon. And target has been very successful own brand they're also talking about brand exclusives so we'll sell stuff from National Brands but. Excuse that are only available in our store and will sell limited edition stuff so the stuff you know that there's a constrained Supply Target some what famous for that with promotions they've done for people with Lilly Pulitzer in others. So that is one of their big plays that's most retailers big play against Amazon has to sell stuff that Amazon can't sell. So that was kind of his big talking points. Scot: [14:42] So I know they room essentials is there like furniture brand and then what is a jack and. Kids one cat jacket are there any examples where they sold those other places. Jason: [14:59] So I haven't as Machine Target sell their own brands in other places. Scot: [15:04] Costco has. Jason: [15:06] Costco very famous he does there's more Kirkland on on sold on Amazon than on Costco.com I think. Scot: [15:12] Yeah but there are other. Jason: [15:15] I'm trying to remember if Target invested in or owns method but method is sold elsewhere so there's. Scot: [15:20] I swear Dakota velvet with that a designer Michael Graves Sr. Do one of our interns to research them. Jason: [15:28] Yeah yeah yeah let me know how that works out for you so that was an interesting keynote and then. Sort of the perfect transition the third keynote on Sunday night was to VPS from Amazon that are responsible for the Amazon go store so this is Gianna Parini. Responsible for who started the. The business leader for Amazon go and then dilip Kumar who's responsible for all the technology used in the Amazon go store and is also responsible for the Amazon bookstore. So the very first thing they did which was just I thought hysterical after both. Target and Macy's had mentioned kind of Scan & Go. Amazon of course came on and threw shade at what a pain in the neck skin and go is and how we really built the store just because customers don't want to have to scan each item as their. As their shopping. Scot: [16:29] Is that a learning from the book store cuz that's how the bookstore model works. Jason: [16:33] Yeah well I don't know specifically I mean. Scot: [16:35] Typically the kind of throwing shade at the bookstore. Jason: [16:38] Yeah and I would argue the bookstore is in many ways the worst version because you like literally can't find out the price without. Scot: [16:44] Face can't even find a price there's more scanning you would even get it at Macy's. Jason: [16:48] I told you it was not a very hostile interview so let me just say that question was not asked. Either of them but it was a little bit funny this was the keynote I was most looking forward to Amazon Prime now was at the show last year and I felt like. They shared a lot of new information about the prime now program that they least I wasn't previously aware of. It was less through this time so I didn't do was not a lot of like major new disclosures normally trying to figure out his. How to get a roll go out to more stores are you getting to put it in Whole Foods your new announcements like that at this it is Keynote. They did talk about what some of the best sellers in the store was and apparently there's this chicken sandwich that's been there Perpetual number one seller but it is a lot of food stuff so that Amazon makes their own meal kits in that store in the doors are top sellers. Fresh fruit is a top seller there's an odd thing about Amazon and fresh fruit. This store is in the corporate headquarters in this corporate headquarters Amazon has way less employee amenities than almost any other big company. So the rare amenity that that Amazon liked out a lot is. Did they give free bananas to all the employees and apparently this has killed the market for bananas in downtown Seattle. The smoothie shops used to charge to put bananas in the Smoothie now they let you bring your own smoothie your own bananas in to put in a smoothie because everyone in downtown Seattle gets free bananas from Amazon. Scot: [18:22] Does the banana thing so when Prime took on Arrested Development there was a big. What is running jokes I'm not a huge Arrested Development person but there's a banana stand thing in there and I think they started it as kind of like to celebrate that it's kind of kept going is that is that true or did I make that up in my head. What decimal burx Amazonian Institute election. Jason: [18:43] Or just is this odd fruit thing with Amazon so then I found it funny that like this. The store which is largely the employee cafeteria is really what the Amazon go store is the number one seller is fruit so it made me wonder if they're going to stop by the bananas. They can monetize the bananas in the ghost. Scot: [19:00] How we don't sell a lot of bananas in the guest room. Jason: [19:03] No I imagine that it's fresh fruit other than bananas but there were a couple other interesting things so delete was talking about like. The ghost are we talked about a lot it's based on. Very Advanced machine learning around computer vision so this is mostly done with cameras and the interviewer asked why they chose cameras there all these examples in Europe in elsewhere of people trying to do similar concept with RFID tags. And they they felt like aspirationally a store model where they have to constantly apply tags and sensors to all the Shelf some product. Wasn't very interesting to them they felt like that the much more scalable long-term solution was to invent this computer vision model. Scot: [19:49] Now I know you're very passionate about RFID tags how do you feel about that. Jason: [19:52] I think he's right I think RFID tags are item level RFID tags for products in a store. Is a pain in the neck and unless we get to this thing called Source tagging where all the manufacturers put the RFID tag on in the factory it's it's never going to take off. Scot: [20:09] Can you do RF IDs for like a fruit and stuff. Jason: [20:13] Potentially yes so at the moment. Scot: [20:15] Yeah at the moment. Jason: [20:19] Yeah it there's a man. Scot: [20:21] RFID on my app. Jason: [20:22] So there's a sticker on every one of your apples now and that sticker could essentially be an RFID tag. That sounds like a Farfetch'd example like there's an argument in the future of food that you're going to want to know a lot more about that Apple before you buy it like how many, days ago was picked and all these other things and so like you you could imagine them wanting a tag each individual apple for a variety of reasons. All that aside it was just interesting to hear them talk about how they debated tags versus cameras and went with the cameras. Scot: [20:55] Another nice thing with with cameras is once you get on digital then more law should kick in where RFID tags rising to this manual. Process that is not going to change the scale and will always be subject to let you have a robot that can put the tags on her which. Jason: [21:12] What kind of software vs. Hardware really like an unlike General lease offers I have a lot more profitable because as as you scale at the the normal cost is very well. Scot: [21:22] Yeah then you have the the nurse's other acceleration I don't know so Moore's logic we all understand that you don't processing power gets doubled every two years but then, you know I wonder if there's some correlated to that with machine learning like the system get smarter every X things that sees Pride another there's some pretty interesting thing there that also is. Jason: [21:43] Yeah I mean there's a couple examples of that like the the. Accuracy of computer vision which is this specific subset of artificial intelligence this towards using has been improving faster than more as wise as a noun yeah. Scot: [21:56] You think it would yeah and then I hit some kind of like. Jason: [22:00] Resume wait I had some flat toe because it's unlike chips which could always get faster at some point your computer Visions perfect. Scot: [22:09] How do they tell like a chicken sandwich in a tuna sandwich but do they have to put different containers on it to help her. Jason: [22:16] So that was a good question that wasn't asked but there was a similar one that was kind of interesting so because there no sensors on on the items the camera has to recognize every skew in the reporter said like. Do you struggle the tell sugar-free Red Bull from regular red bull. And he's like yes we do it right like that those are the the the really difficult edge cases and I thought about that before they like different flavors or or subtle differences your chicken versus tuna sandwich being up in exacerbated version of that. Would be really hard and then he pointed out of part of the problem I haven't considered before. Not only do we need to tell sugar-free Red Bull from regular red bull the moment when we need to tell them is the exact moment when you picked it up and probably block the word sugar-free with your thumb. And so those sort of obfuscate abused that they get is obstructed views they get in the product is also a pretty tricky problem. Scot: [23:12] No Amazon in kind of the play but they've done with frustration free packaging you can almost see them going back to the manufacturing kind of having you know, air visionfriendly packaging where you make this one purple in this one yellow or something other than a small kind of text word for sugar. Jason: [23:29] And you've hit on one of the reasons like this works for ghost or the potential and other things everyone keeps calling at the ghost or a more accurate turn might be Go restaurant because they're actually is a big kitchen in the majority where they sell is food that is prepared. In that store and search your point they can solve their own problem by using square boxes for the chicken and round boxes for the tuna or whatever whatever they want to do. A minority of the skews in the store are National Brands so for their own Brands they can make the packaging distinctive enough. It does have that problem where has much harder to do a whole food store or something like that. Scot: [24:11] Wonder if they could even do have seen some examples this in retail, I want to take an overlay some kind of a machine readable but not human-readable thing on the packaging to write so the chicken in the tuna come in the same package but the machine can see maybe the UV level or something you know that something that very clearly you know, 2 blinking circles versus a red boxer and things in. Jason: [24:35] They can build cameras that seen in the infrared Spectrum or something like that yeah absolutely not discussed but interesting things to think about. Scot: [24:41] Did they talk about when they first launched we did a deep dive on that the. They had a room right there in the store where people were kind of like both checking the AI and then also you know I'm sure they are kicks out and says does not compute and there's some air right there in a human has to go, like figure it out. Do they talk about that at all but the air raid and. Jason: [25:04] Omelette no only very indirectly so they did not talk about how well the machine learning the Machine Vision is working or the Air Raids they were asked how many employees work in the store for any Dodge that question 2. She talked about. Three big classes of employees that they're like you seen how you been to the store you seen how many people are in the kitchen you seeing how many people on the floor helping and you've seen how many orange shirts there are. An orange shirt is if you been to the store is code for these employees that are working in the back room looking at the video displays and training the AI in so the implication was there still. An army of orange shirts watching a lot of people shopping and refining though I'll grow them. Scot: [25:54] It's a nurse and they don't use Mechanical Turk for that because I'm a janaz be real time so after like you. Jason: [26:00] Videos welcome to the store I bet you that video isn't like it was in real time going I mean it's a lot of cameras so even even Amazon would like love the 8 of us bills for doing that. [26:12] So that was interesting I would have like to hear some. Scot: [26:14] I'd like to hear some way you should have been the interviewer on that one but Amazon negotiates these things very carefully so I imagine there's a reason so that things didn't go to where we would like to see. Jason: [26:27] And then the only other thing that kind of came up with a bit that was interesting to me. Scot: [26:29] I put a bet that was interesting to me as they did talk about. Jason: [26:32] They did talk about the fact that. You have to have an app to be in the store cuz you you have to have the go app to register you so to walk through like a Subway turnstile to get in in one of the. The peripheral benefits of that is did they allow Shopper feedback to be given real time in the. And so unlike almost any other store went to Shoppers in the middle of the shopping experience and something doesn't go how the Shopper wants they can in real time. Give feedback and that feel it feedback is tagged with a contact that Choppers in so that shows she said that that's been a surprisingly valuable. Data stream for them to improve their operations in the store which. Scot: [27:19] You are using beacons they know where you are too or that the machine that visual stuff are knows where you are better than any bacon they don't. Jason: [27:25] Visually light and again it's a tiny store so I you're in front of one of three gondolas so like so it's like probably tagged with with that kind of contact information. Scot: [27:35] Now Jason Delray overtree code that you Commerce reporter he is kind of heard rumors are dug up some some data that indicates there's a plan to open for 5 more the stores and then did they talk about Whole Foods at all. Jason: [27:49] Only in that context that they said they have no intention of deploying this Whole Foods right now and said two ways to introduce. Usually win on Amazon and play emphatically says they have no intention of doing something you should sort of assumed they're going to do it right like because they have no intention of offering a shipping service they have. There's a lot of history of them denying something right up until the moment they do it in this case I think there's a lot of logistical reasons that Amazon go dozen. Legacy Whole Foods Fleet of stores particularly well so I sort of do believe them. Scot: [28:27] Let's talk about this I think it's interesting so why why doesn't it work in a Whole Foods is it just the cost or what. Jason: [28:32] So in this very smart 2000 square foot store there's more than 50 cameras to make sure that they have complete coverage on the store and. What they need to do is from the time you walk through that Subway turnstile they have to maintain line of sight on you at all times and have to maintain line of sight on every skew in that store. I'm so there can't be any blind spots where no camera can see you in there camping spots where every camera in the store loses track of you momentarily because then even when they saw you again. They don't know that you're the same person that had the app when you walked in the store right so this store was designed from the ground up. The perfect lines of sight it's a very boring square store with no displays in the middle of the store in a traditional store you have this thing. And those Donna was in the aisle obstruct your ability to see certain angles you have lots of displays that. You know for fruit and things that like tree blind spots in the store you have vendor provided displays that aren't even provided by Whole Foods that block lines of sight in the store. The amount of cameras you would need to eliminate every blind spot in a 25000 square foot Whole Foods is. Almost mind-boggling and then you still have another problem you can't let a customer go into an elevator where they wouldn't be on a camera you can't let a customer to go to a bathroom there's a whole host of things that you know just taking off. [30:06] The Whole Food stores that are D exist and retrofitting them with this technology doesn't feel very likely to meet could they build new Whole Food stores. They're intended to be more compatible with this yes could they use this technology in The Limited ways in that whole food could they use this technology to make you not have to get your wallet out when you pay and just charge your Amazon account. Scot: [30:29] Or the most popular part of a Whole Foods is the prepared section in a lot people just go and have lunch at Whole Foods so you could see I'm kind of like yeah. Jason: [30:36] Panda Express portion you can have an Amazon go store inside of the the Whole Foods or for sure. Scot: [30:43] I bet that's kind of what he's hitting at because he said he also said something like stay tuned yeah we have no plans to put in Whole Foods but stay tuned with a lot of people took to mean either there an open more stores are there was some plan to do something at Whole Foods it's kind of like different than the question. Jason: [30:57] And to me the most valuable thing that you can do with this computer vision that they could very easily do it at Whole Foods is just putting the camera at forget tracking the customer. Just putting the camera to see the shelf and to accurately track the inventory on the Shelf is hugely valuable. For the store stores are have very poor inventory and they spend a lot of money to maintain that poor inventory and leveraging the computer vision system to have more actor and inventory. That alone could be super valuable to Whole Foods. Scot: [31:32] That's the really bad part of the delivery so I'm a big instacart I've tried I use them all over it regularly now because because it's a maintained DC, so you're having cameras that then watch them and Tori and see the last apples been picked by in-store customer so that me the delivery customer. Or that apple and then get a stock-out you know that you're some really big wins on all side of the equation there I think you're right that's it. Jason: [31:58] Absolutely and I think that's going to come up again and some of the other Keynotes we're going to talk about as well. Scot: [32:03] Cool so that any other highlights from Sunday you don't hit any crazy off the hook parties where you were dancing on the table. Jason: [32:09] None that I'm contractually allowed to talk about. Scot: [32:12] Or that you recall that takes us to Monday and then I got in late late late Sunday night so I was able to hit some stuff Monday, the way it works this morning is you had two tracks in the way they're running these tracks as there's five parallel tracks as a, 20/20 build these events and always frustrate people that that event planners do this but they do it for a reason it's designed so that you'll bring, five people you in for friends from your company so and then they there they're very somatic this year I don't remember being as the Mac last year so they're there was a grocery track for example. I was, I attended the first track it was really interesting it was about Brands as in the grocery track that could have been anywhere and there was a VC there that invest in kind of nascent brands. Consumer Brands 7-Eleven was there and and then another investor of his rule was entirely clear to me but he's really all about subscription kind of products. I think there is when we hit on the show a lot where, you notes create a brand used to be like a PNG level event where you would have to go spend $92 to kind of say here's this idea for a swifter and it can be this or going to watch on TV with a 50 million dollar campaign to do the Super Bowl ad now, the world is swimming in Brands and in fact this panel was there so many Brands out there that, everyone's really struggling to kind of like figure it out one of the more interesting things I thought you would like is you know the interviewer has 7-Eleven is all this digitally need a vertical band saw it bother you that she said no it's great because. [33:50] Those companies you know once they get to certain scale we know they, control like it's when I have to test it in our store and then we can help them because most times if they're doing well digitally against the cpg they're selling cases and large volumes, they can help them a lot with itches and how to how do you single serve package these things and they talked about some they give a case that they wouldn't say the name of the brand, kind of the vibe it was. They are buyer how he said that one that they had a lot of insights Wednesday packaged it at 7-Eleven it did really well because the, the consumer they picked up a whole nother set of consumer because, there's folks that wanted to try it and they also wanted it served cold for their commute back home were or what not so it's really interesting kind of things there of they actually view the digitally native thing very positively because it actually kind of, you know already jumped the hurdle didn't have to build the brand in their stores pre-built and it made it easy for them to cherry-pick it down into the storm, then track two came along and that was your tracking for today I had a meeting and had to miss it but tell us about what you talked about. Jason: [34:56] So you made an excuse not to not to support. Scot: [34:58] Well I figured we would talk on the podcast I don't want to spoil it. Jason: [35:02] Got it okay fair enough so I did one of the the panels in the grocery track in this was called sort of. The future of grocery our grocery Reinventing itself until I had three panelists the first was. Kind bars and so that was a Jared who's the VP of e-commerce there and and this is a very. Interesting traditional case for me that's a traditional. Cpg brand that that mix products and very successfully sells them through wholesale so kind bars are you not very successful there in every Starbucks store and a Whole Foods and Amazon, and they hired Jared and experience e-commerce gaido launch their direct-to-consumer offering. And we talked a lot of brands that are interested in doing that in the big question is always why would a consumer want to buy from you cuz generally. You have the worst with just sticks in you're the worst price for your product and so it's interesting to hear kinds of you about that. The a big component is. Assortment so they're offering exclusive flavors and skews that the wholesale Channel. Doesn't want to carry or is out of our limited editions their heavily relying on a subscription program that a lot of the wholesale Channel doesn't offer and they feel like they have. Unique brand promise and there's a subset of the kind consumers that buy into the be kinder to each other. [36:41] Serta brand ethos in want to buy from the brand even though they're not going to have as good of a Justice or prices Amazon. Scot: [36:50] Yep I think kind is one of these, classic examples of a new newer brand that's really kind of leveraging that assortment packaging everywhere you go it's different from a consumer sometimes it's like frustrating because you want to go to Costco and my wife likes a certain one and then, either can't find it at one of the wholesale clubs are bundled with like some really crappy flavor you're not going to eat so there is very clever on the brand side but but I do think sometimes, be a little too clever on some of that stuff that makes it really hard from a consumer to get what you want. Jason: [37:20] And I feel like there's a bunch of brands that think they have that position with a consumer and they really don't kind I think probably does sit in the next episode. Scot: [37:30] Did they say how much as directed like do they give you any indication is that like 5-10 15% of their business. Jason: [37:35] They didn't but I I suspected the last than that right now it's it's it's it sounds like meaningful Revenue but it's still pretty nascent compared to their wholesale Revenue. So I would imagine it's it's south of 1% of their other two other total sales at the moment. The next company with Chef which that spelled Chef apostrophe D and they are. And some meal kids are at sort of an interesting part of the grocery echo system at the moment. A lot of people that think it's a fat and then it's not really going to be a thing or a lot of people think it's the future shopping whenever you say meal kids Denny when they immediately think of blue apron and Blue Apron famously. Has like apparently no business plan to ever be profitable. Scot: [38:27] But earlier go sits when their top sellers right now so I'm in there Snoop the Timbers like these things. Jason: [38:32] And shut his actual interesting that they do offer their own meal kits but what they mostly are. Form from young cats so they're actually the private label provider for a lot of grocery stores that are now offering their own meal kits and they have a lot of Big Brand Partnerships to offer Brandon meal kit so I, Campbell's is a major investor in Chef for example. Inside there you know there are so so that was interesting he had a lot of. Understanding and familiarity with that market. He talked a lot about the pros and cons of home delivery of meal Kids versus grocery store pick up a meal kits and the two takeaways I I had from his his. That were kind of new to me. She's very anti subscription in meal kits and he thinks that you know he's a fundamental flaw with most of these meal kits and most notably Blue Apron is you cantilever a meal and then reorder which is exactly opposite of how most of us. What are the spines in particular things we like and we repeat those over and over again. And he also believes that we all need a lot more personalization than the mule. Currently allow and so a big part of their platform is an infrastructure that allows highly personalized male cats and he eventually envisions. The distance can be highly personalized even. In the store on demand so you can get the the spaghetti with a lot of garlic or a little garlic and a lot of onions are all those all those sorts of. Scot: [40:09] And deserve their delivery remix. Jason: [40:15] They do have a a chef branded meal kit that they delivered recta home but mostly what they. Scot: [40:21] On demand not subscriptions. Jason: [40:25] Mostly what they do is facilitate a regional grocery store offering their own meal kit or someone else selling a meal kit through grocery store so it sounds like more of their stuff is in store pickup meal kids then home delivery. Scot: [40:39] And my regional it kind of makes it seem like they haven't cracked into the top five or six big guys is not like a Kroger or Harris. Jason: [40:45] So I think there is. I think it is pot like he was not completely transparent about who is Partners were so it's possible that he is white labeling for a big one and that part of their agreement is that they that they don't disclose that. , number of the big ones at this point now own their own meal. Scot: [41:03] So Safeway bought I can't remember who. Jason: [41:06] Albertsons bought placed plated plated thank you. Which is one of the biggest wins in history of Shark Tank by the way fun story there but so some of these guys out on their own Walmart owns their own. For just bought one car for the second largest retailer in the world they just bought one this week so. The market for the really big guys is probably smaller it wouldn't surprise me if they secretly have one but he certainly din-din disclose. Scot: [41:35] I feel like musical chairs and some you don't want me the guy off without a chair and then the meal world have their own meal than his distribution mechanism is like maybe some A&P. Jason: [41:48] Exactly so that was interesting and then the third panelist is this company I was also not familiar with call Daily Harvest and Daily Harvest I decided that milk it sounded too easy so they decided to do something. Scot: [42:03] Getting harder. Jason: [42:05] We're going to do direct-to-consumer home delivery of frozen foods. And so there's a strong. Scot: [42:14] Prison meals are like blueberries so I can make a smoothie. Jason: [42:18] Yeah so smoothie kits I think is the thing the best-known. Scot: [42:21] I think it's the thing the best known for so all the. Jason: [42:23] Show all the frozen fruit you need to make a smoothie but also like not not so much like complete frozen meals but like frozen fruit and produce that you might. I'm using a meal they seem very focused on. A lot of the altruistic we need to solve a lot of the problems in the food chain or we're all going to die of starvation kind of thing they talked about what you'd foodways there is in the world and how Frozen is a great solution to a lot of food ways. Throw away a lot of fruit just because it doesn't look perfect and nobody wants to put it in their fruit bin in the grocery store so what's what the industry calls ugly fruits and apparently when you freeze it and no longer matters that that fruit didn't love. Beautiful so. The bruised Apple tastes exactly like the regular Apple a lot of famous restaurants now try to primarily use ugli fruit. They're trying to turn around this trend of throwing away all this fruit that has cosmetic damage and so is interesting that they're they're trying to leverage ugly fruit as a big part of the next there's also this. Scot: [43:32] Ugly frozen fruit. Jason: [43:36] And another one was this concept that I never heard of called transitional organic. Say you're a traditional farm and you transition to becoming an organic farm you have to adopt a bunch of organic processes but then you can't sell your food as organic until you've been following the those processes for a number of years. Writer so there's a bunch of farmers that are in Linda where they're paying all the expenses of. Producing things in organic way but because they're only two years into their through your program that they're not allowed to call their product Organa. And so so she's buying a lot of this transitional organic. Products so that that was somewhat interesting and then because it's frozen and they've invested a lot in the technology to pack the Frozen stuff in dry ice and ship it through common carriers like FedEx and UPS. They're able to deliver nutritious food to a lot of places in the country that don't have convenient access to grocery store so we have a lot of these. Areas we call Food deserts that they're able to cater to so so that was somewhat interesting but they had to. Scot: [44:50] Ugly frozen food to food desert that's the fish. Jason: [44:56] They were able to raise money on it so. There's a investor for everything. But it was interesting thinking about all these complicated with Justice of the cold chain and. Yeah so hats off. Talk to her and if you think about it if each of these things are popular they just wrapped up portion of the traditional grocery business right so you know she pointed out the the. The Frozen I always the Wiest appealing part of a grocery store and that it discourages interaction with the product and I'll and all of these sorts of problems, and by the way you buy this Frozen stuff and then you throw it in the trunk of your car and it's not frozen by the time you get it home so. So if she's successful in direct-to-consumer with Frozen that potentially takes to rose out of the grocery store the meal kits potentially, take a lot of the individual ingredient shopping that happens today so so some interesting things thinking about how groceries Reinventing itself. Scot: [45:58] Absolutely cool so after that after Jason second track there, then we went into the Keynotes so kicking off the show kind of the the opening keynote if you will, which kind of strange I think they realize that a lot of people come in Monday or Sunday zo winter who puts together all the content for shoptalk kicked it off, I thought I was a pretty good good kind of Esprit shortest like 5 minutes but the summary was you nowhere in The New Normal which is kind of you know, in in 15 and 16 and 17 we had all this disruption going on and when you're in the middle of it you figure it's going to be. You'll go back to the old normal but they have that never happens and then she called The New Normal and abnormal is essentially where, I know you're not really reacting to disruptive innovation it's just you've adopted it and said this is going to be happening going forward so she really kind of had two pieces to it for predictions, where we going to go and Retail and you can tell this that shapes the content obviously, the number one back in technology will create new efficiencies in expectations number to Shoppers will come to expect experiences that are Cutting Edge today I kind of took that to mean yeah once Amazon sets the bar at, today one day just walk out than the customers tend to expect that I called a zero friction it's pretty interesting, human thing I'm Number 3 start up some traditional businesses or more line where I think we're seeing that you know we just talked about several is very very big trending in our industry be a grocery retail where you have kind of the you know the. [47:29] Analog dinosaur acquiring the digital DNA and smashing it together to create a new kind of, no I was using her language a new normal kind of combination. And then a wide range of new consumer product to hit the mainstream in this is kind of what was in the first panel where the cost to build a new consumer product is effectively gone down to zero and now you're going to see this huge swath of new products, your micro products micro kind of tribes that they appeal to and then she said those predictions field 7 trends, I never won the rise of Miss France number to the growth of experiential retail, we had a show in the can where will have some really interesting kind of examples of that and then the next keynote talk a lot about that, store associate will not go away but change what they do there so I can becoming an orange shirt or between prep and so check out and in the go example cashier list check out as a big thing automation to the warehouse, more transparent Supply chains in this goes to there's a lot of concern around food safety in that kind of thing, a lot of people talk about blockchain there I think there's a couple talks around that coming up in an explosion of AI machine learning. So after after yeah we went right into office of the CEO of Ulta was there and I don't know if it even some of these. These Keynotes they seem really interesting but then like there's kind of. People 20 minutes so you can't get into much detail and then the format seems to be show a video about the company. [48:59] Talk about some high-level stuff most people are dino and then talk a little bit about, diversity and maybe the company's culture seems to be the kind of formula you lived up to that expectation couple points that they hit on, and we talked about on the show this kind of your beauty is an area that's doing really well and, then why you know she said they're 90% off Mall property so they were smart to be off ma that three different shaders the real estate location which is off Mall product mix and services, and then talk about the benefit of the Loyalty program they have 28. Million members in that program and it represents 90% of their sales, and the other day it's pretty integrated between online and offline so it's omni-channel loyalty program and then the other day she talked about the consumer changing this is interesting you know she talked about, gender fluidity and now that actually helps them so now you have more and more people wearing makeup regardless of their gender and it used to be all these social things around you then wouldn't wear makeup you and I wear makeup because, podcast but now the so you know it's okay. Jason: [50:08] We're actually thinking about launching our own line of podcast. Scot: [50:10] The Chase, spoiler alert, forward facing cameras at selfies has really helped all these Beauty companies cuz now people take more pictures of themselves and they want to look good for those she didn't mention that those with a freebie that will throw in there. The you know. Today's consumer wants a personalized convenient experience I'm certainly living that with my new company where convenience is everything for folks and then personalized as well. Nothing I thought was interesting to see where she broke the script a little bit she went out on a limb and really said that they know is in her she paid homage and she's talking about we couldn't do this without our Partnerships with Google Google Express Facebook and then Spruce labs, I end up that was interesting that you went to Old diversity thing which was good you know that they have. Have a board that has over 50% women which is great and then officers in the company are over 60% so makes a ton of sense you know you know kind of, older middle-aged white dude song makeup doesn't make a ton of sense and I think this is a great example of both aligning with your customer and then also having really good diverse kind of input in the company to make it better, then how the Nike net was up so would you take from that one. Jason: [51:33] So that this was Adam Sussman who's the chief digital officer at Nike I think he's really tripping you in that really don't think Nikki's had a cheap digital out. Scot: [51:41] He said he was the first. Jason: [51:43] And so the heater is it Nike. When they spend a lot of time talking about was their membership program so they they have a thing they called Nike Plus Membership. And they probably have over a hundred million current members they want that to be 500 million in the next five years those members Ben Forex what non-member spend. And there's a number of specific experiences they have in the membership program that have even more dramatic conversion results so is interesting. I would have said that the general Trend in in Welty was that. The effectiveness of loyalty programs is kind of a roading in here we had to back-to-back key notes that were saying how successful their their membership programs are so I found that interesting. He also talked about their conversational Commerce initiative which is launching so this is called. Hertz on demand and you can use the Nike apps to have a text chat with a Nike brand expert that will give you advice and so you know. You mentioned that you get your running shoe advice from attend time Marathon winner. Probably doesn't want to be giving me advice about running shoes but but that's interesting in a bunch of the the conversational Commerce vendors that. At at the show were thrilled to hear him him supporting that experience personally I think the jury still out on. [53:17] Particular chat base conversational Commerce I'm not sure if Facebook's gotten all that the traction that they were they were hoping to get but but it's still early so we'll see. And then they did talk a lot like his corporate videos. Nikes done some really interesting product launches so that you know Justin Timberlake debuted a new Air Jordan Super Bowl. And they made that available for purchase through their sneaker app like the second he walked off stage and it's sold out instantly a month later the next version of that screw came out and they launched it on Snapchat with a. I really enjoy Innovative kind of want Commerce experience and you know he didn't explicitly call this out but one interesting point. Used to be that they would watch all these products through their wholesale partners and people like Footlocker would sell these and kids with a line up in the mall. And now he's talking about all these Innovative direct-to-consumer experiences that are owned by Nike. And the drink late relationship Nike has with his hundred million users in their Affinity program so to me Nikes really the poster child for someone that's transitioning from. Predominantly wholesale to the majority of their sales but but predominantly direct-to-consumer from experience stand for. Scot: [54:35] Yep sidebar I don't know if you fall or not but the average several Wall Street reports that to the shoe guys are really having a first company of tough, 2018 I don't know if if it's because they're losing a lot of these launches or what's going on but you're trying to see kind of the cause sneaker fatigue with with. That model seems like it would never run out but it looks like. The average Sneakerhead has X number of shoes that really interested in watches yet Brands like Nike moving that away from retail that could be sneakers have been kind of sustaining through them the retail apocalypse mall again so bit interesting to see if maybe the steps over. Jason: [55:09] Yeah yeah I think of the inside tip. The thing that sneakers need to save them now is much wider angle front facing cameras on that smartphone because the moment you can't see your feet in the selfie. Scot: [55:21] Yeah. Jason: [55:25] So the next keynote I think I was the only one that said in on so I think everyone left after Nike but I was really interested in this next keynote this is Tim Stein or who's the founder and CEO of a company that. To her listeners that probably heard of called a Cato Cato is a uk-based. To Consumer grocery store so you order online they have fulfillment centers they they deliver the groceries to your home. And there are quite successful they sell the equivalent of 2 billion dollars a year in groceries direct-to-consumer. Is we talk about an issue and UK 6% of all grocery sales are are digital where is here were less than 1% to. So I was super interested there that the digital pure-play grocery retailer in one of the most successful markets in the world. Scot: [56:16] Scot to be part of the UK but aren't there like I know our folks in UK almost they have like six people they can choose from that and some of her like Marks & Spencer. Jason: [56:26] Grocery stores all out for some Marks & Spencer Tesco as though which is Walmart in the UK car for they they all offer. Scot: [56:34] Is the only Pure Play. Jason: [56:35] Yeah but these this is the Pure Play and these guys are bigger digitally than any of those those other companies so it would be a little bit like what a Peapod sold more groceries then Kroger. Scot: [56:50] Amazon has a big mouth for Walmart. Jason: [56:53] And I don't know what their ownership structure is it if they're in play or not those are interesting questions but he talked a lot about. The benefits of. Being a pure being built from the ground-up to deliver groceries versus being a retailer trying to transition to groceries so, I have talked a lot on the show about how I think curbside pickup is the ultimate winner in this space and largely because it's something that traditional grocery stores can do and so we have this concept in the industry called store pic, and that's what the traditional grocery stores have decided to do is will will pay our employee to pick all the groceries instead of the customer picking it. And then we'll make it convenient for the customer to get those that store picked order and so he like very self-serving lie but with some credibility. Talking about how he doesn't think store pick can work in the long run and how these. From the ground up for filament centers for home delivery are better and he alleges that they've tried curbside pickup. Scot: [57:59] Pick up for their system in the customer always gives. Jason: [58:00] For their system in the customer always gives is always choosing home delivery over herbicide pickup Which flies in the face of my advice by the way. Scot: [58:07] So it's the. Customer experience not the economics of let me take this item put it onto a shelf in a convenient way for a shopper and then at Pea Picker to pick it in an inefficient way. It's not the economic so you saying it's when you give customers a choice they will choose delivery. Jason: [58:25] Exactly at the same price which is a big caveat in this and so so one thing. Is he talks about is he he showed the math and he took all the things that have to happen when you place an order with Tesco and they store pick that order and you do a curbside. Tesco delivers at your house and it a typical order by his math take 75 min. Scot: [58:51] And then. Jason: [58:52] And then he does that same order in his automated grocery fulfillment center that uses Robata. And he picks that same order in 15 min. So hit his fundamental premise is where 5x cheaper in these purpose-built things so store pick you know is really cost disadvantaged. Scot: [59:18] And if it's what the consumer wants regardless. Jason: [59:24] And I I buy that the. Purpose-built fulfillment centers are way more cost-effective than store picking in there other problems with store picking then we'll talk about in that in the next Keynote. I totally buy that where I'm I'm not as confident as him is the curbside pickup versus the the delivery and that you could I believe in that his customers want delivery in the US. We find lots of people aren't home to receive that grocery delivery and one thing he. Very much points out as he says we are at Price parity with all the traditional grocery stores so we scrape all Tesco's prices and our price to deliver it to your house is the same as Tesco's price for you to drive there and pick it yourself. And so no one in the u.s. does that everyone in the US that's trying digital grocery have all kinds of premiums and added cost. Scot: [1:00:21] Service is the dreaded Services yes. Jason: [1:00:24] And it's it's worse than just service fees it service fees and they charge more for the same skus when they pick them for you. So so a big difference between the two markets right now so his presentation was super interesting. Then the afternoon Keynotes there were three more so the first one was was Ben Silverman who's the CEO of Pinterest. And I'm just going to be blunt. That was the most boring keynote to me of the show so far and large he did a great presentation about how important visual Discovery is. Which I agree with him it is there was no unique inside the weight like a very self-serving for you know the business that the Pinterest happens to be in. Scot: [1:01:14] The governor there Rich pins and they also had a lot of marketplace initiative none of that no retail kind of tie on them. Jason: [1:01:17] Talk about any like it was it was purely like people aren't going to discover new products via text they need visual Discovery and where we build a business provisional Discovery and it was literally that abstract. Scot: [1:01:32] Go back on the K2 or however you say it one of the intern just came in they are a public companies are independent and they're listed on the footsie the London Stock Exchange and they're part of the foot C250 and have a market cap of about 3.6 billion. Jason: [1:01:48] So that's a perfect segue to the next keynote is. In some ways the u.s. equivalent which is much more company is Fresh Direct so this is Jason acreman of who's the CEO and founder of Fresh Direct. Resurrect is direct-to-consumer digital grocery exclusively in the Manhattan area. Scot: [1:02:16] I was going to confuse with hello fresh with their meal delivery company. Jason: [1:02:20] FreshDirect is like Aikido a built from the ground-up to deliver groceries to your home. The most thought of is a grocery delivery company which annoys Jason to know in because he thinks of them first and foremost as a food company so so the big thing that happens is. He buy stuff from the farm and gets it to your refrigerator in half the time that Whole Foods does so. Pressure it's going to last much longer they do these promotions like a lobster day when you order Lobster to be delivered to your house in Manhattan. It's been pulled out of the water in Maine less than 12 hours ago so that so the supply chain is super cool. Like Ikeda although I don't think it's quite as automated like they built this. Purpose-built fulfillment center so they're avoiding store pics and Jason jumped on the same bandwagon about why store picking isn't going to work right and. Hey price structure is problem number one. Problem number to none of the stores have accurate inventory something we aren't we aren't we talked about earlier and so they just can't fulfill your order properly like they're missing stuff and they make mistake eggs. Phone number 3 store pic doesn't scale and so his point is is store pick ever got really popular the customers in the store would be. Derogatorily affected as they're competing with all those employee Pickers in the store so then the customers will get irritated that they're losing out on the. [1:04:01] To the to the Picker and staying in line behind too many pictures in the cashier and. Scot: [1:04:06] This happened the other day I went to Harris Teeter Saturday night and there was more employees picking and instacart people picking, then us and daddy's giant things that you have these relatively kind of pallet size cards that you haven't seen him and it is it is cumbersome, I can tell our grocery store is also throttling so they have you know, when I go like a Friday to get started delivery it's already sold out so I think they're really limiting the number of deliveries which is another bad customer experience you're stuck between you know who's going to have the worst customer experience in-store person or the outer person and that's a, that's a tough tough decision to make for the customer. Jason: [1:04:46] For sure so that was all super interesting so this is two guys that were lobbying heavily in favor of dedicated delivery centers versus the the store picking model again there just are so many grocery stores that have all this investment like it's hard. They're going to be the best they can with the model they have but then he had another Insight which I totally haven't thought about it all that's super interesting. FreshDirect is launching a sub brand service call. And foodkick is 1 hour delivery normally FreshDirect is next day delivery. And so what are you wanting out is he said only about 40% of food purchases are planned purchases. So I'm going to do my grocery shop I'm going to shop from the list and it's fine that all those groceries get delivered tomorrow cuz I'm putting it in the fridge

Ryan and Dan start off the show by talking about the movie they reviewed earlier that day, Jason X ! The movie is about some asshole serial killer ( Jason from Friday The 13th ) who goes to the future and kills almost everyone he sees because he's a dick. The movie starts off by Jason getting frozen and then rediscovered 400 years later by humans from another planet. They find out that Jason is worth a lot of money so they try to revive and unfreeze him. Little did they know that he's killed over 100 people and doesn't give a fuck ! Keep in mind that the majority of the movie is on a space ship and the explorers are trying to get Jason to a space station to trade him off. So Jason unfreezes and starts doing what he does best, sneaking up on defenceless people and killing them in a badass way ! Jason's first victim on the space ship was a girl by herself in the room guarding him who looks like Howard Sterns wife. So she gets her face frozen by liquid nitrogen and then Jason smashes it on the counter ! Then he walks over to a room where a couple are making out and then he stabs the guy with a machete and pulls it out from the handle side of the machete ! Then he walks away and leaves the girl because I guess it was too easy of a kill or he couldn't think of a cool way to kill her so he sadly walked away. At this point other crew members on the ship are catching on that Jason escaped and is killing people ! So there's a change of plans, kill Jason ! His next target is the pilot who gets brutally murdered by the machete ! So now there's no pilot... for the rest of the movie. Then like hours later the ship crashes into the space station and blows up the massive station and the ship makes it out without a dent somehow. So while the ship is ghost riding without a pilot, Jason is still on the loose ! The only people on the ship with killing experience are 4 army members, who happen to split up on the search for Jason. So obviously Jason absorbs 170 + bullets and kills all of them ! One of the guys lands on a massive upside screw and get death spiked. One of the crew members finds him and reports back to the rest of the team saying " he's totally screwed ! " The crew members find out that they can't kill Jason so they try and escape by calling a space uber. So the few remaining crew members plant dynamite all over the ship and escape with the space uber pilot ! As soon as they get far enough they blow up the ship and unfortunately didn't do shut to Jason because he starts flying through space rift at the uber ship ! One of the few remaining people has sacrificed himself by putting on a space suit and jumping out to attack Jason ! The movie and Ryan and Dan's show ends by them talking about Jason falling down to earth like a flaming meteor !

This is the VERY FIRST episode of our new show THE CONSPIRACY CORNER! My co-host is our good friend Alex who did a show years back when we just started. He will be a great addition to the group and he brings lots of enthusiasm and heart to everything he does. So Jason and I welcome him wholeheartedly to the fold. on this inaugural episode we talk about the Mandela effect, alternate realities and we deviate some but I promise you its fun for your ears. So please take a listen and subscribe! We appreciate your support and will will be building more podcasts for our group all under the They Came From the 80's umbrella. Its time to build our empire!!!

Jason and Alan are joined by Mike Blumenthal of getfivestars.com who is a well known expert in local search and "in the know" about Google and all things search! Local search. Google Q&A. Reviews. These are all things that you need to know about as a business owner and dentist. So Jason and Alan went to the expert. Not the "dental" expert but the overall expert. Mike Blumenthal has been in this space for years, blogging at blumenthals.com and now helping people grow their business and understand search at getfivestars.com. Links from the show: Google Q&A The Voices of Dentistry Summit 2018 (January 26-27th at the DoubleTree in Scottsdale, AZ)! Up to 16 hours of CE and a chance to meet your favorite dental podcasters for the ridiculous price of $897! The Dental Hacks Nation closed Facebook group has over 20,000 members! Head over there to interact with other Dental Hacks listeners, guests and Brain Trust members every day, all day! Remember...if you don't have any thing "dental" on your FB page, we might decline your membership request. So IM the group or email us at info@dentalhacks.com. We're pretty big fans of Cosmedent's Renamel Nano Plus composite. Use coupon code "HOLIDAY" when you purchase and you can get their "buy 2 get 1 free" deal until January 1st, 2018! Check it out at www.dentalhacks.com/nanoplus Do you do ortho? Bioclear goes with ortho like beans go with rice. Like Donny and Marie. Bioclear can tweak ortho finishing results in a minimally invasive way with stain resistance to boot! Go check it out at www.dentalhacks.com/ortho Go Hack Yourself: Jason: Microcyn Al: Finish by Jon Acuff If you have any questions or comments for us please drop us an email at info@dentalhacks.com or find us (and like us!) at www.facebook.com/dentalhacks. Or, if you prefer...give us a call at (866) 223-5257 and leave us a message. You might be played in the show! If you like us, why not leave us a review on iTunes? It helps us get found by like minded people and might even help us get into "What's Hot" in the iTunes store! Go to this link and let the world know about the Dental Hacks! Finally, if you aren't an Apple person, consider reviewing us on Stitcher at: stitcher.com/podcast/the-dentalhacks-podcast! If you would like to support the podcast you can check out our Patreon page! Although the show will always remain free to download, our Patreon supporters get access to special bonus content including (at least) one extra podcast episode every months! Also be sure to check out the Dental Hacks swag store where you can find t-shirts, stickers coffee mugs and all sorts of other things that let the world know you're a part of the Hacks Nation!  

Welcome back to The Vegas Tourist Podcast.  In today's Podcast, Mark is joined by Minnesota friend and fellow blogger, Jason Hetland from The Rodeo Round-Up. This year has seen some changes to the Las Vegas events calendar and the moving of some dates for sporting events. The NASCAR Victory Lap was moved back a week. The Pro Bull Riders World Finals was moved a month and the National Finals Rodeo is the second week in December.  A week later than past years.  So Jason has been jet jumping back and forth between events. We caught up with each other halfway through the 2017 Wranglers National Finals Rodeo. (WNFR) to talk about all the changes, the winners and the updates as well as seeing what He has been up to in Las Vegas since he arrived.  

Today on the Healthpreneur Podcast we have an interview with the one and only Jason Phillips. Jason created a nutrition coaching platform that has been used to help tens of thousands of people. And he’s done some pretty amazing things along the way, like scaling his business to over $100,000 per month in about two and a half years. Just for the record, it took me about three years to crack $100,000 per year—he’s doing $100,000 per month.  So Jason is doing some really cool things with his business. But he’s also just a great, heart-centered guy. He’s in it for the long haul and he wants to impact a lot of lives. You’ll see that one of the big themes in our discussion is the journey. There’s no magic pill.  Jason is also going to talk about how he evolved from a scatter-brained, chasing-shiny-object type of entrepreneur, to being much more focused and driven based on his vision. Definitely worth a listen, there are a lot of great nuggets in here. In this episode, Jason and I discuss:  How to get away from working 16-20 hour days  Replicating yourself  Why it’s called nutritional coaching  Deadlines  Speaking gigs  Delayed Gratification  4:00 - 9:00 - Jason’s California trip and his certification program  9:00 - 15:00 - Replicating yourself  15:00 - 22:00 - The evolution of Jason’s certification  22:00 - 27:00 - Giving without expectation, the marshmallow study  28:00 - 36:00 - There’s no magic pill  36:00 - 40:00 - The rapid-five questions 

In Episode 79, we welcome Jason Goepfert, founder of SentimenTrader. Per usual, we start with Jason’s background. It involves listening to margin calls, when “real emotion” would come out. Jason tells us anger and panic were what you would hear, and that people are not necessarily rational. These experiences and others eventually led Jason to launch Sentimentrader which is, according to its website: “an independent investment research firm dedicated to the application of mass psychology to the financial markets… Our focus is not market timing per se, but rather risk management. That may be a distinction without a difference, but it's how we approach the markets. We study signs that suggest it is time to raise or lower market exposure as a function of risk relative to probable reward. It is all about risk-adjusted expectations given existing evidence.” The guys discuss some of the mechanics of Sentimentrader – the time-frames of the various models, the inputs, and how most people want just one indicator (but that’s not the best way). Meb asks for an example of one of Jason’s favorite indicators – it turns out to be the VIX, sometimes known as the market’s “fear gauge.” As of the time of the podcast, the VIX is quite low. One might assume this means it’s about to pop, but Jason tells us nothing works 100% of the time, with Meb noting it can stay low for a long while. Meb asks how investors – specifically long-term investors – should use indicators like the VIX. Should they pay attention at all? Jason tells us you can use these indicators for color. Meb throws in a funny aside about a “seafood tower” indicator – the idea being when times are bad, no one orders the seafood tower, but when times are good, towers are stacked at all the tables. And it just so happens, Meb recently had a meal out in which the table wanted a seafood tower…as did at least three other tables at the restaurant that night. The conversation bounces around a bit, with interesting back-and-forths about the AAII and Investor Intelligence surveys, the potential for “observer effect” to be skewing some results, and how every bull/bear cycle is different and people put too much weight on the market event that’s just happened. Jason tells us that many investors are now saying, “well, stocks probably aren’t going to peak because we’re not seeing the same kind of optimism we saw in 2007.” But 2007 was probably a once-in-a-lifetime type of a peak (and 2009 was a once-in-a-lifetime type of a bottom) – so we shouldn’t expect to see the same readings at those turning points. The guys breeze through a fun topic next: whether Twitter should be considered a useful sentiment indicator. Jason tells us it’s wonderful and horrible. The problem is we self-select and tend to follow people with a similar mentality as our own. So, we’re largely just in a bit of an echo chamber of our own opinion.   Meb and Jason go on to cover margin levels and the commitment of traders before discussing the contrary indicator of magazine covers. It turns out magazine covers are not the great contra-indicator they’re purported to be. Finally, the guys turn to today’s markets, with Meb asking how the world looks to Jason given his experience with sentiment. Jason tells us U.S. equities are optimistic, but not necessarily overly optimistic, and bonds and gold are both “meh,” neither registering any extreme sentiment readings. Meb asks which asset classes around the globe are, in fact, registering extreme readings. Jason tells us we’re seeing some extreme readings in cocoa, coffee, and grains – the soft commodity complex. He actually provides the name of a specific fund if you’re interested in playing this as an investment. There’s tons more in this great episode: how today’s cryptos are resembling the internet stocks of the late 90s… why it’s hard to buy, even when the sentiment indicators are signaling you should do so… and the time when sentiment called the markets nearly perfectly. And of course, there’s Jason’s most memorable trade. It involves a times when all the sentiment indicators were lining up together nearly perfectly. So Jason went in big…and lost big when things didn’t play out as he expected. What are the details? Find out in Episode 79.

JD & Special Guest Host Jason watch and review episode 114 of Dragon Ball Super. Stephen is gone this week. He got married or whatever, no one really knows. So Jason jumps in to talk about his favorite anime. Caulifla and Kale are after Goku. They want to be as strong, or even stronger than him. Kale gains control over her berserk form, which is not good for anyone else. Goku is forced to go into God mode, and easily overpowers the sisters. However, they have one more trick up their sleeve. Which may or may not be legal, that is tbd at the moment. Can Goku overcome this new foe?! Listen and find out on this episode of DragonBallerZ. Thanks for listening, subscribe and leave us a review. Follow us on Twitter: JD: @realjdlee Stephen: @stephenthebrit Jason: @vrtjason The show: @dragonballerz Check out our Patreon to get bonus content: patreon.com/dragonballerz See you next week for episode 108.

Our guest today is Jason Korman, who entered the world of consulting via the wine industry. Jason is the founder of Stormhoek Winery, a South African wine label. While running that label, he retained Hugh MacLeod to blog and draw for Stormhoek, creating one of the the web’s earlier social media campaigns. Even if you don’t recognize the name Hugh MacLeod, you have probably seen his cartoons, which are absolutely distinctive. Hugh’s cartoons are generally about the world of work and marketing, and the drawings are beautiful and abstract, often resembling a cross between Rube Goldberg and Pablo Picasso. I've been subscribing to his daily blog for years and years – check it out at GapingVoid.com My hero Seth Godin is a huge fan of Hugh, and I think that’s how I first discovered him.  Hugh is also the author of the book Ignore Everybody, which I highly recommend. So Jason hired Hugh, and the campaign that Hugh developed was widely successful and won all sorts of awards – while the work helped sell wine, they found it was also helping people have important conversations. One thing led to another, and the winemaker and the cartoonist decided to set up a consulting firm, and the Gaping Void Culture Design Group was born. In our discussion, Jason tells me about how his firm helps corporate clients use art to drive cultural change. The firm is happy to partner with independent consultants, so if you are working to drive cultural change at your client, check out the website to explore if it might make sense to collaborate – visit gapingvoid.com

To continue our Marathon Movie #14 is Friday the 13th part 8: Jason takes Manhattan.  Fitting we release it on Friday Oct 13th :-). So Jason gets on a boat and goes to New York City, and well you will just have to listen to how we felt about that... So sit back relax and enjoy. Keep it Geeky 

Jason Momoa was the FIRST one to audition for GAME OF THRONES and the LAST one cast a year later. His cousins impact on his life helped him make a strong choice that ultimately landed him the role. But it took him a few years and a couple of classes to trust his instinctive strong choices and learn how to "audition". BAYWATCH discovered him in his native home of Hawaii among a 1300 person cattle call. Jason responded to a radio call announcing the audition that would pay him more than the daily rate of folding T-shirts at the family owned surf shop. Jason's unique look has always made him a different choice but also made opportunities few and far between. So Jason, with many of his close friends, formed the production company Pride of Gypsies which has made Jason into an all around film maker, writing, producing, directing and acting. Jason will always be remembered for his unforgettable role as Drogo in season one of GAME OF THRONES. Currently, Jason is Aquaman in the DC Comics JUSTICE LEAGUE and AQUAMAN in 2018. Check out Pride of Gypsies' BROWN BAG DIARIES, ROAD TO PALOMA and BRAVEN.

On January 6, 2016, Jason Hartman went on Brian Bain's Investor in the Family podcast and left little doubt that a long term buy and hold strategy for income properties is the path to real wealth. Brian Bain is a stock market investor, and wants Jason to break down the basics of investing in real estate rather than stocks. So Jason shows how a 30 year mortgage can lead to serious wealth production in multiple dimensions, unlike the single dimension of stocks (buy low, sell high). Brian fully admits to not being a professional investor, but aims to help people protect themselves from big mistakes while outperforming their benchmarks by building (and, most importantly, sticking to) their investment plan. Key Takeaways: [1:46] Jason's real estate investment backstory [8:07] Using income property as a multi-dimensional asset and tax write-off [11:17] A non-recourse loan protects you from a lender lawsuit [15:11] 6 ways government can handle underfunded entitlement programs [18:41] Aligning your interests with those of government and banks [21:10] Redistributing wealth through inflation rather than taxes [23:31] How thousands of people used single family homes to gain real wealth [32:52] A deal that doesn't produce income isn't a true investment [34:38] Long term investments are definitely the way to invest your money Websites: http://investorinthefamily.com

So Jason has recycled one of our segments an attempts to pass it off as a new one, but that’s ok because we’ve got plenty of news! Thor: Ragnarok adds another Jurassic Park star and Stan Lee is set to have his first feature length cameo (you’ll see what we mean). Batman gets a new outfit and the Power Rangers get a new Alpha 5. ​We could be more concerned about Chloe Grace Mortez’s change in career goals, but we’re still too worried about the Jumanji movie!!

Dennis has to review Human Centipede and Jason hates the result because he didn't throw up. So Jason angry now.

The Dental Hacks get email. Oh yes. We ask for it all the time and our listeners come through! So Jason and Alan have decided to set aside an episode to answer some email! We get into some pretty great questions from our amazing listeners! Some links from today's show:  The Dental Economics Principles of Practice Management Conference (Jason and Alan will be podcasting LIVE!) Sign up now and use the coupon code "HACKS" at checkout for a $395 discount on this amazing meeting! Please go take our dental podcasting summit survey The Voices of Dentistry dental podcasting summit is coming in January 2017! Go see the amazing line up and register right away! Be sure to use the coupon code "Hacks" for a $200 discount on the already amazingly low price! Go get yourself a 10% discount on Cosmecore, the official core material of the Dental Hacks podcast! (All podcasts have an official core material. That's a thing, right?) Bioclear GoDaddy Hover.com Salli saddle chairs RGP saddle chairs Go Hack Yourself: Jason: Adobe Stock photos Alan: Crescent dental chair cushions If you have any questions or comments for us please drop us an email at info@dentalhacks.com or find us (and like us!) at www.facebook.com/dentalhacks. Or, if you prefer...give us a call at (866) 223-5257 and leave us a message. You might be played in the show! If you like us, why not leave us a review on iTunes? It helps us get found by like minded people and might even help us get into "What's Hot" in the iTunes store! Go to this link and let the world know about the DentalHacks! Finally, if you aren't an Apple person, consider reviewing us on Stitcher at: stitcher.com/podcast/the-dentalhacks-podcast! If you would like to support the podcast you can check out our Patreon page! Although the show will always remain free to download, our Patreon supporters get access to special bonus content including (at least) one extra podcast episode every months! Also be sure to check out the Dental Hacks swag store where you can find t-shirts, stickers coffee mugs and all sorts of other things that let the world know you're a part of the Hacks Nation!

Join us for a discussion on the new Angel's Blade Blood Angels supplement. Oh also the bosses off in Mexico, Frankie is relaxing on the beach and Reece is still sending emails from the cabana. So Jason and Pablo are filling in. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Why I Switched from the Podcasts App to Overcast The last update from Apple broke their own software, and it left it there for at least a week. Never give your customers a chance to find an (alternative because they will). The creator of Overcast recently made it availabel for free (you can donate to help cover the cost $1 a month). Here are the features I love about it. If I share something I can not only share the episode, but send people to the location I am currently at. I can listen at surprisingly fast speeds and still understand the content A 60 second skip button that when I click on it repeatedly takes giant jumps to skip through bad content. It syncs via the internet so you can listen on your iPhone, switch over to your iPad and pick right up where you left off. You can even listen on their website (overcast.fm). I can see how much storage each podcast is taking up. In the end I love it, and according to the app I've saved 2 hours using the Smart Speed feature. VoiceStak is SpeakPipe on Steroids Let's You Capture Video Testimonials and Feedback 8:20 I love Speakpipe and I've been using it for years. This is a great tool to allow you to capture audio from your audience. You can then use it to build your email list, and you get notified via email when a new message arrives. there is a free plan for Speakpipe, and then plans start at $7/month. VoiceStak is a similar product that does everything Speakpipe does AND it allows people to send VIDEO messages (up to 5 minutes). You can integrate it to send videos straight to YouTube. It also has no limits on the number of messages you can receive a month, or how many you can store. The pricing starts at $17/month, but there is a very interesting option to purchase a lifetime option for $197 (so after 11 months you are basically using it for free). This might be handy if you have a business and you're looking to create a testimonials page. You could easily send people over to your site and using their computer, phone or tablet, they can leave a video message. You can use this on any number of sites, and you can place the widget anywhere you want. For more information check out www.schooolofpodcasting.com/voicestak Jason Bryant Turns His Passion and Expertise Into a Career with Podcasting Jason Bryant has had a goal of working as a sport commentator his whole life. Starting as a teenager in his high school he has slowly been given opportunities and taken advantage of each one. His hard work, dedication, and passion created impactful results. What results? He was asked to participate in other events. As the old saying goes, "Lather, rinse, repeat." After getting caught in the crossfire of media politics again, Jason decided he would strike out on his own. He was listening to Satelite radio and heard one coaches show, and another, and another. He thought to himself, "I could do a show like this for wrestling." Jason contacted me, and hearing of Jason's experience and history, I asked, "What's the worst that could happen?" So Jason went to his school and got his first client. Fast forward and you see Jason doing 12 shows and running at Wrestling network at www.mattalkonline.com Here are some things we learned today. Jason knows his audience, so he had an idea of what to charge. However, it took him a year of tweaking to get it to where he is today. He didn't wait until everything was perfect. By getting his first client (going to those people you have a relationship with) it became easier to get his second and third. Jason who states, "I'm not a salesmen," has been helping potential clients see how they could run sponsors on their show and that money would pay for their podcast (and go right into his pocket). So the "non-salesmen" is helping his clients sell their podcast. So when you say, "I'm not ___" you may have those skills but no know it. Jason realized that its better to provide good content less frequently then a daily show that sucks. For more information about Jason check him out at www.mattalkonline.com Are You Thinking of Starting A Podcast? There is so much information out there about podcasting, some of it is great. Some of the information about podcasting is painfully outdated. Don't be one of those people with a drawer full of microphones they never use. Start your podcast in the right direction, with the right tools, and much less stress. Check out www.theschoolofpodcasting.com today.

This Episode’s Focus On Strengths Jason Treu joined me to chat about using your natural talents to build better relationships at work. He gives lots of ideas for building real connections.   What You’ll Learn Jason reminds us that business is not the only thing about your life. And he translates it into asking simple questions like, “what do you have planned for this weekend?” Those questions can build rapport very quickly. It’s about being human. And getting beyond conversations about spreadsheets. And he shares ideas on: Tapping into emotions (don’t worry, you don’t have to be a walking Hallmark card). Rapport, likability, and trust – getting beyond the surface in small talk so you can get to know a person. Being magnetic and irresistible, even when you feel awkward or quiet. Listening. I mean listening actively. And not thinking about your next topic while your conversation partner is still talking. Spreading the contagion of high fives. Allowing vulnerable moments. Stop trying to be perfectly perfect. Build on people’s ideas with a “yes, and” philosophy. Learn how to lead through a person’s strengths to be a better manager. Why you should consider offering the gift of a book (and Jason did this for me–what a delightful surprise to receive a book as a gift). Jason, if you’re reading this, I’m digging right in to Give and Take. Thank you for walking your talk!   Resource of the Episode Check out Jason’s book Social Wealth when you’re ready to go deeper on these topics.   Subscribe   To subscribe and review, here are your links for listening in iTunes and Stitcher radio. Subscribing is a great way to never miss an episode – let the app notify you each week when the latest question gets published. You can also stream any episode live on the website. Just click through the title you like and there will be a player waiting for you on each page. See you there!   Episode URL http://pinchyourselfcareers.com/build-extraordinary-relationships-through-your-strengths-with-jason-treu/   Read the full Conversation:   Lisa Cummings: Today you'll get some ideas on how to make career transitions and how to increase your success through the relationships you nurture and you'll get to do all of this with Jason Treu. So Jason is the author of a book called Social Wealth, and just like the title implies, the wealth part, it's not about the blinky kind of currency, it's about building extraordinary relationships and that's why it's social wealth. So Jason, thanks for joining. Jason Treu: It will. Thanks for having me on. Lisa, in speaking to your fantastic tribe. Lisa Cummings: They are fantastic and as you know, these fantastic people are all about exploring their strengths, how to find them, leverage them, and what it's like. What's your life is like when you do that. So let's give him just a little glimpse of your life before getting into your expertise. So think about your life and a peak experience or a peak moment where you can think about when you were in your relationship flow and can you tell us about what that was like for you? Jason Treu: Well, before I found the job that I have now been in business and executive coach, I was working as a marketing executive and I noticed that when I was on the road and doing roadshows with my usually my CEO of the company, I was with, you know, I'd be on fire. I would just be so passionate because I'd be speaking to different people. We'd be evangelists to whether it's financial analysts or media or customers or whatever it is. And I just be loving it. And you're right. And that was when I was in my peak because connecting and belonging are my core emotions, are my top emotions. And so having that ability to connect and feel that belonging and be passionate about speaking and evangelizing with something that I really got me excited in my life. Lisa Cummings: And I love that. You know, that the connecting and belonging matters for you. How did you find those values and how have you come to that to determine that those matter that much to you? Jason Treu: Well, one of the things is finding your purpose, so people typically mixed up a mission statement with a purpose because they say to themselves, well, my purpose is to help entrepreneurs or help you know my clients do better work, or whatever it is, but that's something external to you and everything external to you will let you down. So if you have your purpose outside of yourself, what happens with people as they go through some precipitative crashes in their life? Because eventually when that purpose lets you down, whether it's something you've unconsciously made or consciously, you really go through some significant trauma. But if your purpose is inside you, you don't. And when you attach it to emotion and your top emotions and figure that out, life really opens up for you. And how you really do that as an exercise. You know, you go back and recall your earliest happiest memories in your life. And from those you can extract your emotions that are in each of those memories. And then ask yourself what emotion would you rather feel and you can really uncover that. And what's really great about that is that although as you age, you will want your different experiences will be different. The structure and form of bad emotions will not. And so then when you can say to yourself, am I living my emotion? Am I living my purpose? And that's a little bit more than that, but that's really an easy way of taking a look at it for someone. So to see what they're doing. Because the problem for me in my job before was I was great when I was connecting and belonging, but I was, as I was going up the corporate ladder, I was sitting in my office more and more about myself and I was dissatisfied more and more so I realized at some point I connected the dots and realize well I'm better with people and I need to be with people all the time and not just part of the time. Lisa Cummings: Yeah, and your hitting on a topic and getting into things like emotion. I love that you brought that up straight away here because a lot of people shy away from that and the corporate space and they're afraid to talk about it or use that word and I think that one thing that's important as, hey, there are a lot of emotions that go well beyond the hallmark kind of emotions. I mean you might go through that exercise and recount all of the times where you just felt jubilant because you were riding your bike faster than anyone else on your street or because you won a track meet or something like that and you can start tracing back those. And those are emotions too. So that's cool to hear that terminology in this context because a lot of people shy away from it. Jason Treu: Yeah. And I think the great thing about it, I have a client of mine who's a CEO of a large company here in Dallas and he is extremely unemotional. His father was in the police force in Boston area and you know, they never showed emotion and I went through exercises like that earlier on with him and you know, probably like a month ago and then I working with about three months. He's like, I got to tell you a story, and I'm like, okay. And he was like, he told me he dropped off his daughter at summer camp and as he drove away, he cried for the first time in 25 years. Oh Wow. And he felt so good. And the ability, he said, the ability for him to actually open up to people, be more vulnerable, be authentic speak his truth and be generous, has transformed his ability to lead, manage and actually run his entire organization, which is a very large company. And I thought that, you know, that's a really critical thing because when you're not in touch with your emotions, you don't understand what drives you, you really become lost because you can't connect to other people. People don't buy facts and figures. They buy emotions and buying could mean anything, any part of the organization, right? It's everyone's selling something right and idea of thought or to a client partner or supplier, etc. Lisa Cummings: Yeah, and let's talk about that part where you get into the other. So building relationships, it's great if you can feel your own emotions and also watch what other people are feeling because it's going to inform you about how your connection. So okay. One of your key principles I've heard you talk about is that your career potential, your success happens because of your relationships with other people. So give us a tip on making the brand-new connections and not feeling awkward about it. Jason Treu: Right? So the building blocks of any relationships are rapport, likability, and trust and how you build a relationship quickly or you can take an existing relationship significantly farther is on the rapport side. You have to start tapping into people's emotions because emotions are what runs people. That's why they do everything that they do. So I find that people ask questions to other people that are just surface level questions. You know, where do you work, what are you doing or how's your weekend? And that's fine, but if you never get any farther than surface level, you will never really get to know a person and that's going to hurt you in your career because people make promotion decisions, they give you money, they do everything because they like you. And the more passionate they feel about you, the more they're going to advocate for you in anything that they do. Jason Treu: So in an easy way to ask this, I've done this to strangers all the time, is I ask people, what are you passionate about? What projects are you working on that you're passionate about? And in fact, I did that a month ago to a woman. I was at a charity event and I asked her, you know, what's, what are you passionate about? And she told me she's passionate about, you know, cancer, charity events. And I was like, well gee, that's awesome. I am too. And my mom had leukemia and I told the story about how she almost died and etc. And you know, this woman just lit up. She didn't. She told me a story about her sister having breast cancer and literally in a couple of minutes later she was crying and I'm sitting there and I gave her a hug and she introduced me to her friends like, this is the greatest guy you got to meet him, and so we carried on a conversation and all that. Jason Treu: My conversation between me and her was less than 10 minutes. Right? And then I created an emotional connection at that point that I could have done anything else. And in top of that, what you do then is you ask a person, well, what do you need any help with that? Are you having any challenges around that passion in your life? And then you can actually help people with the things they actually care about the most. And if you can do that, people will do anything for you, right? Because one, if you lead with giving, people know that you don't have a scorecard and the only people that don't have score cards with them are people in their inner circle. The closest people to them. And also there's a thing called the law of reciprocity. Meaning, people don't like to get things too far out of whack typically, so when someone gives the other person many times will at least give back in match that in that relationship and get back to even. So either way you can get pretty far and take relationships pretty quickly or take existing ones and really move them forward quickly. Lisa Cummings: Yeah. So okay. There's a situation that I keep hearing happening with the audience and they will buy what you're saying and when it comes to their peers and where they get tripped up is with exec senior executives that they want to build a relationship with, but for some reason the hierarchy gets this thing all out of whack for them. So let's say because you mentioned promotional opportunity in there, so that’s what prompted me to think about this. I keep hearing at where suddenly people feel more awkward or they feel that the opener that they might be pushing. Strangely if they come in and they're trying to make emotional connections. So when somebody is approaching a senior executive, they don't yet know who would be in a promotional power kind of situation or even just an org chart kind of power situation in their company. What would you do if anything that's different or would you do it totally the same? Say you're nervous around that person. How do you work through that? What's your first step? Jason Treu: I realized they're human beings too and they’re having a connection with me too. You need to understand that you have to learn about them. Right? And the business is not the only defining thing; their personal life really is and what their passions are. So I think a great thing is I ask people all the time is what did you do this weekend? What's on your agenda for the week? Right? Something like that. So I can try to find some things that they might really like, that I can find some common ground and build rapport quickly with them. Especially if I don't have very much time because at least you can build some quick rapport with that. The other thing that you can do is some more technique on mirroring and matching them, and that's a very powerful way because most communication is nonverbal, so you can, if you mirror how someone is, speaks, the tone of their voice, if it's high or low, if they're animated, not animated on the space in between them to make sure you have the proper space. Jason Treu: If you can actually match their movements a little bit, you don't need to be like mirroring every possible thing, but the more that you can do, the more helpful it will be because people like people that are like themselves or the people that they want to be like. So you need to build that rapport on both sides of it, the verbal and nonverbal because then it's a way a quicker way to build a relationship that matters for them. Right? And how they see you in view and you because people make snap decisions really quickly. So you want to go in there and do that in plus most people are not really interested in the other person, right? Or they're trying to ask them business questions or they're trying to get it and they're trying to an angle and when you try to do that, the other person knows because again, most of communication is nonverbal so people know when you're trying to get something from them or you're trying to run your own agenda on them. I try to go into with a contribution mindset, like how can I help someone else and how can I get to know them? Right. And that is what I'm always acting like in everything that I do and everyone I meet. Lisa Cummings: Yeah, I love those. And I like the weekend one because it's easy. It's repeatable. I mean, if you give someone that tip alone and they go ask five people that same question, then they have something also to follow up and take the conversation beyond later because you can say, hey, how'd your triathlon go that weekend? Or how was your son's play? And then it fuels future conversations as well. And then on the mirroring part, one of the simplest of all of those is the kind of the pace and the tone of that person. So that's an easy one. If it's too much mentally to handle having all sorts of things to watch, for just the pace of their conversation. Trying to match that and bring it up a level or down a level can really be helpful. Jason Treu: The other thing to do too is that if you know, something I think often we don't do is trying to do that little bit extra. Like perhaps you find out when their birthday is and you know, you give them a card or perhaps that you decided to get a book and just buy a book and you know, write a little note saying, I thought you might like this book and you know what? You may not even know what they like, but if you go find a business book that you really enjoy, odds are that person will. And even if they never even read it, the fact that you were thoughtful and did something like that, you're immediately going to stand out because you know what, no one does that. I've talked to senior execs all over the place. I've asked them that question because I bring people books know, and I ask. So when's the last time someone's brought your book? Never, Jason Treu: You know. And that's the question. That's almost always the answer. Never. Or it will be someone that they know really, really well. So if you're an organization you want to stand out, why would you not do something like that? Because it's a $10 investment in your future and it's an easy thing to do for other people and, you know, you won't ever be wrong because someone will least appreciate the thought. And that's what matters the most. Lisa Cummings: Yes. And it could really go well as an opportunity to notice something that you appreciate about their leadership style, where if you read this and say, hey, when I read this, I thought of you. It's almost as if you contribute it as an author. And then they realize, of course they liked the generosity and that you thought of them and that you would, you know, get grab a book for them. All of that is great and you noticed something that they're doing well and you're reinforcing their strengths and just because they are a higher level in the org chart, then you are at that point, doesn't mean they don't like to be appreciated as well. And those things they stick in the memory. Jason Treu: Yeah, because often as a pretty lonely existence because my clients that are that level, you know, they have no one to talk to, right? Because they have a board over them or they're on the board and the people on the leadership team like, you know, that's a difficult challenging conversations. They can share something but people below in the organization, they really can't. Right. So they're often very alone and lonely in that role. And so they want people to actually embrace them. And I think the way to do that as well have been talking about today and realize that they're not sitting on some high mountain and they want to be a part of something else in the organization itself is just filling a role that makes it many times very challenging to do so. Lisa Cummings: I like how this topic is really getting into a feeling of being a magnetic person and in a lot of ways you're doing that by offering that same sentiment out to someone else. And I think you've gone as far as calling it irresistible, like you believe anybody could be irresistible. So for a lot of people when they hear that term, that feels way far away from where they are today. So what are a couple of steps? Let's just start with the first one. What do you do out of the gates? When you don't feel like an irresistible person, you want to build better relationships at work with all the people around you. Get us a starting point, Jason Treu: Listen. You know, very few people actually listen. How many people do you know are thinking about the answer? And everyone listening, ask yourself, how many times are you really listening to someone or are you finding the answer in your head before they finished the sentence? Right? And I think being an active listener is one of the skill-sets that seems so simple in like, oh yeah, how can they make a difference? But it makes all the difference in the world because when you actually listen to someone and give them positive feedback, it's amazing what can happen, right? And be an active listener along the way because you know they have feelings too and they have emotions and I think that's something that is really important to do in the process. The other thing is just be excited. Be passionate and be enthusiastic. You know what I mean? Jason Treu: They've proven that happiness and enthusiasm is contagious so you can actually change someone's state right in front of you by being happy, enthusiastic, and being excited. And I do it all at a time and prove it out. My friends were. I go anywhere what I do anything or done it all the time in organization. I might go in and I've hired five people and it's wonderful, right? If I see a client's really down, I get always more exciting and I’ll five them, or I'll do something just because I want to get them excited. You know what? Instantaneously their state changes and if you're around in doing something like that with people, that's amazing. I think the other thing is what we don't do is actually share vulnerable moments with other people and we don't really tell them about ourselves. We try to be perfectly perfect instead of imperfectly perfect. And when you actually are vulnerable and authentic with people, you make it okay for them to be dumb selves around you because they don't need to worry about being perfect. So I love to lead with being vulnerable and telling stories about things that are going on in my own life or things that are not going well so I can actually create a level of… it's not even beyond rapport. It's that emotional connection as a human being and what's going on and people's struggles. Right, and that again, then and you can listen to what they're saying and you don't solve it. You don't know. You don't need to come up with a solution or try to fix it. All you need to do is be empathetic and listen. Right, and a lot of times that's the best thing because sometimes when you're offering solutions and trying to help people, people look at it as you're not really listening. You're trying to fix them. Lisa Cummings: Yeah, I love the phrase “perfectly imperfect” too, and that sharing that stuff is. It's not about the thing itself, it's that you're willing to share the story and that you've become human to them and then you get the emotional connection and the listen thing. Let's back up to that because, this is big and there are many factors. There's obviously the huge number of distractions that people have that keep them from listening and then when I've been around people are trying to listen better, I've also noticed that one thing that's missing from the equation is actually acknowledging back that they actually heard what the person said. I mean, they might be watching, they might be hearing the words yet kind of to that point of pre planning what you're going to say next, even if they're trying to focus intently, just bringing the conversation through instead of it being a choppy, you know, you're saying your part. I'm saying my part. So I think that's another good step is acknowledging, oh, I loved, oh, okay. Here's a perfect example. Let's get real meta here when you said perfectly imperfect. And I said, oh, I love that phrase. Perfectly imperfect. This is a small way of listening and paraphrasing what you said yet it's at least acknowledging I heard that and I made some meaning out of it and let's break it down a little bit more. Jason Treu: Yes, and that's the thing, that important point, if you can bring part of what their content of what they just said to you back into your first statement or two that will make the other person's feel like they've been heard and that you actually listened to them because otherwise you wouldn't have been able to do it. And that's like that's what they call active listening. Right? Versus focusing on what you're going to say and getting out what you need and not in just asking them a question, not because you want to hear what they have to say but more because you want to get your point made. Lisa Cummings: Exactly, and I noticed something that in the way that you hold a conversation personally that you say a lot of yes and not literally. You do a lot of “yes, and” and that can be another great one and listening that you're modeling is instead of saying sometimes you're going to disagree with somebody and instead of jumping right in with your defense or your butts or your other way to view things can say yes, I see where you're coming from on x and here's another way we could also consider it. And that is a way to throw in another perspective without shutting down what that person said. And I love how you've been modeling that here. Jason Treu: Yeah, that's important thing. “Yes, and”, and the other thing too, for managers out there I think is really helpful to do is when someone comes to you with a problem or a challenge, you spend five percent on the challenge and making sure you define specifically what it is, but 95 percent of the solution and what I tell people all the time is when someone comes into your office or your cube or wherever it may be an ask a question, you should ask back, okay, well what are three suggestions to solve this problem? Right? Or what are a couple ways that you believe they can solve the problem? And if they say to you, well, I don't really know, then I say to them, well, if you did know, what would you say? And if the person continually doesn't give an answer saying, well, you know what? I tell them to come back when you have some things; are there some ways that you think you could possibly solve it, right? And it doesn't have to be right, but I want to know that you actually thought this through more and you force people. It's like fishing, right? If you teach people to fish, they can continually do that, but if you give them this fish will always need your help and when people walk away from that conversation and they've solved their own problem, he feels smarter and they feel like, wow, like that's awesome. Like I can do this on my own. right, and that's a really powerful way, again, to build an irresistible brand for yourself and other people because people want to be around those people because you're lifting them up, right and you're helping them and it's a fantastic way and very few people do that. Jason Treu: Most managers give the solution and they say, well, no, that's not right. Do it this way. Right? Well, the other person then feels like they walked away and that they were broken or they did the wrong way and it will because the manager didn't take the time which would have helped the manager have a better relationship and the employee be way more motivated and proactive moving forward because they're excited about being in a learning environment where you know where being wrong isn't panelized. What's wrong is not having any thought or any idea and not communicating it forward. Lisa Cummings: And it's such a fun skill to practice as a manager because it's actually easier to ask back and the tendency is, okay, well yeah, I have an idea in my mind I could offer up this advice and instead of doing that, I love how you did the three options. That's cool too because the person who's coming in with a problem, they might have an idea of a solution. They probably feel stuck, but they have a solution that they don't love yet. Or they would have taken action and started solving it, so to say what are a few options? It gets them feeling open enough that they could throw out bad options and then it's good options and then work through them. So that's a really cool too. Jason Treu: And if you're a manager, what you can’t say back, let's say someone throws out an idea and you're like, wow, that's not really right. You can say to someone, you know, I can see how you could think that that can be an option. Right? And you know, and then you can sort of guide them by asking another question. We'll have you have you thought or considered, you know, doing x, y, or z, right? And you can lead them down the path by asking them questions and having the other person then give answers back, right? In guiding them through the question sets to get to the answer right then. And then you can say to him, see, you knew the answer, right? I may have had to help guide you a little bit, but all along you had the answer inside of you. So I want you to continually start looking inside of yourself because you're a smart, motivated, intelligent individual, and you can do anything you want if you set your mind to it. Right? And I helped you a little bit along this process, but now you see that you can do this yourself, right? So I'll be excited next time when you come to me and we go through this process and we see how much quicker you're going to get to the solution. It's got way more motivating. Someone was walking out of an office like that or somebody who's been told the answer, what do you think is going to motivate and get people excited? Right, Lisa Cummings: Right. Obviously the second one, and it also, if you tie this to strengths, it's such a beautiful way to have a conversation because everybody problem solve a little differently. We have different thoughts, patterns of thoughts and behaviors and that influences how we solve problems and how we process what's going on around the world. So when you as a leader asks somebody else how they're thinking through the issue, you're helping them use their strengths to solve the problem and you're also learning how they think and then you're learning how to lead in a way that supports that person individually. So it does so much beyond even just getting the answer to the problem; it really does help you individualize your style to that person. Jason Treu: Yeah, I think it's really important. And you know, the last thing for managers to. I think it's important to really understand your employees and understand where they're at, because you know one of the challenges I've been finding, I was just doing some sales training a few weeks ago and I was talking to people and I was doing more inner work than I was doing actual strengths that they would be using in the external world. What I found when people were coming to me, marital problems, some people had abuse other things that had gone on in their life and this is the things that were holding them back. So I think we've got to realize that when people walk into a business or organization or work remotely or whatever they're going to do, they don't leave their personal life at the door. It goes with them. So you have to get to know people. Jason Treu: You have to understand what people are doing and you have to support them and be empathetic and possibly even get them help because that's affecting their work performance and affecting the bottom line. And if you try to gloss over that, you're missing a huge opportunity to uplift people and really improve the bottom line. Because people who are more happy and motivated work harder because when you are in a negative mindset or sad or frustrated or angry; the first thing to go with self-discipline and momentum and motivation. Every time. You've heard this before, people say, well, I'm not motivated. I'm not this, I'm not that. Well, you know, one, if you get happy, excited or really joyful in your life, you're going to be more motivated. The other thing is you've got to take action in your life, but you're less likely to take action when you're in a negative place. Lisa Cummings: Yes! And there are stats from Gallup that they've put out and have studied this really deeply and those who focus on their strengths and focus on what's right about them in the workplace are six times as engaged with their work. So it's a significant difference in the way that you feel. Jason Treu: Yeah, and I think that's how you find out your strengths a lot of the times too is you know, you got to help people figure those out and see where their challenges are as well. Right? And help them with their own blind spots and weak spots and help them alleviate those or bring those up, work around it. Right. And figure those out. And I think that these are ways for you as a manager and also to manage up and you can see that in other people as well, once you get more in tune with them on an emotional level and started connecting with them and they've done all the studies that the managers today that are succeeding and the people they lead are succeeding because they have vulnerability and authenticity; they are key leadership traits because end of the day, that's what influences other people. And that's what creates charisma. That's what creates persuasion and at the end of the day that creates leadership. Lisa Cummings: So I know a lot of people are going to want to get their hands on social wealth because there'll be thinking about the charisma and building their leadership and building those relationship skills. So for everybody who wants to get more of Jason, where can they find you, where can they find your book and how can they dig into your stuff? Jason Treu: So you can go to https://jasontreu.com/(updated, February 2019) it's all one word and you can find my coaching. There are tons of free guides on branding, networking, you know, how to email busy people. There's tons of things and self-development as well and there's stuff on my coaching as well there. And then you can go there also to Amazon to get my book and audio book. Lisa Cummings: Wonderful. And that is called Social Wealth. So thanks so much for joining Jason. This has been really cool to look at relationships and emotional connections. Jason Treu: Well, thanks a lot. At least I appreciate the opportunity to speak with you and your audience and know they're all fantastic and just go out and take on the world.  

In critical spawning and overwintering habitat for salmonids Hwan studies the effects of temporal stream fragmentation across three organizational levels of ecology: population, community, and ecosystem levels.TranscriptSpeaker 1: Spectrum's next Speaker 2: [inaudible].Speaker 1: [00:01:00] Welcome to spectrum the science and technology show on k a l x Berkeley, a biweekly 30 minute program bringing you interviews featuring bay area scientists and technologists as well as a calendar of local events and news. Speaker 3: Hi, my name is Brad Swift. I'm the host of today's show. Our interview is with Jason won a third year phd student in the Carlson lab, which is [00:01:30] part of the environmental science policy and Management Department of the College of natural resources. Professor Stephanie Carlson directs the lab and she is a fish ecologist. Jason is researching the effects of summertimes stream drying on fish ecology in the John West fork, a creek in Marin county. The John West fork is the spawning grounds for two varieties of salmon the summer of 2011 Woolmark the third year of his research on this stream. [00:02:00] His research will continue for two and possibly three more years. This interview is prerecorded and edited. Speaker 4: Jason, welcome to spectrum. Thanks for coming in. Thank you. Wanted to ask if you could, uh, give us a brief overview of your research and add in there how it's being funded. My research is looking at the effects of low summer flow on juvenile steelhead, on the insect communities out in the stream and [00:02:30] on certain ecosystem processes such as Algal production and leaf decomposition. And it's currently being funded by, mostly by my, by my guiding professor, Stephanie Carlson. And I also have some funding from our department and the division within our department. All right. We get out a sperm wildlife grant, which helps fund the research. And also I'm currently on an NSF graduate research fellowship. Described the, the general [00:03:00] area of the site that you chose. Sort of put it in context of where it is. So my study say, uh, the John West work is in point Reyes national seashore, which is about an hour north of Berkeley in a national park in and surrounded by some state parks. Speaker 4: Also. Can you explain the watershed and the area that you're working, how it all interrelates to the watershed? So I'm, I'm working in the Lagunitas watershed. I'm working [00:03:30] in a creek that is a tributary of a tributary of a creek to the lock Anitas to log in neatest creek and log Anitas creek flows into Tomas Bay in point rays. The creek that I'm working in is a little different in that there are only two species of fish up there. Both our salt Monets, there are still head and coho salmon. This is because it's not that the creek went dry, completely dry one year and there's, there [00:04:00] was a culvert that was put in place and other fish species weren't able to recolonize the creek, but someone had adults can jump over the barrier. And so they were able to recolonize the creek and they're actually jumping through the culvert. Speaker 4: Yeah. And through this culvert and swimming up swimming into the two John West work. And what's the drop on the culvert like from, from the the bottom lip to the dead of the bid. Lower part [00:04:30] of the creek. It's about four feet. Four feet drop-off. Yeah. So that's quite a leap for the salmon. Yeah. And so with this study, what is it that you're trying to learn? That is not already known. So I'm basically trying to look at the effects of low flow and my study is really looking at what the affects are at a really fine scale. So I'm tracking, uh, juvenile steel head growth, movement and survival and I'm tracking them on a weekly basis. So [00:05:00] it's pretty fine scale monitoring, which is something that hasn't really been been carried out before. And the low-flow period is when, uh, the low, the low flow start after the last records. Speaker 4: And as the, as a temperature gets warmer, the stream starts to dry and it pretty much lasts throughout the summer until the first rains of the following year. Are you collaborating with other people on your project? Not directly with my lab mates on [00:05:30] my project. Sometimes they might come out and help me, but for the most part I've been working alone with the help of some undergraduates. There are certain side projects that we collaborate on. Um, there's also a person who is working with me from, uh, from a different department. He's not really working on my project, but, uh, something that's related to my project out on my field site. It mean it helps both of you? Yeah, definitely. And is that going to have some bearing is his, his [00:06:00] work or her work and I have some impact on your results. It definitely is connected. It is connected to, I'm more at the temperature and looking at how stratification and pull temperature stratification in pools might affect fish behavior. Speaker 4: So where, where they kind of hang out in the pool. So that's something that could definitely help us fold into your report. Yeah, exactly. So in doing your research [00:06:30] and working in the field as opposed to, uh, if you're working in the field and the lab, how much time do you spend in the field and in the lab? Um, when I'm out during the summer, uh, during my field season, it's a pretty big chunk of it. About 80 to 85% is probably spent in the field and the remainder is spent in the lab. Um, but once the summer is over and on, the field season is over. Most of the time is spent in the lab, um, [00:07:00] crunching data, processing samples and stuff like that. Speaker 5: [inaudible]Speaker 2: you're listening to spectrum on KALX Berkeley. Today we're talking with Jason Juan about his research into summertime streaming drying its effect on Fish CollagenSpeaker 5: [00:07:30] [inaudible]. Speaker 4: And so was there fish breeding going on in this part of the Stream? I would assume that that's the reason they're up there. Yeah. So one of the adults jump up into the stream. They breed typically during the winter when the rains, they come back with the rains [00:08:00] and they breed and the eggs hatch and spring. And then I kind of track the juveniles once they get to a large enough size to be able to monitor to them. So as you start to go up in the early spring, you're seeing lots of of small fish. Yeah. And it's so the fish that have spawned, have they left then or are do some stay? Yeah, but most of them have left. They're too large to stay in some of these pools. So most of them leave and with the Coho that or [00:08:30] they die right after they breed because they just breed once and they die. Speaker 4: But with the, with the steelhead, they're able to breed multiple times. And Are you tracking it all that mortality of the coho that are coming up and breeding? No, but the park service is definitely keeping track of adults, adult spawners they go up every winter and quantify the amount of a salmon reds, which are the nests that someone is build. And they also try to [00:09:00] keep track of how many fish, adult fish that they see. Talk about the insects in the fish in the same context of the frequency. So with, with the insects, um, it's, it's a pretty disturbing method to go and collect them. So we try not to collect them too frequently. We recollect them once at the beginning of the summer and again at the end of the summer. So we don't want to disturb the habitat too much that we have to kind of dig in [00:09:30] to the stream and it just disrupts, disrupts things a lot. Speaker 4: So we try to keep the frequency down and with the fish, um, we go out again, it's similar to to the insects that's we have to go and shock them and which as you can imagine, um, is quite stressful to the fish. So we shock them once in the beginning, beginning of the summer and we place pit tags into them, um, which allows us to monitor them across [00:10:00] the summer without having to actually handle them. Also, while we, um, capture them during the first event, we weigh them and measure them. And then during the late season capture event, we weigh them and measure them again and we're able to identify which the fish that were tagged, we were able to determine their growth rates and their survival. In addition, we can monitor them using the pet tags. We have a, a [00:10:30] handheld antenna that we take out and we just place it over the stream and we're able to find out where they're located or, and also if they're other still alive. Speaker 4: So that happens pretty much once a week. So the pet tag is like a radio. Gotcha. Yeah, it's an audio id, tariff id similar to what is found in a for pets, the microchips that they use for pets. And then you can also measure the mortality with that as well I guess if, yeah, so we go [00:11:00] out and we try to track their movement and also if we find a pit tag, we just kind of disturb the area around, uh, around the tag lightly. And if, if the tag isn't moving, then we kind of can surmise that there has been a mortality event that that occurred. Do you remove the fish or the die or now it's pretty hard to find them because we don't track them every day. So, so things happen [00:11:30] within the week and sometimes we kind of look around for the tag but it's pretty hard to find the tag. Speaker 4: But if we do come across any fish we do, we do take you back to the lab. Any dead Fisher and they are often tagged or have they not? Some of them are just untagged. We try to tag as many fish that we can capture at that are a certain size. They to be a certain size and size for them. So we do try to capture and tag every fish that is of [00:12:00] a certain size, but whether we do within that period of time that you can do the, that you're doing the tagging because you try to limit that. Yeah. How long is that period? What do you do? I've tried to do it all in a week. Three to four days. The tagging, the taking takes about three to four days. The caption and taking. And what's that like in terms of a process? Is it, is it you and a bunch of people doing it together? Speaker 4: Yeah. Take a little group out. Yeah, we actually took a group out, um, and we actually stayed out there for the three, three or four days. We wanted to get an early start [00:12:30] in the day and it takes about an hour to get, get out there each day. So we just decided to stay out there and it's actually quite fun. Um, most, most people really everybody volunteers to do to do like fish capturing. They're like, oh yeah, I want to do that. It's something that the interns really enjoyed. So is that time that you're in the creek, are you actually standing in the creek? So I, yeah, I actually get into the creek and I have a, an electrical Fisher and I move through the creek, [00:13:00] shocking the fish and there are a couple of them matters beside me on the scoop up any fish that had been shocked and we placed them into a bucket and then from there we kind of weigh them and measure them after, after all the fish have been captured for a certain pool. So you do this pool by Paul? Yeah, exactly. Speaker 5: You [00:13:30] are listening to spectrum on KLX Berkeley. We're talking with Jason y about his researching the summertime scream drying and its effect. Speaker 4: So Jason, how did you get interested in science when you were in high school, say or college? [00:14:00] I've always kind of really been interested in science as a kid. I really enjoyed reading science textbooks and it was as one of my favorite subjects and I just decided to stick with it. And I, I majored as a, as a biology student. And what about it appealed to you when you were young? It was like, it was the investigative process, [00:14:30] I guess that that appealed to me. It was just something that you can go out and observe and I really like that, that you can, you can actually just go out and see how nature works. And I was really fascinated by that. So biology was sort of the entree and then as you went through high school, College, yeah, I majored in biology and I really enjoyed my ecology class, just getting up out [00:15:00] there and I wasn't too keen on the molecular side of biology, but the ecological part aspect of it was really fun to get out there and observe things. And, and so it was it field work then that led you to streams? Yeah, I actually worked as a, as an undergraduate. I worked with a professor of mine and he would take me out into streams in southern California and it was quite a great experience for me. And what sort of work and studies research [00:15:30] was he doing? He was, he was doing, uh, population, uh, studies of endangered and threatened fish in southern California. Speaker 4: So when you're in the lab, what sort of data are you gathering? So for instance, with the leaf litter bags and the Algo production, um, when we come back from the field we have to process those samples. So we deploy tiles and we have to scrape off the LG from the tiles. And then we [00:16:00] have to run an analysis to quantify chlorophyll production. With the leaflet or bags that we set out, we bring them back and we, we way leaves in them and quantify how much leaf litter mass has been lost across time. What is it about the algae that you want to know in the river? With both the algae and the leaf litter, we want to see how the stream drying effects say Algal PR productivity or leaf litter decomposition. So we want [00:16:30] to see how much, how much Algo productivity there is in the early part of the summer when or when the stream is still pretty connected. Speaker 4: And then again, we want to track that change over time to see how productivity changes as the string gets dry and dry and with the leaf decomposition, same thing, seeing it over the, over the time, yeah. We want to see how decomposition rates change as the stream gets dryer and with that we're finding that decomposition rates slowed down quite a bit. [00:17:00] As the stream dries, there's less microbial activity, less insect funner to shut up the leaves. Are there other key data points that you're collecting out of the stream? Yes. I'm trying to measure the volume of water in the creek. Mostly the volume of water in between the pools of the fast flowing portions called riffles. I tried to measure how much water is in these portions and I go out pretty much every week and measure the dimensions [00:17:30] of the riffles and I'm able to get volume on every week and I'm able to quantify how this volume gets smaller and smaller every week. Eventually these, these pools are isolated and there's no more flow exactly. Between pools. Yeah. The, the riffles just most of them completely dry up by the end of summer. Speaker 3: And so the fish are then isolated in these, yeah, they're isolated. Speaker 4: The there aren't able to move among the different pools Speaker 3: at this point. Is it too soon in your study to, to [00:18:00] reflect on what you might conclude? Well, I'm, Speaker 4: I'm already seeing some pretty drastic inter-annual variation and precipitation in the area. So as I mentioned earlier, 2009 was a very dry and that was your first year? Yeah, 2009 was a very dry year, so I noticed that there was quite a bit of a mortality for the fishes. Uh, this past year, 2010 and during that summer was a lot wetter. There was a lot more habitat for the fish. A survival was a lot higher. So [00:18:30] Marty seen, uh, some significant results in terms of inter annual variation and how more extreme temperatures and extreme dry might influence the fish population. Speaker 3: Is there any part of water quality that you're measuring? Speaker 4: Temperature and a dissolved oxygen levels? Not In terms of pollution really, but a temperature and dissolved oxygen are are really key for [00:19:00] some almond species in particular, they require cool temperatures that are pretty well oxygenated. Speaker 3: The information that you're getting from your study will have an impact on other streams and creek management potentially. Yeah, that's, that's my hope Speaker 4: is that especially in certain areas where water withdrawals occur and there needs to be a certain amount of a water, hopefully our findings can maybe influence these areas where water withdrawals occur in the [00:19:30] stream comes even more dry than they typically should naturally. Speaker 3: Jason, thanks very much for coming in and talking about your research. Yes. Speaker 6: Oh, Speaker 7: [inaudible].Speaker 3: A regular feature of spectrum is dimension. [00:20:00] A few of the science and technology events happening locally over the next few weeks. Joining me this week to bring you the calendar is Rick Karnofsky. Speaker 8: In 1848 gold was discovered in the Sierra Nevada mountains luring people by the thousands to California. Join Ranger Tammy on Saturday, August 13th from 11 to noon to find out how this event changed the San Francisco Bay forever at the Bay model visitors center in Sausalito. This is a free event on Saturday August 13th at 4:30 PM Christopher de Carlo [00:20:30] will present how to be a really good pain in the ass. A critical thinkers guide to asking the right questions at Kelly's Irish pub, five 30 Jackson Street, San Francisco visit. Reason for reason.org for more info. That's r. E a s o n, the number four R e a. S. O. N. Dot. O. R. G. Speaker 3: The science at Kow lecture series for August will be presented by Dr Willie Michaelson and is entitled nanotechnology, Enabling Environmental Monitoring. [00:21:00] Dr Michelson is the executive director of the center of Integrated Nano Mechanical Systems known as coin's, a nanoscale science and Engineering Center headquartered at UC Berkeley dedicated to enabling and realizing novel environmental monitoring applications using nanotechnology. The date of the lecture is Saturday, August 20th at 11:00 AM in the genetics and plant biology building room. 100 Speaker 8: August 17th center night takes [00:21:30] place at the rickshaw. Stop. One 55 [inaudible] street at Van Ness in San Francisco from seven 30 to 10:00 PM at this $8 old age of show you'll hear talks about winery building, a virtual reality chocolate factory and neutrophils, one of the first immune cells to reach infection sites. Be there and be square. Visit SF dot [inaudible] Dot Com that's SF dot n e r, d an ite.com Speaker 8: nightlife takes place Thursday nights from 6:00 PM to 10:00 PM at the California [00:22:00] Academy of Sciences in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. It is 21 and over and pictures music, cocktails and exhibits centered around a theme. In addition, the regular exhibits such as the rainforest and planetarium will be open. August 25th nightlife is on dinosaurs. Paleo lab will present a fossil shone till featuring trilobytes Coprolites, Aka fossilized dyno poop and other amazing fines that are 65 to 500 million years old. Check out additional specimens from the academy's research collections and at dyno burlesque. Show [00:22:30] the planetarium will feature cosmic collisions, a fulldome show depicting the hypersonic impacts that drive the evolution of the universe, including a recreation of the meteorite impact that hastened the end of the age of dinosaurs 65 million years ago. Clearing the way for mammals like us to thrive admission is $12 for more info and for tickets, visit www.cal academy.org that's www dot c a l a c a d e m y dot o r g Speaker 3: [00:23:00] and now several news stories. This item from the inside science news service scientists battle the dramatic declines of honeybee colonies with targeted breeding. There are a handful of pests and diseases that individually and in combination are causing unprecedented mortality in [00:23:30] honeybee colonies in Europe and North America. Serious efforts are being made to find solutions that can eradicate the pests and diseases. While the search for a solution continues. Researchers in Canada and the United States are attempting to bees that are resistant to Mites and viruses that attack bee colonies. The breeding process exposes the Queens to high levels of what is termed disease pressure. According to Rob Curie, professor of entomology [00:24:00] at the University of Manitoba. The survivors are then bred next season and so on. Seven generations have been bred so far. We are looking for bees that are resistant to mites and with a greater tolerance to viruses because they appear to be the two main factors behind colony loss. Speaker 3: QRI said and added breeding attribute pursued by the Canadian breeders is the ability to withstand the brutal North American winters. Curious said [00:24:30] that normally only 46% of the species known as European honeybees survive the Canadian winter, but the newest generations have a 75% survival rate. The total losses from managed honeybee colonies in the United States were 30% from all causes for the 2010 2011 winter according to the annual survey conducted by the US Department of Agriculture and the apiary inspectors of America. [00:25:00] This is roughly similar to the losses reported in similar surveys done in the four previous years. This story from Metta page today, lab grown trickier implanted in patient June 9th, 2011 at the Karolinska University Hospital in hunting, Stockholm, Sweden. Dr Paolo Macchiarini implanted the first ever bio artificial trachea grown on a synthetic [00:25:30] substrate using the patient's own stem cells. The patient was a 36 year old cancer patient for this procedure. Dr Macchiarini and his colleagues collected stem cells from the patient who had late stage tracheal cancer since no suitable donor windpipe was available. The researchers used a nano composite tracheal scaffold designed and built by Alexander Se Follian Phd of the University College London. [00:26:00] They seated the polymer model with auto Lucas stem cells. These are blood forming stem cells and grew them for two days in a bioreactor. Dr Mk Jadine says there's no room for rejection because of the cells are the patient's own. Thus, there is no need for him to be on immuno suppressive drugs. Speaker 2: [inaudible] [00:26:30] occurred during the show is pointless on a David Kearns album, folk and acoustic made available for creative Commons license 3.0 attribution [inaudible] mm editing assistance provided by Judith White Marceline production assistance provided by [00:27:00] Karnofsky [inaudible]. Thank you for listening to spectrum. We are happy to hear if you have comments or questions, please send them to us via email address. Is Spectrum. K A l s yahoo.com Speaker 5: [00:27:30] genius at this same time. [inaudible] Speaker 2: [inaudible]Speaker 5: [inaudible] [inaudible] [inaudible] [00:28:00] [inaudible]. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.