Uncommon Advice
Business is a game you have to 'Play to Win' and it's the Uncommon Advice from Experienced Entrepreneurs that helps produce your winning playbook!
Uncommon Advice
Creating Amazing Ideas, Bad Leadership, and Sales vs. Marketing
Ever wonder how successful brands like Financial Maverick and American Centrist come to life and reach the right audience? Join us as we share our journey of creating the Sportsbred brand and crafting content that resonates with our target consumers. We also dissect the importance of leadership evolution and overcoming stagnancy, both in sports and business.
Join Nate as he sheds light on mental health and coping strategies that have worked for him, including his "walk and think" routine that clears his mind and helps him focus on the task at hand. Get inspired by his insights as we explore the significance of nurturing mental well-being amid a busy work schedule.
Finally, we touch upon the vital collaboration between marketing and sales teams in driving a successful business. Discover the importance of congruent messaging and learn how effective communication between these teams can lead to quality leads, closed deals, and a thriving company. Don't miss out on this episode packed with valuable insights and actionable advice!
If you want the Uncommon Advice that it takes to build a profitable lifestyle business then subscribe to my newsletter at https://natekennedy.com
Stay connected with me for more content like this:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/natekennedymd
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/natekennedymd
Twitter: ...
So let's dive on into another episode of Uncommon Advice. All right, miami Heat are still in it.
Speaker 1:We are. You know the Boston Celtics series. By the time this episode drops, we're going to be ahead. I'm just going to put it there. The Heat will be leading. I think I'll have them like leading. I think what? 3-2? I think they'll be in game six, or game five, three-one, it doesn't matter. I think it's a game six game series. Miami takes it, they'll win game six at home, but that will be good. And then the Lakers Nuggets. That's going to be a good series too.
Speaker 2:I don't know. I think I'm going to go with the Celtics on this one. So, kaden, my son, is a Celtics fan for some reason. So we'll be going for the Celtics. I'll let him know that you're going for the Heat. The Heat Talk a little trashed, you on the field Jimmy Buckets.
Speaker 1:Well, let's see if Jimmy can do it. Hey, last year, jimmy's words, we'll be back again this year and we'll get the job done. That was his words last year after he pulled up on game seven, on a one-on-one against Al Horford, he decided to pull a three, which I know why. He wanted to go for the win. They probably would not have been able to last an overtime. He tried to go for a three and it rimmed off the front of the rim. So he said this year they'll get it done. All right, it's going to be a title tell Well, hey, rematch. You know? oh, funny thing, you know how, the whole thing about the bubble Like everybody's saying the bubble is a fluke, because it was like a weird year, well, all those 14s that were in their conference championships are back in it Lakers, nuggets, miami Heat, miami Boston. So it's going to be a fun one.
Speaker 2:All right, it's going to be Celtics Lakers, so let's go, let's get in behind the marketing this week We want to dive into, we want to talk a little bit about, you know, how we come up with different ideas, how we come up with different brands, right? So we've talked in the past about financial Maverick being one of our brands and the audience that we go after with that and the subscriber count that and how it's growing. We've talked a little bit about American centrist on here and let's dive in And people are wondering, like, how do we pinpoint these brands that we actually want to go after, to build going forward? So for us, you know, a big thing is the audience that we're trying to attract. One, is it's something that we're interested in, right? Correct, is it a topic we're interested in?
Speaker 2:And then we want to because that's first and foremost right. You want to be able to kind of have some things that you're interested in. Actually, a lot of these brands we can are going into are spin-offs of the political sites that we've had for all these years, right? So we've got a lot of political new stuff and we now want to branch out and get into some more stuff that's just not political news, frankly and that has a little wider audience than just some of that stuff. So you know, that's an important piece and we're getting into the kind of stuff that we are talking about regularly anyways, and then curating that content And that's one of the big pieces.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely. I mean one of the things just jumping it off, nate, and you were bringing it up that we sit down and we look into something we like. We were having a meeting I think it was earlier this week where we're talking with Ashton and we're talking about this new brand called Sportsbred. We'll get into it a little more here, but you tell us and you're like what is it If you guys were to sit down and read anything in sports, what is something that will catch your attention?
Speaker 1:Right, and that's one of the things that we go into. We do our research, right, what is something we like? Research? is that going to be something the audience is going to like? but then it's like, when we sit down, is this something that we can read? Can we sit there and read it? Because if we can't, then that means there's more than likely, if we can't read our own thing, our audience is not going to read it. So that was a good point that Nate brought up is like find something that you will read and make it simple, and that's what we're doing. We're in the process of doing that right now with Sportsbred. Yeah, i'd say.
Speaker 2:You know, with Sportsbred is a little bit just to clarify a little bit of that. It's more of create something that you would read daily Correct, Because there's a lot of different options when it comes to news. There's tons of options. So for us, when we're getting into Sportsbred, we're identifying the people that we want to speak directly to, But it's also got to be something that we would read And I actually asked Ashden that for a reason, because he's also falls within the. I would say he falls within demographic of the consumer that we're looking to attract with Sportsbred And he's also in Sports, And so it's like what's something he would actually consume in three to five minutes a day to give him the information he wants, right, And so for one, it's identifying, like you just said, something. Create something other people want to read, that you would read on a daily basis, that others want to read. We're looking at the demographic of the. Who are we going to serve with this content? Who?
Speaker 2:is this brand, who is it going to serve? Because if we understand who we're going to serve, then we also know what products and what advertising dollars to go after to put within side of that newsletter, because we are monetizing a lot of these newsletters through advertising dollars.
Speaker 1:And we do it And we're looking at research. Right, I mean, there's competitors out there and it's even. If we find the competitors that are successful, it's like okay, like Nate mentioned in the last episode, people want us to try something new. Right, We can be doing the same sports, but maybe we're seeing it different or we're showing it different. Right, It's on all letters, Maybe it's more videos. So there is competitors out there that are very successful that we've been looking into And that's where we're going to run with that. I mean, researching is, I think, plays a big part of it. I've done it.
Speaker 1:I looked into three or four of them right off the bat that are doing it and each one has a different style. Each one one of them is like big on Twitter in beds. They grab different Twitter stuff and they put it. One is more they focus on the odds on Vegas, Like what are the odds of this series or what are the odds of this game? One is more detailed. One is more one content specific base where it's like major event happened last night. They just focus on that one event. There was one that was just a major focus on, like Tatum's 51, but there was one that had like 20 Twitter embeds just stuck on it and it was just small little short sentences And then the Twitter post. So each one has its own different spin off and flavor, which makes it unique.
Speaker 2:And for us, the, if you look at the marketplace of what's really big right now is the online gambling is growing rapidly. And actually I was just on a phone call with a guy who was telling me about a brand he's working on that they're launching out And he, his thing is what his excitement is. He goes we are in the infant stages.
Speaker 2:We're going to be getting at stages of online gambling in his mindset right And they have a product rolling out that sounded pretty awesome, that, frankly, would become an advertiser for us inside of sports spread, when we are are officially live and growing that, and it's you know that space in itself has a lot billions of dollars of advertising inside of it that are people are willing to spend. So if you build the audience, the revenue will come. so that's why it's super important. when I talk, we talk about million dollar audiences, it's because we know that if we build that audience, the advertisers will spend millions of dollars to get in front of it, and so that's why we focus so heavily on owning the audience as opposed to trying to go create the product, especially sports.
Speaker 1:I mean every, everybody at some point in their life. I won't I won't say everybody, but I say a large percentage or a large majority. At some point in the life I had some involvement with sport and if you didn't, i know people that never play sports, where their fans huge fans of sports. I have a buddy who You can tell him right now, throw five yards. You can't, he probably can't even throw two, but the man's like a diehard dolphins fan And he just loves sports. And talking into gambling. The reason and that's gonna keep growing is more and more states are opening it up. It's North Carolina, hurry up. More and more states are opening it up. So that's that's growing too. So there's so much Opportunity when we go into this. Research is how we're gonna make money, who's out there that we can make the money from and What content can we create? or what way can we stand out, the unique in front of these competitors against these competitors?
Speaker 2:Yep, so yeah, and in sports There's a passion. I was at, i was at my men's group meeting this morning. It's a Bible study. I go to you every week and I started a conversation. I was talking about champions football right here with the guy, about our, our teams and what they're, what they're doing and the season and The you know the things that went well and the challenges that we've had and it was interesting to see him Light up and so our meeting, our Bible study, ended and him and I sat there for another 45 minutes just talking sport. So like when you get in and use sports. More importantly, because he's had two two of his daughters play D1, d1 volleyball, his they've had his son play college. His son-in-law was a really good college quarterback at D1 schools. He went to all burn and play. But just you know to see like it's a very passionate Industry as well. When you talk to, when you get talking to someone, that's truly about it, right.
Speaker 1:So especially soccer Nate, huge soccer fan, as you can see, he's supporting it. He's supporting it right there, but man.
Speaker 2:I'll tell you what I've. I make fun of soccer, but at the same time I also appreciate the sport, after my son has played it for so long.
Speaker 1:Hey, it's a hard sport played anymore.
Speaker 2:It's hard. You got to learn how to fake and act and fall on your. You know, get, get, get tapped on the shoulder and hold your ankle. I'm just kidding, i'm just kidding, but it's, you know, these The. The sport in itself is good and actually seeing it come to Charlotte, which was really cool, is the fact that FC You know Charlotte FC came here and to see the city truly rally around a sport in the city, because you go to a, you go to a Panthers game and 50% of the stadium is whatever teams visiting you go to a.
Speaker 2:You go to a hornets game. 50% maybe 60% of the people watching that game are for the other team, so it was pretty cool to just see how many people came, and it gives the city a Sports team to rally around and whatnot right as opposed to just being, you know, 50-50 at games. That's a true home game experience and I went to the opening game. It was amazing. It was awesome.
Speaker 1:That's funny that you mentioned that. So I went a couple years ago to a Seattle Seahawk game West Coast as far as you could probably get from the Carolinas In the United States other than Alaska, alaska, hawaii When I am telling you that there was more Russell Wilson and DK make cap jerseys than any Christian MacArthur anything else. It was ridiculous. I was like, am I just a Seattle game here? Like it was like those barely pay, i would say those barely Panthers fan, it's all Seattle fans, but a real quick just to take you guys back here. So these trophies back here that we just do back here just because we want to make sure that you guys know We are winners and not losers, these are trophies actually. So this side right here is actually I haven't won one this year yet. I'll be honest, having won one this year, but I won two last year with my team at 12 you And then I'm not gonna see those Nate's done there. So I'll let him explain his well, i haven't won any.
Speaker 2:Our teams have our teams, yeah, so we're just out there guiding them and letting these kids, you know, giving them the tools to succeed and compete. And so we've a yard team, our 12-view team. It has been in Six tournaments. They've made four, four finals appearances, four finals appearances and pulled home, brought home two trophies this year so far. We got one more to go. We'll see. You know, this last tournament They got over that hump, they won their first tournament ever, lost their next two finals and won the finals. So you know, we'll see how they do. I mean, it's been cool to see the kids grow, get better and Just enjoy the season Absolutely and have fun and get pumped and just see these kids, you know, become a team and hanging out at practices and, you know, messing around and just growing his kids.
Speaker 2:It's been cool.
Speaker 1:I say and if you support You sports and you want to support what we're getting done here, we'll be more than happy to take donations. Champions for it, yes, so champions football is.
Speaker 2:It is a nonprofit, we talked about it on it. It's our nonprofit arm of our organization that we give back to you to To help our community, help the youth, and we're actually just really excited about some of the new things that we're working on with that. But we'll talk about that in another day, once we get that finalized, but some really, really cool stuff. and let's jump into trends, oh, let's do this jump into trends That's behind the marketing.
Speaker 2:We're gonna jump into trends here Where we go over some different topics that are kind of going on in the World currently?
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely. And one big one right now that I will go into is actually in the sports. Again, we're bringing sports back, but it's a. It's what's happened in the last week and a half, maybe two weeks, with all these coaches after In the NBA, after a bad series or a tight series, being fired due to performance. Just an example Milwaukee Bucks, um bud and hosier was fired after a four was a four one to the number eight seed Miami Heat, but they were the best team in the NBA before that. And the same thing with Monty Williams and Doc Rivers coaches who have put some big In part, i would say, in that, or the organizations they were fired from.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they're, they're winning coaches. They, their teams, have performed at a high level, but their teams haven't gotten over.
Speaker 2:They'd hump where they need to go absolutely And I think it's the thing is where it comes down to is evolving. Not only in sports, like we talked about the coaches here, but coaching is in business. Your There's a direct correlation in business as well. You have to be evolving in your business. You have to be getting better and better, else You will not win the long game. You have to be constantly competing at a high level inside of business. You have to be focusing on how do I get better? What skills can I, who do I need to become To build the company that I want? right, correct? So if there's a life that I know that I want, that I'm trying to achieve and I'm not there yet, who do I need to become to get to where I want to be?
Speaker 2:And I think what happens is a lot of times in business, people get very stagnant and I'm frankly I speak from experience. I mean I when I had my agency for years before we decided to build everything in-house and rebrand into marketing rebels, start building our own media properties. When I had that agency, i was stacked for three years. We had zero growth. We just stayed stagnant on revenue. We had zero growth. We weren't Really reinventing Anything game-changing. So we weren't inventing anything new or crazy, but we were performing, but we weren't growing. So it's and that and frankly it becomes. As a business owner, it's very challenging not to grow as an entrepreneur, a high performer, something that makes us better is constantly growing. If we don't, we get stagnant, we get complacent and then that things can go downhill Right. Next thing you know you're fired.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so, so going into that. So what would you say to the ones that come back and they'll make excuses right, and some excuses are valid, some are Get over it kind of excuses But if they come at you and they're telling you I don't have the tools or I don't have Things that I need or that I want to be able to get the job done, what are so? what are? what can they do to Overcome that? is that really their fault or was it? is that the upper, more people, or Yeah, so how do I don't?
Speaker 2:know, i mean, i guess, one thing my dad always told me and I was growing up excuses are like assholes, everybody's got one.
Speaker 2:So, so you can either make excuses for your lot in life or you can get off your butt and get stuff done. So You know, here's a story of mine. When I I went in 2008, i lost everything, belly up bankrupt and I had to. At that moment I had to define. I lost completely everything. I'd been to dollars on paper that I was worth, lost it all when the market shifted, end up filing bankruptcy, losing absolutely everything.
Speaker 2:Sitting in a condo, so counting change with a month, a mice problem in my condo right. So I'll never forget that mice running across the floor in front of me and I'm like man, how can I? I went from like Thinking I was, you know, king dingaling on top to like down on the bottom doing absolutely, counting pennies, counting pennies. And I had one option at that moment blame all the other people For the things that I didn't accomplish, or blame all the other people for the things that I didn't do, or blame all the other people for the bad decisions I made, or take ownership and accountability and actually Change those right. So you got one. It's your choice. So you can either blame people or you can do what you need to do to to move forward And if you want to get better and you're being stagnant, there's a plethora of YouTube content. There's a plethora of Information out there that you can go, gain the knowledge that you need to become who you need to become Right.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it gets. it's a pointy finger game, huh? So it's like now. It's not my problem, it's not my fault, but at the end of the day, if you're the head of the snake and your company's sinking, it was your fault. It's the reason it went downhill. So, guys, so keep evolving, keep getting better. Like Nate said, don't stagger. just because, even if you have a really good year you had the best year of your life financially, physically, everything it doesn't mean that it can't go away, or it doesn't mean that you should stop. You got to keep getting better because that's how you're going to keep growing until you have billions in your bank account and then you can stop.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and to get back, and even then those guys don't, So let's go.
Speaker 1:I think I'd look at all those successful people.
Speaker 2:They keep trying to create more change or trying to have positive impact. So a question of should leaders be blamed for failures? Absolutely Now, because, at the end of the day, it's even if someone below you made a bad decision that caused it to fail as a leader, that's on you, because you're the one who hired them, you're the one who trained them, or you put people in place to train them, and if they are not meeting the expectations of where you need to go and it's causing your team to fail, that's on you, because you have to either replace that person to make sure that you have the right person in the right seat, or so, at the end of the day, it's always to you. People always say what shit rolls downhill, it actually rolls uphill. So because, at the end of the day, the people that are working with you may be making mistakes, but if you're not helping them correct it and get better, that's you failing as a leader.
Speaker 1:Correct them or giving them the correct tools.
Speaker 2:Tools, resources, knowledge, the resources to get it done.
Speaker 1:You'll see a lot of people. Actually, i ran this in before And when I used to work with State Farm, you'll see that they would do this. It's like, ok, how do we do this? And nobody walked you through. And you would think, with a big company like that, you think processes, procedures are set in place. But there wasn't. There wasn't processes, there wasn't procedures set in place And everything was basically you got to learn it, or you were asking a ton of questions on how to learn it And I always thought like I was failing because I didn't think I was doing the right things. But I wasn't the only one. I saw people come in and the same things were happening to them. They were doing the same thing where I was when I started. So it comes down. Like you said, the top is as important as the bottom or even more important, people. Always, when you become a business owner, you got workers. They can do it for you. It's not the case. You got to keep supporting and giving them the correct tools and resources to succeed.
Speaker 2:You want to lead from the front.
Speaker 1:Exactly. Not pushing and cracking the whip from the back.
Speaker 2:Exactly exactly.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so let's jump into the next one, right? Because this one, so the whole point of this, the trending is we're going to jump into a couple of topics, like Nick said, and our next topic is actually one that I found really funny, because if you guys watched the video, he pauses for a good like. I would probably give like five or 10 seconds where he pauses and he's like staring into blank space before he gives his answer. But last night well, when this comes out a week ago Elon Musk did an interview with CNBC And they were talking to me.
Speaker 1:It was after the whole Tesla big meeting, the roundtable they did And they were asking him is like do you think the things you say or tweet about does it affect your company Or does it make your other, does it make your investors upset? He's like I don't care, i don't care if I lose money, freedom of speech. So, nate, in being in a big position like that, in an ownership, i think he's big enough where it probably won't impact too much. But someone who's more in the mid-sized to small-sized businesses, that does make a tweet that can affect, do you think the freedom of speech or do you think they should be considering? I shouldn't do this, even though his thoughts are. Those are his thoughts.
Speaker 2:So you have the ability? I think you've got the ability for freedom of speech, correct, but it doesn't protect you from the wrath of being an asshole.
Speaker 2:Right, you have the ability of freedom of speech. But if you're going and I don't think Elon Musk has done this with stuff he said but there's people who go out there and say some crazy things and attack people and verbally assault people and they're like, well, freedom of speech. I'm like, yeah, you do have freedom of speech. you also should just not say you don't have to be mean to people either, correct? So I think it depends on what it's doing. In regards to the business front, i think there is some you do have to think about what you're going to say, and that comes down to what company are you? Who's your customer? And we talked about this on a previous podcast right, like alienation versus, you know, alienation in response to inclusivity with Bud Light.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So I think it's there's a time and a place. But you have to be know who your customer is, how you're speaking to them, and understand that if you say some things that are going to ruffle the feathers and which is okay, right, cause not everyone's going to love you Correct. But at the same time too, if you're going to go out of your way to just say crazy things just to get attention, then expect the repercussions of it, correct, you know so, in a business, you still got to be smart about it. You don't want to just go say whatever you want off the cuff and then go oh my bad, didn't mean it, cause in today's social world it don't work that way. That's going to be chopped up six, seven different ways.
Speaker 1:Exactly. Well, I mean, things have changed from when you were a business owner back in 2008 and stuff, To now.
Speaker 2:it's like now you're old, let me see. No, it was 2002 when I started, but you could call it new, oh 2002.
Speaker 1:But back in the day you would be able to say something and you won't have what's been going around for the last probably, i'd say four, five years, with this cancel culture where someone could make mistakes right, mistakes do happen. They could say something by mistake, or something can slip out that it didn't mean to say it, or maybe it's just it just crossed real quick of something and they get canceled. They get I saw it happen with. I always go back to sports because sports is something I always follow a lot, but it happened to an NBA player where he was playing online a video game and he said something in a call of duty. He said something and he got canceled Like he got off the team. It was dropped. Endorsen's yields were dropped just of something he said. I think it was towards the Jewish community And don't be don't be a tagging Jewish community.
Speaker 2:Don't say stupid stuff He came back.
Speaker 1:He came back. He came back to it and he talked to it like he didn't mean it, like it's not something. He meant It just like he was just playing the game and it slipped out. So nowadays even slipping out can cost you big time Just cause I mean social media. When you put on social media you might hit delete doesn't mean it goes away. Someone's screenshotting that as soon as it's going online.
Speaker 2:Well, yeah, I mean, it's insane. You can look at the John Moran situation of what's going on there, right?
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, everyone but I do think. So. The thing is like should high profile people and let's flip this over to celebrities, cause celebrities say a lot of things And I think the problem is people care too much with celebrities say, that's true, i could care less what they have to say, yeah, like I can't identify with what some of these celebrities do and go through and everything else, but for some reason, man, there's so many people that actually are like and you'll see the media do it too It's like well so, and so said this I don't care. How does it impact my life? So I think you know. At the same time, so you not only should you be cautious on what you say if you're a business owner, but you should also be cautious on the people you listen to, any opinions and the words that you care to hear from other people. Right, so it works both ways.
Speaker 1:Cause it's different lifestyles, right, it's. Usually those celebrities are people who do have the millions and their problems are completely different problems. So they could have said something, and it's completely different context of what you're thinking of. So then you know the media you say something, they'll chop up like you said, boom, boom, boom, and they'll make a brand new sentence And they'll change it up. So, yeah, so that's a so we got there. But the next topic is actually something that we can discuss, and I'm going to ask you this question first, and it's on mental health.
Speaker 2:I think, mental health.
Speaker 1:It's being more like. It's being more and more talked about nowadays. More and more people are opened up about it, from athletes to celebrities to business owners, from you growing in the business standpoint In 2002 you had you started your business. From that point to now, what has helped you as a business owner? mentally? Cause you, like you said, you went through ups. You went through great, great highs and very down lows. So mentally, how did you get through that?
Speaker 2:Like yeah, i think one. I've never been extremely emotional up and down. I've always been kind of even keel, and that's how I operate. You know, this is me excited, this is me angry. So I think I have. I've done that, but, more importantly, one thing that I do, just a recent example I came into the office on Monday and I was irritable, i was edgy.
Speaker 2:I was short answered I was, and I knew I was doing it, and the reason being is I hadn't done what I'd normally do. Which helps me with that mentally is I hadn't worked out in like four days because I was so busy with everything else took precedent And I just didn't get the time to work it in. So I went in Monday. I got my workout in, I felt better. I got up Tuesday morning, i went for it. I had to start back up my morning walk and think So I get up in the mornings, i go for a 45 minute walk, i get some steps in, get some thinking time in, and it helps me. Every day I do that is always a better day, and so I got back into that routine just this week. So when I'm coming into the office and I'm getting things done, i'm thinking clear. I've been able to think through big problems. I've been able to take time to just be creative. People talk about your having meditation time. Right, that's my meditation time.
Speaker 1:So taking a back real quick to this walk and think when you're walking, what are the things you're thinking? Is it more like? is it more job related? Is it more life related? Is it a mixture of everything? Well, what are you thinking It?
Speaker 2:depends on what's going on. Today. It started with how mad I was about an email I got And so, and I was frustrated about it And I'm like, why am I so mad about this? And then I'm like, all right, well, here's how my handle it And I start figuring out going forward. All right, here's the steps, problem solved. All right, move on.
Speaker 2:So I think then there's days where I wake up and I'm trying to think through or I'm just trying to think big of like hey, we've got this new sports bread Like what's the real vision with it? What's our vision? What are we gonna do? How are we gonna do with it? So sometimes it's you know, my mind starts thinking about just the very little things that don't make a big difference in your day to day, or things that bother me. But by the end of my walk I've moved into creative mode, i've moved into thinking bigger, i've moved in so to solution oriented and excited to start the day. But the days that I don't do that, walk and talk to my. You know, walk and talk. So I'm basically walking and talking to myself.
Speaker 2:But, do you struggle in the days? No, i call, i'm sorry.
Speaker 1:Walk and think, walk and think Do you struggle in the days you don't do it Like? do you hit like a mental block when you get into the office where you're like, how do I get started, or what do I do, or what are my priorities today?
Speaker 2:So I usually have my priorities kind of outlined, but what'll happen is my attitude sometimes will be impacted, gotcha. So I'm either coming in with a mindset of like frustration or chaos If I didn't get my time in, or a little more scattered and not as focused, or when I get my walk and think in I've thought through what's gonna happen.
Speaker 1:So I come in a little bit more dialed in right, yeah, and I noticed it because the other day I gave you a call in the afternoon. He's like yeah, i just got out of the gym. I needed that. I haven't been to the gym for five days. You were telling me. But yeah, that's. And similarly I talked to you about yesterday. With me, i walk in here and I got frustrated. I'm talking about clenching my fist in the office. I was like, what do I do? I got like, was anxious, like I didn't know where to start, i didn't know how to start, i didn't know what to do And I had to literally come out here. We have a big area here in our office where we have a table and couches And I sat down with the notebook and I just wrote whatever came into mind.
Speaker 2:I thought you were snoring.
Speaker 1:No, i didn't take a nap. I didn't take a nap yesterday, but I just wrote. I just wrote literally anything that came to mind, anything that came to mind, cause it helps me. I find very satisfying when I have things to do and I can put it on a checklist and I can see that scratch off And I'll send it to you so I can see the scratch off. Even if there's things that I forgot to put on the checklist, i write them down after I do them and I scratch it off. Just gets. it's like a motivation satisfaction that okay, i'm getting things done Where if I didn't do that yesterday I probably wouldn't have gone and done. After I did that I probably killed four or five things that were on my list. If I wouldn't do that, i probably would have done maybe one or two things Just cause I was so like frustrated and I'm like I didn't know where to start, Like everything. like my emails are going off, i have Slack going off, i have the Skype going off, so as everything's going off and it's like wait, where do I go? So that definitely helped me.
Speaker 1:And one thing that helps me too mentally is actually coaching. Coaching for me is like nobody bothers me. I feel like when I'm coaching, i feel like it's I'm coaching first. I'm coaching the sport I love, i'm helping and giving back to the community, but nobody bothers me. Like when I'm coaching It's me and the kids and that's it. and the kids are very respectful, they respect me, i respect the kids and it's we're in our zone and I just feel like very I.
Speaker 1:That just helps my mind so like I can, like I go sleep at night Before turn, before I'm coaching. a turner minute I think about I was like I got a coach tomorrow. It's like my relax time, like I get to do my own thing. And same thing when I'm not coaching. I find a sport like I'm. this summer I got a chance to sign up for it because Nate said he would be dunking on us if he were to play. but We signed up for a rec basketball league just to keep my mindset of like sports and for the rims, right Yeah exactly, but sports has always been something that's kept my mindset off of things like I'm.
Speaker 1:When I'm doing sports, i'm not thinking about anything else. I'm doing sports is sports, so that's. That's something that's always helped me is sports has helped help a lot, and even in school. In school, sports was big for me to get through things. So I I Thanks for for a lot of it, but yeah, it's that activity, right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so you know it's kind of how Everyone's. I should have an outlet, right. I have a way to deal with some of that stuff.
Speaker 1:So I should not turn.
Speaker 2:There is a lot of moving stuff and being a high performer in a company Our company, like you are like there's a lot of stuff going on a lot of moving pieces Like it's you got to have something that you can have, an outlet, that you kind of just take your mind off it. Another thing that I do to like Sometimes when I get out of here, if I've just been thinking and getting a lot like just brains rattled, i just cranked the music. Crank the music in the car.
Speaker 1:I can see I can when you come a big pop With the windows down, you got the hydraulics.
Speaker 2:So Sometimes it's rap, sometimes it's hip-hop, sometimes it's country, depends on the day AFI, back in the day, you know like I might be listening to some of that. So it just really depends on. I've got different mixes of just different genres and depending how the day's going, depends what music It's correct I got into the car with you and you had you also big with podcasts.
Speaker 1:Does that? does that? does that help to? does that help like us? That gives you like a spark on your day on thinking like that podcast, oh, that's a good idea, or does that also help you with the spark on?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I like listen. There's certain I like listen a podcast to you. I usually do that stuff in the morning, correct, so I listen to. If I'm listening to the radio, i'm listening to K love, the Christian music station, and then I've heard some Katy Perry in there.
Speaker 1:It's good music.
Speaker 2:So so listen to that or I'll have a podcast on, and the podcast is Usually learning, kind of understands, kind of trying to understand how some of these people are thinking, some of the things that are going on, and sometimes I got to take a break though, because it's like information overload, but a lot of times it's really kind of it does get creative juices flowing Listening to to podcast, and I'm always trying to learn something or understand something or, have you know, spark, spark ideas.
Speaker 2:So I would say, yeah, it's usually for that. One thing I started doing recently is so I drive my son to school every day, and so I started putting on a podcast, and the one I'm listening to is found put on with him as founders, and it's a guy who's who reads books about all these different, you know, successful entrepreneurs and business people, and then he summarizes that these Biographies or autobiographies and biographies into a podcast, and so I've been listening. Instead of having, like, music playing in the car, i now have those playing in the car and it's interesting to see him listening and then ask questions and, you know, and actually sees engaged in it. So I've been doing that as well.
Speaker 1:So for someone who has success. Right, we're talking about business owners, right, there's there's business owners who are getting there. They're trying to grow their business to be successful, but someone who's had been successful with you, with money, having a awesome family, all that. But They say, the more success you have, the more problem, the more. The more success, more money, more problems, correct, so how does how, in that mindset, right, mentally, did that ever play a role with you? the more the money came in where you was it?
Speaker 2:More throwing out, or uh yeah, but I had my times with that Mm-hmm in the past where I, you know spending it as fast as it's coming in, no matter how much was coming in. So I've done that, i think it's. It's one of those, though, where, when it comes to money, i think they say more money, more problems. I think you make more money because you solve bigger problems, right, so it's a different way of looking at it. So, the bigger the problems you solve, the bigger things that you do, yes, they are bigger problems, but you're getting rewarded At a higher level for that gotcha. So, in regards to more money, more problems, what it means is solving bigger problems, make more money, and so I think that, you know, is important. But on the money front too, like if, if, money also just amplifies personality.
Speaker 2:So, a lot of times, if you're not a good person And now you're, now you gain millions of millions of dollars, you don't instantly become a good person, right, you just got it. Your, your personality just amps amplified in the same thing, if, if you're, you have a heart and intention of serving For example, we're talking this morning in my, in my group, of Serving. You're not a leader because you're on top, your leader through sir. You, sir, you're a leader. Through serving right, servers become leaders And and so I think if you have intention of serving people, the more money that you make, the more you will be able to serve and help And provide right. So I think your personality gets amplified with the money and so You know that's kind of a different answer to your question, but You know absolutely There's different ways you can go in the whole morning conversation.
Speaker 1:I've been to the last thing As an agency. The most important thing in business is marketing the uncommon advice, exactly so We we've all heard this before. If you're in any of these, sales versus marketing, uh, nate, what do you think? Uh, marketing or sales?
Speaker 2:marketing.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:So we are called marketing rebels. Our company is marketing rebels, so let's sit that side. Yeah, i mean, i think You know, back in the day used I used to actually think Marketing was more important right, because marketing It's a chicken or egg. We don't. it's not the chicken or egg, what came first? It's like what's more important? marketing, right? Uh, that was my mindset, and Reason being is because if you don't have a brand, you don't have an offer, you don't have a way of attracting customers, you have nobody to sell correct and At the same time that's my thought on it but at the same time they have to work hand in hand.
Speaker 2:It's more of a It's it's not a competitor to each other inside a company. They're collaborators, because the more in tune your marketing and your sales team are together, the better they will both perform together. Right. It's like a well-oiled machine. If you know you have to have the right pieces, the right gas. You've got to have all that stuff that's going on inside of an engine to make it go go properly. Right If you got a, if you have a Lamborghini but no tires, where you going? Right.
Speaker 1:So so in the last company I was in, i uh, i was a marketing sales manager and when sales wasn't going, it was always marketing's fault. Oh, but a marketing's not doing this for a market is it's like all right, let's. First we got to take a step back. What did the marketing bring in right? What did you generate? What leads did we generate What? what came from that? All right. So if you get a several generated leads and they're not closing, that's not that's not marketing's fault.
Speaker 1:Now, that's that's sales, right? So sales is not closing the leads, because if it's generating, it's doing its job of generating leads revenue whatever it's doing. But if it's not being closed on this end, it's not marketing's fault. Marketing, we need to work on the sales part. So I remember that always being a back and forth, and when sales was and when sales was not working, uh, when sales was not working, it was marketing's uh fault, when marketing's uh not working, it was just back and forth.
Speaker 2:Well, a A bad salesperson. A salesperson who doesn't close will blame the leads 100%. A salesperson who closes the same leads will take credit for being a salesperson.
Speaker 1:Correct.
Speaker 2:Right, yeah it. Just We do have a lot of lead generation and my agency back in the day we did a lot of lead generation for companies and they had sales teams and everything else And usually we'd get that, oh well, it leads the marketing sending us. I'm like, all right, well, let's go look at your call logs. All right, let's go look at your sales team.
Speaker 2:Let's listen to those calls And then you get the guy, you get him to go listen to those sales calls and look at those call logs. You're like, oh, there's the problem, there it is, You know so.
Speaker 1:You guys using not saying the right things or it's going like that. But marketing and sales always the messaging has to be, i feel like, together. I feel like when those meetings happen in these big companies or in any company, marketing sales show is being the same meeting. I don't think there should be a marketing meeting. I don't think there should be a sales meeting. I think they should all be together because at the end of the day, they interlude, right.
Speaker 1:It's like hey, marketing, what are we running this week? How many ads, how many leads are we looking to generate sales? Where are we at with closing? What's our closing rate? Are we? These leads go to quality? They're not bad quality, right, because also, this end of the day, marketing is going to generate leads and not every lead is going to be good. Every lead is not going to be great.
Speaker 1:Some leads you might have to work a little harder to get. Some leads might be one phone call. It's a closed deal. Some leads just might suck, right, it just depends. But we don't know that unless those two are working together. If it's just a pointy finger blame oh, your leads suck this. And this is like let's look at the data. What sucks about the lead. Where did the lead come from? Did it come from this ad? Did it come from this ad? This was an ad we were running an AB test on And hey, this A ad didn't perform, had to generate way more leads, but B ad generated less leads, but they're high-coverting, which is your better ad. So I think they have to collaborate more, like you said, which I feel now it's happening, but I know there's a loss with a lot of companies that it's not happening.
Speaker 2:Another old school right. So great marketing. We'll turn your sales team into order takers.
Speaker 1:There you go. Do we have a mic? we can just drop. But yeah, so that's from my experience running both sides of the thing with sales and marketing, and it was a struggle It was. It was ups and downs all the time, cutting off marketing budget because sales weren't in here, or blaming sales for leads not being closed when the leads weren't good. So it's always up and down with marketing and sales, which I don't think it should be. I think everybody needs to do the same.
Speaker 1:Work together, collaborate, not compete. Right, that's how we do it. So if you have a marketing and sales team, stop splitting in the part. Stop telling them you do this, you do this. Get them together, find out how do we have a one in Right. At the end of the day, all you guys have a common goal. A company has a common goal, and that's grow or hit your revenue target, whatever it is. So if each team is having different goals or have different standards there's, i don't think they'll ever be grow.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's tough too right, Because you're fighting each other.
Speaker 1:Correct. So marketing or sales. Now You're still going marketing.
Speaker 2:I'm still going marketing because without Great marketing can make an average sales guy look good.
Speaker 1:That's true.
Speaker 2:Average marketing can't make a great sales guy look good.
Speaker 1:And when you're selling, you're also marketing, because when you're selling usually you have to call You're talking about your brand, you're giving your brand's message. You're sending resource, probably through email. You're sending a PDF, you are giving a product, you're showing a product, you're marketing. so when you're selling And when you're marketing, you're also selling.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I think with Passing it through, and the more reason for them are together too is because marketing, the more dialed in they are together, the more of the consistent the message is. So there's marketing congruency I feel like a lot of companies lack within their campaigns. So what they see from your ad to your landing page should be very There should be congruency. They should see Languaging on the ad, they also see on the landing page And then they should also hear on the phone with the sales team. So that congruency should be within your marketing. And if your sales team doesn't understand the marketing you're running, you're going to have a breakage or a slippage inside the tube, because some of the things the sales team might be saying might be completely different than the promises that were made on the landing pages. So it's even more important for them to know what sales needs, to know what marketing is doing, so there can be congruence in their conversation from the campaigns that you ran.
Speaker 1:So, for example, so if someone were to come in and say if the ad is saying get one free bag of coffee when you subscribe, but when the salesperson picks up the phone and tries to sell the bag of coffee and says, yeah, you get one free bag of coffee with a subscription of $14.99, like what we do, what we have right. So if someone were to call and say your bag's going to be $14.99 and the ad is saying you get a free bag, yeah, i mean, it's incongruous. It's incongruous. But if the message is the same, what you're saying is if it's saying free with this, not $14.99.
Speaker 2:Buy three bags, get one free, exactly. And then the sales team can do that, but I think it's like trying to on an ad. you're marketing with cats and then they call in and you're talking to someone selling you a puppy. As ludicrous as that sounds, that is in a prime. That stuff happens in marketing campaigns, so your companies are losing sales because of it.
Speaker 1:Yeah Well, I think we're running here towards the end. So What, you don't want to keep going? I mean, if we want to keep talking, I mean we can talk about the Miami Heat.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we got no Miami Heat.
Speaker 1:But guys, remember, like, subscribe in the YouTube channel, follow us on Natsa Instagram, my Instagram We'll be putting out content for you guys and we'll see you guys in the next episode.