Energy and Experience – Business Brain 664

Business brain episode 664 for Wednesday, July 9th. Don't put all your eggs in one omelet day 2025. Greetings folks and welcome to Business Brain the show where we take some ideas, we crunch them, we dissect them, we use them to tune our business brains every single time we get together. Our sponsors for this episode are openphone.com businessbrain where you can go to get 20% off your first six months of the number one business phone system out there. It's going to streamline and scale your customer communications and eversight.comb this is your own in house web team for just 3 99amonth. No big upfront fees. We'll talk more about both of those in a little bit. For now here in Durham, New Hampshire.

I'm Dave Hamilton and I'm still out in Lafayette, California. I'm Shannon Jean. Hey. Hope you had a good long holiday weekend.

I did it. I'm still fighting whatever this thing is, but it worked out well to have several days in a row of downtime.

Yeah, it was good.

That's cool. Yeah.

How about you?

Do you have a good one?

Yeah. We were up at our river house and you know, a lot of projects in the works. I built a big shed while I was up there. If you've ever built one of those giant like plastic sheds you get from Costco, there's like 3467 screws that you have to track, keep track of. So there's definitely a feeling of accomplishment when you get that thing all done after you've gone through like five batteries and you're on your screw gun, you know, so. But it's great. Yeah. Got that together. We did a bunch of bunch stuff. Relaxed, had, had a great time. Nice to get away.

Excellent. Yeah, that's great, man.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's good, it's good. Hey, I want to talk about. So I was looking through my calendar as I am often as I do my past calendar as well as forward trying to see what the last month looked like, what's coming up.

Sure.

And I realized I had been on 141 discovery calls in the about, about the last four to six weeks of. And these are people that have joined my mastermind, my $5 mastermind. But, and they get a call, we book a call. Fifteen minutes with me.

Okay.

Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah, I, of course I'm, there's no sales going on. It's more like just truly discovery. Like hey, what do you do and where do you Live and what, and what do you want? Because I'm trying to learn about building this community because I've never built one before.

Yep.

And so what's interesting is that I get a lot of really positive feedback. That was great. 15 minutes. You gave me a lot of great insight. You this, that. But I had a call last week with a young guy, I think it was 19. His name was Cooper.

Okay.

And man, it just like the energy that this kid pushed through the zoom call. I was like, I was just pushed back because he had so much going on. And I was so impressed. He was like, yeah, I'm 19. I'm not going to do the traditional college thing. I've got. I started a business. I've got TVs in 50 locations throughout my city, and I sell advertising on those TVs. And this. And then he start this, and he's like, and now I want to learn to be a reseller. And this, this, and this. I'm just like, dude, it's incredible. Wow. So, yeah, it was amazing. And. And I was like, man, this is so great. You're so far ahead. You know, you're, you're. We talked about a lot of stuff because I was interested in how he fought against the system, so to speak, to create his own system. Right. To be successful. Turned out his dad follows me on X and he kind of forwards him stuff. And, you know, that's how I got connected. Yeah. But the thing that's really stuck with me and I. I've talked to people about this is this energy transfer when you connect with other people, and especially if you work remote like I do, and I think you do most of the time.

Yeah.

And. And there's all kinds of different ways to get it. I know you get it by playing in bands, various bands, and being involved in production.

That's one way energy. Yes, one way. Yep.

And. And, but I, I, after I met with this young guy, I was like, you know what the greatest thing is? These people think that they're learning from me. Right.

And. And they may. Well.

And they are.

Yeah.

Oh, no, no, they are. However, the trick of it is they're like giving me so much back about, number one, what they. How they got here. I always ask, how'd you get on this call? And so I, you know, track where they came from and, you know, with the link and what. I was on a podcast or I posted this, but that, but it's that power of connection if, if you don't have it and I didn't have it for a while, you know, and so the last year and a half or so, I've, I have, I've created it. And by growing this business, I would suggest you, you need to find it because it is life changing. And I know that's a cliche, but the feeling you get after you have those conversations, man, I'm just like, you know, I feel good. It's like after I do this show, yes, I, I connect with you. I know we have a ton of listeners. I know I, I obsess over the numbers. I'm always like, how many live streamers and how many downloads. Yeah, but that's just my personality. I need some kind of measurement to see if I'm doing better than I did last week or yesterday. But the connection, you know, I just can't tell you how important it is and how much purpose it gives to your day to day work.

I totally agree. I mean, you know, we talk, we've talked about this in a variety of different ways over the years. One way is, is the, the value of going to conferences and trade shows. Right. Where you're getting to do that. But even phone calls with people like that energy can easily transfer and just getting out of your own head, having literally someone else to interact with we humans. And I say this as someone who is very aware that I am an introvert and by that I mean I recharge alone.

But I would agree, I'm the same way, I think. Yeah.

But I know that there is value, that we humans, we're social creatures and we need interaction and we need different interaction, like with the same people all the time, it's fine. But there is a benefit to interacting with new people on at least a semi regular basis where, you know, you're getting different opinions, you're getting different views, different ideas. All of those things are very exciting and stimulating and very, yeah.

And yeah. And also, of course, we all want to feel valued, right?

Of course, yes.

On a basic human level, you know, sharing some of my experience and having somebody go, oh wow. And writing it down, I'm just like, oh, that's cool.

That. Yeah, man. Yeah, that's the Superman syndrome.

That, yeah, of course, of course. I've never, I'm never giving that up, Dave. That's just a way.

No, I, I, I don't think, I don't, I don't think it's anything one needs to give up. I share it because I, when we had that conversation about the consultant trap.

Yeah.

The Superman syndrome is the problem that pulls you into the Consultant trap. So that's the only part.

That's it. Yeah. And. And so. And then just learning about their background and your experiences. And I always ask, you know, why you're doing this Besides the obvious. I want to make money. But. But the, but the stories behind it. Yeah. I. I want to start a 529 for my kids. I want to pay for my kids college. I want to. I don't want to. This one woman's. I want. I want to contribute more so my husband isn't so pressured to make money. And I've had guys say the same thing. Oh, I want to. I want to bring more homes to know for my family so we. Everybody can relax a little bit.

Yes.

And I always stop them right there. And I was like, that's really important to share in your story and your narrative based on what you sell. These are all people that are interested in learning how to become resellers, right?

Oh, sure.

In my. My world.

That's right. Yeah.

I'm one of the first thing I'm trying to convince them, you know, hey, it's not about the product as much as it is about you. And you want to differentiate on you. You're a monopoly of one. That's it. You're the only one that can tell your story. So when they share that with me, I'm always like, okay, stop. That's what you should write. That's your credibility. That's your reputation. It's like, oh, I'm a nurse and I'm going to do this and I do that. And I had a call with a couple this morning that they live near like Indian reservations. And we were like, well, you know, there's always excess product that you never sell in your death p. I'm like, you should. And they're like, well, we could donate that to the reservation here and help people. Like, I mean, that's exactly what you should do. And you should become a huge resource to your community and that will ex. That's an accelerant on your business right there. And it's a good thing to do. So.

Right. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's really cool. Win, win, win. Yeah, Win, win, win. In fact, yes, exactly.

That's it. So just if you can find some way. And you know, and I had no idea when I first got on X, someone said that to me. They were like, oh, you need to be in the DMs to people that you're interested in talking with. And I was like, well, why would they want to talk with me? But you know, they do want to talk with you and, and then you like, oh, it's not the same person. Like, we should be jumping on calls each week. I was like, calls? What are we doing on those calls? You know? And it was just you just connecting.

It's just connecting. It's that.

And it just moves you down the road in so many ways of sharing advice, sharing struggles that you're facing. Like, I don't know how to do this or how to figure that out. And yeah, yeah, man.

If you, if you've got ways that you are connecting with people that you, that we haven't mentioned in this segment, let us know. Feedbackusbrain show. We'll share them so that we can all learn. We have, we have some more topics to talk about. The next thing that I want to do, though, is I want to talk about our sponsors because let's be real. Running a business means juggling flaming chainsaws while riding a unicycle across a tightrope of deadlines and customer needs. And if your phone system drops the ball, that tightrope gone. That's why our sponsor, OpenPhone, is a must. Open Phone is the number one business phone system that scales with your grind. It works on your phone and your computer, so you don't need to carry two phones like it's 2003. Your whole team can share single number, reply to texts and calls from one shared inbox and pick up conversations right where someone else left off. Collaboration, seamless customers delighted and Forget voicemail purgatory. OpenPhone's AI agent can handle calls after hours, answer questions, and even capture leads. It's like having an intern who never sleeps and doesn't drink all your mint tea. So if you're building your empire, whether solo or with a full team, OpenPhone makes it effortless to stay connected. That's how you live your charmed life. And OpenPhone is offering our Business Brain listeners 20% off your first six months at openphone.com businessbrain. That's O P E N P-H-O-N-E.com businessbrain. And if you have existing numbers with another service, Open Phone will port them over at no extra charge. Open Phone, no missed calls, no missed customers. Keep leading that charmed life. And Our thanks to OpenPhone for sponsoring this episode. And now let's talk websites. Because if your business doesn't look good online, it's basically showing up to a job interview in pajamas. And not the cool startup kind. That's where our sponsor, Eversight Comes in, they're not some overpriced agency charging 10k just to schedule a kickoff call. For just 3.99amonth, you get what amounts to your own in house web team. Fast, friendly, professional, and best of all, responsive. Phone, email, even text. Same day replies, no contracts, no nonsense. Eversight builds beautiful, fully managed websites and proactively keeps them running. Want to make an update? They got you. Want to focus your money on growth instead of babysitting a back end dashboard? They've really got you. They handle hundreds of sites for entrepreneurs just like us. In fact, Shannon, you are one of those entrepreneurs for whom they handle a website, right?

Yeah, totally. And I never have to worry about it. Before, I was, I got behind on keeping things updated and my security on my site went to hell and I got hacked. And these guys, the Eversight team and Joe Benson, man, they just saved me when I was in massive distress because I was right in the middle of a lot of stuff going on on the site. They came in with some real quick ways to redirect stuff and put up splash pages and man, they saved me. It's incredible.

Well, you can work with them too. You just got to visit eversight.com BB to get started today. And our thanks to Eversight for sponsoring this episode. All right, what's, what's next here, Shannon?

Yeah, so I listen to this other podcast, podcast I really like. It's called Founders.

Okay.

David Senna, I think, or Senna, I forget his last name, but it's founders podcast.com you can go to. Anyway, he breaks down books of famous founders. And one of the things I was listening on the way home from the river this weekend, and it was about the Michelin brothers or Michelin brothers. The tire guys got it. Yeah. And you know, I can remember learning about Michelin stars and the Michelin guide and like, like, wait, that can't be the same company, that tire company. And of course it is the same company. And the, the, this concept that we've talked about on the show, of course, before, of selling the experience and the, the, the feeling like these guys are in the tire business. They were in the rubber business and then got into the tire business. Right. But they didn't sell tires. And in their advertisements, really, they sold the experience and movement. This was the big thing. They sold anything that got people moving. And they started out with bicycle tires. Right. They were, they were the first company that invented the detachable pneumatic tire so they could fix your bike because all the other ones were glued first Bike tires were, were solid rubber, which was a backbreaker. Right. And then so the next ones were pneumatic, but they were glued to the rim. And it took like a half a day to do a repair. And these guys, Keith's two brothers, came up with a way to do the repair in like 20, 30 minutes. So they kept. And then they moved into cars, of course, and everything else. And then the, the older brother that was a marketing guy came up with the Michelin guide with maps that they made.

Yeah.

And just to get people moving, it's like, look, you could go to and have this experience at this restaurant, get in your car, go to get people to drive, to wear out your tires, to sell more rubber, of course. And so this restaurant at a one star restaurant is like, hey, this is worth visiting locally. Da da, da, da. Two star restaurant. You know, it's worth going a little further. Three star worth going to another country to visit. Right. And they started in France and so they were all about, you know, they did everything. They, they built the first road signs in France because the government didn't do anything. And hey, look, we'll build it for you, no problem. So this was their marketing, all about movement and your experience and what their product did for you and how it created this great life for you. We talk about it here. We don't hammer down on the, all these business lessons. We talk about, we talk about living a charmed life.

Right.

As an entrepreneur, that is what we want and that's what we have done. And it's. What we want for you is to take all these pieces of the puzzle we've been talking about for 11 years and live this great life that, that we've been able to create. And I, as I listened to this show, I was just like, just genius. That. And, and they just kept. So we, we really are in the movement business is to get people to move and to drive and to go whether it was on a bike or, you know, in your car. It's incredible, right?

Seems that.

Yes, no obvious, but it was not.

I mean, once you connect the dots, of course it seems obvious, but I had no idea that the Michelin tire people were the same as the Michelin guide people. Yeah, but I mean, of course it makes sense. Yeah, yeah.

They created the first maps in those guides to, you know, and, and they spent as much time and money promoting and marketing the guide than they did the tires because the guide became such a, you know, they, they started promoting statistics like we've. The. So many people get the guide that it's taller than the Eiffel Tower.

Sure.

And then it was taller, you know, it was just like so many, this many miles. And they also created quizzes and polls in the guide that said, look, we can only visit so many places, but we want your input. So it got their customers to go and to write and to answer the poll and now they get like, you know, millions of people.

Well, now it's a self fulfilling prophecy. Right. Like it just keeps going. That's really good.

So it's almost like they build this, you know, cult like following of hey, we're doing this so we can all lead this great life. And the byproduct is, hey, everybody's wearing out their tires so we can, you know, obviously sell more tires. So I just thought it was just, it was just an awesome way. Don't sell your product. Sell what it does sell how it makes your life better, how it gets you more time to yourself. Sell the transformation. Right. Not the transaction. And, and just keep reminding yourself of that. Like how can we make, you know, yeah, I'm in the printing business, I make this whatever. I'm in the H vac business. I sell comfort. Right. Not yes. You know, not heat and air, whatever, all that kind of stuff. So I love that. Yeah. And if you're doing it, which I hope you are. Feedbackusbrain show. Come on and tell us ways that you're sharing the experience and, and the transformation so we can talk about it on the show.

Absolutely. Yeah. No, we all need to be thinking about this. In fact, as you were saying that, you know, the ads that I do that we do for the sponsors, I often feed the their talking points into chat GPT to help it help me come up with a different script each time so that it doesn't get old. I'm thinking of feeding. Of changing my prompt to say, you know, let's focus on helping them sell the experience. Experience, not the product. Because the better the spots.

Yeah.

Do for the. Our spots. Do. The better, the more people are going to want to advertise. Yeah.

It's like the eversight thing. I don't talk about like the technical part of. It's like, dude, these guys saved my.

Exactly. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. This is great.

All right.

Y. Yep, yep. Love it. All right folks, thank you for hanging out with us. Thanks for sending in all your feedback and questions and all that stuff. It's amazing. We love doing this with you every twice a week. In fact, keep living that charmed life. We'll see you on Friday.

See ya.