Full Family Buy-In and Sports Guy

Business brain, episode 676 for Wednesday, August 20th, National Bacon Lovers Day 2025. I know bacon. Greetings, folks, and welcome to Business Brain, the show where you or we come up with some ideas better collectively and we use them to tune our business brains as we discuss them so that we can each keep on living those charmed lives. Our sponsors for this episode include bitdefender.com brain. That's where you can go to save 30% with BitDefender Ultimate Small business security and also constant contact. We can go to constantcontact.com and try it out free for 30 days.

Days.

It's more than just email. We'll talk more about that and Bitdefender in a minute here. For now, here on National Bacon Lovers Day in Durham, New Hampshire. I'm Dave Hamilton.

Boy, I love bacon. Tell you what, I'm Shannon. Gene. I'm still out in Northern California.

Yeah.

And we, we smoke a lot of fair amount of bacon out here. Do you? It's pretty good. Yeah. Put on the smoker. We. Yeah, yeah. We make. Make it ourselves, then we buy other stuff. Yeah. I went to a place, a restaurant nearby recently. They have a appetizer called Million Millionaire Bacon.

Okay.

And it was seven bucks a slice. So I don't know if the guy who's making it wants to be a millionaire or what. I think that might be it. But it was very good. I love slow smoked bacon, you know, with a little heat and some sweet on it.

This million dollar Bacon, maybe.

Yeah.

Okay.

Million Dollar Bacon. Million dollar Bacon. Yeah. Yeah. First washed.

Is that the name?

This restaurant's called Sweet Maple.

Oh, okay.

There's, there's a bunch of them, but if you search for another term they use for it, if you want to make it yourself, is pig candy. And it is delicious, man. It's easy, easy to make. I post about it all the time. Usually on Fridays I'm smoking something, but I love it. You know what they say, it's not that if you don't eat bacon, it's not that you live longer. It's just life is slow and boring. It just feels like that.

Yeah, there it is. Yeah, your sample platter. You get, you get four different kinds of bacon. All right, I'll put a. I'll put a link in the menu. That's great.

That's awesome. Yeah, that's pretty tasty.

I was at a, a diner after a gig recently, which is something we, you know, I certainly used to do when I was a lot younger and, and now maybe happens 10 years. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But, you know, the timing and everything worked out right. And it was like, yeah, okay, let's go to the diner. We were. We were all hungry with the band, so we went and our singer ordered a mug. Oh, bacon. And it really was just a mug filled with.

Full of bacon.

Yeah, just, you know, strips of bacon. And it was at that point of the night, you know, we'd been playing. We played like three hours or whatever. Like, you know, there was a lot of. We burnt. Yeah. We needed protein, so. Yeah, it was good. Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, if you've never cooked a pork belly, you don't know what you're missing. Boy, that's bacon.

That is what it is.

It is what it is. But just a more, the more direct version. Let's, let's say. Yeah, yeah.

I.

What are we talking about today?

Speaking of. Well, this bacon might help with this topic. I've been thinking a lot about something that in you and I have sort of danced around this idea of having buy in from your family. Now, you know, we talk about having the right partner is a force multiplier for your life and your business. And obviously I couldn't agree more with that. And it is important as an entrepreneur to have buy in from your family. Your kids need to understand how your life works. It's different from your friends. They're the easiest ones to train, I think, because assuming that they grow up with it. But if, you know, if you're, if your kids are 10 or 12, when, when you start your own business and things change, then you probably need to sit them down and sort of talk them through it.

Sure. But I would agree.

And so you definitely need buy in from your family, but probably need buy in from, in some circumstances anyway from your parents and your spouse's parents so that they're not constantly like needling you about why I never really experienced any negative stuff from my parents or my spouse's parents, but I certainly have talked to folks who are.

Because you performed well. But right away, Shannon, it would have been. No, but.

Yeah, that's fair. That's fair. Yeah.

There's a. Because, you know. Yes, on one side of the tightrope is flakiness and stopping and starting and not getting anywhere. And on the other side of the tightrope is success as an entrepreneur.

Right.

And if you can have a mix of those things. Yes.

And I have.

But if you. Yeah, yep. So of course. But if you fall off on the flakiness and failure to start and stop and oh, I'm following every single idea I ever get. I would argue that's much tougher to get the support.

Yeah, that's fair.

From your family. But I totally agree with you that your, the support buy in from family is huge for really important being successful. Yeah.

And the other thing that, and I think, well, perhaps other than our parents, I think you and I have had this conversation about our nuclear families needing to have buy in from them. One thing that I think is really important is having buy in from your team members or your employees families, having them feel like even if, and you may not get the opportunity to interact with them directly, you may only ever interact with these people through your employees. If you can interact with them directly, if you can create opportunities for that, even better. But if you can't, then making sure that the way your employees are going to complain about you and work to their families.

Normal.

It's totally normal. Don't worry about it. In fact, truly, like, don't worry about it. Don't worry about it. Like, leave it alone. Don't touch it. That's, that's, that's, that's a third rail right there. They are going to do it, even if they have no intention of ever complaining to you or leaving or any of that stuff. But with that in mind, having them communicate to their families that, you know, your business is a good business to work at is, you know, you are a good manager, a good leader. I think someday we need to address this thing that you and I, you and I have punted on something, Shannon, about leadership and management. And I don't think we need to let each other get away with that. But that's, that's for a future episode.

Okay, Write it down. Write it down.

I'm writing it down.

Put it on the list.

Yep. But, but making sure that you know that, that your employees or team members, families are, are on board with this. Because if they're not on board with, with their family member, partner, whatever, working for you, that person won't be working for you for very much longer.

Yeah. And I think the way you get them on board, you know, the easiest way is you treat them great and they talk, they talk about, yes, I love this place. I'm learning this. I got this. And it's not, you know, of course everybody complains about salary. It's just a human condition. There's no way around. It doesn't matter what you pay.

I want more money too, Shannon.

Yeah, of course, all of us do. So you just have to get over that. Yeah. The other. I, I agree with you wholly that having buy in and I, I think we've done an episode where I think the title was Everyone is a Customer. And this plays into this because you, especially as an entrepreneur, everyone is a customer. And that could be your spouse, your fam, your immediate family, your extended family. You are in the persuasion business. And if you, you know, you may not be able to dump all the negative stuff you went through today on, you know, these people or, you know, they. And. Or you. I know this for a fact. You cannot go in and drop every crazy idea that you're working on everybody, because they'll freak out. You can't do it. They'll just be like, this is ridiculous. But so you have to keep that in mind how you present it. And it's not manipulating. It's persuasion. It's like, well, I'm going to present this this way because I'm trying to get buy in. I want support. And then the other comment I will just, you know, real quick is that, like, when I do calls with people. You, you said this last week or the, or maybe the week before, there was a, A supplier that was like, well, we can't come sign. We can't come over unless you're both. Your spouse are going to be. Oh, yeah, you and your spouse. Which is crazy, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. But one thing I do say, when I have people on the phone and they're asking about this and that, and there they might spend some money with me or do that, I always say, hey, you should go show this to your spouse.

Yes.

About 87% of my clients are. Are men.

Okay.

And I, I always say, you know what? Our wives have a great BS detector.

Yep.

And I suggest you go, because I send them all a link to the recording of every call. I said, please have your wife watch it so she could critique it and offer you feedback. Because I know I'm not full of bs. I'm not trying to.

Yeah, yeah, you're not. Right?

Yeah, it's just. I'm just sharing what worked in my life. And if you're interested, great. I don't really sell. I just kind of present opportunity. But I always say, you should have your wife watch this because it'll be great. And if you hire me, one of the first questions I ask is, are you okay if your spouse or significant other sits in on a call? Because I'm trying to get buy in for this guy.

Yes. Right.

Because if you don't, if it's. If I'm Pumping you up and filling you full of optimism, goodness and ideas and action items. And you go walk in the other room and someone else is tearing you down with, that's not going to work. That guy's a flake. You're wasting your money. We're just fighting this losing battle.

It's never going to happen. Yeah.

It doesn't happen. So I'm always just like, hey, what does your spouse think?

Yes.

Or what is your. Who are you involved in? Is it your dad, your father in law?

Yeah, yeah, it might be a parent, whatever. Yeah, yeah.

Get them on the call. And some people need that. Some people need that third party validation.

It's from a trusted third party. Not. Not just some random third party.

Yeah, yeah. So there's lots of different ways to do it, but don't forget that those people in your family are not. They're your customers as well. And you have to convince them.

Love that.

Have to convince them.

I love that. I'm processing here.

All right, good topic.

Yeah. There's going to be more to. More to be said about this. For now, we want to talk about our sponsors because. Well, this episode is sponsored by bitdefender, a global leader in cybersecurity. And let me just say, they can save you from a very expensive mistake. If you run a small business, you know the drill. The invoices pile up, you pay them as fast as you can and you hope nothing gets missed. But one day I caught something weird. An invoice for a service we never used. It happens. It looks legit. It had a logo, a real address, even a phone number. It was a scam, right? You've seen this too. A totally fake invoice designed to trick us. And that's exactly why I recommend using our sponsor, Bitdefender Ultimate Small Business Security. It scans everything. Emails, attachments, links and flags. Shady stuff before anyone on your team clicks or pays anything. It even monitors for data leaks and helps you manage passwords and digital identity risks. It includes phishing and scam protection, unlimited vpn, password manager and breach monitoring. And I love getting real time alerts. Right. We all do. It actually makes me feel like somebody's watching our back. Running a business is already stressful enough. Getting scammed on top of that. Yeah, no thanks. Keep your small business safe with Bitdefender Ultimate Small business security. Save 30% when you go to bitdefender.com brain. That's bitdefender.com brain for 30%. Off. Off. And our thanks to Bitdefender for Sponsoring this episode. And hey, when it comes to growing your business, we all know that engaging with customers is crucial, right? I mean, every business is in the customer service business. We say it all the time, but the real question is how to engage with customers. Most of us don't have the time, the skills or the money to keep up with marketing every day. We're too busy actually running our businesses. That's why I'm so glad our sponsor, Constant Contact exists. And I really can't wait to dive into what they're doing here. This isn't just another email tool. Constant Contact is an award winning all in one marketing platform that lets you run email. Yes. And text and social media and events and landing pages all from one place. This way we can finally ditch our ridiculous spreadsheets labeled, you know, marketing chaos 2025, which really is just a copy of marketing chaos 2024 and constant contacts AI content generator that'll turn your rough ideas into ready to send campaigns faster than you can brew your favorite cup of mint tea. Folks add in hundreds of templates, automated sending, real time reporting, and a 97% deliverability rate. I know, and I'm ready to live the charmed life knowing my messages are landing where I want them to. Like I said, I'm so glad I found Constant Contact and can't wait to get started. Get a free 30 day trial when you go to constant contact.com. try Constant Contact free for 30 days at constant contact.com again, constant contact.com and our thanks to Constant Contact for sponsoring this episode. All right, Shannon, what do we got next?

Hey, did you know that like, sports are a big deal, right?

Yeah, turns out huge business.

Big deals.

I mean, it's the entertainment business, right?

Yeah. Today, Paramount paid 7.7 billion for the rights to stream the UFC. Do you know that UFC, that's like a fight thing?

Yeah, Ultimate Fighting or something.

Do you watch that stuff?

No.

No. Neither do I.

7. Almost $8 billion for something you and I, somebody watches, barely know anything about. That's right.

Okay, so. Yes. Stay with me here. Okay? That's important because in business, sports is a big deal, you know, and so golf especially.

You play any golf foot?

I've been known to play golf years, but I have. I used to play, but I don't really pay much more. Yeah, yeah, but things like football, your local team, your college team, your NFL team, Major League Baseball. Now I like, you know, football, I like watching baseball, but I'm not like. I couldn't tell you a single player's Jersey number if my life depended on it.

Yeah. Like.

But my son, he could tell you every stat, everything. Sure. So in business, what happened? What I. One thing I noticed is people walk in and they're like, hey, you know, who's your team? And I'd say for the 49ers, you know, because I live near San Francisco.

Right, of course.

This is great. And I know some names, and I love watching the games, and I can tell who's who, and I know the personalities and players, but, you know, I can't tell you. Oh, you know, did you see that? That guy beat that record? This. It just. I fall apart everything. So that I. Years ago, I came up with an answer because I'm in. You know, lots of guys walk into my office. FedEx reps, UPS reps. Sure. Guys in the parts, business, technology. But. But, but women as well. Into. Really into sports that I. Oh, yeah, yeah.

Oh, yeah.

And I just didn't follow it. But you know what I did? I hired a guy.

Really.

And that guy know everything about sports. And that became hit part of his role in our thing because he knew all the stats. He knew everything. He could walk out, guy would come up, pull up and say, well, who's your team? I go, hang on a minute, Paul. Yeah. Talk to this guy.

Talk sports.

Yeah. And really worked. It would endear people to you and connect to your business and everything. And it worked out amazing. So just remember, you can always hire a guy that knows. And that could be an interview question when you're trying to hire whoever a warehouse person could be, a. You know, it doesn't have to just be a guy. It could be anybody.

Yeah, yeah. It doesn't matter.

But what do they know? You know, you got to know, do you follow sports? Do you know statistics? Do you know that? Do you play fantasy? To me, if you play fantasy sports, you're really into it. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I. I don't know anything about that. But again, my. Yeah. My son's like the commissioner for his fantasy sports league. Yes. Just different. It's not me. My wife knows more about it than I do. That's not my, you know, not my. Not my forte. And I. I enjoy it. I love going to games, of course. But. But I want like, FedEx to take me and put me in the luxury box.

Better way to go to a game. Yeah.

Yeah. It's fun. Yeah. It's cool. But don't forget, you can always hire a guy to fill those roles. And there's lots of. I guess it's Like a PR role. It's just a social thing.

It's a social thing.

Yeah.

I always. I always ask people. I mean, I can talk enough about sports here in New England. You know, it's. It's the. The Bruins and the Patriots and the Celtics.

Sure.

And the Red Sox. I couldn't tell you much about baseball or basketball here in New England or anywhere else, but I can tell you enough about hockey and football to sort of hold my own. Ish. But. But what I eventually will do is ask people what their favorite band is.

Oh. And then. You got it.

Right. And now. Now we're home. I can. I'm good. I can tell you a story you've never heard about your favorite band. I might know somebody that knows someone in your favorite band. Like, you know, I love it. I love it.

Yeah. And I'm always like, hey, did you know Costco did 250 billion last year?

Right. Yeah, exactly.

Yeah.

You got your thing.

Everybody's a genius at something.

Yes. One of my favorite. And I know I've talked about it on the show, but one of my favorite interview questions is, and we. And we only stumbled on this in the last, you know, five years, is, what are you a nerd about?

Yeah. I love that.

If someone. If. For our organization, if someone doesn't just immediately go and talk for, you know, 10 minutes about whatever they're nerdy about up until the point where we're like, great, that's enough, you know? But if they can't. That's what you want, then they're not going to fit here in our, like, you got it. You don't have to be nerdy about the same thing that I am. That's fine. But you need to be nerdy about something every. Well, you need to be aware that you are nerdy about something and able to talk, because I know that once you've worked here for six, eight months, you're going to know our stuff well enough to be able to talk about it as well as you can talk about something that you know about today. And so it's a great way to test. Are you able to just talk about something that you know about? I don't care what it is.

Yes.

You know, I. I just want to see how you talk.

Yeah, I love it. Yeah. My. Anyway, my. Yeah, my favorite interview question that I always ended, I. I'm sure I've shared this on the show before, but is I always say, listen, we're interviewing a bunch of people. I'm going to have, you know, all These people in here talking to them, either via zoom or, you know, in person. What should I remember about you?

Love that.

That's the last thing I answer. And I always take a little note, and I'll be like, oh, I like that trained guy. Or I like the horse. The dude that's into horses, or the guy that loves football, whatever. Because I have a hard time. It kind of melds together. You ever gone and look at places to live? Like, we just look at 10 apartments today or five houses, and you're like, wait, I thought that one had the extra. And you. I mean, I bought a house thinking there was an extra room that we didn't get, you know, so that. That. I love that. I thought this had the other thing. And that guy was like, that was the other place that you didn't want.

That you didn't buy. Oh, okay.

Okay. Okay. Yeah. So what are your love. So those are good?

Yeah, I love it.

Awesome.

Love it. Tell us what your favorite interview question is. Feedback at BusinessBrain Show. If you send in your favorite interview question and we read it on the show, which we're definitely going to, we will also enter you into our drawing for a MacBook.

It's out of control.

I'm out of control today. I did this completely without any buy in. We can. We can edit this out if you're not on board, Shannon.

Oh, I'm totally on board. I'm happy to give it away, man. I know.

Same. Yep. We want the engagement. Engagement. Engage with us, please. We love it. Thanks for hanging out. And yeah. Feedback at BusinessBrain show. That's where you're gonna send in whatever you want if you want to do the review as well. Or instead BusinessBrain show review. That's it. Yeah.

Do them both, man. Do them both.

Absolutely. Get twice. Get in there twice.

I love it.

Have a. Have a good Wednesday and we'll see.

You on see you Friday.

Keep living that charm life.