Episode 252: Manipulating the World into Solving Problems with Business Leader Anthony Franco

Welcome to this episode of the Million Dollar Mastermind. I'm Larry Weddell. And before we get started, if you want to know exactly how to win again and again, go to Wydell on winning.com webinar now to watch something I've put together for you. Now let's get going into this episode of Million Dollar Mastermind.

I am here with Anthony Franco. And Anthony, you're in Denver, am I right?

Yes, just north of Denver.

Yes, just north of Denver. And he is the founder of MC Squares and many other companies. Serial entrepreneur and having the time of his life because he's moved into making things now rather than just working in software and services. And so it's fun to hear Anthony express the life he's got and the challenges he has. You have a unique way of putting these issues into words, Anthony. Does anyone tell you that?

No, actually, it's the first time I've heard it.

Yeah, you're real good at it. And I'm glad to see that you've taken on an advisor role and a mentor role, talk about those things.

The one thing that I know for sure is that I love other entrepreneurs. Like, I love hanging around them because it's such a unique group of daredevils. And so, you know, mentor is the wrong word really. I like talking to other guys that are trying, guys and gals that are trying to solve hard problems and doing it at the, at a leadership position in a startup. It's just a very unique, very small group of people with a very unique set of skills. So if I get to help somebody else achieve what they're trying to do, that's awesome. And I plug other entrepreneurs brains all the time trying to figure and sort stuff out or get to market or define a position in a market.

Well, you find, where do you find these people?

So there's actually Denver's awesome. When it comes to an entrepreneurial community, there's a leading. The charge essentially is Denver Startup Week, which is the largest entrepreneurial event in the world. And they do that every summer. Now, last summer was virtual, but it's still a great community out here. Boulder also has a very strong startup community. And then I have, I participate in Rocky's Venture Club, which is a, which is an angel group here that I get to see a lot of entrepreneurs through that. And I've judged pitch competitions and I've just, I just get involved in the community as much as I possibly can.

And what was that called? Because I might come over in the summer. I'm over in Aspen I may come.

Over for that this Denver Startup Week.

Yeah, I hadn't heard about that.

Yeah, it's huge and quite fun.

The thing about hanging around entrepreneurs, one thing is you find that people that are of the same mindset where they'll bring up subjects and they'll ask you questions alone that challenge you because they know how to. They're very pointed in how they describe things or ask things. They're thinking about stuff that maybe you hadn't even thought of yet, but thinking about how to answer them taps into a side of your brain that otherwise maybe you wouldn't tap into. You find that true?

Yeah, that's absolutely right. Yeah. There are all kinds of different perspectives on how to look at solving a problem. And I am fascinated with, again, entrepreneurs in general, that they see a problem a little bit differently. And it's. It's quite exciting to talk to somebody that's looking at a problem differently than anybody else has in the past and.

Don'T feel, you know, it's not that unusual. Like Jerry Seinfeld says, if he goes to a party, the first thing he looks for is other comedians, another comedian, and that's what he talks to the whole night.

Yep, yep. I think there's a lot. There's a lot of similarity between comedians and entrepreneurs, actually. Essentially, a comedian is an entrepreneur of their own content. And comedians are all about the ideas. They talk about. The idea is the only thing that matters. And the way you look at something is the critical part. And that's very similar to how entrepreneurs see the world.

Yeah. And as you've gone through this process, one reason people will want to talk to you at some point, you gotta produce, you gotta sell. And getting big is important in the world today because that's how you establish your credibility. And, you know, when you make contacts, you know that people will take you serious because you've had success in the past. Talk about driving your production and how important that is to you to drive sales and reach new markets. And, you know, it's fun to come up with new products, but it's sometimes it's not as much fun to sell the product you got, you know, and so. But you got to get that out there, let people know what you got.

If you're a product, if you love making new products, but. But can't sell it. Then again, it's a hobby. So I love. Like, I don't sell. I just believe in the stuff that I build and.

Right.

And so sales is more about just. No, no, no, you don't it's like telling people why I'm excited about it or telling the problem I'm trying to solve. And so, you know, I find it very, very difficult. I've hired a lot of salespeople in my life and, and it's very difficult to get somebody to sell something they don't believe in. It's next to impossible. So part of sales, especially at leadership position, is selling the people that are responsible for going to market on the vision and why it matters and why they're making a difference. And it makes their job as salespeople a lot easier.

Hey, listen, there's a lot of information online, but there aren't a lot of people who have actually done something. In my case, I've actually built a successful business, has accrued over $5 billion in assets under management, and has done well even during trying times. Now, if you want to know exactly how I've done this, go to Whiteellawinning.com webinar Now, I've compressed a decade of learning into five short weeks. Just for those of you who want to give your an incredible advantage and are tired of waiting and watching others.

Move up, we do the same thing. It's like, you know, you have all these presentations and booklets and brochures and this. And it's like, let me make it easy for you. Tell people why you're excited about it. You know, that's what we tell our trainees. You know, what did you see when you heard the thing that really tripped, you know, flipped the switch in your brain? And why did that flip the switch? And what did you really see that got you excited? Tell people that. Because the whole idea of a presentation is to get people excited. And you're more likely to get people excited talking about what you're excited about than just talking about stuff, you know, details and descriptions like that. So that resonates with me. And again, that goes back to Jerry Seinfeld. Like, you can't, you can't make people laugh at a joke you don't believe in, you know, and if you don't think it's funny, they will know. And so as you move forward in this thing, what we'll give us do this. Why should we be excited about your current product? Maybe a little taste of your pitch because you got to get the sharks excited when you go in there in the shark tank. So when you talk about MC Squares and the dry erase whiteboard tiles, talk about why you're excited about that and why other people should be excited about it.

Well, so it's essentially, think about it this way, when you're in a meeting room and the real work, when you're trying to come up and problem solve, the real work gets done with sticky notes in the whiteboard. That's when the real ideas come out of people's heads and the real work gets done. The ideas happen. The aha moments happen. The moment you pick up a dry erase marker. And I discovered that in my last company building software for Fortune 100 companies. And so I wanted to bring that moment of an idea coming out of somebody's head. I wanted to be part of that moment. And so that's why I'm passionate about dry erase. It sounds kind of silly, but I truly am a dry erase nerd. I love the fact that we get to be a part. You know, we're not curing cancer or launching rockets to Mars, but we are in the room when those things happen. And that's what I love about MC Squares. And then we also have an environmental impact. So we make reusable sticky notes so they stick with microsection rather than adhesive, and they're dry erase. So a single six pack of MC Square Stickies replaces 12,000 paper sticky notes. And so far, we've replaced 1.8 billion sticky notes from going into landfills. And I'm excited about that. We have a lot of stuff to do still on the environmental side, but that's one metric that I get super excited about.

I'm sure your mind is running to extensions of that idea and that concept.

Yeah, we have more product ideas than we have time right now. We're actually raising capital from the crowd under new Reg CF rules so that we can capitalize on more of these. These amazing ideas and continue to expand the company? So, yeah, if you go to mcsquares.com invest, you can actually put everyday investors can invest in our company and our vision.

Yeah, fantastic. And we'll help expedite that. And you know, this has been so much fun. Would you like, what would you say to people that are, maybe they're young, maybe they're at a stage of their life where they want to change careers and they need that encouragement. Because people like you said, when you've been in that stage many times where you told people your idea and they're shaking their head no. That's the normal response when people hear an idea that they didn't come up with. And how do you. What would you say to the guys that are ladies that are on the verge, they're on the fence they want to jump. And if they were sitting and talking to you right now, you know what, what would you say to them?

Don't do it.

Yeah, don't do it.

Don't do it. Don't. No, it's not worth it. It's not worth the headache. And anybody that listens to me, they weren't ready. Any, anybody that's like giving me the middle finger right now, they're ready. They don't need me to tell them to jump. They don't need any, any pun, any wisdom from up high to tell them why they should need to go do what they're doing. Either that, either, either they're going to do it or not. And, and, and so, yeah, so the, the first thing I tell somebody when they're thinking about starting the business, I tell them, don't. It's too much work. There's not enough self fulfillment in doing it. You're going to get weight. It's not, it's definitely not an ego boost. It's definitely not. Doesn't fill your, fill your cup full of joy. It's a pain in the ass to be an entrepreneur. So don't do it. And the only reason to do it is because you can't do it. You can't do anything but do it.

Well. And the thing is, it goes back to why do you think you were put on the earth? What do you think you're supposed to be doing anyway? And you already made up your mind what you're supposed to be doing and what other people's opinion won't hold you back.

I'll tell you.

I probably told this before, but I remember after a meeting, people come after meetings and they want the inside scoop. And this one lady came up, very nice and she said, what do you do when you just can't get yourself to, to, you know, I'm at the point where I just, I just can't get myself to dive in and this, that and the other. And I said, well, you know, I just, I looked at her and I said, well, I think you need to flounder for another 2, 3, 4, 5 years, get deeper in debt, get more and more frustrated because you're obviously not there yet because, or you just haven't.

Found the thing that gets you out of bed like you're doing. It's not, it's not that, it's not, there's not something wrong with you. You just haven't found your thing yet. So keep looking. That's what I'm trying to do stuff.

Thank you for saying that. Because there's a lot of people that are stuck in situations where either other people or their previous thinking and books they've read have got them convinced that they're supposed to do what's in front of them now to do, and they can't get themselves to do it. Well, that's probably your insights telling you you're bored.

The problem, the reason why you can't get unstuck is because you're bored.

Yeah.

Go find something you're passionate about and it's not work anymore.

Yeah, yeah. You're not cranked up. In fact, you know, we'll have people in offices, they say, I can't recruit. You know, nobody seems to. I said, you're boring.

Yes.

Yeah, you're you. Nobody comes to my meeting. Yeah, you're boring. You know, and you're boring.

Yeah, exactly.

It's just, you got to get, you know, I also, it's kind of like this. I tell them, like, if you design a contest, it's got to be a contest that excites you. You know, it's not going to excite your team unless you come up with something and a payoff and whatever that you're excited about. If you have a meeting. The way you plan a meeting is you put in a combination of ingredients, speakers, this, that, the other location together to where you're super excited about telling people about that meeting and running the meeting. I said, if you get to that point, you're going to have a great meeting. But if you can't get to that point, don't waste your time and don't, don't waste everybody else time because it ain't going to work.

That's exactly right.

Yeah. Well, you see this very clearly. I'm so happy for you and so proud of the message that you're carrying around with you with your product, your business, your employees. And I tell you folks, Anthony is the kind of guy that, you know, I, you, you want someone like this. If you're going to be investing anywhere, you want an idea, but you want a person behind the idea that's going to make it happen. If you go to the venture capitalist with behind that, you know, they were the main guys with a Uber or things like that back when it was nothing. You find that they didn't care about the charts and the graph they cared about. Tell me a little bit about the idea and then am I convinced? The person telling me that's going to be running this thing is super fired up about it and somebody you know, because they, they bet on the person. And so, Anthony, I hope people take, take you serious and get involved. I know that they would have a lot of fun if they decided to join up with you and you know, get involved funding some of this stuff because I can tell you're going to go places because you're doing what you love and I'm, I'm happy to have you on and we'll look forward to us crossing paths. Maybe we'll cross paths path at this event this summer. But let's, let's decide that we're going to get together somewhere down the road and do this again because it's going to be fun to hear about your new adventures.

Thank you, Larry. Appreciate it.

Yeah, thanks so much. And Anthony, wish you the best. And I think you have my cell phone number. What I do is coach million dollar earners and sometimes you just need somebody to bounce ideas off of if you ever need. I always have time for super successful, super driven, super energized people. So anytime you want to call, bounce an idea around, I'm available.

Thank you.

And I look forward to seeing great things happen to you. And I can tell you that as far as I can tell, you are 100% right on in every one of your answers. So thanks so much for sharing.

Thank you, sir.

Yes, we'll talk next time. Thank you.

Goodbye. If you enjoyed what you've heard and are dead serious about finding out for yourself exactly how this works in the real world, I've taken the most valuable business lessons I've learned over 40 years and put them into something for you to watch. Go to whiteellawinning.com webinar now in order to move up as fast as possible. I'm Larry Wydell and I run the Million Dollar Mastermind. Go, go, go.