Episode #624 - Being Aware Of Your Strengths And Weaknesses with Tom Hunt, Founder and CEO at Fame

Welcome to this edition of the Million Dollar Mastermind podcast. This is where we pick the brains of high achievers from all walks of life and get their hard earned real world insights on winning. I'm your host, Larry Wydell. And I think it's important, it's critical for those of us in leadership positions to give some thought or to be clear about what gets us excited and keeps us excited and gives us enjoyment and break that down to the smallest level of being able to target an area, see growth and get a thrill from it. You know, if you're not getting a thrill, you're not getting a rise, you're not getting some excitement or enjoyment from being able to impact a situation and see it turn out good. You need to find something else, don't you believe?

For sure, for sure. And here's something that's been really important for me recently is the awareness of what I like and what I'm good at. And I think it's finding a small improvement is. And so what that means is that we need someone else in the business who's like doing the. Ensuring everything is up to standard and running the weekly meetings. And if, like making sure everyone's doing their work on time, that's crucial because if we didn't have that, and I wasn't aware that we needed that then, and we'd never be at the size that we are today.

Yeah. Because there's a side of. Of course we know that if there's poison in the environment coming from something or some person or some whatever, that's gotta go. But on the other hand, it's like if I'm being forced to spend time on things that's dragging me down, I've got to figure out another way of getting that done. Get someone up to scale on that, get them on board. Because this all relates to the topic Tom of the leader has got to take. It's not like, you know, spend money, buy a new Ferrari every week, every month. You know, we do have guys in our business that have a Ferrari for every day of the week. You know, I wish life, that's great. But on the other hand, once you get over the Ferrari thrill, you go down as a green Ferrari. It's a. Yeah, you know, it's a red. But after a certain point, you know, I wish it was, that was all there was in life, you know, is to get that satisfied. But whatever the satisfaction is for you, you've got to make it happen. And they, everybody I know that's in leadership position, they find Little areas where they can impact and counsel with people, get involved in situations, see them turn around, they get a thrill out of it. Much like opening a new project and see, you know, tweaking those things and getting advantages that you can take in and install another. Other businesses. I, you know, when I rode horses, which I did for, like, 16 years, I even. I love training horses. You know, the. The boring part of getting in the ring and getting a new horse and, you know, teaching that thing to swap leads on a canner or to, you know, to jump fences without getting all, you know, panicky and everything, and just going around the ring step by step, helping that horse mature and then take it, you know, then you go into the shows and the small shows and the bigger shows and bring that horse along. Just incredibly satisfying. And even something boring like dressage, which is like ballet with a horse, I just found that incredibly fun, just getting the horse to do it, you know, step by step, little improvements every day. And it's similar. Why, you know, when I do the art, because you essentially do battle with the canvases, and then eventually you wind up, you know, you have to make something aesthetically pleasing happen. And a lot of times it doesn't want to do that. But once you. Once you. Once you have your fight to the death, you know, like Vincent van Gogh said, outside the door to a great painting, lies, terror and fear, you know, and so you have to go through that door. But when you do, it's just like, yes, you know, this is fun. You know, it gives you a thrill. And working with people the same way. And seeing your businesses where you had bottlenecks now see that work smoothly, or your employees used to have problems handling a certain situation, and now it just goes like clockwork because you got involved. Those are the things that keep us excited. But we've got to keep ourselves stimulated. Otherwise that lack of enthusiasm will go throughout the entire organism. It'll drain out of the entire organization. Don't you think, Tom?

Exactly right. Continuous improvement. Yeah. You can't just come from someone at the top. You have to come from everybody. Because what happens when you step away? You go on holiday, you want to move out of the business. It will eventually die if it's not improving.

And you have a quote. There's nothing new under the sun. We hear that. We learned that in Ecclesiastes in the Bible. And so you have a quote in line with that. And it goes where? While you're a big believer in podcasts, he says, I think the ability to learn from an experts in the niche you're trying to grow into is super valuable. I couldn't agree with that more. And that's why podcasts should definitely be considered at some stage in the early journey of a company. So talk about how you. You came to that conclusion and how that's benefited you.

So going back into, like, the seven years, the wasteland of seven years, I told you about that one company, the one that sold for like, an okay amount, and my mum was disappointed. So that one. What actually happened is I started a podcast alongside that company. And I think the podcast has probably ended up being a bit more successful than the business itself. And one of the reasons why I think that is because people were listening to the show. Basically, the show was a daily update where I was telling people what I was doing to build that company. And so what actually happened out of that company is that there was this one guy who I remember would listen religiously and ultimately offered to put money to invest in the company. And so I was like, this is a bit strange. I've never met this guy, but he's obviously been listening to me every day for a while and now is happy or wants to give me some of his cash. And so this for me was quite strange. But then I realized that it's such a great way for you to influence or to have authority in the eyes of people that could be your investors, that could be your buyers. And so that was a big realization for me. And then we started that podcast for my old employer, and we turned even the guests into buyers, and we built authority and became famous in that space. And so really, the. What happens if somebody knows more about you or has been exposed to you and you haven't been exposed to them? This is like the concept of fame. Then you basically have elevated authority in their mind. And if you have elevated authority in their mind, then it's easier to influence them. So this is why if, like, Will Smith came on this call now and told us both to, like, go and start cooking dinner or something, maybe that's a stupid example, or asked us to do something, we would probably do it because he have authority in our eyes, because we've been very exposed to him, and he, I think, hasn't been exposed to us.

Right?

So when we suggest that businesses run podcasts, this is what we're trying to do, is to elevate the authority in the eyes of the people that could be buyers, because then, then these people can be more likely to be influenced.

And what. What are things that resonate with podcast listeners, would you say? You know, because I don't even know why when I started this podcast, I didn't know how well it would be received. But it should, because I've had pretty good success working with successful people for 40 years and helping them become successful. So it should. But you don't know how it's going to come across in a podcast. What do you think causes people to, to get attracted to a podcast and to lock in on a podcast? Yeah, I think basically, you know.

Yeah. So there's information and then entertainment, and ideally these can be, can be combined. And so a great example is a podcast called the All In Podcast, which is for best friends, but also very wealthy Silicon Valley investors that come on every week. And it's entertaining because if like they're sitting around a table just chatting and taking the piss out of each other, but then it's also super informative because they've all spent 20, 30 years in investing or in startups or in business. And so it's a combination of those two, which I think can be really killer for any podcast. One of the ways that you can improve actually both information and entertainment is your style of hosting, Larry, which is not scripted, even though we tried to give you questions sometimes. But it's you just having an understanding of the guest and then you're not preparing, you're like listening and then you're moving on to the next thing. And so one thing I think 80% of podcast hosts can improve is to do less of the scripting and more of the just reacting to what the other person is saying.

Yeah, yeah, because it's just when I've got a script, it just doesn't seem to be interesting. It seems to be interesting why it's being written down. And then when I read it back, it's like, that's boring, you know, because that's the way my talks have been. You know, historically, if I've had a speech or a talk to give to a meeting, you know, it was like a one word outline or something, and that's as much as I could take. Yeah, but any, anything that you'd like to pass along to wrap this thing up, put. What, what have I not probed that we should have probed on this thing that could really be meaningful to people, would you say, Tom?

Yeah, I think we, I think when I coming on, I think or. The biggest thing that I've realized recently is that if anybody is trying to like make money or build a business, you just have to build a better Thing. And I don't think that's, like, I didn't really know that for, like, five years.

Yeah.

And so just ensuring that you invest the time and effort to build a better thing, and if it's not working, it's more than likely that the thing that you're trying to sell is not better than the other competitors. Yeah. So that I think if someone, like, drilled down into my head after five years of trying entrepreneurship, I maybe could have shortened the journey. So that's probably the thing that I want to highlight again, is that just make your thing better. Like, don't worry too much about sales and marketing. Just make a thing better, and then you'll be successful.

And the thing is, you know, it's. It's a certain maturity, but you have to be willing to accept the judgment of the public. And if you put your thing out there, it's kind of like people with managers will, over the years, will call me up and say, you know, people just don't come to meetings. They're just not that excited when they're in the office. And, you know, I never get a reaction after we have a training session. And I said, well, that's easy to understand because you're incredibly boring, you know, and, you know, you're lucky they even come at all. You know, I'm saying it's like, you know, smile, you know, have some fun, you know, put out some cookies. Do something to change the dynamic of the office. Because at some point, like, if you put out, it's kind of like a sales letter, you know, like you and I, if we run some kind of campaign, a sales letter promotion, and nobody responds, it's because it's. It's no good or it's not good enough. You've got. You got to be. If you're going to be a success, you've got to be willing to go through those things where they're. The response is telling you, not good enough yet. You know, and, you know, losers will go in and say, not good enough. I'm not good enough. I quit. You know, Whereas the winners will go say, okay, not good enough yet. But that's like painting. I swear, I have no clue how to paint. You know, I get what, you know, you get a canvas, you get an idea, you get started. There's a guy in New York who does videos on YouTube, Brian Ruttenberger, and he said the process of painting is you start. He'll start a new series every six months. He gets, like, 10, 12 new canvases and big ones. You Know, and he said, the first day is fantastic. You know, you get. And you're putting the paint on the thing, you get these ideas. And then he said, and then it's a bloodbath for six months trying to turn it into something decent, you know, but the first day was exciting. And, but. But you have to be willing to go through that thing of where your idea is not exciting, not, you know, like you're a comedian, you telling the jokes, not getting laughs. What that tells you is, it's not funny yet. And so that's why they're refining and everything. And so keep on going. And just because you didn't get the laughs, you didn't get the sales, you didn't get the response, doesn't mean you won't. And keep looking for, like, what Tom says to make it better. And, you know, eventually, you know, here's the thing. It's like passing a test, you know, you know, if you pass a test, you don't have to get a hundred to pass the test, you know, like the driver's license test or so you just have to get like a 70 in this country. 70. 70%. You pass. And so all you do is got to get a point. Like, you don't have to get a joke where it's so funny, everyone falls down in hysterics and they're laughing for three days. No, you just have to have a joke good enough to get people to laugh enthusiastically and then onto the next joke. And so what you're looking for is a success, and that you can build on and keep tweaking it, keep improving it. And so is that. Are we on the right track to wind up that way, Tom?

Yeah, that's exactly right. The keyword is yet the only way you're going to build something better than your competitors is by learning from the people that matter. You do, your customers. And so if you cut that learning loop off, then you're not going to get better. And so you just have to keep trying, keep trying, and then ultimately you'll build something better and then you'll win. But it might take three years.

Yeah, and you're like, that check came in to your house with your parents, and it's like, those checks will get bigger. I know you're not impressed yet, but your parents are probably impressed now.

More. More impressed.

More impressed. So, anyway, thanks so much, Tom. This has been a lot of fun. Looking forward to hopefully doing this again in the future. And we can hear about how all this has this foundation you put in place. Has compounded in directions far beyond we could even imagine now. So we've got, we've got some great future events to look forward to and then hopefully we'll get a chance to come back and talk about.

My pleasure entirely, Larry. I really enjoyed this interview. And yeah, I love the podcast. So I'm looking forward to hearing these episodes.

Right. Yeah. Well, thanks so much, Tom.

Thanks, Larry.

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