0273: From Country Sunshine to Community Squalor with Cliff Oxford

Hello, my name is Cliff Oxford and you're listening to EA interviews, EA interviews.

Episode 273, inspiration, transformation, success stories and the imperfect action round. Seven days a week, join Mario Ficcini for today's Expert Authority effect interview. Thinking about the future, you know, considering the past. All these things come into business. But how would you like to hear from a visionary? How would you like to hear from someone who has an international think tank and is author of the Redneck Reverie? I have none other than founder of Cliff Co Cliff Oxford on today's episode. We're going to be talking about all this and more right after we thank our sponsor. Every business needs a book, including yours. Visit freebusinessbookpublishingcourse.com today to learn the seven steps to publish and promote your nonfiction, lead and profit generating business book in eight weeks. Once again, this that's free businessbook publishingcourse.com Here he is, ladies and gentlemen, Cliff Oxford. Cliff, how are you feeling today?

We're feeling good here in Atlanta, Georgia. As we say in the South. It's pretty outside.

Well, I can imagine that it's definitely warmer too, I believe, isn't it?

Yes, yes. The rain has moved out, so it's a nice day in Atlanta.

Well, that's good to hear. I want to ask you about your book, your think tank, everything you're doing. It's very inspiring because I've heard of things like a think tank and I've heard of people talk about masterminds, but you have not only a very intriguing book and everything you're doing, but also you have an international think tank of over 500 different companies. How did you decide to do that?

Well, you know, I had the Oxford Entrepreneur center, which I sold to Forbes Books in 2018. And I started Oxford Entrepreneur center when I was actually at Emory. That's after I had sold my software company. I went to Emory and kind of got bored there on the faculty and started an Oxford Entrepreneur Center. And what we said is we're not really for startups and we're not for big corporations. It was really for companies who had become cash flow positive and really wanted to proliferate. And how do you do that? So we developed massive content around how you blueprint a company from cash flow to be $100 million business. And so we got a following there. Then I started writing with the New York Times that certainly helped build it. But I sold that in 2018 and it was focused on entrepreneur education for kind of the advanced entrepreneur. So when I sold that I started looking at what I want to do next, and I said, I want to have a think tank among business, medical and academia. I want to bring those three disciplines together into a think tank. And it's very different than Oxford because we're looking at issues that are coming they hadn't hit yet. We trying to discover what issues are ahead. And having those three disciplines in the room and putting out a newsletter like we do and all the events we do.

You know, business people always say, well, we didn't even think about a business having a think tank. But since business solves most of the world's problems and we think it's been. It's been a lot of fun and very exciting to have one.

What's been the biggest challenge and also biggest benefit of having an international think tank.

Constantly producing content? You know, if you. We learned this from the Oxford center. You know, there's a lot of networks, there's a lot of groups and everything. But what really distinguished us was producing content that moved the needle for our folks. And so we do a newsletter two days a week.

And that is constantly looking at what's ahead. So getting that information, putting it in a digestible format and coming up with white papers and research. Porsche is a major sponsor of ours. We just had it a socially distanced think tank roundtable at Porsche. And so it's constantly creating content is.

The biggest challenge and the biggest benefit.

The biggest benefit is it's a multiplier. You know, when you put two companies together, they can.

They can do a deal that affects 10 more companies than 100 companies. So there are so many deals being worked on right now and so much going on that I don't even know about. But the roots of it was in the think tank. So it grows like Frankenstein.

That it just multiplies once you get it going. So the multiplier effect is the big thing.

So I want to ask you about your book, A Redneck Reverie. Did you get the idea from the think tank or did you have it beforehand?

Well, you know, I had written two other books. I'd written no Grow Exit and I had written Lambs to Leaders, Liberal arts majors in a business society. And how do they come into business and develop into leaders? And.

So the book did come from the think tank.

Because that's where we really were doing the thinking about. Trump didn't run a political campaign. He ran a marketing campaign from day one. And the media didn't understand that because they don't, you know, they were used to political campaigns and they kept saying, I can't believe he's doing this and it's working. So we really wanted to dig then. I grew up in the Okefenokee Swamp.

So here I'm running a think tank with a lot of elite leaders. And I grew up in the Okefenokee Swamp. And what I was, what I could see was the conditions that created the environment for Trump to run a marketing campaign. And.

So it was definitely, I would say the think tank had a.

Definitely impact on it, but also where I grew up had an impact on it. And what I had done in business before the think tank and where we, you know, we were started a company from scratch, dealt with Wall street going public. So it was a good Lynn view that I could tell the redneck reverie story that nobody else could. And that created the conditions for Trump.

What would you say those conditions were that do you think anyone else prior to him could have pulled off the marketing campaign?

Really good question. You know, he was kind of the perfect fit for this.

And what attracts, quote, the redneck reverie? You know, I go in the book, there was 2.8 million people in 2016 that voted, that normally didn't vote. And they were all in precincts won by Trump by 80% or more. So he pulled them off the sofa, he pulled people in who had given up. So you know what, you never want to say never, but it would be hard to pull off the personality, the bigness, the go F yourself attitude that he brings to it, which rings their bell.

Very much so. So I doubt it.

And I doubt if there's going to be.

Anybody else comes along. I know, you know, so many people lined up to bring on the Trump.

Take over the Trump legacy. They're not going to get it. Ted Cruz is not going to get it.

It's like I help buy and sell companies and the one company you never want to buy is a personality driven company.

Why is that?

Because that personality moves, is the blood flow of that whole company. Their personality moves the decision making, it moves the whole attitude of the company. People know how to when to act with that personality. So that personality drives everything. And if you buy that, if you buy that company and take that personality out, you have an empty shell and it's very hard. So you want to buy a systems driven company. You can replicate systems, but you can't personalities. And the Trump phenomenon is personality driven.

So even though he's a big personality, but even though he has the hotels and other businesses which could be systems driven, you're still Saying that it's all personality driven.

His political entity is totally personality driven.

Okay.

You know, we look at, we measure companies that are they 80, 90% personality driven, 50%.

What would you say most companies are.

Like, let's take Microsoft and Apple, because I know they're both hugely successful companies. They have the systems in place, arguably, but they both have Bill Gates, Steve Jobs as the personality. What percentage would you say those are driven?

Well, in the early days, they were definitely personality driven, like most companies are. And reason many companies don't get above 3 million is because at 3 million, you've got to start putting some systems into place.

You're talking in revenue, huh?

You're talking 3 million revenue. A superstar entrepreneur can run it with kind of on the balls, in the air for about 3 to. About 3 to 3.5 million.

Around 3.5 million. You've got to start implementing systems. And the thing, if you look at Jobs and Gates, they were maniacal about systems. That's where they came out of.

And I think what out of.

If 10 companies make it to a million, only 1 in 11 make it to 2 million. I mean, so the numbers become very tough because that personality has to pull back and put systems into place, and that's. And they have to hire people. Who doesn't say yes to them? They have to hire. So the whole thing is different when it's around the personality. Up to a certain point, it can.

Operate very efficiently with a personality.

But so what you see is companies try to do it, maybe they're 50% personality, 50% systems, and you can get to 25 million with 50, 50. So that's another whole podcast, actually. But Trump is in the 90s.

If you look at the attributes of his political.

Entity, it's, it's in the 90s. No decision is made other than through his gut.

And he called some of them right in 2016, 2020. He underestimated the, you know, he called the virus from his gut. He didn't look at the science, and he got that one wrong. If he'd gotten that one right, he would look like a genius if the thing would have disappeared. And he was going to leverage that by saying, see, these people are always telling you how bad it is. And he had a plan for the virus going away in July and how to utilize that. But this virus had other, had other ideas. You know, it wanted to live as much as the Trump campaign wanted to live. So he just called that one wrong. And that's because he didn't look at systems and Science.

He looked at a personality.

Well, how would you compare him to jfk?

You know, I have thought about that. That's funny you asking that question. I have thought about that.

You know, JFK.

Had a belief in institutions and systems, though his personality, I think he was probably 20% personality, 80% institutions.

And systems, but definitely, you know, higher on the personality than a George Bush. But I would say.

The Kennedys had such a belief in the institutions of democracy that.

He would listen to those. I would say 2080.

Okay. So you think he was still even more reserved than Trump was?

Oh, yeah, very much so. Very much less personality driven than Trump.

Trump was.

It was kind of dangerous. Now, when he called it, right, he looked like a genius, right? He did. So he made some good calls. But it's kind of dangerous when you run into the free world and you're kind of doing it all on personality.

So with.

When he went to Pence and said, you should just overturn the election.

That'S what his personality said. Do.

So with your. So with your symposium and think tank, you. You have international companies, how has the US Politics played a role in the discussions internationally that you have?

Well, the international companies. Let's take Pakistan. We've got some Pakistan, got some in Lebanon, in the Middle East. And, you know, I think I've seen a return to normalcy there. If that's even a word.

It can be.

It was Trump. You know, they kind of understood we had something there that was. We were dealing with. I think if we had reelected Trump.

The international would have said, okay, we got to rethink the whole United States.

But I think they almost saw it as an aberration.

And said.

You know what, let's just see what happens in the re election.

Okay?

I want to take a pause real quick and ask you, can you.

Leave the Zoom and come back? Because that thing that popped up has me curious why.

But I'd rather we control it than it kills us. You know what I mean?

Yeah. Jimmy, to come out of Zoom and come back in, please. Sure.

All right, we're still live. Steve and Nick, we're clearly going to have to cut this. I have no idea why it's even doing this.

All right, Cliff Oxford, start.

Boom, Boom.

And we're back.

Continue converting.

All right, if you're watching live, Merry Christmas.

Welcome to doing stuff live.

But we're gonna be back. He knows what he's doing. He's awesome. And.

We'Ll switch this to the two.

Well, this looks kind of cool.

I was gonna say we're gonna switch this to the T pain 2 pane.

And ask to unmute.

If you could just tilt it down again.

Oh, here we go with this.

All right. So we were talking about the politics and you know, you were mentioning that Pence was, you don't, you don't, I don't want to insinuate that you, you were implying that he shouldn't have asked him, but you were implying that Trump's personality, that's just how he does things. And he's less institutionalized than previous presidents would have been.

He's a personality driven political.

Animal. You know, we find in companies, when we go into personality driven companies, we'll find, wow, they do two or three things super well. And then you will find two or three things that make no sense at all because they're driving it from their gut and their personality. And any kind of data measurement would say this is a stupid decision.

And, but they stay, that's why they stay personality driven. Cause of bad decisions like that. So Trump.

I mean, the, you know, if you look at the last.

The six weeks between the election and inauguration, it was, the personality went off the rails.

And he started doing some really crazy things. If you look at when he was running in 2016, he told all the political consultants, go, take a hike. And he made an awful lot of good calls to win. Now you can debate whether they were good political policy wise or not, but he made some very good calls and they were right from his gut. And his personality.

You know, he was his own, he was his own press spokesman, he was his own chief of staff. Because that personality is going to drive those decisions no matter what.

Now, I want to ask you about white privilege and rednecks. Why do you feel so many people feel like they were stabbed in the back?

Well, you know, when I go home and I was home this weekend.

Thanks. You know, these people.

Had their jobs.

Taken from $20 an hour in 1987 to the day they're making on average 10, 50. So, you know, in 23 years they have, they've lost 50% of their wages. And the last time I checked, nothing's really going down in price. So, you know, maybe they're at.

You've never seen inflation stop over the ages.

So really if you with inflation, they're not making 10, 80 an hour, they're making about $6 an hour. So you've gone from $20 an hour to $6 an hour. And where they used to live in houses, they're now living in trailer parks in squalor. And they go, look, Cliff, white privilege my ass. Excuse my language. I'm sitting here with a $6, you know, making barely above minimum wage. And all the jobs got sent overseas.

And nobody. And it was all to protect the stock market. You know, the stock market only went up.

Not even 1% between 1970 and 1980. And it was because wages were going up. And as I say in the redneck reverie, the Biltmore Group got together and said, we're never going to have a stock market as long as we have.

Rising wages. So what they did, they created nafta. And I'm a global trader. And I say in the book, I'm for global trade, just do it fairly. But, you know, these people got stabbed in the back. They said, basically, you're gonna compete against the Chinese, who's making a dollar an hour, $2 an hour. That's who you're gonna compete against. And, and, oh, by the way, good luck. And then, as I said in the book.

The redneck is not totally guilt free here. I mean, they don't like to move, they're very immobile.

They want a job and be left alone. If Donald Trump's a dictator and he can do that, that's fine with them. By the way.

They're not at PTA meetings, they're not at the city council meetings. And so that is what. And then, so the Democrats take their jobs away. Who was supposedly the soul of the Democratic Party is that particular person. And they sold out. I mean, Nancy Pelosi's husband is a Wall street banker, and he is the one that went to Wall street and said, we can actually get Democrats on our side if we fund their campaigns. Consequently, Nancy Pelosi becomes House speaker because her husband got them into the campaign spigot of the Wall street trough. So, you know, all this is going on. Nancy becomes speaker, the Democrats get their campaigns funded, and.

These rural communities just got devastated. It's worse than Third World. Third World is because you got to put in the diabetes and you got to put in all the meth and all like that down there. But we do know this. Whether you're a redneck in rural Georgia or you're in the hood in Atlanta, when you have no hope, things go south.

When a human being doesn't have hope, they turn devices. So it's hard to argue these people have white privilege. And then, so they say, then we turn on the TV and they're telling us how racist we are and we should not.

Know. Go to Trader Joe's and See Jose's.

Sauce? And you know, they're taking Paul Revere off the high school because it offends somebody. You know, what did Paul Revere ever do wrong? You know, didn't ride the horse fast enough. I don't know. I mean, so there is. They've been screwed over. Those guys got screwed over. And the. And it was all about campaign contributions and connecting the Democratic Campaign Committee into the Wall street.

Money spigot.

Now, back when I was there, you know, it was not country squalor, it was country sunshine. People had a job. And you're not talking about getting rich here. I mean, you're not even as I explained in there, it's to have a house on a slab rather than wheels. That's what these people wanted. They didn't have to be rich.

They didn't.

They just. But you said. But there was an economic coup that said we got to get the stock market up. And I would argue as a business person, if we would have kept wages rising, we would have more.

We would have a bigger middle class. We wouldn't have as many billionaires, but we would have a bigger upper middle class than we do today.

So you think the billionaires would have shrunk, but the middle class would have been bigger?

Yes, I think overall there would have been more winners in that scenario than winners today.

Now, what about the under.

I don't want to say low class, but.

Lower income. Do you think they'd be moved up to the middle class and yeah, the.

Working poor would have moved up. The whole idea was working poor, working class, middle class and on.

Today.

You know, the middle class is really now the working poor.

And you go in these communities and it's no longer there's not middle class or working class. There's working poor is what exists in those communities today. Working poor and then the unemployed.

What would you define the middle class as nowadays?

You know, the middle class today in these communities we're talking about, you're only talking about you need about four grand a month to lead a middle class life in a rural area. Four grand a month. And I would say, you know, let's say 10, 50 an hour. That's $80 a day, that's $400 a week, that's $1,600 a month. So you're looking at about six, $18,000 a year is what they're making. So they're long ways.

From that $4,000 they need to make. If wages would have gone, if we had not had trade agreements with no labor or economic or environmental standards.

Those people would be making $32 an hour.

Today.

That were making 20 in 1987. They would be making $32 an hour. That is what, $250 a day? That's about $1,000 a week. There's your $4,000.

So it's all coming down to the math here, and it's just a matter of who's getting the bigger percentage of it.

Yeah, I mean, when that's. That's exactly right.

So, because from an economic and GDP standpoint, I mean, it's not like unless you create an add value to create extra money.

It'S coming from somewhere and it's. I never thought about it because I wasn't even around in the 70s. But when you're talking about.

They decided to keep everything stifled so they could keep a larger percentage of it. I'm like, that seems like huge market manipulation.

Yeah. And I think, you know, in a way, the smart guys over at Reddit explain a version of this back to them, of course, that they manipulated the trade agreements. They manipulated everything to create, you know, where they could make money in the stock market. I mean, the stock market, Wall street.

There'S a lot of mouse to feed there. There's a lot of kids that send a private school. There's a lot of vacation homes in the Hamptons.

They have to create it somehow. So what they finally figured out was we can do this because you can buy off the system in Washington.

You can buy the system in Washington. And that's basically what they did.

Okay. So I want to.

I'm going to do the wheel of whatever, and we're going to thank our sponsor and come back for the imperfect action round. And I know exactly what I'm going to ask you.

Okay.

With everything we're talking about, the gdp, economics, political.

You got to pick a color, though. Any color, as long as it's yellow or black.

Okay, I'll stick with black.

Oh, there we go. You got it.

So my question for you is, with everything you're saying about Trump and running the marketing campaign, do you think he could do it again? And do you think he will run again in 2024?

I think he will. If they don't get him on the 14th amendment in this trial, I think he will come out and he's going to be a constant force that says he's going to run again. And he's going to be the kind of president in exile. You know, he's got to get through this trial.

And.

And I think he will garner all the attention. My gut tells me at the last minute he will decide not to run.

And why is that?

Because he doesn't want to lose again. He's got this one, you know, blamed on the election was stolen and.

And I think if he lost again, he would go down as a two time in his viewpoint, loser. And he can say I won one time and the second time they stole it, so I'm still a winner. And I think he would be afraid he would lose. Now if something happens.

That he can see that he can win, he probably will run again. But I think he's got to have a good deal of certainty he can, he can win. Now. He, I think he will tease it a lot because he really knows that game. You know, that's a personality game and.

He'S good at that. So I think he will definitely leverage it to get the attention.

Okay, that's fair. Well, I appreciate everything, the insight you've been sharing so far and we're gonna thank our sponsor and come back for the imperfect action round. You've heard me say every business needs a book, including yours, and it's true. And that's why you should visit freebusinessbook publishingcourse.com today to learn the seven steps to publish and promote your nonfiction lead and profit generating business book in eight weeks. But you know what, don't take my word for it. Take it from a few of my authors like Lori.

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There's no way in the world I would have been able to do this with somebody else again. I've attempted it in the past. It didn't serve me. As a matter of fact, I ended up more frustrated than anything. So this has been a very seamless process.

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Hey, their words, not mine. Visit freebusinessbookpublishingcourse.com to get started now and I look forward to hearing your Transformation as the next video success story. Once again, that's free businessbook publishingcourse.com and we are back with the imperfect action round. Cliff, are you ready to take imperfect action?

Love it. Shoot.

All right, three questions for you. 60 second or less answers. The first one is what is the fastest path to the profits?

The fastest path to the profits is find an underserved customer and and then spend all your time learning about that customer. And here's the key thing. And don't ask them their needs. Figure out their needs before they need it.

Oh, I like that. Number two, what is the biggest problem you see your prospects making and the fastest way for them to fix it?

In searching for prospects for companies looking at project prospects. Is that what you're asking?

Yes. What's the biggest problem that the prospects keep on making before they come to you?

I apologize.

Who are the prospects.

Your prospects for the prospects of a company?

Oh, the biggest. The prop. The problems they're doing. I apologize that prospects. Something else totally gets into my mind when I say prospects. Here's what they constantly do is they chase shiny objects. They get a little groove going, they get some action going, they get some positive cash flow. They run off and chase. I call it S.O.S. shiny Object Syndrome. Stay focused is and stay what you're doing. You know, many of these people want to start a new division now go like what's the market share of you got right now? Well, I got 1% in market share. We'll go after the other 99 then chasing a new one. So shiny object syndrome is the biggest problem.

I like that. Great expert authority insight. Number three, what is the best way to maximize customer lifetime value?

Let the customer know you care.

You know, customers want three things. They want it on time, they want it default free and they want to know you care. And if they find out you care, they'll forgive you for the first two when you make a mistake. Now if they think you don't care and you do one of those first two, they're going to be like banshees out there telling everybody how bad you are. So show the customer you care and that's a lifetime value.

Excellent. What books would you recommend to expert authority world?

I would read no grow Exit.

That I wrote. I will be shameless here. I think it's a great read for an entrepreneur.

You know, one of the things we discovered was liberal arts majors. You can get them at cost, you know, very cost effective to start. And we found if they survive six months, they actually become more productive than Anybody any other discipline in the company, they got to survive that six months. And that's why I wrote LAMSA Leaders Liberal arts majors in a Business Society and what it does, it ramps them up for the first six months with one read what it's going to take them six months to a year to figure out. So liberal arts majors. I would read Lambs to Leaders and the.

The other one would be Good to Great by Jim Collins.

Oh, good recommendation. Thank you for all of those.

That's a good foundational book.

Where would you like people to learn more?

You know, the other book is the 22 immutable laws of marketing.

I have to mention the 22 immutable laws of Marketing.

Well, I'm glad you did.

So okay, what was your last question? I'm sorry?

Where would you like people to learn more about you and your Cliff Co?

There's two ways to learn more. Cliffco.com and you feel free to send me an email@cliffliffco.com and I would encourage you to get on our newsletter as a thank you for having me. You did a great job. And as I want to give something back any of your listeners, I would put them as complimentary on our think tank newsletter and all they got to do is email me@clifflefco.com and that is a subscription based newsletter and I think that I would encourage them to do that. I hope they do that. Feel free to contact me. A Redneck Reverie that's on Amazon. All three books are on Amazon.

We'll make sure there's links on the show notes page for you.

Okay. Yes. So I really enjoyed it. I really enjoyed the mix of the business and looking at Trump. The Trump book Redneck Reverie is not either a pro or anti trump book.

It is a Here is what happened to create the conditions and here are the solutions. You know, the solutions is its own chapter.

How do we turn this country squalor into country sunshine again?

I like that. I like that a lot.

Well, thank you for sharing. It's been a lot of fun and appreciate your insights.

Thank you very much.

All right, Expert Authority world. We have another great episode here today. I'll see you tomorrow. Have a great day and God bless.

You're already the expert, but have you transformed your expertise into a tangible asset that will generate and qualify leads while increasing profit for you 247 and if so, how well are you promoting it? With the Expert Authority Effect publishing method, it's easier and faster than ever. Visit freebusinessbookpublishingcourse.com today to learn the seven steps to publish and promote your nonfiction, lead and profit generating business book. And in eight weeks, visit freebusinessbookpublishingcourse.com to get started. Now once again, that's freebusinessbookpublishingcourse.Com hey, thanks for listening to today's episode. I hope you got a lot out of it. I know I sure did. If you haven't done so already, I invite you to subscribe to the show. And also be sure to check out eainterviews.com for complete show notes, the full interview video experience, links to the resources we mentioned, and more. Have a blessed day and I'll see you tomorrow.