Episode 204: The Benefits of Understanding Lingo with Jeffrey Shaw

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I started collecting records and I just bought their very first record they ever did. They came out with, like, a new collector's edition. It was like old, like kind of 60s, doo wop girl kind of thing. It's really, really good.

Oh, interesting. So Walk like an Egyptian was not their first album.

No, that was later on. That was, I think, their third. Yeah. Oh, no, I.

Just another man, Nick.

It's fitting. It's a Monday.

Because that's my fun.

By the way, do you know who wrote that song?

No, I think I know. Bruce Springsteen. Bruce. Stella.

This is a.

This was not written.

It's a very, very famous musician who just died about two years ago.

Male or female?

Male.

Prince Bing.

Prince wrote that?

Prince wrote Matic Monday.

It was.

Look.

Thank God he did not do that himself.

Yeah.

That would ruin his career.

I bet you. In all those demo tapes that have not been released yet, I bet you he has a version of it. That'd be cool to hear, I'm sure.

But it doesn't feel like a guy should be singing that song.

Yeah, he wrote. I think he wrote it for them. Like, for her. He was fans of the. He was a fan of the Bengals.

I was listening to Purple Rain earlier today. That is such a good song.

He was unbelievable.

I know it.

He's probably one of the best guitarists.

Yeah.

Out there, too. I didn't realize all the solos was his.

Well, all the. Almost every album was just. He played every instrument.

If you really.

Yeah. Look up anything says. It says, all songs written, produced, arranged and played by Prince.

That's wild.

Oh, my God.

I know. Yeah. He played everything.

The guy from Foo Fighters does the same thing.

Dave Grohl.

Dave Crawl. Right? He grow. Yeah.

Yeah. Brian Wilson from the Beach Boys used to do the same thing, too.

I know Howard Jones as well.

I did not know. I don't know who Howard Jones is actually.

They're from the 80s. No one ever.

Don't turn away from the microphone when you sing. You guys sing into it.

All those 80s pop synth kind of hits.

What's your favorite band, Kels?

My favorite band?

Yeah. Music. What are you into right now? At the moment at least.

I would say, like Florence and the Machines. Recently I've been listening Lawrence and the Machines, but I'm like an oldie. I like. I listen to a lot of Simon and Garfunkel and the Beatles.

Oh, I like Simon Garfunkel, Florence in the Machine stuff. Is that fronted by Florence Henderson? That's the only Florence Henderson.

I loved her.

Yeah.

You should hear about two women I love, Florence Henderson and the girl from the Bengals. Like, that was the two.

And.

Yeah.

All right, we gotta kick things off.

Okay, everybody. Welcome to the Brother first podcast.

He's back. Ryan Lee's here and it's another episode of Private first podcast. I am Mike McAllowitz, the co host to the co host, and I'm the author of Private first and Clockwork and Pumpkin Plan and all that other stuff.

And the other co host of the co host, Kelsey A.

And the host, you are?

I am Ryan. I am the host to the co host and the co host.

That's right.

Co co host.

Right.

You can find us on itunes, Stitcher, Tunein Radio, Google Play and profitfirstpodcast.com or any podcaster anywhere.

Yeah. Cause that's the podcast you're listening to. This is the Profit first podcast. All about profitability. Every single angle, every kind of alpha and omega, and everything in between of profitability. We talk about. And today will be no different. Today we're talking about the lingo you use. Finally, someone stepped up and wrote a book about lingo. Like in the health food industry, there's lingos, lawn salads.

There's a lot, a lot of lingo. And I've been looking for a good book on lingo.

Yeah, well, there's a book called Lingo that's all about lingo. And I'll tell you, when you can talk your customers language, they buy from you, which makes you more profitable. Jeffrey Shaw will be on in just a minute. But before we do that. Kels.

Yeah.

What have you been up to, just in general?

Well, I've been buying a house in general.

That was deflating.

That was.

Yeah. How's the house purchase going?

It's okay. It's a roller coaster.

I don't want to say, are you back in like I am back in what happened?

They came down. So what happened was the house that I was purchasing didn't meet the appraisal that I was purchasing it for. And originally the sellers did not want to renegotiate. They were not willing to come down in price and they wanted me to come up with cash to make up the difference. So we ended up settling with. Now they're not going to do the. In the. For the inspection that they were originally gonna do, which they're not major things, but it would have just been nice to have them taken care.

What were some of the things that you're gonna.

So there is the vent for the exhaust in the. Not the exhaust.

The return.

Yeah. For the. In the bathroom, the exhaust.

It's a diesel run bathrooms.

In my bathroom, that toilet flushes.

Anywho, it was just vented into the soffiting and not completely out to the exterior of the attic.

Why do they do that?

So stupid. So then there was mold in the attic.

Oh, black mold.

Not the bad kind.

Okay.

Yeah. So. But it wasn't major.

What have you been up to, Ryan?

I'm learning more about soffits. I've been exhausted. Yeah. I've just been finding coffee shops in Boonton.

Yeah.

How did you like.

You know coffee shops? Very well.

I do know coffee shops. That's a nice one.

Does it qualify coffee?

Yeah, I would have. If I had more time. I would have hung out there and did a little work.

And where are you from? Connecticut.

Well, I still say I'm a New Yorker, even though I've been out of New York for almost 20 years. But I am. I'm a nutmegger now. Yeah. I'm up in New Canaan, Connecticut.

Oh, it's so funny. I saw. I thought New York. No, no, because you say New York so much like. Oh, he's from New York, not the city. I thought you from New York state.

Yeah, I am. But now, no, we live in. Let me see. I moved to Stamford, Connecticut, originally in 99. It's been like almost 20 years. So I'm starting to speak like the. Hello.

Hello. How are you, darling?

It's good to be back in Joyce.

Yeah.

Now in Joyce, do you feel a.

Different vibe down here?

You know, well, Connecticut still, we're right on the border of New York, so we still have that kind of New York energy. And everyone commutes into the city who lives there. So you don't really lose it. But when you. You feel it, though. And when you're driving here in Jersey, which is the most confusing Place still in the world. 80 to 287. 46. No, you got to make a U turn, get off the exit. I had navigation and I still made three wrong turns. I'm not kidding. Like, it really, but it's. I'm just happy to be here.

Yeah, well, we got to get. We got to get Ryan up to Heavenly Temptations. That's the competitor for Boss Boot and Coffee.

I'll hit it on the way to.

See what your judgment is. You know your coffee shops. You work in coffee shops?

I work from coffee shops.

Touche.

Well, my son said that to me. He goes, daddy, what do you. He's like, when you go to the coffee shop, do you like, serve the coffee? I said, no, no, honey. I just kind of bring my laptop and I work from there. I just, you know. But we are. I'm getting my first physical location in like, almost 10 years. I'm signing a lease in about a week.

Exciting.

Yeah, it's. It's great. It's. It's a former retail store, so It's. It's about 1200 square feet. And I might rent. There's space above another 1200 square feet because we're going to be doing our new health company, our rewind company. We're going to do all the fulfillment out of the space as well. And we have a space where we could have taste testing for clients and do workshops and kind of like a profit first esque.

Oh, I love that, man.

So it's going to be a lot of fun. I'm looking forward to it.

That's awesome.

Is it near your home?

Yep, ten minutes away.

And do you think your work schedule will change now that you have a physical space? Employees too, I assume.

Yeah, we're gonna have a couple more people. No matter what. I'm gonna make sure I'm done by three. Four o' clock. Yeah, that's it. If it's not done by then, it ain't getting done.

This is the most regimented man on family time, personal time. He respects it more than anything. And your business is wildly successful.

Yeah, it's. I really do put my family first, Profits first, then family first. And I'm just gonna keep plugging your book. But even this, after this, when I leave, I go home. I'll probably have like an hour and then I'm coaching my son's baseball team because I can't miss that.

That's so amazing.

But it's been. That's. I. I truly build my business around my family because I have four kids. And that's, they're my life. So I'm going to build it around them. And if, and if I, and I know I've sacrificed money and I continue to. But that's okay.

Yeah, exactly.

Yeah. But you, from the outside, you seem to live a very comfortable, financially successful life.

We're, we're great.

And. But you're one of the guys who actually does what everyone says, like, oh, I need work, life balance. Like, like you, you actually are doing it.

You've designed it effectively.

I really have. And I am, I'm okay again. Financially, we're doing fine. And I think what, what I think it makes me do is it really has me focus on lifetime customer value, like really taking care of people. Because we, you know, you guys know in your business, when you take care of your people, they're gonna stick with you for a long time. It's just a better business. As opposed to this, the churn and like being so hyper and aggressive with selling now, we could just kind of take our time, say we're just gonna take care of you and they're gonna be with us forever.

Right. You nurture those relationships and we use really good lingo.

Such wise, sage advice from a guy who works in a coffee shop.

Would you like a mocha?

Yeah, you like a mocha? I do like mocha. Actually, in a second we're get to our guest, Jeffrey Shaw. But I do want to thank our corporate sponsors. I won't mess it up like I did last week. Fundbox, who is a sponsor, paying sponsor. I take it all back, nextiva and Receipt Bank. So we'll give a thanks to them in a little bit. Also at the end of the show, we write down like what we learn as we go along here. So we're going to share at the end of the show what we learned. His name is Jeffrey Shaw and he's a personal friend of mine. And we actually were hanging out down in Florida as he was writing his first book. And probably one of the most important books that shockingly has not been out there yet. I've never discovered a book that like this. It's called Lingo. Discover your ideal customers, secret language and make your business irresistible. He's not just an author, he's also a professional speaker. He's a TEDx speaker and previously was a portrait photographer. I bet you that influenced his book a little bit. Jeffrey Shaw, welcome to our show.

Hey guys, I'm really glad to be here. I'm still reeling from what it means to have an exhaust problem in the bathroom. But other than that, I'm totally present otherwise.

Ownership or home rental? Like the worst home experience you've ever had? Jeffrey.

Oh, my gosh. Oh, this is easy. So when I moved to Miami Beach 2 1/2 years ago, I didn't intend on moving here. I came down here for three months to get away from New York City winters, and so came down to the Miami area and I rented a couple different Airbnbs, fell in love with the area, and decided I would move here. Within three days, I went from, hey, I think I'll live in Miami, to actually signing a lease. So I signed a lease on an apartment which is directly across to alleyway from the Airbnb. I was renting, and we checked out during the day and, you know, you give come up those lists of things you want done. Like they had, you know, I wanted things repainted. And there was tiny evidence that there might be cockroaches under the kitchen sink. So, you know, by little droppings or little markings. So we wanted the place fumigated. You know, it's Florida.

After marking their territory.

All right, so time goes by, they're renovating this apartment. A month later, we can finally move in. It's the first night I'm going to spend the first night. Now, it's important because we'd only been there during the day. So the first night I'm going to spend in the apartment, right. You know where this is. I go. It's during the day, everything looks good. I go out for my first dinner, I shut the lights off. I go out for dinner. I come back from dinner, I flip the light switch on in the kitchen, which was the first kind of light switch when you entered, you couldn't even see the kitchen counters. There were so many cockroaches.

Oh, that's mortifying.

And then they scatter when the light.

Exactly. And I'm just like freaking out because they're going up the walls, they're coming down the counters towards my feet. And so I hightailed out of there so quick. And long story short, you know, we tried sticking it out with the landlord, getting them to fix it, but two weeks later, I walked from the apartment and I moved down the hall to the apartment I'm in now in the same building, which was completely cockroach free.

Really?

I was worried. I was worried. Yeah, yeah. No, it's. Well, you know, my rule of living in anywhere in Florida is that I will not live ground floor because my phobia snakes. So I won't live in any way, shape or form where snakes. Of course, down here, snakes hang in trees, but I've not seen a snake in Miami yet, so we're good.

Oh, my God. So my, my friend Paul Scheider is a jokester and I've. He's in St. Louis. I visit every so often. But he, he, when he does a joke, he can't, can't hold his laughter in. So he does one of those, like, those type of things. Like, so I, I go into the bathroom, I'm saying his house, and I hear, I'm like, oh, what'd he do? Right? I come out, there is like three cockroaches in my bed. But there's these plastic ones he had bought. So if he didn't do that, I would have been shitting myself. So, Jeffrey, lingo. Why is it important to even speak the language of our customers?

Well, you know, let me set the stage also by saying what I mean by lingo, by definition is a jargon, right? And there's a piece of that, right? There's a piece of that in the concept of lingo. But when I'm speaking of lingo, I'm speaking more about speaking someone's essence. You know, like teenagers have a lingo and, you know, even twin babies have a lingo where they can communicate with one another and nobody, you know, they're pre verbal, but yet they can communicate with each other. So what I, what I'm speaking of when I'm talking about lingo of our ideal customers is speaking to their essence, their value system, you know, how they, what their perspective is in the world. So it's a little bit more soulful and heartfelt. It's kind of like it's what's inside of them. That's their lingo. Because when you can connect with that as a business, you're, you're emotionally triggering them so you're pulling in deeper. So it's, that's what I mean about lingo as opposed to the jargon. And yet jargon is part of it. And the five step strategy I explained in the book, which is laid out in a sequential order words, is actually the last, right. Which is the complete opposite of the way most people build a business, right? Mike, you know this. I mean, you know, even profit first, right? My favorite line from the book, or one of the many, is, you know how that, that light bulb moment that goes off when you realize that people take their profits like they're leftovers, right? It's like the last thing, right? That's the Whole point, you know, you're trying to turn that up. That's the last thing most entrepreneurs take. Well, same thing with the way businesses come about in the first place. Most entrepreneurs have a great idea. They, you know, execute that idea by going into business. They launch a website and products and they fill it up with a whole bunch of jargon and words. But they've never taken the time to understand, well, what's really the lingo of the ideal customers. I want to reach what's going to connect with them emotionally, what's their. What's their value system. Right. So we end up with a website and branding full of words that don't communicate to your core ideal client base.

Right. And I think that what you have to start with knowing who your actual customer is. So people start with a website and they have this really generic, watered down copy because they're trying to reach everybody. But you can't have the lingo of everybody.

No. And that's, that's the key.

Start with who you speak to.

Right. And that, that to me is a key. That's a key turning point in business. So what I'm trying to accomplish with, with, by producing lingo is I want businesses to only work with their ideal customers. That to me is the path to the most profitable business. You want to put profits first while only work with your ideal customers. And unfortunately, that's not how most businesses start out. Most businesses start out, as you said, trying to, going too broad, trying to be everything to everybody and taking whatever work comes along, which is not necessarily, certainly in your long run, is not the most profitable way to build a business.

So I presume, Jeffrey, this is what Ryan just says, one of the steps to know the right customers. Can you walk us through your five steps?

Yeah, sure. So, you know, I will say this with some regret now, of course, I don't know if you have felt this way, Mike, but I'm willing to bet you did once the book is out. Actually, I have to say, I'm so grateful. Two things. One is I have a podcast because I can continue to explore the content in the book through the podcast because there's a million things would already change in the book.

Yeah, you got to say, last hour.

20 minutes ago, last week, when I came to Boonton.

Yeah, we had this exact discussion.

And I'm wearing the same clothes. Yeah, we talked about that.

Yeah. Which is of course why you came out with a revised version of the book. I can always already imagine there's going to be a revised version. It's also why, you know, probably somewhat out of laziness, to be honest with you, but I haven't gotten around to doing the audio book yet. But I'm kind of glad I didn't because now when I do the audiobook, it's. It's going to be a different book. I'm going to add to the current.

Version 39 steps now.

So one of the things I wish I could structure this so there are five steps. However, there's a step before that, if you will, which is, which is surprise to me. And it was a surprise to me because the book was written and then I started doing podcast interviews and one question kept coming up and amazingly it wasn't in the book. And it was really what would be the first step, which is how do I know who my ideal customer is? Well, I assumed if you were in business, you knew that and I found, wow, a lot of people in business have no idea who even their ideal customer is.

So most don't know.

Most don't. I had no. I mean, that blew me away. So we actually went back and wrote what is now chapter two, which is, right, the introduction, in order to help people first define to their ideal customers. So step number one, if you will, is define who your ideal customer is. And here's what I'll offer about a different perspective on that. It actually starts with you, you as the business, the brand and the business owner, which is, I think, what everyone does wrong, right? We folk, who's my ideal customer? You focus on that. The fact of the matter is you first have to look at yourself. What is your core skill set? What are your strengths? What are your weaknesses? What are your innate characteristics? And this is so often overlooked. The title of the chapter around this is called who will Love that? And I know it's supposed to be whom, but we went with who, who Will Love that.

Oh, I hate when they do that. They said that in my book too. I know, should be a whom.

Exactly. It's not my audience. It's not the lingo of my audience. I went with who? Yeah, but I just don't want any, I don't want any hate mail after this interview. So I know it's supposed to be home, so I called it who Will Love that. Because that to me is really essential in defining your ideal customer. Like who are you naturally? You know, there's a whole world of comedians out there and you know, one foul mouth comedian is not for everybody. Right? So you want to know what, right? What are your innate characteristics? Like I'M a complete neat freak. I drive everyone in my personal life crazy. But man, my photography clientele loved that about me. Like, that was a leading characteristic of who I am. That benefited me tremendously in business because, you know, rich people love detail oriented people who don't miss crossing a T or dotting an I. So that was, you know, to me, you want to define your ideal customer by looking inward first. Like, what are you innately good at? What are your characteristics? And then who would love that? Right? So then, yeah, now you've got a market.

So on the same page, by the.

Way, share a few more details.

Ryan, this is. I really believe that you cannot. Well, to start a really good business and something I think you even mentioned before, soulful. Like a soulful business. I use that word a lot. You really do have to start with yourself because it's hard to build a company around. Like I couldn't build a company for tweens. Right. It's just not in. It's. This is just so vital. And I'm glad we're talking about this because people do skip over this. They say, what's your customer avatar? Oh, it's 40 to 50 year old women who do this and that. But when you start with yourself and you build a company around your personality and your soul and you kind of know what your strengths are and.

Right.

And you're okay with it. And you're, you're always honest and transparent and say, this is who I am and this is what we believe in. And we believe in this and we believe in that. And you build, you don't just build a business, you build this connection, this, this movement.

Jeffrey, Ryan just hit on a point. You got to be okay with it. Like, it sounds like we have to accept ourselves and appre. Actually really value ourselves to, to do with this first step you're sharing.

Yeah.

And I would even say, see yourself. And that sounds odd, but one of the exercises I do with my coaching clients is I ask them to make a list of compliments they've heard throughout their lives. Right. Because people have been telling you what they found most valuable in you, probably your whole life. And it's so natural to who you are that you've been brushing. Know, somebody says to me, man, you're so neat and organized. I'm like, yeah, well, you know, isn't everybody. Actually, I thought everybody was until, until I got married at 20 years old, I thought everybody was neat and organized and realized my first wife was a complete slob. So there are other people in the world. I notice it said first wife.

That.

Didn'T break up the marriage, but it was a piece of it. But, you know, it's. This list of compliments is really powerful because it is really hard to take ownership of who we really are. Right. I mean, what. What people find. So, Mike, I think you. I know you know Sally Hogshead, and that's why I'm a huge fan of her work, right? Because she turns it upside down and she poses the question, well, how does the world see you? Right. That's essential in business, is to understand how people see you. So there's a list of compliments is just one tool that I suggest that people, you know, so you can embrace and come to know what people see valuable in you. And here's the. The thing with most entrepreneurs, we have the hardest time charging the most money for what comes easiest to us. There's a mind bend.

Right. Interesting. Yeah.

I've never heard. It's true. I mean, that's. I. I've been working with struggling artists. You know, I've. I've, you know, been in the arts, and I've worked with plenty of artists. One of their biggest struggles is they have a hard time charging for what comes easy to, like their natural talent. They're natural. They're easy way of doing things. They had the hardest time to charge that because A, they love to do it, and B, well, how valuable can it be if it comes so easy to me? They don't realize what comes easy to you may not come easy to a whole bunch of other people. And those are your ideal customers that want that ease from you. They want to learn what you know.

Hot diggity. All right, give us the next step. Now, that was step like pre step. Now give me step one, pre step once.

Mike, you're very handy because I know.

You would like to hear compliments.

Okay, Sorry.

You look right at the pubes, dude. So I'm wearing this shirt.

You have to. People haven't heard the previous. If they missed the previous episode, they don't know what you're talking about.

Okay, so, Jeffrey, I'm wearing every single week, Mike, Jeffrey, I'm wearing a shirt with Ronald McDonald. And his. He's wearing. He's just in skivvies and he's flowing out, if you know what I mean, a little bit. And when Ryan looked at me, he didn't look me in the eyes.

He looks right around McDonald's junk says natural redhead. Jeffrey, what's step number two?

All right, so step number two the first step of the five step strategy is perspective. Kind of to what Ryan's point too, right. So once you know who your ideal customer is, you cannot build a business for them until you have a willingness to understand how they see the world. Right. What is their perspective? And this is critical because most entrepreneurs, particularly service oriented businesses, we're not serving people who are necessarily exactly where we are in life. So my, my example is extreme. As a photographer, I end up photographing, you know, the families and children of the wealthiest people in the country. I mean, that was my, that was my ideal customer. And I grew up lower middle class, two hours north of New York City, Right. I knew nothing of affluence in the rich lifestyle, but once I realized that I needed to speak their lingo, I studied all the brands that they went to, not to really understand the brands, but to understand their perspective of why they chose that brand, what did they experience? So I would go to, you know, the book is, is grounded on the story that I tell about going to Bergdorf Goodman, one of the highest, most expensive department stores in the world. And I would go to Ralph Lauren's FL ship store in New York City, and I would go to these high end brands and put myself in a position of the people I was going to serve. So I literally could walk a mile in their shoes and experience what type, what, what did customer service feel like? If you were that clientele, what did, what did I see? What was the pricing psychology? So I wanted to understand if I were, you know, I was pretending, in a way I was, I was hoping that I was horribly dressed, but I was hoping they, they were thinking I was a rich heir and I could get away with looking. I didn't have the money. I look like. I look like a poor K. They authentically was.

But Mike shops at three times a week.

I do, I do.

Takes a while.

So step number one is perspective. Like, you cannot build a business for your ideal customer until you understand their world. Right. So you have to. Step number two, which I think is one of the most important emotional triggers, is familiarity. Right. We are naturally drawn to what is familiar to us because familiarity creates comfort. So once you understand how people see themselves in their own lives, you can then build your business that captures the feeling of familiarity. It doesn't mean you're capturing or, you know, copying other brands verbatim, but you can capture the feeling of familiarity. And just as a point of proof of how powerful familiarity is, is, you know, think about traveling to any foreign country and you can't not see American icons like Starbucks and McDonald's. Like, you can't not see them. Right. It's just whether you want to go into it or not, it's familiar. There's a safety to it. And there are times I've been traveling where I'll go into a Starbucks even though there are, you know, other coff shops around. I, you know, for sake of familiarity, I'll go there because I know the coffee is going to be predictably good. Right. It's, it's, there's a standard that's going to be met. Right?

Yeah.

And I tell this, I tell. In the book, I tell the story about getting into a conversation with a guy on an airplane, which I'm one of those people that I sleep and don't talk to people on an airplane. But this guy was reading a book by a pod by someone who we had just booked on our podcast and I hadn't even read his book yet. So that book was familiar to me. If it wasn't, I never would have sparked up a conversation. Right. And by the way, this guy's now, you know, like a lifelong friend. Right. So familiarity is incredibly powerful. And I think probably one of the most underused emotional triggers in business is to create a business that feels familiar to the people, your ideal customer, because you understand their perspective.

How do you create that, though? Sorry.

No, you go.

It's, you know. Well, it's a bit of, a bit of the third step, which is style. So we'll talk about that in a second too. But familiarity is more of a feeling. The third step is style. Style is a little more surface level. And because it's a little more surface level.

What I hear is we gotta be different than our competition. We gotta stand out from our competition. But you're saying you gotta be familiar. Is there a blend of being different and familiar at the same time?

Absolutely. Mike. I'm pretty sure my next book is going to be on paradox. I just want to make sure it has. Paradox has to do with business. Yeah. Because I'm fascinated by paradox. Because nothing's black. We live in a black and white world until we realize nothing in the world is black and white.

Right.

It's. It's both like. And that's the. So to be highly successful in business is to actually figure out how you can stand out and capture a feeling of familiarity. Right. I mean, I stood out as a photographer when I started my brand, and yet I felt like other high end experiences the customer, my ideal customer had because they were Right, Yeah, yeah.

Well, you know, there's an interesting thing. I don't know if you've read the book. I think it was the newer one by Jonah, Jonah Berger, Profit First. And he talks about these anchors where if you build your business sometimes around specific. So, all right, how do I describe this? So, for example, for a long time, one of my businesses was teaching people about entrepreneurship. And I. All the time I was working from Starbucks. So every morning I'd start my email.

So you did work in a coffee shop? I just want to clarify.

I actually did I say, hey, I'm working from Starbucks this morning. So I'd say it all the time. It got to the point where every time people would see Starbucks or hear a Starbucks, they would start to anchor and associate with me and my brand. So all of a sudden we're getting all these kind of subliminal messages. Every time they see a Starbucks, they think Ryan. And to the point where people would be in Starbucks and they take a picture of themselves like, oh, living the Ryan Lee lifestyle. Now with our new nutrition company Rewind, we're relying heavily on the retro kind of 80s feel. So every time people, we're always hammering home these of 80s fun like Michael Jackson music, I want them to start to think of us.

Rewind.

When they start thinking and they do that now, they'll see like we're talking about the Bengals. The Bengals video back. Oh, it reminds me of Rewind.

So you align yourself with something that's already familiar, Right?

Exactly.

The first thing I did, first thing I did in my business when I was making this shift is my previous photography business, which had been in existence at three years and was struggling and failing at that point in my hometown. What I shifted. The first thing I shifted was the name it. My. My previous business had a photography name was called Light Images Stud. And the first thing I did is I shifted it to my own name. I. What I realized was familiar to my ideal customer was buying authority and buying designer names. So I changed the business to Jeffrey Shaw.

Ah, very smart. Tell us about the style.

So that's because that's what's familiar to them. So step number three is style. And style is the decision maker. And sometimes people, you know, we all want to sometimes go so deep and profound in our businesses, but sometimes you got to just be aware of what's on the surface because style is a decision maker. We walk down Main Street, USA and malls every day of our lives and we make instant decisions on whether something feels like it's, you know, Speaking on our behalf. Like, that's my style. That's not my style. Right, right.

We.

That's. So you want to. Again, once you understand the perspective of your ideal customers, you'll get a sense of what are their. What are their. What's. What style resonates for them. You know, what. What makes them feel like the style that you've communicated is kind of speaking on their behalf. In the book, I interview Mike, a friend, a common friend of ours. Tamsen Webster.

Yes.

Now, okay. One of the things you might know about Tamson is that she almost always wears Diane von Furstenberg dresses. Right.

So I noticed that. Yeah.

Yeah. So her devotion to that brand really had me curious about the impact of style. And one of the things that she discovered, I think. I mean, I think she knew, but in our conversation, just. It just sort of seemed to bubble up that everything that she would like people. Everything that people commonly say in descriptive about Diane von Furstenberg, designer, she wants people to say about her work. Right. It's a smart choice. It's intelligent. It's well styled. It's kind of on the go. It's. It's. DPF has a really interesting. Even the fact we're going to talk. The next step is pricing. Psychologists. I'm sort of leading into that. Diane von Furstenberg, as a company, they. They describe their price point as the low end of the high end. All right. Think about why.

Interesting.

Think about why I think this is so powerful. The reason they're the low end of the high end is because they want to be a smart choice. Their ideal customers. Right. Their ideal customers are willing to spend the money, but they don't like to feel like they're. They're excessive. They want to feel like they made a smart choice.

They don't want to be shown.

They want to be showing. Right. Diane Von Verseberg, for those that aren't familiar, she invented the women's wrap dress. Right. The woman's wrap dress is one of the smartest design choices for a woman. Right. It just wraps around and ties to the belt. Easy on, easy off, doesn't wrinkle in a suitcase. It's smart. So all these ways in which you would describe the style of DVF designs, Tamson wants people to say about her work, and that's the connection between her devotion to that brand because the style resonates for her and it's speaking on her behalf.

You know, it's funny, as I look around our studio right now, our dressing selection, our attire, Brian's wearing a. A collared shirt, finely pressed. His belt is perfectly placed. Nice jeans Kelsey's wearing.

Wrapped it around my head like Rambo.

That would be awesome.

In the 70s, you wore it off to the side. Now he used to wear the belt off to the side. It was a thing.

No, I mean, your belt buckle is dead center.

But, Mike, I would say, like, you got one of the best styles out there. And I don't know if you're aware of this. I drive an incredible amount of traffic to your website because. And I tell people all the time, I send people to your website. I'm like, you've got. This is the best website online. And I'm not kidding, because it is so authentically you. I know you in person. I know you on your website. I know you in your books because I read them, and it's the same guy. Your style and your voice carries through in everything you do. You have your. Your website is one of the. The best styled website. That's. I'm saying style is the decision maker. I would go, as I have gone to your website and say, this is a guy who I want to get to know, whose books I want to read and, you know, who I might even want to look like. But, you know, it's. It's all right.

And it's. Let's not get carried away. And. And it's. And with. With his.

Exactly. And that's really. That's. That's the importance of communication and lingo, right? I mean, you break. You break communicate, you break lingo, you break style, you break communication.

Right?

And that breaks. And that breaks trust. And it breaks trust.

Oh, that's a big tip. Because people do that. I noticed that they have their own style among friends, their authentic style. And then when they're in the business space, like, and they always say, I'm a chameleon. You're not a freaking chameleon. You're a moron.

There's a jersey. I agree. Yeah.

Freaking moron style sounds like Jeff transcends just a website. It's throughout your entire brand, throughout your entire person. Question mark.

Yeah, it's your personality and voice, right? I mean, your style is your personality. That's like the way you project yourself. And then your voice is that consistent thing that is underneath all your work that isn't as obvious to people, but it's consistent. Right? So, Mike, you have a very clear voice and everything that shows up. Like I said, I've cooked meals with you, an author retreat. I've read your books. Listen to your podcast, you're the same guy. Your voice is consistent, right? But then what you project is, you know, is your personality. So, yeah, consistency and style is incredibly the most. The biggest compliment I've continued to receive with lingo. Now the book is out there. People have sent me messages, say, man, reading this book is exactly like listening to you in your podcast. And that is more than. That was more important to me than book sales. Like, if I've accomplished that, I really think it's.

Consistency is huge. Everyone, they get on the website and all of a sudden they. They have these really either very professional headlines like, we are the leader in customer service and it's just generic law. Just have some personality.

I hate that. And I think back to what you're saying, like really knowing who you are in the first place, right?

And being.

And this is what I do.

Lean into it, baby.

Lead into it. Give us number four, Jeffrey.

I think, yeah, that's pricing.

That was pricing.

Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. So number four is pricing. Pricing psychology, right? There's a. You can. What I say is pricing creates perception. You actually get to decide how you want your business positioned in the marketplace based on how you price yourself. Both the literal prices, but then also even the style, how you visually represent price can give a very different impression. I mean, the fact that there are no prices on one restaurant's menu gives you an immediate perception of that restaurant. Dollar menu gives a. Yeah, dollar menu gives you a whole different perception. So you actually. The first. When people come to me, when I'm coaching or rebranding businesses, one of the first things I ask, how do you. What do. After we've done the internal work, like, who are they and defining their customer? So how do you want your business to be perceived? Because the price point you choose has to be aligned with the perception if you want to create. It's the. One of the things that drives me the most crazy is people that come to me and say, well, you know, Jeff, I would like your help with. With the fact that so many of people coming to me are trying to talk me down on my prices or I have a low conversion rate people, you know, I have a lot of traffic, but I'm not converting. And I'll look at their. Their overall branding message and I'll see the break. I'm like, well, you're communicating the language of cost conscious customers and then you're complaining that you have cost conscious people in front of you, right? So if you're going to call. If you're going to call your online program 497, then you can't, you can't bitch and moan about somebody complaining about $3 because you've just called it out.

What's the.

Yeah, just call it $500 then.

What's the fifth and final step of lingo?

The fifth is the words. Right. It's not until, and this is what I was saying right at the top, that you cannot load up your website with branding messages and words and email marketing and all. You cannot do that until you've done all the previous four steps or you're going to be complete. You're just going to be buck shooting. You're going to have no idea who you're speaking to. You're trying to speak to everybody. It's going, as Ryan said, feel generic. And most importantly, you won't be singling out. You won't be speaking the lingo of your ideal customer. And when you don't speak the lingo of your ideal customer, who are your, that's your fastest path to a profitable business. If you're not speaking their lingo, they're not showing up. So words and the impact and the power of words to convey the secret language of your ideal customers, that's the fifth and final step. And then you're out in the world with an amazing brand message that will attract your ideal customers.

And I know you guide clients through this process. What have you seen, seen the impact be when they actually nail down the lingo?

Yeah. This is one of the things that I wish that if I were to write the book again and we'll add to the audio, I actually want to up my game a little bit. I actually want to show up even more committed and say, I think brand message is more important now than ever. I've been in business for 33 years, never a more important time, because 99% of the time your brand, your image, your messaging is speaking on your behalf and you're not present. Right. So it's great when we can convert people, when we can get people on the phone or however it is that they purchase from us, but we don't get them there until they've walked through the gateway of your branding message in the first place. They're already checking you out online because we're doing so many things in today's world to, to, to create traffic, podcasting. Right. Where you're out in the world in a big way, it's driving people towards you. They're checking out your brand. If there's an incongruence in your Brand message or how you can serve people isn't who you can serve. If that's not clear in your brand message, they leave. So there are so many people of your ideal customers that you're. You're driving towards your business, but if your brand message is off and not speaking correctly in your behalf, you don't even know it. So brand message to me.

We'Re gonna get going. We're gonna discuss you.

I want 34 remaining steps.

But. But this is a great teaser. There probably. There's a lot more to it. Where can people learn more about lingo? Where can they get the book?

So you can get, of course, Amazon, anywhere books are sold. What I've put together for your listeners is a lingo media kit. I would actually start there.

Nice, dude.

So the lingo media kit, it's Lingomediakit.com Lingomediakit.com and there you'll actually get an infographic of these five steps with an explanation of how to build each. And of course, there's the free chapter, and there is one audio chapter out there, and that's included in the lingo media kit as well. But so start there.

And we have. We have this for the URL. We have the lingo media kit.

Lingomedia kit dot com.

Okay.

Yeah, I'm gonna buy the media and have it redirect and steal all your traffic.

I own like 500 domains, by the way, because anytime I. I'm big on that. So you're right. I should probably own the. No, it's Lingomedia Kit.com.

Yeah, got it. Good. We will have the link in here. And I hope you do the audio soon. If you want to ask. Kelsey, I know how to get the audio done very effectively. I can just tell you how to do it if that helps you, because consumers love audiobooks, please do it. Please, please, please do it now.

I will. I definitely will. And actually, Mike, I've been listening to Profit, and I've read Profit first two or three times. I'm actually. Yours was the audio version of the revised version of Profit first has been my go to for getting to know how I want to show up on mic and be my authentic self. Because you do it. He's so.

You should see a smile right now.

I know.

Ear to ear, lighting up the room.

Even. Even Ronald McDonald. My shirt's getting stretched out a little bit.

You look. I did keep looking.

From the way you tackled the shirt, I've been stretching out. I don't want to know.

All right, Jeffrey, It's Been enjoy having you and everyone listening. Get a copy of Lingo. We're ordering how many copies? I know we're ordering a box.

I think two.

Two for all our members. No, Jeffrey's gonna be speaking at Profit Con.

Yep.

So our annual conference in September. This is the guy. Main stage, keynote. Jeffrey. Sean. Jeffrey, thanks for joining us.

Thank, guys.

Okay, so let me get a punch. There we go. I want to first thank our corporate partners. Then we're going to recap what we learned. We got some listener mail and all that stuff, and we got to go quickly now. We only have about 10 minutes. So fast. Yeah. So thank you to Fundbox. That's a cash flow accelerator. So if you have an invoice due to you now, you know, call Fundbox. They send the funds to you, and, you know, they don't do the collections. You still collect the money as normal so your customer relationship isn't compromised. Nextiva voice over IP phone system. The best out there. We've even using them ever since this business has found it. And I've been using it 10 years even prior to that. I love them. Maybe not 10. Maybe about five years prior. Cumulatively, probably about 10. And then receipt bank is a receipt. Receipt system scanner is actually the receipt system scanner. Any receipts you have, just scan it in. It ties into your QuickBooks or Xero or whatever you use, and you're taken care of. All right, I want to know what you learned today.

So what'd you learn today, Kelsey?

Ryan started us out last week. You want to start us out this week?

Yes. So I learned a lot, but I feel like the most impactful thing was knowing who you are. What are your innate character, gifts, gifts, or strengths, and capitalizing on that. I feel like I've sort of touched on that, but never thought of it in that term. Like, actually honing in on what my best strengths are and how I can serve with that.

Come on, man.

What'd you learn? Boom.

I like. And there's a lot of truth to what he said about people. When there's something you're really good at, naturally we tend to have a hard time charging. So I can. I can absolutely relate to that. So it. He nailed it.

Yeah, that was. I dried that one down and circled it and stuff.

I know. I saw you writing it down. I know you're, like, totally gonna take it because it was good. It was good.

It was good.

Yeah.

So then I'm gonna go to my backup, which one? Which was words actually come last. So when I hear Lingo, I Think immediately I get to get the words out there. But he put now five steps in front of the that with identifying your market, getting perspective, familiarity, etc. Etc. I think the sequence of et cetera.

That means you like lost track of it. I know I can't read my own handwriting, etc. Etc.

Yeah, style and something pricing. But words actually come last, not first. I think that was the big takeaway for me. Oh, do you know when you used to. Used to be a personal trainer, you posted online like you're wearing that guinea.

The, the T shirt, the old muscle. No, no, it was a. I love the politically incorrect terms. No, it was a. It was like from the early 90s and I was wearing a tank like.

A black low hanging one and a.

White, like white shorts with white. Yeah, it was, it was a picture I took from my personal training company. It's funny, a picture like that. And I got more likes and comments.

I love that picture. And we actually got a video, a audio from when you used to train people. So Kelsey got it in the studio. We'll play in a second. What do we have to do? Oh, do we have listener mail?

Oh yeah.

Let's do a shout out, shout out to Krista Patton from Market Ready Designs.

Bazinga. Sorry.

So a little over a year ago she was a mom who worked nights at a restaurant. She went through a divorce and her financial options for self sufficiency were grim. So while there's more to the story, the short version is rather than getting an entry level job, she chose to start a real estate staging business using more than dusty and rusty interior design degree to fall back on. She just want to say thank you because among many things, your book gave her the tools to start correctly and to continue even when the slow season of real estate hits. She put the money away into her accounts and I just changed the percentages to reflect the quarter's boom or bust reality.

Nice, Kristen. Kelsey, good job. First of all, she was reading that from a third person perspective. Translating as you're going along. You nailed it.

It was very good.

It was not smooth, but thank you guys.

It is awesome though, isn't it that you can write a book and just impact lives.

Yes.

Like when you see stuff like that.

Now I'm getting emotional. It lights me up. Yeah, we get an email in probably one an hour because we're getting over 25 a day.

I think I said like one a year, but one in ours.

Did I say that? Yeah, dude, it's.

It's amazing.

Yeah, we have mail.

Yeah.

Let me hit the mail button. You've got mail pattern baldness. No, that didn't make you laugh. That's my favorite. Here, let's play again for Ryan. I thought. Ryan, I thought you'd wet your pants. I thought your perfectly placed belt would have unraveled. Listen, you know, remember the aol? You got mail.

I do remember aol. You got mail.

All right, listen again. You got mail pattern baldness.

Oh, male pattern.

That's my favorite bit.

I'm like, what? I don't get it. Yes, you got mail pattern boldness.

It's hysterical. All right, what's our mail?

Okay, so this comes from Susanna Townsend, marketing design specialist. I'm at the stage of setting up new bank accounts. I already have a bank account set up with a couple of savings accounts attached and can add for free. More savings account, all under the same umbrella. The problem is that because they are savings accounts opposed to card accounts, they can't pay out. They can only make transfers between each account. So my question is, how many of the accounts need to be able to pay out to one of the hold accounts and to my direct debits?

It sounds way more complex than it really is.

Mike will let you take this one.

Yeah, I'll run with it. It's checking accounts versus savings accounts. Some banks only allow you to the transfer from savings accounts, but not ever write a checkout, of course. And they'll limit the number of transfers you can do. Usually a savings account, you can do up to six a month. So get two checking accounts. One is for your operating expense. I'm sorry, three checking accounts. One's for your operating expenses. One is for your owner's compensation, your owner's pay. And the other one is for income because you have income accounts, inbound money into it. But the other two accounts, the profit account and the tax account account, are both savings accounts because you're not going to write checks from there, just going to accumulate the money. You're then going to transfer the money from profit to the owner's pay when you pay the owner the profit distribution. And you're going to pay, move the money from the tax account to the operating expense account. When you pay out of the operating expense account, your taxes. So three checking accounts, two savings accounts, and a partridge in a pear tree. All right, so Ryan was totally into the. This personal fitness, and you were one of the first to be the. The one that yells and spits in your face almost like a boot camp.

Yes. That was my motto. That was my lingo.

Here's recording of you training your first person.

Do it. Just do it.

Yesterday you said tomorrow, the whole recording.

And I know, I know this too. The sh. Love come true.

Nothing is impossible.

Yeah. So it just keeps going.

That was my entire. But I. It's funny though.

I.

When I used to train client. I used to train young athletes a lot and I would do sports camps and I would do that stuff like. Let's go. Yeah. Oh, I loved it.

I still love.

I still kind of do it now even when I coach the eight year old baseball. So our team is called with the Mets. So when they're on the field like all the other coaches, like, all right. You know, very reserved New Canyon, Connecticut. And I go, let's go. And they all have to go met. And that means that's for them to get round and ready.

That's awesome.

Yeah. Yeah.

I think as a coach there's so much pressure. I don't know why you're doing coaching. Because you had the parents that hate you. Because my kids not playing enough. You have the competition of other coaches that want you to lose. You have the children that are upset. You have the politics that goes on around the whole thing.

Yeah.

How do you. And you. And there's a threat of you getting sued by someone.

It's not even. I just, I. I'm always in touch with the parents and I say are especially 8 years old. We're just gonna have fun. I want to teach them some stuff.

Yeah.

And I. My whole goal for them is to look forward to coming to practice in the games. That's it. Like, I don't say this, but they're not gonna play in the major leagues. Like they're not. So let's just have fun and teamwork and learning the game. And I also, I've coached football and basketball and lacrosse. I've coached every sport with my kids. So we just go out and have fun. And I take my background. I used to be a gym teacher. So we have fun.

That's awesome.

That's cool.

We just play.

Yeah.

You can deal with anything.

He's rewound us to the perspective of the 80s. Like it used to be just have fun.

And that's, that's. I just. And with my kids it's all about the reason they all play sports and competitive sports. It's the biggest life lesson for me to teach them is, is when you fail and it's not. You're going to fail in life. You're gonna fail. You're gonna, you know, things happen. It's about getting back up and that's it. Like just get back up, brush yourself off, get mad, give yourself 10 minutes and get back up and just keep trying.

Yeah, that's it.

Are you in a league though that everyone has a freaking trophy?

They do a lot. Although this, this one, this eighth grade base. Eighth grade. Eight year old baseball. We had a draft. So me and all the coaches met one night for at a guy's hat.

Yeah.

Eight year old. Eight year olds.

Eight year olds, yes.

So like second, third, fourth grade we had a draft. So all the kids were rate ranked based on that and then we actually chose kids.

I'll take Bobby Mickledorf.

It was, it was cheese sticks. My town, you know, it's very kind of type A. They're all like really successful investment. Like it's. They've. Everyone's played college sports. It's very competitive. So we just, you know, I just picked kids I knew and liked and we're gonna try Hars. We're having fun.

Yeah.

That's awesome, man. That's awesome.

And now I'm here.

Yeah, and now you're here.

Now all downhill now I'm talking profit first.

Well everybody leave us a comment on ratings on itunes, stitcher, any podcaster and come Visit us@profit first professionals.com.

Yeah, and I can't believe last week I forgot pitch. Like the whole reason we do this show is to get people excited about profit first and learn about profit first professionals, our organization. And I didn't talk about it at all. I mean that's a big. That's a big fan fail.

Oh yeah. You're like, well, why do you do this show? Just to promote profit for the professionals. Let me not mention.

Yeah, let me. The one thing.

Let me talk about Ronald McDonald.

It's like you coming out with a. Yeah. Oh my God. I really did too much fire bush. It's funny. It'd be like you saying, oh, we have a new super bar coming out. People like what's the name? Like, ah, yeah, don't worry about it.

Don't worry. Forget about it.

It's delicious. You don't worry about it.

Whatchamacallit.

Yeah, that's a. I love.

Remember that.

Oh, I love. They don't make any still around. I love watching. That's my favorite. Enough nougat. You know what nougat is?

Oh yeah, that like gooey.

Yeah. You know the ingredients of nougat nuke in it. We'll discuss that next episode. Yeah, that's the cliffhanger.

That's the cliffhanger. Stay tuned for Nougat.

Don't google it.

Before that.

No, do not freaking don't google it. You can hang on for a week.

Ted Nugent and nougat.

That's part of it. Ted Nugent.

Nugent on Nougat.

There is it. We'll get into it. There's some history. But profit first professionals. I want you, dear listener, after you clean up that spittle from all that laughing you've had today. All the entertainment after you clean yourself up, go to profit first professionals.com then click on the find button and we'll hook you up with a profit first professional. These are. There was 210 in the U.S. now we have 770 international system. 280 private first professionals who are certified trained by our team here. Ryan, you've met him. Now trained by our team in driving profit in your business. You want to be profitable, there's only two ways to get there. Step one's listen to the show. Step two is to hire a profit first professional and we'll hook you up with that.

Nice.

Oh and also Google natural Redhead and Ron McDonald. Whoever buys that T shirt and wears it, you'll get a prize. You guys send a picture.

Send us a picture.

Yeah, yeah.

And if you have a trouble getting on the site, go to profit second professional. Cuz I just started that company with a second choice. With a low price choice.

Right.

A little more economic hour and we will not going to help you at all.

Right, right. But, but it's a great deal. All right. But yeah, send a picture wearing your Ron McDonald Natural Redhead T shirt and we'll send you all four of my books anywhere in world. The world. But you got put on Twitter and Facebook and have your family shame you.

$75 for shipping.

Not in any place besides the U.S.

Oh, I love it. All right guys, anything else to say before we get out of here?

No, that's it.

This is another fun. I can't wait to come back next week.

Yeah, in a week.

I have to drive back.

Yeah, we're going to have lunch in the meantime.

Lunch. It's going to be a very. It's going to be week long lunch.

All right, we'll see y' all.

Bye everybody.

Bye.

Bye.