Episode 250: Effective Networking for Word of Mouth Referrals with Matt Ward

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Hello everybody.

And my other dear friend, Jay Boner. Hello both you. Welcome to the show. I hope you enjoyed your Mexican that we just had together.

It's awesome.

My mouth is still on fire.

Well, you. Yeah. So J. Bones, like, I need the hot sauce. And Jackie, she goes, do you know how hot the sauce is? He's like, I can handle anything. And she gave you that. So I tried a little dab of that stuff.

Yeah, that was the habanero.

Yeah.

And I really slathered it on.

You slathered it on?

He didn't taste it before he slathered it on.

So I went to Rookie Mistake. I was in. In Mexico, in Tulum, Mexico, with a couple colleagues, and one of these people, they brought their son, and we went out to a Mexican restaurant. It was me. I don't even remember the son's name. So we'll call him the Son and a few other people. And he asks for mas picante, more hot. You know, mas picante. Masakante. So they bring this hot sauce. He pours it on. Worse than Jeremy. He pours on. He takes one bite, and he goes. And it's like he starts. His hand starts. He was so bad that tears are coming down. He had to leave the restaurant to find some leche to chug down. All they had was the horchatas, which has a little bit of. But he had to go out to a store. We were the only Americans there. It was a hole in the. Hole in the wall type of dive. Everyone's looking at him. It was so embarrassing for him.

That's what happens when I, like, accidentally swallow too much wasabi. Like, one time I thought it was a piece of lettuce, and it was the whole wad of wasabi. It's painful.

It's painful. That's horseradish, right?

Wasabi?

Yeah.

Well, it's a root. It's like in the horse.

Oh, it's in the horse family. All right. So, Kelsey, why don't you tell us what you got to tell us now?

If you could first subscribe and second of all, rate review, comment wherever you're listening to us.

Okay, so.

And you can find us on itunes. Stitcher, Tune in, radio Spotify, iheartradio.com.

Okay, you're not. You don't have the script in front of you.

No, that was good.

That's good. With no script. What have you been up to, Kel?

Well, I went to Nashville for the first time.

I. This is your first time there?

Yeah. That's why I tagged on some Ds so I could explore.

So we had a business conference down there for Story Brand. We were talking about last week. So we all flew in the office. Flew in on Sunday. But you went down on Friday.

Yep.

What was your favorite thing that you did down there?

I think first of all, it's a great city to walk around in even though it was really cold while we were there. Just like there's tons to see and it's great for people watching. I also really loved that they had a parthenon replica. Like a one to one replica of the Parthenon in Greece. And then they have this giant Athena inside that was originally in the Parthenon in Greece. It's not there any longer, but it's pretty incredible.

Isn't the rock and roll hall of fame there?

The country music? Country music. Sorry, that's.

Yes.

Yeah, I think the rock and roll hall of fame is in that. In Cleveland. No. Cleveland. Yeah, it is. Cleveland.

Cleveland.

Nice Matt.

Nice Matt. That's Matt, by the way. Get back in your hole. Okay. Do we English or shout outs?

We do. This one comes from Ms. Wi. Another itunes.

Why are people not putting their names?

Well, a lot of times when you set up your itunes you just create something random. It doesn't necessarily reflect you. Yeah. And you can't change it like per thing that you do.

Okay.

Anywho, this one comes from Ms. Wy. They write. I started listening to Mike and Kelsey after reading profit first which I've now read multiple times. I really appreciate their honesty, practical advice and array of guests they have on. I've since read several books by guests on the show and find them all informative and helpful as well. Keep up the good work and thank you for all you do. Mike and Kelsey.

Thank you Ms. Wy. I want to thank our corporate partners making the show a reality thanks to nextiva and receipt bank. I also do want to tease a couple things that are coming and then we're going to get our guests on. But I can't wait to talk about. We are going to be talking about tacking later on today. I talked about that last week. A strategy that you can use to grow your business faster and healthier than ever before. We also. Are we doing dead or alive this week?

Dead or alive.

Dead or alive.

Dead or dead or alive.

And we're all going to sing it together. Just a couple more.

That's the only part I know.

Wanted, Wanted, Dead or alive.

We're supposed to save that for later.

You guys have good harmony.

Yeah, you know we did. You know we had a dance. Not dance troupe but we did too. We sang together.

That's how we met each other.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

On the circuit.

So we'll do that a little later. And dead or alive is where you have to guess if the entrepreneur is dead or alive. I think that's it, right, Kelsey?

That's it.

Okay, so let's get to the meat and potatoes here. This is what we wanted to talk about. Matt Ward is in house and we're talking about the power of asking for introductions and investing that time to build relationships with which yields word of mouth marketing, which is the most powerful marketing in the world. In 2002, Matt Ward started a website agency In Concert Web Solutions, which he in turn sold in 2018 so that he could focus on helping businesses get more word of mouth referrals. Matt is a professional member of the National Speakers association, nsa, and a podcast host of the popular small business podcast Square Peg Round Hole. Matt, welcome to our show, brother.

Welcome, Matt.

Thanks for having me, guys. Appreciate it.

Hey, man. So you sell a business so you can help businesses get more word of mouth referrals. What's the. What's the gap here? Why aren't businesses getting more word of mouth referrals?

Because they're asking for referrals. For referrals. It never works.

I. Oh, let's tackle that right away because I love that.

Before I get into that, I just want to clarify. I sold my business because I implemented profit first.

Woo. Okay.

Business. 18 months after I implement a profit first and got double the value.

Oh, that's awesome.

So I just put a plug out there. Like, I keep books of profit first copies of profit first on my bookshelf and I give them away to people who, when I talk about growing their business and they perk up. I'm like, well, I did it this way because I read this book and implemented it. This is what you should do as well. And they perk up. I mail them a copy of the book.

Oh, thank you, brother. Congratulations to you.

Yeah, it's awesome.

You know the rule. I mean, I don't even really need to explain to you, but it's your responsibility now to send half of your earnings to the author of the book. That.

I'm well aware of that. Yeah, yeah. You have not been receiving those checks.

No, no, I wait here with bated breath.

I think you probably should check your daughter's piggy bank.

Oh, nice.

See the callbacks?

Yeah, I love that, brother.

This is how you get more word of mouth referrals.

All right, so let's talk about. So asking for referrals doesn't work. What the what?

So two responses happen, Mike, when people do that. So first of all, you know, at the height of the sale is when people are taught to ask for the referral because it's the most opportunistic time that somebody's happy. Right? The problem with that is the two responses you get are, yeah, I know someone and let me, let me, you know, Mike, I know someone. Her name is Kelsey and she just bought a new house. So she needs your service. But in fact I haven't spoken to Kelsey to know that she actually needs your service. So at best that's a lead, not a referral. She isn't ready, willing and able to buy. So that's a lead and not a referral. And the second response you get is, yeah, I'll get back to you. And then you never hear back. And the reason they do this is because they were put in an awkward situation where they're put on the spot and they had a good experience with you, but now they, they don't know what to say, you know, and dude.

Say I say, I went to you, Matt, and today, you know, we just do a transaction and I grab a check from you. I'm like, hey, can you give me a referral? Are they saying, hey dude, thanks for the money but the money's not good enough.

I need. Don't you love that when you buy a car and then they, oh, before, before you drive off the lot, do you have three friends or family members that can help me? Yes. I hate, like I want to help you that much. Remember when I buy a car, my biggest concern whether that car is going to be a lemon, right? Because I've already done the transaction. Now I want to know if I'm going to actually keep the thing, right? And so I'm not even in this, I'm not even through the honeymoon phase yet. And we're asking people for this stuff. You have to build trust in the trust bank account. You can only take those withdrawals after you've deposited year over year over year. Word of mouth referrals comes from building long term relationships with people to the point where they trust you more than anybody else. See, most people believe that people do business with who they know like and trust. I believe people do business who they know like trust and care about. And the caring factor comes in because you've cared about them so much that they want your business to be successful so you don't go away. Because if you go away and your business goes away, then you're not going to show up in their live it life anymore.

Yeah. So let's talk about this. Care about how do you. How do you do it? How do you do it? Not artificially. Like.

Yeah, so like, you can't care to get referrals. You have to care because you care.

Yeah, yeah.

Right. And so, like, I should care.

Like.

Okay, so here's an example. If we have a first time listener listening to the podcast today. Welcome. First of all, welcome. My question to you, first time listener. If I said to you that there are two people on the podcast today, one of them likes Twizzlers and one of them likes tequila, Pick one, Who would it be? They would most likely think as a first time listener, that Mike likes tequila.

Right. And Kelsey likes the Twizzlers.

But that's not true, is it?

Dude, you're working me right now. I'm like a. Tears coming down. I'm like, I gotta give this guy a referral.

So here's the thing. It's not necessarily about that. It's about connection. Like, I listen to your podcast. I've been listening for a long time, and I. I don't give to get. I give because that's what you like. Right? So if I'm gonna be at Kelsey's housewarming party, it's not ideal to bring her a bag of Twizzlers. It's better to bring her a small bottle of tequila.

That's right.

Yeah. And dude, you hooked me up with me.

Mike shows up in Lambertville and sees me in person, and you walk over.

To me on stage. On stage too.

Right.

And one person walks up with a bag of Twizzlers.

Yep.

With a note not to Mike. It says to fat daddy, fat back.

I know, I know. Because.

Because I listen. You can listen with your eyes and your ears. You can pay attention to everything going on on social media and not comment, but know what people are up to.

Yeah.

And you can connect in a deeper way that matters to them, not to you. And those relationships over a long period of time bears so much more fruit than just asking people for referrals.

Yeah. It's just being thoughtful. Right. And if you think if. If you were with a friend of yours, you get to know them intimately, you do things specific to their desires. That's what I'm hearing is, is focus on the friendship.

It's intentionally building deeper relationships. And you go after the friendship. Like you would want to invite these people to your house, to your wedding, to your. To your family cookout and barbecue. And you, when you get to that point. That's what you actually do. You invite them to these barbecues and then they hang out with you. And then you're gonna find that the people you surround yourself with are gonna send you referrals because they know what you do at that point and they want you to be successful.

Okay.

Just like you would refer other people.

So, Matt, how do I find the right people to build these relationships with? Like, I can't do with everybody.

No, that's true, you can't. So you do, you do have to. Look, I mean, if you're going to be intentional building relationships, I suggest to people, all things being equal, that you focus on people that you like, that you get along with, that you've met, and that they have a synergy around business that you do. So when I built my website agency, I found that IT professionals referred us a lot. They never bought our service because they could build their own website. But people would call them and ask them to build a website and they didn't want to do it. So anytime I walked into a networking event, I would have conversations with people, the accountants, the bankers, the lawyers, and all those people there, but I would actually ask them, hey, do you know any IT people? That's where I'm asking for the introduction. Now I'm not asking for a referral, I'm asking for an introduction. Then I get the introduction, which is ideally an email that's copied to both of us and that provides trust from the person introducing us. And then I start building the relationship. And I look at it as a long term approach. I look at it from six months to a year. And the way you really get this off the ground and really start moving is you just mail a handwritten note card to somebody.

Are you looking to find, I mean, for you to have genuine appreciation for someone else. Do you look for common interests? How do you build that rapport?

Yeah, you know the old school theory that you walk in to do a sales meeting, you're like, you look on the wall, you see a golf photo and you're like, hey, you like golf?

Yeah, like golf.

That's so fake. But the reality is you want to find common interest that excites you. So if you're a musician or if you guys, you know, if you're in a dance troupe together, you heard right. Then you might, you might hang out with other people who are in dance troupes that also have businesses because now you have some commonality behind it.

Yeah.

You know, so a lot of speakers hang out with other Speakers because they really love the business of speaking and so they have commonality there and that's why there's a lot of referrals that happen.

You're a professional speaker, Matt. And you and I ran into each other down at Michael Port's event. He puts on Stealing the show mastery classes.

Yeah. His was his graduate program. Grad school.

Graduate program. Yes. Heroic public speaking graduate program. All those speakers down there. But how can you. You've good friendships down there, but how can those friendships serve you? How could. I mean there's all speakers, they're all looking to speak too.

Yeah, but I just had a call today with one of them who lives in Indiana and he speaks to, to high school teachers. So you might say, well, well, how's that beneficial? Well, there's a couple things. So building a relationship with him. He's a full time professional speaker too. There's a lot I can learn from him about being on the road. The skills, not just the speaking skills, but just the business side of it. I could build a mastermind around it. Right. What happens when you build a mastermind? Everybody starts referring each other because they know like trust and care about each other.

Yeah, yeah.

Right. So I don't have to be in the school business or my ideal market to be in the school world to have a mastermind with somebody who's focused on schools. Like you did this early on, you know, you, you did a, like a, a group that you had a bunch of speakers together. You got together every month or every two months and you exchanged ideas and leads and things like that.

Yeah, we call it the speakers exchange. I don't know if you knew this, Matt. So I call it the speakers exchange. I bought the domain. When you look at it, it's either the speaker's exchange or the speaker section when you look at the domain.

That mistake early on with a client, his Earth solutions excavating. And so we had the same problem.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

So I mean, that's just what happens, Mike is, you know, so you say that everybody's looking for the same gig, but we're not. You know, we're looking to grow our businesses and there's a lot of idea sharing that can go on in that world. And, and it's commonly said that speakers get speakers business. Well, if he gets a phone call, that is that they want somebody to talk about networking, you know, connection, word of mouth referral or video, email or something like that to build deeper connections, then he'll be like, well, I know this other Guy. I know a guy is the common line, right?

And because he. Because he trusts you and likes you, because he cares about you, say, oh, yeah, call Matt.

And the reality is, Mike, if I just keep showing up in his life, that's the number one thing I wrote in my book, was just show up. Because so many people are so busy that it's your job as a professional to stay in touch with people. You don't have to sell them something, but you got to stay in touch. I mean, that's what it's all about.

Yeah, that's interesting. So now let's talk about people that are not in the same space. This is what you actually started off with, is the synergy. So say I own a pizza shop and I want to get more customers in there. I guess it may be good to have a relationship with the liquor store right down the road from me because, you know, I can't sell beer at my pizza shop and he can't sell pizza. How do I even go about that? Maybe I don't even. They've never met this person, and I have no contacts. How do I get in with that relationship? How do I build it?

Yeah, Mike, you gotta grow set.

I gotta grow up. Sound like my wife now, for God's.

Sake, you gotta walk into that guy's liquor store and introduce yourself. You stick out your hand, you say, hi, I'm Mike Michalowicz. I own a pizza shop down the street. You know, I've noticed for a while that I've had a couple people come in for pizza, and they asked me if I have bottled beer available, and I don't. And I'd like to send them down here. Just wondering if you could show me what you got so I can be informed and send people over your way.

Hold on. Wait, wait, wait. Because you're Matt, you're not saying, I got a pizza shop. People want beer. Why don't you carry a coupon promoting my pizza shop? You're just trying to help this guy.

No. Did you notice, by the way. By the way, to the listeners, I was not set up with that question?

Of course, no.

Like, did you notice? I immediately replied about what you can give them. Because that's the one thing that's going to trigger referrals back to you. If you think you're going to show up in a relationship and take, take, take, it's never going to work. You need to provide value just like you would in a business. In a referral relationship. Why would somebody just show up all of a Sudden because you say, hey, I need referrals. I'll give you some if you give me some. That's just lip service. And people have heard that time and time again. You know, the common commonality in the world of business was the network marketing world, where they would show up in these networking events and just keep asking you if, you know, anybody has a phone service, you know, anybod, or any of these other things. And they, what happened was they burned all the bridges, right? Because it became all about them and all selfish. And, you know, it just can't be that way because, you know, you cringe in this environment when people do that and you're like, really? Like, that's, that's why you showed up today is you wanted to talk about how you can get more business instead of helping out other people. And so if you go into that pizza shop and just, I mean, that liquor store and just offer to help him or her, the owner, it will come back in spades for you, man. You know what you have to do.

Oh, dude, everyone's trying to get a question.

I had a question for the pizza analogy there.

Yeah, look at the microphone a little more.

Yeah, so you said you don't want to like bring your coupon in, but what if you did the reverse? What if you said, hey, give me some coupons that I can give out to my customers?

Is that 100%?

So the first level is talking to him. Second level is how do I refer? Right? How do I refer? What educated way can I refer to him? Right? Him or her, the owner. So I would say, okay, so now that you've shown me around, do you have some business cards? Do you have some punch cards? You have some marketing material I can just put on my counter and just point to or hand out to people? That way you definitely know that they're for me as well. So the referral game is a little bit kind of interesting because not only do you want to refer people, but you also want the person receiving the referral to know it came from you. And in a retail environment, it's really super hard to do that because oftentimes the transaction count is very low. In a service based world, it's. It's much more relationship. That's why I talked earlier about the email introduction, because the email introduction shows exactly. Like years ago when you guys had Robbie Samuels on, I did an email introduction so that he would be a guest on your podcast. So that way it's clear to Robbie and it's clear to you that that I'm the one doing the connection, you know, and so that's the key in that business. So if you take those cards or those pamphlets from the liquor store, in that scenario, you would either staple your business card to it, write on something, just find a way to inform them, you know, in a passive way.

You know, do I have to be a referral monogamist? Meaning, like, once I build this relationship with this liquor store, like, I gotta be exclusive or is there a way to build that network bigger?

Yeah, so you don't have to be exclusive. I mean, I had 35 IT partners that were referring me on a regular basis.

Don't they say, hey, Matt, come on, I want to be your guy. Now you're working me. I mean, does that come into play?

It does. And when they go that route, they're off my list.

Oh, interesting.

I think I say deny everything becomes selfish then. Right. I'm giving referrals to a lot of people. And for me, the person I'm referring has to be the best fit for the customer. So just because you're doing. Just because he has a liquor store, if he doesn't carry tequila, I'm not, I'm not sending Kelsey there. But he's going to want that.

Kelsey wouldn't. Yeah. And Kelsey wouldn't go.

He wants. He wants to flip it into another sale.

So just a quick Kelsey tequila thing. So we went to this event in Nashville the first day, our two colleagues, Billy Ann and Paul hadn't made it yet because of plane delays. So Kelsey and I go to the networking event effectively together. The mixer.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

Right. So we get to the bar and we're like, we like two drinks that we like a straight up tequila and a tequila gimlet.

No, first he starts talking and he was like, can you make a tequila gimlet? And the one is like, I don't know what that is. The other one's like, we don't have lime juice. And he was like, can you just squeeze the limes?

But then even after. Right, right. Basically even after I got through that, they gave me the straight up tequila and they wanted to give her the tequila gimlet in.

Seriously. Is it tequila gimlet? Is it an alcoholic beverage? Is it with tequila?

It is drinking like, it's not like a. It's not.

It's almost like one to one lime to tequila.

What you do in a traditional sense, you take half a lime, cut in half, squeeze the juice out fully, and then add tequila to it. It's like a Margarita sugar?

Because I actually thought you were doing the nabs.

The.

The non alcoholic beverages.

Oh, no alcohol. Oh, I did for a while. I did. I went for six. Six months to almost a year. Yeah. Not because I. I just. I wanted to be. I just wanted to. And. But now. Now back to tequila game.

Yeah.

And wine. Yeah.

Okay, I got. So now I can say yeah. Or all the listeners. It's gonna get flooded with tequila.

We won't complain.

Sitting there, washed up, crying. Yeah.

But you know, I mean, this is. The thing is like. And so like, what's. What's beautiful about that networking event is that you're ordering the drink for her because you know what she likes.

It's a good point. Right. So what I'm hearing is these referrals, it is not about the business transaction. It's about the relationship. And the transactions has come out.

All day. All day. All day. You know, I say, Mike, you got that exactly right.

Yeah.

Hey, now here's the thing to get started. You got to do one thing. You just.

You.

You just gotta.

You're miss. You're missing it. Mike. Come on, he's killing you up.

Oh, because I'm reading, dude. I am reading the next question I wanted to ask you. What? You gotta stage me again. You gotta do one thing.

You just to get started with this stuff. You just gotta do one thing. You just gotta.

What? Why I'm so.

Do it.

Oh, oh, oh. Oh.

Jesus Christ.

One more time, dude. Third's a charm. Third's a charm.

Okay, I'll put the. I'll put the ball on the tee right up for you. So you to get started with building referral relationships. You just gotta do it. Do it.

I love it.

Do it. Just do it.

Oh, my God, dude. Three tries together. Hey, I want to ask you one more thing before they go bananas. What the freak is this bananas thing?

Yeah. So I believe that the problem with small business is bananas. Bananas are an analogy. Certainly. What happens when we walk into a networking event is everybody thinks you want a banana, so they start handing you bananas. They don't even ask if you're allergic to bananas.

Right.

If you like yellow, if you're hungry. Bananas are the analogy to business cards. Mm. All we do is become the pest dispenser. And I had to change the analogy because of our younger folk who don't know what a pez dispenser is. But the problem is they're just spitting out these business cards with no real relationship or intention behind them. And what started all this is I walked into a trade show one time when I was a web company. I had a monogram shirt that had my company name on it. And a guy by the name of Sean stepped out and attempted to hand me his business card. And I just stopped cold. I didn't take it. And I looked at him, and he moved his hand forward again. And I just stood there and looked at him, and he said, oh, here you go. And I said, well, why would I want that, Sean? And he said, because surely, you know somebody that needs a website. And I pointed to my logo on my shirt, and I said, and why would I want that? So what he was missing was the complete relationship behind building connections. Things that last. And we're just spitting out, you know, gummy bears or something, or Twizzler bites. I have no idea.

No, I love twist.

Super bad. And. And you go to a networking group networking event, and you leave with, like, 40 business cards, and then they end up in a stack on your desk. You do nothing with them.

Right.

You have no real relationships. You don't even know who half those people are. And half of them are life insurance people or bankers. Yeah, no, I got you life insurance. But I'm going to buy it from the person who builds the most trust with me over a long period of time.

I love it. Dude. What good insights, Matt. We gotta get going. But you don't go because we're gonna pull you back in for little bits. We're doing. But before we let you go from this part, where can people learn more about you, Matt?

So My website is breakthrough-champion.com. my book is out on Amazon. It's called More Word of Mouth Referrals, Lifelong Customers, and Raving fans. And it's 45 tactical tips on how you can truly connect and build deeper relationships with other People.

Good. We'll have that in the show. Notes and links. Kelsey, make sure you put more up there. More stuff. And his book. And just more stuff. All right.

Just keep doing.

All right, buddy. We'll talk to you in a few. But hang tight because we'll play right back. Kelsey, you know we're gonna do now.

Yeah.

Okay, so we're gonna. I want to know what you learned. We got. We're gonna talk about tacking today. We're gonna do the Wanted Dead or Alive phase. And then we have listener mail too, right?

Yeah.

All right. But first, I do want to thank our corporate partners, make the show a reality. Nextiva's a voiceover IP phone system. The entire interview we did today, a lot of people ask, when do you use nextiva? This entire interview was not conducted over nextiva P phone system, but the voice quality is the same. And then receipt bank. You're. You're a big fan of receipts. I noticed when we just had lunch today, the three of us, I noticed you eyeing up that receipt.

Yeah, I hoard them.

Are you one of those people when someone else gets the bill? Because I think you are, Kels. You look over and you're like, how much was the bill? Because you want to see how much they're tipping. You ever go to dinner or lunch with someone?

No, I actually don't want to do that because I don't want to know.

Okay. Do you, Jerry bone? You ever experienced that?

So, I mean, I come from that industry, so I'm. Well, I pay more attention to it than probably most people do. Yeah, but I mean, I don't.

I didn't see you look. Oh, you left. You were so outraged by the tip I was not giving. You left early. You walked out. So I noticed a lot of times, like, when I pick up a bill, that some people at the table will be, like, the looker overs to see. Oh, but they're trying to do it very, like, conspicuously to see how much you're tipping. And other people. You get all these clowns. Other people won't look your way. Other people do the old. The alligator claws, like, oh, no, I got the bill, but I can't reach it because it's right next to me.

Yeah. You know, I see that all the time.

You do, right?

What's wrong with them, dude, you're one of them.

Those clowns, you know, you didn't.

You're one of them.

Just go to the bathroom when the check comes.

I've done that.

In the truck.

And then they just feel awkward, and.

They'Re like, ron does that all the time.

And the best thing is no one will ever question you. The longer you're in the bathroom, like, you stand, just wait when they feel bad for you. Yeah, exactly. So, like, when you come back, like, no one's gonna say, what took so long?

They'll just, like, that hot sauce is killing me.

I took care of the bill. You know what the one thing that solves all these problems? Receipt bank.

Really?

Yep. You can scan your receipt. You can distribute to your friends, say, hey, look at the receipt. You want to see it? I really don't care, J Bone. Like, yeah, I want to see it. I can now share it all publicly through receipt bank.

You never even knew you had that problem, but now there's a solution.

Yeah. A lot of you have that problem. It's one of the most insidious problems perpetuating through our country right now.

I can believe it.

Okay. Kels.

Yeah.

Would you learn. Oh, would you learn today?

I really love when, you know, you sort of want to build these relationships, these communities to find people that not only have a common interest, but an interest that you are excited about. Because I feel like that's so critical. Like, I think about you and Ryan Lee. Right. That's such a natural relationship. And you guys Both love your 80s movies and music and our awkwardness. Yeah. And you have the same sense of humor. And you can build a community off of that. Right. It's. And I feel like that's the absolute best way to do this.

Yes. I love that. I loved Matt's comment. Just about building synergy around the businesses. It's a community. They're all kind of serving a similar community. So I heard all these complimentary relationships. That's why the pizza, liquor store idea or question I had. I love to eat. There was one common theme. He said over and over, just give. Just give.

Yeah, exactly.

And Matt lives this. I was down at Michael Ports. I think Matt. There was like 60 people in the room or something. Yeah. Matt appropriately comes up to me. He's like, dude, here's your thing. This is fat daddy fat back. It's, I think, Twizzlers. I'll tell you, I will never forget that moment for the near future. It's. It was remarkable.

He has a very short memory. Not you.

It's good. I've got a mailing address, but I'll tell you, Matt, like, you know, boom. Dozens of other people came up and, hey, I love prop. First they shook my hand, whatever. And it was great. I remember anyone except for you and Michael Port, who slipped his hand around my back and walked me around awkwardly and showed off his space down there.

Kelsey, I have to tell you, too. As he was being escorted off the stage for the tour.

Yeah.

He turned to me, you know, like between the hug that him and Mike were having. Mike and Mike were having.

You saw that, right? So I'm not making that up. You saw.

And without saying anything, he mouths, thank you now. So that's what I was gonna say.

I love you.

Power of connection. Right. And I don't think. I mean, he can buy from me. I. I have plenty of books I can buy from him. But that's okay. That's okay. That's how, you know You've connected with somebody and it matters to them. You know, you missed it.

So I, I did say that I was Mike, you know, he's. Michael has a strong hug. So he's like, he's hugging me. You. The Twizzler's my hand. I mouth thank you. And as I continue mouthing, you start turning away. I said, are you available later tonight? And as I'm saying that you started turning away.

I said, only if you've got a king size bed.

Exactly. I said, I have a twin. Even better.

Hilarious.

What does that even mean?

Oh, God. So we were talking about that. Matt, it's amazing you listen to that many shows. So I'm terrified. King size beds. Do you know we went over phobias when we were on this trip in Nashville. My phobias, king size beds. It's serious. I. I can't stand king size beds. Because when you're in the middle of a bed, I travel a lot by myself. When I wake up in the middle, I go to the bathroom or something. I start turning.

Loses his ability to function.

I lose my direction. Because you lean a little bit to the right. Like, oh, that's not the lip of the bed. I can't get off this side. So I go left the other way. I can't find.

I almost crashed my truck off the road.

It's like adult quicks sand or something.

Exactly. It's so huge.

I just can't get out of the middle of the bed. Usually how I get off a king sized bed is I go off the foot side, I just crawl down, I follow the feet.

And then he also said that he just gives up and pisses in the bed. I don't know what a king size bed. The fact you have to get up every night to go to the bathroom.

I know. I get up, I think almost every night now. I go to the bathroom, I drink a lot of water. I should stop doing that. But yeah, I just give it up and just pee myself. You know, we also found that Billy Ann. Greg, what's her fear? This is the most bizarre fear of.

Antarctica on the map. Like not even in reality. The like it on a map. A picture of it, like legitimately the vast gives her anxiety.

Picture of Antarctica will make her crap her pants.

That's the like. Like if I'm looking at it like a wallpaper on my computer of Antarctica.

Yeah.

She started perspiring.

Yeah. Like legit anxiety. But it's not like the actual place. Right. It is the it on a map.

Does she know why? That's like.

Matt, what's your. What's your analysis, Matt?

My analysis of her fear of Antarctica. She should probably call Diane Denopoli, who's the penguin lady who's been to Antarctica.

Yeah. Oh, that was a trivial reference.

She did a TedX Arcon Penguins.

All right.

Yeah. No, she did.

You. Not me.

Oh, no, no, no, no. I'm thinking about it. I'm like, oh, that's a scary phobia.

Yeah, because you can't.

You can't run from that. You just have to avoid maps.

Exactly.

She can't.

And you know what Mike does? He pulls them up and shows them in her face.

So I did a little trick and it was. It was inappropriate. I. I typed in website and it said phobias that you could actually demonstrate in the moment. So some people are afraid of small holes. So they show this object with lots of holes. And I show it to Kelsey. Paul was there. Billy Ann. No one flinches. I said, oh, this next picture may get someone. I showed to Kelsey. It's Antarctica. I showed the paw. Nothing. I showed it to Billy. I thought she was kidding. It was real. All right, let's get to our next bit. This is Matt. You're welcome. You actually more than welcome. You have to join us. So it's called Dead or Alive. And these are entrepreneurs who are either dead or guessed alive. Yes. And all you have to do is say dead or alive. And I'm gonna go around and we'll do a vote. So the three of us right now, let's sing the beginning.

Okay.

I wanted.

You don't know. That's not the beginning. Beginnings. I'm a cowboy cowboy Rusty horse I.

Ride I want it all morning Dead or alive.

This karaoke section.

All right, here we go.

That was horrible.

George D. Mestral. And I apologize if I mispronounce the name, but I'm going to give you the background. These people. So. So George D. Mestral was the founder of Velcro. He was a Swiss engineer. Swiss electrical engineer, specifically. He's walking through the Once one day and he found that burdock seeds were sticking to his dog's coat. He took it under a microscope and invented what we now consider Velcro. That's a true story.

Okay, I say he's dead.

Jesus.

What?

Why would you wish upon anybody?

She wants him.

I'm pretty sure he's not offended.

All right, so, Jay Bones, you want him dead or do you want him?

He is dead.

Okay, and your guess, Mr. Matt. Word.

My. I Believe he's dead. And he was velcroed inside of his coffin.

Okay. Ooh. O.

Fun fact.

So he invented velcro in the 1940s, so there's the biggest hint of all. Yes, he did pass away February 8, 1990. So. Okay, next person.

Long time.

This one. This one's a good one. Dean Kamen. Dean Kamen is the inventor of the Segway. He created a mobility wheelchair that climbs steps. Subsequently built the Segway, which is a two wheeler. But his greatest invention, according to him, was first. It's an acronym. Stands for inspiration and recognition of science and technology. It's a program he started for kids K through 12 to get excited about the sciences. Is Dean Kamen. We're gonna start with math this time. Dead or alive?

He's alive and in New Hampshire.

Oh, cocky, cocky. What do you think?

I think alive as well.

Okay.

I think he's riding a Segway right now.

Okay, so you think he's dead? He's alive.

Yeah. Yeah, he's riding a Segway.

Dead.

Only people who are dead.

If he rides it too long, he may be dead.

That's true. He's alive. He is Alive. He's born April 1951. He's currently 67 years old. Now here's the bonus question. The business partner, Jim Helsingen. I hope I pronounced correctly. Jim Helsidden was the owner of the Segway company. He's the one who took this technology, brought to the public. Is he dead or alive? Jim Helsing.

I'm gonna say dead.

Interesting. I wouldn't say that.

Okay, yeah, I say dead just by the way you preface that.

I wouldn't say that, Matt.

I. I would. I would. I would say dead as well. Because he worked.

So he is dead. But here's the this is true fact. Google.

Are you trying to throw us off when we said that?

I wouldn't say that he is dead, but here's the crazy part. Jim Helsingen, the owner of the Segway company, died by falling off of a cliff while riding a Segway.

Oh, my gosh.

True story. Happened on September 26, 2010.

It's like you can bring a horse drink.

You can give a horse a segue.

But you can't teach him A little too soon. Way too soon for that. You guys are pigs.

When was that, Mike?

What year? 2010. September 26, 2010.

Irony, right?

Too soon. Yeah. And he was. They would. They spotted him falling too. Witness saw him falling 30ft off a cliff into a jagged rock. River.

Why is it jagged?

Because that's what rocks are. They're jagged.

You're adding so many details to this.

I swear to God it's true. They recovered the Segway. They recovered the Segway before his own body. And he was. Listen, I took the notes here. He was driving the rugged country version of the Segway.

The Segway was worth more, so they grabbed that first.

Is that what you're saying?

It's like the Segway Rubicon version.

This is someone's father you guys are laughing at.

I know, right?

Oh, here goes. Get in the microphone. You're doing that weird laugh of yours where you start choking, you start swallowing stuff.

She's the funniest. She has the funniest laugh, Mike. Like, when you're driving down the road. Listen to the podcast. And Kelsey starts laughing. You just. It's like confection.

It's magnetic. But the thing is, when she starts laughing, she pulls away from the microphone. We got to get away this. Keep the microphone. No, because you start. Right. Did you hear. Oh, you haven't heard this episode yet.

For air right now, dude.

Matt, have you ever heard of someone with the last name Cox?

C O X. Yeah, Brian. Brian Cox.

Brian Cox. There's a lot of Cox, right?

Yeah.

Kelsey, she says the word Cox. Here she goes now. What was it? What happened?

Kelsey, for whatever reason, it just surprised me. It was a listener mail, and the guy's name was Zach Cox. And I read it, and then it just, like, tickled my funny bone. But then I couldn't stop. And then Mike was like, what's his name? What's his name?

Because you laughing when you say his name, you're like, oh, I want to thank Zach.

Kelsey. That's because one of Mike's best attributes is instigator.

Yeah, exactly, exactly.

Okay, last one more Dead are alive. Yeah, last dead are alive.

I promise she cares in, like, five minutes if she keeps laughing like that.

Right?

This is a double. So this is. The last one's a little more challenging. You can do both dead, both alive or combo. You know, one dead, one alive. And I'm sorry, I'm gonna mispronounce the name. It's first name is Mark Chavanis, I think it is. And the other person was Alfred Fieldling. They're the founders of bubble wrap. Okay. They were attempting to make a new style of wallpaper that became bubble wrap. True story.

And then they licked it and died.

Really? Who?

The Licks wall. I mean, that is Kelsey. And the Mic.

Okay. They sealed it together. This is true. They sealed together two shower curtains, pumped air in the middle to make bubbles. They tried to sell as wallpaper initially, which failed. Then they tried to make it into greenhouse insulation, which failed, ultimately becoming a packing material. That's true. I'm tired. It's all true. So the question is, is Alfred and Mark, what's their status? So, J Bone, you didn't start yet.

So I'm gonna say. Oh, I mean, I feel like bubble wraps around one alive, one dead.

Okay, who's alive?

Oh, I. I don't even remember.

Okay, just one. So one alive, one day. We'll take that.

Okay, I'm just gonna say both dead.

Both dead. Mark.

Matt.

Oh, Matt, Mark. There's one guy's name, Mark.

He's really good at building these relationships and remembering people's names.

I'm gonna say two different fact. Your friend, professional speaker and hall of Famer Scott Stratton, used to sell bubble wrap.

Oh, did he really?

Yeah.

So, Matt, so what do you say?

I said both dead.

Okay. The reason I said Mark is because the guy's name was Mark. So mark died in 1994. Alfred, shockingly, died almost in the exact same day, 1994, right around the exact same time. They both bopped at the same time.

Did they suffocate from bubble wrap?

They burst the bubble. You just burst their bubble? Yeah, I don't know. Okay, should we do those again? Are those fun?

Yeah, those are good. I love how there is so much detail about the Segway guy. Like, excruciating detail. And then this one, he's like, well, how'd they die? And you're like, yeah, I don't know. But, like, him is like jagged rocks. Somebody watched it happen the entire time.

Blue and shiny.

They sold Segway after pulling it back up.

Can I defend myself?

No, I'm not sure there's a defense.

No, I won't even. No, it's very hard to find information on the bubble wrap guys, whatever reason. And the Velcro guy, there's nothing but the segue. There was a lot of current articles because it happened so recently. So they talk about his perilous passing. So that was the heavy breathing there for.

I don't know.

All right, Kel. Oh, we're running time, so I have a tip to share. We got listener mail, so let's do listener mail first.

Okay. So this comes from David Stahl, Dental question. When figuring out what I paid myself last year, I come up with $185,800 of which $67,500 was sub S dividends. Do I consider the sub s dividends profit or part of my salary? If it is profit, how do I pay myself moving forward? I guess I'm not sure how to allocate funds to the owner's comp account.

David, great question. When it comes to the distribution of money, regardless of you, an S corp or any formation of a company llc, a sole proprietorship, a C corp, whenever the distribution money comes out to support your lifestyle, that's what we call your lifestyle account or your payroll. So it doesn't matter if it comes out in big chunks or small pieces. Disregard that. My simple question back to you is, is this money used to support your lifestyle? If so, it's all payroll. If part of it is used as bonuses like you, you do something special for yourself, your family, or you save for retirement or your kids education, then that's a bonus. Do you have something else to say, Kelsey? No. Say it.

No.

Get closer to the microphone, please. What the. What the hell's going on? What's that thing? Are you kidding me? What's so funny?

It's like when you laugh at funerals. Like you just can't.

What?

Laughs at funerals?

Oh my God. I thought the question was gonna be when I take your profit distributions, do I buy a segue?

Yeah. Oh my God. I can't believe you're laughing.

Someone's death, it's awful.

Who laughs at funerals?

I feel awkward and then start laughing. No, no.

Have you jaebone ever laughed at a funeral?

Never. Never.

I mean, like someone makes a joke and they're like, oh, you know, you know, two people walk into a bar, oh, they hurt themselves.

I think she's laughing because it is really unbelievable that the creator of this.

Wouldn'T be able to work it.

Like, how do you not know how to work it?

Country version. That's a good point. That's a good point. He didn't know how to work it.

That's tragic.

All right, so let me give the tip of the day. Now we better get the hell out of here. It's called tacking. Do you know what tacking is?

No.

I remember this from the toilet paper entrepreneur, I believe.

Yes, Matt, what is it?

Matt is leaning into the wind, baby.

Yeah. Tacking is a sailing technique where you leverage the wind. And so sailboats, when they go from their current position to wherever their destination is, they typically will not go in a straight line because they have to leverage the wind so they will Adjust in a zigzag pattern to get where they want to go. That's how we need to develop our business. Are you going to start laughing again at the dead guy? Cows.

What the.

Jeez, I've never seen you like this. Keep going. Oh, my God. I wish we had the camera on her. Do we? She did the hand wave. Like. Like, she's like. Oh, just.

Yeah, I'll edit that in.

Yeah, get the big hand wave in my face. Let's keep going. So in tacking, what you do is you figure out where you want your business destination to be five or 10 years from now. But then every quarter, every 90 days, you readjust your business to take an opportunity. You take your opportunistic around the environment around you. So wherever challenges present themselves, wherever competition appears, consider all those wins going on in your business and adjust accordingly on a quarterly basis. That's called tacking. All right, guys, we gotta get out of here. Kelsey's killing me today. Okay, Kelsey, what do you want to share?

Please rate, review, comment on itunes, Stitcher, tunein, radio, whatever podcast are you listening to?

Yeah, you know what? Don't rate us this time because it's a one star. Yeah, yeah, but. But definitely subscribe. Yeah, not because of you, Matt. Because of Kelsey and Jeremy laughing at dead people. Oh, and one last thing, my friends. Go to mikemcalowicz.com or you can use the shortcut mikemotorbike.com Go there. On the page, you'll see a big call to action button. Click on it right now. You can get a free copy of Surge. Soon you'll get something even better. So do that now. See you guys later.

Sam.