Consulting for Equity LIVE: Day 1 Highlights with Adam Lyons

Well, actually, that. I don't know if you've heard the story, but that came from a conversation between Tony and Dean when. So I was having dinner with Dean and he said that he was getting. Dean said Dean was getting out of real estate and going into mindset because it's a bigger market and he felt he had kind of done all he could do in real estate. And he partnered wisely with Tony, who has a giant audience because Tony was on television for years, 247 on multiple channels. So like one of the bigger brand recognition people around. So he aligned with Tony and then he was talking about a conversation that he and Tony were having. And he said, tony's getting ready to write this book called Money Master the Game. And he's writing it because he said, you and I are dancing bears. He and Dean, you and I are dancing bears. As long as we're able to dance on stage, people throw the money. And Tony, when I was representing him, was doing like 260 dates a year. I mean, it was non stop. Travel is a miserable life, in my opinion, you know, but so what he said, I'm doing, I'm writing Money Master the Game and I've partnered with somebody to put together a fund and we've realized that when we get, I think it was a billion or 2 billion under management, then I'll be set. And so that's what he did. And so Money Master the Game was just a funnel to get people educated, but then also to have them be exposed to his fund and invest in it. And that really changed the game for him. So interesting. Yeah. So, so yes, being a dancing bear in terms of if you're only a dancing bear, then when the music stops and the dancing stops, the money stops.

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But. But if you're using. That's what to me, consulting for equity is. It's kind of, you know, you're dancing, but you're owning more and more and more of yourself because you're able to stop when you want. And then maybe the deals would stop. They won't, though, because you'll have built a brand, but you won't have to actually do the work to get paid.

There is a. There is a false correlation there as well. That happens. You'll sometimes see someone who's a dancing bear realizes they're a dancing bear, and then they pivot to no longer being a dancing bear, which convinces everyone else that they have to become the dancing bear first in order to do that. But that's not actually true. That's somebody who made a mistake and is then pivoting and everyone else is now going to go make that same mistake. You can totally just be the behind the scenes person and just set yourself up so you don't have to do anything.

Yeah. And I think part of it, too is that what I want for you guys is an intentionality of we're looking to create equity from whatever skill set we've got. We're looking to transmute that into equity. Right. We're spinning the straw into gold. So it's kind of an alchemy that's going on that unless you think to do it, can happen accidentally, as I think it did with Tony. And it happens with lots of people. Right. It's like, oh, yeah, I got this piece of this company. But if you're actually consciously, intentionally saying, the way I do that is I do this and I do it for a finite period of time because it's all to get me to this. Right. And I bring tremendous value. Not that I'm going to be pushing buttons, but I can give you the people, the teams, the resources, the connections, and the strategy to make it happen. That's ultimately, to me, going to get you so much farther, so much faster than if it's, you know, you kind of bumble accidentally into, you know, hey, can I give you equity in my company? Right. Because people will.

I mean, literally in the middle of a negotiation. I was talking to you about the car wash company.

Yep.

So I had this car wash company come to me and say, we really want to give you equity in our company to help us do More car washes. They've got like two or three car washes already and they want a whole bunch more. And so I said, oh, that's great. Can you send me a one sheet? Show me everything. So send me a one sheet. It summarizes the whole business. I was like, this is wonderful. How do you see me being involved? That's my first question. And they go, well, what we're looking for is. And then they listed all the things that I definitely don't want to do. Right. We're looking for you to give us some money. You know, we really want help doing ads. And they just had all these things they want to do. I was like, great. I don't do any of that, by the way. None of that. I literally, I was like, I'm putting my own money into my own things. I'm not going to help your business for a small percentage or I can help my own for 100%. Yeah, I won't do anything. Is there any other way? You see us working together. And they go, we're open to whatever you say. It's like, great. And so then I said, the way I typically do this. So I wrote down how I would get involved and I was like, I am more than happy to be a business strategist in return for equity in your company. If this is a discussion you're open to, we can continue this discussion. And they replied, I would absolutely like to open the door, walk into the room and see what that's all about. And that's where we're at.

Yeah, love that.

Many huge takeaways, but with one being clarity around benefits of profits only interest versus the phantom equity and all. Also the strategies to cover downside risk of liabilities and partnerships by contractually being called a co owner and not a partner.

Yeah, that's a good one, Linda. Good takeaway. It'll save you some, some pain later on. You can role play with me.

Perfect.

You know, so ask me what I do. Yes.

What do you do?

God, I'm a drug dealer.

No, I'm in the right place.

I'm an investor. So and so then I can just explain. I don't have to let him wonder. I say I'm an investor. What I do is basically come into companies, assess where they are, look at all the opportunities, and then I've got a framework and some models for helping them increase their profits. Sale, excuse me, increase their sales and profits and really ultimately the valuation because I'm all about exiting. So that's, I come in basically work with them as an equity owner and do that. That's it, right? Because then, just like him with the car wash, I don't ever say, this is what I do and how I do it. I say, so how would you like to work with me? Right. But I do make it clear in that initial conversation, as I just did, that this is what I do. I'm an investor. I invest my time, resources, connections, and strategy in businesses to help them grow so that they can exit.

I focus less on who I am and more on the results they will get. So I'm far more likely to say, you know, I'm. It doesn't matter. What I do is I. I help companies become more profitable and help them grow and scale.

And the exit is important to mention because most people haven't ever thought about that, right? And when they do, even the. My guy who I met because he exited, he came to me because he exited and wanted the guy that offered me the one point, right? He came to me because he exited and he wanted to do more deals, and he found my stuff, you know, online, and somebody introduced me to him, and we did a consult. And then he made a ridiculous amount of money, which I'm very annoyed that he didn't give me all of that, which I was really happy about. And then, you know, to me, that's the time when you come in and do something. But. But he had not thought, as he said in his text back to me, about exiting the new thing that he was doing, because most people, that's just not something they think about. So when you bring that up, you're opening a pretty big door to something that is a lot of opportunity that they haven't thought about, which really starts things off on a good footing.

Yeah, I like that. That's. I've spoken about this before. I don't know if you guys have heard it. That's what got me sold on Roland. I mean, I was really thinking, Roland's, like, the smartest guy ever. And I was like, I just want to be in the same room as him. But it was the exit discussion that made me think, yeah, I'm just pretty much only gonna listen to this guy and nobody else, because no one else was saying it. And it was very clear. It was like everyone else had read three quarters of the book and was going out there and preaching the book, but Roland had read the whole thing and was like, you know, there's a twist at the end. You know, it's just like, no one else has said that yet, but this guy clearly knows it. And I was like, I'm just gonna be in this guy's camp. And as far as I'm concerned, Ronald, if you. If we've got. I'd like to share the thing about the silver coin, because I think so. Something I'm hearing from a lot of you. And this, it really does fit with the go broad and go go deep, like understanding the difference, like when you're far too wide versus when you're niching. And that's to understand what is the value of a dollar coin. And when you guys. To really think about this, because I'm going to challenge your perceptions of value here. As we looked at the objections and we looked at the things that came up, a common thing came up. How do I explain my value to somebody? How do I tell them what I'm worth? How do I make it clear that I am not just a commission person? And I think one of the components you guys might be missing is it actually matters who you're talking to as much as who you are. And a lot of the focus here is. Is on what did I do wrong? Who am I? How have I positioned it wrong? And there's very little question about who is this other person, and am I actually talking to the correct person? And I think many of you took away the takeaway, right? Say no more often, but let's really ask us, why are we saying no? We're saying no to find the right person. The more nos we say and the more we're clear about who would actually be a yes, really, it's just filtering everyone until we find the very clear yes. And the easiest way to understand that is to work out what is the value of a dollar coin. A single dollar coin. Raise your hand if you think you know the financial value of a dollar coin. Somebody raise your hand. What is a dollar worth? Go for it.

A dollar.

Incorrect. Is actually worth $550,000. Now, that was a trick question, Chris. I'm very sorry. Clearly it was. That's because the dollar coin I'm talking about is actually the 1893 silver dollar coin, which, to a coin collector is the most expensive coin that exists in America, potentially the world.

So before you go on, what's the takeaway from what he just said, from the interaction that just happened? What's the takeaway? Didn't ask enough questions. Right. And not. Not as a criticism, just as a. Because it was. You were set up to fail. Congratulations.

You're welcome. Yeah, I know that we.

But I just don't I don't want you to miss. It's those questions that you ask are really important that in your mind, I think if you can say, what questions do I need to ask to really find the answer to this? When someone asks you anything, what is the clarifying question or questions that I should be asking? I've got a dollar coin. Awesome. What date from what country? You know, is it like, it could be a Canadian dollar, which is worth like 0.02 cents. I'm just kidding. I mean, it could be anything. Right. So that's, that's an important thing to take away.

Yeah. And it does. Right. It helps you understand where it is. Now, an $1893 coin has a third value. The third value is approximately $28, which is the spot price of silver. Approximately the last time I looked at it in the last like few days. Which means we have a single coin with three distinct values depending on who we talk to. What is hysterical about the $1893 coin? I can make you a freak out is if you've ever had a silver dollar coin and did not know that the 1893 was the really, really special one, you may have had it in your wallet, walked into Walmart and thought, yeah, I've got a bucket somewhere, handed it over and just paid for, you know, a dollar can of soda for $550,000 or $28. And it all comes down to the person you're talking to. There's no way that the cashier at Wall Walmart will value that dollar coin at anything other than a dollar because they can't see the value. And it doesn't matter how much time you spend trying to explain to the cashier at Walmart that actually the $550,000 worth of groceries that you've picked up in the store and the TVs, is actually worth a single dollar that you have in your head. And you can argue to your blue in the face of the cashier, get them to call their manager, get them to escalate up. No one is going to believe that that single dollar coin is worth $550,000. On the flip side, I live in Texas and I go to gun shows because I think they're really fun. And right now, if you go to any gun show, it says, we accept silver. Like, I could take that dollar coin and I could exchange it for $28 worth of, of jerky, which I buy when I go to gun shows because I don't really buy guns. Whatever. It's funny, but. But that's the truth, right? I can exchange it because at a gun show, my silver is valuable. I can buy things with it. But I'm not going to get the $550,000 value at a coin show where I go, where there are collectors. I can walk around to every single booth and I'm the coolest person in the whole room. Likewise for you guys. In the wrong room, in front of the wrong person, you're worth an hourly wage. And it doesn't matter how good you are at your job if they can't see your value. And that's not necessarily because you can't explain it. In the same situation as Walmart, they may not be in a position to receive how valuable you actually are in another room. You're not an hourly wage slave. Instead, you are a consultant for a fee. But why would they ever give up equity to you? And it doesn't matter how well you explain it, they cannot hear it because to them, their equity is priceless. Now, I will give you something on this to understand why most business owners believe their equity is priceless. And this is actually one of the objections that came up, which me, Roland, are going to go through in a moment. We're going to go through these objections. One of the most common things is I believe as a business owner, my business is worth far more than it is worth to. I literally have a client that says, offer me 10 billion and I'll sell because that's what it's worth. And I'm like, it's not. It is not okay how much you. I don't care how loud you say it, it is not worth 10 billion. You are incorrect, sir. But what he really means is the time I have spent away from my two daughters was given to my business. And if you want me to walk away from the fact that I sacrificed time with my loved ones for this company, you are going to pay for the love that I did not get. This is why people value things insanely. And the key to understanding how to value someone's equity is to get them to realize that in an exit event, they will get back that unbelievably impossible thing to value. They will have more time with their children and soon stop losing it. But just because you're saying it doesn't mean they can hear it. And so equity is not on the table. Lastly, for the right person in the right room that really understands that equity is essentially a blank check to hire anyone you want to do things for you, and you'll probably get a discount rate on their services if you're willing to pay them cash in addition to equity. You're in the right room talking to the right person and you're speaking their language. And in this situation they fully understand what value you're bringing because you're answering questions a fraction of a heartbeat that would have taken them months or years to figure out. So because Roland gave the little teaser earlier, I'll give you one of my top resources right now for gaining insight where I can't get it anywhere else. There is a new service that has just been released we're talking about within the last month or so, maybe a little bit longer, but it's just gaining popularity. It's called Intro Co I N t r o.co as far as I'm aware, I'm the first person in digital marketing to really talk about it. It is known about in the corporate world, but it hasn't really become popular anywhere else. But I think in our world in a consulting for equity epic digital marketing, even in physical business, I think there's a real power here that has been missing. Intro Co is cameo for high level employees and business owners of major multi billion dollar corporations. To put this in perspective, you can today hire the founder of Reddit for less than $1,000 to consult for you. That has never been possible in the history of mankind as far as I'm aware. I hired the person that was the vice president of the Hustle, is the current vice president of HubSpot, and was the head of new business for the Motley fool, three major direct marketing companies who have had massive success. It was incredibly expensive. It was $300 spore, 30 minutes and he felt bad because he wasn't sure he gave me enough value. So we added an extra 15 minutes to make sure I felt I got my money's worth by the time we got on the phone call. The guy's incredible by the way. I highly recommend him as the most amazing person. His name's Jordan DiPietro. If any of you hire him through Intro Co, please say Adam referred you because I want him to know just how much I truly did value him. Because he kept saying, I don't think I've done enough. I'll explain to you what he did that wasn't enough. He went through my entire website, downloaded a bunch of my free products, watch a whole bunch of videos, then he went through my podcast and listened to a whole bunch of episodes. Then he made notes analyzing my offer, wrote down what he felt was wrong with my offer, then gave me a link to four or five different websites that had better structure than mine that he felt I should rebrand my website on while focusing on his new offer. When he identified that my actual specialty is upselling and cross selling, which for any of you guys that have seen me teach. No, that after I buy a company, the very first thing I do or acquire a company is I go in and I develop new products in upsells and cross sells. I just never used that phrase before, so I didn't understand what I was doing. And he gave me that. I mean, literally, that alone was probably worth a percentage of my company, just that piece. And if he'd have said to me, I can in a single sentence tell you how to position your company for more sales, that would have been, you know, and if I do it and it's good, would you give me a percentage? I would.

You know what?

Probably because I've spent a while trying to piece this together.

Right.

He then gave me a list of all the best ways to improve my podcast and get more listeners because he felt the quality was so high but not enough people were listening to it. And then after that, at the end of the phone call, sent me an email with every single action step we spoke about with links to absolutely everything, finishing with. Please email me if you have any further questions, clarifications. And we've traded about six or seven emails since, which is refused to charge me for because he wants to make sure I get the full value of the $300 I gave him. I complained he didn't buy me a coffee. No, it's ridiculous. So I highly, highly recommend this. And the reason that I like it and what I would recommend for you guys to use this service is as a way of just getting another opinion. And that to me, I think is like one of the best things. Now I do look very carefully and make sure that the business I'm picking for the consultation is great. But to go back on something that we were talking about with consulting for.

Equity, just point one thing out with this also. So who else is on Intro Co?

I mean it is beyond CEOs and business owners, there is also a whole section for home interior design Celebrities do.

The business people have different skills.

Oh, completely. Yep.

So would it be possible then perhaps as a business strategist, consulting for equity type person, for you guys to use that as some of your team of experts if you were going to provide an in depth thing? What if you bought as part of your consult, let's say you charge five grand. What if you spent $300 to have somebody like this go through for you on behalf of the client and give you all of the stuff that they gave him so that you can then send that to your client. That's pretty cool, right? Arbitrage. Yep, big time arbitrage.

What's really fascinating is he comes across like a very, very high level employee of a company. So he just constantly wanted to add value and everything was diligent. All the details are there. Much better detail than I see. Whenever I typically talk to an entrepreneur, even if I'm trying to get advice from them, you know, I'll get like, they'll casually be chatting to me while doing the grocery shopping, you know, and I'm trying to write down everything. And I'm guilty of that as well. This was just phenomenally professional. And yeah, I highly recommend it. But I love exactly what Roland was saying. What was saying that that can be your team. I mean, at this point I feel really comfortable pretending I know interior design because I'll just go to the interior design people there that are on all these tv, TV shows. It's like, you know, the home show and the ABC home show, all these things. I was like, yeah, I got a. I got a team of interior design experts. One moment, let me find out what they say. So, yeah, it's a really, really powerful resource. Yeah. And for any of you guys that, I mean, I would pull it up because it is phenomenal. And this is. I've got a few like secret resources like this, but that one has been a bit. I was super excited to share it with Roland when I found it, but.

I would grab like, I would grab it for. I'd grab a CFO on there that's got ridiculous experience. I would grab a recruiter, an HR person, somebody like that, like all of the things a marketing person like, like that guy. Because then you can get a detailed analysis for $300 or so that comes from such credibility that you can't help but deliver insane value. Right. And it's just your ability to find the resources too. It's not that you have to be pushing the buttons, Mark. Yeah. And hire them. Yeah, exactly. Clearly, if they'll do it for $300. Like if I wanted to put together a board of advisors, let's say, I might reach out to them and say, hey, you do that for $300. How about if you be on the board of advisors where all I'm going to ask you to do four times a year is the thing that you offer for $300. Can I buy a block of four of those to be delivered quarterly?

Ryan here. And look, if you're an entrepreneur, you're busy, right? Whether it's replying to emails or scheduling meetings, whatever, there is a lot of work and a lot of hats that we need to wear as entrepreneurs. And that's why, as entrepreneurs, especially if you're of a version visionary founder, you need help, right? And I don't know about you, but at one point for me, I was getting so overwhelmed with all the little day to day tasks that, let's face it, they gotta get done, but they don't necessarily need to get done by you. And so when I came to this realization, I said, I gotta get help. I need to get a virtual assistant. I gotta get a social media manager. And that's when I called my friends at Belay Solutions. Belay Solutions are an incredible organization. Now, look, I don't know about you, but I tried to work with VAs in the past. It was always a disaster. And so I was really, really suspicious of being able to make it work. But their process was fantastic. They found out the type of work that I need done, the type of people I like to work with, and they really did match me with a perfect virtual executive assistant. And this person's been with me now for three years and counting. So obviously it worked for me and I think it's gonna work for you. So here's what you need to do. All right? The good folks at Belay, they're actually giving listeners to this podcast $300 off the startup cost for their virtual assistants. You'll pay less than I did. Here's what you need to do. Text lunch. All right. Text lunch. L U N C H to 55123. Again, that's text LUNCH to 55123. To talk to Belay about getting a virtual assistant of your own. You need it. You know you do. And they can make it happen.

I'll tell you exactly what, what I am doing and what I would have done. I would just make a list in my head of the three to five people that I would be calling about the specialty that I want. I wouldn't be using it to help me pitch. I would be pitching the way I normally do my consulting for equity pitch. I do everything I need. And then as part of that, I would then once I've secured that money and we've scheduled when we're going to meet up, I would then take a percentage of that money and hire some experts and get them to give me their opinion. Now I've got a full summary of their opinion of everything. Now I'll go in, add my own information to that, compile it all and turn up with a killer presentation that blows them away because it's got four billionaires or four experts from billion dollar companies, exits and me.

You don't really need it until you have the client and then you have the information that you will ask them about.

The way I would word it is, I wouldn't say I'm going to bring him in and I would just be like, you know, I got this guy I know that just sold his company for eight figures. So I'm going to call him about this situation again. I'm just going to get his opinion on this too. Exactly. Are you sure? I go, yeah. And then I got this other guy, he found Reddit. I'm going to call him as well. I just want to see what he. Are you okay with that? Do you mind if I just get these two guys opinion on this? Are you kidding me? Yeah, look, it's just a favor. I'm going to throw him some cash. In fact, probably more that you're paying me. Maybe. I know exactly.

Yeah, cool.

Awesome stuff.

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