Bill Nowicki: Marietta Stories

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All right everyone, welcome back to another episode of the Business Blast podcast. I'm your host Tyler Wagner. Today I have Bill Nowicki with us, and 2 years ago he created Marietta Stories podcast as a way to create genuine relationships. After 90 interviews and over 56,000 downloads, it has become much more than that. So welcome to the show, man.

Hey, it's excited to be here.

Excited to have you here, man. And we'll jump right in. It's always fun to talk to another podcaster. The first one I have for you, Bill, is what is the best story from your life that has an underlying valuable message?

Okay, well, I just turned 50. I took a new job and I was kind of miserable at it. So I hired a coach thinking that he could help me do better in my job. And my job, I went from a manager of a large organization and there was from his project work to more of analytical evaluator, you know, telling people where they screwed up kind of a job. And I, first time I met with a guy, his name is Gary O'Malley. I said, he said, what are you, what's your goals? I said, well, I want to get better what I do. And he said, well, I can't help you with that. What I can tell you is how you're wired and what you should be doing. And at 52, That, you know, started my journey. And, you know, 4 years later in podcasting and all the other stuff I've been able to do is based on that one conversation.

Wow, man. I love that. Thanks for sharing that.

But, you know, I thought I knew myself too, and it just— I was amazed at what I figured out.

Yeah, man. And if I just had to guess, if you're doing podcasting, like, you probably— I would assume, you know, you like to connect with people. And that's what I realized. Like, my major in college was accounting, and I would have been absolutely miserable. I mean, I couldn't even get past the first Accounting 101 class either way. But podcasting, I mean, I can do these interviews every day and I absolutely love it.

So yeah, me too. Yeah, I was a— I'm still an engineer. I've been doing it for over 30-something years, but podcasting is a whole different thing.

Yeah, man, it's a lot of fun. The next one I have for you is what is the most valuable piece of information we should know that's within your expertise or industry?

Okay, what I think is very important is when you start, let's say you wanna be a podcaster, I edited myself for the first, I don't know, 6 months. And that taught me a lot of things. One, my vocal tics, the ums, the ahs, and the sos and all that stuff, I learned to reduce them because it actually made my editing job easier. And the other thing is I wasn't a good listener. And that's the biggest thing. So when I first started doing interviews, I would interrupt, you know, I had something I wanted to really jump in and say, and it's not about you, it's about you're the host that's enabling the listeners to, you know, get the best situation out of your podcast. So you really have to listen for the listener. And it was a game changer. I mean, I was actually bent over like, and doubled over just listening to myself. I was so embarrassed. I was like, man, I gotta do better than this. That's it, man.

And what is your best piece of overall business advice? So not necessarily industry specific, right?

Right. Yeah. And I feel strongly about this. It's you got to go for the long-term relationships, things that pay off. And like I said, I've been doing Marietta Stories for 2 years. I didn't know any business owners. Now I get people coming up to me, connecting with me. Hey, I heard about your show. Can I take you out to coffee? I mean, can I— I've been going to shows, I've been getting restaurants for free, but it's not It's not about that. It's about connecting with people. One real quick thing. So I started out like many journeys, and I'm sure your podcasting journey is very similar. I started out thinking, I'm going to meet these people, I'm going to sell them business videos, and I'm going to make a lot of money. And I haven't quite abandoned the video stuff, but what I found is I've created relationships, I reconnect with people. And I was just in, there's this place called Poole's Pharmacy. It's a family-owned pharmacy. It's not like a Rite Aid or anything like that. And I went in there the other day. I was just saying, "Hey man, how you doing?" He says, "Great, you know, a bit busy." You know, he goes, "By the way," he said, "Have you ever done voiceover work?" And I said, "No." And he goes, "Well, I have this service where I have to pay every year and these guys do like, once somebody's put on hold," they have to listen through the, hey, Bull's Pharmacy has blah blah blah, and you know, we wrap up, and he said, it cost me a lot of money, would you mind doing it for me? I said no. And so he's like, man, that'd be great. And I didn't even know that's something he needed. Yeah, but I have that kind of relationship with him that he just shared it and I was able to help him out. And I opened up a whole new world to myself through that, uh, just listening and being there for him.

Absolutely, man. Relationships, I think, are everything. So, if you could give your younger self one piece of advice, what would that be?

I know this is probably a Gary Vee quote, but you gotta double down on the things you love. So, I really love podcasting and I did do some videos, but video is so much setup and you have to do so much editing and color matching and all this other kind of stuff. To me, the audio content through podcasting or just interviewing is so— it's very authentic. And if you're a good listener, you really get to hear the way people are and how they're wired. And I kind of— I'm starting to back away from the video as much and kind of doubling down on podcasting. I think that's a great way to You know, just keep honing those skills on things you really love, and that's really what's going to provide value for you in the long term.

Definitely, man. And I don't think video is going to like die by any means, but I do think that audio is— it's already making a run. I think it's about to make a big run because it's just something like— I know for myself, like audiobooks, like I go on long walks every morning and I listen to probably like 2 hours of audiobook every day and I don't watch YouTube that much because I got to watch it and I can't see where I'm going.

Right. Exactly.

And then kind of going down a different path, but in your opinion, what is the key to happiness?

Yeah, and this kind of all works together, but I think you have to be open-minded and curious and vulnerability. The other part of that is I would say is vulnerability is not a weakness. And when you're vulnerable, then other people are vulnerable back and you create these really deep conversations and relationships with people that you wouldn't otherwise because you got to be somebody you're really not, you know. So I kind of own my vulnerability, own myself, my foibles, what I'm not good at. And it's really opened up a lot of cool relationships I wouldn't have had otherwise. And to me, that's what makes you happy is giving to people and Relationships.

And what is the best book that you've read and what was the number one thing you learned from that?

Yeah, Building a StoryBrand. I don't know if you heard of the StoryBrand podcast, but there's a book that kind of outlines the whole thing. But basically businesses are not the heroes in the story. It's the clients are the heroes and you're the guide on their journey. And I'm like, that resonates with me in so many different ways. One, It matches my personality. I just love helping people. But two, I love when other people can be successful. And I look at that guy that's running his own pharmacy. You can imagine all the challenges he has every day. And if I can go in there and make his job just a little bit easier, I'm like, man, that's such a great feeling for me because I don't have the brick and mortar. I don't have employees. I mean, this guy's dealing with a whole bunch and I'm able to help him.

Yeah, man. Oddly enough, I literally just finished that on audio like 3 weeks ago.

Oh, really? Yeah, man.

Very— I like how like they made it so simple in the process of like creating your story script.

Yes. Yeah.

So I think it's a brilliant piece of work, I think. And what is your favorite quote and why?

Yeah, this is from that guy, my coach, Gary O'Malley. He says, do the thing that gets other people excited when you talk about it. And think about it next time you meet somebody, but if they start getting all revved up about something, that's the thing they should be doing the rest of their lives. And I found that for me, and I think you too, with podcasting and just helping folks. And it's been a great run so far.

Absolutely, man. Awesome. Again, thank you for coming on. The last question I have for you before we let you go is where's the best place for for people to find you online?

Yeah, I just started localpodcastnetwork.co. It's a way to kind of duplicate what I've done here in Marietta. Free setup, here's all the equipment I use. And then I'm creating a course to be able to, like I said, replicate what I've been doing here in Marietta and make all these great connections, become part of the fabric of the community. So people check that out, they can find me Send me an email, I'll help you out. I've been doing it for a few weeks now, helped a bunch of people out, so it's been fun.

That's awesome, man. Thanks again for jumping on.

Yeah, man, it was fun. It was— I didn't think we could make it short, but it was fun.

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