03.26.24 - Marketing Accounting Firms w/ Stories

Marketing your accounting practice is one of the things that distinguish you from others. Dave Young from Wizard of Ads, and Accounting Pro, Brandon Morris join us to talk about their approach to and share their experience on this topic.

QB Power Hour is a free, biweekly webinar series for accountants, ProAdvisors, CPAs, bookkeepers and QuickBooks consultants presented by Michelle Long, CPA and Dan DeLong who are very passionate about the industry, QuickBooks and apps that integrate with QuickBooks.

Watch or listen to all of the QB Power Hours at https://www.qbpowerhour.com/blog

Register for upcoming webinars at https://www.qbpowerhour.com/

Episode Transcript

Michelle Long (00:30):
Welcome everybody to another QB power hour.
We've got a great one for youtoday.
Marketing accounting firms withstories.
So we've got some good onescoming up today with some great
guests for you.
So my name is Michelle Long andI am a CPA, owner of Long for
Success trainer for Intuit,author of five books.
You can check them out.
There's the links for, ofcourse, QB Power Hour.

(00:52):
Our Facebook group was a, whichis an awesome interactive group
with a lot of support out therefrom your peers and the LinkedIn
group.
If you're interested, Dan, goahead.

Dan DeLong (01:03):
All right, my name is Dan DeLong, owner at DanWitt,
worked at Intuit for nearly 18years, co hosting today also
over at schoolbookkeeping.
com, running the workshopWednesdays, oddly enough, on
Wednesdays, doing some techediting for the QBO for Dummies
series, as well as pro advisorglitches.

(01:24):
We'll talk a little bit aboutthat, but let's talk let's
introduce our guests.
The D, come on.
Come out of the come out ofhiding Hey, dan,

Dave Young (01:33):
good to see you again.

Dan DeLong (01:35):
Good to be seen.
How are you?

Dave Young (01:38):
I'm good.
Thanks

Dan DeLong (01:40):
All right Tell them tell the folks a little bit
about who dave young is if youhaven't Seen a seen him before
on the power hour

Dave Young (01:46):
I mean i've been on the if you're not watching the
backlog, the back cat catalog Idon't know how long ago that was
it was 2020 wasn't it?
Yeah,

Dan DeLong (01:55):
during COVID.

Dave Young (01:56):
Yeah I'm an advertising and consulting,
advertising and marketingconsultant and I've been doing
that for about 20 years or soalong with my partner, Roy
Williams, whose headquarters ishere in Austin, Texas.
And two and a half years ago, Icame in as vice chancellor of
Wizard Academy.

(02:17):
It's Quasi really same founderRoy Williams founded it.
And I've also founded the wizardof ads group.
We've got about 70 consultantsAnd so I have two roles here one
is a as a consultant and theother is as an administrator and
teacher at wizard Academy, whichis a non profit non traditional

(02:40):
School for advertising andmarketing here in kind of the
edge of the hill country,southwest of Austin we've got a
campus that has housing for 1919 rooms for housing.
Our class only holds 32 peopleand we teach advertising and
marketing classes.
And then 8 years ago, we starteda whiskey marketing school.

(03:01):
I'm in the, I'm in the whiskeyvault, which is the quiet place
to go today.
We actually have, that's not,

Dan DeLong (03:06):
That's not a background.
That's not a background.
What's behind you?

Dave Young (03:09):
No.
And that's just a small piece ofit.
I, this, I'm in this little roomthat's got about 3000 bottles of
whiskey in it.
It was just a quiet place tocome on campus.
We've got just across the way aclass going on.
And so I need, I was going tosneak away to, to be on your
webinar, Dan,

Dan DeLong (03:26):
which is not so it's not that you're there.
You can assume that.

Dave Young (03:31):
No, I have a just for just, I have a glass of
water here.
I will not be but I also have abreathalyzer.
Just in case, and all no, it'sSo go ahead.
You want me to introduceBrandon?
You want to introduce Brandon?

Dan DeLong (03:46):
Yeah, let's let Brandon introduce Brandon.
Because I wanted to have if youhaven't seen any of the prior
webinars that we've had Dave onbefore, I wanted to have I
noticed, from.
From stalking I guess that'sprobably the easiest way to do
that, of the happenings, bothBrandon and and Dave Young are

(04:08):
friends on Facebook and Inoticed they were together.
And it was really interestingabout that.
So I wanted to have Brandon comeon today to talk about, his
experience with with the wizardacademy as well to see that on
the, like the other side ofthings but Brandon, tell us a
little bit about you and yourpractice and firm.

Brandon Morris (04:28):
Yeah.
Thanks.
My name is Brandon and I'm anadvertising and marketing
consumer with Dave and a coupleof His guys and also one of my
favorite places on the earth isthe wizard academy co founder
and CEO of Barron'sincorporated.
Um, super cool to hang out withDan and Michelle, because
they're legends in our space asfar as QuickBooks, but yeah.

(04:51):
What I've learned about Wizardof Ads and Dave is I suck at
marketing and they don't.
And so that's a good place forme to be.

Dan DeLong (05:03):
Here we go.
All right.
So let's go ahead and talk alittle bit about the get some
housekeeping and then we'll diveright in to our our agenda for
today.
So a little bit about the QBPower Hour webinars.
They're every other Tuesday atnoon Eastern.
Not eligible for CPE credit.
You can always check the websitefor upcoming events.
But we're focused on QuickBooksand QuickBooks tips.

(05:26):
But also.
Accounting practices in general,right?
Because as today, technologytoday is turning.
The commoditization ofbookkeeping into automation.
So we want to make sure thatwe're holistically approaching
the accounting practicethemselves.
So today we're going to betalking about marketing, right?

(05:47):
So we've got the PDF of theslides, the recordings,
podcasts, and other resources atqbpowerhour.
com slash resources all in oneplace there for you.
A little bit of the housekeepinghere.
If you have specific questions.
About anything that Brendan,Michelle, myself, or Dave are
talking about today, please putthem in the Q& A because if we
can't answer it live or, bytyping in the answer putting it

(06:11):
in the Q and A allows us to beable to follow up with that
after the webinar is over, ifyou just have general comments
or chat based things just youcan feel free to put them in the
chat as well.
And then we also have the slidesin the handout, which I should
have left in the in the chat sothat people can access that as

(06:32):
well.
So new for 2024 is we are we'retrying out this simulcasting
where we are not just doing thisin the zoom webinar series as
well.
But also on Facebook, YouTube,LinkedIn, which is no need to
register to be able to see thatsimulcast.

(06:54):
However, because we are puttingthis in the QB Power user group,
that's a private group.
And if you were to If you wereto comment on the in the
Facebook group, it ends upshowing up as Facebook user.
So there's a QR code there togrant the the streaming

(07:14):
platform.
Access to your profile so thatwe can see your name when you
actually say something.
Otherwise we'll it's far toomany places to see where, who
said what, where though.
If you want to be a part of theconversation please just grant
access to the streamingplatform.
We're also we launched the storeand and we got our first order,

(07:36):
which is awesome.
We are putting power relatedthings in the store for a little
swag things like phone chargersand coffee mugs, because that's
how you recharge Dave wouldwould say whiskey might be a way
to to recharge as well.
Maybe we should make some TV andpower hour shot glasses or
snifters.
But there's a way to accessstore there as well.

(07:59):
And Michelle and I, and Brandon,are you on the top 100 voting
list this year?
I

Brandon Morris (08:04):
am not.

Dan DeLong (08:05):
Oh my goodness.
We should

Brandon Morris (08:07):
be.
We've got several people thatare within in our accounting
success group that, that are.
And so yeah, that's, we're stillhappy to have those
acquaintances and people thatsell and consult with QuickBooks
through our program that are inthat channel.

Dan DeLong (08:23):
But voting is open I think until the end of the month
for the top 100.
So please if you feel free to,You can vote up to three
different people.
Definitely give that anopportunity there.
So our our agenda today is we'regoing to talk a little bit about
with Dave and Brendan aboutbookkeeping being a grudge
purchase which kind of changesthings as far as the type of

(08:45):
industry and the way maybe thebest way to, to, to market and
advertise that type of product.
And then we'll recap some of thethings that we had talked about
with Dave before about creatinga character and how to tell a
story and really just having adiscussion about the process of
doing so.
And getting Brandon's take onhis experience with working with

(09:08):
the wizards there at theAcademy.
So let's first start off with apoll because.
As Dave was mentioning, we loveour polls here at the
QPPowerHour, but now I need tofind out where it is.
Okay, there we go.
And we'll launch that first oneabout how do you currently
market your practice?

(09:29):
And Dave, if you want to talk alittle bit about, How we met and
those types of things willstart.
We'll start with that story.

Dave Young (09:40):
Yeah.
I'm trying to think like it was,but what year it was 2017, 18.
When I, you were in a BNI groupthat I joined.
And so yeah, a word of mouth andreferrals networking groups,
those kinds of things.
I joined the BNI group One ofour partners in Australia was a
member of B and I group, and herecommended it.
And in fact, he was myreference.

(10:00):
The president of our group hadto call Australia to find out
anything.
Oh, and Craig Arthur is he's 1of the guys that's working with
Brandon as well.
Brandon knows him.
But it's it's a great way ofjust getting the word out in a
small group of here.
Here's who I am.
And here's what I do.
I'm not sure where else youwanted me to go with that, Dan,

(10:21):
but

Dan DeLong (10:22):
It was great to meet with, to make that connection
with you in the B and I group.
And, we ended up.
Becoming friends because of thatmeeting.
And we would hike, the localHill Tumamoc Hill in Tucson.
And just, in, in one of those,one of my favorite stories about
Dave is how he saved my house,when we were, debating this

(10:44):
whole or trying to do thisselling of our home and moving
into a, an RV nomadic lifestyleDave came through at at a pinch
when we really needed him whichis Moving of heavy furniture.

Dave Young (10:57):
Yeah, don't expect a marketing story.
I didn't sell Dan's house.
I'm just the kind of guy, thekind of friend that will show up
if you say, hey, we're loadingthe truck tomorrow.
Can you be there?

Michelle Long (11:08):
That is a true friend because that's when most
people are like, oh, sorry, myback hurts.
So I got to do this.
I got to

Dan DeLong (11:15):
do

Michelle Long (11:16):
that.
I'm going

Dave Young (11:16):
to Starbucks tomorrow.

Michelle Long (11:21):
Here are three today at 1045

Dan DeLong (11:23):
a.

Michelle Long (11:24):
m.

Dan DeLong (11:24):
I didn't do it.

Brandon Morris (11:27):
I did.

Dan DeLong (11:28):
Was that Alexa or Siri?

Brandon Morris (11:31):
No, that was Google.

Dan DeLong (11:33):
That was Google.
Okay.
Fantastic.
So we do have some priorwebinars with Dave about telling
your story and some personas andcopywriting.
So if you want to get a littlebit more Deeper dive into some
of the things that Dave hastalked about with us in the
past.
You're welcome to do that.
Now, do you want me to stopsharing so you can pick it up

(11:54):
from here, Dave?
Or do you want me to justcontinue?

Dave Young (11:57):
So if I advanced, I don't know what's going to
happen if I'm let's just counton you doing this.
Okay, I'll watch it.
And I'll just be surprised.
Whatever slide comes up next.
We'll treat it as just a big,happy accident.
Okay.
The Bob when we last talked, wewere talking about, and more
specifically like thinking ofyour company as a character in

(12:19):
one regard and thinking of yourcustomers as personas or
characters in another, and it'sreally interesting how How story
has continued story and contenthave continued to really play a
very important role inmarketing, even as we see the
rise of a I and the peoplefigured out that the advanced

(12:44):
targeting that they thoughtworks so well, doesn't work so
well anymore.
But there are some cool waysaround it.
You mentioned earlier thatbookkeeping is a grudge
purchase.
And by that, nobody wakes up inthe morning and says, Oh, I need
some good bookkeeping today.
I'm going to go out and findmyself a bookkeeper and get all
my receipts organized.
And I, this is going to just,I'm going to love it.

(13:06):
No, we go.
Oh, gosh, this has grown to thepoint where.
I think I better find one.
So it's a purchase that'ssimilar to having to need a
plumber.
I need a plumber at my houseright now because something's
leaking in my front yard nearall the valves and shutoffs.
And there's like a little swampyarea of about two square feet.

(13:27):
I don't know what to do aboutthat.
I didn't wake up this morningand want to call a plumber.
I woke up this morning and now Ineed a plumber.
So who do I call?
If I don't know a plumber, I goto Google, right?
Or I call somebody that mightknow a plumber in my
neighborhood or I go to aFacebook place.
And that's where you by makingyourself known in an area, you.

(13:51):
You create some opportunitiesfor referrals and that kind of
thing.
But the only thing I really meanby a grudge purchase is that
it's just triggered externally.
So the triggers are usuallythings like I mentioned, right?
I I gotta get caught up.
Yeah, go ahead.
Lay these bullets on us, Dan.
Boom boom.
These are, in fact, I thinkthese are bullets from the last

(14:13):
one.
And, yeah.
These are all things like theseare probably the triggers that
your customers experience whenthey start looking for somebody
to either buy QuickBooks from orto do their bookkeeping or their
accounting, right?
They they've got to get reportsfiled.
They've got to, these are

Dan DeLong (14:31):
the leaky faucet of bookkeeping.

Dave Young (14:34):
Yeah, exactly.
And so whatever you're doing inmarketing address these things.
And I'm going to talk abouttargeting through copy a little
later on but keep these thingsin mind because these are the
kinds of questions now that youcan put at the top of an ad in
Facebook or in a video inYouTube and say, Hey, are you

(14:55):
trying to get organized for abank loan?
And that's targeting by It'stargeting by inclusive
copywriting.
So the challenge has alwaysbeen, how do I target people
that are trying to get ready fora bank loan?
Can you buy that group onFacebook?
I don't think Facebook knowswho's trying to get ready for a
bank loan.
Or

Dan DeLong (15:16):
they do, and they're just not telling you.

Dave Young (15:18):
They're not letting you, they're not letting you
make that a choice in yourtargeting.
And they may know because theremay be other people that are
running ads like this.
But if you just buy a broadlybased demographic and you put in
your copy, an opening questionare you trying to get ready for
a bank loan?
Do you need your financesorganized for a bank loan?

(15:39):
And you show that to a broadrange of people, the people that
are getting ready for a bankloan will read that message and
self select and target.
And that's it's actually a wayyou can train an AI, believe it
or not, is by writing.
If you've been asking questionsand identifying information in
your headlines of your ads, andyou're now training the AI.

(16:03):
Oh, these are the kinds ofpeople that I'm looking for.
And yes, Facebook, Google, theymay actually know that you're
getting ready for a bank loan,but they're not going to let
people target that way, but theywill show you ads if they know,
right?
Because their goal is to get youto click on an ad, and so if
they know that you're not caughtup for your taxes, they will

(16:23):
they may not specifically knowthat, but, uh, they, who knows
what they know?
They listen to us all the time.
So I'm sure just the fact thatwe're talking about getting
caught up for taxes we'reprobably going to see some of
that in our own Facebook andsocial media feeds.

Dan DeLong (16:40):
So you mentioned AI and we've been talking about how
AI is affecting the accountingindustry.
Sure.
How is AI affecting themarketing industry, which I'm
sure that is, part of the, someof the challenges where, maybe
you have some obstacles, whenyou're talking to I can just ask
chat GPT to write me some copy.

(17:00):
Can you talk a little bit abouthow AI is is changing.

Dave Young (17:03):
I've got lots of colleagues and friends that have
gotten neck deep in AI and Ihaven't dabbled in it a whole
lot yet.
And I say that just in that I'mI'm keeping an eye on it and I
still haven't I haven't seen anad that I feel is a better

(17:25):
written ad than what a humancopywriter can do, because we're
talking about artificialintelligence versus real
intelligence.
An AI can get you part of theway there.
I don't we talked about thisearlier.
I'm not going to talk aboutQuickBooks because I don't know
anything about QuickBooks, butI'm guessing what you're saying
is now I can just hand an AI allmy receipts and very similar

Dan DeLong (17:49):
to what you just said, and we had and Michelle
had discussed it like AI is likean intern, right?
If you treat AI like an intern,For rough drafts and those types
of things, they can do a lot ofthe legwork that, that an intern
might do.
As far as the final draft thatit really needs some human eyes
and especially some, someonethat has some experience with

(18:11):
these sorts of things to, tomake sure that it is exactly the
same way.
Can you tell us the story aboutwhat you were just talking about
with the, where Do a do an adcopy.

Dave Young (18:24):
It was more of a fun way to write a radio ad.
Because this was about a yearago.
And, it was a I was bubbling upis this big hot topic.
And so actually found an AI thatwas informed by stupid writings.
Like it was, I think, I don'teven think the AI is around any
longer, but it was called toodumb to destroy or something

(18:46):
like that.
So it was like informed by MontyPython and Dr.
Seuss and, National Lampoon kindof thing.
So it wrote a thing that wasclever and it was about 15, 20
seconds I incorporated it into aradio ad, but made fun of the
fact that we asked in the AI.
to write it.
I wouldn't turn creative controlof anybody's ad campaign over to

(19:09):
AI just yet.
There are probably a little tooliteral.

Dan DeLong (19:14):
It's a little too literal to to really Michelle,
you were talking about AIgenerated images and some of the
funny things that you hadexperienced with with that.
But before we get into that,into another option, where we're
talking about AI and marketing,let's talk about some of these
things that, Really accountantsand bookkeepers can stop doing,

(19:36):
rather than trying to figure outwhat is the, what is it that we
can do?
Talk about some of these thesethings here, Dave.

Dave Young (19:42):
Yeah we talked about this last time too, unique
selling propositions.
When you read advertising books,maybe you took a marketing or an
advertising class in college andeverybody talks about What's a
unique selling proposition?
This is what my company doesthat nobody else could possibly
do.
And honestly, that doesn'texist, right?

(20:03):
There's nothing that you can dothat other people can't do that
you could brag about in youradvertising.
Because the especially in theaccounting world, right?
It's pretty cut and dried.
You're either doing it right oryou're not doing it.

Dan DeLong (20:20):
Yeah.

Dave Young (20:20):
And we reconcile accounts.

Dan DeLong (20:22):
4.
5 seconds faster than the otherguy.

Dave Young (20:25):
Yeah.
Now you've got time to take onemore sip of coffee.
But we had a student.
We actually had this came from astudent last week at our magical
worlds class and we were talkingabout.
Yeah.
You need selling propositionsand people, let's say it's a
food ad and they say we only usethe best ingredients.
And the question is, whywouldn't you do that?

(20:49):
So if you have a unique sellingproposition and it can just be
torn down by somebody saying ofcourse you do that.
Why wouldn't you?

Dan DeLong (20:58):
There are the I think the other example.
The other example is, yourthere's a guy in Tucson that
would be like your I can'tremember what he said, but your
satisfaction is our prioritylike that.
Yeah, Would that not mean Iwould I would hope so any
business.

Dave Young (21:13):
Yeah, I would hope so right?
Sure I'm all for that.
And I so I guess what i'm sayingis where we're leading with this
is What you have in yourbusiness?
That's unique Is you right andthat's that's actually what
we've been working on withbrandon the most is how do we

(21:36):
incorporate the uniqueness thatis brandon, right?
And we love brandon and he isHe's so unique there's a lot of
things You probably don't knowabout brandon and things that
he's done in the past and thingsthat he does now And those are
things that are pretty unique,right?
So you make somebody interestingthrough the stories that you

(21:57):
tell And then when they needwhat you sell they remember.
Oh, yeah that that guy fromalabama that scuba dives It used
to be EMT, that guy.
Bearded guy.
Yeah, that dude with the beard.
I saw him somewhere.
Yeah, and it's not so muchgrowing a list and marketing to

(22:18):
it or being unique, it's beingmemorable.
And we're not doing, at thispoint, we're not doing mass
media for Brandon, but if youBrandon and you're in business
in Mobile Alabama.
LA as he likes to call it, lowerAlabama.
Um, you think of, Oh, that'sthat guy.

(22:40):
Yeah, I know him.
He's a cool guy.
He does QuickBooks too.
He, Oh, he can put togetherinventory management for me.
Oh, I never, I would never wouldhave guessed that.
So you connect something that'sactually true about your
business with something that's,um, surprising and it makes you
memorable.
For the most part, the work wedo with our clients is is to

(23:02):
make them famous in their town.
We work with a lot of localbusinesses.
Now, Brandon's trying to reach abroader audience with some of
the services that he doesfranchise operations, for
example.
And that's, all of thefranchise.
Franchisors, the guys that own,the company that franchises
businesses, they're not all inmobile.
So we have to reach out a littlebit further.

(23:24):
But you target you target bywhat you say, not not
necessarily by the kind oftargeting that we've been able
to do with Facebook and LinkedInand things in the past.
You can still do a little bitmore of it with LinkedIn when
you're talking about business tobusiness, but really, you want
to be memorable.
Yeah.
The heating and air conditioningcompany that I talked about, um,
we're doing ads that like they,they have a really unfortunate

(23:46):
name.
Their name is B.
W.
S.
plumbing, heating and air B.
W.
S.
And they thought about changingit when we first started working
with them, because it's not aneasy name to remember.
But they decided they didn'twant to do that.
And that gives you creativehandcuffs to work with.
So the ads all tell the story ofBWS, but we talk about how these

(24:07):
three little letters are easy toremember because obviously B is
for plumbing, W is for heating,and S is for air conditioning.
And we have this sort of Quirky,weird spokesman that is doing
all these absurd things all thetime, but at the end of the day,
it's It comes down toremembering these three little

(24:28):
letters now kids go grab asharpie and write these three
letters on daddy's hot waterheater right And so when the hot
water heater breaks, there theyare.
And we're very transparent aboutthat in the ads, right?
It's tongue in cheek.
And yeah, we think it's a goodidea for kids to do that.
Maybe mom and dad don't, but ifthey do, that's a wish, but at

(24:49):
the end of the day, it's famousin their market.

Dan DeLong (24:53):
And Brandon, what is your, tell us about your journey
with working with the wizardAcademy and some of the courses
that you've taken and yourexperiences there.
What that's been like.

Brandon Morris (25:05):
Sure.
So we started out with adiscovery call much like most
salespeople, right?
I think the most interestingthing was we've been working
with Dave and Craig and Johnnyfor a while.
And we would go through and say,Hey, what do you do?
I don't know.
I do QuickBooks and we, we doinventory and we do all the

(25:27):
things that QuickBooks does.
We've done, we've been doingthis thing for 20 years.
But that's the rollercoaster.
That's been the this process isnobody really cares about what
we do and all the things nobodywants to talk about accounting.
And nobody wants to talk aboutbookkeeping or QuickBooks or
third party apps until they havea need.

(25:51):
So it's the journey that I'vebeen on with Dave is realizing
that.
Yeah, we can talk about all thestuff and when they have a need,
they're interested.
They've got two or threequestions.
That's it.
They don't want to learn.
They don't want to know anymore.
Even if it's relevant.
They just want to know that Iknow what we're doing.
But the only thing that theyreally care about is they know

(26:14):
me, they like me and they trustme.
Yeah, I know how to doQuickBooks stuff and we're
probably going to talk aboutsomething else.
Maybe this scuba diving or thearmy stuff or EMS stuff or all
the other things that we'vedone.
It's just not being don't talkto them about crap they don't
care about.
And most of it is accounting andbookkeeping and all that.

(26:36):
So figuring out how to work yourstories in and be likable and
approachable and yeah, not notboring and not mundane and not
the stereotypical accountants.
You need, and if you can't getaway from that, you need to have
somebody else doing it for youthat can be more interesting
than you.

Dave Young (26:57):
So even when Brandon's going to the, we were
talking about what's the bigevent coming up that I'm not
invited to?
I told you were scaling.
Scaling new heights.
Scaling

Michelle Long (27:06):
new heights, David, when you are invited,
we'd love to have

Dave Young (27:09):
you.
Scaling what?

Michelle Long (27:11):
Scaling new heights.
Scaling new heights.

Dave Young (27:14):
Scaling new heights, and this is QuickBook training.
Okay.

Michelle Long (27:17):
It's a conference.
Yes,

Dave Young (27:19):
but it's in Orlando.

Michelle Long (27:21):
It's in Orlando for a Disney World.
I'm

Dave Young (27:24):
down for that.
I'm

Michelle Long (27:25):
Orlando.
Yes, we can.
We'd love to have you come

Brandon Morris (27:33):
Dave.
I may have a ticket for you.
Let me check.
Sweet.

Michelle Long (27:38):
Accountants can party.
You'd be surprised.

Dave Young (27:41):
Oh, I'm looking forward to it.
I'm in the whiskey vault.
I'll come do in fact, I'm a, I'ma.
Let's bring some samples.

Michelle Long (27:47):
There are some pretty wild parties.

Dave Young (27:50):
Since we're on this, do you mind a little, this is
the ridiculous medallion you getwhen sommelier school.

Michelle Long (27:58):
Oh my, wow!

Dave Young (28:00):
Grass, it weighs about a pound, and so I mean if
you want, come to Orlando, we'lldo a whiskey tasting.
Oh

Michelle Long (28:08):
my!

Dave Young (28:09):
I'll bring my medallion because it unlocks it
unlocks better olfactory sensesand taste.
That's some magical powers.
It's basically magic.
Yeah.
But you when you talk aboutthings like that, um, Now, some
of you that are on this callwill go, Oh that's the guy that
was in that whiskey room on thatcall.

(28:30):
Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
He had that big, stupidmedallion and that's crazy.
Oh, but he knows aboutmarketing.
Yeah maybe we ought to call him.
When Brandon shows up at achamber of commerce meeting in
mobile and he looks like all theother three piece suit dudes And
businessmen and women at theChamber of Commerce meeting, he
doesn't stand out and you don'tgo, Oh, I wonder what his story

(28:53):
is, but if he shows up as hisauthentic self and has scuba
diving conversations with peopleand talks about his experiences
training his service dog and allthese, this myriad of things
that he's interested in.
And the fact that he just looksinteresting people tie those two

(29:14):
things together, right?
And they, when they finally doneed what Brandon does, or they
come across somebody that does,it's like so you meet a CEO on
an airplane and he's frustratedabout not having software in
place that all his franchiseescan use so that he gets uniform
reports across the entireorganization.

(29:34):
And you met this guy at thischamber meeting and you go, Oh
man, I know a guy.
He's you're not gonna believethis about him, but he knows
exactly how to solve thatproblem.
And so he becomes the rememberPulp Fiction in the scene where
they have that guy killed in theback of the car and they call
Winston Wolf.
And he's a fixer, right?

(29:56):
And he's there in 10 minutesspeeding down the streets and he
tells them exactly how to solvethis problem that they have.
And so you can use a metaphorlike that to for your own
marketing for the stories thatyou tell.
And that's where we're headedhere.
Um, in terms of using character.

Michelle Long (30:14):
Can I just add on to that?
And that is the best thing too,is that word of mouth
recommendation.
But the one thing that so manypeople fail to do is when that
CEO would call Brandon and say,Hey, so and so recommended you.
Or whatever, Brandon has tofollow up on that lead and so

(30:38):
many people don't follow up,because that is a warm, hot
lead.
And that is the best thing thatyou've got there.
But so many people won't followup on that and follow through
when you get that hot lead.
So that is critical because youget that, you've got to follow
through on that lead.

(30:58):
That's

Dave Young (30:58):
fantastic because we know this from a lot of the home
service companies that we workwith.
A lot of them have the text usto contact like you need your
air conditioner fixed.
You can go online and they havethe little text box, text them
and they'll get a response andclose rates fall off

(31:19):
precipitously after 20 seconds.
If you don't respond to themwithin 20 seconds.
You're way less likely to landthem as a customer, right?
Yeah, no, no pressure, butMichelle, you're dead on.
Absolutely right.
You, if you have a lead and youdon't just call them right back

(31:42):
the odds are dwindling furtherand further that they've called
the next person that they couldthink of because.
That I couldn't get ahold ofyou, so I called the guy across
the street.

Michelle Long (31:53):
Even on the referrals from the Find a
ProAdvisor website, which issomething that Intuit does for
us, to send referrals toProAdvisors, there's so many
people that report that whenthey try to contact someone from
the Find a ProAdvisor website,that they don't get a response.

Dan DeLong (32:10):
Yeah.

Michelle Long (32:10):
People are getting an email, and then they
don't get any response.
Yeah.
Follow up when you do like acontact, figure out how

Dave Young (32:18):
to put the emails from that site on some kind of
alarm bell that goes off in yourhouse or in your office.

Michelle Long (32:24):
Even if it's not right for you, let's say
somebody contacts me and say,Hey, so and recommended you, can
you help me with the taxes?
And I don't do taxes.
I still follow up and say, no,that's not the type of work I
do, but I'm going to refer youon to so and so still follow up
with them.
Because you don't want theperson that made that referral

(32:45):
to stop giving you referrals andthen follow up with the person
that made the referral.
Thank you for the referral.
It wasn't right for me because Idon't do task work because then
you're also telling them what'sthe right client for you, you've
got to keep that working foryou.

Dave Young (33:01):
That's exactly right.
And if you need to call like yousaid, it's not enough to just
say, Hey, maybe you should talkto Dan.
Cause I think he does taxes.
It's better to get them on thephone and say, look, I don't do
taxes, but what kind of taxesare we talking about?
Or are we talking about personalincome tax?
Are we talking about for profit?
Are we talking about a realestate partnership?

(33:21):
Are we talking to these are all,Really special specialized types
of taxes, right?
You want to make sure you sendthem the right person and then
that's what really cements yourrelationship to the person that
you're actually sending a leadto because it's a good lead it's
really strong because it fitsthem perfectly.
So you've gotten to know that sothis sort of lands this whole

(33:42):
thing about Quick response toleads this first bullet focus
improvements on things thatmatter to your customers.
And we just told you whatmatters to your customers.
And that is prompt response.
So your business improvements.
If don't go out and spend moneyon marketing.
If you don't have a system inplace to respond to the leads

(34:03):
that you're going to get fromgood marketing.
You better have a way to makesure that you call people or
respond to them in 20 seconds.
And that's where you shouldfocus improvements in your
business.
Story based ads.
We've talked a little bit aboutthat.
Um, and study how to brandunsexy externally triggered

(34:25):
businesses.
Honestly, I'll come to what's itcalled?
Arise what is it?
Dailing new heights.
Scaling new heights.
The best thing that would happenif I came to it, I would get
ideas that I could use with myplumbing and heating and air
conditioning companies.
So one of the things I alwaystell people is study other

(34:46):
businesses, study other businessmodels that have similar
characteristics to yours.
We're a grudge purchase.
Nobody calls us until theyreally need us.
And we fix, problems that arepopping up just like an air
conditioner that's broken in thesummer.
Study like honestly, find one ofyour favorite clients and you
want more people like that.

(35:07):
Find out what convention thatperson's going to and go with
them to that convention, andyou'll probably find ways to
market to them.
Your QuickBooks or youraccounting business by attending
somebody else's industry's eventthat has similar problem
topology to yours.
We call it

Dan DeLong (35:24):
What is the heating and air conditioning conference
for accountant to go to?

Dave Young (35:30):
Gosh I don't, and there's a bunch of'em.
I'd probably focus on one of theones that are run by there,
there's organizations that dolike mastermind.
Groups with them, honestly, theywouldn't be hard to find.
Call

Dan DeLong (35:45):
and tell them, what is this all about?

Dave Young (35:49):
Oh, this was this.
This slide was I appreciate youfinding the old slides, Dan,
because I didn't have to makenew ones.
There you go.
This is a little peek at what wedo when we do a thing called
uncovery and Brandon wentthrough some of this, but we
typically like to becauseBrandon became a client in the
tail end of the pandemic.
We, we did a lot of this here inAustin but these are just some

(36:13):
of the things that, We gothrough to help us understand
who a client is so that we knowwhat we can do in the
advertising and what we're notagain.
Remember, we're not looking forunique selling proposition, but
we are looking for what makesthis client unique, not what
makes his QuickBooks business orhis, you know, it's what makes

(36:36):
him unique.
So things like a North star Oh,man, here on the Wizard Academy
campus, we get really gosh, I'llscare some people away.
We get a little woo over thingslike North Stars.
And if you know what the NorthStar is and how it works it's a
star that sits right above thepole of the Earth.
The Earth spins on its axis, andthere's a star called Polaris

(36:58):
that hovers right over the NorthPole and doesn't move.
So it doesn't move in the sky.
And that's what allowednavigators to get across the
ocean was they had a fixed pointof reference.
And if you're out in the middleof a lake or an ocean and you
can't see land having a fixedpoint of reference changes
everything right now.

(37:20):
All of a sudden, if you know howto measure that, you can figure
out your exact position.
And so a north star is in yourbusiness.
What do you believe?
What's your vision?
How important is it to you?
All these things.
So we're looking for somebody'sNorth Star.
We're looking for their originstory.
How did they get into thisbusiness?

(37:40):
Those are usually pretty uniquethings.
Sometimes it's just nepotism.
Sometimes it's partnering.
It may not be nepotism.
In Brandon's case, you work withyour mom, but I don't think that
was nepotism, right?
That was you guys setting out tobuild this thing together,
right?
You're way more partners thanyou are.

(38:02):
Second generation in a business,but you run into a lot of a lot
of businesses where it's a nextgeneration that's stepped in.
The reason B.
W.
S.
plumbing, heating and air didn'twant to change their name is
because those are the initialsof the founder.
And so he's not really runningthe show anymore.
His son is, but his name isKevin, and it doesn't make much
sense to say, you don't want tochange the name to KW.

(38:23):
So figuring out that originstory and seeing if that makes a
difference.
When we do this uncoveryinterview, what we're looking
for are what we call unleveragedassets.
So origin stories can really beunleveraged assets.
We've uncovered great storiesfrom people that make really
good ads.
We I've got a podiatrist clientin Milwaukee who we have a great

(38:46):
origin story from him because hehad some problems with his feet.
And when he was in high schoolplaying basketball, it was
another podiatrist that reallygot him turned around and got
his feet working right again inhis ankle.
And it got him interested inthat profession.
And that makes a cool story.
Um, the sword in the stone, likein your business, what will you

(39:07):
always do?
What will you never do?
What do you stand against?
And those are the kinds ofthings that make really
interesting talking points,especially if you're networking,
right?
Oh, we would never do that.
You might hear about somebodyelse that does something that.
Feels a little shady and you'dsay no that's never going to
happen with us.
So that's really uncovering isus doing a deep dive into the

(39:29):
business owners world andfiguring out what makes them
tick and figuring out if thereare some things in what makes
them tick that we can use as westart to put together stories
and messages for them.
All right, so some interestingcharacters we have.
Some brand characters.
There are some great storieswith all of these.

(39:50):
We don't have time to, to tellall the stories, but a really
strong brand has this thing thatthat you can look at and say, oh
that's the brand.
Yeah.
And if you know what the brandstands for and you've been
exposed to it long enough, youcan know a brand by its codes.
Like if you look at these,there's a few of them that don't

(40:11):
have any kind of logo at all.
But do we need a logo to knowwho Tony the tiger is or Mr.
Clean, right?
We can just look at that and go,Oh that, that's Mr.
Clean.
And in fact, we might see a guythat looks like that at an
airport and say, he looks likeMr.
Clean.
So the brand has become soubiquitous that that you can get
away with just using what wecall brand codes the things that

(40:33):
signal to people that it's abrand.
You don't see Ronald McDonald awhole lot anymore, but what you
do see are you might just see anad, you might see a billboard
that's just got the McDonald'scolors and a picture of French
fry.
You might hear a McDonald's ad.
Or see one on a YouTube pre rolland all you hear is ba, right?

(40:55):
That's all you hear.
They don't even say the name.
Because all they have to, we'veheard it so long, all of us,
from probably before we wereborn, that we don't need to hear
the words anymore.
We just need to be reminded baand I'm hungry.
Or you want to you can smelllike the man that's in this ad,

(41:20):
right?
Those kinds of things.
So you start identifying thoseand then that becomes a part of
your campaign.
And your campaign, even innetworking, right?
You be, it becomes the thingsthat you always do that you've
become known for.
And there were always a fewpeople, Dan in our B and I group
that, You knew we're going to doa thing, right?

(41:44):
They were going to stand up anddo a thing that they became
pretty well known for.
I think of the, there's ajewelry guy in BNI and in Tucson
that always showed up at otherBNI meetings with a rack of
jewelry.
It's Oh, Hey, jewelry guys here.
And he had a story to tell, buthe also had product to sell.
There was a carpet cleaning guythat one of the most amazing 45

(42:06):
second B and I demonstrationsI've ever seen in his little
thing.
He gets to talk for 45 seconds,right?
He stepped out to the center ofthe room and sprayed his carpet
cleaning stuff on this coffeestain that had been in that
hotel conference room for yearsand clean in five seconds.
Dang, that was pretty powerful.
But he came, he became that guy.
Figuring out What's unique aboutyour brand is it falls back to

(42:30):
the stories that we were talkingabout with Brandon on the next

Dan DeLong (42:33):
and with Brandon.
And with how is that?
How has that story evolved withyou and your journey with with
the Wizard of Bath?

Brandon Morris (42:41):
We had a conversation yesterday with Dave
and Craig and all of them, andcreating that outline of all the
things that you do I waschallenged by the last slide
that, all these are nationalcampaigns, big budget
advertising, and, but what aboutall of us that are doing, say,
QuickBooks or accounting orbookkeeping, We don't have those

(43:04):
kinds of budgets, but whatresonates with me is going
through that that exercise.
And I'm, I think Dave is gonnagive you the slide that you can
actually go do this, but it'sgoing through all the things
that you do and answering thosequestions.
So if you're going to do a blogor a podcast or an interview,

(43:25):
however, you're going to do it,it's.
Not just what you do, becausewe're gonna, we're gonna do
that.
We're gonna talk about what wedo, but nobody cares.
So we, we do that, but we alsowe truncate it.
We make it five minutes aboutwhat we do, and if we could
throw a story in there about,and what makes us interesting,

(43:45):
or what something, a, we'll saya success story, or maybe it's
just some little thing here andthere that sets you apart from
everybody else.
That's That resonates withpeople.
They want to hear a successstory or a case study or
something interesting about youand just know that you can,
yeah, you can do inventory ormanufacturing or lot tracking or

(44:08):
serial numbers, serialization orwhatever it is.
Okay, he can do that, but hey,he's a pretty cool guy, right?
Um, Dave's daughter's aglassblower but he's really good
at marketing too.
There, there's a, it's notabout, it's not about you.
And that's what I've learned.
It's not about me or what we cando or what we've got that the
tools to make happen until youneed it.

(44:30):
Then as long as they know thatwe can do it, then it's just
about making a friend, makingacquaintance or yeah, just
having somebody that you canwhat I usually do is my
customers, I ended up buyingfrom them because I know now
what they do and I like them.
So we've established trust in arelationship.
By marketing myself, I'veusually marketed them to, and I

(44:52):
ended up going to them forservices that I need later on.
But it's just about beingrelatable and likable and just
letting them know what what itis we do.

Dan DeLong (45:02):
So do you find that, do you find that stories that
you need that, that are besttold in the accounting space are
examples Of those types ofthings or is it more of stories
about you and your company thathelped?
make them memorable.

Brandon Morris (45:21):
I think it's a combination.
Stories about if somebody askedme about inventory or about,
Hey, can you do this?
Yeah.
And here's the case or I don'teven call it a case study, but
we did this once for certaincompany out of somewhere.
And this was the this was thetakeaway that it really worked

(45:41):
and they love me now.
And I wanted to change herprocesses and I made her feel
like an idiot.
Look, I'm not an accountant.
She had a degree in accounting,so it was a fun story.
I think I told Dave that, but itwasn't what the guy wanted.
The CEO that's now running thecompany, it's his stepmother
that was that was theaccountant.
So he told me what he wanted todo.

(46:02):
I went to her and said,

Dan DeLong (46:04):
all right,

Brandon Morris (46:04):
so your accounting is fine.
Obviously you've been doing itfor years.
But in order to get the resultsthat he wants, we've got to be,
we've got to change the waywe're doing estimates and so we
can get the reporting right sothat he can get what he wants
and compare the actuals versusthe estimates and change the way
that they're scoping the jobs.
But the funny story is shecussed me out.

(46:25):
I got a 10 minute lashing thatsaid that I made her feel stupid
and she's not and yada.
So at the, in the end, she lovesme.
We say we address some thingsthey weren't doing and save them
a ton of time and got exactlywhat they wanted.
So when we tell that story, itsays,

Dan DeLong (46:42):
Oh,

Brandon Morris (46:42):
that's cool.
Yeah probably benefit.
And then we start talking aboutother stuff that's completely
irrelevant, but it also sealsthat relationship between us.

Dan DeLong (46:55):
So let's talk a little bit about characters.
And yeah, I think

Dave Young (47:00):
Daniel will quickly go through that.
We talked in depth about thislast time.
But what I want to get to arethe if you think about yourself
and I'm going to give you, I'mgoing to give you a super simple
shortcut to finding whatcharacter.
Would you depict of yourselfright?
And maybe you need somebody tohelp with this.
But if you go to the website tvtropes, I think it's tv tropes

(47:22):
dot org.
Yeah.
A tv trope is they're just thisstereotypical sort of character
that we've seen a million timeson TV, right?
All different kinds of them.
And you don't have to bring thisup.
Just make a note of it.
And we'll talk about these fourexamples.
So with this slide that we'relooking at, a lost wallet lies
on a Manhattan street stuffedwith cash, a white middle income

(47:43):
male New Yorker between 30 and44 picks it up.
Will he look for the rightfulowner or will he pocket the
cash?
And it depends on who that 30 to44 year old person is, right?
Because we don't have enoughinformation.
If it's George Costanza, We knowwhat he's going to do, right?
So he's think of him as a trope.

(48:05):
We know exactly what a GeorgeCostanza would do.
And if I'm not saying, Dan, youshould think of yourself as
George Costanza, but if you werelike George Costanza, and he was
the one you identified withthese next four slides of your
profile from a while back.
Are written in the style, right?
So if you were George, the IRSwas angry that day.

(48:26):
My friend, one phone call,that's all they gave my client,
right?
That's a George kind of thing tosay.
And the law and order SVU if shewere to write an opening line to
a profile, some things you canput them behind you, but they do
change you.
Let's get caught up.
So very relational type ofthing.
The good wife.
Man we're talking about loyaltyhere, right?

(48:47):
Friends come and go.
My clients stick around.
We're loyal that way.
And what was the last one?
Ah the what was his, the spider?
What was his name?
And Game of Thrones.
I can hear the numberswhispering.
True power comes when you masteryour numbers.
So if you're writing just getsbetter, if you can put yourself

(49:08):
into the mindset of someone thatyou can relate to, here's Snape
and what did we put?
I make it my job to protect you.
You'll find safety and tidybooks and sleep all the better
for it.
Those are four or fivedramatically different
statements.
Bookkeepers are time travelers.
How far back was me go?

Dan DeLong (49:26):
I can see Michelle.
Like these are awesome.

Michelle Long (49:28):
I love it.
These are so creative and Icouldn't come up with these
myself, but I could use AI tocome up with these.

Dave Young (49:35):
No, so I, even better than AI, think about what
characters.
I don't even know what this was.
This is a cosplay thing.
So think of yourself as acosplayer and think of who do
you relate to that?
That's who's your hero on filmor in TV, right?
And in this case, video gameswho's your hero and try to put

(49:55):
yourself in that mind set as youwrite.
As you write, and it will changethe words that you use.
Um, I haven't even told Brandonthis.
If I had to pick a TV trope forBrandon.
There's one on TV tropes dot comcalled Southern fried genius.

(50:20):
All right, Southern friedgenius.
And we've all met these people,

Dan DeLong (50:25):
right?

Dave Young (50:25):
You might like I'm going to read just one little
paragraph.
The simple country lawyerexemplifies the trope.
He uses his intelligence andaccent as a weapon talking in
simple allegories andcolloquialisms in order to make
people think he's a moron andthen brutalizing them with
superior will.
There was and Brandon he's oneof these, one of the smartest

(50:48):
guys I've ever met.
And he's also a scuba divingfishing he's got dogs.
He, he does all these amazingthings.
He's got amazing background andchooses to live in Mobile,
Alabama.
So he can be.
With all the things that heloves, but he's wicked genius.
If you need help managinginventory and hooking up a CRM

(51:11):
to your QuickBooks, so you cankeep track of these leads that
are coming in, right?
He's got these superpowers thatbelie the fact that he's this.
This dude down in mobile.
Does that make sense checks in

Brandon Morris (51:24):
the mail

Dave Young (51:25):
checks in the mail?
Awesome Yeah, I don't know thatwe have time.
Where are we at on that dan?
We're at noon

Dan DeLong (51:30):
Yeah, we're coming up at the top of the hour we can
stay a little longer if you haveif you guys have the time if
anybody needs to drop off, ofcourse, we will have this
recorded.
And for available viewing afterbut what any anything that you
wanted to Wrap things up as wecome in for a landing here,
Dave.

Dave Young (51:49):
Find a way to be you and tell the story of you and
don't worry about making itmarketing sounding right?
Find your story, find who yourbest customers are and tell
stories that are going toresonate with them.
You can do all this mapping andlet's just let's just jump to
the slide.
That has the outline exercise.

(52:10):
I'm actually this is on We'vegot a lot of things that we
didn't cover.
Yeah, do all those things.
Do all those things.
I think you skipped it.
Did I?
Slide 43, maybe.
Oh.
This guy.
That's it.
So, find yourself a trope thatyou relate to.
And maybe find a trope that yourbest customer, maybe find two or

(52:31):
three tropes that your bestcustomers.
You can see your best customersthrough those tropes.
You go.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah.
Dan is the I'm trying to thinkof who I would pick for Dan
what's the old cartoon withSherman and the professor the
way back machine Mr.
Peabody, Mr.
Peabody, right?
You're that kid that's alwayswith Mr.
Peabody, right?
He's super bright smarter thananybody knows.

(52:54):
And he's hanging out with thisscientific dog.

Dan DeLong (52:57):
Sherman was Sherman.

Dave Young (52:58):
Yeah, so but so right in the voice of your trope
to how you perceive yourcustomer as a different trope.
Maybe jet clamp.
It is the ideal customer foryou, right?
Somebody that just came intomoney and they don't know how to
manage it.
Guess what?
I can help you with that, Jed.

(53:19):
I speak your language.
I know your problems.
I can relate, right?
That's a way easier story forJed to understand than just we,
we do all manner of QuickBooksconsulting work and can handle
any financial situation.
So speak to your customer.
You don't even

Dan DeLong (53:36):
need to move to Beverly Hills to do that.

Dave Young (53:38):
No.
So I would pick those two thingsfirst.
Pick your trope, pick the tropeof your customers.
It's a shortcut to doingpersonas.
Personas can be a lot of work.
And then this exercise Brandonjust did it in the last week and
takes about 45 minutes.
There's a PDF on that page thatyou print out.
And do it by I recommend doingit by hand.

(53:58):
You'll have a, you didn't do itright.
If you don't have a cramp inyour hand at the end.
But all the instructions arethere.
And what you'll end up with in45 minutes is.
60 topics that you could writeon today, you could absolutely
just sit down and say I need towrite that one now.

(54:18):
And that's usually the firststep in, in deciding what it is.
Most of the time people can'tthink of, I don't know what I'd
write.
I don't know what I would write.
I don't know where I'd put it.
If you write it you'll have itso that you can put it on
LinkedIn.
You can put it in places wherepeople will see it.
You can tell people about it ata meeting, all kinds of things,
but you got to write it first.

(54:38):
And this helps you organize itto to get it written.
Does that make sense?

Dan DeLong (54:42):
Yeah.
Yeah.
I've used this, this, I don'tknow what is this called?
Like a

Dave Young (54:47):
brainstorming exercise.

Dan DeLong (54:50):
Yeah, there we go.
It's almost like it's on theslide.
But I've used this for multipleprojects that I've been wanting
to do, whether it's, blog topicsor chapters of a book or,
creating a course outline.
So these are this was a greatway to, to just get it, do a
brain dome, get those topics outon, on, on paper and the way

(55:11):
that you structure this thisbrainstorming exercise is to not
not stop yourself.

Dave Young (55:18):
Yeah, you have to click the play button and just
plow through it.
And it's actually a mind trick.
It tricks your brain into justnot judging the things that you
write down.
Because if we said, hey, betweennow and tomorrow, could you give
me a list of 20 things that youcould write blog posts about?
You'd write a list of 40 andscratch 35 of them out.

(55:39):
I promise you would do that.

Michelle Long (55:41):
So Dave does a shot of whiskey help if you do
that before this exercise,

Dave Young (55:46):
I like to think of it as writing oil.

Michelle Long (55:49):
There you go.

Dave Young (55:50):
There's a song I could probably get it.
There's get

Brandon Morris (55:52):
started,

Dave Young (55:52):
There's a bottle right up there called Writer's
Tears.

Brandon Morris (55:56):
let's say at the Wizard Academy.
If you ever go and take a classthere, they're gonna start the
wine pouring about nine or 10o'clock in the morning.
And yeah it will help youunleash your your creative side.

Dave Young (56:07):
We call it purple coffee.
And what we, what Wizard Academyreally is a place that you learn
things in a, in an environmentthat's unlike any place you've
ever learned.
And so it, it gets it out ofyour head that you're sitting at
the what was it called?
Summit?
Ascend?

(56:29):
We all know what's going tohappen in Orlando.
We're going to be put in a roomwith in a room with accordion
doors and there's going to be alittle a little square coaster
that the iced tea sits on.
It's going to be dripping inthat all day.
They're going to give us acrappy little notepad in a hotel
pen that doesn't work and try toteach us stuff, right?
And we're against all of that.

(56:51):
We believe you should sit amidstart and beauty in the woods and
have a nice night's sleep beforeyou start in on class.
And And then when you sit downin our classroom in a super
comfy leather chair and kickback and enjoy a glass of wine
and we start with loud music andit's crazy.
It's fun.
So that's our vibe here.

(57:12):
And we teach this kind of thing.
This is this topic.
Brainstorm was actually taught.
It's where I learned.
It was at Wizard Academy.
An author named Keith Millertaught it 20 years ago, and I've
been using it with clients eversince.

Dan DeLong (57:28):
It's a fantastic, it's free, it's, you have
everything on that link in thatwebsite, which is in the the
handouts somebody asked wherewe're going to get it in the
handouts.

Dave Young (57:38):
I don't even like, dude, I don't even ask you it's
free to the point that I don'teven I don't ask for email.
No, nothing.
It's just there.
It's free.
Take it.
And

Dan DeLong (57:51):
that's part of your story.
Where you're, you're that guythat gave it all away.
And then when you need more, youknow where to find them in the
whiskey cellar of the wizardacademy.

Dave Young (58:05):
No, we have a wine cellar.
This is a whiskey vault.

Dan DeLong (58:08):
That's right,

Dave Young (58:10):
That's actually the inside of a vault door.
I was expecting somebody becausewe just, they just broke for
lunch.
I was expecting somebody to comebarging in here.
But so far, so good.

Dan DeLong (58:18):
Before that happens, we'll go ahead and wrap up here.
Dave, I appreciate you joiningus again on the Kibbe power
hour.
And Brandon is great to see you.
And we will maybe see you all at

Dave Young (58:30):
And then it's a joy to see both you and Michelle
again, and I appreciate beingable to just come on here and
tell you about what I love andwhat I know, and I'm just going
to remind you, Dan, because Iknow you live a mobile life.
We do have a camper parkingspot.
Oh really?

(58:50):
Come to Austin.

Michelle Long (58:53):
This was great and very helpful and good to see
you Dave and Brandon again aswell and Dan Always, thank you
for all that you do and thankseveryone for joining us.
All right.
We'll see you next time on

Dan DeLong (59:04):
the QB Power Hour