Keynote Speaker Business - Joshua M Evans - Small Business Insights with Laura Fisher

Episode Transcript
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Laura Fisher (00:02):
Welcome to small business insights where back
office conversations give usinsight to what's really going
on? Is it grit, or luck, thatgives a small business owner an
advantage? Let's find out. I'myour host, Laura Fisher. Well,
hello. And today, my specialguest is V. Joshua M. Evans,

(00:26):
keynote speaker, and he speaksabout company culture expert.
Well, that's what he is. Andthen key what theme is

Joshua Evans (00:34):
it all starts with purpose.

Thank you. Thank you, openings are never that
smooth. Joshua, thank you forcoming in today. And I've never
had a keynote speaker here. SoI'd like to know how you got
started. And then we'll alsotalk about how you make it into
a business. So give us a littleinput on how you got started.
And what do you go aroundtalking about?

That's a great question. So I speak all over
the world. And I speak onbringing purpose back to the
workplace. And I think right nowpeople are facing a level of
uncertainty that has neverbefore been experienced. And
because of that, it's causing alot of disjointed workplaces is
causing people to disengaged tobecome unfulfilled to be
unhappy. And I think a lot ofthe problems behind that stem

(01:20):
from the fact that people do notsee purpose behind their work.
It's not just about money, Idon't think it should be, I
think on day one, everybody'sexcited to start their job they
get there on day one, they gottheir cup of coffee, they're
excited to take on the work. Andon day 500, they want to stab
their coworker. So whathappened, it's not that their
job changed, their perspectiveof their job changed. And I
think if I can help peopleremember why they cared so much,

(01:43):
it allows them to reclaimpurpose behind their work. And
so I speak all over the worlddoing that to large audiences,
it's sometimes small audiences,but it's organizations or
individuals that they may stillsee purpose, but they can't see
it every day, because they'reinundated with the day to day
minutia, the stuff that gets inthe way. And so I help them look
past all that minutia, like theunread emails and the Zoom
meetings and the KPIs and theoffice politics so that they can

(02:05):
reclaim purpose for their work,and then subsequently help their
team rediscover and reclaimpurpose as well.

So when somebody calls you, are they having a
problem? How do they figure outthey need to hear from you?

Well usually besomebody that's they're having
an event or they're having a aninternal, you know, company
retreat or leadership retreat,or they're having a large
professional association event.
And then what what kind ofproblems are our team members or
our audience facing and ifthey're facing where people are
disengaging or people lack likefulfillment in their work or
their burnout? Maybe Maybepeople are starting to feel
complacent,

just a lot of shifts in the workplace.
Exactly.

That's when they're like, Okay, who can we
bring in to help recalibratethese individuals to help
inspire exactly

What makes you an expert?

I was a weird kid, I was the kid that was always
like, Oh, give me a microphone.
Like my parents would turnaround at like a festival. And
they look around and like,where's Josh, and then they
would see me on the stage withthe band like holding the
microphone like, hi, everybody.
I'm Josh. But how I really gotinto speaking, I was in the
corporate world for over 10years, mostly in software and
technology, sales, seminar, oiland gas. And I had seen lots of
different cultures, companies ofall sides, we had a company that

(03:06):
I worked for, that was 30people, I had a company that was
90,000 people. And so I've gotto see a lot of different
cultures and a lot of differentways in which organizations
engage their talent. And it gaveme some insight to that. But the
real way, I turned into akeynote speakers, I got into an
argument one day, I literallygot into an argument with a guy
that I was working with, and wewere at a client's office, and
we were in sales, and he was mytechnical guy. And we were

(03:28):
talking through what we coulddo. And I told him this very
small deal and this hugeopportunity for our company. And
we're walking out of there. AndI'm just so excited. Because as
a salesperson, you know, thispaid on commission, like I see
dollar signs. I'm reallyexcited. And he goes, Josh, why
would you tell him we could doall that? I thought, well,
because we can use it, but it'sgonna be so much work. I was
like, but this is our job. Like,how can you be so despondent and

(03:50):
I was just so taken aback by howlackluster he found this
opportunity, how despondent hewas, and I went home that night,
and my wife was working late.
And so I was sitting with my dogdrinking a glass of scotch, and
I just started venting indictation mode to my iPad. And,
you know, over the course of theevening, it turned to a lot of
words. And so a few days later,I came back to and I looked at
it, I was like, you know, thisis pretty bad. But some of it's

(04:12):
not There's something in there.
Exactly. And so I started addingto it over the next two years,
still maintaining myprofessional career. I wrote a
book accidentally, we juststarted adding stuff. And then
by happenstance, I ran into apublisher. And she said, I would
love to work with you send methe manuscript. And so we looked
at over, they did a bigmarketing campaign. And when
they did their marketing, it waspretty amazing. It became a
number one bestseller, the nameof the book, it's called

(04:35):
Enthusiastic You and I reread itrecently, and I'm not impressed.
The next book I think, will begood. But no. And so when it
became a number one bestseller,I said, this is what I want to
do. And so I gave my two weeksto my boss, he's like, Okay, are
you going to a competitor islike, Nope, I'm going to do my
own thing. He's like, alright,well, best of luck.

So you jumped in as an idea. You didn't have
things book.

No, I didn't.
Again, nothing booked. I had noidea how to run a business. I
had no idea what I was doing. Imean, luckily, I mean, I I had a
pretty good job. And I was avery good saver. I set myself up
financially to be able to makethat jump. Yeah. And then that
first year of business, I madenegative money.

But this is how you start your business.

This is how I started my business,

You have to invest in yourself

Exactly. And the biggest problem and I think that
and I don't want to get too faralong, I think some of the
biggest problems that that Iface as an entrepreneur early is
that I didn't know what was agood investment or a bad
investment. We have thesemoments where we question
ourselves, we question ourdecision making abilities. I
mean, I've made some badinvestments in my business. And
it was it was poor marketingcampaigns, or hiring the wrong

(05:36):
people to do to do marketing.

But But you knew your product was good, right?

I didn't know how unprepared I was. And I probably
wouldn't have jumped had Iknown.

Ok so stepping forward, you've been at the
seven year. So obviously, you'vecome past that,

Yes. And so the first couple of years were
rough. And then I started tolearn the ropes, I found people
that were doing what I wasdoing, or something similar. And
I studied them. And I became ascholar at how other people were
running their speakingbusinesses. And so there was I
found in any business, there'ssomebody out there that can
train you on the on the moneypiece behind it. And so I found

(06:11):
somebody that does that. Andthey were, they were already way
far ahead of me.

So you found a mentor?

that I was gonna mentor, I say, mentor, I paid
him to go to these classes. Andit was phenomenal. And all of a
sudden, things started breakingloose. And of course, you know,
early on in business, like youcelebrate every win, right? So I
had a bunch of small wins, I wasgetting very excited, and I was
getting booked. And those areleading to more events. Because
if you perform well, at oneevent, somebody sees you and we

(06:35):
should get him for our event.
And the second I started doingthat momentum started building
and then just like any business,you start hitting ceilings, and
so I hit my first ceiling withthe industry that I first
started speaking in, and Inoticed, okay, they can't pay me
above this amount. I'm gettingthis amount, but they don't have
budgets beyond this. Okay, well,what's the next level for me?
And so I started looking beyondthat.

Did you have to change the way you did your
speaking to go to the nextlevel?

Unknown (06:57):
No, I had to change the way I did my marketing,

Same message. You just had to repackage it?

Exactly. And so you take the small shifts and
the small things and so you trystuff out, I split test my
marketing campaigns. I'm sureyour audience knows all about
that. But I tried two differentavenues. And the one that that
took hold next was a lot of HRassociations, which is great,
because when I'm talking aboutpurpose in the workplace, I'm
preaching to the choir, right. Imean, they're Labradors like,

(07:22):
yeah, you're right, you'reright. And so that and so I
started shifting there, and Istarted building business on
that side, and then you feelyour way, it's feeling your way
in the dark, right? You movetowards your endgame. But it's,
it's such a meandering path. Andit's a cliche because it is
true, right.

So once you found your market and your niche, and
you found an audience, tell us alittle bit more about what you
actually talk about to people inyour marketing. It starts with
purpose. And specifically inyour marketing, I read you talk
about the millennial generation.
And I'm a business owner, and Ihire people. And sometimes I can
only afford the millennial, youknow, I can't afford the older

(08:00):
folks, you know, that have allthat experience. What do you
talk to folks about

every generation thinks that the generation
behind them is less driven?
That's yeah, less driven, lesscaring, less important. And the
problem I have with that iswe're discounting huge
opportunity. A lot of thesemillennials, if you can get them
fired, if you can give them areason to care about their work,
they'll work harder than anybodyelse, and they'll work for less
money. So

that's, that's what the purpose is. Exactly. So
what kind of purpose is it goingto be a professional purpose or
personal purpose?
It's her second gig.

I don't think those two are mutually
Exactly. This isthis is for her to get money so
exclusive. And I'll go deeperinto that. Okay. So I think
that she can she can do whatevershe loves. I want to find out
anybody can have purpose behindthe work that they're doing
right now. I don't care what howmenial the tasks seem, or how
what she loves. And so I alwaysask this, what do you do when
mundane the job functions are, Ithink you can still derive
purpose from it, because what wefail to do is follow the impact
that our work has. And so we'llfinish a project will shoot off

(08:55):
an email, and then it endsthere. And we go on to the next
project. Think about the nextthing I have to complete the
next deadline. The next KPI Ihave to achieve. And the problem
with that is when we're justfocused down we forget what the
work we're doing actually doeshave an impact other people, I
was at an event in Tucson,Arizona, and I had to fly to New
York for an event the nextmorning, I had a 6am flight. And
I had to schedule an Uber topick me up at four. So I'm

(09:17):
you're not driving for Uber? Andshe goes, Oh, well, I manage an
sitting there waiting for myUber outside this Holiday Inn
and up pulls this Toyota and Idid that dance that everybody
does were like, Oh, are youGabriella? And she's like, Yeah,
are you Josh? It's like a shoeramp. So I hopped in. So as this
one, okay, I know if she'sdriving Uber, likely she's doing
it to fund her passion project,because that's what most people
do. Right?

(09:46):
upscale restaurant here inTucson, and I go, Oh, that must
be very fulfilling. And shegoes, No, it's not. And then she
followed it up with somethingI've never heard before she
goes, I'm just so passionateabout driving for Uber. I was
like what you're passionateOkay. Nobody's passionate about
driving. I've heard it's great.
The hours are nice pays well hadnever heard anybody say their
passion. So I dug in. It's like,why are you Patrick? Because I
only drive after midnight to6am. That's when people need

(10:10):
help the most to get home. Andshe went on Yeah. And she went
on to tell me that evensometimes she'll go to like the
bar district within Tucson, andshe'll give people rides that
don't have money, because shedoesn't want them driving. And I
thought that was so amazing.
Like she's seen the impact herwork is that this person is now
home safe because of the workthat she did. So ask why do you
why do you do this? It'samazing. And she was well, my

(10:32):
sister died in a drunk drivingaccident couple years ago. And
so I do this. So nobody else hasto go through that pain. And I
was like, this is a woman thathas such a deeper purpose behind
your work,

Right

Why can't we all and this led me on this kind of
internal journey where now Ifigured out that if we can
follow the impact that our workhas everybody's work has, it's
just so invaluable if we reallyget to where the impact is.
Let's talk about this podcastfor a second. So if you take
this podcast, yeah, what yourrole is, is podcast host, I'm a
podcast guest. What we do istalk, ask questions, listen, and

(11:03):
make pithy comments. Great.
That's what it does. Not notcompelling. But we can talk
about the impact that thispodcast has on its listeners,
let's let's take for a minutethat there's somebody out there
that's trying to start abusiness is lacking a certain
idea, or a skill or strategy togo to market with, you're
literally providing them with anopportunity to gain knowledge so
that they're better so they canactually build a business so

(11:24):
that they can achieve theirdreams. It's amazing.

Yeah, I want them to get a nugget of something.
Exactly. That's so invaluable.

The end, if you were only thinking about, Okay,
I have to, you know, I have toput on the opening. And I have
to go ahead and upload it aftershare all this on social media,
if you're only thinking aboutthose things, you would not care
about your work, you have to bethinking about the person that
it's helping that that personthat has an idea for a business,
or somebody that just started asmall business and they're
struggling, and they they'relooking for a life preserver.

(11:54):
That's what this podcast isproviding to them. And if you
can remember that, of course,you can maintain it, a view on
the purpose that you have, andif we can look at anybody can
look at their job and the impactit has on the final person,
right? That really benefits fromit, it helps you remember why
you should care.

You're absolutely right. I know for me, I've had
some jobs I don't particularlylike but they were for a
purpose. I worked for Katy ISD.
And I loved the job. But mypurpose was not to work. It was
to provide health insurance formy family, because we're a small
business owner, and we didn'thave insurance. And so when I
would have a bad day, I'm like,No, I'm doing this for my
family. You know, I havepurpose. So that's a personal,
but I also like to do good work.

(12:32):
So worked out well,

Indeed. And I think all generations desire to
feel fulfillment in their work.
And if they can attach it to,you know, because this providing
for my family, that's great, orif they need to attach it
because it makes them feelphilanthropic. I understand that
too. If you look at Toms Shoes,people buy their shoes, because
they give away one pair tosomebody that doesn't have
shoes, people like that feelingof giving of others, even if
you're still receiving somethingfor it. It's a phenomenal

(12:54):
business model for a consumergood. It's also a great model
for us as individuals, right? Wewant to feel like we're
providing value. And if we cansee how we're positively
impacting somebody else's life,it allows us to see the purpose
behind that work.

So what is the takeaway that someone gets when
they listen to one of yourspeeches,

there's a few things that we should be doing
as individuals, right, we losesight of why we cared. And so if
I had to boil it under to threethings, it would be to manage
the influences in your life,direct your perceptions, and
move towards meaning in the workthat you do. And so you unpack
that through? Yeah, so I impactthat through through silly
stories and some jokes, and thensome audience interaction so

(13:34):
that they can see how we areeverybody's being constantly
influenced by the things intheir lives. And if we're not
being cognizant of those things,it's impacting us without our
knowledge.

So as an employer, so I would be listening to what
am I, what are the messages I'msending throughout the day to my
employees,

if you want your people to be at their best for
you, you need to make sureyou're setting them up for
success, but even starts back tolike, our personal routines and
habits, right, like whetherwe're looking at the news or
social media before work, thosethings are hugely detrimental to
our mental health, and to how weapproach the rest of the day.
People think, Oh, I can look atthe news or social media. It
doesn't impact me, because we'readults, and we're not immune to
it. Alright, so

you traveling quite a bit, right?

Yeah, I travel a fair amount. So

They call you do they say Hey, Josh, I want you
to come to my event. What kindof timeline? Are you planning
ahead? Do you have gigs booked

pre COVID I was I was booking stuff out about nine
months to a year ahead. That wasthe standard is around nine
months. Then COVID hit and Icancelled 16 round trip flights.
Yeah. And which was crazy. Andwe went virtual, I only had one
actually cancelled all the restjust went virtual. And I did
virtually you were blessed.
Here's the thing. Nobody knewwhat we were doing. And I didn't
know what I was doing either.

(14:42):
And so I was doing anything Icould to maintain my audiences.
Exactly, obviously, and not onlythat, I had a lot of

deposits well, and you're starting your career. So
you have momentum, you'regetting momentum.

I was I was definitely getting momentum
heading into COVID. And I didn'twant to lose that and so I
didn't stop my marketing, but mymarketing shifted. Okay, look.
So instead of talking about,okay, how can we overcome the
challenges in our work? How canwe overcome anxiety in the
workplace, you can't be tonedeaf to what's going on in the
world, right. And with that, Ihad all these deposits, I was
like, Look, if you want theDeVos back, I'm happy to give it

(15:16):
to one person. The other isgood. No, we want to find
something else. So I did a bunchof virtual events, one actually
in person event in September of2020, which was awesome, because
I just missed it. And then abunch more virtual events, and
then stuff sort of breakingloose again, in the summer of
21, I had an in person event innorthern Michigan on Mackinac

(15:36):
Island. And then that afternoon,I had a virtual event for
Florida, it allowed me as abusiness owner to do two gigs in
one day, which you rarely get todo, unless it's the same
organization,

But you're missing the interaction.

There's ways you can do that. And as a
professional speaker, you watchothers, and you figure out what
they're doing. Oh, he did somesort of an erection at the
beginning where he had peopletyping, I'm gonna have them do
that. And some people are doingsomething differently. Ooh, how
are they doing that? That'sreally cool. I want to I want to
do something like that. And Iread a book years ago called The
idea Hunter and set this mode ofoperation. And if I see a really

(16:08):
funny idea, a really cool ideaor really fascinating business
card, I write it down, I takenote of it, because there's
something about it. And if Icould figure out if I can unpack
why that's so interesting. It'llit'll allow me to use that as as
as an opportunity or a tool.
Like I saw, I saw a businesscard the other day, it was for a
doctor, and the middle of hiscard was clear, convex plastic.
And so you can use it as amagnifying glass. Oh, no. Okay,

(16:31):
well, that is so fast, becauseit's something I can actually
use. And it's his calling card,and it directly ties to his
business. And so like, that'show I impacted. It's like, well,
how can I do a cool businesscard like that? Where it's
actually kind of like a gift orsomething unique? Yeah, that's
kind of the way I run mybusinesses, which is very
tangential. So you've got somegigs booked? Yeah. I'll be in
Dublin next week for an event.

(16:53):
Yeah.

How did you get that gig?

They were looking for a speaker for this event.
And they saw my website, andthen they just they said, Oh,
this guy, it seems like it wouldbe a really good fit for what
we're looking for. I guess we'relooking. These are owners of
businesses. And we're lookingfor a way to bring purpose and
deeper engagement back to ourcompanies. In essence, let's
hire Josh. And so they filledout my contact form my email,
and we start negotiations. Andnow I'll be flying out there,

(17:15):
which is great. So I'll do that.
And then I get back and I'm herefor two days. And I go to Kansas
City. That's as far as I'mlooking at, like so my stuff
gets booked on my calendar, andI put everything in there like
the hotel and the rides andeverything. And then I don't
even look at it to like themonth of it was Okay, where am I
flying this month?

Yeah. Awesome. All right. We're gonna take a quick
break. And we come back. Josh, Iwant to talk to you a little bit
more about the business of it.
How'd you get started? How doyou do your marketing, the
logistics of it, how you craftthe message for the event? So
we'll be right back.

Sponsor (17:45):
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(18:06):
district of Houston. And nowback to small business insights.

Alright, we're back with Joshua M. Evans. He is
a keynote speaker. And hespecializes in company culture.
He's an expert on that. And hetalks about how you need to have
purpose in the workforce thatcover that right. That sounds
perfect. Awesome. All right. SoI want to talk about the
business of how you madeyourself to be a keynote
speaker. How did you know youwere ready to go 100% Because

(18:33):
most folks, they are working inthe corporate job like you were.
And then you say, have an idea.
And you're like, I'm ready tojump in 100% How do you know it
was time? I

didn't know it was time, to be honest with you. But
I had an old mentor that I hadworked for at a company and when
I was working for him, I toldhim, Hey, I you know, there's
this woman, I love her theminute get married to her. But I
don't know if I'm ready. Andhe's Josh, you're never ready
for anything. And then I talkedto him a couple years later,
when we became pregnant with ourfirst kid and oh, man, I'm gonna

(19:03):
be a father. I don't know if I'mready. And the same piece of
wisdom, he tossed it back at meagain over coffee. He's like,
Josh, you're never ready foranything. It's stuck with me.
And so after my first cup wasborn, it was about a year after
that. I wasn't ready. But thebook came out. And we mark it as
like this. This is what I wantto do. And I know that if I if I

(19:24):
sprint towards it, I can makeprogress. And I can figure it
out. And so I set a timeline foryou know how my business like I
want to make this by this yearand this by that year, and I was
nowhere near those numbers and

You had some type of business plan. You put it
down on paper.

I told my wife I had a business plan. I had a
loosely constructed straw houseand my business plan. Okay.

But she had a book you had a product. I had a book
publisher, publisher give yousome support. Right? It was all
financial. Yeah,

yeah. And so if I'm being real honest, I made
very little money off the book,right. I make money off the book
now but In publishing the bookand getting it ready and getting
out to market, it was a piece ofmarketing because once we became
a best seller, that's, that's apiece of credibility that I can
go to the marketplace with,right? It's now all of a sudden,
okay, what sets me apart fromany other competition? Well,
he's, he's the number one bestselling author. Okay, that's

(20:14):
something right. And then beyondthat, you just start building
other other credit agencies, youstart working for bigger
companies. So now becomes, youknow, these are the list of
companies I've worked for. Andall of a sudden, like they
started starts looking prettygood. Now, was it was it getting
huge fees, then? No, I was not.
And so the first couple ofyears, it was not easy. It was
rough.

But you mentioned earlier, you are a saver you had
had so planning, exactlyplanning and savings.

I am a planner, my wife is a saver, she's taught me
to be one. But we had we'd savedup money to be able to cover our
expenses. And she was stillworking full time at the time.
And so when I left, we still hadinsurance. And we had, you know,
a pile of reserves in case youneeded it, and just slowly
started figuring out thebusiness. And I mean, it was a
lot of wrong turns on dead ends,he had a backup and then come

(20:57):
forward again. It was hard. Thefirst couple I mean, it just is
with like any business, itreally is, um, I mean,
overnight, success doesn'thappen.

I'm thinking like most entrepreneurs, you feel
alone, you're working this outon your by yourself, right?

Absolutely. And I felt really alone for the first
year. And then I found a smallgroup of people that were in
similar places where I was wheretheir fees were similar to mine,
and they were trying to try andexplain to the market. And all
of a sudden, we had this awesomecollective or we could get to
get into okay, this is theproblem I'm facing. Have y'all
seen it? Yeah, we've seen thatproblem.

Exactly. Did you find a peer group like that?

Well, and so some of them came from a course I
took on the business ofprofessional speaking because
once again, I'm trying to learnright now, while while I'm
falling, I'm mending thisparachute. And so I took this
course. And I met a few otherpeople at that course.

Did you have to pay for the course. Yes. Okay.
Yeah. So it was a noted speaker

retreat. Yeah. And so I'm gonna, I'm gonna plug the
guy because it was a phenomenalcourse anybody wants to be a
keynote speaker. It's called apaid to speak conference. And
it's a guy named Ken Julian. Andhe was a phenomenal mentor. And
then I mean, he's become afriend. But he was doing all the
right things in business. I waslike, Okay, this is a person I
want to learn from, that'sawesome. So you're wasting money
on people I shouldn't have beenlearning from to, but that just

(22:08):
comes with a business.

I've had a lot of guests that come in and say
don't pay for a lot of stuff.
Because a lot of it can be awaste of time. So I'm glad that
you found something that worked

Especially early on, right when you're just
starting to make money in yourbusiness. Okay, I need to spend
more money on this or on youknow, Google ads or on you know,
you know, AdWords. Exactly, andyou're just spraying and
praying. And it's so hard toknow what's going to be a good
investment for your organizationand what's not, I still make bad
decisions with marketing. Sosometimes I make good decisions.
I recently I hired a phenomenalorganization to redo my website.

(22:41):
I'm so glad I heard that becauseit

Looks really nice.
It sets you up to look at it.
What sets you up to lookprofessional and trendy in a
good way.

How am I trendy?

It's the way you're dressed on the blue suit.
You look hip, you look like thekind of guy

I'm not I'm just I'm so not.

The marketing is working. It makes you love it
make me look cool. You lookcool. That's it? I'm not cool.
I'm not what do you have to dofor the daily marketing? Are you
posting yourself? Or is yourmarketing people doing it?

So I've tried a few different ways. I had a
marketing team help postingstuff, but the problem became
that wasn't my voice. And so itgets off tangent, and then I was
spending more time managing whatthey were putting out there than
I would have been just making myown content,

let's back up.
That's key, because that is whoyou are. It has to have your
voice.

Well, especially for my business. It's it's
absolutely critical. And it hasto be my tone. Otherwise, it's
they're gonna the wrong audienceis gonna see it and find it
right like me.

And I know from my experience, it's all in that
editing, editing, editing, andgetting it down to like the two
or three sentences that reallysay what you mean to say, but it
takes a long time to get there.

What does that famous quote by Mark Twain is
that, sorry, the letter wouldhave been shorter, but I didn't
have enough time.

So tell me more about how you the marketing
because in So marketing isalways an issue for every
company, anybody. But for you.
Your marketing has to have yourimage because you are the
product and your voice. That'sthe same for all companies. For
me. When somebody walks in thebuilding. I know my company is
business esuite or imperialstorage solutions, but when they

(24:23):
see me, I'm the owner. There'ssomething about seeing an owner,
how are you managing that? Andhow do you keep it going?
Because finding content, littlesnippets of content to keep
people interested?

Yeah, it's not easy. I go through like bouts
with social media, because Ihave a disdain for it. But I was
really early in adoptingLinkedIn. I was first when I
first saw my career that was thefirst social media platform I
ever on. It's really a businessplatform. I like I love it. And
so I was on it very early, andI'll be posting yours on
LinkedIn by the way. Oh, good.
Yeah, I will share it with myfollowing of all 50 people now I

(24:57):
have more net. I love LinkedIn,because it's a great data mining
tool, you can literally findevery customer you should be in
front of

That's interesting. How do you use
LinkedIn, you use it as abusiness tool.

I don't use it to consume other people's content.
Okay, I love LinkedIn forsharing insightful content. I
love LinkedIn for connectingwith people that are like minded
connected with people that Icould help connected people that
could help me. I mean, all theselittle things. LinkedIn is a
phenomenal tool. I know the Iknow, all other platforms are,
are great for what they're for.
But for my business, LinkedInwas the right way.

You are business to business. Exactly. That's
what your product is. .

Exactly. So that's my platform. I have presence on
the other platforms. But that'smore social. It's not even more
social. I don't I don't go onthem. I post them. Okay, which
sounds terrible. How dare youwrite I'm one of the people
that's flooding, all these otherthings. But I'm not as vigilant
as I used to be. I was prettyvigilant for a while, but do
content every single day. But ifunless I have something really

(25:57):
substantial to say, I'm notgoing to do that, no, I love
sharing other content that Ifind very fast, right? So like
the new Gallup poll on employeeengagement, it was it was crazy
to me because Okay, the numbershave shifted after COVID People
are back in the office, and now,people are less engaged than
they've ever been. And it'sphenomenal zap with the new
numbers, a 79% of people aredisengaged in their work, which
is crazy. That's sad, damn you71% of people at every

(26:21):
organization are doing justenough to not get fired. It's
crazy.

It breaks my heart. Because there's been so
much time somewhere. Yeah, andnot like it Oh, my gosh, that
sounds horrible is your numberone goal is to get them to go to
your website to fill out theform and say, talk to me, what
are you trying to get them to doin your marketing,

And I'm poor at call to actions in social media,
because I feel like I see otherpeople's call to actions, and it
makes me feel kind of itchy. Andso I don't want to be that kind
of a guy. I'd rather give them

Call me and I'll solve all your problems. You
don't want to do that.

I don't want to be that. Okay. Though, I could
solve all the problems. I don'twant to be the guy that's
pushing my, my website on toothers. And so I do keep a blog.
And I do I have I have a list ofpeople that I send that out to
that are people that couldpotentially hire me like, Hey,
here's something for yourmembers, you know, how they can
reengage in the new year or youknow, here's how to get past the
holiday.

So you're creating content to bring people to your
website? Exactly. So becauseyour blog is on your website?
Exactly. So have a newsletter.
And how often are you doingthat?

I usually send it out about every five to six
weeks. Okay. And so, I know somepeople do do this weekly good
for them. That's not really, Idon't have that kind of
relationship with my, I guess myfollowship right now. And so
that's, that's not what I do. Ido share stuff on on LinkedIn
weekly. And I do stuff likethat. But as far as these
articles, because I have a listof marketing that I email to,

(27:40):
and it's Hey, you know, this issomething I find useful. Also,
the call to action is, if youhave a need to bring this kind
of message to your audience, I'dlove to chat with you. And it's
a link to either my Calendly ormy or to my contact form.

All right, so I know we do the same thing. And
you don't always see results.
But you may see the results twoto three years from now because
I go those planners. Yeah, Iremember a guy. Okay, so
logistics, there's not a lot oflogistics involved.

A lot of logistics involved. Okay, so marketing
campaign, right marketing turnsto leads, and we have our leads
we have to manage. So we havenew people coming in, we got to
set up calls with them, we gotto set up meetings, usually a
Zoom meeting so they can talk tothem and understand their event,
understand their audience. See,if we're a good fit, right,
then, then there's theproduction in the back of it.
Because I always send videos tothe Hey, it was a pleasure to

(28:28):
speak with you. I'm honored tobe considered. This, again, is
what I talked about. Let me knowif you need anything.

And then so you sent a personalized little
video. Absolutely. That's nice.
Yeah. Because you are theproduct you're gonna I'm gonna
look at you as you talk, the wayyou move all those things did
they are involved in.

Exactly, you gotta give him the tasting menu up
first. And so I get a littletaste of Joshua Yeah. And then
after that, then you know,there's negotiations then
there's contracts, then there'sinvoicing, there's billing, then
there's you know, booking oftravel and finally then there's
the performance where I show upand actually met the engagement
and and then there's travel backand then once again, after that

(29:03):
it doesn't stop because then youhave to you have to collect
testimonials you want to see Iwant to see their I want to talk
to their event team and do apost event call so I can
understand how it can be betterthan next time and it's a long
process and there's a lot ofmoving parts there.

And it sounds awesome. You really have thought
it through how

I didn't at the beginning you learn these things
where I wouldn't always send thelittle videos and I didn't
always remember to send aninvoice and

Tell us about getting those testimonials is
that easy to do.

I find it pretty easy. There's some neat ways and
I see some other people doingthis I think I'm about to employ
it but I like to approach peopleright after the event if your
thoughts right it's usually theevent planners or people on the
events committee your team andand okay, what do you think
really landed well and so that'sso I make sure I know what I
keep in my speeches because Ijust my speeches constantly

(29:45):
okay, what could have gonebetter? Like what didn't land
well with your audience and itmight be maybe something maybe
something was a little off tonebecause it's a different type of
group or it that's alwaysharder. People don't want to
give bad testimonials. And it'snot that I'm going to put that
into testimony but I want toknow what could have been better
because I want to constantly bebetter. And that's I mean,
that's, that's how I approach mybusiness. Because if I'm not
getting better I'm atrophyingright. You're either green and

(30:06):
growing or ripe and rotting.
Right. That's how I approach it.
And then once again, I do a postinterview with the events team,
and committee and Okay, give meyour Give me your thoughts. And
once again, that's another greatway to extract testimonials. And
also find out some of the stuffthat I can change

That's just a good business model. Because that's
good for anything. When you sellsomething as a gift, let's talk
about how somebody can reach youin case they need you to come
and inspire their their staff.

Yes, sure. So you can go to my website, Joshua

M. Evans lives there. Now,

let's talk about the M, there's an M there
because my middle name is Mark,after my father, the real reason
there's an M in my website isbecause some cheeky Senator out
of Tennessee, I believe, hasJoshua Evans. And I asked him if
I would buy it, and he's refusedto sell it. And we're at a we're
an impasse. And so I'm Joshua M.
Evans, and he is a lowlysenator.

So he has Joshua evans.com. And you don't go to

that site. Go to Joshua M. evans.com. That's the
one. All right,

Yeah. Anything else you'd like to say? No, no,
you can't?

No, I, I have a lot more I can say, I don't know
if we really have the time. Ithink that if there's one piece
of advice Oh, and part toeverybody is everybody faces
challenges. Everybody facesobstacles. It's how we approach
them? are we approaching themwith a way of looking for
solutions? are we approachingthem with the mentality that I
want to complain about them. Andas a small business owner, you
don't have the luxury of timethat a lot of other people

(31:34):
would, as a small businessowner, or entrepreneur, you need
to be looking for theopportunities and everything I
had, I had a really neat bossyears ago, where I went to him
with a problem at work. And Iremember the specific problem
because Joshua have a greatidea. I go what he goes, I want
you to go back to your office,they get three solutions come
back here. It's like, okay, andI came back and like I had two
solutions to the problem. Andthe third one was like, forget

(31:55):
about it, and go have a beerwith my boss. And so I walked
back into his office and said,Okay, give me your three
solutions. And I gave him thethree solutions. And he laughs
He's like, good. Next time youhave a problem, come up with
three solutions. And come tellme three solutions. I was like,
okay, he's like, I don't wantyou to bring me a problem
anymore. Unless you have threesolutions, because they don't
even have to be good solutions.
But I want three options, so wecan discuss it. And it proves to
me that you've actually spentthe time to work on it. And it's

(32:15):
not gonna complain. Exactly. Andso from then on, it changed the
way that I looked at a problemas an opportunity, right? A
conflict is an opportunity tofind resolution. And so in our
small businesses, we're just werun around ragged, right? And we
get stuck in our own minds. Andwe think that small setbacks are
the biggest problems. I mean,being an entrepreneur or small
business owner is like the onlyprofession where you can go from

(32:38):
pure elation to pure terror inthe same hour. Absolutely. So
realizing that that is how weapproach them protein with the
solutions mindset, it's so muchmore valuable to actually making
progress. So that's where I'llleave you on.

Alright, sounds good, good management tool.
Absolutely. All right, Josh.
Well, we're gonna say goodbyetoday. I'm so glad you stopped
by. And I'd love to see yourcareer grow. And you come back
and tell me more about it in acouple years. Let me know where
you've been and the successstories, then you're gonna have
a lot more. I'm just confidentof that. Well, thank you. We're

(33:13):
gonna close it out. And Josh isgonna say my closing line. Until
next time,

You better be up to something.

All right. Bye.
Bye.
Thanks for joining us this weekon Small Business Insights, make
sure you visit our website atFisher podcast.com where you can
follow the podcast on iTunes oryour favorite podcast platform,
so you'll never miss a show. Ifyou enjoyed and found value in
today's episode, we'd appreciatea rating and review on iTunes or

(33:43):
simply share it with a friendthat would help us out to make
sure you tune in next week forour next episode. Until then,
you better be up to something

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Keynote Speaker Business - Joshua M Evans

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