August 3, 2025 • 25 mins
Caroline Biesalski introduces the episode by discussing the impact of small initiatives on business profits. She welcomes guest Brad Koch, who shares his coaching journey and emphasizes the role of mindset and mentorship in achieving coaching success. The conversation highlights the importance of small businesses as community backbones and explores transitioning tradespeople into business ownership. Brad shares key insights from his book, "Profitable Pathways," offering listeners practical strategies for success. The episode concludes with information on where to find Brad Koch and Caroline's final thoughts on the power of intentionality in business and life.
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Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
Every single holiday, flowers are gonna showup.
And bundling all that together, that had such atremendous impact on their profits.
I probably quoted the wrong percentage, but itwas a 75% increase in their profit, not just
their top line, but their profit because theystacked these little initiatives in the right
(00:27):
order, and it just had a tremendous effect.
Welcome to Inspired Choice Today.
I'm your host, Caroline Biesalski, here tobring you authentic stories, surprising
lessons, and powerful takeaways to fuel yourjourney in business and life.
In each episode, I'll take you from oneinspiring guest to the next, blending their
(00:48):
experiences with my experiences to uncoverpractical strategies you can use right away.
Whether you're starting out or stepping up,stay tuned for insights and actionable tips
that make a difference.
And stick around until the end for a specialfreebie just for our listeners.
(01:09):
Hello, and welcome, inspired podcast community.
This is your new episode.
My name is Caroline, and I have so much funalready because my today's guest is Brad Cook,
and I'm so happy to meet today.
What a beautiful day.
How are you doing?
I am wonderful.
It's a beautiful day here in the Southeast ofthe United States.
(01:32):
I hope you're having beautiful weather too.
Oh, a little bit of snow today.
Oh.
Yeah.
I'm in the Alps or in the mountains of Bavaria.
But doesn't matter.
I would like to introduce you to the audience.
I'm inside.
You know?
It's snowing outside.
So okay.
(01:53):
You are a Marine Corps veteran and entrepreneurwith over 30 years of experience.
You are the founder of Foresight, an executiveand business coaching company dedicated to
helping small businesses thrive.
A proud father, grandfather, and husband of 34years, you are passionate about improving
(02:14):
communities by empowering small businesses toachieve their goals.
Welcome to the inspired podcast, Brad.
Welcome.
Well, thank you.
It's a pleasure to be here.
You've had some wonderful guests, and I'mthrilled to be one of them.
Yes.
You definitely are.
And my first question to you is, what inspiredyou to transition from building your own
(02:40):
businesses to coaching others throughForesight?
Yeah.
So I believe everyone goes and reaches a forkin the road at some point in their life or
their career, some more than others.
For me, that happened about 32 years into, I'lljust call it corporate America.
(03:06):
And if I went to the right, I would continuedoing the things that I had been doing for
years.
If I went to the left, it would be a newjourney.
And for us in our life, going to the left wasan exciting choice.
Our kids had all left the house.
(03:28):
We were ready to move into a different part ofthe country.
And as I was thinking, what would I want to do?
Coaching really came to the forefront becauseif I think back to my career, any success that
I had, I could directly correlate coachingeither that I personally had through my coach
(03:52):
or coaching that I did with other employees orcolleagues to ultimately get to the goal, have
success.
And so I knew the power of coaching, and Ireally wanted to take that and apply it at the
community level.
Small businesses don't necessarily have accessto, you know, technical business coaches,
(04:21):
people that can really give them tools andprocesses to start their business.
So that was my motivation that I wanted tobring what I had learned into the local
communities.
Oh, I love that.
Thank you so much for sharing.
You wanted to serve other people and to giveback maybe a little bit of your knowledge and
(04:43):
wisdom as well from experience, not from whatyou learned at school also because that doesn't
serve us.
It has to do because, yeah, when you own abusiness, you like to be mentored by someone
who has the experience.
You said it.
And also, you said you had coaches foryourself.
So please tell us who was the best coach youever had.
(05:08):
Oh, that's a tough one.
I'd you know, they all serve different purposesin my life at different times.
I can recall a coach that was just brilliant athelping me understand how to lead a team.
So there was a point in my career where I waspromoted.
(05:30):
So I was this is back before I owned my firstbusiness.
And I went from being a peer with other peoplein the department to now being their boss.
And that's a challenge that lots of peopleface.
And that particular coach, I think, brought methrough that with as little scarring as you
(05:55):
could possibly get in that situation.
I've had another coach that was really, reallygood at marketing and understood how the human
mind works with story.
And so I learned a lot from them, how to bringthe customer into the story to really get them
(06:19):
engaged and take action.
And then, of course, there's my father who'soverall been probably the best coach in my
life.
So it's hard to pick one in particular, butthose are three that stand out.
Oh, I love that.
Thank you so much.
And also, that you mentioned your father.
(06:40):
Yeah.
I love it when this is the case for otherpeople.
It's not the case.
They don't take so much away.
You know what?
I had a guest, and I asked this question, andshe said the best coach I ever had was the
worst coach because I knew exactly what to whatnot to do.
You know?
(07:00):
So you take the opposite.
This
is also
a great approach.
Mhmm.
Well, the truth is you could have a great coachand not be a great student and you're not going
to get results.
So much depends upon the person that'sreceiving the coaching.
(07:22):
And are they open?
Do they have blocks up?
Are they pessimistic?
Are they, oh, this will never work?
Or do they have, not a fixed mindset, but anopen mindset that I can do anything or I can
try anything?
(07:43):
That's where magic happens.
And you can learn from your bad experiences.
Those are painful, and those tend to stick withus longer.
But the truth is during the course of our day,at least I believe, if your eyes are open,
there are tons of opportunities to improve yourbusiness, of course, but your life just by
(08:09):
having your eyes open and being open tofeedback, whether it's positive or negative.
Yes.
That's so true.
Thank you so much.
It's also about perspective as well.
Being open, right?
The growth mindset.
Yes.
I love that very much.
To be open-minded.
I'm open-minded all the time with my podcastguests.
(08:31):
I learn so much, you know, in a short period oftime.
We connect 15 to 20 minutes, and then I knowsomething I did not know before or my thinking
changed.
You know?
So I have another question for you.
Of course, why do you believe small businessesare the backbone of communities, and how does
(08:51):
your coaching address their unique challenges?
When if you're in the States and you probablyas well in Europe, with COVID, I think that's a
great example of what happens when we lose theinfrastructure of small businesses and what
(09:15):
that does to your local community.
And it's I can tell you the places that I livedor the places that I visited during COVID, it
was very apparent that the community sufferedwithout the local businesses.
You can Amazon this and you can Amazon that,but at the end of the day, the heart of any
(09:38):
community in my mind is the local businesses.
That could be a positive, and that could be anegative.
It really just depends on how the business ispositioned, and a myriad of other factors.
So because of that, because that I just feellike they're so important, my focus is to help
(10:04):
them do their job better.
And let me define better.
I mean, better for some might be more profit.
Better for others might mean retaining clientslonger.
So some businesses, a customer experiences,they go and they buy the thing, the widget or
(10:29):
the service, and then the customer goessomewhere else next time.
And that's expensive for a business to havethat happen.
And so teaching business owners how to have astrategy to actually retain customers for
longer, it's just a different way to look atthe problem of solving issues for clients.
(10:54):
And then some, it is the challenge they have.
And I use this example often, and I think a lotof people do, so I apologize if you've heard
something like this.
The perfect example to me is the tradesman ortradeswoman, someone that's good with their
(11:17):
hands.
Maybe they're a plumber, and they were workingfor somebody as an apprentice.
They got good, and they got tired of workingfor that person.
Maybe the guy wasn't a good boss, or maybe thehours were terrible, and they started thinking,
you know, I can do this myself.
I don't need Bob's Plumbing to give me a job.
(11:42):
So they go out on their own, and they get acouple of clients.
They do a good job.
The next thing you know, you blink your eyesand five years have gone by.
They're still out on the road in the truck,earning wrenches, doing the same thing they did
on day one.
(12:02):
They never made the transition from employee toowner.
And I think that happens more than we realize.
So my heart tells me helping people like thatunderstand they have this business.
(12:22):
They have that skill.
Now let's turn that skill into this thing thatcreates generational wealth, that creates
freedom of time.
Because it is, on day one, they don't get paidunless they're out there turning the wrench.
And so it's this time for money transfer, andthat's really not—you can't—you're limited on
(12:48):
how many hours you can put in on a job to getpaid.
So the real growth happens when you realize thebusiness is there to serve you.
And so helping that plumber in that examplelearn how to grow his business in a way that he
could take three weeks off and go to the Alpsand go skiing, and everything would still work
(13:12):
out just fine because he has a business.
I'd like to use this analogy, and I know I'mrambling, but I think this is a good one to
share.
Systems run the business.
People run the systems.
And as the owner, our job is to lead thepeople.
(13:32):
And so when you think about your organizationlike that, then the possibilities are endless.
Yes.
That's so true.
I love how you shared this, and I did not hearit before, I think.
And even though, you know, it's a differentperson telling the same story.
No.
It was not the case.
(13:52):
So it's very helpful for me and the audiencebecause I was one of them.
I had a company 16 years, and I don't know if Imade the transition to owner because I thought
it doesn't work without me.
But then I started traveling like I wanted itto do, and then I think the system was not
(14:15):
right in place at that time.
And the people I employed were doing what theythought was good, but it wasn't.
So everything went.
Yeah.
I can laugh about it.
I'm doing podcasts now.
It's better.
You know?
It's my passion.
(14:36):
Right.
But your story is a perfect example of what,let's face it.
It takes a certain type of person to have theguts to start their own business, whatever it
is.
If it's a cleaning company, if you're a writer,if you're a plumber, it takes a lot of guts to
(14:57):
say, I'm gonna bet on myself.
And that's only part of the equation forsuccess.
And most people don't.
They haven't gone to business school like acoach has.
They haven't got years of training as a coachhas, and they don't have years of experience
(15:19):
learning how things work in the real world withother clients and getting feedback.
And, you know, this way to set up a cleaningstructure works or this one doesn't because of
this reason.
You would never know that, unless youexperience what you experienced, which is you.
(15:41):
I don't know what your business was.
But if you were to do it over again, you knowat least one way to not do it because you, you
know, you ultimately experienced that.
And your priority shifted and, you know, ofcourse, now you're much happier.
Yes.
So true.
It was an accounting company.
(16:02):
You know?
It was boring.
That is why I left, so to say, but it had ahappy end.
It was good.
Yeah.
Now I do what my passion is, and, of course, Ihave another question for you.
Let's see what it is.
Can you share a key insight from your latestbook, "Profitable Pathways," that listeners can
(16:24):
apply right away?
Yes.
Most people have heard of and understand theconcept of compound interest.
As an accountant, you would certainlyunderstand that.
And, I think Warren Buffett or someone reallysmart said it's the eighth wonder of the world,
(16:45):
this idea of compound interest.
Well, I think the same thing applies in action.
So compounding action.
Doing little things that stack on top of eachother over time will give you a result much
bigger and much more valuable to the person asopposed to going and just saying, I'm just
(17:15):
gonna do this one thing.
I'll give you an example of that.
In the book, I think I talk about this valuechain, and this is think of someone having a
wedding.
In order for a wedding to take place, there area lot of little things that happen.
(17:35):
There's the man or woman making the decision,getting the ring, so they're talking to a
jeweler.
Then, of course, there's the venue.
There's the food.
There's the catering.
There's the DJ.
There's the dress.
There's all these things.
(17:57):
Let's take a florist, for example.
A florist is somewhere along that chain.
If you were looking at a timeline, everythingto the left, so everything that would take
place in a bride's mind before that, those aremarketing opportunities where if you took a
little action for each one of those, thecompounding effect of that would be tremendous.
(18:24):
And I think in the book, I give an example of aflorist that instituted three different
strategies (18:33):
what's called a reactivation campaign, going back and retouching everyone
that's purchased from the past, and then what'scalled a joint venture.
So going to the jeweler, the wedding planner,the venue, the DJ, and having not just
(18:56):
relationships, but active, like networking,being very intentional about what they do.
And then the third one, I think, was bundling.
So, you might sell the bride the flowers forthe venue.
That might turn into, the next year on everyholiday, you will receive flowers from the
(19:22):
groom, every Valentine, Saint Patrick's, youname it.
Every single holiday, a flower is gonna showup.
And bundling all that together, that had such atremendous impact on their profits.
I probably quoted the wrong percentage, but itwas a 75% increase in their profit, not just
(19:46):
their top line, but their profit because theystacked these little initiatives in the right
order, and it just had a tremendous effect.
Wow.
I love what you shared.
This is a whole business model.
And what I take away from this is that it'sabout making people's lives easier.
(20:10):
Ultimately, in, yeah, in that example, thewedding planner, I mean, the flower shop,
they're positioning themselves to be a solutionfor the bride all along the way.
But an accounting firm is, you know, there'sexamples of an accounting firm, which most
(20:33):
people would think, god.
That's what marketing.
You know?
You do books for businesses, and you doindividual taxes for people.
Yeah.
But, do you have a relationship with businessbrokers?
Do you have relationships with realtors,financial wealth people?
(20:56):
There are people that make a tremendous living.
They may have started doing taxes and doingbooks, but they've learned how to build a
business that runs and generates thiscompounding revenue to them.
Then they probably don't even do—they don'teven deal with numbers anymore.
(21:18):
You know?
Yeah.
Yeah.
It's the merchandising.
Yes.
Thank you so much for sharing.
I could talk for hours.
I think I have one last question for you.
It's about where can we find you when peoplewant to reach out to you after listening to
this episode.
The easiest way is on my website, ForesightCoach, and that's the number 4, s-i-g-h-t coach
(21:48):
dot com.
And there, there'll be links to my book andsome other things that I've done, as well as a
newsletter, email, social media.
I try and stay as active as I can.
I don't know that I do as good a job as you do,but I try and stay active on the social media.
(22:13):
Yes.
Please stay active.
We are connected now, and please reach out toBrad.
He's amazing.
Of course, I put the link in the show notes.
Thank you so much for our interview.
Now it's time for your final thoughts to theaudience, please.
(22:37):
I'll say this.
If you are in business or even take a stepback, if some of your listeners aren't
necessarily thinking about going into business,they have a job, and so their job, you could
step back and think about your job as your ownlittle business.
(22:58):
I want to emphasize the word intentional.
I used it a minute ago.
I don't think it gets used enough.
And that is it's one thing to write down notesand to-do lists and stuff like that.
There's another level when you becomeintentional about it.
(23:19):
And for me, that means when you wake up and youthink about that thing, how does that apply?
Like, it's not just what you do.
It affects other people.
And how do you get other people involved in thesuccess of that task or that thing?
(23:40):
If you think about if you work for somebodyelse, you've got colleagues and you've got a
support system.
If you have your own business, it might feellike you're on an island, but you're not.
Involve people and help yourself be intentionalabout achieving one little thing at a time.
(24:01):
Stack them, and at the end of the year, you'regoing to have some huge results, whatever that
is for you as an individual.
Intentional.
That's the word.
Okay.
So I rename the podcast to Intentional Podcast.
Yeah.
That's a great idea.
Thank you so much.
(24:22):
I'm inspired now.
Oh, well, you're too kind.
Thank you so much for having me.
Oh, and I see you, of course, in the next.
Thank you for listening to Inspired ChoiceToday.
I'm thrilled to have you on this journey ofgrowth and transformation.
Don't forget to hit follow or subscribe to stayconnected and never miss an episode.
(24:45):
And here's something special.
Grab your free 20-minute breakthrough sessionwith me.
It's designed to help you kick-start or levelup your business.
Just check out the show notes for more.
Until next time, keep making those inspiredchoices.
See you in the next episode.
Every single holiday, flowers are gonna showup.
And bundling all that together, that had such atremendous impact on their profits.
I probably quoted the wrong percentage, but itwas a 75% increase in their profit, not just
their top line, but their profit because theystacked these little initiatives in the right
(00:27):
order, and it just had a tremendous effect.
Welcome to Inspired Choice Today.
I'm your host, Caroline Biesalski, here tobring you authentic stories, surprising
lessons, and powerful takeaways to fuel yourjourney in business and life.
In each episode, I'll take you from oneinspiring guest to the next, blending their
(00:48):
experiences with my experiences to uncoverpractical strategies you can use right away.
Whether you're starting out or stepping up,stay tuned for insights and actionable tips
that make a difference.
And stick around until the end for a specialfreebie just for our listeners.
(01:09):
Hello, and welcome, inspired podcast community.
This is your new episode.
My name is Caroline, and I have so much funalready because my today's guest is Brad Cook,
and I'm so happy to meet today.
What a beautiful day.
How are you doing?
I am wonderful.
It's a beautiful day here in the Southeast ofthe United States.
(01:32):
I hope you're having beautiful weather too.
Oh, a little bit of snow today.
Oh.
Yeah.
I'm in the Alps or in the mountains of Bavaria.
But doesn't matter.
I would like to introduce you to the audience.
I'm inside.
You know?
It's snowing outside.
So okay.
(01:53):
You are a Marine Corps veteran and entrepreneurwith over 30 years of experience.
You are the founder of Foresight, an executiveand business coaching company dedicated to
helping small businesses thrive.
A proud father, grandfather, and husband of 34years, you are passionate about improving
(02:14):
communities by empowering small businesses toachieve their goals.
Welcome to the inspired podcast, Brad.
Welcome.
Well, thank you.
It's a pleasure to be here.
You've had some wonderful guests, and I'mthrilled to be one of them.
Yes.
You definitely are.
And my first question to you is, what inspiredyou to transition from building your own
(02:40):
businesses to coaching others throughForesight?
Yeah.
So I believe everyone goes and reaches a forkin the road at some point in their life or
their career, some more than others.
For me, that happened about 32 years into, I'lljust call it corporate America.
(03:06):
And if I went to the right, I would continuedoing the things that I had been doing for
years.
If I went to the left, it would be a newjourney.
And for us in our life, going to the left wasan exciting choice.
Our kids had all left the house.
(03:28):
We were ready to move into a different part ofthe country.
And as I was thinking, what would I want to do?
Coaching really came to the forefront becauseif I think back to my career, any success that
I had, I could directly correlate coachingeither that I personally had through my coach
(03:52):
or coaching that I did with other employees orcolleagues to ultimately get to the goal, have
success.
And so I knew the power of coaching, and Ireally wanted to take that and apply it at the
community level.
Small businesses don't necessarily have accessto, you know, technical business coaches,
(04:21):
people that can really give them tools andprocesses to start their business.
So that was my motivation that I wanted tobring what I had learned into the local
communities.
Oh, I love that.
Thank you so much for sharing.
You wanted to serve other people and to giveback maybe a little bit of your knowledge and
(04:43):
wisdom as well from experience, not from whatyou learned at school also because that doesn't
serve us.
It has to do because, yeah, when you own abusiness, you like to be mentored by someone
who has the experience.
You said it.
And also, you said you had coaches foryourself.
So please tell us who was the best coach youever had.
(05:08):
Oh, that's a tough one.
I'd you know, they all serve different purposesin my life at different times.
I can recall a coach that was just brilliant athelping me understand how to lead a team.
So there was a point in my career where I waspromoted.
(05:30):
So I was this is back before I owned my firstbusiness.
And I went from being a peer with other peoplein the department to now being their boss.
And that's a challenge that lots of peopleface.
And that particular coach, I think, brought methrough that with as little scarring as you
(05:55):
could possibly get in that situation.
I've had another coach that was really, reallygood at marketing and understood how the human
mind works with story.
And so I learned a lot from them, how to bringthe customer into the story to really get them
(06:19):
engaged and take action.
And then, of course, there's my father who'soverall been probably the best coach in my
life.
So it's hard to pick one in particular, butthose are three that stand out.
Oh, I love that.
Thank you so much.
And also, that you mentioned your father.
(06:40):
Yeah.
I love it when this is the case for otherpeople.
It's not the case.
They don't take so much away.
You know what?
I had a guest, and I asked this question, andshe said the best coach I ever had was the
worst coach because I knew exactly what to whatnot to do.
You know?
(07:00):
So you take the opposite.
This
is also
a great approach.
Mhmm.
Well, the truth is you could have a great coachand not be a great student and you're not going
to get results.
So much depends upon the person that'sreceiving the coaching.
(07:22):
And are they open?
Do they have blocks up?
Are they pessimistic?
Are they, oh, this will never work?
Or do they have, not a fixed mindset, but anopen mindset that I can do anything or I can
try anything?
(07:43):
That's where magic happens.
And you can learn from your bad experiences.
Those are painful, and those tend to stick withus longer.
But the truth is during the course of our day,at least I believe, if your eyes are open,
there are tons of opportunities to improve yourbusiness, of course, but your life just by
(08:09):
having your eyes open and being open tofeedback, whether it's positive or negative.
Yes.
That's so true.
Thank you so much.
It's also about perspective as well.
Being open, right?
The growth mindset.
Yes.
I love that very much.
To be open-minded.
I'm open-minded all the time with my podcastguests.
(08:31):
I learn so much, you know, in a short period oftime.
We connect 15 to 20 minutes, and then I knowsomething I did not know before or my thinking
changed.
You know?
So I have another question for you.
Of course, why do you believe small businessesare the backbone of communities, and how does
(08:51):
your coaching address their unique challenges?
When if you're in the States and you probablyas well in Europe, with COVID, I think that's a
great example of what happens when we lose theinfrastructure of small businesses and what
(09:15):
that does to your local community.
And it's I can tell you the places that I livedor the places that I visited during COVID, it
was very apparent that the community sufferedwithout the local businesses.
You can Amazon this and you can Amazon that,but at the end of the day, the heart of any
(09:38):
community in my mind is the local businesses.
That could be a positive, and that could be anegative.
It really just depends on how the business ispositioned, and a myriad of other factors.
So because of that, because that I just feellike they're so important, my focus is to help
(10:04):
them do their job better.
And let me define better.
I mean, better for some might be more profit.
Better for others might mean retaining clientslonger.
So some businesses, a customer experiences,they go and they buy the thing, the widget or
(10:29):
the service, and then the customer goessomewhere else next time.
And that's expensive for a business to havethat happen.
And so teaching business owners how to have astrategy to actually retain customers for
longer, it's just a different way to look atthe problem of solving issues for clients.
(10:54):
And then some, it is the challenge they have.
And I use this example often, and I think a lotof people do, so I apologize if you've heard
something like this.
The perfect example to me is the tradesman ortradeswoman, someone that's good with their
(11:17):
hands.
Maybe they're a plumber, and they were workingfor somebody as an apprentice.
They got good, and they got tired of workingfor that person.
Maybe the guy wasn't a good boss, or maybe thehours were terrible, and they started thinking,
you know, I can do this myself.
I don't need Bob's Plumbing to give me a job.
(11:42):
So they go out on their own, and they get acouple of clients.
They do a good job.
The next thing you know, you blink your eyesand five years have gone by.
They're still out on the road in the truck,earning wrenches, doing the same thing they did
on day one.
(12:02):
They never made the transition from employee toowner.
And I think that happens more than we realize.
So my heart tells me helping people like thatunderstand they have this business.
(12:22):
They have that skill.
Now let's turn that skill into this thing thatcreates generational wealth, that creates
freedom of time.
Because it is, on day one, they don't get paidunless they're out there turning the wrench.
And so it's this time for money transfer, andthat's really not—you can't—you're limited on
(12:48):
how many hours you can put in on a job to getpaid.
So the real growth happens when you realize thebusiness is there to serve you.
And so helping that plumber in that examplelearn how to grow his business in a way that he
could take three weeks off and go to the Alpsand go skiing, and everything would still work
(13:12):
out just fine because he has a business.
I'd like to use this analogy, and I know I'mrambling, but I think this is a good one to
share.
Systems run the business.
People run the systems.
And as the owner, our job is to lead thepeople.
(13:32):
And so when you think about your organizationlike that, then the possibilities are endless.
Yes.
That's so true.
I love how you shared this, and I did not hearit before, I think.
And even though, you know, it's a differentperson telling the same story.
No.
It was not the case.
(13:52):
So it's very helpful for me and the audiencebecause I was one of them.
I had a company 16 years, and I don't know if Imade the transition to owner because I thought
it doesn't work without me.
But then I started traveling like I wanted itto do, and then I think the system was not
(14:15):
right in place at that time.
And the people I employed were doing what theythought was good, but it wasn't.
So everything went.
Yeah.
I can laugh about it.
I'm doing podcasts now.
It's better.
You know?
It's my passion.
(14:36):
Right.
But your story is a perfect example of what,let's face it.
It takes a certain type of person to have theguts to start their own business, whatever it
is.
If it's a cleaning company, if you're a writer,if you're a plumber, it takes a lot of guts to
(14:57):
say, I'm gonna bet on myself.
And that's only part of the equation forsuccess.
And most people don't.
They haven't gone to business school like acoach has.
They haven't got years of training as a coachhas, and they don't have years of experience
(15:19):
learning how things work in the real world withother clients and getting feedback.
And, you know, this way to set up a cleaningstructure works or this one doesn't because of
this reason.
You would never know that, unless youexperience what you experienced, which is you.
(15:41):
I don't know what your business was.
But if you were to do it over again, you knowat least one way to not do it because you, you
know, you ultimately experienced that.
And your priority shifted and, you know, ofcourse, now you're much happier.
Yes.
So true.
It was an accounting company.
(16:02):
You know?
It was boring.
That is why I left, so to say, but it had ahappy end.
It was good.
Yeah.
Now I do what my passion is, and, of course, Ihave another question for you.
Let's see what it is.
Can you share a key insight from your latestbook, "Profitable Pathways," that listeners can
(16:24):
apply right away?
Yes.
Most people have heard of and understand theconcept of compound interest.
As an accountant, you would certainlyunderstand that.
And, I think Warren Buffett or someone reallysmart said it's the eighth wonder of the world,
(16:45):
this idea of compound interest.
Well, I think the same thing applies in action.
So compounding action.
Doing little things that stack on top of eachother over time will give you a result much
bigger and much more valuable to the person asopposed to going and just saying, I'm just
(17:15):
gonna do this one thing.
I'll give you an example of that.
In the book, I think I talk about this valuechain, and this is think of someone having a
wedding.
In order for a wedding to take place, there area lot of little things that happen.
(17:35):
There's the man or woman making the decision,getting the ring, so they're talking to a
jeweler.
Then, of course, there's the venue.
There's the food.
There's the catering.
There's the DJ.
There's the dress.
There's all these things.
(17:57):
Let's take a florist, for example.
A florist is somewhere along that chain.
If you were looking at a timeline, everythingto the left, so everything that would take
place in a bride's mind before that, those aremarketing opportunities where if you took a
little action for each one of those, thecompounding effect of that would be tremendous.
(18:24):
And I think in the book, I give an example of aflorist that instituted three different
strategies (18:33):
what's called a reactivation campaign, going back and retouching everyone
that's purchased from the past, and then what'scalled a joint venture.
So going to the jeweler, the wedding planner,the venue, the DJ, and having not just
(18:56):
relationships, but active, like networking,being very intentional about what they do.
And then the third one, I think, was bundling.
So, you might sell the bride the flowers forthe venue.
That might turn into, the next year on everyholiday, you will receive flowers from the
(19:22):
groom, every Valentine, Saint Patrick's, youname it.
Every single holiday, a flower is gonna showup.
And bundling all that together, that had such atremendous impact on their profits.
I probably quoted the wrong percentage, but itwas a 75% increase in their profit, not just
(19:46):
their top line, but their profit because theystacked these little initiatives in the right
order, and it just had a tremendous effect.
Wow.
I love what you shared.
This is a whole business model.
And what I take away from this is that it'sabout making people's lives easier.
(20:10):
Ultimately, in, yeah, in that example, thewedding planner, I mean, the flower shop,
they're positioning themselves to be a solutionfor the bride all along the way.
But an accounting firm is, you know, there'sexamples of an accounting firm, which most
(20:33):
people would think, god.
That's what marketing.
You know?
You do books for businesses, and you doindividual taxes for people.
Yeah.
But, do you have a relationship with businessbrokers?
Do you have relationships with realtors,financial wealth people?
(20:56):
There are people that make a tremendous living.
They may have started doing taxes and doingbooks, but they've learned how to build a
business that runs and generates thiscompounding revenue to them.
Then they probably don't even do—they don'teven deal with numbers anymore.
(21:18):
You know?
Yeah.
Yeah.
It's the merchandising.
Yes.
Thank you so much for sharing.
I could talk for hours.
I think I have one last question for you.
It's about where can we find you when peoplewant to reach out to you after listening to
this episode.
The easiest way is on my website, ForesightCoach, and that's the number 4, s-i-g-h-t coach
(21:48):
dot com.
And there, there'll be links to my book andsome other things that I've done, as well as a
newsletter, email, social media.
I try and stay as active as I can.
I don't know that I do as good a job as you do,but I try and stay active on the social media.
(22:13):
Yes.
Please stay active.
We are connected now, and please reach out toBrad.
He's amazing.
Of course, I put the link in the show notes.
Thank you so much for our interview.
Now it's time for your final thoughts to theaudience, please.
(22:37):
I'll say this.
If you are in business or even take a stepback, if some of your listeners aren't
necessarily thinking about going into business,they have a job, and so their job, you could
step back and think about your job as your ownlittle business.
(22:58):
I want to emphasize the word intentional.
I used it a minute ago.
I don't think it gets used enough.
And that is it's one thing to write down notesand to-do lists and stuff like that.
There's another level when you becomeintentional about it.
(23:19):
And for me, that means when you wake up and youthink about that thing, how does that apply?
Like, it's not just what you do.
It affects other people.
And how do you get other people involved in thesuccess of that task or that thing?
(23:40):
If you think about if you work for somebodyelse, you've got colleagues and you've got a
support system.
If you have your own business, it might feellike you're on an island, but you're not.
Involve people and help yourself be intentionalabout achieving one little thing at a time.
(24:01):
Stack them, and at the end of the year, you'regoing to have some huge results, whatever that
is for you as an individual.
Intentional.
That's the word.
Okay.
So I rename the podcast to Intentional Podcast.
Yeah.
That's a great idea.
Thank you so much.
(24:22):
I'm inspired now.
Oh, well, you're too kind.
Thank you so much for having me.
Oh, and I see you, of course, in the next.
Thank you for listening to Inspired ChoiceToday.
I'm thrilled to have you on this journey ofgrowth and transformation.
Don't forget to hit follow or subscribe to stayconnected and never miss an episode.
(24:45):
And here's something special.
Grab your free 20-minute breakthrough sessionwith me.
It's designed to help you kick-start or levelup your business.
Just check out the show notes for more.
Until next time, keep making those inspiredchoices.
See you in the next episode.
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