#21 Entrepreneurial Inspiration with Marty Fahncke

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Devin Henderson (00:04):
All right, everybody, welcome to the
Possibility Mindset Podcast.
I'm Devin Henderson, I am yourhost and I believe that
something greater is alwayspossible for you.
And let me introduce you to myawesome friend, marty.
All right, so that's theinformal introduction, right?
So I'm gonna give a couple ofthanks and then we're gonna talk
about the awesomeness ofeverything that you are.

Marty Fahncke (00:25):
I notice you didn't introduce my last name.
I didn't for a reason, becauseyou can't pronounce it.
No, I can, I can.
I'm gonna play a little gamewith them about it.
Okay, I even okay.
So we'll get to it All right.

well, before we get to Marty's last name, I
want to say thank you once againto etc.
This is my first podcast in2024 where I'm actually
recording in 2024.
So it's awesome that we havethis partnership going.
They give us this space.
They feed us breakfast.
How was breakfast?
Ah?

so good, I'm full .
I need to take a nap now.

Yeah yeah.
And you've eaten here before.
Yeah yeah, good place, yeah,yeah yeah, and you're sharing
with them.

You're not gonna say that.

Wait, should we talk?

about what you're used to.

Yeah, so before Marty knew that the restaurant
was called Etcetera, which, bythe way, if you don't know, it's
like spelled E, like it's basedoff the word Etcetera, but it's
E-G-G-T-C.
Etcetera, right?
Well, the first time you sawthe sign, what did you think the
name of it?
I thought it was.

Ecstasy and I, you know, I mentally put an S in
there.
So I was like, oh, Ecstasy,that must be a really really
good place to eat.

Is that what brought you in?

Sure.

I was like oh, et cetera.

Okay, well, that makes sense too, but I still
call it that I drive past hereall the time because there's a
scout camp actually not far fromhere.

That I've been Nash Camp Nash yeah.

And I've been a scout leader for seven almost 18
years.
So, I drive past here all thetime, I've eaten here several
times and I still call itEcstasy in my head, though.

Okay, so we lost camera there for a second
and had to make a switch, butanyway, we were talking about
what the moon landing and no, no, we were talking about Camp
Nash and how you were a scoutleader and how you thought this
place was called Ecstasy, anyway, et cetera.
Thank you, et cetera.
Shani Also want to let you knowI've pitched it one time on
this podcast.
This has been life changing forme.

(02:07):
Zero shoes Check it out.
Are you familiar with barefootwalking or barefoot style shoes?

Only for watching your podcast.
Okay, so you saw it.
So I saw an episode where youfirst talked about those.
Yeah, I have people who I know,people who wear those things,
but I haven't tried it, haven'tbeen into it.

Yeah, so for me it really has made a difference
in just I'm.
I just feel I'm not sure I'mdeveloping better muscles in my
ankles.
My knees are stronger thanthey've ever been.
I feel great.
These shoes allow your toes todisplay because of the white toe
box.
There's a zero level drop,which is where Zero gets its
name, so that you're not, yourheel isn't elevated, it's.

(02:43):
It's very flexible.
The shoes are very light.
They're awesome.
Go check it out.
Zeroshoescom slash go slashDevin Okay.
So zero with an X, x-e-r-o.
Zeroshoescom slash go slashDevin.
Get on there and check it outit.
Really it's amazing.
If you've ever thought about,you know barefoot is good, but
you can't go barefoot in thewintertime.

(03:03):
Well, they even make winterboots, right, so that, yeah,
seasonal.
They make fashion shoes.
If you want to really get thatbarefoot simulated walk while
you're wearing something on yourfeet, zeroshoes is the way to
go.
Zeroshoescom slash go slashDevin.
Okay, let's introduce youformally now.
Same with your last name, marty.

(03:24):
Before I pronounce his lastname, I want you to just go to
the title of the episode, lookat his last name and see how you
think you would pronounce it.
That's the fun part.
Like, how would you say itBecause go ahead, pause it right
now.
Go look at it, come back to us.
Okay, I wonder what they'rethinking.
I'm just going to say it'sFonkey, and the reason I'm

(03:45):
thinking of that is because Idon't know if this is still in
your email signature, but youused to put it phonetically in
there Yep, maybe Deer, and thenKey, because people must have
been pronouncing it wrong, I'mguessing.

Every way you could pronounce that.
Yeah, how do people say it?
So it's weird, because my lastname doesn't have enough vowels
it's way too many consonants andyet people try to put more
consonants in it.
So the number one thing thatthey put in are Frankie or Frana
check, or yeah, I've heardFrankenstein, frankenstein,
fonkey.

Funky, you had to just.

Yeah, you know, it's a tough one.

Yeah, so Marty Fonkey, this is Marty Fonkey.
So many things to say aboutMarty.
Okay, we're going to start withserial entrepreneur that's one
of the terms you gave me.
Is that kind of like the serial, anything but serial
entrepreneur?
You're a big entrepreneur guy.
That's what you are.
You've done manyentrepreneurships.

And none of them related to breakfast soup.
Yeah, so yeah, I've started andbuilt I don't even know how
many businesses now in my lifeand some of them have been
miserable failures and some ofthem have been very successful
and I've just kind of always hadthat entrepreneurial, been ever
since I was a kid.

Honestly, yeah, that's great man, some people
do just get that entrepreneurialfire lit in them early on and
no one has to tell them go outand start a business.
This way, you just go and youfail, you learn and then you
just get up and you do it again.
So I love that.
So, yeah, many, many businesses, which I want to hear about
some of those, because it soundslike a variety of them.
Marty yeah, he's a businessgrowth strategist, helping

(05:22):
entrepreneurs around the world.
As a marketer, you've generatedover $1 billion in sales.
Is that it?
That's it, I know.
All right, there's still time.
There is still time, that'strue.
And as a mergers andacquisition advisor, he's been
involved in nearly $500 millionin deals.

(05:43):
Yeah, $500 in deals, $500million in deals.
It was the way that I have thatwritten is I didn't write that
the way I was going to read it.
He loves and here's the coolpart he loves to teach and
inspire other entrepreneurs,which is one of the great
reasons to have you on thepodcast today.

(06:04):
This is we're talking about thepossibility mindset, asking
what else is possible.
When you ask what else ispossible, what greater way than
to find a mentor, find anadvisor, find a teacher who's
going to teach you, invoke thiswisdom in you to how can I
pursue greater possibilities inmy life?
Because you can cut down yearson the curve of learning when

(06:27):
you're learning from someone whohas failed over and over and
over again.
So that's who's coming to ustoday.
So, entrepreneurs, buckle in,get ready.
We're going to learn some coolthings, even if you're not an
entrepreneur.
You're going to have fun.
I've known Marty for a while,so thanks for joining today.

Thanks for having me.
I am so excited to be here.

Awesome, man, Cool.
And let's talk about what wefirst met.
Was it?
What?
Won't you tell them?

The Toastmasters yeah, yeah, tgif Toastmasters.
Yeah, go check them out.

Yeah, tgif.
They're here, local in town.
We're hopefully going to havesome people from that club as a
panel here to talk about whatToastmasters has meant for them.
Tgif is the title they gavethemselves for that specific
chapter in Overland Park,because TGIF stands for Thank
God.
It's Friday, yup Friday,because Fridays is when we would

(07:13):
meet.

So pretty awesome .
But I was actually in adifferent club in Utah before
moving to Kansas, so I've beenin a couple of different
Toastmasters clubs and it wasabsolutely beneficial and
critical to my success in a lotof ways, because it's difficult
to be successful in businesseither as an entrepreneur or, as
you know, if you work in thecorporate world without having

(07:35):
good communication skills, andToastmasters really does a great
job of that, and I know youwhen you were transitioning your
business from magician tospeaker and key noter.
I think it helped you as well.

Yeah, oh for sure, we were talking about this
over breakfast.
That that was.
That was the whole pivotalmoment for me.
You know, I met with Brad Plum,one of the guys in the club.
Hey, brad and Brad, what up?
And he said hey, you knowyou're doing well with the
magician thing, why not tryspeaking?
And the rest is history.
You know I went to the firstmeeting, got hooked, started

(08:08):
learning how to develop amessage and how to how to speak
instead of just entertain, and Imean that's what started it all
for me.

I was there, I got to see it.
It was the beginning before youwere rich and famous.

Yeah, I just I was doing the math and I was
like I tell people I've beenspeaking for 13 years.
It's actually been like 15since I started that because I
was in my 20s.
I started at 29, which isunreal.
So you know, a lot ofentrepreneurs do join
Toastmasters because they wantto improve in their speaking
skills, but it's not.
It's again not justentrepreneurs, I mean people.
Companies have their owninternal Toastmasters clubs to

(08:41):
help their salespeople or peoplewho give any kind of
presentations become better atspeaking, you know.
So what exactly did it do foryou?
Can you tell us, like I knowyou said it proved on your
communication?
Did it do other things thathelped you with business and
life?

I wouldn't be here right now for Toastmasters.

All right, it brought them to the very top.

To, to, to, etc in Shawnee Kansas.

There you go, well, say no more man, that's it
.
Well, and then it's funnybecause we've had some random
run-ins over the years.
Well, at one point in time whenI was still heavily doing, I
was still doing a lot of kidsparties at the time, and you've
forgotten about this now, or I'mwrong.
No, I'm sorry as a scout leader,you hired me to come and
perform for one of your kids.
It was just like a Boy Scoutpicnic or it wasn't a blue and

(09:26):
gold banquet, but it was just apicnic in the park and that's
gone from his memory.
That's how bad the performancemust have been that he's like
I'm just going to block that out, how old I'm getting.
So we had that, and then do you.
Okay, let's see if you rememberthis one, because I know this
is true, okay, no-transcript.

Oh, yeah, yeah, but where was that?

I can't remember what city that was in,
who knows.
Yeah, okay, we wouldn't knowyeah but I remember that's when
you introduced me to whatever.
At the time, yourentrepreneurial venture was on
some kind of app to help peoplesleep.

Oh yeah, absolutely.
It was like the music app.
It was Whole Tones to Sleep.
It's still out there.

Yes, Whole Tones.
Yeah, that's right.
Yeah, that's one of thebusinesses.

I started actually.

Okay.

So on my serial entrepreneurial journey was yeah
, started that from scratch andbuilt that to about $24 million
in revenue by the time I wrappedthat one up.

And I think that you sent me like it was
just like a file of something tolisten to and it did help me
sleep at the time, but I need toget back on that.

Yeah, that was frequency based music.
That was.
There's a long story there.
That's not necessarilyapplicable to what we're doing,
but it's music that has embeddedfrequencies and the relief
stress helps you sleep those allsorts of great things.
I eventually came up with aversion because testimonials
kept flooding in about how thatwas helping people's pets.
So we actually came up with apet version.

(10:45):
So if you have a lot of timesdogs during like 4th of July
fireworks time.
They get really scared, Likeyou play that?
and your dog will calm rightdown.
So yeah, we came up with asleep version, a pet version and
all sorts.
It's a great product.

Yeah, that's really cool.
Is that kind of like a whitenoise thing?
No, it's different than thewhite noise because it actually
has frequency.

So think of this let's go back in time 50 years,
yeah all right.
And you come to my house and Isay, hey, devon, I got some
great leftovers here.
Do you want to eat someleftover whatever?
And I say, okay, I'm going toput it in this magic box and I'm
not going to put it in the oven, I'm going to put it in this
magic box.
And the magic box is going toexcite the water molecules in

(11:28):
the food and the vibration andfriction of the excited water
molecules is going to heat it upfrom the inside out and it's
going to use frequency waves todo that.
And you look at me like whatare you talking about?
I'm talking about a microwave.
So we understand, as humanbeings like that frequencies can
do things right.
Your voice has a frequency,this microphone is picking up a

(11:50):
frequency and sending it to thecamera, and everything has a
frequency, and so your cells inyour body are vibrating at
various frequencies, and so thismusic.

I can feel them right now.
You're getting me excited.

So this music actually has embedded
frequencies that, as they'reabsorbing into your body, can do
certain things, including helpyou sleep and reduce stress.
So it's way more than just thesound, it's actually the
frequencies doing things.

Frequency based .
Frequency based.
Yeah, wow, that's wild man itis, I will tell you when it I'm
talking about possibilities.

When it first came to me I was like I don't
want anything to do with that Isthat right, I did.
I refused having to do it.
They did it.
The artist and the partnerlaunched it anyway, without my
involvement or not, or because Ijust said it's too weird.
They launched it.
They sold like 300 copies atlike a launch party.
And then they did a survey andthey asked them well, what did

(12:49):
you think about it?
And the testimonials came inand they sent them to me and I
was like no way, no way, is thistrue?
I'm aiming like a sleep, betterpain relief, claims that you
can't make without getting suedby the FDA like cancer, all

(13:10):
sorts of I know, just likethere's something to this that
I'm missing, and so I said, okay, I'm going to look at it.
So I looked at it and I said,oh, there's something here, and
so I agreed to launch it and Iwrote the copy for it.
And I remember to this day Iwas sitting in the parking lot
of Vietnam Cafe up in.

River Market.
Oh okay.

I remember sitting in the parking lot and I
was talking to my copywriter,Jeff, and I was trying to
inspire him and I was like,think about what you feel when
Darth Vader's music start.

Okay.

And it changes your body, Like if you watch a
movie without music.

it's completely different or jobs.

Right.
So they use music to createcertain things in your body, and
it's not just emotional, and Isaid let's talk about this.
So that was the genesis of thecopy we wrote, anyway this is
why I watched Jaws with thesound off.

Yeah, because it's not scary.
It's just that Jaws is going toeat that person.

So I launched it and sold $300,000 on the first
day, on Black Friday of 2014.

Wow, I thought you were saying the black market
, no, the black market, yeah.
And then went on to sell about$24 million worth of that.

Wow, man, that's incredible.

Yeah, that's fun to jump into.
That Now is the reason you werehesitant at first, because you
just thought there's nothinghere.
It was too weird for me towoo-woo.
I didn't understand it.
But, once.

Like I said, once I saw the testimonials from
people who actually had used itand what it was doing for them,
then I had to go study it andthen I realized it was real.
I realized, oh okay, this isn'twoo-woo, it's true.
So you can go to YouTube andlook up Soundwave Sand Sculpture
.
So there's a guy that has thesetables and he'll just put sand

(15:05):
on it and then he'll playcertain music under it and the
sand changes shape based on themusic and it's beautiful, like
snowflakes.
It's gorgeous.
Look at that.
It's really cool.
I'm like, oh well, music doesthings.

Sounds do things, frequency do things.

So I studied it pretty aggressively and then
they were using 528 hertzactually to clean oil off of oil
spills and actually playingthis sound frequency and it
breaks up and dissolves the oil.
When the gulf, when the gulfoil still happened several years
ago and they were usingfrequencies to break up the oil,
so okay, this is real.
So once I understood it wasreal, then I agreed to market it

(15:43):
and you know, here we go.

Well, it just makes you think of how faith
works.
Like the wind blows, you don'treally believe in the wind until
you see the leaves moving right.
Right, and then with the sandand the frequency it's like, and
you were skeptical at first,like eh, but then when you see
the results, that's what makesyou go.
I'm a true believer now, so Ilike that whole demonstration of
faith.
That's awesome, man.
Thanks for sharing about that.
That's cool.

There's a planning on it, but there we go.
I know, I know.

Well, I have a couple more fun fact things
before we get into sort of likehow the possibility mindset has
really fueled your you knowcareer as an entrepreneur and
your different ventures.
A couple of things.
We were having breakfast and hementioned he had grandkids.
This guy's a grandpa.
I didn't even, I didn't evenknow.
And I was this young handsomeperson, and so I was like I
don't want to ask you more aboutthat right now because I want
to save that for when we record.
And I said that's the problemwith having breakfast before you

(16:28):
record is that you don't wantto, like, get too deep because
you want to save it for theconversation.
But then he goes.
But then you also discoverthings that are good for topics
and, case in point, I alsolearned you are a motorcycle guy
.

I didn't know that either about you.

So tell us about your motorcycle and how
you became.
Do you have the leather?
Oh, yeah, do you beat people up.

No, no.
What's the motorcycle lifestylelook like?
Yes, the Vietta people.
No, I don't beat people, but Ido go to Biker Brothers.
Okay, tell us about that life.
So you know possibilities,right?
I wrote a motorcycle as a kid.
I actually got a motorcycle asa graduation present when I
graduated high school.

You got mom and dad.
I don't remember motorcycleyeah yeah, yeah.

I've been given my mom and dad both crap about
that recently, though, becausemy motorcycle was in Phoenix,
arizona, and I lived in SaltLake City at the time, so it was
like I don't know a thousandmiles away, and my dad literally
like goes congratulations, youknow, I'm giving you a
motorcycle, and it was one ofhis that he had had before, and
I don't know why it was inArizona.
I still don't know why.
Okay, but you got to go get it.

(17:33):
So I kind of ride with a friendand then I wrote a thousand
miles Like I'm 18 years old, I'mriding a thousand miles on the
motorcycle and this is not likea motorcycle you should be doing
a thousand miles on.
And I had to go up overFlagstaff and I got.
It was in June and I hit with afreak snowstorm.

So here I am, I'm 18 years old.

I don't have a clue what I'm doing.
I'm doing a thousand milemotorcycle ride in the snow and
I'm like what were my parentsthinking?
Like you know, just here you go.
And then so it was.
It was crazy, but I wrote amotorcycle for several years and
then kids started happening andthink of them like.

Well, you know.

I'm probably shouldn't do things that are
super dangerous.

Yeah, I don't even get on ladders.
I mean, you know, I'll alone beriding motorcycles.

Yeah, but my kids are grown now, and so I started
riding again a couple of yearsago, and I'm proud that I
actually Caution to the wind,baby.

Literally You're like forget it.

Who cares?
And I ride year round, so Ithere's not a month of the year
that I've missed.

Really.

I started riding like three or four years ago.

You would ride it out in this weather.
No, what is it like?
Negative eight today?
Negative eight today, and no, Iwould not.
But where do you cut the line?
Where's the line?
You won't go out.

Well, that depends.
So, in general, the line on thetent doesn't matter if I if it's
, if I haven't ridden that month, I have to ride.
But I just did a New Year'sride with I'm America, a member
of the American Legion writers,and so we did a Legion ride on
New Year's Day.
They have an annual ride, yeah,and I think it was 30, I think

(19:01):
about 30, well, no, it was justbelow freezing.
I think it was 29 when we leftin the morning and it was like
36 something along the way back.
Wow, but yeah, so so I'll ridebelow freezing.

Nice, I've got chaps and you know all the, all
the things and yeah, but yeah,chaps and chapstick, that's all
you take with you.

The only thing I won't write in now because of my
early experiences in the snow.
I won't write in the snowbecause that's just, that's just
for.
But yeah, no, I write, I writeand I'll write cross country.
I wrote last summer.
I wrote all through Coloradoand over to Utah and back
through Wyoming and really,really gorgeous ride.
And then before that I wroteout to the summer.
Before that I wrote out toCheyenne, wyoming, for Cheyenne

(19:39):
frontier days and saw GarthBrooks and Ned Ladoo and I'm
bringing that up because we mayhave a story later that involves
Ned's dad, chris Ladoo.

But I don't know, I don't know, I don't know
if I'm going to tell that storyor not.
So we'll see.
Well, and I don't know how muchyou're going to get into this,
but you've mentioned Utah a fewtimes this morning.
What took you?
Where did you start?
And am I jumping the gun onyour story?
I don't know.
Yeah, so I was born in Utah.

Yeah, I've moved around several times since then
and lived in California, livedin Washington, other places, but
I moved from Utah to KansasCity 17 years ago almost 18
years ago, because my son, oneof my sons.
I've got five kids.
One of my sons is deaf and theKansas School for the Deaf here
in LA is one of the best deafschools in the country.

I've performed there.
Did you know that I did, I did?
You weren't there, so I waslike do you remember that one?
But yeah, during the snowstormactually one time, really Okay.

So your act would be great for that, because it's
so visual it was fun, Well, Iremember.

so yeah, they had an interpreter there for me
Sure.
So this was my first timeperforming for a deaf crowd, so
I would say the line kind ofwait for the interpreter, but it
was difficult because it wasn'tjust words coming across.
They had to watch her and thencome back to me to watch the
visual thing I was doing withthe trick.
So I was just aware I was likeI'm going to go real slow so

(20:58):
that they have the time to goback and forth.
Now I probably wouldn't havegiven them enough credit.
They're probably like speed itup, fella, you know, because
they can probably take in morethan I realized and with the
proper training I probably couldhave been more effective, but
they seem to love it.
I mean, this was like you knowforever.

This was like what would they love You're
Devin Henderson.
What would they love you?
Come on.

Thank you.

I didn't want to say it, but yeah, I'll say it
for you, okay.
So Utah and then you moved here, so we moved here.
We were going to stay until myson graduated, but he's 25 now,
so apparently I like it aroundhere.

Yeah.

I was heavily involved in the in scouting,
which is really strong in thispart of the world, and made a
lot of good friends.
And here I am.

But it was the Kansas school for the deaf.
That, initially.
That's what brought you here.
Wow, okay, awesome.
I wonder how many schools likethat there are around the
country and this, yeah, anyway,that's, you know, there's a lot
of schools around the countryand we looked all over.

We went to Oregon , looked at Indiana, florida,
looked at a couple in Californiaand this was.
This was the one.
It was the right move, awesome.

I feel like so far this is just fun facts and
background, but it's like this.
So far that's been a greatpodcast.
We could just quit here, but Ifeel like we're just getting
started.
Tell us about your, yourgrandkids.
You have how many grandkids?
I have six grandkids Awesomeman.

What's it like being grandpa?
It's the best.
It's so much better than beinga parent.

That's what I hear.

It's so much better.

What's?
What's the other thing?
You got a long time to go, yet.

But can you imagine 20 years from now?

how many grandkids you're going to have
Holy.

I know how do you know, with seven daughters,
you're going to be yeah, yeah,it's going to be awesome.
No, it's fine, you, you, you,you sugar them up, you get them
all hyped up and send them home.
Yeah, man, and no, it's good.
I've got some here in KansasCity, I got some in Utah, I've
got one in California and andvisit, visit as frequently as I
can.
So very nice, yeah.

Well, okay, let's go back now.
Let's actually start thepodcast.
Ladies and gentlemen, okay,marty Fonkie, hi, when I know
you from Toastmasters and I seeyou here and there, I don't get
the whole story, but I just knowthat Marty's one of these
mysterious people Because whenyou would speak at Toastmasters,
you would just come up withhere's what Twitter means in my
life right now and you would doall these whatever you were

(23:09):
working on at the time, and I'mlike who is this guy?
I can't define him, I don'tknow what to call him.
So you're going to help usfigure that out and how the
possibility mindset has playedinto your life and advanced you.
But you started.

If it makes you feel any better.
My mom still doesn't know whatI do for a living.
Well, and that does.
You don't keep doing internetthings.

An internet thing, the internet thing.
Guy, 30 years ago you startedas a telemarketer, right?
Is that a good place to start?
That's a great place to startat the beginning.
At the beginning, let's do it.

Yeah, so way back in the olden days, before the
internet existed, there used tobe lots of TV commercials on the
air and they'd be sellingeverything from Slices and
Dicers to Elvis's 68 ComebackRecord, to jewelry or whatever
else, and back then you'd call atoll-free number.
Operators are standing by.
You're probably not old enoughto remember that.

I remember the there's a kid maybe.
Yeah, yeah, I was prank callingpeople and I was pranking you,
did you probably?

So I was one of those operators that was
standing by and it was a hugecall center, Thousands of
employees, hundreds of thesecubicles.
It was just a factory andminimum wage which, at the
minimum wage at that time, was$3.35 an hour.
And I was a young, starvingfamily man.

(24:25):
I married very young and I hadmy first child very young.
And I'm looking around going.
I am not going to be able toprovide for my family $3.35 an
hour, but I'm here because thisis what I have.
So one day I was sitting thereand I'm taking calls and I'm
taking orders and at that timethere was an exercise machine

(24:47):
called Soloflex that was reallypopular and those things sold
for $1,000 just to make that.

And was that sort of like the Bowflex, but
the precursor to.
Bowflex yeah.

And so there was a stop smoking program that we
would sell.
That I loved.
I had an honor selling thatbecause it worked.
Like literally, people wouldcall us crying afterwards.
I bought it and it worked.

And I stopped smoking finally.

So some of the stuff we sold was really good
stuff right.

Just curious about this no smoking thing.
Was it a CD?
It was a PIL CD's.

And I can't remember.
I was 30 years ago.
Give me a break.
I don't even remember why Ihired you to come talk to my
scouts, but anyway, yeah, it wasa whole program.
It was called Cigarast.
I don't remember the name of it, cigarast, it doesn't exist
anymore.
Yeah, cigarast.
So I'm sitting there and I'mlike, ok, I just got off a call
and I sold something else, likea piece of fitness equipment,
something and I was like man, Istarted adding up and I realized

(25:44):
that in the past hour I hadsold $10,000 worth of stuff and
I had made $3.35.
So I'm like there's a big gaphere between this and this.
How do I get my hands on someof that?
And it wasn't because I wasgreedy, it's because I need to

(26:07):
take care of my family right.
So I'm like somewhere betweenwhat I'm making and what's over
here is $9,996.35 or $0.65.

You did that all in your head.
Well, I got it wrong, so I saidOK.

Who's making all this money?
So I started looking.
I said, ok, the people whomanufacture and sell these
products and put the ads on TVare making all this money, so I
want to be one of those.
How do I get there?
I don't know, I have no ideahow I'm going to get there, but
I've got to figure this out.
So I started looking around.
I said, ok, what's a steppingstone to there?
And I started looking aroundand at my company 1,000

(26:43):
employees, huge building.
I looked around and said who'smaking good money here?
Who seems to be having a greattime and enjoying it?
Who?

likes their job right.

And I looked around and it was the sales
department of the accountexecutives who actually went and
sold the services to those endusers.
So I'm like they've got itgoing on.
I want to get there.
I need to get where they arebecause they drive nice cars and
wear nice clothes and seem tohave enough money to support

(27:14):
their families.
I got to get there.
I don't know how I'm going toget there, but I'm going to get
there.
So the next thing I know theyopened up a division to service
what at that time was the veryfirst home delivered premium pet
food.
It was a carnation company thatcame or carnation said we're
going to sell this homedelivered premium pet food,

(27:34):
which home delivery pet food wasnot existent.
It was the very first.
And they said we need people tohelp take the calls on them.
I'm in whatever, because that'sgetting closer to the end
people who are making the$10,000 an hour.
So I jumped right in and I saidI'm in.
They said, ok, come on over.
And so people would call in.
They'd get a free sample.
And then my job was to callthem back and say, hey, did Fifi

(27:55):
like the free sample?
Can we send you some more?
Can we put you on asubscription program?
And all of this was completelynew and innovative at the time
and I became very quickly thenumber one salesman.
There were probably 80 of us orsomething and I was writing
birthday cards to cats and dogsand sweet talking old ladies.

(28:17):
But I believed in what I wasselling.
I knew that the product I wasselling was a premium quality
product and I knew that theservice I was providing, which
was delivering it to their homes, was a huge benefit, because a
lot of people can't lift an 80pound bag of dog food or, if
it's wet food, a case of 24,that's a 10, right.
They've got to drive to thestore and at that time premium

(28:39):
pet food wasn't available at thestore so you can only get it
from your vet.
So you'd have to go to your vet, get premium food, load it in
your car, haul it home, pay afortune for it, and this was
cost effective.
I felt good about myself,knowing that I was selling
something that helped people andpets.
So I'm just cranking away andcranking away at it and I'm just

(29:00):
doing the best I can do Forprobably six months.
One day and they had on thehallway outside our room they
had like salesmen of the weekand salesmen of the month and
all this kind of stuff and myname is like on 80% of those
plaques.
This lady named Opal Singletonand I'm going to talk about her
later too.
But Opal Singleton, who was thenumber one corporate sales

(29:24):
person there she was the numberone, that was her account and
she had other accounts.
She'd sold tens of millions ofdollars for the services, for
this call center services, andshe was walking down the hall
thinking I really need to getsome help, like I need to get
like an assistant or some sortof help, and out of the corner
of her eye.
She was saying my name, martyFonkie, marty Fonkie, marty

(29:46):
Fonkie, and she literallystopped and looked at the wall
and goes this guy might knowsomething.

She's like who is Marty Frankenstein, right and
Marty Frankenstein?

So I probably just said.
So she walks in the room andthe supervisor says who is Marty
Fonkie?
And she's like, yeah, he's overthere.
Would you be interested incoming upstairs to the corporate
offices and doing some work fora day and seeing if you'd be
interested in working up there?
I'm like, would I?
Heck, yeah.
So I literally put my headsetdown and followed her upstairs

(30:24):
and she told me what she neededand what kind of things had to
do.
And I was just an assistant, Iwas just an administrative
assistant and I worked for herfor half a day.
But I was like this is it?
This is my shot.
I'm on the upstairs, I'm at theexecutive level, I'm a nobody,
but I've got to figure out howthis works.

(30:45):
And so at the end of the day,5.30 comes along and she goes
would you be interested incoming back tomorrow?
And I'm like, heck, yeah.
Now keep in mind, at the time Iwas wearing ripped jeans, a Van
Halen t-shirt and I had a longhair.
I had a mullet.

The 80s.
I want some pictures.

The 80s, that's awesome.
So she says would you beinterested in coming back
tomorrow?
And I said I would.
And she kind of looks at me andshe kind of looks me up and
down.
She doesn't say a word, shejust looks me up and down.
Well, I'm on the executivefloor where everybody's wearing
suits, so I leave, I get ahaircut and I go to the

(31:33):
secondhand store and I bought asuit and I showed up the next
morning early and I was standingoutside her office door when
she got there and she looked meup and down again.
She never said a word.
She looked me up and down againand just kind of nodded and
that led to a career.
We eventually closed Direct TV.

(31:54):
We handle all their customerservice.
That was a $300 million accountas a team, her and me and Brett
.
But just thinking aboutpossibilities, I knew that was
my ticket, that was my shot andI was like and I had friends, I
kind of hung out with a roughcrowd and I'm not cutting my
hair for anybody.
I was like no, I'm cutting myhair for my family.
I know that I can't dress likethis and look like this and work

(32:17):
in this environment.
And she never said a word.
But her eyes told me OK, youcan come back tomorrow, but you
probably ought to clean up.

And amazing, without saying a word.
What wisdom is there to let youfigure it out for yourself.

Right, yeah Just the look.

I mean already the possibility mindset is
written all over this story.
Going back to the call centerand seeing that discrepancy
between you're making minimumwage versus, well, some people
are making $10,000 off of whatI'm selling, I think a lot of
people may not have theawareness to say, wait, to see
that first of all, and then toask what else is possible, which
is what you ask when you have apossibility mindset.

(32:55):
What else is possible?
Can I get more of that?
And why?
To feed my family, just tosupport them better.
So I love how you had the goodintention behind it.
Like you said, it wasn't greed,you just want to provide so and
then it just kept going doorafter door.
She asked me to come up there.

(33:15):
Well, how can I look better,how can I succeed more if I'm to
come back for day two?
And you act on that.
Right, that's amazing.
So then, yeah, what from there?
Where did you go.

So from there, she basically said you're a kid,
you don't know anything, whichis true.
I really just read constantly,study constantly.
And so she had a Wall StreetJournal subscription, all these
subscriptions, all thesenewspapers and magazines.
One of my jobs was tovoraciously read everything
Again this pre-internet Readeverything.

(33:46):
And she had a list of targetcompanies that she wanted to go
after.
So if I saw anything about anyof those companies, I would cut
it out and put it on her desk.
Well, about two weeks after Istarted working with her, there
was a complaint file against me,because all I did was sit at my
desk with my feet up readingand somebody literally hey, that
new guy you hired, he'sterrible, like.

Ollie does his sit.
Funkeys over there are readingyeah, I do.

And she's like that's literally the job I gave
him and that's what I need himto do, because he's critically
analyzing media to find meopportunities to go sell our
services.
And the vice president hadcalled her in like, hey, I'm
hearing some stuff.
And she told the vice president, just let me do my job.
I'm the number one person here.
I sell more than any fivepeople combined.

(34:33):
I know what I'm doing and Iknow what he's doing.
And he's doing what I told himto do, because you can't be
successful without knowledge,and so he's getting knowledge.
So back off.

Wow, that's so awesome.
She had your back on that andshe knew what she was doing.
What are you looking for whenyou're sourcing?
Like you're looking for adspots, or, oh, this would be our
bio.

Like people who read this magazine buy pet food,
I mean at that time, it waswho's launching a new product or
who's got some new initiativeor who's having a recall?
Like potentially a recall,because we would handle recalls
Like you got to call in and getyour product.
So just a clue.

(35:17):
You're just looking for clues.
Oh, they might need call centerservices which is what I was
selling at the time.
So you're just analyzing anylittle opportunity and then we'd
go and say hey, we heard youwere doing this or that.
Our biggest day ever at thatcompany was the San Francisco
earthquake, which was, I think,in 1989.

During the World Series.
During the World Series.
Yeah yeah, I remember that Iwas watching that game.

Then the candlestick park was going like
that and right after that and ofcourse bridges were collapsed.
It was pretty bad.
Right after that the presidentof the United States got on and
said the thing you can all do tohelp right now is to call the
Red Cross and donate.
And then he gave the Red Crosshis toll-free phone number.
Guess who?
Those calls went to Us and wegot annihilated.

(36:03):
We literally got millions ofcalls.
Yeah, it was crazy when thepresident of the United States
and at that time this was stillback, when there was only a few
TV channels, everybody was justwatching TV, because it was so
crazy that earthquake.
And so then he gets on there.
Everybody called right now andit was like millions of calls,
so we got bombed.

George Bush senior?
I think it was senior.
Yeah, it was George Bush senior.
And were they donating?
Well, thanks, man.
Were they donating blood money,bows?

It was money, not blood money, but money.

Comma money.

Punctuation matters too.
It does.
That's a problem with listening, right?
Well, it was money at the timebecause, again, there were
collapsed bridges and still atthat time there were still
people buried under rubble andstuff like that.
So yeah, that was a prettyintense time.

Now was Opal coaching you on how to find
these opportunities, or was shelike, hey, figure this out?

No, she was telling me what to do and what
to look for.
But that was the start.
So from there then I looked atit.
I still had that goal.
I was like it's the people whocome up with these great ideas,
these great inventions orwhatever and then sell them on
TV.
Those are the ones reallymaking the big bucks.
And so, and I still had thatgoal, and so I was working with

(37:20):
them now and we were sellingthem our services.
They were our clients, but Iwas still wanted to be them, and
so I worked through a longthing Again, that possibility, I
want to be over there to what.
Eventually?
I was on that side of things.
I was working with theinventors and working with the
creators and helping them bringtheir products to market and
putting them on TV and QDC.

(37:40):
And then the internet camearound and I was the very first
person to ever put a URL on aninfomercial Really, which, at
the time right here.

I know it's crazy.
Why are you funkin' people?

Yes, dating himself yet again.

It's just how old he is.
Wow, like URL on an infomercial.

So at the time, the infomercial space, they were
all like no way, people call,they order.
We have scripts to upsell them.
It's a controlled environment.
There's no way we're gonna puta website address, a www address
, on there and let them go offinto the wild and we can't
control.
It was so interesting the fearthat people had about.

(38:18):
No, I'm not gonna do that.

It's probably like the way people feel about
AI today.
Ai everybody, yeah, AI is awhoa.

Yeah.
And this was when the internetwas still maybe a fad.
Yeah, and I was like no, I'mlike no, seriously, people are
fad, maybe it still is fad.

Maybe it's just a long term fad.
It's gonna be a really long fad.

So people?
So I was hired by a veryvisionary CEO who did a couple
of different things, taught me alot, but one of the things was
like well, we don't know untilwe try, let's go do it.
Yeah, yeah, nice.
So we consolidated with acouple people and we put it out
there and it worked.
It worked great, because, duh,of course it worked.

(38:56):
But it's weird to think thatback then people were afraid of
it.
They were afraid of it.

Where does risk play into this?
When is it too big of a risk?
Because so many organizationstoday are risk averse for good
reasons a lot of times.
But when is it okay to?
When does a calculated riskbecome too much of a risk?
How do you write that out Inthat?

case.
I mean we put it on aninfomercial that was probably
doing a million dollars a month,let's say, and we probably
bought.
I think we bought and we werebuying.
Let's say, let's say we werebuying $100,000 a month in media
time.
I think we put $10,000 of thatinto spots with the URL and
let's put it out there and seewhat happens.

(39:38):
And what do we think happened?
People went to it and theybought.
And so we're like, oh well,that was a good risk.
And then we and it was crazybecause at that time most
infomercials ran on the weekendsreally aggressively over nights
and then Saturday mornings andSunday mornings was a key time
for infomercials and so our callcenters we're super staffed up
we had tons of calls onSaturdays and Sundays.

(39:59):
When I put the URL out there,we got most of our orders on
Mondays.
I was like, wait, a minute, whyis that?
Well, I went back.
Not only did I put an, put aURL on there, I would put videos
, snippets of the infomercialitself, to download.
There wasn't streaming.

(40:19):
Then this is I mean, this wasfour years before YouTube
existed, so you could go to thewebsite and you could download
bits of the infomercial.
So I put like the kind of themain pod of it and then the call
to action and the testimonialsand you could download.
And what I found out was atthat time only about 30% of the
United States had broadband, so70% went in a dial-up.

So when did they get to work?
Exactly, exactly.

So, they literally were writing down the
URL and they'd go to work andthey'd watch the videos and then
they'd order.
Why is, all of a sudden, allthese orders on Monday?
We don't even have an airing onMonday, because they it was so
unique.

Dark ages man, it was so dark ages.

But it was so that curiosity effect, people
like, like and watch a video.
And this was new, this waspeople you won't watch it, and
so they.
But they didn't have broadbandand you know so.

And they probably watched the whole video
as opposed to now.
Right, I'm just thinking no, no, no.

We couldn't do the whole video because it was
the file size was too big, Evena few people.

What I mean is the whole, at least what you
posted, the whole thing whereasnow you watch a minute of a
YouTube video and you're likeonto the next one, right?

Right.

Because everything's too available, and
then it was like this goal.

Oh, yeah, watch this.

I can't wait till Monday morning to come
watch this clip.
And you're going to, you'regoing to take it all in.
And it was some exercisemachine, right, they're just
watching, yeah.

What I learned, though because I did have enough
presence of mind to putanalytics on all of this was
that the the I could tell whatthey watched before they
actually ordered, andoverwhelmingly it was the
testimonials Okay.
And that's when I learned howpowerful testimonials are in
marketing.
I already kind of knew that,but like it really drove and I
was like, wow, okay, they watchthis, and then they watch that,

(41:51):
and then they watch thetestimonials and then they click
the buy now button.
Okay, I was like, oh,testimonials are important, so I
use testimonials for all of ourmarketing, for all of our
business.

I'd love to pause your journey right there
on testimonials, because peoplehave mixed feelings about
testimonials.
From what I've heard, I usethem on my website.
Others I mean everyone usestestimonials.
I use a lot of videotestimonials as well, which I
kind of feel like is a notch upbecause you're getting the
emotion, the real thing.
You know you're getting like inthe I like.
I like to take testimonials onmy camera.
I'm on my phone right after thekeynote when the energy still.

(42:22):
I'm like oh my gosh, we just hadDevon, this was so fun Rather
than in their office laterthey'll.
Some people say I'll, I'll sendyou one later because I like to
think about what I'm going tosay and it's like we had Devon
Henderson.
He was a blast and it's likethat's not really going to sell.
But I think a lot of people seetestimonials as contrived and
that people wrote the testimonybecause they felt obligated.

(42:43):
So do you have anything to sayabout the power of it or the
lack of the power.

Okay, you just say you're just 100%
testimonials all the way yeah,it's the way to go.
It's like.
It's like when people do marketresearch and they will how much
would you pay for this item?
And people, well, I'd pay thatmuch.
And then you put it to marketand that's like, oh, that's not
really what they'll pay.
People think they they knowsomething, but they don't.
They don't really right.
They think that testimonialsare contrived, but they aren't
realizing how much of theirdecision making process of

(43:13):
anything has to do with reviewsand testimonials.
Even though they think they'recontrived, they're still
believing it.
I suppose Chaldini's principlesand influence.
I don't know if you're familiarwith that, but everybody should
read that book, by the way,influenced by Dr Robert Chaldini
.
And it's okay the influenceInfluence by Dr Robert Chaldini.
Okay, highly wrecked.
Anybody should read that book.

(43:34):
Okay, and it talks about theprinciples of influence and
there's there's sort of, but oneof those is called social proof
.
And you you really lack theability to communicate a message
effectively without that piecein there, the social proof piece
.

And I think I'm I'm more likely to trust a
testimonial if there's bad onesand good ones mixed in, you know
rather than just going to likea speaker website.
What are we going to do?
We're going to put our best onthere.
Now, sometimes in the podcast,I like to share some of some
like helpful criticism that Iget because I do a survey at the
end of my keynote.
So I like to be honest about.
This is what someone said.
I missed the mark a little bitwith this person, but that's

(44:14):
that's good for me, because I'mgoing to correct that, you know
so.
I don't want to hide that, butyou know we're going to put our
best stuff out there, but moreof like.
You know, when you go to Googlereviews or Reddit or whatever,
you can trust the good when yousee the bad, but the good people
will be like no, no, no, dude,this was amazing Cause it's not
going to land well with anybodyanyway, and I think it's.
I think it just there's more ofa trust level there when you

(44:36):
see both sides.

Yeah, I agree.

Anyway, I'm just, yeah, okay, so, so, anyway
, the testimonials.
That was.
That was rocking, for you.
Put the URL on the informationfor the first time.
Which, by the way, who's theoxy clean guy?
That Billy, billy Maze.
You have a Billy Maze.
Look and feel you could havebeen the one giving so the
information, the picture hasbeen lost.

I've been looking for it for several years.
I don't know where it went.
I have a picture of me withBilly, with arms around each
other, and we look like prettysimilar to the same beard.

I see theorists would say he's sitting right, I
even have.

I had on a blue shirt that that mashed his and
and so oxy clean was actuallyone of my clients.
Well, that's the product name,but Orange Glow International
was the name of the company thatcreated oxy clean.
That oxy clean, orange glow andkaboom were the three big
brands and they were.
They were on my clients forseveral years until they got
bought by a church in Dwight.
But I knew Billy pretty, prettywell before he passed away

(45:32):
Great guy Okay, great, okay, Idon't know.

I jumped ahead.
I jumped ahead several decades.
I know We'll be talking aboutthis.

Oh, I know, okay, so, so, so, visionary CEO.
So I'm working for thisvisionary CEO and he's like go
put a URL on an infomercial,let's see what happens.
And we, we did and it workedwell, and so I'm doing.
I'm running an internetbusiness, one of the very first
successful internet e-commercebusinesses.
Again, I'm going way back 20something years and we were also

(46:01):
wholesaling our products out toTarget and Walmart and Kmart at
the time and Sears and whatnot.
We had a lot.
I did a lot of fitness and homeexercise equipment and so.
But we also hold sell ourproducts to some online
retailers.
And there was one onlineretailer in particular who sold
our products and they were outmarketing me and they were.

(46:25):
They would get to the searchengines more aggressively than I
would.
They had at the end and theywere, and so I'm like they're
selling the same thing I'mselling because we wholesaled it
to them.
I've got more margin becauseI'm the manufacturer and yet
they're somehow able to acquirecustomers like better than we
are.
And so it was really frustratingand I had a good team and I'm a
I'm a good marketer, my team'sgood marketers and we're doing

(46:47):
well.
But I can tell these guys keepbumping into to where we are and
I'm like man, they're reallyfrustrating me.
And so I went to the CEO and Itold him man, this is what's
happening.
I said we need to stop sellingour product to these guys.
And he's like, well, they'reselling a lot, like, yeah, but
they're, they're selling outfrom underneath us right Right.
Right, well, that's a good point, cause then we're not building
the customer database, and we'renot, you know so and he's like,

(47:08):
well, why don't you go out andbuy them?
I hadn't thought of that Now.
I had already had someexperience in Mergers and
acquisitions before that,because I had, before that time,
I had built a company and soldit for a million and a half
dollars.
So I knew that this buying andselling of businesses existed,
but I hadn't yet put thepossibility mindset on it, right

(47:29):
.
So I just kind of like, well,what do you mean?
He goes, go, go call him up,see if they want to be acquired.
Okay, so I call him.
Hey, this is your maincompetitor online, and how?

you doing how you?

doing and he's like, oh hey, hey, you know,
yeah, I'm kicking your butt.
I'm like, yeah, yeah, I am, howwould you, how would you like
me to buy you?
And he goes oh yeah, I'm opento that.

Really that?

easy.
Yeah, I'm like okay.
So, yeah, let's talk.
And so a couple meetings, acouple talks and we acquired
their company and he was doing$2 million a year in sales and I
was doing a million and a halfa year in sales.
Yeah, that's very early on, sothat was pretty good money
online back then.
And okay, now here's I have amath riddle for you.

I have so many questions about this story.
This is great.

I love this, but I'm just going to follow you, so
my company's doing a millionand a half dollars a year in
sales online.

So you're half a million.
Is that where you're going?

Well, let's, let's make sure the audience
Sorry, I'm going to try to getprideful and jump ahead and
there are $2 million in salesand we put the two together,
what do you think our annualrevenue was in the second year?
Oh, okay, I'm just because themath says three and a half but
it's got to be more than that,because when you're combining
forces, I'm going to say five,five and a half.

That's a great guess you can get Was it last
week, completely wrong.

$30 million.
What $30 million we did in thesecond year?
Wow, okay, how?
Because one and one doesn'talways make two.
Yeah, okay, one and one canoften make 11.
Totally, and that's whathappened here.
Wow, brett and his team werephenomenal.
My team was phenomenal.

(49:08):
He was missing some stuff, Iwas missing some stuff.
When we put the two together,all cylinders were firing and we
just crushed it.
Dude, how inspiring is that?

Yeah, Seriously , because I think about it, talk
about it all the time, whenjust even whoever you can
collaborate with, even if it's acompetitor, even if you're not
going to emerge, it's like meand another speaker getting
together having a mastermind.
You've talked about that yeah,I'm missing things, he's missing
things.
Sometimes I think, asentrepreneurs, we want to hide
from our competition.

(49:39):
We want to hide what we'redoing and put a hedge around it
so they can't steal our stuff.
But if you can tap into eachother's brilliance and resources
, I mean, look what happened.
That's insane.

Yeah, it was crazy awesome.
That's insane.
Here's the cool thing in whatI'm going to ask you another
math question, okay, all right,I'm ready.
We bought his company, okay.

I got my mud water and I am ready for this
next question.

All right, so we bought his company.
Okay, yes, we paid $3.5 millionfor his company.
How much do you think that costus?

Well, out of that $30 million, not very much,
I mean a fraction of what youmade, but how much did that cost
you?

Okay, so we said we're going to give you $3.5
million for your business.
How much do you think we tookout of our bank account and gave
him it there?

Yeah, I'm not good at this.
I'm not good at math.
I was going to say $3.5 million, but I know that can't be the
answer.
That's the logical answer.
You're so smart, devin.
You're doing exactly whateverybody else says.
I'm trying to be smarter than Iam.
I always can't see.

All right.
So most people would think oh,you bought a business for $3.5
million.
You must have given them $3million out of your pocket to do
that.
Nobody does that.

Okay.

That is not how effective mergers and
acquisitions works Okay.
All right, we paid about aquarter million dollars, about
$250,000 in cash, okay, and therest was in what was called
earnouts.
They got stock.

Okay.

And they took a piece of that future earnings.

Okay.

And so they wound up making more than $3.5
million in the long run, but thecompany only paid $250,000 to
acquire that and that's actuallyhow most people.
So when I talk to businessowners and I'm like, hey,
whether it's a plumber or arestaurant, I don't do a lot of
restaurants but I say, look,you're doing a million dollars a

(51:31):
year and you want to do $2million a year next year?
Okay, that's the easiest way todo that.
And what does everybody think?
Well, I'm going to have todouble how much I sell, right,
sell twice as much products andservices.
That's hard, yeah, that'sreally hard to just sell more.
If you could sell more, I wouldhave done it by now.
What if you go out and acquirea million dollar business and

(51:53):
then overnight you're a $2million business and they go.
Okay, that's logical, but Idon't have a million dollars to
go acquire a million dollarbusiness, right, you don't need
that.
You could do it.
There's ways to do it forliterally not one penny out of
your pocket or at most maybe 10%out of your pocket.
So you can take a hundredthousand dollars and buy a
million dollar business.

(52:13):
Put the two together and nowyou have a $2 million business.
That maybe is a $10 millionbusiness because if you get
those synergies right and sobusiness owners a lot of times
don't understand that's part ofmy mission to educate people
about that because you justthink, well, oh, they bought it
Three and a half million dollarbusiness.
They must have had three and ahalf million dollars laying
around.

No I wouldn't do that so here's my big no that
is so interesting I don't knowmuch about.
I've seen a lot of acquisitionand mergers because a lot of
times when people have me comespeak is after an acquisition or
you're trying to get the teambuilding and like hey, we got
these two groups, or like people.
Sometimes it's when and this wasmy where my question is leading

(52:52):
where a company is beingacquired, but a lot of people
are losing their jobs and it'stheir last big company party and
people are depressed about it.

It's a tough audience.
It's a tough audience.

It was, it happened, yeah.
And what are the ramificationsof the people, the families who
don't benefit from thisacquisition or merge?
I mean, what are your thoughts,feelings around that?
You know?

And that's and honestly, for the most part
that's in a space I don't plan,so I don't do great big
companies that are going to likemerge and then lay a whole
bunch of people off.
I see, I see I focus onentrepreneurial business.

I work with entrepreneurs.

So I focus mostly on businesses that are between
one and 15 or $20 million Okay,it is my kind of sweet spot and,
for the most part, those typesof businesses that do mergers
and acquisitions.
You're needing those people.
I'm almost never involved in atransaction where you're merging
something and laying up a tree.

(53:51):
Okay, so I, for those peoplewho are affected by those big
corporate mergers where there'shuge layoffs, I feel bad, it's
terrible and I don't play inthat space.
And that's part of why I don'tplay in that space too, because
there are those incidents wherethey're going to merge the thing
and then you've got twoaccounting departments or two
this, and they've got to lay abunch of people off and that's.

(54:14):
I just don't play in that spaceand there's a ton of money in
that space, but I don't want todo that.

That's not what I want to do so with the
entrepreneur thing.
I'm curious where from that?
Like, what else do you do now,because you obviously you help
with these merger type thingsfor entrepreneurs?
Is that the pinnacle of whatyour business is?
Is that?

maybe what you do ?
Yeah, so well it is.
I've also in this field, so Inow have taken equity positions
in lots of businesses.
So I own lots of businesses inlots of different spaces.
And you know, something elsethat I try and teach
entrepreneurs is owning yoursupply chain.
So, for example, you know wewere working with a brewery that

(54:59):
we were, we had invested in.
We took a piece of equity inthat brewery and they wanted to
do a huge campaign with a wholebunch of swag, right, hats and
you know, koozies andsweatshirts and blah, blah, blah
.
So we actually took anownership stake in the company
that does all of the printingand all of that custom work.
So now we're buying fromourselves, right?

(55:21):
So, as a business owner, Iwould say look up and down your
supply chain.
Who are you paying money to andwho's paying money to you?
And should you own a piece ofthat?
Should you have a stake ineither all or part of the
businesses that surround yourbusiness as a satellite?
Yeah, because A you can getbetter quality, you get
preferential treatment andyou're making money on yourself.

(55:42):
So I always encourage that aswell when.

I'm talking about the commerce Interesting
the whole supply chain thing.
Yeah, that's crazy.

So all this is stuff that you read about in the
Bloomberg blogs and whateverelse and you think about oh,
this is Wall Street stuff, thisis big business stuff, this is
oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, so-and-so,merge with so-and-so or
airlines or whatever.
It's applicable at the smallbusiness level too, in the
entrepreneurial level, becausethose synergies and that working
together and that, like all ofthis, can be done at a smaller

(56:10):
scale and help grow any kind ofentrepreneurial business.
So, but people don't thinkabout it.

Well, I love how exactly People don't think
about it.
I love how that visionary CEOis like go see if they want to
be bought.
And you're like what?

We can do that.

And so sometimes it's just about having
someone instill thatpossibility in you.
At Marty, just remember to keepasking what else is possible
and that to me I felt likeopened up for you, like, oh man,
anything's possible.
Now I can always seek outpeople to acquire, to work for
win-wins, buying your supplychain.

(56:44):
That's amazing.
What things can you tell theaudience?
I don't want to miss any biggaps in your story.
Are there any other significantmoments that have brought you
where you are today?

All right, I'll tell my Chris Ladoux story.
Okay, all right, let's have sosometimes possibility, and it's
I got to.
Let me back up to the verybeginning of what I was going to
say when we so I was going tosay that thank you for having me
on the podcast, Dev, and I'mhonored to be here.
Yes, and I'm very excited to behere, because whenever I'm on a

(57:17):
podcast, I listen to severalepisodes of the podcast before
I'm on it.
I want to get to know the host.
Now I know you, but I want toget to know the host and the
style of the podcast and themessaging.
And the messaging of yourpodcast so intrigued me because
it's very different than mostAnything I've done.
Most stuff I've done is veryhardcore, business oriented or
marketing, or emergedacquisitions and yours is
possibilities.
My set and I was.
I seriously was listening tothe episodes and you've got Top

(57:40):
Gun Pilot and a professionalboxer and a chiefs cheerleader
and all these really successfulpeople with this anchor like I'm
the pinnacle of whatever I am.
And I was listening to theepisodes I started to get some
really serious imposter syndromebecause I'm like I'm just a
regular guy, I'm not famous, Idon't have the book, I'm not a

(58:03):
keynote speaker.
I do speak here and there, butI'm not a keynoter.
And I started really I almostcanceled on you.
I really yeah, I almost wentlike I'm not qualified Like when
.

Was it like last night, or no?
No, no.

Like a couple of weeks ago.
I don't know I'd listened to acouple of episodes I don't think
I'm qualified to be here, well,but then I got to the, I said,
okay, get out of your purelybusiness, entrepreneurial head
and think about.
And I realized that I've nevernoticed before I've always

(58:38):
considered myself sort of apessimist, but I've never
noticed before listening to yourpodcast, that actually I've had
a possibilities mindset formost of my going back to the
call center story, becausethat's what popped into my head.
I'm like that's probably.
I was thinking about the peopleI worked with at that time.

(58:58):
They were not sitting there,going, calculating, going how do
I go with the next step.
They were just like I hate myjob.
When I'm going to come and do myjob, and then I'm going to go
home, and so just listening toyour podcast, what I'm being
here has helped me identify thatI don't want to thank you for
that.

That's great man.

How was that.
And so, as I was thinking about, well, what can I talk about as
possibilities with you, anotherstory popped in.
I wasn't sure if I want toshare it, because it's kind of
the opposite of possibilities,but it's being open to the clues
that life gives you.
So I'm going to tell this story.

(59:41):
I was a consultant working withseveral different companies,
and there was a big Right therewith a big product company who
had a hugely successful product.
They were probably doing $100million a year.
I was consulting with them andthey kept saying we want you
full time.
We want you full time.
I'm like no, I got otherclients, I got this gig.
I love what I'm doing.
I love being a consultant.
I don't want to work with youfull time on entrepreneurial.

(01:00:02):
They kept hammering andhammering.
Finally they said look, theywere in Washington DC or Falls
Church, virginia, beautiful town.
And they said look, why don'tyou just bring your wife?
We're going to send you acouple of first class tickets.
Bring your wife, come out, staya week and we'll set you up
with a real estate agent.
We'll get some houses and we'lltake you out to dinner and
let's just see what thepossibilities are.

(01:00:23):
And I'm like, okay, I'm notgoing to turn that down.
So we fly out there first class.
They rented us a nice car andwe check out the area and it's
in a beautiful area like Fairfax, virginia Falls, toronto,
virginia.
It's been really gorgeous.
You know Tyson's Corner.
We went with the real estateagent and looked at houses.
We found a house.

(01:00:43):
Oh my gosh, there's a beautifulhouse.
We found the.
We kind of started mentallymoving in.
I went to them.
We were like, where's the movietheater that we'd go to?
Okay, we went to the movies onenight.

Devin Henderson (01:00:51):
Okay, this is where we'd go, or here's the
mall, and we're like mentallyokay.

Marty Fahncke (01:00:56):
So I go back and I'm like, yeah, you guys, you
guys did your job, like youreeled us in.
We get on the plane to go homeand we spend the entire flight
talking about the future andwhat that looks like and how
excited we are and everythingelse.
And I know this story is goingto sound crazy, but this is a

(01:01:17):
hundred percent true story.
We get on the, we land in SaltLake City.
It was.
It was a time of year that SaltLake wasn't pretty Like.
Salt Lake's really pretty inthe wintertime, when it's
snowing, in the summertime orearly summer spring, when it's
green, but it is a desert.
So there's times when it'sreally brown and we landed it
was really.
We're like, oh man, it was sogreen in Virginia, it was so

(01:01:37):
brown here.
We're like, oh, oh, we're soglad to get out of here.
Right.
We get in our car, we startdriving and a song comes on the
radio from who?
At that time I was an artist, Iknew, but I didn't lie.
I just you know he was aroundand he was pretty, pretty
popular locally.
His name's Chris Ladoo.
He's a country artist andactually Garth Brooks mentions

(01:01:58):
Chris Ladoo as his inspiration.
Oh really, yeah, garth, andthey did a.
They did a song called what youCan Do With a Cowboy, and then
there's another song where hesays worn out tape of Chris
Ladoo lonely women in bad boots.

Anyway.

So Chris Ladoo is like a guy who never was a
superstar.
He was always kind of onpurpose, like he's, like I'd
rather.
I'd rather keep my integrityand only be down here than than
sell out and become a superstar.
So he was.
He's a great artist and he hada song out that I had never
before or since heard on theradio.
But we're driving.

You're good, come on.
Yeah, sonia, everybody hey.

Sonia, oh yes, brought us those amazing omelets
.
You can tell the cool we're waylacks here, sonia's cool, we're
just talking about Chris Ladoo.

I'm checking the plumbing stuff and the
prying stuff.
He is about to buy them.
Oh, I'm so sorry.

You're about to.
You just told that story tothousands of people, Sonia.

Yeah, You're G they don't know that's real life
.
And you're VIP anyway, sonia,it's not for you, though I
thought you were going to doyour private, all right, so so
Chris Ladoo is planning on theradar.

So we get in the car we just landed.
We're so excited for the future.
We're going to pack up our kids, we're going to move across
country.
I'm taking this high paying jobwhere we found a house we
didn't put an offer in, butwe're going to put an offer in,
a beautiful house andeverything's like.
And we're driving along andthis song comes on and it's
called Beneath these WesternSkies.
Now, this is in Utah, right,and it talks about raising my

(01:03:22):
kids in the in the westernsummertime.
And we both go quiet and shelooks at me and I look at her.
I don't remember who said itfirst, but one of us said we're
not moving to Virginia, are we?
And the other one was like no,we're not.
Now call it.

(01:03:44):
You know, chris Ladoo is notGod, but I believe, crazy enough
, I believe God was talking tous through that.
He was like no, you're supposedto stay here for now.
And so I called, I called thecompany.
I was like hey, I'm notaccepting the job.
You know, this is vicepresident position.
You know big, a lot of my.
And I said, hey, I'm not saying.
And they got.
They were very unhappy.

(01:04:04):
They fired me as a consultant.
They were ticked Cause I told.
I told him, yes, the last dayout, yeah, I'm coming.
And then I call them like thenext day I'm like, yeah, I'm not
coming.
And they were, they were livid60 days later they went bankrupt
, locked the door.
The employees showed up and thedoors were locked and never

(01:04:25):
opened again.

I just got chills literally.
That's insane.

So possibilities mindset was hey, somebody's
offering you a big, high payingjob and they're whining and
dining you and pressuring you totake it and like, of course,
it's great money and it's thisgreat position and it's
opportunity.
And there was all blah, blah,blah.
Yes, we're gonna do it right,possibly as well as it.
And then we go home and then amessage comes that says, no,

(01:04:51):
that's not the possibility,that's for you.
And so I didn't take that andit was the best move ever.
I would have been just closedon a house in a brand new area
that I couldn't possibly affordand it will have just lost my
job, with no family, no support,no anything, if I would have
gone forward with that.
So I don't know how that fitsinto the possibilities mindset.

(01:05:12):
Other than possibilities aren'talways positive.
Moving forward Sometimes it'sthat being open to the
possibility that you are whereyou're supposed to be for now.

Well, I see perfectly how it fits, and only
because I'm always thinkingabout the possibility mindset
the possibilities were in Utah,not in Virginia, you know.
So it's like what else ispossible here in Utah, a place
where we want to be, where wewant to raise our children,
where we feel God is calling usto right now and he revealed it
in a Chris LaDuce song and thenwe don't always get to see like

(01:05:50):
why things were like, why God'splan was the way it was.
But when you do get to see howawesome is that, I think that
just reinforces your faith andto follow your true calling, to
follow the Lord's lead in inyour life and that's that's what
I get from it is that thepossibility mindset.
If you wouldn't have beenasking what else is possible,
you would have been zoned in onthis new opportunity, blinded to

(01:06:13):
the blessing that you alreadyhave.
And that's one thing I alwaystalk about always give thanks,
agt, you know.
Be thankful for what you haveright now, because things can
look so good.
The grass is always greener inVirginia, right?
I mean literally that that dayit was.
And for you you realize wealready have what we want.
And how did it feel?

(01:06:35):
I mean, what was the feelingwhen you found out they went
bankrupt?
Not that you were happy thatthey went bankrupt, but for you,
what kind of peace came overyou.
What could, what?
How'd that feel in that moment?
I was so grateful.

I was like if we'd have gone, like what?
Oh my gosh, that would havebeen an absolute disaster, just
an absolute disaster.
And so it's made me.
Ever since then, it's made memore aware of of.
Well, let's never thought ofthis until just now.

(01:07:08):
But you talk to me.
Oh, you do these mergers andacquisitions and then all these
people get to lose their jobs.
I could go do that.
I could be involved in multihundreds of millions of dollar
deals.
I choose not to because I don'tlike the way a lot of those
turn out.
I don't want to be responsiblefor people getting laid off and
losing their jobs.
So could I be much moresuccessful in my field and make

(01:07:30):
a lot more money?
Yeah, I could.
I don't want to, because what Ihave to, what would the outcome
of that, would be something I'mnot going to live with.
Yeah.
And so I think, when I thinkabout the possibility, you have
to know what the possibilitiesare within your own set of
values, because it's not alwaysjust about the money, it's not
always just about the success orwhatever else.

(01:07:50):
It has to.
It has to align.
Those possibilities have toalign with your values, yeah, or
you're making a mistake chasingthem.

One of my life mantras and the title of my
keynote is something greater isalways possible, and I always
make it clear to people thatdoesn't mean more success, more
money sometimes.
Something greater is alwayspossible in what you already
have, just realizing theblessing and it, being thankful
for it.
And that's when you see fruitfrom your life grow that you're
like I want what I already have,yeah, and I was missing the

(01:08:25):
blessing, and now I appreciateit more.
And that's when greater thingscome your way More peace, more
joy, more fulfillment.

So, ironically, it wasn't maybe three months
later that this CEO that waslike the go, put a URL on an
infomercial and let's go by hecalled and said the same things
I'm not going to hire you.
He was one of my clients at thetime.
Oh wow.
And he said I want, and I didthe same that none, I don't, I
don't want to, you know.
And he, but he, he succeeded,yeah, and dragging me to

(01:08:55):
California and I and I worked inCalifornia for a number of
years and had an absolute wall.
I mean it's super, I meanthat's where we built that
e-commerce business.

Yeah, so you would have missed out on that.

I would have been working full time in Virginia
and missed out on what's turnedout to be the where I am today.

Or you would have gotten laid off and then, a
month later, maybe not been inthe right space for him.
Right, because it didn't workout?

Yeah, because I well, I would have had to resign
as their consultant to go takethat full.

So I would, I would have ticked him.
Oh, I see, I would have beenlike, hey, I would have burned
that bridge.
I got you.
I would have been like, hey.

I'm taking this full time gig.

Wow, so I can't consult with you anymore.

But instead I was continuing and he was like I
really like what you do, Ireally like what you're doing
for our company, I really wantyou full time.
No, no, no.
But he talked me into it and itwas great.
I did great with her.
I'm glad you, I would haveburned that bridge completely.

I'm glad you chose that story.
That's a great one to end on.

I didn't even.
I never thought about thecorrelation of those two things
until just now, right.

About that you wouldn't have had that
opportunity in California.

I've always thought about, yeah, that, oh, I
would have been, I would havebeen, you know, lost my job and
I'm stuck in Virginia, but itnever occurred to me until just
now that that would haveprecluded me from what truly has
led me to the path I'm in today.

Wow, that's the beautiful thing about just
sharing and talking andverbalizing, you start to
realize things right.
That's why it's this is a sidenote, I mean, I was talking
about this early in bed thismorning how your.
She heard a quote that your,your sorrow gets cut in half
when you share it with people,but your joy multiplies when you
share it with people.
So by sharing this story, youhad that realization of, oh, the

(01:10:23):
blessing that you didn't seebefore, of how you didn't burn
that bridge and you kept goingon in that venture.

Yeah.

That's, I mean, that's possibility, mindset
written all over this.
This is, this is so greatYou're a great host.

You know these stories I wasn't going to share.
You're a great guest man.

I appreciate it .
I do have a couple finalquestions for you in a second
and but first.
Is this a thing where I knowyou didn't really come on here
to promote products or anything,but is it a thing where, if
there's an entrepreneur lookingat new possibilities to maybe
partner with slash, acquireanother, are you for hire?
Is this something where theyshould connect with you?
What's the best way for them toget a hold of you?

Yeah.
So let me tell you who shouldreach out to you.
Sure, I mean, I'm a great guy,and then how?
Yeah, so so the who would beany business owner who's
thinking about selling theirbusiness to call me first.
Any business owner who'sthinking, hey, I'd like to grow
my business through acquisition,I wonder if it would work for
me, they should call me, okay.
The third category is if youknow anybody who is in that, if

(01:11:25):
you know of a business that, hey, we're thinking about selling
or we're interested, refer themto me.
I pay really generous referrals, so a referral from me can be
fifty, sixty, seventy thousanddollars to you.
Who refers to me?

So I'm ready to sell, if you know.
I know a guy.

You know a guy who is thinking about buying or
selling a business.
Send them my way, okay.
So to your listeners, like ifyou know of anybody, say hey,
well, joe's thinking aboutselling his business.
Connect me up, because it'llit'll benefit all of us.

And what a great model for marketing.
I mean, you know that thatyou're making sure you're clear
on who your audience is andtelling them who I love that.
So all right, and then how toreach me.

Well, first of all, my very unique last name,
marty Fonkie.
Yes, you can just Google me ifyou can see how it's spelled
here on the YouTube or whateveryou try.
Sorry, linkedin, I'm veryactive on LinkedIn, so connect
them there, or my website iswestboundroadcom.

And even the name on that in the show.

Westbound Road dot com, and even the name of my
, my main company, ispossibilities mindset.
The Westbound Road, is reallythat going?
West in that, what's next andwhat's the adventure?
And freedom and, like my, youknow, ties to my motorcycle
rides.

Yeah, but it's all tied together.
The story you just shared, theChris Ladoo story, that yeah,
yeah.

And I've gone and ridden my motorcycle to where
his memorial he's passed awaynow, but he's got a really great
memorial in in Casey, casey,wyoming, and and I've ridden my
motorcycle there and what not.
Like I said, it's a whole lotof Chris Ladoo wasn't supposed
to be, but anyway.
But Westbound Road my companyis is named that just because of
that, that possibility thatwhat's next down the road in the

(01:13:06):
future, and so it's.
It's.
It's so interesting to me, yourpodcast, when you invited me
here and I was just like, oh, Idon't, I don't know, and then
I'm, I'm not, we actually arepretty line and I didn't realize
it.
So, yeah, so and I'm the onlyMarty Fonkie in the entire world
.
So, if you, if you, which isgood and bad, because it's good
because you know it's amazing tofind, but it's bad because I'm

(01:13:28):
easy to find.
So I am very proud of the factthat when, when people Google my
name, I'm the only one thatcomes up, the only one in the
world, and you only find goodstuff, thousands of things will
pop up on Google.
My kids like to play that gamewith their, their friends.
When they were little theywould say, hey, let's Google
your mom and dad.
There there's, you know,basically yellow pages.

(01:13:49):
Oh, I wonder if my, my dad hasanything and they Google me like
10,000 results come out.
Oh yeah, they play that game.
But everything is good.
Because you talk abouttestimonials, like I am.
I am acutely aware that that,with a being the only person
with my name in the world, thatif I screw up or take somebody
off or rip them off or mess uplike it's going to show up, and

(01:14:12):
I've worked really hard to makesure that doesn't happen.

Nice job Westbound Road, westbound.
Road you like the like, truemodern cowboy, aren't you?
I just imagine you just ridingoff into the sunset man.
I do, right off into a lot ofsunset.

I think my face, but my personal Facebook profile
has a picture of a sunsetthrough my handlebars.
Oh yeah, and I don't use thatprofessionally, but my personal.
And don't friend me on Facebook.
I'm not, I don't use Facebook.
I have like hundreds ofunresponded to request that I
don't do it.
But yeah, I I my ultimate goal.

(01:14:49):
When I was younger, before Iknew anything about mergers,
acquisitions, what was I wantedto own?
I wanted to own 10% of 10companies and spend my time
driving around visiting each ofthose companies and helping them
and advising them, but thenjust wanting around the country
and and and, somehow, throughsome weird chain of events, it's

(01:15:11):
actually coming true.
Wow, that's so cool.
Yeah, except from my motorcycle.
I didn't know I was going to beon my motorcycle.
Yeah.

Yeah, it all started with telemarketing.

I'll start with.

Well, man, well , hey.
Before I ask you the last twoquestions, just want to say once
again, thanks again to a centerof shiny for providing
breakfast or a space to seewhichever you want to call it.
And also remember to go to zeroshoes dot com.
Get yourself some of thesebarefoot style shoes.
It just might change your life.
It might be the solution you'relooking to for healthier ankles

(01:15:40):
, knees.
All that so that zero shoeswith an X, zero shoes dot com.
Slash, go, slash, dev.
And also, by the way, you know,if you're listening to this on
Spotify or Apple for the fullexperience to see my handsome
friend, marty, you know, go toYouTube for that full experience
and and share that, subscribe,comment, let us know if you got
something out of it.
Also, if you're listening, oneof the best ways you can help us

(01:16:01):
extend our reach and impactmore people is to give us a five
star review.
If it's a genuine, you know,five star review, we appreciate
that and then comment how didtoday inspire you know what?
What did Marty say that madeyou grasp and embrace the
possibility mindset?
So okay with that one.
One last question and I did?

(01:16:22):
I don't know.
The one question was how canpeople connect with you?
That was number one.
Number two is just briefly onepiece of advice for my daughters
, so I've been watching you areready for this.

I knew you're gonna add.
I've been rocking my brain.
No, all right.
Devon's daughters, listen toyour dad.
He's smarter than you think.
That's it.

That's all I'm gonna say that's awesome, marty
funky, ladies and gentlemen,thanks, okay, awesome.
We're gonna sign off with thephrase what else is possible.
I'll say what else you say ispossible.
You're ready, okay?
Never stop asking the questionwhat else is possible?
See you next time.

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