September 11, 2024 • 51 mins
Scott Grates is a self made success story. I was fortunate to meet him when he was a guest on Uptown Girls podcast, a show produced at ROC Vox about marketing and success, hosted by Martina Barley.
I immediately liked Scott's approach to business and life in general, so I asked him to Blather with me. His latest book, Referrals Done Right, is a master class in relationships. When you think of Referrals, you think of business - but it goes deeper.
Scott and I blather about my favorite success principles, I tee up the questions and he crushes them - straight down the fairway. Join me with Scott Grates and make sure you take notes!
Find Scott at
ScottGrates.com
ReferralsDoneRightBook.com
I immediately liked Scott's approach to business and life in general, so I asked him to Blather with me. His latest book, Referrals Done Right, is a master class in relationships. When you think of Referrals, you think of business - but it goes deeper.
Scott and I blather about my favorite success principles, I tee up the questions and he crushes them - straight down the fairway. Join me with Scott Grates and make sure you take notes!
Find Scott at
ScottGrates.com
ReferralsDoneRightBook.com
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Three peat.
Speaker 2 (00:02):
No, I'm conformists. Oh, I promise to be different. I
promise to be I promise not three peat things other
people say, Hey, welcome.
Speaker 3 (00:35):
Back to positive latherings with fits And yes, I know,
I'm I'm I'm the worst at doing podcasts. I tell people,
show people how to do podcasts, help them do podcasts,
and when it comes to myself, it's a shit show.
But it's a good show because I'm bringing on some
pretty sweet guests and a lot of this is is
(00:56):
total happenstance on how I meet these people and this guy.
Speaker 4 (01:00):
So it's kind of the Scott Show.
Speaker 3 (01:02):
This, this afternoon, this morning, whenever you're listening to this.
Scott Greats is an author Scott Greats dot com, and
he has this book that I'm going to hold up
to the camera right now, Referrals Done Right. And you know,
at first glance, you're like, oh, referrals. What does that
say to you?
Speaker 4 (01:20):
Is that like a real estate thing?
Speaker 5 (01:22):
Is that?
Speaker 3 (01:22):
And this is a small business I would almost say
this is like a small business Bible. And I got
to read I got to read the dedication here because
this really sums it up for me.
Speaker 4 (01:34):
This book is.
Speaker 3 (01:36):
For the bold, courageous, hardworking, inspired optimist who had a
ten thousand foot vision of better serving those around them
with a business of their own. I'm glad you took
the leap and excited to provide a parachute.
Speaker 4 (01:50):
That's awesome. That is just so awesome. Thanks for joining
me today, Scott.
Speaker 1 (01:55):
Absolutely listen.
Speaker 5 (01:56):
I mean when I read you know your your podcast
all about being positive, no prep work and no script
I'm like, sign me up, I'm in.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
I can, I can do all of that.
Speaker 4 (02:06):
And it's and it's really it's really about like.
Speaker 3 (02:11):
Just having a conversation, you know, with the person and
letting letting the conversation kind of unfold as we go
kind of I don't know what's going to happen. I
don't know what's going to be said, but we're gonna
get there and it's gonna be fun, and we might
go in a completely different direction. Like my intention is
to is to you know, talk about your writing process
(02:32):
and the journey that you've taken to to write this book.
But we might end up, you know, spending twenty minutes
on your dogs or cats or whatever you have.
Speaker 5 (02:41):
So yeah, not the cat and the cat and I
aren't getting along totally, but yeah.
Speaker 1 (02:46):
You're not excited to see where it goes. For sure.
Speaker 5 (02:49):
This could call could go a lot of places, man.
But you know, it's funny you talk about the title
there was there's obviously so much talk. You have a
working title, and then you're working with a team at
the publishing company and everyone's got different thoughts and ideas,
and really the book is about relationships, more specifically relationship
(03:09):
marketing and how we operate in this connection economy and
what was once old is really new again because in
this digitally dominated world that we live in, where everyone's
trying to fight for the same you know, business in
these traditional ways, cold, frankly ways, right, you know, just
(03:30):
the eyeball to eyeball, the human interactions, conversations like this,
you know, meaningful connections.
Speaker 1 (03:35):
They matter.
Speaker 5 (03:37):
But I couldn't name the book relationship anything because then
that puts it in a whole different category at the bookstore,
and it's you know, it's a business book and referrals.
It's funny, it's a book about referrals. And then in
the book I talk about we really shouldn't use the
word referrals. You know, it's better to introduce people or
connect people. Referrals has this cold business feel to it,
(03:57):
but everyone in business knows what to refer is.
Speaker 1 (04:00):
So it's on the cover and here we are.
Speaker 3 (04:02):
Yeah, and and that's a that's a really great point
because the relationships. I look, I look at my business
and you know, yes, I've done some advertising, I've done
some radio I've done, but really ninety eight percent of
what I bring in here is all word of mouth.
It's it's talking to someone like you who says, oh, hey,
you know, I don't I know a guy, and and
(04:24):
being the guy that that people know, and and it's
those relationships that if it's probably my favorite part about business,
besides actually doing what I love to do, which is all.
Speaker 4 (04:35):
This techie stuff.
Speaker 3 (04:36):
You know, being surrounded by wires and knobs and buttons
and and VU meters and stuff is really cool. But
but the relationships going and having someone say I've got
this problem. I really need to do this and I
don't know how, and I go, oh, yeah, let's do
it this way, and we figure it out, and then
they're all excited and they're like.
Speaker 4 (04:55):
Wow, that's so much better than I thought it could be.
And that and then I'm like I have done my work.
Speaker 5 (05:01):
You know in that voice, Yes, but exactly listen, Scott,
You're you're hitting on where the book starts. And you
can't be the guy or be referred if you weren't referrable.
And so what you're hitting on is you have to
have just a tremendous amount of value. You have to
create this unique, memorable customer experience where it's like, well,
(05:21):
fits does this better than anyone else, Like, if you're
looking for this, you need to go see him. And
so really it all starts with the value. And I
think with business relationships sometimes we feel entitled or there's
this expectation that hey, I'll help you and you help me,
and you know, I'll take it to a Rochester Amerks
game and then you're going to send me everyone you know,
(05:42):
that's a deal. But the reality is that the value
has to come first. Otherwise you haven't earned the right
to be introduced to others. So that's really where we
start this journey is be freaking awesome at what you do.
Speaker 3 (05:56):
Yeah, and what gets me is that sometimes I forget
that you know, people know a lot of people.
Speaker 4 (06:03):
So I really I take that to heart.
Speaker 3 (06:05):
I'm like, oh, I worked with this person, and then
I see them working with someone else who's doing something
similar to me, and I take that personally and I'm like,
oh my god, what did I do wrong?
Speaker 4 (06:19):
How did I screw this up?
Speaker 3 (06:21):
And it's not it's not actually what's happening. Every single
time that I've looked into those situations, from what it
seemed to be on the surface is not what it
was down deep.
Speaker 4 (06:33):
It was.
Speaker 3 (06:34):
It was total happenstance. Oh, we were talking and this
guy said this, and then this just happened. It wasn't
like they said, well you know, and every time it
was like, no, I thought of you, and it just
didn't make sense to call you because this was already
in motion. And so the way that those relationships go
(06:54):
sometimes can be hurtful in a way for me. But
if I just sit back and I chill out about it,
every single time, it comes back around because I play
the game correctly. I'm positive. I'm encouraging. I'm like, yeah,
that's a good that's a good guy to work with.
He's awesome. You know, continue what you're doing. If you
(07:15):
need any help, just let me know and continue to
be that sort of positive force, and eventually it comes
back around, might not be right. Then it might be
six months later it might be who knows, but or
they refer me to someone else and said, you know,
you need to talk to this guy. So those relationships,
they go deep and they're very unpredictable.
Speaker 5 (07:36):
So what's funny there is we all do this as humans.
We create this false narrative when we don't know the
real reason why. So we see something from the outside
and then it's like, oh, I must have do isn'thing wrong?
Or oh they must not like me, or oh they
must be you know whatever, and we create this entire
narrative just isn't true.
Speaker 1 (07:57):
And you know, so I'm I'm an.
Speaker 5 (07:58):
Insurance agency owner and we're in a high volume business. So,
you know, I just to give some perspective, like we've
got over ten thousand policies between two agencies that we
take care of, and so I joke all the time,
like how many places can I eat pizza? How many
places can I get my haircut?
Speaker 2 (08:17):
Right?
Speaker 5 (08:17):
Like I can't reciprocate to everyone who does business with
me because I ensure twenty pizzaia owners.
Speaker 1 (08:23):
You know, although I probably kind of eat pizza at
twenty different places.
Speaker 5 (08:26):
But you know, so what I've found is, you know,
just like I want that deep relationship and that connection
with someone, I have to respect the fact and understand
that they may already have it with someone else. And
so what I get from a lot of people is
they're like, Scott, we love what you're doing, we like you.
But look, I've been with my agent who's you know,
(08:46):
for twenty years, or it's my uncle or a friend
of whatever, and I'm like, look, I get that, but
that doesn't mean those people won't refer me. Right So,
even though they're not personally doing business with me, A
lot of our referral sources are people that actually do
business somewhere else else, but they kind of feel like
they can't leave because of a personal connection. But it
doesn't mean they can't be a referral source or a
connector to to others.
Speaker 1 (09:08):
And I get that a lot too.
Speaker 5 (09:09):
I want to introduce you to to so and so,
and then so and so becomes a great customer or
referral source. So you know, I just look at everybody
as an opportunity to add value, lead with that servant's
heart and know, like you said, at some point, it's
just karma right that you do good things, good things
will come back to you.
Speaker 3 (09:30):
Now, do you are you able to Some people are
really good at finding or identifying certain characters, certain types
of people in a population. So are you the kind
of person who can who can look at someone and say,
I know this person is like this or I think
(09:51):
this person is like this, and you know I'm going
to use that to my advantage, not in a devious way. Yeah,
you know, you know how someone is, you know what
kind of person they are, and you know how to
approach it better rather than just going in, you know,
like full born being like, Hey, I'm a salesman, you know.
Speaker 5 (10:11):
So I love that you said that because you know,
I've been in sales twenty five years. I actually started
my career just down the road from you at Raymore
and Flannigans in Eastview Mall and.
Speaker 4 (10:20):
Just Flanagan Recliner.
Speaker 1 (10:23):
Love it, Okay, it's good stuff.
Speaker 5 (10:25):
I still have a lot of the stuff that that
I had bought their twenty something years ago. But the
I share that because I've always been in sales. But
I say I've never sold a thing, and I truly
mean that, Like I feel like if you're if you're
trying to sell something or somebody, then you're doing it
the wrong way. I ask a lot of questions. I
get to understand people, what their interests are, what their
(10:46):
needs are. I educate them on different products and services,
even stuff that I don't have, right, and I just
live by this mantra that if you do the right
thing for the right person at the right moment, you'll
never be wrong. And you know, ultimately, if they're going
to buy, great, But if they're not, who cares? Right,
I did my job. I educated them and I helped
(11:06):
them understand, you know, what they're potentially in the market for,
what a potential need might be. And at some point
that all comes back. So, so you know, I am
a salesman, but I've never I say I've never sold anything,
which sounds really bad, but it's true. And so you know,
it's uh, what was the original question? I lost tractor?
Speaker 1 (11:26):
Oh, identifying people? Yeah, you know, I'm sorry. You were
talking about identifying people.
Speaker 5 (11:30):
So what I do is I get very strategic and
intentional with what I refer to as parallel markets. And
so again, I'm an insurance So who's working with my
potential customers?
Speaker 1 (11:42):
Right?
Speaker 5 (11:43):
Who already has those strong relationships with my potential customers,
people I want to work with. And so in my industry,
it's realtors, it's mortgage brokers, it's car dealers, it's attorneys. Right,
So so really, anyone that is involved in the home
or auto industry that's already working with people who own
homes or have cars or potentially need life insurance, I
(12:06):
don't look for the customers. I look for the realtors,
the attorneys, the car dealers, the mortgage brokers, and I
work my butt off to establish relationships with them, all
value driven, never ask for a thing, just how can
I help them? How can I support them so that
when they think of insurance as they talk to one
(12:28):
of their customers, like, hey, you got to go see Scott, right,
And that's way more powerful than any traditional marketing. And
I'll do because my AD is going to be just
like everyone else's ad in some capacity, and it's cold
and it becomes white noise because there's billions of dollars
that are being spent on this stuff. But when your
mortgage broker says, hey, the only person you need to
work with when it comes to insurance is Scott. Now
(12:52):
I'm already endorsed by a third party, someone they trust,
and now it's a whole different conversation when they come
to me. So yes, very strategic and intentional. That's what
the book is about.
Speaker 1 (13:03):
To do it.
Speaker 5 (13:04):
The right way is to add you know the value
and then develop those relationships with the right people who
will ultimately send you the people they know.
Speaker 1 (13:13):
Uh and and everything becomes a lot more fun.
Speaker 3 (13:15):
So as of like, right now, on the surface, and
I'm sure deeper than the surface, you have your your
professional guy, your successful guy. You've got successful businesses, you
just came out with a book. You got a nice haircut,
you got a nice background, you get a nice microphone.
I mean, there's pretty much nothing I don't like about you.
But but you've you've you've not always been on top.
(13:40):
You've had some low points, You've you've gone through, you've
gone through.
Speaker 4 (13:44):
The problems you've you've you've.
Speaker 3 (13:46):
Been there, done that. What's your number one? What's your
go to sort of self?
Speaker 4 (13:53):
Uh?
Speaker 3 (13:55):
You know, the way that you can really push yourself
through those really hard times, is there is there a
method that you go back to that you do all
the time, a mantra or a meditation or something.
Speaker 5 (14:06):
Well, yeah, meditation actually is part of it, but yeah,
it's And I love that you bring that up, right,
because we celebrate people for what they do in public,
and we forget that they put a lot of work
in private. And you know, people that are at the
top of the mountain that you miss all the climbing
(14:26):
and the falling and wanting to quit, you know, along
the way.
Speaker 1 (14:29):
And I grew up very poor.
Speaker 5 (14:32):
We were you know, we're six years and a single
wide trailer in a park. My father was a welder,
my mother was at the post office. They were you know,
blue collar working people. But you know, one car between them,
and we took one family vacation about an hour away
EUSS as far as the crappy car could take us.
And you know, I share that because nothing was handed
(14:53):
to me. My scope was very limited. This is before
cell phone and internet. And you know, the way my
lens that I saw the world through was well, you know,
you get out of high school and you get a
job in the factory and if you can, you know,
make more per hour or work over time, and you know,
that's that's it. That's life, and that's that That was
(15:13):
my lens and I won't bory you with with you know,
kind of some fortunate things that happened to great mentors
that I found along the way that kind of pushed
me outside of that.
Speaker 1 (15:21):
But that's answer question.
Speaker 5 (15:24):
Yeah, Well, well, I guess the long story short is
I was fortunate to have those mentors, one being a
high school football coach who encouraged me to look at college.
I never, no one of my family ever went to college,
so so he and he pushed me there. And then
actually I was right down the street from you again
at Saint John Fisher and UH and Paul Paul Osburg
(15:45):
he's still a football coach there and I was there
thirty years ago. But you know, he was a great
mentor to me to UH to encourage me to to
go to Fisher because I was I was like, just
I got a gig at the factory. Like they're paying
you know, triple and minimum wage. It seems like a
good deal. And so and then I was able to
get a job and in sales. I had a great
(16:08):
mentor at that story East View, mall Alan Shackey, who
since passed away, but you know, he took me under
his wing and kind of taught me the psychology of
sales and working with people, and and so one thing
just kind of led to another, and I was very
fortunate that I was pushed outside of my comfort zone.
And so that's something that I still do to this day.
I'm constantly pushing myself out of the comfort zone. When
(16:30):
I started the business we had, I had no business experience,
I had no insurance experience. I was I just lost
my job in two thousand and eight with the financial crisis.
I was with HSBC. They pulled the six and a
half thousand jobs out of North America. I was one
of them. We had two kids in diapers, my wife
a school teacher, and.
Speaker 4 (16:48):
I feel like I'm talking to myself.
Speaker 3 (16:50):
Well, I went through I went through the same thing,
roughly the same thing at the same time I was
let go from my job. I had three kids and diapers.
Speaker 1 (17:00):
Yeah, right, so you start learning a few things.
Speaker 5 (17:02):
But if they're in that process, yeah, and so really,
the best advice here's the answer to the question. The
best advice that I could give and what I truly
took on is this mindset of just win the day.
Speaker 1 (17:16):
Right.
Speaker 5 (17:16):
So we're recording this on Thursday, September fifth, and my
only goal today is to identify I've already done it,
Identify one or two things that if I get done
before I go to bed tonight, then I've won September
fifth and I have earned the right to move on
in September sixth, and let's let's get after it again.
I think one of the mistakes we make is we
(17:38):
think too big. I know that sounds counterintuitive to what
you know. A lot of the motivational people will tell you.
I'm not saying don't have long term goals. Definitely have
long term goals, but your focus today needs to be
on today. And so where we get discouraged and where
we want to quit is because one thousand miles away
(18:00):
and we took two steps, and we're like, shit, none
of this mattered. I'm not even making a dent in this,
like why bob there? But if my goal was two
steps and I did it today, then it's a whole
different mindset that. Man, I just I just crushed this thing, right,
and now if I can do two more steps tomorrow
and and suddenly you wake up twenty years later and
all this great stuff has happened, and people ask you,
(18:20):
how'd you do it and it's like just one day
at a time. They're like, you know, bs stupid answer, cliche,
but it is. No, but that's the truth.
Speaker 3 (18:28):
No, that's that's amazing, And that's kind of like what
I'm going through right now is I'm the I'm on
the verge of a possible expansion with a new sort
of business idea that's related to what I do, and
I'm scared to death because it's it's signing a lease,
(18:48):
it's doubling my rent, it's you know, investing in things
that may or may not work. I don't know. I
think they'll work. I've got a good feeling. I've got
people telling me that it'll work and it's a good idea,
but you know, you never know.
Speaker 1 (19:03):
So I'll bet on you. I bet it works, you know.
Speaker 3 (19:07):
So that actually does that, you know, I laugh because
we're like, hey, I'm bet on you. But that actually
makes me feel good, like when someone like you says, hey,
that's a good idea, Like I'm gonna listen, you know
when Yeah.
Speaker 5 (19:22):
We talked briefly off off air, but you know, before
we started this, and so I'm somewhat familiar with the
idea and just seeing what you've already done and doing
some research on you and and looking at how you're
you want to expand absolutely, you know, I'm just a
huge fan of scaling a successful model. And you have
a successful model, you have a brand, you know what works,
(19:43):
you put in the reps and so absolutely, you know,
take that next step and make it bigger. And the
other thing that I use is I call it a
fear que you know. And it's interesting that you talked
about it. It's scary, right and and so to me,
when something scary, I know I'm on the right track.
Speaker 3 (20:00):
Hm.
Speaker 5 (20:00):
Right, When when when I don't have that challenge or
things aren't scared to me, it's like what are you doing?
Speaker 1 (20:07):
Why bother?
Speaker 2 (20:08):
You know?
Speaker 5 (20:09):
And so so just the fact that you're scared, I
like it now was there was there a point early
on in your career, especially when like for me, the
biggest thing recently has been taking on a part time employee,
which it's a new thing for me. I've I have
plenty of contractors that work on a per job basis,
(20:31):
but there's no you know, there's nothing, there's no worry
for me. I'm not supporting anyone, They're not depending on me.
Necessarily on a weekly basis or you know, a paycheck basis.
So for me to take on an employee was like
a really big step and it was frightening as hell
because I'm like, someone's like, I don't know what I'm doing.
I'm just I'm stumbling through this day to day.
Speaker 3 (20:52):
I have no idea what I'm doing, you know, and
and and you say, you say, uh, you know, a
scalable business. And I've heard in the hundreds of podcasts
that have come through here in the last just in
the last year, I can't tell you how many times
I've had business people talking about scalable business. Get a
business and make it scalable so that you can, you know,
(21:14):
and data out it out and go through the whole thing.
And I'm thinking about it, and I'm like, that sounds
like a great idea. I don't have clue one on
how to.
Speaker 5 (21:22):
Do it, but well you do, and you are doing
it because that is the first step is to leverage
your time by using someone else's time. And that's employees, right,
And so really the model becomes at a simplest form,
what start with what you don't like doing, what's not
(21:44):
worth your time? What's below your pay grade. This is
difficult for a lot of people, right, you got to
put an hourly rate on your what's my time worth?
Speaker 1 (21:52):
Because you only get so much time?
Speaker 5 (21:54):
And so if and I'm just throwing a number out there,
but if your time is worth one hundred dollars an hour,
then you shouldn't be doing fifteen twenty dollars an hour work, right.
Speaker 1 (22:02):
You either have to outsource it or you have to
hire to it.
Speaker 5 (22:05):
And then you start looking at the things that you're
spending your time on and it's like, well, if I
wasn't spending two hours of my day doing that, what
could I be doing that would be able to build
my brand, build the business and earn me more money.
And that's you know, when you hire. And then ultimately
you just have this whole system of either replacing yourself
(22:27):
or replacing things you're outsourcing internally along the way and
really just find the one or two things. You're a
book guy. So there's a great book by Gary Keller.
I think it's co authored, but Gary Keller is one
of the authors, called The One Thing. Yeah, and you know, yeah,
so I mean it really here's the essential question in
(22:48):
that book and it fundamentally changed me when I heard it.
When I read it, it was if you can do
one thing at such a high level that nothing else
mattered and everything else became inconsequential, what would that one
thing be? And you know, when I first opened the agency,
(23:08):
I was the head of eleven different departments.
Speaker 1 (23:11):
You got a necessity.
Speaker 5 (23:12):
I had no money, I had no experience, fifteen hour
days and yeah, I had no customers. So I was
a salesperson, the service person and everything in between, the
HR person. And so I said, look, if I'm going
to leverage this thing, I'm going to use other people's
time to do the sales, to service the customers we have.
Then my one thing has to be the ability to recruit, hire, train,
(23:36):
motivate team. Like I've got to be really great at finding,
hiring and developing people. And so I put all of
my time and energy just there, and I stopped trying
to figure out where the customers coming from, and who's
going to, you know, do this after we write them,
and who's going to take her of claims and who's
going to take care of billing? Right, And so then
I just said, who's going to be the person And
(23:57):
I spent all my time trying to find the people
and and really for fifteen years that's been the process.
Today we've got, uh, I don't know, twenty three twenty
four employees between three different businesses. And you know, the
coolest thing is, I don't want to say it all
runs without me, but it kind of does. Yeah, you know,
(24:19):
yeah we're there. Yeah, that's the goal, you know. And
then then you know, another book is The e Myth
by Michael Gerber, and he talks about you're going to
work in your business or you're going to work on
your business, and he talks about if your business can't
run without you, you don't have a business, you have
a job, and you've got the worst job.
Speaker 1 (24:38):
In the world.
Speaker 5 (24:39):
And and that kind of like was a gut punch
to me. And I'm like, ah shit, he's right. And
that's when I made that transition and I had it's hard,
right because we're control freaks. It's our business, it's our brand,
it's our name. And I'm like, I can't trust someone
else to do that the way I do it, and
guess what, they're not going to. But if you can
get them like eighty percent there, then that frees up
(25:01):
one hundred percent of your time and I'll take that
trade off any day of the week. So so that's
kind of the scaling model.
Speaker 4 (25:10):
This is, this is a this is like a masterclass
for me.
Speaker 3 (25:14):
So I'm you should be billing me for this.
Speaker 4 (25:17):
No, I don't want to.
Speaker 1 (25:18):
Give you any ideas. We'll sell some books, I hope.
Speaker 4 (25:22):
So, I hope.
Speaker 3 (25:23):
So the one thing that I do want to kind
of uh sides move to the side here is but
it's related you you're talking about scaling, You're talking about
business and all this kind of stuff. And then and
then there's family. There's a wife and kids, and there's
you know, other family members and friends and and pastimes
(25:46):
and hobbies and things you like to do. And I've
I've found it very difficult to balance those. And there's
one of the things that I've worked on in the
last year was to prioritize those times for me or
my family and and and start saying no to things
that weren't, you know, so dire because you know, every
(26:08):
client wants it tomorrow and they and they need it
and the world's going to end if they don't get it.
Speaker 4 (26:13):
So how do you.
Speaker 3 (26:14):
How how how have you been about balancing that, and
and were you always good at no?
Speaker 1 (26:21):
I wasn't.
Speaker 5 (26:21):
I was never good at anything, to be honest with you,
And everything's been an evolution. But I love there's actually
three things there. I was feverishly taking notes as you
were talking there. But you know, the word no is
the most powerful word for a business owner, for a solopreneur,
really for any of us.
Speaker 1 (26:39):
Real quick.
Speaker 5 (26:39):
This is a whole thing I do in live seminars.
But but I teach this this triple D approach, which
is do it, delegate it, or decline it. And the
declinate is to just say no part. And so I
really have these these two or three things that are
my Kevin Alko talks about keep your main thing, main thing,
(27:00):
and so right now I've got two or three main focuses.
And anytime a request comes through, you know, it's one
of two, one of three things.
Speaker 1 (27:10):
It's you know, I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna do
it immediately.
Speaker 5 (27:12):
I'm the freak that has no emails in his email
box right because I'm o CD like I mean, they're
gonna do it or I'm gonna delegate it. Now here's
where my twenty three employees will tell you, this is
the place I'm the best. I delegate like everything to
them and they're great at what they do. So that's
why I do it, or I just decline it. I
(27:34):
say no, and not in a mean spirited way, but
just in a I explain like, right now, my area
of focus is this, and I'm not saying that it's
a no forever and maybe in the future, but right now,
I just don't have the capacity to take it on.
And people appreciate that and respect it. So so that's
my triple D approach, which I use every single day.
(27:55):
And I'm not afraid to say no to things, and
I'm really good at delegating. But the other thing with
the family, my wife and I we host a local
podcast and we were just talking about it yesterday with
a young business owner who was on and I think
in the Referrals Done Right book, I talk about this,
Actually I do. I don't know which chapter, but it's
this work life balance myth for the business owner, and
(28:18):
this takes the right relationship, and it takes a lot
of open conversations with your family, with your significant other,
because when you go into a business, it's not just
you going into it's the whole family, right, And that's
a commitment for everybody, and so they have to understand
that and have to be on board. And so rather
than this work life balance where it's like I'm fully
(28:41):
engaged at work and nothing else, or I'm fully engaged
with family and I can't think about work and I'm
an a hole if I do, we've adopted this work
life integration where this is who we are, like we
are the brand, our business is what keeps our family
doing what we love to do, giving us the freedom
and flexibility to you know, be at the ball games.
Speaker 1 (29:03):
I've never missed a game.
Speaker 5 (29:04):
I've chaperone to every field trip, you know, anything my kids,
I'm there, right.
Speaker 1 (29:09):
I love that.
Speaker 5 (29:10):
That's my favorite thing after you know, because now I
got one in college, one's a senior in high school.
Those were the two in diapers when I open and
and then the princess came along. The twelve year old
who's going on twenty two. But that's the whole different.
But yeah, but listen, I just love that. You know,
we talk in business terms with the kids about how
(29:31):
we have standards, right as a family, Like we have
personal standards, professional standards, right. They know they're part of
this brand, not in like a crazy hardcore way, but
just we have these conversations right that we are a
little bit different, and I want them to understand that
they don't remember it, but the struggles we went through
(29:53):
to build this thing when they were super young. Jenna
wasn't even born and and so they're kind of coming
in the talent and enjoying a lot of the fruits
and and then we're very you know, they all have
out well, not as twelve year old, but the boys
have jobs, not at the business elsewhere because I didn't
want to enable them with that. They have their own money,
they have their own responsibilities. So we're there to support,
(30:15):
but we're not going to enable the same way that
you know, we grew up where we had to figure
it out ourselves. With just we offer them a little
more guidance. But anyway, work life integration is really where
we've gotten this thing too. Where I like that, yeah,
we don't stop working, we don't stop living, you know,
we can do it all at once.
Speaker 3 (30:32):
Yeah, And it's it's a it's a real approach. It's
it's a reality approach, like this is how it is,
and it can't be any so let's make the best
of how it is and and don't try to live
to some standard that we read somewhere.
Speaker 4 (30:45):
That you have to do that that's what we have
to emulate. It's like, this is how we are.
Speaker 3 (30:51):
I love my kids wear my rock Box shirts to
school all the time.
Speaker 1 (30:57):
As they should.
Speaker 3 (30:57):
It's just what And it's probably because we haven't had
time to go buy them clothes lately, but mostly here's
a free T shirt.
Speaker 4 (31:08):
But there. But it's cool to see. It's cool to see.
Speaker 3 (31:10):
The kids proud of something that I'm doing, you know,
and it being on my own. I want to get
back to the writing process of putting this book together.
And I'm sure that this is the culmination of many
years of you know, little nuggets that you're like, oh, oh,
(31:31):
I gotta I gotta tell people about that, and and
and stuff.
Speaker 4 (31:34):
So how how.
Speaker 3 (31:35):
Long ago did you decide you were going to write
a book and how long did.
Speaker 4 (31:38):
It take you to actually put it together?
Speaker 5 (31:41):
Yeah, so great question, and you're right, it's not you know,
just a hey, now I'm going to do a book.
It's been hundreds and hundreds of pages of notes right
through the years. But so this book's actually my third one.
It's my it's my first one, traditionally published seven years ago, frankly, honestly,
as a straight up lead magnet to my coaching consulting company,
(32:04):
I wrote a book called Insurance Agency Optimization. It gave
insurance agency owners enough meat to be like, hey, there's
some value here, and hey, I like what this guy,
you know, his approach and the brand, and you know,
then they got to the website and here's what we
can offer you, you know, from a membership standpoint, right,
So the goal was to get people to the website
(32:25):
so they could become members and we could monetize that way,
because you don't really, unless you're Colleen Hoover or Stephen King,
you don't really make money off of a book. I
mean you can, but it's very difficult. We call it
a very expensive business card. It's a resume builder. It's
you know, hey, now you're you're an author, you're a speaker,
you know, like I've been on a ted X stage,
(32:47):
and so everything's kind of led to the next. But
then anyway, so the process started there seven years ago
when I self published that and just so many lessons,
and then when my oldest son became a senior in
high school, I got thinking to myself, man, you know, financially,
we're good if something happens to me. Like I sell
(33:08):
life insurance, but I have a lot of life insurance, right, Like,
they'll be okay financially if something happens. But there's a
lot of stuff in the old man's head that if
I die, you know, as cold as that sounds, but
it was just how I think, you know, I would
take with me, and I didn't want that. Like, as
my kids were becoming adults, I'm like, I want them
to have something they can hold and look back at,
(33:29):
you know, for one hundred years from now my grand
kids kids, I'll never meet great grand kids. So I
every morning I woke up and I just started writing
different thoughts and ideas and stories and lessons from my life.
And none of it was preachy. It was all just
common denominator success principles and habits and helping my son
(33:50):
understand that you're going to come to a lot of
crossroads in life and you're gonna have to make a decision,
right And I'm not here to tell you what decision
to make, but here's how you can prepare for that
decision and just work through some mindset, some critical thinking, discernment,
you know, skills that they don't learn in school. And
so that became the essential F words for teens. So
(34:11):
nine different sections of the book, all starting with F.
Obviously none of them are the F word, but that
was the punching title, and that you know, really took off.
That was also self published, but I worked with a
professional editor on that one and learned a lot from that.
And and really the book business Shocking Leaf, it's it's
a it's a money business, right, a lot of money.
And so when you talk to a traditional publishing company,
(34:36):
really all they care about is how big is your network,
how big is your email list, how big is your
social following. They want to know how many books you
can sell if they're going to invest in you. And
so through all of this, and that's why I shared
the backstory, we were building the community, building the community
right through the agency, through the consulting company, through the podcast.
(34:58):
You know, had ten thousand plus people on our email
list and over ten thousand social media followers, and now
all of a sudden, traditional publishing companies.
Speaker 1 (35:07):
Were like, hey, you know, let's talk. So this book
referrals done right.
Speaker 5 (35:11):
Was the first time I worked with a traditional publishing company,
which was really cool because then I got a team
of professional writers. I thought I was a decent writer,
and then I started working with professional writers. I'm like, oh,
I don't know anything about writing.
Speaker 1 (35:23):
You know.
Speaker 5 (35:23):
And so it was a ten month process. They challenged
me in ways that it was just awesome, you know
that I would never have thought of different systems and
concepts and ways to do things.
Speaker 1 (35:37):
You know.
Speaker 5 (35:37):
They offer suggestions some ghost writing, if you will, right,
every word in that book is not mine. It got
my approval, right, but they would give me that. The
process was they'd give me a bunch of questions to answer,
and then every week we jump on a zoom call
and there were three or four of them, you know,
they're all different roles, and we would just hour long
(35:59):
back and forth kind of interview, right and think tank,
you know, go through these things, and then that would
turn into all right, hey write about this, and then
they take the answer to my questions, they take my writing,
and then they would offer suggestions edits, and it was
just this process of back and forth. So this was
over ten months that we did this, and then they
(36:21):
get the creatives involved and the title tests and and
and you know, ultimately, none of it matters if you
don't sell it. And so then I was working with
the company called Brand Builders, and they had a whole
best seller launch plan.
Speaker 2 (36:38):
Uh.
Speaker 5 (36:39):
They were the same company that did at my Let's
last book, The Power of One More, They did Lewis
Howe's last book, right, and so like big stuff here,
Jamie Kern lima worthy. You know, these are New York
Times best selling books. And so we used the same
plan to launch it. And that was actually more exhausting
than the writing process because it was this NonStop tour
(37:01):
of talks and podcasts. And they gave me a podcast
agent who started booking me on all these different shows
and then just yeah, the tours, right, the webinars, the seminars,
the talks, the podcast, just promoting it, photo shoots, video shoots,
you know.
Speaker 1 (37:22):
So it was this whole build up to August.
Speaker 5 (37:24):
Thirteenth, when the book was released, and it was exhausting.
But a week after it released, we hit the USA
Today Bestseller List, so national bestseller list.
Speaker 1 (37:36):
It was the one.
Speaker 5 (37:37):
Hundred and forty first most sold book in America, which
was really wild. Right, So Colleen Hoover, she's got this
thing figured out. She was, she's number one and two
on the list. But it was this moment in time
where I love was look at this list and I
was one forty one with that book and one forty
five was Stephen King's book that he has out.
Speaker 1 (37:55):
I don't know what the name of it is. And
I'm like, you know.
Speaker 5 (37:58):
What, Like he's had a hell of a career, right,
but but if we just wiped it all away this week,
I'm beating them this week going forward.
Speaker 4 (38:05):
Right right, that's cool.
Speaker 1 (38:07):
So it's a wild process.
Speaker 5 (38:09):
It was a year long journey and uh, you know
now it's it's kind of opening up doors to other things.
Speaker 1 (38:14):
So it's it's working.
Speaker 3 (38:16):
You've you've talked about delegating and what's the what's the
difference between delegating and collaborating.
Speaker 5 (38:24):
Well, delegating is I'm just straight up telling you to
do this, right, delegating or outsourcing I might be paying
you know, well, I delegate to people I pay, and
then I outsource to people who have their own thing,
but I pay them, you know, to do their own thing.
Speaker 1 (38:40):
They're un employees.
Speaker 5 (38:42):
And then collaborating is really like what I did with
the publishing team. Right, we would just put our heads
together and think tank things.
Speaker 1 (38:51):
Right.
Speaker 5 (38:51):
So I'm part of coaching groups, I'm part of study groups.
I have a network of people that that we meet
on the right their basis and share ideas, some of
them internally, right, other insurance competitors, and we have this
this mantra that you know, it's collaboration over competition. And
(39:11):
if we all can get better and we all can
add more value as long as we have this abundance
mindset and we work together, there's there's enough business to
go around. There's enough money to go around, right, And
and how much is enough anyway?
Speaker 1 (39:23):
Right?
Speaker 5 (39:24):
And and so my whole life changed when I got
into an abundance mindset that you can't beat me, because
I'm rooting for you, like I just I want people
to win. I want them to succeed, even if I'm
in direct competition. Like you know, I'm willing to help
another insurance agent who's going through the struggle, just opened
(39:45):
up and trying to do their own thing. And you know,
they might take business, they will take business from me,
but I don't care. Right, there's enough business out there
and every customer has the right to choose, and if
they find more value there, then absolutely go. So really
it's this collaboration over competition mindset and if you truly
are rooting for people, you can't lose.
Speaker 3 (40:08):
I like that the reason why I asked it's kind
of a silly question, like the difference. To most people,
the difference between collaboration and delegation is pretty obvious until
you work with a micromanager, and then the delegation and
collaboration sort of become this morphed weird thing that it's like, well,
you told me to do this, so now why are
(40:30):
you working with me on this?
Speaker 4 (40:32):
So that's why I wanted to see what your answer is.
Speaker 1 (40:35):
I knew.
Speaker 5 (40:37):
I love that follow up, by the way, because I'll
follow up with this. If you're going to be good
at delegating right, you can't be a micromanager like you said.
You have to empower the people that you're delegating to
and trust them that they're going to do it right.
And that's my message to my team all the time
is that, look, you know, as long as you're doing
(40:57):
it legally, ethically and compliantly, you can't mess it up.
And I almost encourage them to make mistakes, because not mistakes,
but just fail right, because they're trying different things. They're
trying things that we've always done a new way and
it didn't work, and failure is feedback, right, and so
so I want them to not become complacent and try
new things and then we can collaborate what worked what didn't.
(41:21):
But to your point, you can't delegate and then be
breathing down someone's neck or taking it back, right. You
have to empower them to run with it.
Speaker 3 (41:31):
Yeah, And I know that that's really really hard for
some people.
Speaker 4 (41:36):
I don't want to it's.
Speaker 3 (41:38):
It's hard for me in a way because there's for
me for what I do here, there's there's a there's
a period of training that has to happen. And I'm
sure it's the same with your business. When you have
someone coming in, they have to learn how to do
what you do. And a lot of times, if you're
really really busy, you end up saying, well, you know,
what's just easier for it's quicker for me to do it,
(42:00):
and then you know, all right, watch or something like that,
and that becomes kind of a bad habit because then
you just end up doing it all the time. And
like you said earlier, you don't have a business, you
have a job, So how do you how do you
navigate that?
Speaker 5 (42:16):
And I love all these questions because you're just team.
But we literally have never spoken about any of this.
There was no prep work. But this is all like
you're putting stuff on a tea for me.
Speaker 4 (42:24):
Here.
Speaker 5 (42:25):
The word busy will bury a human, It will bury
a business owner, especially because we use that as a crutch.
Is common, right, very common. And yes, it's like, hey,
I just don't have time to teach you, so I'll
just do it myself and I'll share a really quick story.
The difference between a buffalo and a cow when it
(42:49):
comes to a storm rolling in is when a storm
rolls in, a cow starts running away from the storm, like,
oh my god, a storm's coming. I don't want to
be in a storm. And a herd cows they all
follow each other. They start running and the storm goes
over them because it catches up to them, and then
they keep running with it and they stay in the
(43:10):
storm way longer than they need to.
Speaker 1 (43:13):
Right, A buffalo looks at a.
Speaker 5 (43:15):
Storm and it says, all right, this is gonna suck
for a little bit, but we're gonna run right at it.
And as they run at it, yeah, they they're through
the storm. But then the storms are going the other way,
and they're going the other way and they get through
it a lot quicker. And I share that because to
multiply your time, you have to go backwards for a
(43:35):
little bit.
Speaker 1 (43:35):
You have to go through the storm.
Speaker 5 (43:37):
And the only way to multiply your time is to
take time to go backwards or pause where you're gonna
miss business. You're gonna miss opportunities, or things might not
be right, you might lose a client, but you're going
to build a system or a process, you know, and
this could be training new employee that will serve you
in the future, so that the next time this comes up,
(43:59):
it's already and now you don't have to spend that
time doing it. Now you have the training system and
process and you know whatever in place. So you have
to look at the busy thing and go when am
I not going to be busy? And just be honest
with yourself because the answer is never. And if you
just keep saying you're busy, you're running with the storm
(44:20):
and you're never gonna get anyway, you become this hamster
on a wheel, and so you've got to have the
courage to take some short term losses to get someone
up to speed, because what they're going to do if
you train them, empower them, enable them years into the future,
will buy back so much of that time. Maybe that
(44:42):
that three four weeks that you invested initially, you'll multiply
that you'll save three four years of time by not
always having to do the stuff that they're now doing.
Speaker 3 (44:53):
So essentially, just like run straight at it. Stop what
you're doing, say we're going to go get through. It's
gonna suck right for a little bit, but we're going
to get through this and then you don't have to
go through it again.
Speaker 4 (45:06):
Amazing, you know.
Speaker 5 (45:07):
I mean when I talked about the win the day process, right,
so we're going through I won't get too deep into this,
but the insurance industry is upside down right now. It's
a whole mess. It's a season, right everything's cyclical, but
everything is really bad right now. And so this was
a moment in my agency, you know business, where I'm like, hey,
this is gonna suck for a minute, but we've got
(45:27):
to adapt, right, adapt or die.
Speaker 1 (45:29):
We've got to adapt to.
Speaker 5 (45:30):
What the new normal is out there, figure out what
the opportunities are, where are the silver linings, readjust some
of our systems and processes, which is really uncomfortable for
people because no one likes change. They're used to doing
things a certain way. And I'm having these fights daily. Actually,
I was a little bit late in on this call
because I was talking about one of my agency managers
and we're trying to change things up and she's getting
pushed back and I'm coaching her through how to handle that,
(45:53):
and you know, so I'm in one of those periods
right now where we're kind of hitting the pause button
and we're reworkingstems and processes because externally, the world's changing
and we have to adapt with it, and if we
just keep trying to go the same way, we're gonna
fall behind. So so, yeah, it's this constant process of
reinventing yourself.
Speaker 1 (46:13):
Yeah, it's it's.
Speaker 5 (46:14):
Short you know, you gotta look at everything on a
short term window.
Speaker 1 (46:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (46:18):
That that reinventing yourself has been a theme throughout the
life of this podcast. It's been one of the major
themes reinvention, stepping out of your comfort zone, mentorship and
and just overall positive attitudes, positive thoughts, almost psyching yourself
(46:42):
out and saying, you know what, I'm having a shit day,
but I'm gonna start thinking about happy things and I'm gonna,
you know, I'm gonna watch like a comedy bit for
a couple of minutes and laugh and then kind of
break that cycle of of of crap.
Speaker 1 (46:58):
Easier said than done.
Speaker 5 (47:00):
But you know, so sports analogy, A big sports guy,
the you know Yankees fan, you know, I remember once
Derek Jeter was like over sixteen or something like that, right,
like it's just uncommon for him. But in a slump,
and he has us at bat where he saws off
an inside pitch, breaks his bat, It dribbles down the
third baseline, he gets the first base infield single and
(47:21):
like a guy's in dugout are laughing, he's laughing on first, right,
But that broke the streak. So now he's not over
for his last sixteen. He's won for his last one.
And so to your point, when you're going through a slump,
sometimes it doesn't have to be pretty, doesn't have to
be this big monstrous home run, like just a broken
bat infield single. Just get away from what you're doing,
(47:42):
get a different perspective, you know, get set the easiest
goal in the world, and then hit that first thing
in the morning. You're like, damn, I just hit that
goal on one for my last one.
Speaker 4 (47:51):
Crush porn a cup of coffee.
Speaker 5 (47:53):
Man, Yeah, that's no joke, Like you know what I mean,
like find wins and the little stuff.
Speaker 3 (47:59):
Here's the book referrals done Right Scott Greats dot com
and referrals done Right book dot com. It's it's been,
it's been a fantastic rite here I I it's like
I said, it's a masterclass of of for small business
and for just a general you know, attitude adjustment that
(48:19):
that people need as they're going through their day. This
was fantastic. So so what's uh, what's like in the
near future for you.
Speaker 4 (48:28):
Who? That is that a whole another episode?
Speaker 5 (48:31):
I feel like that should be an easy question, but
you know it's uh, coming off the book launch and
and you know, wrapping up the end of the year,
and so now you know, I talk about this du
delegate decline model that I use. I'm I'm kind of
at this crossroad myself where I'm getting a lot of
requests to do a lot of things that I feel
like I should be doing, but fundamentally I don't want
(48:55):
to do because I don't want to miss time with
my kids. I've got a senior in high school, so
a lot of speaking events and things like that, which
is awesome, right, I mean, you get like seventy five
hundred bucks for an hour keynote, but it's not just
an hour, right, The talk is but you've got the travel,
You've got the prep work, you've got So I'm finding
myself taking my own advice and saying no to a
(49:15):
lot of things and then just trying to figure out
what I do want to say yes too. So really,
the hyper focused local podcasts love Living Local three, one five,
I do that with my wife to shine a spotlight
on awesome people in our community doing awesome things. And
then I do the Referrals Done Right podcast, which releases
(49:36):
two episodes a week and really just gives people a
deeper conversation with other business owners on relationship marketing. So
really that's my core focus. Obviously, the agencies are that's
what's paying you know, the bulk and the bills and
putting against your college. But yeah, That's that's where my
heart is right now, just trying to serve as many
people as possible while staying true to my values, standards
(50:00):
and family.
Speaker 3 (50:01):
Well, that being said, I'm really honored that you took
an hour out of your day to UH to sit
and wrap with me about this kind of stuff and
just some shmow in the five eight five. But I
do appreciate it, and I'm really glad that I met
you through Martina and UH and her podcast Uptown Girls.
Speaker 4 (50:20):
That was You were a great guest on that one,
and I was like, I want to talk to him
some more.
Speaker 1 (50:25):
Well, I'm glad you reached out.
Speaker 5 (50:26):
This was a lot of fun and UH, I think
we could potentially collaborate in the future as well.
Speaker 4 (50:31):
I love it.
Speaker 3 (50:32):
I love collaboration. Well, that is it for today. Positive
Blatherings dot com. I think that website still works. But
Scott Greats dot com and the book is referrals done
right and they can find it on Amazon and any any.
Speaker 1 (50:49):
Other anywhere books are sold anywhere books.
Speaker 3 (50:52):
And I got this bad Boy in the pre the
pre the pre order, so I sat here, Yes, that's right.
Speaker 5 (51:00):
My commitment, We're worthless after I sign it
Speaker 4 (51:05):
Right, come on,
Three peat.
Speaker 2 (00:02):
No, I'm conformists. Oh, I promise to be different. I
promise to be I promise not three peat things other
people say, Hey, welcome.
Speaker 3 (00:35):
Back to positive latherings with fits And yes, I know,
I'm I'm I'm the worst at doing podcasts. I tell people,
show people how to do podcasts, help them do podcasts,
and when it comes to myself, it's a shit show.
But it's a good show because I'm bringing on some
pretty sweet guests and a lot of this is is
(00:56):
total happenstance on how I meet these people and this guy.
Speaker 4 (01:00):
So it's kind of the Scott Show.
Speaker 3 (01:02):
This, this afternoon, this morning, whenever you're listening to this.
Scott Greats is an author Scott Greats dot com, and
he has this book that I'm going to hold up
to the camera right now, Referrals Done Right. And you know,
at first glance, you're like, oh, referrals. What does that
say to you?
Speaker 4 (01:20):
Is that like a real estate thing?
Speaker 5 (01:22):
Is that?
Speaker 3 (01:22):
And this is a small business I would almost say
this is like a small business Bible. And I got
to read I got to read the dedication here because
this really sums it up for me.
Speaker 4 (01:34):
This book is.
Speaker 3 (01:36):
For the bold, courageous, hardworking, inspired optimist who had a
ten thousand foot vision of better serving those around them
with a business of their own. I'm glad you took
the leap and excited to provide a parachute.
Speaker 4 (01:50):
That's awesome. That is just so awesome. Thanks for joining
me today, Scott.
Speaker 1 (01:55):
Absolutely listen.
Speaker 5 (01:56):
I mean when I read you know your your podcast
all about being positive, no prep work and no script
I'm like, sign me up, I'm in.
Speaker 1 (02:05):
I can, I can do all of that.
Speaker 4 (02:06):
And it's and it's really it's really about like.
Speaker 3 (02:11):
Just having a conversation, you know, with the person and
letting letting the conversation kind of unfold as we go
kind of I don't know what's going to happen. I
don't know what's going to be said, but we're gonna
get there and it's gonna be fun, and we might
go in a completely different direction. Like my intention is
to is to you know, talk about your writing process
(02:32):
and the journey that you've taken to to write this book.
But we might end up, you know, spending twenty minutes
on your dogs or cats or whatever you have.
Speaker 5 (02:41):
So yeah, not the cat and the cat and I
aren't getting along totally, but yeah.
Speaker 1 (02:46):
You're not excited to see where it goes. For sure.
Speaker 5 (02:49):
This could call could go a lot of places, man.
But you know, it's funny you talk about the title
there was there's obviously so much talk. You have a
working title, and then you're working with a team at
the publishing company and everyone's got different thoughts and ideas,
and really the book is about relationships, more specifically relationship
(03:09):
marketing and how we operate in this connection economy and
what was once old is really new again because in
this digitally dominated world that we live in, where everyone's
trying to fight for the same you know, business in
these traditional ways, cold, frankly ways, right, you know, just
(03:30):
the eyeball to eyeball, the human interactions, conversations like this,
you know, meaningful connections.
Speaker 1 (03:35):
They matter.
Speaker 5 (03:37):
But I couldn't name the book relationship anything because then
that puts it in a whole different category at the bookstore,
and it's you know, it's a business book and referrals.
It's funny, it's a book about referrals. And then in
the book I talk about we really shouldn't use the
word referrals. You know, it's better to introduce people or
connect people. Referrals has this cold business feel to it,
(03:57):
but everyone in business knows what to refer is.
Speaker 1 (04:00):
So it's on the cover and here we are.
Speaker 3 (04:02):
Yeah, and and that's a that's a really great point
because the relationships. I look, I look at my business
and you know, yes, I've done some advertising, I've done
some radio I've done, but really ninety eight percent of
what I bring in here is all word of mouth.
It's it's talking to someone like you who says, oh, hey,
you know, I don't I know a guy, and and
(04:24):
being the guy that that people know, and and it's
those relationships that if it's probably my favorite part about business,
besides actually doing what I love to do, which is all.
Speaker 4 (04:35):
This techie stuff.
Speaker 3 (04:36):
You know, being surrounded by wires and knobs and buttons
and and VU meters and stuff is really cool. But
but the relationships going and having someone say I've got
this problem. I really need to do this and I
don't know how, and I go, oh, yeah, let's do
it this way, and we figure it out, and then
they're all excited and they're like.
Speaker 4 (04:55):
Wow, that's so much better than I thought it could be.
And that and then I'm like I have done my work.
Speaker 5 (05:01):
You know in that voice, Yes, but exactly listen, Scott,
You're you're hitting on where the book starts. And you
can't be the guy or be referred if you weren't referrable.
And so what you're hitting on is you have to
have just a tremendous amount of value. You have to
create this unique, memorable customer experience where it's like, well,
(05:21):
fits does this better than anyone else, Like, if you're
looking for this, you need to go see him. And
so really it all starts with the value. And I
think with business relationships sometimes we feel entitled or there's
this expectation that hey, I'll help you and you help me,
and you know, I'll take it to a Rochester Amerks
game and then you're going to send me everyone you know,
(05:42):
that's a deal. But the reality is that the value
has to come first. Otherwise you haven't earned the right
to be introduced to others. So that's really where we
start this journey is be freaking awesome at what you do.
Speaker 3 (05:56):
Yeah, and what gets me is that sometimes I forget
that you know, people know a lot of people.
Speaker 4 (06:03):
So I really I take that to heart.
Speaker 3 (06:05):
I'm like, oh, I worked with this person, and then
I see them working with someone else who's doing something
similar to me, and I take that personally and I'm like,
oh my god, what did I do wrong?
Speaker 4 (06:19):
How did I screw this up?
Speaker 3 (06:21):
And it's not it's not actually what's happening. Every single
time that I've looked into those situations, from what it
seemed to be on the surface is not what it
was down deep.
Speaker 4 (06:33):
It was.
Speaker 3 (06:34):
It was total happenstance. Oh, we were talking and this
guy said this, and then this just happened. It wasn't
like they said, well you know, and every time it
was like, no, I thought of you, and it just
didn't make sense to call you because this was already
in motion. And so the way that those relationships go
(06:54):
sometimes can be hurtful in a way for me. But
if I just sit back and I chill out about it,
every single time, it comes back around because I play
the game correctly. I'm positive. I'm encouraging. I'm like, yeah,
that's a good that's a good guy to work with.
He's awesome. You know, continue what you're doing. If you
(07:15):
need any help, just let me know and continue to
be that sort of positive force, and eventually it comes
back around, might not be right. Then it might be
six months later it might be who knows, but or
they refer me to someone else and said, you know,
you need to talk to this guy. So those relationships,
they go deep and they're very unpredictable.
Speaker 5 (07:36):
So what's funny there is we all do this as humans.
We create this false narrative when we don't know the
real reason why. So we see something from the outside
and then it's like, oh, I must have do isn'thing wrong?
Or oh they must not like me, or oh they
must be you know whatever, and we create this entire
narrative just isn't true.
Speaker 1 (07:57):
And you know, so I'm I'm an.
Speaker 5 (07:58):
Insurance agency owner and we're in a high volume business. So,
you know, I just to give some perspective, like we've
got over ten thousand policies between two agencies that we
take care of, and so I joke all the time,
like how many places can I eat pizza? How many
places can I get my haircut?
Speaker 2 (08:17):
Right?
Speaker 5 (08:17):
Like I can't reciprocate to everyone who does business with
me because I ensure twenty pizzaia owners.
Speaker 1 (08:23):
You know, although I probably kind of eat pizza at
twenty different places.
Speaker 5 (08:26):
But you know, so what I've found is, you know,
just like I want that deep relationship and that connection
with someone, I have to respect the fact and understand
that they may already have it with someone else. And
so what I get from a lot of people is
they're like, Scott, we love what you're doing, we like you.
But look, I've been with my agent who's you know,
(08:46):
for twenty years, or it's my uncle or a friend
of whatever, and I'm like, look, I get that, but
that doesn't mean those people won't refer me. Right So,
even though they're not personally doing business with me, A
lot of our referral sources are people that actually do
business somewhere else else, but they kind of feel like
they can't leave because of a personal connection. But it
doesn't mean they can't be a referral source or a
connector to to others.
Speaker 1 (09:08):
And I get that a lot too.
Speaker 5 (09:09):
I want to introduce you to to so and so,
and then so and so becomes a great customer or
referral source. So you know, I just look at everybody
as an opportunity to add value, lead with that servant's
heart and know, like you said, at some point, it's
just karma right that you do good things, good things
will come back to you.
Speaker 3 (09:30):
Now, do you are you able to Some people are
really good at finding or identifying certain characters, certain types
of people in a population. So are you the kind
of person who can who can look at someone and say,
I know this person is like this or I think
(09:51):
this person is like this, and you know I'm going
to use that to my advantage, not in a devious way. Yeah,
you know, you know how someone is, you know what
kind of person they are, and you know how to
approach it better rather than just going in, you know,
like full born being like, Hey, I'm a salesman, you know.
Speaker 5 (10:11):
So I love that you said that because you know,
I've been in sales twenty five years. I actually started
my career just down the road from you at Raymore
and Flannigans in Eastview Mall and.
Speaker 4 (10:20):
Just Flanagan Recliner.
Speaker 1 (10:23):
Love it, Okay, it's good stuff.
Speaker 5 (10:25):
I still have a lot of the stuff that that
I had bought their twenty something years ago. But the
I share that because I've always been in sales. But
I say I've never sold a thing, and I truly
mean that, Like I feel like if you're if you're
trying to sell something or somebody, then you're doing it
the wrong way. I ask a lot of questions. I
get to understand people, what their interests are, what their
(10:46):
needs are. I educate them on different products and services,
even stuff that I don't have, right, and I just
live by this mantra that if you do the right
thing for the right person at the right moment, you'll
never be wrong. And you know, ultimately, if they're going
to buy, great, But if they're not, who cares? Right,
I did my job. I educated them and I helped
(11:06):
them understand, you know, what they're potentially in the market for,
what a potential need might be. And at some point
that all comes back. So, so you know, I am
a salesman, but I've never I say I've never sold anything,
which sounds really bad, but it's true. And so you know,
it's uh, what was the original question? I lost tractor?
Speaker 1 (11:26):
Oh, identifying people? Yeah, you know, I'm sorry. You were
talking about identifying people.
Speaker 5 (11:30):
So what I do is I get very strategic and
intentional with what I refer to as parallel markets. And
so again, I'm an insurance So who's working with my
potential customers?
Speaker 1 (11:42):
Right?
Speaker 5 (11:43):
Who already has those strong relationships with my potential customers,
people I want to work with. And so in my industry,
it's realtors, it's mortgage brokers, it's car dealers, it's attorneys. Right,
So so really, anyone that is involved in the home
or auto industry that's already working with people who own
homes or have cars or potentially need life insurance, I
(12:06):
don't look for the customers. I look for the realtors,
the attorneys, the car dealers, the mortgage brokers, and I
work my butt off to establish relationships with them, all
value driven, never ask for a thing, just how can
I help them? How can I support them so that
when they think of insurance as they talk to one
(12:28):
of their customers, like, hey, you got to go see Scott, right,
And that's way more powerful than any traditional marketing. And
I'll do because my AD is going to be just
like everyone else's ad in some capacity, and it's cold
and it becomes white noise because there's billions of dollars
that are being spent on this stuff. But when your
mortgage broker says, hey, the only person you need to
work with when it comes to insurance is Scott. Now
(12:52):
I'm already endorsed by a third party, someone they trust,
and now it's a whole different conversation when they come
to me. So yes, very strategic and intentional. That's what
the book is about.
Speaker 1 (13:03):
To do it.
Speaker 5 (13:04):
The right way is to add you know the value
and then develop those relationships with the right people who
will ultimately send you the people they know.
Speaker 1 (13:13):
Uh and and everything becomes a lot more fun.
Speaker 3 (13:15):
So as of like, right now, on the surface, and
I'm sure deeper than the surface, you have your your
professional guy, your successful guy. You've got successful businesses, you
just came out with a book. You got a nice haircut,
you got a nice background, you get a nice microphone.
I mean, there's pretty much nothing I don't like about you.
But but you've you've you've not always been on top.
(13:40):
You've had some low points, You've you've gone through, you've
gone through.
Speaker 4 (13:44):
The problems you've you've you've.
Speaker 3 (13:46):
Been there, done that. What's your number one? What's your
go to sort of self?
Speaker 4 (13:53):
Uh?
Speaker 3 (13:55):
You know, the way that you can really push yourself
through those really hard times, is there is there a
method that you go back to that you do all
the time, a mantra or a meditation or something.
Speaker 5 (14:06):
Well, yeah, meditation actually is part of it, but yeah,
it's And I love that you bring that up, right,
because we celebrate people for what they do in public,
and we forget that they put a lot of work
in private. And you know, people that are at the
top of the mountain that you miss all the climbing
(14:26):
and the falling and wanting to quit, you know, along
the way.
Speaker 1 (14:29):
And I grew up very poor.
Speaker 5 (14:32):
We were you know, we're six years and a single
wide trailer in a park. My father was a welder,
my mother was at the post office. They were you know,
blue collar working people. But you know, one car between them,
and we took one family vacation about an hour away
EUSS as far as the crappy car could take us.
And you know, I share that because nothing was handed
(14:53):
to me. My scope was very limited. This is before
cell phone and internet. And you know, the way my
lens that I saw the world through was well, you know,
you get out of high school and you get a
job in the factory and if you can, you know,
make more per hour or work over time, and you know,
that's that's it. That's life, and that's that That was
(15:13):
my lens and I won't bory you with with you know,
kind of some fortunate things that happened to great mentors
that I found along the way that kind of pushed
me outside of that.
Speaker 1 (15:21):
But that's answer question.
Speaker 5 (15:24):
Yeah, Well, well, I guess the long story short is
I was fortunate to have those mentors, one being a
high school football coach who encouraged me to look at college.
I never, no one of my family ever went to college,
so so he and he pushed me there. And then
actually I was right down the street from you again
at Saint John Fisher and UH and Paul Paul Osburg
(15:45):
he's still a football coach there and I was there
thirty years ago. But you know, he was a great
mentor to me to UH to encourage me to to
go to Fisher because I was I was like, just
I got a gig at the factory. Like they're paying
you know, triple and minimum wage. It seems like a
good deal. And so and then I was able to
get a job and in sales. I had a great
(16:08):
mentor at that story East View, mall Alan Shackey, who
since passed away, but you know, he took me under
his wing and kind of taught me the psychology of
sales and working with people, and and so one thing
just kind of led to another, and I was very
fortunate that I was pushed outside of my comfort zone.
And so that's something that I still do to this day.
I'm constantly pushing myself out of the comfort zone. When
(16:30):
I started the business we had, I had no business experience,
I had no insurance experience. I was I just lost
my job in two thousand and eight with the financial crisis.
I was with HSBC. They pulled the six and a
half thousand jobs out of North America. I was one
of them. We had two kids in diapers, my wife
a school teacher, and.
Speaker 4 (16:48):
I feel like I'm talking to myself.
Speaker 3 (16:50):
Well, I went through I went through the same thing,
roughly the same thing at the same time I was
let go from my job. I had three kids and diapers.
Speaker 1 (17:00):
Yeah, right, so you start learning a few things.
Speaker 5 (17:02):
But if they're in that process, yeah, and so really,
the best advice here's the answer to the question. The
best advice that I could give and what I truly
took on is this mindset of just win the day.
Speaker 1 (17:16):
Right.
Speaker 5 (17:16):
So we're recording this on Thursday, September fifth, and my
only goal today is to identify I've already done it,
Identify one or two things that if I get done
before I go to bed tonight, then I've won September
fifth and I have earned the right to move on
in September sixth, and let's let's get after it again.
I think one of the mistakes we make is we
(17:38):
think too big. I know that sounds counterintuitive to what
you know. A lot of the motivational people will tell you.
I'm not saying don't have long term goals. Definitely have
long term goals, but your focus today needs to be
on today. And so where we get discouraged and where
we want to quit is because one thousand miles away
(18:00):
and we took two steps, and we're like, shit, none
of this mattered. I'm not even making a dent in this,
like why bob there? But if my goal was two
steps and I did it today, then it's a whole
different mindset that. Man, I just I just crushed this thing, right,
and now if I can do two more steps tomorrow
and and suddenly you wake up twenty years later and
all this great stuff has happened, and people ask you,
(18:20):
how'd you do it and it's like just one day
at a time. They're like, you know, bs stupid answer, cliche,
but it is. No, but that's the truth.
Speaker 3 (18:28):
No, that's that's amazing, And that's kind of like what
I'm going through right now is I'm the I'm on
the verge of a possible expansion with a new sort
of business idea that's related to what I do, and
I'm scared to death because it's it's signing a lease,
(18:48):
it's doubling my rent, it's you know, investing in things
that may or may not work. I don't know. I
think they'll work. I've got a good feeling. I've got
people telling me that it'll work and it's a good idea,
but you know, you never know.
Speaker 1 (19:03):
So I'll bet on you. I bet it works, you know.
Speaker 3 (19:07):
So that actually does that, you know, I laugh because
we're like, hey, I'm bet on you. But that actually
makes me feel good, like when someone like you says, hey,
that's a good idea, Like I'm gonna listen, you know
when Yeah.
Speaker 5 (19:22):
We talked briefly off off air, but you know, before
we started this, and so I'm somewhat familiar with the
idea and just seeing what you've already done and doing
some research on you and and looking at how you're
you want to expand absolutely, you know, I'm just a
huge fan of scaling a successful model. And you have
a successful model, you have a brand, you know what works,
(19:43):
you put in the reps and so absolutely, you know,
take that next step and make it bigger. And the
other thing that I use is I call it a
fear que you know. And it's interesting that you talked
about it. It's scary, right and and so to me,
when something scary, I know I'm on the right track.
Speaker 3 (20:00):
Hm.
Speaker 5 (20:00):
Right, When when when I don't have that challenge or
things aren't scared to me, it's like what are you doing?
Speaker 1 (20:07):
Why bother?
Speaker 2 (20:08):
You know?
Speaker 5 (20:09):
And so so just the fact that you're scared, I
like it now was there was there a point early
on in your career, especially when like for me, the
biggest thing recently has been taking on a part time employee,
which it's a new thing for me. I've I have
plenty of contractors that work on a per job basis,
(20:31):
but there's no you know, there's nothing, there's no worry
for me. I'm not supporting anyone, They're not depending on me.
Necessarily on a weekly basis or you know, a paycheck basis.
So for me to take on an employee was like
a really big step and it was frightening as hell
because I'm like, someone's like, I don't know what I'm doing.
I'm just I'm stumbling through this day to day.
Speaker 3 (20:52):
I have no idea what I'm doing, you know, and
and and you say, you say, uh, you know, a
scalable business. And I've heard in the hundreds of podcasts
that have come through here in the last just in
the last year, I can't tell you how many times
I've had business people talking about scalable business. Get a
business and make it scalable so that you can, you know,
(21:14):
and data out it out and go through the whole thing.
And I'm thinking about it, and I'm like, that sounds
like a great idea. I don't have clue one on
how to.
Speaker 5 (21:22):
Do it, but well you do, and you are doing
it because that is the first step is to leverage
your time by using someone else's time. And that's employees, right,
And so really the model becomes at a simplest form,
what start with what you don't like doing, what's not
(21:44):
worth your time? What's below your pay grade. This is
difficult for a lot of people, right, you got to
put an hourly rate on your what's my time worth?
Speaker 1 (21:52):
Because you only get so much time?
Speaker 5 (21:54):
And so if and I'm just throwing a number out there,
but if your time is worth one hundred dollars an hour,
then you shouldn't be doing fifteen twenty dollars an hour work, right.
Speaker 1 (22:02):
You either have to outsource it or you have to
hire to it.
Speaker 5 (22:05):
And then you start looking at the things that you're
spending your time on and it's like, well, if I
wasn't spending two hours of my day doing that, what
could I be doing that would be able to build
my brand, build the business and earn me more money.
And that's you know, when you hire. And then ultimately
you just have this whole system of either replacing yourself
(22:27):
or replacing things you're outsourcing internally along the way and
really just find the one or two things. You're a
book guy. So there's a great book by Gary Keller.
I think it's co authored, but Gary Keller is one
of the authors, called The One Thing. Yeah, and you know, yeah,
so I mean it really here's the essential question in
(22:48):
that book and it fundamentally changed me when I heard it.
When I read it, it was if you can do
one thing at such a high level that nothing else
mattered and everything else became inconsequential, what would that one
thing be? And you know, when I first opened the agency,
(23:08):
I was the head of eleven different departments.
Speaker 1 (23:11):
You got a necessity.
Speaker 5 (23:12):
I had no money, I had no experience, fifteen hour
days and yeah, I had no customers. So I was
a salesperson, the service person and everything in between, the
HR person. And so I said, look, if I'm going
to leverage this thing, I'm going to use other people's
time to do the sales, to service the customers we have.
Then my one thing has to be the ability to recruit, hire, train,
(23:36):
motivate team. Like I've got to be really great at finding,
hiring and developing people. And so I put all of
my time and energy just there, and I stopped trying
to figure out where the customers coming from, and who's
going to, you know, do this after we write them,
and who's going to take her of claims and who's
going to take care of billing? Right, And so then
I just said, who's going to be the person And
(23:57):
I spent all my time trying to find the people
and and really for fifteen years that's been the process.
Today we've got, uh, I don't know, twenty three twenty
four employees between three different businesses. And you know, the
coolest thing is, I don't want to say it all
runs without me, but it kind of does. Yeah, you know,
(24:19):
yeah we're there. Yeah, that's the goal, you know. And
then then you know, another book is The e Myth
by Michael Gerber, and he talks about you're going to
work in your business or you're going to work on
your business, and he talks about if your business can't
run without you, you don't have a business, you have
a job, and you've got the worst job.
Speaker 1 (24:38):
In the world.
Speaker 5 (24:39):
And and that kind of like was a gut punch
to me. And I'm like, ah shit, he's right. And
that's when I made that transition and I had it's hard,
right because we're control freaks. It's our business, it's our brand,
it's our name. And I'm like, I can't trust someone
else to do that the way I do it, and
guess what, they're not going to. But if you can
get them like eighty percent there, then that frees up
(25:01):
one hundred percent of your time and I'll take that
trade off any day of the week. So so that's
kind of the scaling model.
Speaker 4 (25:10):
This is, this is a this is like a masterclass
for me.
Speaker 3 (25:14):
So I'm you should be billing me for this.
Speaker 4 (25:17):
No, I don't want to.
Speaker 1 (25:18):
Give you any ideas. We'll sell some books, I hope.
Speaker 4 (25:22):
So, I hope.
Speaker 3 (25:23):
So the one thing that I do want to kind
of uh sides move to the side here is but
it's related you you're talking about scaling, You're talking about
business and all this kind of stuff. And then and
then there's family. There's a wife and kids, and there's
you know, other family members and friends and and pastimes
(25:46):
and hobbies and things you like to do. And I've
I've found it very difficult to balance those. And there's
one of the things that I've worked on in the
last year was to prioritize those times for me or
my family and and and start saying no to things
that weren't, you know, so dire because you know, every
(26:08):
client wants it tomorrow and they and they need it
and the world's going to end if they don't get it.
Speaker 4 (26:13):
So how do you.
Speaker 3 (26:14):
How how how have you been about balancing that, and
and were you always good at no?
Speaker 1 (26:21):
I wasn't.
Speaker 5 (26:21):
I was never good at anything, to be honest with you,
And everything's been an evolution. But I love there's actually
three things there. I was feverishly taking notes as you
were talking there. But you know, the word no is
the most powerful word for a business owner, for a solopreneur,
really for any of us.
Speaker 1 (26:39):
Real quick.
Speaker 5 (26:39):
This is a whole thing I do in live seminars.
But but I teach this this triple D approach, which
is do it, delegate it, or decline it. And the
declinate is to just say no part. And so I
really have these these two or three things that are
my Kevin Alko talks about keep your main thing, main thing,
(27:00):
and so right now I've got two or three main focuses.
And anytime a request comes through, you know, it's one
of two, one of three things.
Speaker 1 (27:10):
It's you know, I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna do
it immediately.
Speaker 5 (27:12):
I'm the freak that has no emails in his email
box right because I'm o CD like I mean, they're
gonna do it or I'm gonna delegate it. Now here's
where my twenty three employees will tell you, this is
the place I'm the best. I delegate like everything to
them and they're great at what they do. So that's
why I do it, or I just decline it. I
(27:34):
say no, and not in a mean spirited way, but
just in a I explain like, right now, my area
of focus is this, and I'm not saying that it's
a no forever and maybe in the future, but right now,
I just don't have the capacity to take it on.
And people appreciate that and respect it. So so that's
my triple D approach, which I use every single day.
(27:55):
And I'm not afraid to say no to things, and
I'm really good at delegating. But the other thing with
the family, my wife and I we host a local
podcast and we were just talking about it yesterday with
a young business owner who was on and I think
in the Referrals Done Right book, I talk about this,
Actually I do. I don't know which chapter, but it's
this work life balance myth for the business owner, and
(28:18):
this takes the right relationship, and it takes a lot
of open conversations with your family, with your significant other,
because when you go into a business, it's not just
you going into it's the whole family, right, And that's
a commitment for everybody, and so they have to understand
that and have to be on board. And so rather
than this work life balance where it's like I'm fully
(28:41):
engaged at work and nothing else, or I'm fully engaged
with family and I can't think about work and I'm
an a hole if I do, we've adopted this work
life integration where this is who we are, like we
are the brand, our business is what keeps our family
doing what we love to do, giving us the freedom
and flexibility to you know, be at the ball games.
Speaker 1 (29:03):
I've never missed a game.
Speaker 5 (29:04):
I've chaperone to every field trip, you know, anything my kids,
I'm there, right.
Speaker 1 (29:09):
I love that.
Speaker 5 (29:10):
That's my favorite thing after you know, because now I
got one in college, one's a senior in high school.
Those were the two in diapers when I open and
and then the princess came along. The twelve year old
who's going on twenty two. But that's the whole different.
But yeah, but listen, I just love that. You know,
we talk in business terms with the kids about how
(29:31):
we have standards, right as a family, Like we have
personal standards, professional standards, right. They know they're part of
this brand, not in like a crazy hardcore way, but
just we have these conversations right that we are a
little bit different, and I want them to understand that
they don't remember it, but the struggles we went through
(29:53):
to build this thing when they were super young. Jenna
wasn't even born and and so they're kind of coming
in the talent and enjoying a lot of the fruits
and and then we're very you know, they all have
out well, not as twelve year old, but the boys
have jobs, not at the business elsewhere because I didn't
want to enable them with that. They have their own money,
they have their own responsibilities. So we're there to support,
(30:15):
but we're not going to enable the same way that
you know, we grew up where we had to figure
it out ourselves. With just we offer them a little
more guidance. But anyway, work life integration is really where
we've gotten this thing too. Where I like that, yeah,
we don't stop working, we don't stop living, you know,
we can do it all at once.
Speaker 3 (30:32):
Yeah, And it's it's a it's a real approach. It's
it's a reality approach, like this is how it is,
and it can't be any so let's make the best
of how it is and and don't try to live
to some standard that we read somewhere.
Speaker 4 (30:45):
That you have to do that that's what we have
to emulate. It's like, this is how we are.
Speaker 3 (30:51):
I love my kids wear my rock Box shirts to
school all the time.
Speaker 1 (30:57):
As they should.
Speaker 3 (30:57):
It's just what And it's probably because we haven't had
time to go buy them clothes lately, but mostly here's
a free T shirt.
Speaker 4 (31:08):
But there. But it's cool to see. It's cool to see.
Speaker 3 (31:10):
The kids proud of something that I'm doing, you know,
and it being on my own. I want to get
back to the writing process of putting this book together.
And I'm sure that this is the culmination of many
years of you know, little nuggets that you're like, oh, oh,
(31:31):
I gotta I gotta tell people about that, and and
and stuff.
Speaker 4 (31:34):
So how how.
Speaker 3 (31:35):
Long ago did you decide you were going to write
a book and how long did.
Speaker 4 (31:38):
It take you to actually put it together?
Speaker 5 (31:41):
Yeah, so great question, and you're right, it's not you know,
just a hey, now I'm going to do a book.
It's been hundreds and hundreds of pages of notes right
through the years. But so this book's actually my third one.
It's my it's my first one, traditionally published seven years ago, frankly, honestly,
as a straight up lead magnet to my coaching consulting company,
(32:04):
I wrote a book called Insurance Agency Optimization. It gave
insurance agency owners enough meat to be like, hey, there's
some value here, and hey, I like what this guy,
you know, his approach and the brand, and you know,
then they got to the website and here's what we
can offer you, you know, from a membership standpoint, right,
So the goal was to get people to the website
(32:25):
so they could become members and we could monetize that way,
because you don't really, unless you're Colleen Hoover or Stephen King,
you don't really make money off of a book. I
mean you can, but it's very difficult. We call it
a very expensive business card. It's a resume builder. It's
you know, hey, now you're you're an author, you're a speaker,
you know, like I've been on a ted X stage,
(32:47):
and so everything's kind of led to the next. But
then anyway, so the process started there seven years ago
when I self published that and just so many lessons,
and then when my oldest son became a senior in
high school, I got thinking to myself, man, you know, financially,
we're good if something happens to me. Like I sell
(33:08):
life insurance, but I have a lot of life insurance, right, Like,
they'll be okay financially if something happens. But there's a
lot of stuff in the old man's head that if
I die, you know, as cold as that sounds, but
it was just how I think, you know, I would
take with me, and I didn't want that. Like, as
my kids were becoming adults, I'm like, I want them
to have something they can hold and look back at,
(33:29):
you know, for one hundred years from now my grand
kids kids, I'll never meet great grand kids. So I
every morning I woke up and I just started writing
different thoughts and ideas and stories and lessons from my life.
And none of it was preachy. It was all just
common denominator success principles and habits and helping my son
(33:50):
understand that you're going to come to a lot of
crossroads in life and you're gonna have to make a decision,
right And I'm not here to tell you what decision
to make, but here's how you can prepare for that
decision and just work through some mindset, some critical thinking, discernment,
you know, skills that they don't learn in school. And
so that became the essential F words for teens. So
(34:11):
nine different sections of the book, all starting with F.
Obviously none of them are the F word, but that
was the punching title, and that you know, really took off.
That was also self published, but I worked with a
professional editor on that one and learned a lot from that.
And and really the book business Shocking Leaf, it's it's
a it's a money business, right, a lot of money.
And so when you talk to a traditional publishing company,
(34:36):
really all they care about is how big is your network,
how big is your email list, how big is your
social following. They want to know how many books you
can sell if they're going to invest in you. And
so through all of this, and that's why I shared
the backstory, we were building the community, building the community
right through the agency, through the consulting company, through the podcast.
(34:58):
You know, had ten thousand plus people on our email
list and over ten thousand social media followers, and now
all of a sudden, traditional publishing companies.
Speaker 1 (35:07):
Were like, hey, you know, let's talk. So this book
referrals done right.
Speaker 5 (35:11):
Was the first time I worked with a traditional publishing company,
which was really cool because then I got a team
of professional writers. I thought I was a decent writer,
and then I started working with professional writers. I'm like, oh,
I don't know anything about writing.
Speaker 1 (35:23):
You know.
Speaker 5 (35:23):
And so it was a ten month process. They challenged
me in ways that it was just awesome, you know
that I would never have thought of different systems and
concepts and ways to do things.
Speaker 1 (35:37):
You know.
Speaker 5 (35:37):
They offer suggestions some ghost writing, if you will, right,
every word in that book is not mine. It got
my approval, right, but they would give me that. The
process was they'd give me a bunch of questions to answer,
and then every week we jump on a zoom call
and there were three or four of them, you know,
they're all different roles, and we would just hour long
(35:59):
back and forth kind of interview, right and think tank,
you know, go through these things, and then that would
turn into all right, hey write about this, and then
they take the answer to my questions, they take my writing,
and then they would offer suggestions edits, and it was
just this process of back and forth. So this was
over ten months that we did this, and then they
(36:21):
get the creatives involved and the title tests and and
and you know, ultimately, none of it matters if you
don't sell it. And so then I was working with
the company called Brand Builders, and they had a whole
best seller launch plan.
Speaker 2 (36:38):
Uh.
Speaker 5 (36:39):
They were the same company that did at my Let's
last book, The Power of One More, They did Lewis
Howe's last book, right, and so like big stuff here,
Jamie Kern lima worthy. You know, these are New York
Times best selling books. And so we used the same
plan to launch it. And that was actually more exhausting
than the writing process because it was this NonStop tour
(37:01):
of talks and podcasts. And they gave me a podcast
agent who started booking me on all these different shows
and then just yeah, the tours, right, the webinars, the seminars,
the talks, the podcast, just promoting it, photo shoots, video shoots,
you know.
Speaker 1 (37:22):
So it was this whole build up to August.
Speaker 5 (37:24):
Thirteenth, when the book was released, and it was exhausting.
But a week after it released, we hit the USA
Today Bestseller List, so national bestseller list.
Speaker 1 (37:36):
It was the one.
Speaker 5 (37:37):
Hundred and forty first most sold book in America, which
was really wild. Right, So Colleen Hoover, she's got this
thing figured out. She was, she's number one and two
on the list. But it was this moment in time
where I love was look at this list and I
was one forty one with that book and one forty
five was Stephen King's book that he has out.
Speaker 1 (37:55):
I don't know what the name of it is. And
I'm like, you know.
Speaker 5 (37:58):
What, Like he's had a hell of a career, right,
but but if we just wiped it all away this week,
I'm beating them this week going forward.
Speaker 4 (38:05):
Right right, that's cool.
Speaker 1 (38:07):
So it's a wild process.
Speaker 5 (38:09):
It was a year long journey and uh, you know
now it's it's kind of opening up doors to other things.
Speaker 1 (38:14):
So it's it's working.
Speaker 3 (38:16):
You've you've talked about delegating and what's the what's the
difference between delegating and collaborating.
Speaker 5 (38:24):
Well, delegating is I'm just straight up telling you to
do this, right, delegating or outsourcing I might be paying
you know, well, I delegate to people I pay, and
then I outsource to people who have their own thing,
but I pay them, you know, to do their own thing.
Speaker 1 (38:40):
They're un employees.
Speaker 5 (38:42):
And then collaborating is really like what I did with
the publishing team. Right, we would just put our heads
together and think tank things.
Speaker 1 (38:51):
Right.
Speaker 5 (38:51):
So I'm part of coaching groups, I'm part of study groups.
I have a network of people that that we meet
on the right their basis and share ideas, some of
them internally, right, other insurance competitors, and we have this
this mantra that you know, it's collaboration over competition. And
(39:11):
if we all can get better and we all can
add more value as long as we have this abundance
mindset and we work together, there's there's enough business to
go around. There's enough money to go around, right, And
and how much is enough anyway?
Speaker 1 (39:23):
Right?
Speaker 5 (39:24):
And and so my whole life changed when I got
into an abundance mindset that you can't beat me, because
I'm rooting for you, like I just I want people
to win. I want them to succeed, even if I'm
in direct competition. Like you know, I'm willing to help
another insurance agent who's going through the struggle, just opened
(39:45):
up and trying to do their own thing. And you know,
they might take business, they will take business from me,
but I don't care. Right, there's enough business out there
and every customer has the right to choose, and if
they find more value there, then absolutely go. So really
it's this collaboration over competition mindset and if you truly
are rooting for people, you can't lose.
Speaker 3 (40:08):
I like that the reason why I asked it's kind
of a silly question, like the difference. To most people,
the difference between collaboration and delegation is pretty obvious until
you work with a micromanager, and then the delegation and
collaboration sort of become this morphed weird thing that it's like, well,
you told me to do this, so now why are
(40:30):
you working with me on this?
Speaker 4 (40:32):
So that's why I wanted to see what your answer is.
Speaker 1 (40:35):
I knew.
Speaker 5 (40:37):
I love that follow up, by the way, because I'll
follow up with this. If you're going to be good
at delegating right, you can't be a micromanager like you said.
You have to empower the people that you're delegating to
and trust them that they're going to do it right.
And that's my message to my team all the time
is that, look, you know, as long as you're doing
(40:57):
it legally, ethically and compliantly, you can't mess it up.
And I almost encourage them to make mistakes, because not mistakes,
but just fail right, because they're trying different things. They're
trying things that we've always done a new way and
it didn't work, and failure is feedback, right, and so
so I want them to not become complacent and try
new things and then we can collaborate what worked what didn't.
(41:21):
But to your point, you can't delegate and then be
breathing down someone's neck or taking it back, right. You
have to empower them to run with it.
Speaker 3 (41:31):
Yeah, And I know that that's really really hard for
some people.
Speaker 4 (41:36):
I don't want to it's.
Speaker 3 (41:38):
It's hard for me in a way because there's for
me for what I do here, there's there's a there's
a period of training that has to happen. And I'm
sure it's the same with your business. When you have
someone coming in, they have to learn how to do
what you do. And a lot of times, if you're
really really busy, you end up saying, well, you know,
what's just easier for it's quicker for me to do it,
(42:00):
and then you know, all right, watch or something like that,
and that becomes kind of a bad habit because then
you just end up doing it all the time. And
like you said earlier, you don't have a business, you
have a job, So how do you how do you
navigate that?
Speaker 5 (42:16):
And I love all these questions because you're just team.
But we literally have never spoken about any of this.
There was no prep work. But this is all like
you're putting stuff on a tea for me.
Speaker 4 (42:24):
Here.
Speaker 5 (42:25):
The word busy will bury a human, It will bury
a business owner, especially because we use that as a crutch.
Is common, right, very common. And yes, it's like, hey,
I just don't have time to teach you, so I'll
just do it myself and I'll share a really quick story.
The difference between a buffalo and a cow when it
(42:49):
comes to a storm rolling in is when a storm
rolls in, a cow starts running away from the storm, like,
oh my god, a storm's coming. I don't want to
be in a storm. And a herd cows they all
follow each other. They start running and the storm goes
over them because it catches up to them, and then
they keep running with it and they stay in the
(43:10):
storm way longer than they need to.
Speaker 1 (43:13):
Right, A buffalo looks at a.
Speaker 5 (43:15):
Storm and it says, all right, this is gonna suck
for a little bit, but we're gonna run right at it.
And as they run at it, yeah, they they're through
the storm. But then the storms are going the other way,
and they're going the other way and they get through
it a lot quicker. And I share that because to
multiply your time, you have to go backwards for a
(43:35):
little bit.
Speaker 1 (43:35):
You have to go through the storm.
Speaker 5 (43:37):
And the only way to multiply your time is to
take time to go backwards or pause where you're gonna
miss business. You're gonna miss opportunities, or things might not
be right, you might lose a client, but you're going
to build a system or a process, you know, and
this could be training new employee that will serve you
in the future, so that the next time this comes up,
(43:59):
it's already and now you don't have to spend that
time doing it. Now you have the training system and
process and you know whatever in place. So you have
to look at the busy thing and go when am
I not going to be busy? And just be honest
with yourself because the answer is never. And if you
just keep saying you're busy, you're running with the storm
(44:20):
and you're never gonna get anyway, you become this hamster
on a wheel, and so you've got to have the
courage to take some short term losses to get someone
up to speed, because what they're going to do if
you train them, empower them, enable them years into the future,
will buy back so much of that time. Maybe that
(44:42):
that three four weeks that you invested initially, you'll multiply
that you'll save three four years of time by not
always having to do the stuff that they're now doing.
Speaker 3 (44:53):
So essentially, just like run straight at it. Stop what
you're doing, say we're going to go get through. It's
gonna suck right for a little bit, but we're going
to get through this and then you don't have to
go through it again.
Speaker 4 (45:06):
Amazing, you know.
Speaker 5 (45:07):
I mean when I talked about the win the day process, right,
so we're going through I won't get too deep into this,
but the insurance industry is upside down right now. It's
a whole mess. It's a season, right everything's cyclical, but
everything is really bad right now. And so this was
a moment in my agency, you know business, where I'm like, hey,
this is gonna suck for a minute, but we've got
(45:27):
to adapt, right, adapt or die.
Speaker 1 (45:29):
We've got to adapt to.
Speaker 5 (45:30):
What the new normal is out there, figure out what
the opportunities are, where are the silver linings, readjust some
of our systems and processes, which is really uncomfortable for
people because no one likes change. They're used to doing
things a certain way. And I'm having these fights daily. Actually,
I was a little bit late in on this call
because I was talking about one of my agency managers
and we're trying to change things up and she's getting
pushed back and I'm coaching her through how to handle that,
(45:53):
and you know, so I'm in one of those periods
right now where we're kind of hitting the pause button
and we're reworkingstems and processes because externally, the world's changing
and we have to adapt with it, and if we
just keep trying to go the same way, we're gonna
fall behind. So so, yeah, it's this constant process of
reinventing yourself.
Speaker 1 (46:13):
Yeah, it's it's.
Speaker 5 (46:14):
Short you know, you gotta look at everything on a
short term window.
Speaker 1 (46:17):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (46:18):
That that reinventing yourself has been a theme throughout the
life of this podcast. It's been one of the major
themes reinvention, stepping out of your comfort zone, mentorship and
and just overall positive attitudes, positive thoughts, almost psyching yourself
(46:42):
out and saying, you know what, I'm having a shit day,
but I'm gonna start thinking about happy things and I'm gonna,
you know, I'm gonna watch like a comedy bit for
a couple of minutes and laugh and then kind of
break that cycle of of of crap.
Speaker 1 (46:58):
Easier said than done.
Speaker 5 (47:00):
But you know, so sports analogy, A big sports guy,
the you know Yankees fan, you know, I remember once
Derek Jeter was like over sixteen or something like that, right,
like it's just uncommon for him. But in a slump,
and he has us at bat where he saws off
an inside pitch, breaks his bat, It dribbles down the
third baseline, he gets the first base infield single and
(47:21):
like a guy's in dugout are laughing, he's laughing on first, right,
But that broke the streak. So now he's not over
for his last sixteen. He's won for his last one.
And so to your point, when you're going through a slump,
sometimes it doesn't have to be pretty, doesn't have to
be this big monstrous home run, like just a broken
bat infield single. Just get away from what you're doing,
(47:42):
get a different perspective, you know, get set the easiest
goal in the world, and then hit that first thing
in the morning. You're like, damn, I just hit that
goal on one for my last one.
Speaker 4 (47:51):
Crush porn a cup of coffee.
Speaker 5 (47:53):
Man, Yeah, that's no joke, Like you know what I mean,
like find wins and the little stuff.
Speaker 3 (47:59):
Here's the book referrals done Right Scott Greats dot com
and referrals done Right book dot com. It's it's been,
it's been a fantastic rite here I I it's like
I said, it's a masterclass of of for small business
and for just a general you know, attitude adjustment that
(48:19):
that people need as they're going through their day. This
was fantastic. So so what's uh, what's like in the
near future for you.
Speaker 4 (48:28):
Who? That is that a whole another episode?
Speaker 5 (48:31):
I feel like that should be an easy question, but
you know it's uh, coming off the book launch and
and you know, wrapping up the end of the year,
and so now you know, I talk about this du
delegate decline model that I use. I'm I'm kind of
at this crossroad myself where I'm getting a lot of
requests to do a lot of things that I feel
like I should be doing, but fundamentally I don't want
(48:55):
to do because I don't want to miss time with
my kids. I've got a senior in high school, so
a lot of speaking events and things like that, which
is awesome, right, I mean, you get like seventy five
hundred bucks for an hour keynote, but it's not just
an hour, right, The talk is but you've got the travel,
You've got the prep work, you've got So I'm finding
myself taking my own advice and saying no to a
(49:15):
lot of things and then just trying to figure out
what I do want to say yes too. So really,
the hyper focused local podcasts love Living Local three, one five,
I do that with my wife to shine a spotlight
on awesome people in our community doing awesome things. And
then I do the Referrals Done Right podcast, which releases
(49:36):
two episodes a week and really just gives people a
deeper conversation with other business owners on relationship marketing. So
really that's my core focus. Obviously, the agencies are that's
what's paying you know, the bulk and the bills and
putting against your college. But yeah, That's that's where my
heart is right now, just trying to serve as many
people as possible while staying true to my values, standards
(50:00):
and family.
Speaker 3 (50:01):
Well, that being said, I'm really honored that you took
an hour out of your day to UH to sit
and wrap with me about this kind of stuff and
just some shmow in the five eight five. But I
do appreciate it, and I'm really glad that I met
you through Martina and UH and her podcast Uptown Girls.
Speaker 4 (50:20):
That was You were a great guest on that one,
and I was like, I want to talk to him
some more.
Speaker 1 (50:25):
Well, I'm glad you reached out.
Speaker 5 (50:26):
This was a lot of fun and UH, I think
we could potentially collaborate in the future as well.
Speaker 4 (50:31):
I love it.
Speaker 3 (50:32):
I love collaboration. Well, that is it for today. Positive
Blatherings dot com. I think that website still works. But
Scott Greats dot com and the book is referrals done
right and they can find it on Amazon and any any.
Speaker 1 (50:49):
Other anywhere books are sold anywhere books.
Speaker 3 (50:52):
And I got this bad Boy in the pre the
pre the pre order, so I sat here, Yes, that's right.
Speaker 5 (51:00):
My commitment, We're worthless after I sign it
Speaker 4 (51:05):
Right, come on,
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