Experimental with Justin Wise

Do you ever feel like your clients see you as a cog in the wheel? Replaceable? Interchangeable with someone else who does what you do?

Years ago, I had a bank as a client. They believed their values, "Service, Loyalty, Integrity, Honesty" were enough to set them apart from every other small bank on the planet.

Spoiler alert: they weren't. They were getting crushed by the competition and couldn't figure out why.

It's because they were playing by the industry's rules—and not setting themselves apart ... for real. When a client sees you as replaceable, a few things happen:

1. You have to compete on price.
2. It's WAY more difficult to establish a relational connection with your client.
3. You're completely, totally, unavoidably forgettable.

On this week's show, you'll see what happens when you "monetize your mind" and create a business that's wrapped around the way you think (which is WAY more difficult to replace in the open market).

. . . . . . 

TAKE ACTION

Have you hit the ceiling of complexity in your business yet?

If you haven’t, you’ll likely face the challenge of trying to grow the impact of your business beyond where you’re at now.

Defining the “ceiling of complexity” is super simple: you hit a level of success and then the stuff you did to generate results stops working.

• You can’t work more hours.
• You can’t raise your prices.
• You can’t go and get more clients.

On the surface, it might seem like you’re stuck.

I hit that limit when I was working 60, 70, 80 hours a week in my digital agency. We tapped out just under 7-figures. Because, frankly, that's when everything kind of exploded. I couldn't work more. I could not give more hours. I had a wife that I wanted to stay married to. I had kids growing up that I wanted to see. 

For that alone, things had to change.

That's when I discovered the four levels of "Monetizing Your Mind" I talk about on this week's show.

---

Take Action

One of my mission in this world is to help people stop trading their time for money.

And one of the biggest benefits of being an entrepreneur is generating income 24/7 without being directly involved - it's called Freedom.

The way I do that primarily is by helping folks create scalable digital products - whether it be online courses, coaching programs, virtual summits, etc.

In this episode, I share 4 secrets fears that holds people back - and in this context, building digital products.

Show Notes

[03:19] Fear #1: Money

• Ask yourself a series of questions. How much is financial freedom worth to you?
  
• Financial freedom means the income that you make is enough to cover your expenses in perpetuity without having you to pull levers to earn it
  
• What is time freedom worth to you?
  

[04:36] Why entrepreneurs get stuck financially

• When I was starting my business, there is a season of hustle but you can't run a business out of hustle. You'll burn out.
  
• I reached a point where the market cannot tolerate the price increase.
  
• You might be making an impact on your business but not life-changing levels of wealth.
  
• The solution is to bottle up what you know into a digital product that you can sell over and over again.
  
• You have a sales channel that's open 24/7 called "Digital You"
  

[07:42] Fear #2: I don't have time

• Audit your time for two weeks and be as granular as you can.
  
• More hours rarely fix the problem. In many cases, more hours compound the problem.
  
• Start time allotting time (for ex 1 hour) for a digital product.
  
• The more time you free up on your calendar. the more time you can put on building a digital product.
  

[10:19] Secret Fear #3: I have no confidence.

• Building something once and selling it a thousand times takes believing in your skill-set and wisdom. That's where the confidence needs to come from.
  
• Ask yourself: Do I know what I'm doing?
  
• The feeling of having not enough social proof will never go away.
  

[15:03] Secret Fear #4: Finding the right time

• Finding the right time is just an excuse.
  
• There's never a good or a bad time. There's just time.
  
• Create small steps: Ask your audience with their pain point.

Subscribe to the Podcast

For those who may not know, I used to be a pastor before launching Think Digital, but I was really interested in social media and digital marketing.  I found myself coming up with excuses everyday as to why I cant launch my digital product. I felt that people may think that I am a fraud, no business experience,  no team, and my biggest excuse of all - there are a million people who are talking about digital marketing.

Finally, I have a friend who shifted my way of thinking about digital products, and I eventually stopped making excuses.

Show Notes

[01:44] The conversation that changed the way I think about digital products

• There are hundred of thousands of books getting published everyday
  
• Pick any topic you want into Google and there are hundreds of thousands of books every topic
  
• You have experiences, relationships, and a particular way of seeing teaching a particular topic
  

[03:25] The three shifts in concepts that completely changed my family's life

• Digitizing my mind - What I knew.
  
• Digitizing my skills - What I did.
  
• Digitizing my systems - How I did it.
  
• I launched my course in July 2013, and by the end of the year, we had 100 students in our first course.
  

[05:00] The hurdle in creating digital products

• Why would anybody listen to me?
  
• It's not always a problem of skill. Throughout the years, I saw people who knew less skills that I did but makes more money.
  
• Stop making excuses. Start building the digital product that you want to make.

Subscribe to the Podcast

You know how friend zone, or being in the friend zone works. A guy or a girl giving tremendous amount of care and support to their special someone. And after all the effort, they're just...friends.

Your business can suffer the same fate as well. I was put in the business friend zone with the clients that I wanted to work with, where I would show interest in working with a client or have a desire to work with a client.

Have you ever been in this situation?  Listen in as I'll share 3 steps no how you can break out of the business friend zone.

Show Notes

[1:00] How "Friend Zone"  in the relationship setting works

• On a guy's perspective, A guy likes a girl, guy waits on the girl, caters to her desires and whims, etc.
  
• But the girl doesn't like the guy or not like how the guy likes her anyway.
  
• "I'm so glad we're just friends".
  

[02:38] Friend Zone in the business perspective

• I was doing all the things that I was supposed to be doing as a business .
  
• I was giving a ton of "value" to those who I want to work with.
  
• The business likes having you around but have no intention of ever working with you.
  

[04:36] Step 1: Create some friction in your market

• Say something that scares you. Be easily approachable, but not easily accessible.
  
• Don't be afraid to piss some people off in your market.
  
• Be bold, take a stand, be who you want to be in business instead of who you think your market wants you to be
  

[05:56] Step 2: Teach the "what" and sell the "how"

• Businesses give away the milk because they think it will attract buyers. By doing that, you are training your audience to ignore you.
  
• Show the market that you understand the problem that they are facing. This builds trust.
  
• Do not give away your solution. SELL your solution.
  

[07:28] Step 3: Increase your opportunity volume

• Businesses get put in the friend zone because they don't have a predictable, dependable way to automatically bring in new opportunities.
  
• Once you have the ability to increase your opportunity volume, leads will come in.
  
• Have a simple and predictable way to bring in leads.
  
• Having bigger opportunity changes your perspective on the market and it changes the way that you approach your market

Subscribe to the Podcast

Distractions are everywhere.

Little interruptions - like email, Slack messages, notifications - these distractions get us out of our flow.

And brain studies show that it takes the brain 30-45 minutes to get back into the groove after a distraction.

In this episode, I'll share how you can get rid of distractions, take back your time and increase your productivity

Show notes:

[00:55] We thought we are productive

• I thought I was productive until I did a time audit.
• I realized that I am wasting a tremendous amount of time.
• We can't get work done at work so it hounds us all the way home.
  

[02:05] The power of distractions

• Small situations can even get you out of your groove.
• Brain studies show that it takes the brain 30-45 minutes to get back into the groove after a distraction.
• We need to stay in the groove because it's where we do our best work.
  

[03:00] How I get rid of distractions?

• Put your phone into airplane mode or just turn it off.
• I use Pomodoro method where I give myself 25 minutes for work and 5 minutes for break
• Continuous use of Pomodoro method shows increase in productivity.
  

[05:37] Action step

• Block of 2 hours off your calendar.
• In my "smash time", I smash my task list.
• Make it holy. Commit to it and get stuff done.

Resources Mentioned

Welcome to the first episode of this series called BULLETPROOF YOUR BUSINESS.

Let's be real. We've been in an upmarket for the last decade where our businesses started in but the reality is, we're rapidly approaching a down market.

And in light of recent events, answering this question becomes paramount:  "How can you make your business survive and thrive regardless of the business environment?"

One of them is by downsizing your economic footprint.

I share an exercise that you can do to downsize your economic footprint and get rid of unnecessary business expenses.

You'll be amazed by how this can save you hundreds or even thousands of dollars every month to further grow your business.

Show notes

[3:00] How To Downsize Your Economic Footprint

• Create 3 columns in a Trello Board: Must Have, Nice To Have, and Need To Cut.
• We use that Trello board for a variety of business expenses
• Print out your credit card statement, check your subscriptions and ask yourself: "Is it a Must Have, Nice to Have, or Need to Cut"?
• After doing the exercise, set a date on your calendar where you'll cut those expenses off.
• The first time I did this, it saved us $1,500 a month or $18,000 a year.

[05:52] Downsizing your team members and collaborators

• Use the same exercise. Categorize which roles ones are must-haves, nice to have, and need to cut.
• In my case, an assistant is a must-have. I will cut everything else before I cut my assistant.
• Collaborators are classified vendors and partners.

[08:02] Interest fees, credit card payments, and debt servicing.

• Remember: Lenders don't want you to default.
• If you're in danger with the monthly payments, talk to your lender.
• They would rather get something than nothing. Work with them to give you more breathing room.

[10:30] Why you should not cut on your Ad Spend

• Law of supply and demand: As supply goes down, demand goes up, and when demand goes up, prices go up. We're in the opposite of that right now.
• Fear-based businesses are cutting down on their Ad Spend making the clicks, leads, and acquisition costs cheaper.
• I spent more money on ads in the last 48 hours that I did all last month.

In this episode, we have Malorie Nicole. Malorie is an Executive and Entrepreneur Performance and Mindset Coach where she helps 6 and 7 figure business owners implement mindset works resulting in tremendous business and personal growth.

She's also the host of Abundantly Clear Podcast - a mindset platform for entrepreneurs that want to achieve mental clarity, learn to not only decrease stress but turn it into growth, and continue to create the business and lives most would only dream of.

Tune in as she shares her journey, the countless pivots, the mindset shifts as an entrepreneur, how to align your business with your purpose and the target market, and I think the most important thing: How to stop overly-complicating your business and marketing.

• [03:27] Malorie's Backstory from being an engineer to a subconscious mind expert
• [13:10] Her first client experience working on mindset
• [15:38] What does "mindset work" means
• [19:18] The hardest part of pivoting and changing identity
• [20:30] Launching her business with Facebook Live
• [26:28] Aligning your business with your purpose and the market
• [29:30] How to market a business that sells transformation
• [33:01] The power of the phrase "Most of my clients come to me for x " or "Most of my clients say to me these things" in marketing
• [35:30] The one thing that most people who work with Malory have in common
• [36:25] Why Malorie chose to invest in putting content on her profile as opposed to her page
• [40:16] Being able to say NO
• [42:18] Addressing the limit of 1 on 1 client business model when it comes to scaling
• [48:38] Breaking the thought of having to scale your business to seven figures or you're nothing

In this episode, I have the phenomenal speaker Grant Baldwin.

Grant is an entrepreneur,  public speaker, author of the book called The Successful Speaker, and the host of a podcast called The  Speaker Lab Podcast.

We talk about his backstory being in the trenches, the unfiltered realities of being a public speaker doing 70 gigs a year(the good and the bad), his 5-Step Speaker Success Roadmap, and what it really takes to build a successful public speaking business.

You’ll also learn his life-changing experience writing his book with the best-selling author Jeff Goins.

Snow notes

• [02:37] Grant's illustrious career of being a speaker
• [05:47] Speaking is a high paying manual labor job
• [07:18] What it feels like doing 70 speaking gigs a year and the non-sexy part of public speaking
• [13:34] The 5-Step Speaker Success Roadmap (S.P.E.A.K)
• [17:22] Grant's advice to his past self when it comes to public speaking
• [20:11] How to know that you're BAD in public speaking
• [23:43] Grant’s recently launched book “The Successful Speaker” with Jeff Goins and how it came together
• [28:13] His experience collaborating with Jeff Goins

In this episode, I have the one and only Kerry Wise.

We’ve been married for over a decade and have 3 wonderful children.

Not only that, she’s also my primary advisor, confidant, strategist, and great filter.

We talk about some of the challenges we’ve been through in our journey as a married couple during our early years and how we triumphed over it.

You’ll hear snapshots of our lives, and her perspective on those challenges, and how she supported me throughout my entrepreneurial journey.

Snow notes:

[03:59] Kerry being the breadwinner of the family in our early years

[07:35]  Our reality in the early years of our marriage

[10:01] From working at a church to Monk Development in Kerry’s perspective

[15:40] Launching ThinkDigital and “The Basement Years”

[25:50] Spouse is the closest voice to the Holy Spirit

[30:08] From paying debts to ThinkDigital’s growth

[35:07] Kerry’s advice for entrepreneurs to get their spouses on board

Welcome to the very first episode of Experimental.

Here's a confession: I didn't want to do another podcast

I thought I was already done with podcasting. I've already done a number of podcasts for the last few years with varying success and they got boring.

But then, a bunch of things started happening.

I'll share the reasons why I'm starting another podcast, and unpack what are you going to expect from this show. Enjoy

[01:56] Mentors are telling me that I'm crazy by quitting podcasting

• When I'm paying people by giving me advice, then I'll take it
• Shoutout to Chris Lema by pushing me

[03:15] I'm missing the podcasting format

• Podcasting is the perfect format for deeply exploring ideas
• It's the closest format to the radio, which I love and grew up with
• I miss being able to connect with my 'heroes' and build a relationship with people like Gary Vee, Michael Hyatt, Jeff Goins.

[06:10] I heard all of you

• A lot of people in my e-mail list and Twitter followers are asking when the next episode is coming.
• Podcasting is the medium that you and I connected regularly
• Many of my best clients referenced the podcast in some other shape or form

[08:10] This podcast will be about "Tiny Hinges, Big Doors"

• It's an amazing concept from Perry Marshall where a door is big but what moves the door are the little hinges.
• We're going to unpack the tiny hinges that we can focus on to swing big "doors" on your business
• You'll hear successful methods from guests that you can experiment on your own business
• Finding what works to help you take quantum leaps to your preferred future
• Finding what works to help you find the highest and best use of your time