Impact Warrior
Impact Warrior
EP 5: Reinventing Yourself and Leaving Your Legacy with Greg Hickman
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
Heyo, the Impact Warrior podcast is back!
In this episode, I talk to Greg Hickman, owner and founder of AltAgency and a rockstar content creator. Greg’s online coachings and training teach digital agency owners how to scale their business to serve more clients without hiring more people or working around the clock. So, he’s essentially a superhero making the impossible POSSIBLE.
I love the way that Greg thinks outside the box and creates systems to help people lead better, happier lives AND run their businesses.
As I explain in the episode, Greg has been unafraid to reinvent himself and his service offerings many times in order to serve his audience and solve their problems. How awesome is that? We all have something to learn from this guy's courage and resilience.
I’ve been lucky to call Greg a friend for years, and one thing I know is that Greg has lived the battle of Impact Warriors everywhere! In the episode, he sheds light on the particularly trying moments he’s faced along his journey. He has come out on the other side of those challenges with wisdom to share with his clients, his followers, and his most important legacy: his kids.
Greg has a significant and positive influence on those he trains. Anyone who has binged his Youtube channel (you MUST) can attest to the incredible value that ALL his content provides.
We’ll be releasing new episodes each week, so subscribe to Impact Warrior wherever you listen to podcasts to be the first to see when a new episode goes live.
Don’t forget to check the show notes after each episode for links, free gifts, and additional resources for our listeners! All episodes can be found at www.CaseyZeman.com.
What you’ll hear in this episode:
[4:30] Greg tells his story and describes the barriers he’s run into while building his business and describes how the communities he belongs to helped him to revamp his offering and reinvent himself.
[13:30] How Alt Agency narrowed their services to hone in on what they do best, codify the process, and then teach others how to do the same.
[30:15] “Your business will never exceed your own capacity as an entrepreneur.” What this quote means to Greg and his business.
[41:45] Greg speaks to the fact that we don’t learn everything we need to know to be successful while in school, and how he hopes to transfer the skills he’s learned experientially to his kids.
To learn more about Greg, go to www.gregsvideos.com to see all his YouTube content, and follow @gregoryjhickman on Instagram and Twitter. His coaching programs can be found at AltAgency via the link below.
Links mentioned in this episode:
Where to Follow Greg Hickman:
Impact Warrior
Episode 5: EP 5: Reinventing Yourself and
Leaving Your Legacy with Greg Hickman
Full Transcript
Introduction: 0:00
You're listening to the impact warrior podcast. This podcast was created out of a vision of like-minded entrepreneurs who have faced similar battles and understand how difficult entrepreneurship can be. We will feature guests who are here to share with you how rewarding the journey can be. If you stay focused and disciplined to achieve the desires of your heart. Every business owner will face a certain level of difficulty at some point, regardless of the industry. And we are here to share with you the story of warriors who have knocked down massive walls to inspire you to keep fighting on this journey. Let's conquer the journey together. And here's your host, Casey Zeman.
Casey: 0:43
What's up? What's up, everybody? Welcome to this episode of Impact Warrior I am so pumped to talk to a guy who I've actually known for years. I mean, if I think about it, I've probably known him for almost like eight, nine years or something. We've done masterminds together, we've had dinners together. I feel like we've played beer pong together. So we've done a lot of cool stuff together. And his name is Greg Hickman, he is the founder of an amazing coaching program called AltAgency. And he's been able to scale his business to seven figures and beyond and, it's just so awesome to see what, you know, his growth and his trajectory and what he's done over the years. And I thought he would be a perfect person to come on, because of the impact that he's making with his clients. At the same time, to also, you know, like, talk to him about, the warrior concept of this podcast, which is all about, like breaking through barriers and like, not giving up and like being like saying no to, to failure. So, Greg, welcome to the show, man.
Greg: 1:57
Dude, thanks for having me. I really appreciate it.
Casey: 2:00
So, so we did play beer pong together, didn't we?
Greg: 2:04
Pretty sure. Yeah. Pretty sure. Yeah, we've skied together. We skied together, we've mastermind together. Yes, that we've definitely had dinners together.
Casey: 2:13
Mm hmm. I forgot. Right. We skied together. That's right. Um, so Greg, tell tell us about what you're doing right now with AltAgency.
Greg: 2:23
Yeah, so we are essentially a training and coaching business. Working with small, I call them accidental agency owners or micro agency owners. primarily in like the digital marketing and Creative Services space, helping them kind of transition from "done for you" services into "done with you." So that they can have a little bit more leverage profitability and kind of have more more of an impact as they want to scale and grow and scale that up to being able to serve a lot more clients than they've ever been able to serve before, when they were selling, you know, their time for money or projects.
Casey: 3:01
Awesome. So now, this has changed, because I remember you had scalable, you had you had some other? Yeah, I mean, even before then. You were I mean, I've known you since you were doing -
Greg: 3:16
I was doing mobile.
Casey: 3:17
Mobile marketing. Yeah. Oh, you know, what I love about you is that, like, I've never seen you, like, turn the corner. And maybe you maybe you did it at one point, I just didn't know. But like, I've never seen you, like, ever, ever give up, you know, I've seen you, I've seen you evolve and change and go through different industries. And, and it's so awesome to see how you've adapted and changed and, and I feel like you've also, like, been this lifelong learner person, and then turn this interesting corner of applying all the things you've learned into being an amazing mentor. And can you want to go into that like, like the, what it took to actually be able to, to not stop the flow, even though you felt like the flow was maybe you know, pausing or hitting a wall or anything. What was in you that that when you hit a barrier that drove you to keep on going?
Greg: 4:27
Yeah. That's a great question. I mean, I think you know, the first major like wall that I hit, you know, like you mentioned, when we first got introduced, I had to spend a decade more than a decade inside of the mobile marketing space. Big agencies, small agencies, client side for big retail brands. And went out on my own and I like just could not crack 10k a month, consistently, and I was, I was doing text message marketing, I was doing consulting, I was doing all the things that I was doing for these big companies, but like boiled down to like how a small independent company could utilize it, but just nobody cared. I was arguably still way too early for what they needed as it related to the solution that I had. And I definitely hit a wall. Thankfully, I was involved in communities with people that were like yourself, like, in on these masterminds, like people just doing bigger things than me that like kept kind of showing me what was possible, even though it wasn't yet working. But like, I hit a turning point where, you know, I was, like I said, stuck at 10k, and just kind of beating my head against the wall, you know, sales cycles, were long, I didn't really see how this was going to get that much better. And peers of mine, you know, had kind of asked like, you know, "What, if you just switched what you did, like, it seems like you have some of these other interests? Could you do something there?" And that led into a short exploration of, alright, well, um, at the time, it was, like Infusionsoft now Keap, I was really fascinated by marketing automation. And so I went to some of our friends and like, Hey, I know you use this tool, are you struggling? Can I help you and like, let's do a little trial to see if I can help. And very quickly, that gained traction, I was like, wow, like, one call closes. I'm having fun working with people that I like, and am inspired by versus independent retailers I could care less about. And I walked away from kind of this past identity that I had created for myself of being like "the mobile guy," which is a really hard thing. Like I sat on that for, like six months of "Man, I spent over a decade getting to this point, having this reputation. And it was like, Okay, do I care more about this reputation, or the ability to have a business that, you know, affords me the lifestyle that I want?" And it was like, a no brainer at that point. And I kind of walked away from that reputation and had to, like, reinvent myself. And that was kind of the first major one. But I would say that, like the two big takeaways from that experience were like, I learned, thankfully, again, from the people that I was surrounding myself with that, like I had fallen way too in love with my own solution, like mobile, in this case, then, like the problem, that the person that I was solving people I was serving had, which also led me to realize, like, I didn't really care, I cared more about my solution and the person I was serving, and when it boiled down to it, I didn't really care about independent retail owners, like I do now as an entrepreneur, but like, at that moment is just like, I wasn't as intimate with them as I was, like, you know, the John Lee Dumas' is of the world that like we're building something like I could get behind that. And so like my, my work was more inspired. Which I think just led me to kind of get through all of those other humps, you know, that are just natural inside the game of entrepreneurship. So I think serving people that inspired me, was a key piece of that whole journey of just like being able to deal with all of the lows.
Casey: 8:41
So what I love that you said is you you focused on you had to switch your mind to focus on not on you, you focused on solving the problem that rather than, you know, the, the sort of the tech or rather than the, you know, focusing on the one specific in your mind solution, right?
Greg: 9:04
Yeah yeah, and the who, right because the like when I was like, "Alright, I'm drinking my own Kool-Aid. Nobody cares about this Kool Aid. Well, what problems do you have?" and when they started sharing their problems, like I just couldn't connect with them as much as I felt like I needed to, like really go deep and actually care to solve it. If that makes sense. Yeah, um, you know, dealing with you know, a lot of agency owners we get, you know, we get the people that just chose a niche and a vertical because, like, there was money there, and now they hit these roadblocks in growth. And they're like, "Why can I grow?" it's like, because you literally don't care about the person that you're helping like all you cared about was this niche had money to pay you and you got to this point, and now you have this friction of you don't like, you don't care enough about these people to like go through the pain that is going to be required to go to the next level. And that's why you're gonna stay exactly where you're at. And I just like, you know, I saw that and realize that I'm like, I need to be so energized by the problem. And you know, who I'm in the trenches with, to get through my own lows, you know, when it when it got hard. And thankfully, that was a part of that shift.
Casey: 10:27
What's cool is you're taking that learning experience, and now mentoring other people to not to basically make a decision around that, and like, hey, you know, sometimes you have to reinvent yourself. Sometimes like the point of like, the whole point, I feel of like joining a program like yours is that you have to face those questions head on, you have to have someone who's going to question why you're doing something and lead you down the right path, even if it's super duper scary. And so what you basically said is, like, you started connecting with people that were in a similar space that you and I know, you know, like the course creators, the people that were, you know, trying to make, do a lot of change and make a difference in the world. And through their education, right. So when you started doing that, I mean, obviously, that led you into, obviously creating sort of this hybrid service, but more education piece as well. But, you know, did you have to go and do mentorship on your own as well, to be able to be to do what you're doing now? Like to make that switch? Did you like how much education and learning did you have to do to finally, yeah, figure out what you needed, where you needed this perfect product, you know, market fit type of thing? You know, like, how long did it take? What do you have to go through to get there?
Greg: 12:01
I mean, it's a combination. I mean, I've, I've invested heavily in coaching, mentors, masterminds, you know, really, since 2015. I mean, not that this is like a flex or a brag, but like, when I tried it, I was trying to quantify it the other day, and it's like, it's approaching half a million in like, just between investment of my own programs, buying programs and courses for my team, books, you know, like, masterminds. Like it's, it's getting up to that, like, half a million mark its easily over 350. Yeah, and it's all really been a part of helping, but so as like, just doing the work, and, you know, just like the path that a lot of our clients take. This wasn't a for me as like, I was a practitioner, like I was in the trenches, building funnels and automation for, you know, online influencers and was doing it and then started to see trends and started packaging things a certain way, you know, we might have you remember this, we partnered for a little bit like we were building webinar funnels, you know, using your software and like helping people get through the technical hurdles of like getting their message into an automated evergreen funnel and things like that. And so we kept like, narrowing down the "what we did," as we saw, a certain things we're doing are viewed as way more valuable. And also, they're way more profitable than like some of the Infusionsoft admin stuff that we found ourselves doing. Like how do we do more of the stuff that provides results and less of the stuff that makes us feel like employees? And like our service suite just kept like narrowing, narrowing, narrowing, narrowing, and we'd like kind of towards that productization path of like, "Alright, I've codified this thing, like a client's coming in. It's like, boom, boom, boom, boom, we can do it one on one." Then we got to the point where, oh, man, this thing is so packaged up and codified that I could do this in a cohort. And so we launched a group cohort, and it was like 10, or 20, people went through the first one, and we're like, Alright, like, we can iterate and clean that up, and we did it again. And we did it again. And then now we have like a rolling program that people come through. And it's like, super systematic. So like, I had to go through, I believe all of those iterations to get it to where it's at. And a lot of our clients do too. And, you know, I think a lot of at least our audience service providers, and I guess this is probably the same for a coach or consultant or influencer, like, if you if you want to productize something like it kind of has to be specialized first. So like you have to specialize, you have to streamline it to the point where you're doing it over and over and over again, because that's where you start to see like, the activation points, the loopholes, the "Oh, do this, don't do that," the pitfalls so that you can put it in a box and say "go," right? And have it be efficient for somebody else. And it was just all of those little steps of figuring it out doing it. One on one, yeah, small group, one to many, evergreen versus cohort. And that's just been kind of just the process. So I've just kind of just kept following the next clue, so to speak to, to, like, serve a few more people than I did before, without really changing all that much.
Casey: 15:50
Right. And, obviously, the feedback loop of the results you see from those people feed where you're going, you know, next and and the next, you know, the next round and the next round, right?
Greg: 16:07
Yeah, I always like to say, you know, as we kind of like tell our clients, it's like, historically, as a service provider, you get a client, you do, you work hard, do something custom. Get another client, you do custom work, work hard. Again, it's like, if you're solving the same problem, and you're continuing to codify it, like you work hard once and every other client benefits from like that upfront effort. And you're not selling something new every single time. Like you're selling something that's proven repeatable, predictable. And that's what allows you to charge more money and get people coming to you because you become known for a specific thing, versus just like you're selling your time and your labor.
Casey: 16:51
Yeah. And so I know that you recently interviewed Alex Hormozi. in your, in your Facebook group. That was that was awesome. You know, what, what impact do you think having having the right offer and, and getting good at the kind of the mastery of figuring out your offer or figuring out your audience? Because you you know, you had the brand Scalable at one point.
Greg: 17:22
It was a podcast, yeah.
Casey: 17:24
It was a podcast. But AltAgency I don't think was always the name of your of your program, was it?
Greg: 17:31
Well, we rebranded the entire company to AltAgency actually, January of 2020.
Casey: 17:38
Yeah, yeah. And I thought I thought that was like, I was like, when you said I was like, That's such a smart move, because he's served serving-
Greg: 17:47
We had been doing-- our offer didn't change is just our name of our company did, to reflect the kind of our belief, you know, like, yeah, and who we were helping.
Casey: 17:59
So the offer now- that was my question, did the offer change? Meaning that did you start to serve non- were you serving a wider like, you know, audience, swath of audience versus now you're just focus focus focus on agencies who want to change how they're showing up?
Greg: 18:21
Yeah, it's a good question. I mean, no, we had always been, I was always resistant to the word "agency" personally, even though like I never called like when we were formally Systemly, we were building out funnels for people like, I never looked at myself as an agency. Because what I equated to an agency was the traditional agency that I came from, like part of Omnicom, like these big, you know, they full service, they do all these things. I kind of just, I didn't really put a label on myself, but it was a marketing service provider really at its at its marketing fundamentals. But everybody else called me an agency. And so I was like, whatever, like, I'm not but okay. And so I never used that word, because I was trying to attract more of me, which we were: the person who they had a skill, they were a technician at something, it grew to bigger, a little bit bigger than them to where they were kind of running a business and they're like, Oh, my God, I'm not a freelancer, I'm not a solopreneur. Like, I have some help. Like, we have a lot. We have a handful of clients. Like there's something here. I don't, I don't know, like the business side of the growing this service beyond me without me being the person doing it. That's fundamentally what we're teaching is like, we're teaching the owner to restructure their model so that they can actually be more of the owner and not just the operator. And that was the same path that I that I had to go down. And when I started using the word agency, Even before we rebranded, we just started attracting more of the right people. Because like myself, whether I called myself that I resonated with those problems and those challenges, my clients called me that and so we do really attract, like, I call it the micro-agency owner, like, kind of, you know, a couple part time people, maybe one or two full time people and are like the accidental agency owner, they're like, "Oh, my God, like I have a team. I don't like it wasn't expecting this, I'm not really sure what I'm doing, but I'm here." And that's who we helped and I don't believe in the traditional agency model. And so originally, I was like, I had peers to be like, well, you're teaching agencies to not be agencies. And I was like, "Well, yeah, that's actually kind of true." But I felt like the the "un-agency," or the "anti-agency" was like, a little bit too aggressive for what I've really meant, like, I just feel like that as service providers. The what we were taught was to sell our time for money, and that somehow became the label agency. And, like, really, that's not what it means. And like, you just chose to package your expertise in the form of labor, you can choose to package it up a different way. And still, like there's consulting agencies, you know, there's training agencies like, so why not add those those elements to your business. And it's, you know, the alternative agency is really what it's about. And that's kind of who we speak to now. So it kind of just all came together. I mean, for two years, I didn't like the name Systemly but I didn't know what to rebrand ourselves as, but it wasn't stopping us from making money. Until it was too big of a block for me, personall., I had this like, I'm like, the only thing allowing me to take this to the next level is a clear vision, and I can't see through that I don't like this name, because it doesn't convey where I'm going. And when we got to this name, I was like, okay, like, I could now see, you know, three, five years ahead with a lot more clarity.
Casey: 22:14
Yeah, yeah. I mean, that, that I, and I feel like that's, that's the journey of the self discovery of, you know, what we're supposed to be doing, just the more clarity that comes, you know, over time, the, you know. It's like, it's the mastery that we have to go through, you know, internally, externally, the education, I mean, so it's like, the whole process is required to kind of get to where we, we have that more, that deep understanding of what we want, and it sucks that you have to go through like, it's so hard, man. Yeah, like that. You have to go through like a half million dollars in coaching, and your own self discovery and analysis, but like, yeah, it's hard.
Greg: 23:05
It's so hard. You know, one thing that I that I share a lot. Now that honestly, I don't think a lot of people talk about is like, it seems so it seems so simple to know what you want. Like, I'm going through again, like determining what I want, like how big do I really want this thing like, what sacrifices or compromises am I you know, willing to have, and/or not have, like, non-negotiables. And what I realized was like, and this was more like in 2017. Was that because and I don't know if this was caught for a while, this is subconscious. And I think this is actually part of the problem. Like, if we don't take the time to determine what we want, which, like, hey, quick tip takes, I think, a lot of work. And because it takes a lot of work, we don't do it. And so subconsciously, and or maybe even consciously, we find ourselves in a position where we either adopt or borrow other people's definition of success and what they want. And we like find ourselves in this race to get that thing that we didn't even know like, we didn't even know we were in a race like we feel like we're losing and we're like, why am I losing like oh, I'm not at this thing yet. Like "When did I decide that I want this thing? Like why am I on why am I on this path?" You know, and then you realize like, "Oh, like I just blindly chose seven figures because everyone says get to seven figures like "What does that mean to me? Why is that important? What does that look like?" And it was it was definitely not a healthy I mean it was a an unhealthy but healthy time for me because I had to like do the deep work. I like I was in two different coaching programs that like, I just felt like weren't really helping me. And so like, I cleaned the deck, I like, I was like, I can't even hear my own thoughts and my own, like, when I speak, I don't even know if these are my words like, are these just someone else's words? Like, that's where I was at. And I had to, like, do some deep work on, "What do I want? What does success look like? What does it feel like?" And like, I'd write it out. And that allowed me to kind of like, come back to Okay, this is where we're going. This is and I feel good about it. Because I declared it I defined it not just grabbed it off of someone's web landing page or heard it from someone else's podcast, and it sounded good. You know?
Casey: 23:44
That takes so much, you're exactly right. Because we get so much influence from the things what you know, the things we're putting time and energy into, like, like, you know, we buy programs, or join coaching programs, so that we can know what we need to do to get to this next step. But we're kind of premature as to not not even knowing if that's the direction we want to go in. But you're right, we adopt somebody else's goal. And then that becomes our goal. And then and then it's like, and I completely agree with you on this, like, we kind of we, you know, in in the race to try to figure out how to get to here. We also we may, our own voices might get lost in that.
Greg: 26:18
And you feel all this resistance and you're not sure why. Yes, yeah. That's because you're on someone else's journey. That's why.
Casey: 26:41
It's so interesting. Yeah, I feel like I've done that. I think I did that we all do. Yeah, this year, specifically, you know, I was trying to make some changes. And, and I was like, "You know what, I'm going to, I'm going to join everything," you know, it's like kind of thing, not not like, I'm going to go, you know, go to events more or things like that, with three kids at home, and during COVID last year was like near impossible to do any of that. But I chose to invest. And it's really interesting, because, you know, I've always invested in in coaching programs since like, 2016. But I over invested this year, in the hopes that that would that I could reach this goal. It's almost like I wanted to see if that would create this change that I wanted to see. And interestingly enough, I mean, based on what you're saying, I think I agree with you, I think that, you know, we don't see it, because oftentimes, it just added noise to the noise that maybe we get on a daily basis, like my time is, you know, I do meetings all the time, you know, not necessarily like, I'm not doing the entrepreneurial thing. You know, as much where I'm like, you know, doing a Facebook Live or anything, I'm mostly doing meetings with team members and stuff like that. And even then, that you kind of get lost in the, you know, with with what, "Where are we going, what's the direction? Or have I really sat down and decided and thought this through on my terms, you know?" So I think that you're right, I think there has to be a point where you take on this self mastery of understanding what you want, and what is your voice versus the noise that you get on a daily basis. So that's really that's really powerful. So when you did that you clean, you did clean slate, and then you jumped in. And you just like you had a little more clarity at that point?
Greg: 28:50
Yeah, I mean, obviously it took some time. And yeah, we just started like, you know, baby steps back in the right direction, once we realize what that direction was. And then got momentum. And it was really slow. But it felt right. And then you know, we started picking up steam, 2019 was, you know, was good. And then 2020 was like our best year ever. And we're on pace to be that, you know, this year. Like at the beginning of COVID. So March 2020. We were We were at three people. And right now we're at 11. And we were at we've been at 11 for like at least five months. So like we like more than doubled our team size. And like very quickly I'm like "oh I need to like learn again. Now, again. Not again but now I need to learn how to be a leader of all these people, like new skills." You know, something that you said earlier that reminded me of a quote that I don't know who this actually originates with, but I first heard it because I've heard it varying forms, I first heard it from Brad Martin now from sixth division, and he said, Your business will never exceed your own capacity as an entrepreneur. And so like, I feel like when the business plateaus, it's usually because like, you've plateaued and like you need to uplevel your own skills, your own perspective, your own decision making, you know, all of those things in order to make room for the business to come up with it. And I think sometimes that's really difficult. And I think also that's a point for a lot of people where like, if they don't have that level of self awareness and or they finally gain it, and they realize what's required of them to keep growing it's it could be demoralizing like they're like oh my god, like I got to this milestone that I really wanted to get to and it's not all that it's cracked up to be. And in order to now like now that I have the knowledge of what I need to do next I'm not sure I want to do it yeah, I think you're i think i mean i don't know what having not been in programs you might not see this but like I can tell you that there's people that I was going through programs with in the last two years on and off that literally built multiple seven figure businesses were completely burnt out and now are employees of and some other entrepreneur or got acquired or sold whatever they had which was not much but like they they just died I don't want to be the I'm not the person that's going to take this thing further like I'd actually rather go back to you know just having a job I've seen that a lot like more so and I don't know maybe it's just because I'm at a certain level now but I'm like dang, one these products, like some of these programs like literally are burning people out I think people are chasing this goal that they didn't know was, wasn't theirs they got there and they're like well this kind of sucks. Like I'm doing all these things that like it looks great from the outside but I'm miserable like on the inside and like you got to clean slate again and you like kind of change who you are again. So I'm intentionally like and also maybe not intentionally like just going way slower than what I'm seeing other people do like some of my peers like do like you should be it 6 million this year I was like "Ah like so many things went wrong already this year that I'm trying to figure out to like just be a little bit better than I was last year," you know so like I'm cool if I don't go from you know one to six in a year like I'd be cool with like one I'm okay with anything above one you know like let's let's just grow like a little bit better this year and if it takes me five years to get to that point then so be it but like I'm figure there's so many other things I'm trying to figure out along the way so I don't know if that's a piece of like the passion to me I feel like that's where the you know when you talk about the warrior like the challenges that you're going through I feel like I'm constantly fighting this desire an urge to and like in some ways calling, to-- like I know if we get to 6 million and 10 million like the amount of people that we can help like and that like there's a piece of me that is motivated by that and driven by that and being pulled in that direction but there's also a part of me that's like I know people that are doing 10 million, and like I still can't see myself doing those things and I'm not sure I want to and so like it's literally like before this call I was feeling this way I'll feel this way after this call and it's like that constant day to day battle with that thought.
Casey: 34:12
It- you're, you're racing their race instead of racing your own race and i think that you know that. The thing about it is that I'm in agreement with you, I mean I'm always comparing, you know, and I remember I'm so bad at it-
Greg: 34:28
I'm really bad at it.
Casey: 34:29
And to that I remember like writing stuff like in 2017 like putting on Facebook like you know you see people on this quick rise but then this quick fall and I feel like I've always kind of had this like you know, slow steady, you know, increase. But, you know, but I felt shame in the fact that I'm not up here already where I where I was like I need to be here. I need to be here because I kept comparing myself to what I, what I saw. And so, you know, I've, I've done that, like, we've grown, you know, if I compare 2019 to 2020. And then until 2020 to 2021, we definitely grown like more than 35-40%. But it's like, the, it's really more about like the outside comparison, not the inside, "Hey, where did we start? And where do we, where have we gone?" you know, and I'm not looking at that enough to say, give, give props for this, this already. I'm more so saying, "well, that guy did boom, from here to here, you know, in that same time." So it's like, we don't honor our own race, I think a lot of times, and I have to constantly remind myself that I, you know, that I I'm running at my pace, because of the things that I can only control. Like, I have a certain lifestyle that I want to lead, right? I'm Father first, you know, father, husband, and then business. So it's like, and as I told you, we never took on, you know, any caregivers during COVID. And our kids were like, working out of the house for school and stuff like that. So we chose that route. If I, you know, so I could flip that and put business first and that that would change, you know, everything, but then that would also change everything. That would change, you know, how much impact I can give to my children. Or how much, how much I'm around as a father or a husband. So right. There's always reasons that we create and priorities that we create for, you know, for running the race we're running. So I mean, you're a dad, you have two beautiful kids, so you know. So yeah, man.
Casey: 34:36
So I, I wanted to I want to ask you a couple other things. What what's the, was there ever a point where you're like, I'm, you're like, "Screw this noise, I'm gonna throw it in the towel, and like, go do something else." Like, I'm like, I'm gonna go work for you know, you know, Deutsche, Deutsche Bank or something like that. Have you ever, did you ever have that moment?
Greg: 37:33
I'm not to that level of like, go work for like, corporate again. But I've definitely had the thought of, like, "maybe I should just go partner up with someone" or the, you know, on someone else, someone else's team that I'm like, aligned with their vision. I've actually had two different offers from people that were like, if you're ever looking to leave your own thing, and like, kind of come like, I would love to have you and I, I marinated on it for a minute. Like I thought about it, like more so than I'd like to admit, because part of it sounded nice. But at the end of the day, like, the one I look at, you know, back to that statement of, you know, the business will never exceed your own capacity as an entrepreneur. I felt like, the I've been so happy, and like, looking back on everything that I've been through so far, like, I'm really happy at the person that I've become and continue to become, that I'm not done yet. You know, and, like, so the challenges that this, you know, running my own business has put me in or situations as put me in as, like, I'm continuing to improve and grow every single day. I love learning. And so, like, the process is just really fun for me, despite the lows and like the oh my god, like, you know, money obstacles and you know, personnel hiring, like dealing with more people as the team grows, like, all those things are new, and they have their highs and they have their lows. But like, I'm just learning so much, and I'm enjoying that process that like I that's the thing that kind of keeps me from being like, yeah, like, I'm just gonna keep going, like the way I'm doing it. Because we keep getting better. And that's what's kind of kept me from, I guess, going back to get a corporate job.
Casey: 39:45
I mean, I completely, I completely get it. It's like, it's fun solving that puzzle to a degree, right? Even though we keep hearing people saying "I have, I have the puzzle piece. I have the solution for you that I know the puzzle. How to put this puzzle together. We've, you know, and we've kind of gone in and we've seen, yeah, there there are, there are things that will you know, there are success points that will leave clues, but then ultimately we do have to be the one that put the pieces together, right? No one's ever going to put those pieces together for us. And you almost have to be in love with the challenge of puzzle piecing your life and your goals and the impact you want to create in the world together on your, on your own.
Greg: 6:09
Yeah, and I think now that I'm a dad also, its really interesting. Because so like, my son is four and a half and my daughter is just over one. And you know, I mean, around that three, four range is when I like, would start noticing my son would be emulating, like would be modeling me. Like, starting like he saw me go out on my mountain bike, like he's asking about mountain biking, like, you know, like he's, you know, what am i watching? You know, what am I reading? And you know, as someone who was not a good student high school, got into college for lacrosse, not because I was a good student and was like, a mediocre student. Like, I mean, I personally not to go into like the educational system, but like, I think our educational system is broken. And I've watched the skill transfer that we've been able to give to our clients inside of our business model. And I think this is why I resonate with someone like an Alex Hormozi of like, if I could give my son and my daughter the skills that I've been acquiring since I've met you like that is the transfer of wealth that I think they're going to need to succeed, right, like, and it's interesting because my wife's a doctor, and so she's like, polar opposite, like, needs the structure, the most, like, disciplined, like school system. If you're gonna be a doctor, yeah, you need to go through all that schooling because I see what she does. And like he, I would want someone to have gone through that much to, like, operate on people. Yeah, but like, from a business perspective, like if my kids aren't, our kids aren't involved or interested in being a doctor. Like I think their education is going to be very much similar to the type of stuff I'm creating for my clients, it's going to be like, the online version of and like experiential version of like trade school, like, you know, you go and acquire skills, specific skills, like how to be, you know, how to how to be an agency owner, how to, you know, be a YouTuber, like that's a those are real things like by the time our kids are like going into the workforce. And so part of it's also I think I'm going to be a big catalyst for maybe how they approach education when it comes time to make some of those decisions. And like I'm not ready to be like oh, I'm working for this other person because like I don't know that's-
Casey: 8:59
You want to model that.
Greg: 9:00
Yeah, I want them to model the like the pursuit of yeah the you know, skill acquisition and the learning and the ability to go create for themselves versus again if they're a doctor and they want that that's awesome I think they should go do that schooling but I can't really even-
Casey: 9:19
But even then doctors have private practices, they have that creative piece.
Greg: 9:25
Yeah. No my wife just bought into a practice you know, she was joined a private practice now she's a partner and like she's now asking business questions like I'm like, oh, cuz you're part owner now like you need to worry about the P&L.
Casey: 9:42
You have to know those pieces. One thing I thought I think, I love that you said this is the transfer of wealth I think is is so powerful. I was on Shaa Wasmund's podcast the other day and we talked about this, this transfer wealth. And you know, as as, as someone who has a transracial family, right, there was a lot of the ability to transfer wealth wasn't as wide range of an opportunit. I think right now, with with how school is laid out, you know, it's still as you just said there is there is an inequality around the transfer of wealth with the with a broken education system. I love the idea of democratizing the transfer of wealth. And I think it's important that we do that for our kids. And we do that across the board. And so what's interesting, what you just said is like, you know, you by simply, you're not just modeling, your kids aren't model just modeling you, people are modeling you. And and that's what's really powerful that you can take into the future. Like, because that's, that is the legacy, that's where legacy is born, from what you can transfer to your children. But then when you pass it to them, it's they create their own legacy for their kids and their grandkids. So it's a Yeah, it's a remarkable thing to think about that the seed that you're that you're planting right now, and how it can feed you for the next 50 years. If you really think about it, if you think about it, and you're like, why am I doing this? What what you know, if there are moments of doubt, moments of struggle, moments of like, this is the challenge, the challenge, the challenge, you're creating that seed of generational wealth for years to come. And, and I mean, that fuels me a bit, you know, when I have those friggin you know, like I have to get keep hitting this, you know, goddamn wall. Sorry for swearing. But like, you know, like, that's like, I have to think about those things. You know, yeah.
Greg: 11:58
And I think that, you know, people listening in, and I think what you're saying isn't against what I'm saying as well, like, when we say transfer of wealth, like, I don't think the most valuable thing I'm going to be able to leave my kids is money.
Casey: 12:12
No, it's not the cash that you have in the bank. It's the skill.
Greg: 12:16
Yeah, it's the skills. It's the beliefs, it's all of those things that like, because I mean, someone one of my clients has asked me, like, if you had to start over from scratch, knowing what you know, now like, how would you do it? And like, really quickly, I was like, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom, like, this is what I would do, like, so while I don't want to have to start over from scratch, and I, it would suck. Like, I don't feel like I would be helpless. Like, yeah, I have a lot of knowledge and skills that I could go recreate what I've already done, and I actually feel really confident in doing so. So like, for your kids, and or at least my kids like, for them to be able to lose everything and not like dither and like be able to, like have the confidence that they'll just get it right back. Like, yeah, that's far more valuable than like, me leaving the money. Because if I don't teach them those things, they'll blow the money faster than then they could have. Anyway. So you know, and I've blown money that's been given to me, too. So I definitely made poor some poor money choices. But yeah, so that I think about that all the time.
Casey: 13:29
Well, so, you know, I just want to thank you, man, for your time today, because this was awesome. You know, one of the things that I think about in summing up, Greg Hickman are, you know, leaving, leaving this, like, you know, I know you you you have a, you don't love the word impact, because it's used so friggin' much by everybody, but let's, let's change that just for the sake of this conversation to legacy, because I feel like legacy and impact, they go very much hand in hand. And a lot of people don't think about the, you know, they don't think impact can be so miniscule, can be so. So singular as the act of passing insight and knowledge into your children. Where then they take and they are, they can create impact from that knowledge that you pass. So I just want to say like, hats off to you for creating impact in the world. And also creating a legacy with how you are, you know, showing up in your business, which obviously, shows your children what they can accomplish in the future. So hats off to you brother.
Greg: 14:53
I appreciate that.
Casey: 14:54
Yeah. So you know, we're gonna we're gonna work come to a close but one thing that people don't know about you give it to me. Come on, one thing, one thing.
Greg: 15:10
I mean, I kind of just alluded to it but like I'm a really avid like mountain biker. I used to race amateur professional for like four years when I first moved to Colorado.
Casey: 15:22
So are you still doing it all the time?
Greg: 15:25
That's my church man. Yeah, yeah, I love it.
Casey: 15:28
And and you went to school for lacrosse, right?
Greg: 15:34
Basically, yeah, a D3 school, but I got- I had no business, I would have never gotten in there if I did not play lacrosse.
Casey: 15:42
That's awesome. All right. All right. I dig that. And finally, how can people learn more about the Hickman? What were where can people go?
Greg: 15:55
Yeah, the best place is my YouTube channel. Just go to gregsvideos.com it'll take you right to my YouTube channel. Or just look up Greg Hickman on YouTube having fun over there
Casey: 16:07
And I have to finally, one more plug for Greg is like his he is my model for I'm trying to model Greg and how he's showing up in his videos like he's been doing so many videos, so many YouTube videos. I am, and he's been doing, they've been doing an awesome job over at his company because I'm basically retargeted for every video. I see every video Greg has coming down the pipeline and it's like like this guy's always in my face and he's always got he's always speaking something that I want to hear,
Greg: 16:45
That's cool.
Casey: 16:46
Yeah, so hats off to you for like for showing up and doing the work, and you do that every Thursday right?
Greg: 16:54
Yeah new video every Thursday we slice it up, gets spread out into the world
Casey: 16:59
Yeah yeah,
Greg: 17:01
I've done, when i first launched the channel it was two a week but I went to one and yeah I haven't missed a week since like 2015.
Casey: 17:14
That's amazing. And and it's shown, because like your your content library has just obviously grown, your subscribers have grown. Do you, I'll ask you this final question. If there's any marketing medium that has worked better than others, what is it for you?
Greg: 17:34
Um, I mean, I think it's unfair. It's an unfair question sort of because like the YouTube channel while it's growing slower the way we utilize the content from like a nurture perspective like people find us usually through ads some like percentage wise but like the number of times on our sales calls, they say saw your ad ended up found your YouTube channel binge watched your YouTube channel, scheduled a call bought your program like is not is not uncommon. Like it happens a lot and so I think it really does a lot for like it brings people into our world our methodology, our beliefs, and they can see themselves working with us very quickly because of the content we do there. But from like bang for buck acquisition, I mean running paid traffic has into like into another video that's very similar to a YouTube video that has been really really impactful for us for just getting in front of more people
Casey: 18:46
You take the same YouTube video and turn it into an ad, don't you?
Greg: 18:51
We Yeah, we use it in kind of like our middle-of-funnel we'll just run the whole video as just kind of like kind of to make sure people don't forget about us. And so each new video gets a little bit of ad spend to a specific audience that's already in our ecosystem so it doesn't cost a lot, and it's just a video view runs for a couple days before the next one comes out. So yeah, every time we put a little bit of dollars behind every video both on YouTube and on Facebook
Casey: 19:26
I think what then what I'm what I see is that you are leveraging the video that the content that you're creating and content marketing, whether you're putting it into the middle of the funnel as a as a retargeted ad or whether you're putting webinars in weekly.
Greg: 19:41
Yeah, or webinars, webinars or video, you know, I mean,
Casey: 19:44
Or or webinars, exactly. Yeah.
Greg: 19:47
I mean, people are like "Webinars are dead." I was like, "That's because your webinar sucks." It's like yeah, that's like, if you had a good webinar wouldn't be dead. Maybe getting people there profitably is hard for you. Which is hard for a lot of people right now, but they still work really, really well. We so much though and I know we're like way off topic, but like, technically we're trying to end but because you obviously run a business based on webinars. Our costs to get people to watch our webinar, like went really high with the whole iOS thing, like a lot of people. And so we diverted to, like, lower hanging fruit PDFs, and guides, which allowed us to bring down our cost per acquisition. But like our lead quality, like severely dropped with that our like volume of, you know, booked calls dropped heavily, because you just can't convince people through a PDF. Like, oftentimes. It's like, even a 15 minute video, you know, can do a real powerful job to convince someone to chat with you and your team. And when we just relaunched our most recent one. Like, it's like, "Oh, like, they're the they're the quality leads, you know, there they are."
Casey: 21:02
So you- You didn't, so yeah, you put a webinar back on the thank you, on your thank you page or something? Is that what you did?
Greg: 21:08
We temporarily were driving to different lead magnets, and now we're back to our webinar. Okay. All right. Mini-webinar, VSL, whatever you want. Yeah, it's, it's like 15 minute long video. Okay, but done very webinar style. I'm sharing screen. I'm drawing on my iPad, just like my YouTube channel.
Casey: 21:26
Yep. Yep. And then driving book a call at that point, right. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I think that definitely webinars, you know, middle of the funnel webinar strategy, you know, or even top of the funnel, like, you know, I mean, if you can, so it looks like you got through the iOS thing. You started up on that on that path again? Yeah, you know, you're still gonna be spent it cost per lead for a webinar, registrant probably still higher, really high, but you're getting better quality, right?
Greg: 21:58
100%. Yeah. And they're, and they're booking faster. Yeah. So which leads to sales faster. So it's like, I mean, we're still getting leads to our PDFs and stuff, like you said, it's like, we have top of funnel traffic going to it. But we also retarget to it, you know, for all the people that had come in, not through that, right. We're not God's gift to paid ads by any means. But we're figuring it out as we go. I think like everybody else,
Casey: 22:23
I still see you all the time. So you're doing something, right.
Greg: 22:26
Either we are, or we're wrong. Or we're not.
Casey: 22:29
I mean, it's a retargeting, I'm sure, so I like seeing, probably because I just like I'm binge watching, and I am probably stalking you. And so therefore, you're giving me more, you know, you're showing up because you know, hey, this, this guy stalking me I might as well him all what it wants. So but but in the in the sense of webinars, you know, people say webinars are dead, but no, the day, they are still the fundamental thing that indoctrinates people before you book a call, I mean, otherwise, you're having to do all the heavy lifting on the sales call, you know, when we, when we have people use our system to do the webinar, where they where they do a webinar to a strategy call, you know, the people become order takers at that point, you know, so it's like, it's a, it's a much different experience. And that I think the challenges are with selling a mid-ticket on a webinar, that flow has changed a little, it's not as easy, especially in an in a sort of an evergreen setting. And I think that oftentimes you don't necessarily have the same quality of customer that you can have when you take someone through a funnel where they're still required to kind of get on a call, right? You still you take a two step sort of, like qualifier, and you're just going to get exponentially better, better people coming in. So I think the evolution, that you're still needing that sales presentation that indoctrinates you know, no matter what, that's just I don't that's never that's never gonna change.
Casey: 24:01
I don't think so. Yeah, yeah, I mean, any time soon, at least.
Greg: 24:05
Yeah, I mean, unless you have somebody else, I mean,
Casey: 24:08
When you look at the amount of content that people consume, obviously, even in 2020 has gone up dramatically, right? Like YouTube's taken off like all these, like, I mean, it was already taken off, but like even more so now you see more people rolling out YouTube channels, like every single YouTube video, if you're an entrepreneur, I think if you're doing it right, not every single but many, are basically many webinars. You know, like, yeah, it's every one of those videos that you post on your channel is an opportunity to convince someone to take the next step. And that's basically what a webinar is, you know, yeah. And so you have, you know, four minutes to hopefully 12 minutes, 15 minutes plus to get someone to like you and make that next step. And sometimes, like on the YouTube world that happens over multiple videos. But I mean, it's happening that way on. I mean, our, our VSL, whatever webinars like 15 minutes, and like, you still only get 50% of people. I remember back in the day, it's like webinars 60 minutes, you're aiming for 50% people to watch the whole thing. Yeah, or 50% people to show up 50% of those or whatever to watch the rest. And it's like, you're seeing that same thing with a 15 minute video, it's like, people just have a lot of other things to consume, and like a short attention span. And so it is harder, I think.
Casey: 25:39
Yeah, it's like, you know, there's multiple steps, but I mean, that and, I think the, the thing you're mentioning is like, is a micro cut, right? Micro, micro-content, macro-content, sort of strategy, you know, where it's like, you know, short form video, mid form video, webinar, you know, long form and or VSL, which is kind of like that mid, you know. I think of short form is like, one to one to three minutes. Yeah, longer form is like, five to seven minutes. And those both can be on a YouTube channel as an example. And then you have longer form content, which would be like a 15-minute. Well, you can have, I mean, you could do a 15 minute video on YouTube actually, too, you know, you're gonna get more views, but then yeah, the VSLs you know, it's like the 15 minute or up to like, an hour, you know, and I think it's not just a one prong strategy, I think, you know. Basically video content across the board. The more video the better. I mean, that's, that's what I'm seeing too. I mean, that that medium seems to at least that resonates with you. And I think I resonate with it, because I love doing videos, too. I just haven't done as many. I just need to jump back in.
Greg: 27:01
Yeah, they keep telling me if I want to keep growing my business, I can't be a consumer. But like, bro, I love watching YouTube, like I love there's like some channels that I love. Like there's mountain biking channels that I follow. It's tough for me too because I find myself I'm like, "Oh man, where'd that word those last? You know, 90 minutes go?" I was like, I just watched five YouTube videos. Yeah, that happens.
Casey: 27:26
You gotta just create your own, you know, mountain climbing- mountain biking channel.
Greg: 27:32
That's so hard like if you watched the good ones like yeah, talk about production value. I mean I don't have I don't have the chops for that or the patience really.
Casey: 27:42
You got to just get the hook up. Right? You got to get it on the wheels and you get the multi-camera on the on the bike itself, on the helmet. You know?
Greg: 27:49
They have some next level stuff. Yeah, for how little money I know that they're making I don't know if it's worth the effort.
Casey: 27:56
Well, that's where you can fund it with the money you're making you can fund the production of it, right? We can fund the creative.
Greg: 28:04
Speaking, speaking of poor investments.
Casey: 28:09
Oh man, okay, well, this we were gonna end a little bit ago, but now
Greg: 28:13
gregsvideos.com is where you can find more, is what he was saying!
Casey: 28:18
Yes, gregsvideos.com. Cool. Thanks Greg. Yeah, appreciate you man. Thanks for coming on.
Greg: 28:23
Likewise, man.
Casey: 28:24
Alright.