The Small Business Safari
Have you ever sat there and wondered "What am I doing here stuck in the concrete zoo of the corporate world?" Are you itching to get out? Chris Lalomia and his co-host Alan Wyatt traverse the jungle of entrepreneurship. Together they share their stories and help you explore the wild world of SCALING your business. With many years of owning their own small businesses, they love to give insight to the aspiring entrepreneur. So, are you ready to make the jump?
The Small Business Safari
What If Your Product Isn’t The Problem—Your Offer Is | John (JD) Dwyer
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What if your growth problem isn’t your marketing—or your product—but the offer itself?
Summary:
John “JD” Dwyer, founder of The Institute of Wow, joins us to reveal how challenger brands out perform bigger competitors by engineering irresistible offers that drive immediate action. We break down how incentive-based marketing, high perceived-value bonuses, and creative positioning can transform conversion rates without cutting prices.
JD shares the story of a bank that replaced a standard promotional rate with a vacation incentive—then amplified results with a celebrity campaign that dramatically increased response. From coffee shops doubling revenue with simple behavioral nudges to dental practices generating thousands of targeted leads through creative contests, the lesson is clear: when the offer aligns with customer desire, price becomes far less important.
We also explore practical tactics for small businesses, including designing incentives that cost little but feel premium, coaching sales teams using recorded calls and AI insights, and leveraging Facebook as a responsive lead-generation engine when the economics make sense. This episode delivers a playbook for business owners ready to move beyond price competition and create a “wow factor” that drives both immediate sales and long-term loyalty.
🎥 Watch the full episode on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@TheSmallBusinessSafari
💡 GOLD NUGGETS
• Why the offer—not the product—often determines conversion
• Creating high perceived-value incentives that cost less than discounts
• Behavioral nudges that dramatically increase repeat purchases
• Using contests and promotions to generate targeted leads fast
• Coaching sales teams with recorded calls and AI performance analysis
🔗 Guest Links
• Website: https://theinstituteofwow.com
• LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/instituteofwow/
jdpodcastguest.com
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• Website | https://chrislalomia.com
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Cold Open And Seinfeld Anecdote
SPEAKER_05Yeah, well look, you know, I'll I'll give you an idea. I'm gonna name drop here, so you're gonna have to forgive me. And the name I'm gonna drop is Jerry Seinfeld, because uh you ought to see in my bio I I sort of worked with him for a few times.
SPEAKER_00Never never heard of him. Um, no, and I've never milked the crap. Is he funny?
SPEAKER_05I I've never milked the crap out of that for ten years either. But uh nice. In fact, on the second year of going backwards and forth to New York to do the TV commercials with him for a bank down under, um, I said to him, Jerry, you don't have a website. And he didn't at the time. This was ten years ago. And I said to him, Um, mate, can you imagine the amount of t-shirts and caps you could sell uh if you had a website? And he looked at me like a a principal would with uh a student that he hates. And Jerry put his reading glasses on the edge of his nose and said, JD, do I look like I need to sell any t-shirts or caps? And I said, No, I guess not. I forgot you got more money than God. And he said to me, Look, uh, why do I need a website? He said, I've looked at yours, I'm on there more than you.
Safari Intro And Sales “Ride Buddy”
Recording Calls And AI Feedback
SPEAKER_03So I said to him, how did Now that's funny right there? Welcome to the Small Business Safari, where I help guide you to avoid those traps, pitfalls, and dangers that lurk when navigating the wild world of small business ownership. I'll share those gold nuggets of information and invite guests to help accelerate your extent to that mountaintop of success. It's a jungle out there, and I want to help you traverse through the levels of owning your own business that can get you bogged down and distract you from hitting your own personal and professional goals. So strap in adventure team and let's take a ride through this safari to get you to the wing it. You know what? No agenda, no agenda. Is that a new week? We didn't know I do that every day. In fact, uh, let me tell you about my sales process of my company at the trusted toolbox. It's called winging it. Yeah. Um, clearly, because that's what my guys do. Build rapport, then wing it. And then wing it. Now, uh, I gotta tell you guys, I've uh I have been introduced to a new device and it's called the Plaud. P-L-A-U-D. I don't know this. We call this the ride, buddy, and it records my guys on sales calls, and then I get to listen to them and value it. And as a matter of fact, Alan did too Chris, give me feedback. They love that. In fact, I just had a meeting and they said, Chris, we crave your feedback. At least that's what I heard. Fucking imbeciles. And they listen to this, but it's been great. I'll tell you why. How did how do ride-alongs work in the home services world in the past? Well, I go out there, I stand in the back, I try not to look at the customer, I try to just let these guys.
SPEAKER_02I jump in, I save it, and then I beat you to a pulp later. And now you can do it via recording. Right.
SPEAKER_03Isn't that great? It's so good for you. And I didn't waste my whole day. I get to do it in 15 minutes because I turn it on one and a half speed.
SPEAKER_02I have AI evaluate the call. I get to listen to it.
SPEAKER_03You don't have to spend time with those creatons in the car and and tell them, Oh, I can't wait to go to another uh gas station and get another roller dog. Oh God, those are the best. Oh my god.
SPEAKER_02You know, the roller dog has gotten better. No way.
Meet JD And Define Direct Response
SPEAKER_03Uh uh uh no. I was I yeah, I'll tell you a story. I uh won five bucks at a Braves game, went to the baseball game, and you get five dollars if they win if you went the day before. We had it. I'm out there riding, doing the ride along, and I'm like, hey dude, I got five bucks. Do you get five bucks? Let's go into racetrack, which is here in Atlanta. And uh they had barbecue chicken pizza sitting on there at three o'clock in the afternoon, and that's all they had left. And I went, I'm gonna eat it. Done. Yeah. When did it come back to the 15 stops for me to go five miles to get back to my office so I could sit on the toilet for another three hours before I could even make it back to my house. JD, aren't you glad you joined us? Oh, my God. So anyway, it's called Plaud The Ride Buddy. If you guys want to learn more about that one, uh, I'm not even endorsing it. They're not giving me any money. They should. They should in good space. I'm telling you, it's been a game changer for us because these guys act more authentic, right? They're I actually get to hear them in in their the way they want to talk to people without me being there staring over their shoulder. So it's been a lot of fun. It's really helped me out, but we've got to get to JD, don't we? We do because we need a little wow in our life. We need, you know what? Let's get some wow factor, can we? I mean, for the love. I mean, I want some wow. John, JD, JD goes by JD, but uh let's go. Wow, dude, Wallace, make me laugh, funny guy.
SPEAKER_05Guys, I gotta, I gotta, I gotta tell you, that is an unusual intro. Uh, having done a few podcasts, and uh it when you refer to me as JD, I better tell everyone my name is John DeWire, but I've got JD, and I was doing a Texas one of these last week, and the podcaster said to me, What do I call you, JD or John? I said, Oh, I don't care either one of those. I said, Oh, I I also get dick ed and moron. And so now he's he's sending me emails, hi dickhead.
SPEAKER_03I love that guy. You know what?
SPEAKER_02Kindred spirits, and I love that he may drop it. We may need to have him on our podcast.
SPEAKER_03And honestly, he just made me laugh. Funny guy just made me laugh. We're off the rip. All right, we're already well ahead. All right, John, tell us a little bit about what you do and how you do it.
Likes Don’t Feed Families
SPEAKER_05Good, buddies. Uh yeah, look, it's uh it's called direct response marketing, and I've been doing it since uh the 1800s, uh little house on the prairie. So I've I've been around the block a few times. And uh traditional advertising, if you went to a traditional advertising agency, they'll tell you that uh they'll help you get people to fall in love with your brand so that they'll taste your product. In direct response marketing, you tend to flip that. You get them to taste the product so that they'll fall in love with your brand. So that's the big difference. The big difference is um that you know it's normally the results, good or bad or indifferent, uh, come pretty fast. So if you actually do direct marketing uh or direct response marketing on Facebook today, you'll know whether you've got money in the bank tomorrow.
SPEAKER_02All right, you gotta explain what direct he said a lot in a very compressed way.
SPEAKER_03First of all, he's like 3,000 years old. Two. No, no, it's 200. All right, but he still has more hair than the both of us. Yeah, but if you add us up together, I think we are than we do. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_02So but he's drinking coffee and we're drinking bourbon.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, well, you know, that's what happens. Australia, they're they're backwards, they should be drinking. Well, okay, well, maybe not. I I I thought Australians just started with beer and then went to the country. Honestly, every Australian.
SPEAKER_02They didn't even know they had coffee down there.
Sampling And Incentive-Based Marketing
SPEAKER_03I mean, I swear to god, these guys know how to party. Yeah, I and I tried to hang with them once and that ain't happening. No, no. I they win, I lose, they drink way more beer than I possibly can. You're right. JD brought up a ton, John Dwyer while marketing. But I can you define what direct response marketing is? And that's but probably my biggest question I had. No, he just said it, but I think he needs to unpack it. You get can you unpack it?
SPEAKER_02Oh, Alan, I'm sorry. The sophisticated in the uh room. Well, and for a guy who normally listens at two times speed, he was at two times speed and you didn't catch it. So that tells me that you don't retain much. Do what? You can't did he answer our question yet? Yes, I would, but he can say it again slower with pictures. Did he answer my question yet? No, small words.
Packaged Promotions And Vacations
SPEAKER_05I'm waiting for one of you to say, well, that's about all that we've got time for today. Thank you very much for coming on. Um, yeah, guys, look, your direct response is probably something that you know 90 plus percent of businesses don't do uh because they've been told to, you know, put their face on the side of a bus or the back of a taxi, uh, or they've been told to sponsor the local basketball team. Uh and you know, there's nothing wrong with that because that's called brand building. But if you walk uh into home tonight and the kids are around the dinner table and you tell them, look, Daddy got 156 likes today, they're still going to say, Daddy, there's no food on the table. Um, so you've just got to be careful with uh with what we call you know vanity metrics. Uh and so therefore, this is this is really down and dirty. Uh I I won't refer to it as morning television infomercials because it's much more sophisticated than that. But the actual uh end result is the same, and that is that you advertise uh you know at 11 o'clock and 12 o'clock you've got money in the bank. The whole idea of direct response marketing is to get them off the fence because you make an incredible offer. And in my instance, of course, given that our business is called the Institute of Wow, then it's all about developing a wow factor to get them off the fence.
SPEAKER_03All right. So I think I got it. But I want to know likes don't put food on the table. I freaking love that. That's old vanity metrics. How about that one? Yeah, likes don't put food on the table, and vanity metrics don't matter.
SPEAKER_02But he said something about we don't try to get you to like our products, we try to get you to try our products and then you like them. Something to that effect. Is that correct? How how explain that you're talking about? Yeah, the calamari.
SPEAKER_05Have hostesses at lunchtime and dinner time handing out calamari samples so that people will taste it, like it, and then they'll come in and spend more money on you know expensive seafood lobsters.
SPEAKER_03So try the uh so the teaser, if if you will, the uh the free sample, the hey, let me try this out. Oh, I want more and I want more, I want more. Kind of like my uh cocaine addiction. I can't say that. Um, I don't have one, I'm just joking. Um so wow. Yeah, right. So, but uh tell us the vehicles you would do that. So I'm in a service business, but tell how does this work? Give us an example of one you've used.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, okay. I'll give you an example. We have a uh a number of products. I I found that consultancy was uh yeah, was pretty frustrating. Uh it's fine with the bigger businesses. I used to do the consultancy for McDonald's in Australia and uh 7-Eleven and BP gas stations and uh so forth. And what you know, they're fine because I could give them ideas, marketing ideas, and they'd have a you know a team in the advertising department that would make it happen. But when I swapped across about a dozen years ago to small to medium-sized businesses, I found that, you know, I could give them the corporate level ideas, but they didn't have anyone to implement them. So what we've done is that we've packaged things together. So, you know, we'll have gas discount promotions, we'll have a million, I can get a million dollars for 25 grand uh from one of the insurance companies. And, you know, companies can give away the chance to win a million dollars. It's what we call an insured price promotion. Uh, we have a vacation voucher promotion whereby, you know, we provide businesses with vacation vouchers for three nights in Vegas and New York and Orlando, Disney World, all these places, and it's worth a thousand dollars, but we sell it to businesses for fifty dollars, and they use that as a happy meal toy to get people to buy their products or services. So, you know, buy my refrigerator and you get a three-night stay in Orlando, and so forth. Um, so we do lots and lots and lots of these things, and what they are designed to do is to get people uh well away from price, okay, and then uh get them off the fence. It's called incentive-based marketing, and 97% of businesses in the world have never tried it. McDonald's have been doing it for 44 years, Kellogg's have been doing it for 50 years, but no one else does it.
SPEAKER_02Happy Meal Toy. Secret to your success. You freaking wasted 17 years, Chris, in your business before you figured this out.
SPEAKER_03My mind's blown right now, dude. He uh so I'm a little disappointed. Number one, that I'm going to Vegas and I didn't know about this one. Um, number two, Atlanta's not on that thing. Obviously, it's Atlanta's a destination vacation place, Alan. I don't know what you guys are thinking. I mean, everybody from Australia is coming here, I think. Especially with the World Cup coming here. Let's go. Um, all right. So direct response. You're saying you offer your product or service, and you can offer, you say, Hey, you sign up for this and you get that, and you guys sell, yeah, you guys sell them the opportunity for that. Wow, that's a great one. I mean, I'm I'm I'm fumbling here, Alan.
SPEAKER_02You really are. So let's uh let's turn it over to our guests. Keep keep going, please.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, well, look, uh, you know, I'll give you an idea. I'm gonna name drop here, so you're gonna have to forgive me. And the name I'm gonna drop is Jerry Seinfeld because uh you would have seen in my bio I I sort of worked with him for a few times.
SPEAKER_00Never never heard of him. Um, no, and I've never milked the crap. Is he funny?
SPEAKER_05I've never milked the crap out of that for ten years either. But uh nice. In fact, on the second year of going backwards and forth to New York to do the TV commercials with him for a bank down under, um, I said to him, Jerry, you don't have a website. And he didn't at the time, this was 10 years ago. And I said to him, Um, mate, can you imagine the amount of t-shirts and caps you could sell uh if you had a website? And he looked at me like a a principal would with uh a student that he hates. And Jerry put his reading glasses on the edge of his nose and said, JD, do I look like I need to sell any t-shirts or caps? And I said, No, I guess not. I forgot you got more money than God. And he said to me, Look, uh, why do I need a website? He said, I've looked at yours, I'm on there more than you.
SPEAKER_03So I said to him how did Now that's funny, right there, JD. That's amazing.
Celebrity Endorsement Results
SPEAKER_02So how did you he did make a billion dollars? He didn't need to do any kind of marketing. I mean, he's done a little bit since, but how did you get him to do something in Australia?
Create A Wow Factor In Me-Too Markets
SPEAKER_05Look, it was persistence versus intelligence, uh persistence beats intelligence. I I asked him the same question, uh, and he said to me because he thought I'd never go away. So um I I can be a bit of a nuisance. And uh what had happened is that this particular bank down under was a challenger brand. So they're not the Bank of America or Wells Fargo, they were a challenger brand. Still the 200th biggest business in Australia, but nonetheless, they're not as big as the big, big, big banks. And they put me on as a consultant and I said to them, Look, you guys are on drugs. I mean, you're up against the 40-ton guerrilla, you know, the banks of America and so forth, and you're advertising home runs on interest rates. So they'd be on TV, and the ponytailed advertising agency, you know, sort of owner would tell them to put the ads on TV and come up with a nice jingle. And the name of the bank was the greater, so therefore the tagline, wait for it, sooner or later, it's the greater, like please. And uh I said to them, look, you definitely are on drugs. Uh, so therefore, what you've got to do if you're a challenger brand is what Richard Branson does. Richard Branson in all of his businesses is a challenger brand, and he takes on the 40-ton gorilla by being different. And they said, Okay, smart ass, well, what is it? And I said, Well, look, I've been doing some TV commercials for a uh travel discount company. Why don't I introduce you and uh why don't you just you know say swap your home loan to us and you get a free vacation? They said, How are we going to pay for it? I said, Stop the 1% honeymoon rate because all banks, and it would be the same in America, you give a 1% honeymoon rate to anyone for the first year and then they jack it back up again. So that's what we did. We just transferred the 1% honeymoon rate from people and gave it to the travel company, and we came on TV and we said, look, get a you know, home loan from us and get a free vacation. They took in$15 billion worth of extra home loans in the first three years. We're talking like crazy numbers. We've only got the population of California, by the way. We've got the same land mass as America, but only the population of California. There's a lot of desert down under. And uh, so this was big numbers, and then about three or four years into it, when we'd scooped up all the low-lying for it, um, we you know, they said to me, Where do we go to from here? I said, Well, why don't you try a personality? Why don't we try a celebrity? And I was a complete dickhead, uh, because I didn't realize that they would want to do a survey to find out what would who would be a cheeky personality that would match their brand. And of course, I'm hoping it would be an Australian Australian TV personality, which would be much easier to get. And guess who came up tops on the survey was Jerry Seinfeld. So I was.
SPEAKER_03Oh my god. So yeah, be careful what you asked for. Yeah, you you need to know the answer to the question before. That's tough. Yeah, Jerry Seinfeld.
Coffee Cup Nudge That Doubled Sales
SPEAKER_05So look, as it turned out, look, he's harder to get to than the Pope. Uh, but uh I I persisted. His manager is a guy called George uh Shapiro, who only just passed away about 18 months ago. But uh yeah, so he he's a bit of a cheeky bugger like you two guys and myself, and so uh we got on well. And he said, What yeah, what do you want me to do? I said I just want him to basically do stand-up. And so, cut long story short, it took a few months, but he eventually said yes, and it wasn't for the money. I asked Jerry, you know, why did you say yes? You've got more money than God. And he said, Look, uh, number one, I love the Aussie sense of humor. You wanted me to take the piss out of all the big banks, and I'll do that for a living. I'd take the piss for a living. Uh, and he said, the second thing is I thought, and I can't use the word, but it was a swear word, I thought you would never so-and-so go away. And so I thought I'd better say yes.
SPEAKER_03You you can't use that word on this show, by the way. Really? So you went to New York to have him film the commercial and to do the all do all that, and and you're right, he didn't do it for the money, but I'm sure he charged you a shit ton. Yeah, thank you. Because his money does count.
SPEAKER_05Yeah. I mean, look, he he got 1.1 uh each time for two days' work. So for two days' work, we paid him one point one, and he got that for three years, so therefore he did okay out of it. Uh, but it was nothing like what he's worth. So, you know, that's jump change.
SPEAKER_03Market change, yeah, right. Yeah, but what did it do? All right, so you went from instead of doing I this is uh this is genius marketing, I think. You know, obviously you know that, so I'm just gonna play along with it.
SPEAKER_02You're just catching up now.
SPEAKER_03I am, and I'm an idiot. Uh, I've only been doing this for 17 years in my own business.
Contest Leads Machine For Dentists
SPEAKER_05Excuse me once I just pet myself pat myself on the back. Thank you.
SPEAKER_03Yes, yeah, and then when you come to Atlanta, I'm definitely buying you a lot of bourbon uh at 8 a.m. So um what you talked about though is your my marketing strategy was hey, all the banks are doing this. I'm gonna give you an offer rate, I'm gonna give you a discount. Oh, yeah, I love the money, love the money. Hey, I'm gonna offer you a vacation, which as if you don't know this, Australians they love their vacations, brother. Oh, because that's kind of racist. No, it's not racist, that's country issue. I don't know what the hell it is. I just I have I have cousins who live down there, they they vacation like shit. I mean, they're everywhere. I love them for doing it too, and that's where I got killed by the Australians because they brought all their friends here and I thought that I could drink with them. But uh, you did the vacation thing, you got the bump. All right, then you bring on Jerry. What was that bump? Was it a was it how was that attributed? How did you figure that out?
How The Vacation Voucher Model Works
SPEAKER_05Yeah, well, the figures for the first three years of get a home no, get a free vacation, we're off the planet. They had a call center of you know ladies who would answer the phone before I got involved. They had 15, they had to grow that to 52 women within weeks of opening up this campaign. Um, it was just nuts. Uh, and it was free. I mean, the thing is the bank never had to pay any money through it because they just transferred what was a invisible 1% honeymoon rate that you know it was exactly the same as every other bank, uh, across to uh, you know, giving them a free vacation. I kept on saying to these you know guys who ran the bank, and look, they're all accountants, so they're lots and lots of fun, as you can imagine. And uh I just said to them laugh right. Yeah, you're in a me tube industry, and they said, Oh, what's a me tube industry? I said, You've got the same solar panels as the guy down the road, you know. Um money, but I get a million dollars from you. It's not like I I get, you know, uh Cadbury chocolate versus an own name chocolate. Your million dollars looks like the Bank of America, so therefore you have to come up with an artificial wow factor. See, iPhone doesn't need my help, they've got a wow factor built in. But if you're a Me Too industry and you've got the same solar panels or you've got the same law and service, or you've got the same refrigerator, whatever it might be, as many others, then you're a commodity, which means that whoever drops their pants quickest normally wins. You don't want to be in that game. So what you want to do is take your eyes, you know, take your eyes.
SPEAKER_02That's the title of the podcast. Don't drop your pants. No, whoever drops the pants quickest wins. No, that's what he said. Is that what it is?
SPEAKER_03Wins you know you'll do it. I'm gonna do it. I'm dropping my pants already. Are you kidding? Don't look on the YouTube channel, people. Stay on the podcast. Do not go by the way. We are on YouTube, you can go check it out. Don't forget to tell your friends go back. Yeah, you nobody wants to see this. All right, let's keep going. All right, so did Jerry Seinfeld so you did the big bump, uh, 52, 15 to 52 in the call center. That's I mean, obviously, that's an easy number. Jerry comes on big, not big, bigger. He just said it was big. No, he said that was the end. You don't speak Australian very well. I don't. Um fact when my cousins come over, I still don't understand. Okay, but I I thought the uh bump was from the uh the uh the uh traveling setup. No, yeah, yeah, yeah. Sorry, so what happened is so what was the bump with the Jerry after that?
SPEAKER_05Uh it just went from you know uh 30 miles an hour to 100 miles an hour. So therefore uh the the lift in home loans when Seinfield came along uh was you know off the planet. So they were already doing record home loan home loan numbers for the first three years of just doing it, get a home loan, get a free vacation. And the moment that he came along, uh it just went through the stratosphere. Yeah.
Using High Perceived Value Incentives
SPEAKER_03You brought up a concept early on that I think a lot of people, um, I mean most of our audience, small business owners, uh, or thinking about getting into business. But I think everybody has to have that mentality, especially as a small business owner. You talked about challenger versus the mammoths. Uh, talk a little bit about how a challenger can beat the Goliaths.
SPEAKER_05And before that, guys, I'm gonna show off because I happen to have this guy here actually blowing wind up my backside. So uh if you uh if you want me to press it, it's 15 seconds. You want me to press that?
SPEAKER_03Sure. Go hit it. Showing us off Seinfeld loves GD.
SPEAKER_05What's up with the Australians? Uh and by the way, the the uh the reason for this is that whenever I did TV commercials and we had real people, I would say to them at the end of the TV commercial, look, I'd like to say you were the best couple that we've ever had in a any one about bank ads. And they go, Oh, thank you very much. So I said, No, no, you misunderstood what I said. I said, I'd like to say that. I can't, you're awful, man. Um and I do the same thing at restaurants, which is my wife hates me for it. I say to the waitress, Look, I'd like to say that was the best service I've ever had. And she says, Oh, thank you. I said, No, no, I'd like to say that I can't.
SPEAKER_02Oh, the best. I'm using I am using that.
SPEAKER_03I'm not sure I can pull that off because I'll be you're so cringy. All right, go do it. Jerry got me back. Here we go.
SPEAKER_05Here we go.
SPEAKER_01I just want to say that you know, you are the most professional, um most competent, and just best to work with marketing person I've ever worked with. Thank you, Jerry.
Message-To-Market Match Examples
SPEAKER_02I'd like to say that is outstanding. Oh when he when he said to me, Why did I want to do that?
SPEAKER_05When he said to me, Why, JD, why do you want me to do that? So I can milk the shit out of it for the next 10 years.
SPEAKER_03That's what I want you to do. Oh, that's awesome, dude. Man, how much fun do you have day in and day out?
SPEAKER_05Sorry, how much fun do I have?
SPEAKER_03Well, every day. I mean, you must have fun.
Turf Farm Beer Bonus That Sold Out
SPEAKER_05Yeah, I'll look at it scored the Institute away. So you can imagine that you know we don't get involved with too many boring things. I I I I think that if you're not living life on the edge, you're taking too much room in the middle. So, you know, like yeah, it's uh uh and look, all jokes aside, this this direct response stuff is all about um coming up with ideas that are unusual. And there was a guy uh I had yesterday contact me. Uh I was speaking at a franchise convention in Melbourne, Australia, about uh a month ago, and he has a chain of cafes around Australia, around about 60 of them. Uh so it's not McDonald's by any means, but they're they're quite nice Italian-themed cafes. And he said to me, Look, I'm wanting to boost my coffees. Uh he said, I'm I'm selling plenty of club sandwiches and hamburgers and what have you, but I need to sell more coffees at my 60 recipe, like 60 cafes. I said, Okay, well, how about we do this? Uh, you get rid of your cups of uh your crockery, and we come up with new crockery, and at the bottom of each cup we say, we have a stamp there, like uh, yeah, it's embedded into the cup, and it says, Go on, you know you need another cup, or go on, you want to have another cup. In other words, when you got the end of your coffee and you looked at the bottom of the cup, it said, Go on, you know you want a second cup. Uh, he told me that in the first month of running that through out e60 stores, the average store went from$9,000 to$23,000 in coffee because people were having a second cup.
SPEAKER_03Good lord. Dude, I love this guy, and he's talking, and it reminds me of a guy we're still staying in contact with Troy Truan out of Tasmania. You like that one? Uh he does the bourbon. I don't think he's impressed. What? You should be. What? No, wait, just because he knows somebody in his own career. No, well, he's not even on the same. Troy keeps hitting me up, and I was thinking, I think Troy is because he keeps listening to the pod and he keeps telling me, Hey, I love that episode. And this one, he's gonna love this episode because he's trying to help distillers differentiate their brands. And I was like, just think about that one little nuance. I'm like, I you know you want another cup. I'm like, no, I don't. Yes, I do. No, I don't. You know what's so great about it? It's so simple. It's simple.
SPEAKER_02It is great. Yeah, it is. It is.
Facebook As A Lead Money Machine
Experience Over Branding And Disney
SPEAKER_05And and that's the crap, and in all seriousness, put the three of us sarcastic comments aside for a moment. I mean, just even being very serious. It is so simple, it's ridiculous that 97% of businesses have never done it. And the reason is that because when they go to college or university and they come out as a dentist or they come out as an electrician or plumber or builder, whatever it might be, uh, not once in that three or four or six years that they've spent in college has anyone taught them how to get a customer. They come out as a fantastic dentist with all the wonderful dentistry skills, but no one's ever told them how to get clients. I mean, we had a dentist uh just about a month ago knock on my door and he said, uh I I do a lot of seminars and webinars and stuff like you guys do, so therefore, you know, you get inquiries just from doing that without doing any advertising. And this guy said, Look, I'm a dentist, I want to sell Invisalign braces, which are the invisible braces that kids have these days, unlike when we were kids, it was metal braces. And he said, they're about five, six, seven thousand dollars a time, and I get them for about a third of that, so there's a good margin. So I'm after rich parents with children with crooked teeth. So I said, fine, so we have a program which we call um the Contest Leads Machine, and so therefore we just put the Contest Leads Machine.com into action, and uh we ran Facebook campaign for him uh on uh well basically the the geodemographic area where his rich parents were, and we said, How would you like to win uh invisible braces for your children's teeth? The only people who enter that are people who have got children with crooked teeth. So immediately we've just you know got his audience to glow in the dark, and we got uh he spent$30 a day. So this is$30 a day over seven days, and the first week he got a thousand leads, one thousand leads, nine hundred and ninety-one, but let's just say a thousand. So he gives one of those Invisilite braces away, which cost him a couple of grand, but he's got 999 other people who have glowed in the dark and said, My child has crooked teeth, take my money. And so what happens is that he then has his team ring the people up and say, Look, I'm sorry you didn't win last week, the invisible braces, but obviously you've got a child with crooked teeth. If you actually get in by the end of the month, we're gonna give you a free vacation. Shut the game. And he gets a vacation off us for$50. It's worth a thousand.
SPEAKER_03Shut the front door right there. How about that one? First of all, I would love somebody to say, Oh, I understand your kids have crooked teeth. Hey, fuck you. Uh, those are my job, my kids. You shouldn't be saying that, and they're not from England.
SPEAKER_02Uh but I love it. There you go, pissing off another country again, Chris.
SPEAKER_03I I you know, I'm just you know, one after another after another. Here are the states. Here are the states. I think I'm down to like 22 states, so it'll see listen to me. But um most of Canada's gone. Yeah, oh all of Canada's gone. I don't know why.
SPEAKER_05We thought Canada response America, isn't it? Surely.
Premium Positioning With Delivery Theater
SPEAKER_03We're working on it. Oh boy. Yeah, it's funny. Why you know, uh, we just talked about this the other day. I I got a tangent, we're coming back to this one, but we were just talking about this in one of our CEO groups, talking about Canada has a 6.8% small business ownership percentage. Here in the U.S., we're five percent. So Canada is beating us there. They're more entrepreneurial than we are. They are, and so that that pissed me right off. And it pissed off Hanks.
SPEAKER_02And I was like, well, good for them. Yeah, no, I mean that's impressive. No, we can't have that because we're the U.S. We're still. Well, we should be better, but we're not. We it's so I mean they're better at us than a lot of things like just politeness and manners and are they not surrenderity? Are they sorry? They're sorry. They're sorry a lot. I'm sorry. Hey, I I wouldn't cool north the most important. I should be people when they're pissed.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, well that's that's the wow marketing. I won't hang on. I gotta go back to this because I want to get more about Chris. Yeah, okay. Please back to the cricket, Chris. So you get those thousand leads off of Facebook and then you market back to them and offer them a free vacation if this, yeah, or would would you say a discount off services? I mean, what do you do? I mean, that I still don't get how you get a free vacation.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, we try we try to uh uh our our mantra is don't discount, uh value add some excuse me, price discounting, the dentist down the road can match that in five minutes. The dentist down the road can't give away a free vacation in five minutes.
Final Rapid-Fire And DIY Fail
SPEAKER_03All right, talk about that free vacation because uh Alan brought that up. So you have marketed with these people, like here in the States, we can uh market the same thing, and it costs us as a business owner how much?
SPEAKER_05Yeah, okay. So what happened is that about six months out from COVID, uh I got contacted by uh a travel company and they said, Look, we've seen your Seinfeld campaign down under, pretty hard to keep that a secret. Um uh would you like to join forces with us? Because we get access to unsold hotel rooms around the world. And uh I said, Oh, okay, yeah, right, right. And uh they said, so therefore we're not marketers, we're a travel company. These hotels are part of the program. They're all full-star trip advisor, by the way, so they're not, you know, RV parks. Um, they want to actually be involved in giving us rooms for free outside of school vacation periods because they're running at 30 or 40 percent vacancy factor. So they may as well fill the room with a freebie guest, hoping that that guest will spend money on food and drink. That's the way it works. So it's a win for the hotel, they're filling an otherwise uh empty room, uh, and of course it's a win for the business because they're getting a thousand dollar voucher for three nights in Vegas or San Diego or Grand Canyon, Orlando, New York, you know, all the sexy spots. Um they're getting something worth a thousand dollars giveaway to lure people to buy their products or services, and of course, it's a win for you know the consumer because you know he or she gets a vacation. And I said, yeah, right, well, leave it with me. And I turned it upside down because I've seen every travel scam there is being in the marketing game. And uh, yeah, it's very fair. I mean, it was very, very fair. It's basically the logic behind it, uh, was very well logical because the hotels are gonna have an empty room, they might as well give it up and spend twelve dollars on cleaning uh in the hope that whoever stays there for free will spend more money on food and beverage and massages and room service. And uh, we started to advertise it six months out from COVID, nobody knew COVID was coming along, and I was responsible for COVID. I've got to put my head up and apologize to the world for that.
Wrap-Up And Where To Find JD
SPEAKER_03I knew it, I knew it wasn't the Chinese, it was because what happens if you manufacture that, everybody wants to be involved with you. I I 100%.
SPEAKER_05I mean, look, I apologize. I apologize, although it's insincere. I I think once you actually master the art of uh sincerity, then well, fake sincerity, you've got it made. So therefore, uh, in a sincere way, I'm sorry. Uh but I said to my wife, uh coming up towards Christmas before COVID, I said, Look, how about we go to Fiji? Uh so how about Fiji? And she said, uh, yeah, that'd be great. You've been working hard. Keep him on money's pouring in for this vacation thing. And she said, Oh, you've been working hard, that'd be nice for a vacation. I said, Forget the vacation, by the island, you know. Uh, and God was watching and thought my head was too big, so he thrust COVID upon the world. That was my fault. Um, so for the first time in my career, I've got the retirement package uh and it was uh you know designed around travel, and the first time in 100 years you could not travel. So, yeah, I'm gonna write a book called Mr. Unlucky.
SPEAKER_03Um, so anyway, uh we And you guys, brother, you guys were shut down forever in Australia. Here in the dirty south, Atlanta, Georgia. Uh, Alan and I were running around kissing our cousins uh 30 days. At least 30 days later, yeah. And getting our nails done, going bowling, you know, the whole thing. But guess what? We probably got COVID just as much to do in our kids. Because that wasn't the first thing I did. Uh well, because when Governor Kemp came out, did you do Manny's? I no, I had never done it. But anyway, I was looking at these hands. I mean, seriously, they're they're nervous. You kind of need one. I I didn't need a lot of them. But when Governor Kemp came out, uh March, March 8th, March 16th, my birthday, is when I realized COVID was a thing and COVID. And then on May 31st, Memorial Day, right before then, Governor Kemp, I love our governor here in Atlanta, uh in Georgia. He says, You can go out and get your hair done, get your nails done, go bowling. You can do whatever you want as long as you guys follow these procedures. And we opened up. My brother, my family in Michigan still closed down for three more months, couldn't go anywhere. Because Brad couldn't get a haircut for like 18 months in California. Yeah, you couldn't even go surfing. So we opened up and thank God because it kept my business alive. Um, and then and they did another great thing, they did this other thing called PPP, which I had a lot of employees. I had 35 employees. I still uh today I'm back up to 35. Um, and I got PPP, so I was able to bring people back on because I did scale down my home remodeling and uh Haiti Man business, but we we scaled back up right after that. So back to you and COVID. Um, but we I still want to know how much does a business have to pay for this opportunity?
SPEAKER_05Yeah, it looks like I can have a look at it if you don't mind me uh throwing a shameless plug. Just go to vacationsincentive.com. So it's vacationsplural, vacationsincentive.com, and you'll see it there. Uh so what happens is that normally we charge uh$97 for a vacation voucher and you've got to buy$50. There's no money in selling fives or tens, so therefore it's like a dozen eggs, they have to buy 50 vouchers. Um, but when anybody mentions the podcast, if I'm on, they get it for half that price. So that's that's what we do on podcasts.
SPEAKER_02Hello, talk to me. So this guy, is this available worldwide?
SPEAKER_03Is what I want it. Yeah, all right, worldwide. Talk to me. All right, that here's here's where you're going. Listen to me. Mention this podcast, the small business safari. He said 97, that's 100. Let's round up. He's a sales guy. Come on, face it. He goes 50 at 50, that's 2,500 bucks. Now you got 50 sales vouchers. You can go you vacation vouchers.
SPEAKER_02I could probably timestamp it so somebody 10 years from now doesn't try to.
SPEAKER_03All right, here we are. 2025 picks, it's gonna be 26. Yep, it's gonna be out in 26. Okay. Um, so here we are because the world's coming back, baby. The whole world's coming back in 26. COVID's way behind us, the economy's way behind us, all those problems are gonna be way behind us. This terror fake, whatever terror. Fuck that thing. Anyway, so there you go. You can get for 2500 bucks, you have opportunities to sell vacations along with your services. Think about that. 50 different times you can run specials, do things. How would I use that in a service or a product business? Tell us how we uh works my marketing ideas.
SPEAKER_05Works for both. Um, it works particularly well for B2C uh versus B2B, but it can work for B2B as well. Uh so for example, we have I'm a member, I don't know whether you've heard this name, but there's a guy in the States in Phoenix called Joe Polish, and uh he has a thing called the Genius Network, and uh it's basically for him and Anthony Robbins and the guy that clicked that set up ClickFunnels, uh, Russell Brunson and a whole bunch of these smart dudes. They get together in Phoenix three times a year. So I joined that uh some years ago. So uh my wife was really happy uh because uh going backwards and forwards to Phoenix three times a year is about 50k uh by the time you pay the membership fee. So yeah, you're really happy wife about that. Um what happens is that yeah, I keep on telling you, you've got to invest. And she goes, No, it sounds like a boys' weekend, you know. Um, but uh so the the thing is is that uh when you're around when you're around that particular circle, and you and the three of us have heard the adage of, you know, you are the average of the five people you hang around with, so therefore, you know, I join a few of these things because I hadn't been doing it. Uh, and so therefore, when you hang around those guys, of course, what they tend to do is uh be creative. And you know, the mantra with all of that sort of community is that think outside the square and do things that other people don't do. So the whole idea of the vacation program is that you've got the you know, probably the world's number one Happy Meal toy for$50. Because uh the reason that McDonald's, you know, sort of Happy Meal works is they make that toy in China for 22 cents. But when you go to McDonald's and you buy it for your child or your grandchild, that toy looks like it's a$5 Kmart toy. So the secret source is a low cost but a high perceived value. That's where the vacation vouchers work because it's got a low cost, let's say$50, but a high perceived value of a thousand dollars. If you stay three nights in New York, which you can on this, then New York hotels are$500,$600 a night. So this is worth$1,500 then. If you stay in Vegas because the hotels are cheaper, then it's probably going to be worth$1,000 for you know for three nights. Cancun, you can stay there for five nights, you can stay in Canada, Vancouver, Toronto, it's right around the world, 120 destinations. And uh yeah, it's rocket fuel. And it it the reason it's here is and the reasons it's available is because the hotels are quite happy to give up their tariff outside of school vacation periods.
SPEAKER_03100%. I think you you just hit on a couple things, and that's why Vegas, uh very popular uh vacation destination, down this year. Uh that's 25 going into 26, because a lot of people weren't coming here uh this year, and they were down and they had uh unused space. It's because the Canadians were throwing a little bit of a tantrum. Well, we did they were not sorry, they should be in in they're sorry, but they're spiteful. And well, and then we gotta remind everybody hey, listen, I I'm not the orange guy, man. All right, look, hey, we're fun, we're a lot of fun here. We ain't gonna throw anybody in jail. Don't worry about it. Come on down, we're good, and we're not gonna shoot everybody, not everybody. Um, and not every one of us has guns. Well, not no, but a lot of people do, most of us do. So, but I love that idea. I mean, just creative marketing really helps people uh think out of the box, and you hit something that's really big, go.
SPEAKER_02No, I was just gonna say take the vacations out of it. I go back to the coffee. I mean, that's just super clever. You know what I mean? No, I want I want vacation, but I have coffee on vacation, but the vacation thing could go away. No, but I want vacations. But you you have to be coffee on vacation. But he was talking about the the ponytail marketers. I I caught that. Did you catch that? No, yeah. He called them the ponytail marketers, which I'd like to know what that means, but I I kind of get the idea. And and the fact is, in today Enlighten us. What's the ponytail marketers? Well, I I I want JD to explain it, but apparently it's uh it's all the run-of-the-mill marketing companies that tell you that they're gonna, you know, maybe make your business better if you just give them this much money and but we can't promise anything. Okay, fine. Is that pretty close?
SPEAKER_05Pretty much a bit of hipster hipsters is the other phrase that I insult them with because look, the thing is, is that if if you it if you go to a digital marketing agency these days, that's the Facebook people and Instagram people, more than likely you'll find the owner is still using Pimplegram. Uh, and so therefore, you know, and this is very, very convenient for a baby boomer to say this because I'm bagging. I've got I've got six millennials, by the way, so I know I know what it's all about. Um yeah, so therefore, uh I I always say to people when they go, Oh, look, you're old fat, what would you know? I always say to people, listen, if you were going to get uh, you know, let's say you want a heart transplant for your business, but let's just say you wanted a heart transplant for yourself, would you pick the medical student that got out of uh college uh and he's 25 years of age and he says, Listen, uh I've never done a heart transplant before, but I'm gonna give it a hell of a shot. Or would you pick the doctor who's been doing it for three or four decades in his sleep? And I think you picked the latter. And uh how much they charge.
SPEAKER_03Do I get a free vacation with okay? Can I get a free vacation with my heart transplant? I don't think that's the market for that one, JD. I don't know. I'm just gonna go into a limb here. I mean, you're a creative marketer. I'm not near as good as you, but I'm thinking that one probably is not gonna suck.
SPEAKER_05Well, well, I've got to tell you this one, guys. I was I was doing a I was doing a seminar in Santa Monica of all places a few years ago, and uh, and as it turned out, uh, yeah, there was a reasonable crowd there. And at the end of it, uh, a guy came up to me and said, Could I do the vacation promotion? I said, Yeah. He said, Does it suit every business? I said, sure it does. You know, lawn mowers, you know, you use my lawn mowing services for two months and you get a free vacation, buy a refrigerator, get a free vacation, put a solar panel on the roof, my free vacation. I said, What sort of business have you got? He said, A funeral parlor. I said, I said, Look, look, uh I have to say that I haven't knocked back too many businesses because I don't own my own private island just yet. But nonetheless, I think I've got to say no because I don't think it's very tasteful to say, let us burn your relatives and we'll give you a free vacation. I don't think that works.
SPEAKER_03We'll we'll toast them. There's you toast them later, baby. There's tears, Clink. I I don't know. I think there's an angle there. Actually, uh, yeah. But still, no, it's not good. All right, so that's a great one. I'm having too much fun with this. All right. So you talk about creative marketing, you got the vacation thing. Talk about other uh avenues that that we all should be thinking of to help market our small businesses. Yep, yeah, sure.
SPEAKER_05Okay, okay. Um, look, uh uh I hate to say Facebook, Facebook, Facebook, and more Facebook, but these guys tend to own, you know, pretty much most of the noise these days.
SPEAKER_03Facebook is so I guess that means the Zuckerberg's commercial's coming out soon.
SPEAKER_05Yeah. Look, I I love him and hate him. I mean, I love him one day because I get leaves for you know$35, and then I hate him the next day because they jump to$85. So they play they play the game. Um, but the thing is that if you master that, uh then it's a money machine. Uh, and there's ways to do it. I mean, I'm going to show off again, but I'll hold that to the screen. Um, you know, when you do a seminar circuit like I do, you've got to write books. And whilst I hate writing uh books, you've got to do it. And mine, uh, as you can see there is called the Avalanche Leads formula. So, all right.
SPEAKER_03So, for those on the podcast just listening, it was Avalanche Leads. It was John just a couple years ago. It's a much thicker book than yours, Chris. That's way thicker than way more substance. So yeah, way more substance. Uh, mine's just talking about the well-placed F bomb. Oh, and he's got a bigger book. Wow, that's enormous. And just in case you don't like thick, he's got big. And um, and both of them are a little bit younger, John.
SPEAKER_05I just yes, exactly. I just think uh size matters, so therefore that's why that one is a tableau size.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, well you're living what you preach there, that's huge.
SPEAKER_05Nice. Well, yeah, again, because if you're doing the seminar circuit, you've got to be a wanker, and uh so therefore uh you you've got to have a big book, yeah.
SPEAKER_02Um for our American listeners to find wanker, I know it is a dickhead, basically. Thank you.
SPEAKER_03All right, beautiful and continue.
SPEAKER_05A show off, a show off, a distasteful, boastful person, yeah. Um yeah, look it if you know if the I guess when it comes down to incentives, it's got to be a message to market match. So, for example, if I walked into a menswear shop and bought a sports jacket and they said, Congratulations, here's a free skateboard, then they're on drugs, okay, because uh a baby bourber and skateboards don't go hand in hand. Whereas if they gave me a ticket to the cinema, uh, or two tickets to the cinema, if it was one, then it's an insult, uh, but uh or they gave me a$50 dining voucher, uh then that would make sense. But my view is that, you know, if you give me a$50 dining voucher or two tickets to the movies, I know that you've just valued me at$50. You give me a vacation voucher, it's only cost you fifty dollars, but it's valued at a thousand, I'm going to give you a tongue kiss and a hug. So therefore, uh the way I look at it, uh it's uh embarrassing from time to time, but that's what I do. That's what I do. I'm sorry.
SPEAKER_02He didn't, he said.
SPEAKER_05Um the way the way I look at it is that if you can't I I heard tongue.
SPEAKER_03I heard tug. I I heard tongue. I'm good. Oh, don't worry about it. Hey, one of us, one of us does not serve porn, the other one does. Ish.
SPEAKER_05The the uh probably a good example, a good example of message to market match. We had a turf farm. Uh uh this guy comes up to me at the end of one of the seminars and he said, Listen, I want you to help me sell more grass. And I took it the wrong way, of course. I said, Oh, I don't think I can get involved in that. He said, No, no, turf farm. I said, All right. So he wasn't far away from where I lived. And so I drove up into the mountain range and I saw his, you know, about a mile's worth of turf. And of course, his major audience is landscapers. And he said he doesn't sell turf to mum and dads because they'd buy one front yard and one backyard's worth of grass. Whereas landscapers would buy, you know, three or four at a time. And I said to him, Okay, well, um, what's your problem? He said, The problem is every time, you know, I'm seven dollars a square meter, the guy down there. Other end of the mountain is six dollars a square meter, so the usual race to the bottle that we all hear of. I said, Well, you need to take the rise off the price. You need a happy meal toy. He said, Well, what would what would it be? I said, Well, what do you think landscapers like? They're 99% men. So we came up with prestige beer, and we gave a carton of prestige beer away with every home's worth of grass. And we sent out a mailer to them because they're technophobes, most of these landscapers, but nonetheless we sent emails as well and text messages and we said, Look, for every home's worth of grass that you get from me, I will give you a carton of this prestigious beer. He brings me four days into the promotion and said, We've got a problem. And don't you hate hearing that from a client? I mean, I'm going here, I'm gonna have to pretend I care. Uh, yeah, what's the problem? And he said, Well, we've run out of grass, we've got number of grass. I said, That you had a mile's worth of grass. He said, It's all gone. He said, I'm sourcing grass from other turf farms to keep up with it to keep up with the demand for the beer. He said, The guy who was my worst customer used to say to me all the time, I can get it down the road for cheaper. He rang up and ordered 18 homes worth of grass. He never asked the price. He just said, I don't care when the grass gets here, I need the 18 cartons of beer by Friday. I've got to pass this. Wow. So that's it.
SPEAKER_03Creative marketing and the solution. Value added marketing, John Dwyer wall marketing. Go check it out. John, how can everybody find you?
SPEAKER_05Uh look, I live on a private island now. I'm so wealthy, I don't need anyone to bother me if you don't mind. Uh so that's all yeah.
SPEAKER_03We'll go through giant Jerry Seinfeld to get to you. Yeah. So um that's jerryseinfeld.com. Uh actually it's not because he doesn't have his own website because I need it when you got John Dwyer out there making it happen. Wall marketing makes it happen.
SPEAKER_05I wish that was the case, guys, but uh having six uh children and they're all growing up these days. But uh yes, that's why I'm still uh you know treading the board, so to speak. The six kids took all the money. Uh yeah, so uh look, it it did my email address is john at the instituteofwale.com. So feel free to email me, John at theinstituteofwale.com. The website is theinstituteofwow.com. And if anyone's interested in that vacations thing, it's vacationsincentive.com.
SPEAKER_03And if you guys want an incentive to go do it, go out there, check out that uh offer we and uh said earlier, but also um help John's kids. I mean, I mean, they're six, there's six kids, a lot of kids. He needs a lot of help. And if he's got kids like mine, we're 27.
SPEAKER_05My Aussie accent screwed up. They're no, they're not sick kids. I've got six kids.
SPEAKER_03No, no, let's help the sick kids. That's what I'll go over with that. Sick kids. No, they're going with sick kids. They're all sick, and they're probably the same. They're probably uh if they're like mine, 27 and 24, and still on my fucking payroll. So John needs help. So help John and his sick kids.
SPEAKER_05By the way, the nickname, the nickname for me, their nickname for me is ITM.
SPEAKER_03Oh, yeah. Yeah, I love it. In fact, I got a text message in the middle of this podcast, Dad. I need more money. I mean, I'm like, Yes, I of course you do. So, John, this has been awesome, man. I mean, amazing. If you guys learned something, that's on you. We gotta go to the final four questions. Get the hell out of here. You guys keep driving, keep making shit happen. We gotta get going. Let's go. John, what's a great book you would refer to our audience? The small business. That's right. Not big, not thick, just a good book that you would recommend to our audience, the adventure team of the small business, safari.
SPEAKER_05Uh, my favorite recently is uh titled Hot Sex in Bangkok. Um, not sure that that's yeah, yeah. That's a good thing.
SPEAKER_02Is that good for business or just uh personal, personal and you know development?
SPEAKER_05I'm a gold man, yeah. Uh no, look, uh in all seriousness, I would suggest that Seth Godin's uh purple cow. Okay. Uh guy called Seth.
SPEAKER_02Oh, I love purple cow. I like purple cow. All right. I have one. I have not listened. That makes perfect sense based on our conversation.
SPEAKER_05Yeah, because you know the the the thing is is that that book came about because he was driving in the country with his wife and he stopped the car and went over to the fence of the big farm. And his wife said, What are you doing? He said, Imagine if one of those cows, there was hundreds of cows in the paddock. He said, Imagine one of them was purple, wouldn't it stand out? And of course she said yes, and they got back in the car, and of course the other book came from there. Well, his principles and mantra is pretty much identical to mine, and that is if you're going to stand out, you've got to be different from the crowd.
SPEAKER_03Digging it, and brother, you have, and we're gonna keep on rolling. Do it. John, what's the favorite feature of your house? So, what's the favorite feature of your home?
SPEAKER_05Um, oh to be honest with you, the ride-on mower, okay. Uh, because I suffer from cabin fever doing this crazy shit that I do, uh, I love we're an acreage, and so therefore I love just getting on the ride-on mower, putting the beer in the little beer holder. And even if the lawn, we're on three acres, but even if the lawn doesn't need mowing, I'll just go up and down, up and down.
SPEAKER_03All right, what's the name of the brand? What mower do you have?
SPEAKER_05Of the lawn mower. I think it's called Toro, but I'm I'm the opposite from MacGyver. I I can't do anything else. I could just sit and then put my foot on the accelerator. That's all I can do.
SPEAKER_03You know, it's so, it's so it's so good to go out there and just finish something. That's why I got in my business that I do. I'm remodeling and handyman. My guys are artists. I mean, they they produce beautiful stuff, but when you cut grass, which I can't do and I still don't because of allergies. It's when you Oh, is it really because of allergies or because you're weak and lazy? And um, and I have people to do that. Yeah, that's right. I put my talents elsewhere, Alan.
SPEAKER_01Okay, thank you.
SPEAKER_03Right. So thank you. Favorite feature is home. He likes to get on his tour ride and he's drinking a beer while he's doing it. And the team comes with the drink holder. You know, I didn't know that either. That's amazing. All right. John, you've talked about this a lot, talking about being different. We talk about customer service a little bit, but we usually we talk about customer service a lot on this podcast because Alan is a customer service freak. Nuts about it. What's a customer service pet peeve of yours when you're out there and you're the customer?
SPEAKER_05Uh yeah, uh two things. Um, uh coming back and asking you how you enjoyed the meal when you've got a mouth fit of food. They always do like that one. Yep. And the other thing is that you can go to any cafe or and look, yeah, I've done a lot of Disney courses in Orlando. So Disney, a lot of people might not know this, but it might be worth your audience knowing it. Disney has a university, okay, and it's in Florida. And so you can go, they call it the Disney Institute, and you pay a stack of money, and you sit down for a week with imagineers and they teach you how to run your business like Disney. And uh, and I've been to quite a few of them. And what happens is that they say people when they get home after Disney World or Disneyland, they don't talk about the riots first, they talk about guess what, the experience. They talk all about the experience. Uh, and then they'll talk about Space Mountain, but it's the overall experience which you know is the big deal. And in restaurants and cafes, you know, that's almost non-existent. Um, I can't believe that the local cafes around from me. Um I'm a bit of a coffee snob, so you go to one that's got Italian coffee. They're wearing a dirty black t-shirt, no uniform. Can you imagine if they were we had a we had a pizza shop, you know, an Italian pizza shop contact me and said, Look, we want to sell more takeaway pizzas. I said, Good. Well, stop your delivery man looking like a mass murderer. And they said, What do you mean? I said, Look, he's got his cap turned sideways, and normally he hasn't shaven, and he's just putting out a cigarette as he's walking up the driveway to press your doorbell. And so what we did is that we dressed them in James Bond uh dinner suits, uh black tie, uh made sure that they shaved, and the the boxes were looked like they're designed by the Palazzo Versace Hotel, right? We're talking about the boxes was a piece of artwork, not this crappy cardboard with nothing on it. Um he uh then charged, I he said to me, Look, I I might have to reduce the size of the cost of my pizzas from$22 down. I said, No, no, put them up to$30 because what this is is gonna be the only white gloved pizza delivery service in the world. And so, therefore, that's what he did. And people were ordering pizzas from him to take a selfie with the pizza delivery man.
SPEAKER_03I love it. Love that while marketing John Dwyer making it happen. We gotta go a couple times on this. Now you have. He said, Well, all right, now we've got to get to one. I don't know. We're gonna try this. John, I want a DIY that's do-it-yourself, nightmare story. Not some tradey that did some work in your house. I want to know what you did. I love the local lingo. I know what he's talking. Put it down because we've had a bunch of these guys on the page. We don't, we call them contractors. I don't want to hear about what I fucked up. I want to hear what you did. And I want fire, water, dismemberment. It's always good too. I've done a little flood would be good. Actually, the fingers are still intact, but look, they're a little off.
SPEAKER_05Uh, you mean as in uh trying to be a uh a trade? Is that what you're saying?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, trying to do your own work in your own home. You're like, honey, I got this. I got this, I'm gonna do this. Honey, don't worry about that. That mirror is gonna look awesome. And she gets in bed, and the mirror falls down off the uh bed and knocks you out while you're trying to do the unthinkables. We don't talk about that. Um that's one I have I have not brought that up. No, you haven't. I know.
SPEAKER_05Good for you to think you've got some stuff. I'm glad you did brought that up because I I just told my wife this morning I think sex would be so much more enjoyable if only I had a partner. Yeah. Um I'll make it quick because I've never seen the one tell.com. Mine is very simple. Uh before all of our thousand kids, if before all of our thousand kids came along, I think we might have had two, we moved to the country, from Sydney to the country, a two and a half hours drive. It was a little country town, a little bit like May Mayberry, okay, Andy Griffith. And uh I'm on 14 acres. I am the opposite from MacGyver. I've got no clue uh what to do. I've never seen a snake before. Uh, and of course, you know, this thing must have been snake central. Uh, and I remember saying to my wife, listen, we've blown all the money. How about I paint the interior of the house? It was one of those western red cedar double story houses that you see, little house on the prairie sort of stuff, because idiot me decided that we would theme everything. And then we ran out of money. And I said to my wife, Look, I'll do the painting uh inside. And I she's no, you won't get a quote. So I got the guy into quote, and the painter said I'd be 15k. And I said, Oh, well, you know, you're dreaming. Uh okay. And so if I decided to paint it myself, I got half a day into it and rang the guy who was the painter and offered him 30k if he could come and paint the hand.
SPEAKER_03Oh, talk to me right there. Painting. Sounds easy when you start. But when you're dead tired the next day and you're like, oh my God, this really is a physical energy. Absolutely. All right, guys. This is on you, man. If you didn't learn something, oh my god, what do you think? This has been an amazing episode. John Dwyer, WoW Marketing. Go check it out. Institute of Wow. Yeah. Make it happen. Get out there, make your dreams happen. Go hit. You know what? Maybe you go get a fucking vacation. I don't care. Go do something. Man, make it happen every week. We gotta do this. Keep it going. It's hard. You can do this. Get up, make your passion happen. We gotta get out of here. Gotta go. Cheers, everybody. Thank you for listening to this episode of the Small Business Department. Remember, your positive attitude will help you achieve that higher altitude you're looking for in the wild world of small business ownership. Until next time, make it a great day.
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