Hustler to CEO: How to Automate and have a CEO Mindset with Joseph Octaviani

Discover valuable insights on transitioning from an entrepreneur mindset to a CEO mindset, specifically tailored for small business owners! Joseph Octaviani shares his tips and strategies on how to shift from an entrepreneur mindset to a CEO mindset in our latest podcast episode. Learn how to grow your small business by adopting a more strategic and growth-oriented approach.

Joseph Octaviani, the founder of the first Latino-owned herbal company, Life the Plant Way, shares his story and his experience that has helped him build a 7-figure company. If you're building a business or even thinking of being an entrepreneur, this episode is a must!

Joseph shares how he switched his mindset from "hustler" to CEO. He also goes into the importance of ensuring you set up your business as a legacy. 

He also tells us how important it is to delegate tasks and the strategic hiring of those whose strength is your weaknesses. Joseph also covers how Artificial Intelligence is the key to scaling your business and how it levels out the playing field for minorities.

Finally, Joseph shares how important the art of brand creation and a successful brand identity. He discusses how to stand out against your competition.

About the Guest:
Joseph Octaviani is a serial entrepreneur for 7 years, with business success and failures under his belt. Joseph is the founder of the first latino owned herbal company, Life The Plant Way, which has a 7-figure revenue. He also established his online academy, which focuses on herbal and holistic health education!

Where to reach Joseph:
www.Josephoctaviani.com
www.lifetheplantway.com

IG:
@Josephoctaviani, @lifetheplantway 

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Hola, welcome to another episode of the Money Cheese May podcast. So today we're going to talk a little bit about entrepreneurship and business. You know, our Latino community has been out there kicking ass, building businesses and being entrepreneurs, so I want to talk a little bit about, you know, creating a business that has a purpose. That's going to be here, you know, after you're long gone and you know so with me today to talk about just that, I have Joseph Octaviani, founder of the first Latino owned herbal company and Life the Plant Way. Not only that, but he has also founded the first Latino owned online academy that focuses on herbal and holistic health education. So, hola, joseph, thank you so much for joining me today.

Speaker 2: 0:54

Thank you for having me. Thank you so much.

Speaker 1: 0:56

I want to just pass it on to you and you know, like continue bragging about yourself, about all. You know who you are, what you do, you know and how a little bit how you got here.

Speaker 2: 1:08

I'll brag a little bit. So my name, of course, is Joseph Octaviani. I am a father first, before you know the business comes in. I am a healer. I'm a natural healer. I'm an educator on that side of life. I'm an entrepreneur. I'm a husband.

Speaker 2: 1:26

I started this journey due to my own, you know, health complications. Being in the hospital it really pushes you to change your life, you know. So when I was forced to deal with my own health, I realized how passionate I became about just spreading that knowledge, all the knowledge that I obtained with, you know, my own healing journey. I became extremely passionate about it and that later turned into, you know, me forming a business to be paid about it. You know, be paid to talk about it.

Speaker 2: 2:04

So I mean, my journey starts when I was a little kid and I was surrounded around. I was surrounded with entrepreneurs, but none of them actually. They were hustlers. You know there's a big difference between entrepreneurs and hustlers. Entrepreneurs are the ones who actually build the legacy. Hustlers are just the ones who spend their time for themselves. You know, spend their time for money, that money for themselves, or that money for that situation, that money for that time in their life. But also I was surrounded by a lot of hustlers, but I never really saw anybody take it, you know, quote unquote, corporate or take it beyond anything in their kind of spectrum. They didn't really think generationally. They didn't really think, you know, about the legacy that you mentioned.

Speaker 2: 3:02

And so as I got older, and you know, I became passionate about business and about money and making money. That's something that I knew that I wanted for my family. I wanted everything structured perfectly so that nobody could take it away Not even my own death would be able to take it away. So I'm on that journey now. I teach people, of course, about herbalism, I teach people about holistic health, how to get their mind right, how to get their body right, things like that. But now I've become increasingly more passionate about how to get your business rights and how to take off in your business, specifically more kind of conscious businesses, more on the spiritual end, just businesses that want to make an impact. You know, whatever it may be, it doesn't have to be necessarily about herbs or food or diet or whatever. Just businesses that want to make a positive impact with things that they're passionate about. So that's the kind of the road that I'm on right now.

Speaker 1: 4:05

First of all, I love that, the difference between hustlers and entrepreneurs. And I'm seeing that kind of now with the boomer generation as they are retiring and even with just real estate investing, like how I do their kids they take it over and it's too much or they don't know what to do with the business or whatever. So you see a lot of family-owned businesses just die off because the children, it's not structured like you were saying, it's not structured for the kids to easily take over or it's too complicated or whatever it may be, and then the business is gone. We tend to be a little bit hustlers. We do have our business and everything, but it really is. I used to always say you're creating a job for yourself. Really you're not really creating the business, it's just you're continuously working in it and then once you can't work in it, it's done, the business is gone. Right, but kind of like first steps have you started taking or that you might suggest to someone.

Speaker 2: 5:11

The first is just being, like you said, a lot of our community. They create jobs for themselves because they're so used to working. They're so used they are the hardest Latinos are the hardest working people in the world. I truly believe that. So they're so used to working that they don't understand the concept of getting paid without using your time, without using your blood, sweat and tears. And so the first thing that you would do was the first thing that I did personally was even just open myself up to that concept and the education.

Speaker 2: 5:49

How are these rich people going everywhere, all over the world, taking vacations, but their businesses are still succeeding? Or how are these people CEOs like Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos? They own dozens of companies. How do they possibly have enough time to have all of those companies If you only have 24 hours in a day? We all have the same amount of hours. So I started to open myself up with just the education. What do I need to know in order to one start a business properly? So what does that mean? That means do you have your paperwork set up? That means are you actually a business to the state of California, to the IRS, to the USA? You know you're not a business if you just open up an Instagram page and you put a your name up there, catch a little name and then you start selling through DMs.

Speaker 2: 6:49

You know you're not truly a business under the law, I guess, right? So, um, no, the first thing I did was learn about, okay, what paperwork needs to be set up in order for me to do that. I was so you know, fuck the man that I never wanted to go the corporate route. I never wanted that corporate structure. Mm-hmm, I never wanted to deal with the quote-unquote suits. You know, before I started life the plant way, life the plant way is my first official business, but I was a hustler for years before that.

Speaker 2: 7:19

What does that mean is I set it up in the eyes of the law. So make sure you're getting your paperwork set up. Okay, that is the first and foremost. Your LLC set up, or whatever it is that you're going to file, as you have to get those set up. Your EIN numbers, things like that you have to get those set up, guys. Um, second, I learned that I did not want to work. That was not my passion in life. So you know what I mean, and some Latinos gonna be like like oh, you're not Latino.

Speaker 2: 7:54

Seriously, my mom still thinks I'm. She still asks how the business is doing. You know, is your business okay? Because she doesn't see me working? First make goals for yourself. What is it that you're getting in business for, like? What is your why? What is your deep, deep why, the why that makes you cry? I like to tell people if.

Speaker 2: 8:18

I ask you why Truly why you're getting into business and why you want to set up this business and why you want the legacy and the generational wealth and all that type of stuff. If it doesn't bring some type of emotion out of you, you have to dig some. You have to dig deeper, okay, so really figure out the why of even starting a business, because the business is really not for everybody.

Speaker 2: 8:38

Yeah you have to have business owners and you have to have workers. You know, I know plenty of workers and there's nothing wrong with with being a worker, you know. But if an entrepreneur is a whole different type of beast. So figure out your why and figure out, you know, what your goals are for this business. So for me, I, like I said, I learned very quickly.

Speaker 2: 9:01

After Countless sleepless nights, after working 12, 14 hours a day more than I ever worked at a job, you know, I realized I don't like working. I really don't. It's not fun for me. So I Realized, okay, I don't want to work. How do I get myself in position to not work? So I started doing research on systems. There's something called systems, a procedure, systems, sops. You know what I mean. That means setting up almost like Something on autopilot in your business to where you don't have to personally be there. You know, if somebody has to have a DM with you in order to buy your services, in order to buy your stuff, you don't have the proper systems in place. Because what happens when somebody DMs you and you're not there to respond? You lost the customer. That's something that I learned very, very early. I mean it was really. It was intimidating, I'm not gonna lie.

Speaker 2: 10:00

Yeah because all of these, these, this language is so foreign to me.

Speaker 1: 10:05

You know, one thing that I've noticed is one of the hesitation that, like our community tends to have towards, you know, letting or hiring just like outside help or whatever it's because, like we're so used to doing everything our own, like by ourselves, and we take pride in doing it on our own.

Speaker 1: 10:24

Be like, no, you know, I don't need someone to help me, who cares if I work like 18 hours here, it's my business. And then you, you know that's your baby too. Right, like that's that's your business, you're growing it. And it's kind of like Scary, because I know I kind of had that hesitation at first before I was like, alright, you know what, I can't do this anymore. I need to figure some shit out and create a system and Freakin and start hiring somebody out. So, like I'm in that step as well. But you know it is scary at the beginning that like man, is someone else gonna do it? Right, like you know, can I trust them or whatever. But you know you have to do it like, cuz I'm the same, same I want, I don't want to work, I want to just like chill, be in the bag it drinks coffee or, in the evening, drink like some drink on these guys, ass and shit, like you know. Just be out there. Hey, get out. That's what I want to do.

Speaker 2: 11:16

A lot of that, I feel like, comes from childhood, especially being Latino, because how many people that are listening to this, and you as well, can relate to you wanting to do something, let's say, in the kitchen, and your mom saying, get out, this is my kitchen, I'm gonna do it my way? You know, that was my situation and I'm sure that's so many other people's situation. You know they, they don't, because our parents or our siblings or maybe our bosses or whatever have you don't give us that trust To do our best, to try. Then we don't give others that trust To do their best or to try, and a part of it, of course, is because it is our baby Mm-hmm, I mean and it is our livelihood. So, you know, there's it's a little bit of both.

Speaker 2: 12:09

You know that lack of trust and other people because of the lack of trust that we got, and then, of course, the having it a lot on the line, with it being kind of like your. You know, maybe your stream of income or maybe you're kind of everything. You know what I mean. So it took actually a lot. Like I said at the end of the, my first year is when I learned systems because I was burning myself out mm-hmm.

Speaker 2: 12:34

Burning myself out. You know, and, and I hope, the whole point of starting my business was to have more time for my family. I didn't want to be like my parents, even though they worked hard, you know, god bless them. I didn't want to be like them where I was coming home at five, six o'clock in the in the evening, didn't see my child all day. You know what I mean. I wanted to do something different.

Speaker 2: 12:54

Yeah so I Realized I put myself in that same position, because this business required 10, 12, 14 hours of my day, and so I was like man, this is not where I wanted to go. So it wasn't until the end of my first year where I was. I seeked Kind of like. I was like kind of like one of those Oracle readers, tarot readers, you know, like.

Speaker 2: 13:18

I seeked one of those and I I really wanted to know like what am I doing wrong? Like what? What is my next step? What can I do to improve? And and the biggest thing that popped up to me was trust. Like you are lacking trust in other people, mm-hmm, I was doing all of my marketing, all of the, the content, all of the flyers, all of the Quite, literally everything, the shipping the handling, oh my god, and I couldn't, and my business was growing way faster than one person can carry it, mm-hmm.

Speaker 2: 13:53

So it took me a year to to finally let go of just some control and I started off with something small. You know, if you have something, if you have a business and you're Having a similar struggle, start with something very small, where it's kind of like there's no way they can fuck up. There really is no way. Okay, and for me it was hiring somebody on Fiverr to make some flyers the simplest of the simplest thing. You know. When they got back to me with the flyers and I was sleeping and I woke up and it was there, I was like, ooh, I like this, yeah, anything, I forgot about it actually, and you don't even know, you know you don't even realize like the impact it made on your or the dent and made on your money. It was so minuscule that it's like wait.

Speaker 2: 14:46

Why am I not hiring more people to do little, tiny tasks like this? Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2: 14:53

So it started off with just somebody making my flyers. And then it started off with people Taking over my social media, managing that, and then I Took the big leap of faith because I, I absolutely needed it. My sales were going crazy, so I hired my sister-in-law, mm-hmm Perfect time where she was just got out of a job, she had just quit or got fired or whatever, and I needed somebody. At that moment. I looked over to her like bro, can you?

Speaker 1: 15:23

can you help?

Speaker 2: 15:23

Yeah, my head help, and she's been with me for almost three years now. So you know because she was, she was in warehousing and me I'm the most unorganized person ever, you know. So I realized, okay, if you are gonna hire somebody, you have to hire somebody that who's strength is your weakness. If you hire somebody whose strength is your weakness, you will never feel bad about the money that you pay them. You'll never feel like the money that you're paying them is going to waste. Okay, because they're going to do it better than you. You're not going to do everything, 100% the best okay.

Speaker 2: 16:11

You have to trust people that what they're good at they're good at, okay, and what you're bad at you should not be doing. There's no reason for you to do it. So, yeah, I guess that's how I learned trust is by going in small increments, with small little things that they really can't fuck up on, and then that kind of opens up your trust more, opens up your heart more to other people. It's really important that you have accountability when you start putting things onto other people, Because if their strength is your weakness and they're not doing it right to your, to your kind of like perspective, that means you aren't describing it right. That means you aren't setting them up for success.

Speaker 2: 17:00

You know there is a lack in your explanation, a lack in your flow or your system. There's a lack in something you know if me being unorganized and my system law being organized and being this warehouse person, if the warehouse is looking crazy, okay, what am I doing? That's not helping her. You know we have to have accountability when you start hiring people. These are just little things that you start to learn on that journey.

Speaker 1: 17:25

Our community. I don't think they think about that off the bat. Like when we're starting off businesses, it's kind of like, oh, I want to start a business, I know how to do this, I'm gonna go start it and then like, what do you do? You don't. You're just like always scrambling around and then you hire someone and then you're kind of like teaching them as they go and it's just a lot of scrambling and disorganization. Because I feel like that's where I've been this past year. I just feel like I just been struggling just to survive and grow money, cheese may, and like it was a rough year for sure.

Speaker 2: 18:00

Well, this is perfect timing. This is perfect timing Because, around this time, what three years ago was when I hired my first person around this exact time? So it's really. I just started to think about that when you started saying that I'm like, oh wow, I read a lot of books, I watched a lot of YouTube videos. Youtube university was is everything A lot of audio books and stuff like that and I wanted to get into the mind of a CEO. I wanted to get into the mind of these people like the Jeff Bezos and the stuff like that and they may not be good people fuck them.

Speaker 2: 18:36

They're probably good people, but they are good businessmen and so they have the proper business knowledge and you don't have to recreate the wheel. Guys, the knowledge is out there. Don't just think, oh, I'm gonna do it my way and nobody do it this way. No, there's no need for that. Do it how the people successful before you did it, and you can make it so much easier for yourself. So for me, when I first started Life the Plantway, which is an herbal company, I started to look around. All right, I need references. What are people doing? What are other herbal companies that are successful doing? I'm going to their websites, I'm reading through everything. I'm kind of copy and pasting some things and implementing my things Like I didn't wanna recreate the wheel for everything and completely make everything from scratch. I probably still would have been in the building phase if I did that.

Speaker 1: 19:31

Yeah, and.

Speaker 2: 19:33

I realized that a CEO is a very lazy person. They don't like to work, mm-hmm. They don't like to trade their time for money, are there? You know what I mean? Yeah.

Speaker 2: 19:44

And two, I realized that to become a good CEO, you have to realize that your mind is your biggest money generator. Thinking is your biggest money generator. So, like you said, man, it takes away all my time just checking emails, just doing the little petty shit. Mm-hmm, it takes away your time. It takes away your thinking time, your planning time and it kills the business.

Speaker 2: 20:12

Yeah, but when you are able to put more time into just thinking and planning instead of doing the petty stuff, then you'll see that you're able to achieve those goals that you write down, that you thought of and that you planned, and it grows the business so much faster. So like with my first hire through Fiverr it was Flyers Mm-hmm. I'm an artsy person, like I used to be a photographer, and I like arts, aesthetic and stuff like that. I like looking at cool, looking Flyers and logos and stuff, mm-hmm. But for me to be on a computer to finish a Flyer, it took hours bro I'm talking way more than necessary days sometimes because I'm like oh, I don't like this, I'm going back and I'm changing this and it's never for sure.

Speaker 2: 21:01

Yes, because I'm so incisive, you know, three, four weeks, two weeks later, dang, I never finished that Flyer. When I could have just spent A couple dollars, got that flyer done, trusted that it was good. Make a revision if I need to, but trust that the professional knows what he's doing and then, boom, run with it. Spend my time doing what I'm best at, which is appear. This is the CEO's best asset is in between these ears.

Speaker 1: 21:32

Nice.

Speaker 2: 21:33

And when people really realize that they won't be so stressed about the little shit They'll be like, okay, I don't even have time to think about that. You know what I mean. But that came with all the books and all the YouTube videos that I was watching. I was just watching and reading CEOs from other companies and I got into their mind. I started thinking how they thought.

Speaker 1: 21:54

First off, you need to put that on a t-shirt, because I want that t-shirt. And it's true because I don't know if it was a book or where I saw it that as a business owner, your job or the goal for you, your role in your business, is to grow the business and to do like how you said, the thinking and all that stuff. It's not to be an employee. Really, one of the reasons we fail at leaving that legacy of leaving our business to be able to survive after we're gone, because we don't do these steps of creating systems.

Speaker 2: 22:29

I have a perfect book for you. It's called Buy Back your Time. There's a couple of different things that a CEO can do. They can either use their time to grow the business or they can use their money to grow the business and you're in a good position and people who are maybe listening to this are in a better position than they think because if you use your job as your first investor, then you can scale the business a lot quicker with using the money not your sweat equity, not your presence, but your money to grow the business. A lot of people don't realize their job can be their first investor. They don't have to go get a loan, they don't have to go in debt, they don't have to do any of that. Use your job as your first investor, meaning use your funds that you have left over from your bills and pour 90% of it into your business. Go some time without the pleasures on the weekends, go some time without the modellos or whatever might be the case. Stack up your money and throw it into 90% of it.

Speaker 2: 23:44

I remember I watched this video and this guy said that it was this random IG video. I don't know why it clicked with me so well, but the first year in my business, I saw this guy going crazy like 90% of your money should go into your business and all the money you make from your business, 90% of it goes back into the business. I'm like, wow, this guy sounds kind of crazy but it's kind of resonating with me. I would have $10 in my bank account, $15 in my bank account, but my rent is paid, my bills are paid, we have food, we good on that part. Now all of it is going into the business. Whether I'm buying books to increase my knowledge or I'm hiring somebody on Fiverr or I'm putting money towards marketing or ads, something like it's all going towards the business. I don't want it. I don't need it right now. It's going to come back to me 10 fold down the line. But if you understand that your business, your job, is your first investor, treat it as such. That money that you're making on a paycheck is for your bills and your business.

Speaker 2: 24:49

If you are a baker, absolutely love baking. That is your passion. That is everything you're about. You do not mind waking up every day to go bake, but the business is going too fast and you're getting too many orders or the business isn't growing enough. You're wasting all your time taking the orders, maybe handling, like shipping and handling, or basically everything but baking. You want to hire people around that passion. Don't hire a baker and then go do the other stuff that you feel like you can go play CEO, because then you'll learn that you're getting drained really quickly emotionally, mentally. This is not what you want to do For me.

Speaker 2: 25:33

I know I'm a sales person. I love sales, I love talking to people, educating people, putting my face out there. If that is not, you find someone. If you are a numbers person, you like analytics, you like being behind a computer, do that and then find people to do the other stuff that is necessary for the business. I always wanted to be the person in front of the camera around the world outside of the warehouse, and whether it would be with Fiverr, which is really inexpensive. If you're not utilizing Fiverr as a business person, I don't know what to tell you, because you can hire people $10, $15 to do anything. One time, boom, just little contractors. You don't have to worry about the legalities, you don't have to worry about W2s and taxes and stuff like that at the moment.

Speaker 1: 26:21

Even with AI. That helps a lot too. I paid the extra for this podcast. Now I upload it and it does the chapters, it does the transcript, it writes the description for me and it creates a blog post. I was going to create a blog post for this podcast and all I have to do now is just go back and just fix how I want it to sound or make it more sound like me that I'm doing it. It cuts so much time out. It's worth I think it was like six or 10 bucks. It's worth it. To me, that's the game changer.

Speaker 2: 26:59

The modern, common average person does not realize the opportunity that we have. That is the great equalizer, that is the reparations. If you have you, that is the great equalizer. In this economy that we're in, the big will fall and the small will rise. I made a post saying if you are a person of color and you are not getting into business, you are just not doing well. You are just not.

Speaker 2: 27:31

You're not going with the flow. Your ancestors never had it this easy before To start a business, to build generational wealth, to get out of the enslavement, to get out of the poverty, Because AI will replace many, many things that you might need in business or many people that you might have to hire in business. How much money would you have to spend on somebody to do all of that for your podcast? Probably a lot. Yeah, you probably have to hire a producer or a production team or something like that.

Speaker 1: 28:02

Like most of these An editor. Yeah, like all that stuff.

Speaker 2: 28:06

And so you, doing it by yourself, now have the help of these little robots Most people think the AI is going to take over my job and take over the world, or whatever.

Speaker 2: 28:16

No, ai is going to allow you to do exactly what you want to do. Now you have AI that it's going to help you in every aspect of your business. I used AI to create a whole e-book in 10 minutes. I used AI to create educational flashcards that I'm going to be releasing in the next year. I used AI and I paid little to nothing. And if people really knew and didn't get scared just off of the thought of AI people really knew and how easy it's going to make our life then, they would dive into it more.

Speaker 2: 28:52

But there is this big fear complex around AI and how they're going to take jobs and all this type of stuff. Not at all. Ai is going to do the shit that you don't want to do. That is going to make it the playing field equal to somebody like you who is, by yourself, doing this. That's compared to some of the biggest podcasts in the world who spend thousands or millions of dollars on production teams and all that type of stuff. Oh, my God. I love it. I love it.

Speaker 2: 29:19

So everybody, every new business owner must be I'm not exaggerating when I'm saying this be utilizing AI in some form or fashion.

Speaker 1: 29:30

Before you wanted to start a business and you had to have the funds, you had to go get a loan so that way you could hire anybody like administrative or whatever. But now you have AI. But even if you're not starting your business, I see people using it at work now to create their resumes, to create reports that they have to write.

Speaker 2: 29:53

Unless you have the money to just throw out to different people, to actual people, to hire them, you're going to be growing too slow Because, growing too slow, eventually you'll have to quit. And then, growing too fast, without having anything in place, you'll crash down. One of the things that is going to kill you as a business owner is indecisiveness. Speed is the name of the game. A million dollars is a lot to someone who makes it in a year, in a day, in a month. A million dollars is not a lot to someone who makes it over a hundred years.

Speaker 1: 30:27

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 30:28

How much is that really you?

Speaker 1: 30:29

know what I mean.

Speaker 2: 30:30

So speed is the name of the game. You have to be able to make decisions and trust those decisions, and if those decisions weren't quote, unquote the right ones after the fact, then you learn from it and then you move accordingly. But the business game is about speed. You have to be able to say yes, no, yes, no, yes, no. Beware of that, what's called analysis, paralysis. Oh, you see just too many options and you just get paralyzed, like I don't even know what to do anymore. Or find out how much your time is worth and find out how much that activity is worth. So, replying to emails, replying to comments, replying to messages, things like that, how much would you pay somebody an hour for that? You know, for me that's like a $10, $15 an hour job. Yeah, is my time worth $10 to $15 an hour? Hail to the known Mm-hmm you know, for my consultations and I said it.

Speaker 2: 31:30

I said I kind of set my price for my time with my consultations. My consultations are $250 an hour, mm-hmm. So anything below $250 an hour I have to give away to delegate things. You have to think of the business as your own Life. The Plainway LLC is not Joseph Octaviani Mm-hmm. That guy is completely different. He has his own set of taxes, his own bank account, his own goals. Mm-hmm.

Speaker 2: 31:58

Okay, For me they're completely different. So when I was able to separate that, when I really learned that concept of separating you from the business, which is hard for a lot of people, especially people with and that's why I say I work with people who have like these passion projects, like these passion business Businesses, because it's so hard to separate yourself from that passion- yeah.

Speaker 2: 32:19

You know so hard to separate yourself. So for me, I love working with people like that. But when you are able to separate it, you're able to make smarter decisions. Most of the profits have to go towards that business. You know, if you're never able to let go, then the business is going to go in the grave with you. You know, I see all these businesses going out of business and I get legit, get sad. Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1: 32:42

Me too.

Speaker 2: 32:43

I'm just saddening. I'm like damn, that was somebody's well-being, that was somebody's like passion project that they put their time, their money, their sweat into and it's just gone. We're going into our fourth year of business and we're still babies. Yeah. You know we're still in our infancy stage, so I'm thinking in like hundred year terms.

Speaker 1: 33:05

What other things are you thinking about doing to be able to ensure that your legacy is still there once you're long gone?

Speaker 2: 33:14

When I was in high school, you knew who I was because I always had a crispy fade and I always had a box of cheese into my hand. So many people would tell me, man, I remember you in high school. You had those box of cheese into your hand all the time and they're right.

Speaker 2: 33:30

They're right Because I cemented I didn't know back then, but I was cementing a brand, an identity. You have to create an identity for that business, for that brand, so that you can just look at a logo, you can just look at certain colors, you can just look at a certain product or something and instantly know what it is. So, for example, nike, everybody and their mama knows Once you see that check, it's Nike. They don't have to have any type of advertisement, any type of nothing. They can just spray paint a Nike check on a wall and you know exactly what that is. So you have to be able to establish a brand presence, a brand image. What is that person, that business, that guy, what is this style like? So figure out what that style is. For us we're getting really known, our brand I don't know if you see it on here, the shopping bag with the fruits coming out and stuff. Maybe once you see that, you can understand who we are, you understand what it is. We have to do it something natural. We have to do it with something fruit diet, something along that field.

Speaker 2: 34:47

Money cheese man, I think is a fucking amazing name because it's catchy and it's easy to understand and it's easy to remember. So what is going to be the business name? That's easy to understand, easy to remember, not too long, straight to the point Money, cheese man. You know it's about to be about money, life, the plant way. You know it's going to be about plants. Study, color psychology. I say go to college and go get a four year degree. You can YouTube university that bitch all the way through.

Speaker 2: 35:24

Go to YouTube and look up color psychology, because every single color gives off a certain energy, gives off a certain vibe, gives off a certain statement. It's more than just think of a cool name that you and your homie thought of and just throwing it on the Instagram or something. And then I repeat the same slogans Nike, let's do it, let's do it, let's do it. Everybody knows let's do it is Nike, because then it's just about getting it into the mind of the consumer. So establish your logo, your, your don't be changing up your logo every single damn year. Every single t-shirt like don't man.

Speaker 2: 36:08

I hate when people do that shit.

Speaker 1: 36:09

So this is a logo that I've had for, like the past year, I love that logo with the mouth and the logo. Yeah, but I want something like that, but just a little bit more. Like, I guess, give it a little bit more, because I like the idea of the mouth, we're sure I did the same thing with life, the plant way.

Speaker 2: 36:25

So the first logo I made it on Canva at like two o'clock in the morning and the shit was like 2D, it was a square like you see this. If you look at this logo, it has more kind of like umph. I guess it has, yeah, dimension.

Speaker 2: 36:42

It's like yes, that's exactly looks like a bag is full and stuff. Yeah, I had a legit square ass bag. Didn't look real at all. It was like we didn't have any veins or no definition, Like oh my God, none of the fruits or veggies had lines in it or shit. Like I hired somebody professionally to do that. And now it looks like a real vegetables, real hands, real bag. You know.

Speaker 2: 37:10

So of course, yeah, of course you can do something like that. But you know, don't change up your whoever's listening to this. Stop changing up your identity, so much you know. You have to create an identity beat okay with that and then drive it into the mind of the consumer.

Speaker 2: 37:28

Cause at the end of the day, I do not care. I want people to listen to this. I do not care what you are selling. I don't care if you think your butter, lotion or whatever is the best lotion on the block, like it does not matter what the product is. At the end of the day, it is all about marketing. It is all about perception. It's all about the mental game.

Speaker 2: 37:54

Do you think Nike makes the best of the best quality? Probably not. I have some Wadaches on right now from Mexico that was handmade, has a tire on the bottom. It's lasted me five years. You don't even know that they're five years old. Oh, wow, yeah, because the quality is so good. But the product does not matter. People are still buying Nikes, even though they tear up on them every year. It's simply because they are in the minds of the people. I do business, consultations and stuff too, but I see a lot of people. The only thing they post is about their product. We have the best of the best. This why? Because the best of the best this.

Speaker 2: 38:35

Why should I leave my brand that I've known forever to go with you just because you said my brand makes me feel happy. My brand makes me feel like I'm in a community. Are you helping out the environment? Some brands they get big just for saying doesn't matter what the product is, every sale goes to the oceans and the poor kids in Africa, whatever they use, even though probably 0.1% of it is actually going to that. Yeah, true, just the perception of it. Wow, if I buy this, I'm feeling good about myself. I'm helping out the world and it's really important that you and I bring up these big names, because it's really important that you study the bigger companies, not to copy them, but to understand what they did right, because they're not reinventing the wheel. You probably are.

Speaker 1: 39:21

Since you were talking about earlier of how you do like to work with businesses or people, entrepreneurs, that are working on their passion project. For those that are interested with working with you, or even with the Life, the Plant way, like, basically, how can they work with you?

Speaker 2: 39:41

You can go to josephoctavianicom or you can go to lifethepplantwaycom. Josephoctavianicom is my own personal brand and it's where I do health consultations. One-on-ones is where I do business consultations. We can talk about how to create your brand or if you have specific questions on certain points in your business that you may have, I can answer them. I can do an audit of your maybe your social media or your offer or your website, things like that. And then Life the Plant way is our herbal company and that is if you wanna heal your body, if you wanna go on a transformational diet with herbs and stuff like that. And then I also have an Academy, life in Nature Academy, and that is where we just kind of bundle all of our education on herbalism, on just healing, understanding the body, the mind, body, spirit.

Speaker 1: 40:43

Other than that, any final thoughts or tips.

Speaker 2: 40:47

Be okay with being the dumbest in the room and be okay with asking questions, Whether that be to a YouTube university or to somebody that isn't business. Okay, that was the most transformative thing for me was I never felt shame when asking questions. But you don't have to act on all the advice that you get. So be open to getting advice, but then also be smart on which advice to use.

Speaker 1: 41:18

Any other books that might benefit our listeners. One is buy back your time.

Speaker 2: 41:22

of course, that one's I need everybody, especially if you are in business. I guess I don't really apply to people who aren't in business yet, but if you are in business, every single person must read that. Two would be the 22 immutable laws of branding or marketing. There's marketing, okay. Okay, that one's a game changer, for sure. And then the third one would be how to own your own mind. Ooh, that sounds good. Hold on that.

Speaker 2: 41:54

One should be to anybody who wants to start a business, who isn't in there yet, or who is in there and still feels kind of just like they're doing too much and they're just everywhere.

Speaker 1: 42:05

I'm gonna have all your contact information, especially the academy and how they can reach you and all that stuff that we just talked about a little bit earlier in the show notes, and, yeah, like, make sure you reach out to him because he has a lot of knowledge, as you can see with all the sayings and phrases, that he just dropped this episode and other than that, thank you again for coming on the show and other than that, I am, we'll see y'all in the next episode. Bye, bye.