Growth Strategies and Tips from Industry-leading Founders

Are You Using the Right Growth Strategies, or Are You Holding Your Business Back?

What if the secret to scaling your business wasn’t just about working harder, but working smarter with proven tactics from top entrepreneurs who have built multi-million dollar companies?

In today’s episode, we bring you the winning strategies from top entrepreneurs, business leaders, and industry experts. In this special guest compilation episode, we’ve gathered the best insights, strategies, and actionable tactics to help you scale your business, build a powerful brand, and dominate your industry.

If you’re an entrepreneur, business owner, or executive looking to unlock exponential growth, this episode is packed with battle-tested lessons you won’t want to miss.

Keypoints & Chapter Markers:

00:00 - Intro

01:41 - Rob Levin: Delivering Wow Experience Both to Their Talents and Clients

03:45 - Dr. Nicole Garner Scott: Advice to Building Generational Wealth

08:25 - Ford Saeks: Accelerating Growth through Mindset and 3M's (Message, Market, Method)

10:59 - Jim Taugher: From Invisible Firm to Top Place to Work

13:18 - Joe Lazar: How Being Helpful & Making Friends Can Grow Your Business

17:16 - Ken Joslin: How Ken Joslin Used "Authentic Networking" To Do $250M  in Deals

18:52 - Jasen Arias: How To Turn Connections into Clients Using Free Value Lead Magnet

24:52 - Brook Maclean: Scaling Business While Staying on a Mission

29:06 - Elena Cardone: A Couple’s Framework to Building a Billion-Dollar Empire

32:59 - Amanda Lucey: How Amanda Built the Southeast's Fastest-Growing Female Agency

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About The Hosts:

• Tim & Cindy Dodd are the Co-founders of PEMA.io, based out of Miami, FL. Connect with Tim and Cindy on LinkedIn and Instagram:
  • Tim’s LinkedIn, Tim’s Instagram
  • Cindy’s LinkedIn, Cindy’s Instagram

About PEMA.io:

• Need B2B Appointments or want to grow your authority on LinkedIn? Learn more about our services here: https://www.pema.io/discover

Transcript

00:00
You want the key to long-term sustainable growth. It doesn't matter if you're a product company. It doesn't matter if you're a service company. Whatever you're doing that day will eventually be obsolete. Your product thing you're literally selling will eventually be obsolete. And so the way to grow in our view, sustainably being an enduring company, is to prove to your customer over and over and over again that you really understand what they're going through. You understand them.

00:30
their challenges,  that never gets obsolete.  That  always resonates.  And so they end up investing in us and they end up investing in our clients, customers end up investing in our clients  because  they believe, they get me.  And so their product may be  the same, maybe even a little worse  than the competition  in one metric or another,  but we trust that they get us and that they will.

00:57
be with us on whatever journey we need to be because they have proven through the way that they empathize with what we're going through, that they understand  what we need, not just today, but what we'll need tomorrow.  And that is how we have grown sustainably. And so most of your growth has happened by growing with clients and their accounts getting bigger  and word of mouth, referral,  that's your two primary growth channels.  Absolutely. Yeah. Organic growth.

01:24
It is so much cheaper to grow a client than it is to find a new one.  Welcome to The Takeover with Tim and Cindy, where we show you how to dominate every area of life and business. Let's get with it.

01:40
It starts with our core values. So my partner and I decided to start this business in a bar in Portland, Oregon, neither risk Portland or Oregon. And one of the first things I said is we're going to put our talent first. And he asked me to explain it and I explained it to him, but it was really important for us. We're going to treat our talent really well. We're to put them first. Cause if we do that right, everything else, almost everything else will fall in place. That's where it all started. We now have five other core values and they're actually

02:10
lived and breathed in the company. And that's the essence of what makes our clients so happy with us and wanting to refer us and literally raving about us, raving fans, as you said. So it starts with those core values, particularly that one, putting our talent first. By doing that, we now attract amazing talent. We recruit from, I don't know, 15 to 17 countries in berries by month in Latin America. And we have a great employer brand in those countries where we're sought out.

02:39
get thousands of applications every single month. And then our recruiting department screens that to find that top one or two percent that are good fits for our clients. And then our clients get to interview and all that stuff. But it really just starts with maniacal approach on getting amazing talent. And then, yes, we have this experience, this expression here, wow, experiences. We want to deliver wow experiences to our talent. Even the people that apply that don't get approved by us to interview with our clients.

03:08
You know, they put a lot of time into the assessments and all that. We give them feedback, right? We don't have to do that, but we want to create wow experiences all across the board. When a client has an issue, you know, we're not saying, hey, let's just say it doesn't happen often, but a client like, you know what? This didn't work for me. All right. No contracts. It's not working for you. We can stop today. Stop today. Whereas there's other companies. Well, we have to stop at the end of the month or we have a 12 month contract. Just doesn't none of that stuff makes sense to us.

03:37
We want to have wow experiences everywhere possible. So it starts with a great talent and then we're all committed to deliver wow experience. would definitely say first starting off getting really clear on your why, right? So many people, especially today's society, they're running after money, but if money doesn't have a why to it, it'll just leave as quickly as it came because you're giving too much power to just the transaction. And so once you get

04:06
deeper into what is your why? What are you wanting to accomplish? You don't just want six figures, you want six figures because it gives you more time with your spouse. You want six figures because it helps you do things for your children that you've never been able to do or gives you more time freedom for you to travel, whatever that is, get really clear on that why.

04:24
I know that it can sound cliche, but I mindset plays such a large role when we talk about wealth and really starting to understand what might be some of the trauma and triggers around wealth that have been a narrative that you've carried since childhood. Because the thing is you can be the ultimate self-sabotager of your wealth if you haven't healed some of those different areas or you're aware of what that is for you. Do you tend to over overspend when certain triggers happen?

04:53
Do you tend to not necessarily put yourself in positions that you're getting your worth because of certain triggers? There's a lot of things there that you can have the best financial team around you. But if you're going back and self-sabotaging the recommendation they're putting in place, then you're moving a step forward and moving 10 backwards consistently. So that mindset piece, feel like  you hear it so much and everybody's like, yeah, yeah, I know mindset mindset, but I promise you.

05:22
All of this is mindset. All of this is self-awareness. All of this is doing that internal work to be able to see the external pieces come to place. I think when it comes to, from that wealth building standpoint, having the right professionals around you is another part of that. There is so much information dissemination happening, which I love. First off, I'll say I love that because, I mean, 10 years ago,  it wasn't common just to sit around and talk about

05:51
finances and different tools  and you know, those different pieces. I love that the conversation has heightened, but in the midst of that, there's a lot of misinformation that's transparent at a extreme rapid amount, right? So you can put in, should I  do a raw thyroid or traditional, you put that in TikTok,  you get everyone that's on their soapbox that is preaching a million different things as to why.  And what's missing in that conversation is

06:20
What is the reason  as  it compares to your specific variables of your life?  Right. So a lot of times we're taking financial information and it's really just based upon it worked for that person in their life. They had a different starting point. They have a different finish line and they have a  lot of different variables in the middle of that that  might not be the same as yours, but you're basing everything upon that.

06:49
Just to give a quick example, Cindy, you might look at HGTV and you're seeing individuals and it's like the wife is a stay at home mom, the husband is a teacher and they're getting ready to buy like a $4.7 million house. And you're like, am I missing something? Like what is going on where they're this $4.7 million home? And what you're missing is they might be trust fund children. There might be

07:18
a house that was given to them that they were able to flip  given some generational wealth transfer or what happened in an investment outside of that. There are so many different variables.  So you put yourself into the box, you're like, well, we're making what they're making. Let's also go for a $4.7 million house.  No, it's not the same runway that both of you are descending upon. So when it comes to that financial information, you need someone to customize it.

07:47
to your life, you need the right professionals to understand  your entire dynamic and you have to be truthful with them and you have to account they're being very truthful with you and you're building in that type of way. That is such good advice because they raise this so much information out there on the internet and your ability to kind of serve through it and through a proper lens, right? Of like, what is their financial situation? It may look  very different from mine and then making decisions based on that. I love that you also mentioned mindset.

08:17
Because I think everything that you do as an entrepreneur, as a high performer, it all comes down to the mindset that you take in certain situations. And what I found was that a lot of people want to give you advice,  but they haven't necessarily done it and they're giving you a book report or they're giving their opinion that is invalid. And so for me, as a consultant for the last 40 years, I've learned to speak from experience. If it's experience or if it's an idea, I'll say, Hey, I read this idea, you know, here's, here's an idea.  So.

08:47
For me, when I started this sporting goods product, it was called Pedestal, went from Florida to ceiling, it was Oak. And then I built the company up to $50 million in sales before I sold it. And that's gross sales, that's not profit. There's a big difference everybody. But I did learn how to do private label and how to sell through mass merchants. I was in Sky Mall and Sharper Image and Williams Sonoma and all the specialty catalogs I sold through mass merchants. The big box stores like Sam and Costco and Walmart.

09:13
And then I was in department stores. was in Williams Sonoma as a home furnishing. So I learned how to take a value proposition  and package it in such a way that was relevant to the market. So the formula, and you're all about takeaways. We talked about it in the green room before this episode. So the takeaway for everybody is one, create a success library. What do you have in it? It doesn't have to be the things we're talking about, but absolutely subscribe to this podcast. Make sure you share it with your friends, anybody who wants to grow because Tim and Sydney, that's all they talk about.

09:40
is how to accelerate growth. if you're interested in business, you definitely want to subscribe and add it to your success library. Number two, your mindset. Are you open-minded? Are you coachable? Are you a critical thinker? Are you proactive? If you're not, if you don't identify what's stopping you from your mindset, all the strategy and tactics in the world won't help you. And then lastly, before we go on to the next question, it's a formula that I've learned over the years in business, which is when you attach the right marketing message, which is the reason why the compelling economic

10:09
or emotional reason why. To your ideal client, which is your target market, using the best method, so that's three M's, message, market, method. It's like combinations in a lock. When you align those in the right combinations, you're gonna accelerate your sales. If they're not in the right order, you're not gonna make it. So people will say, paper click doesn't work, influencer marketing doesn't work, podcasting doesn't work. Every marketing method works  if you get the right message.

10:36
to the ideal client. It's normally one of those things, not normally, it is. No matter what business I go into as a strategic advisor or keynote speaker, I've always found that you start with your compelling value proposition to the ideal client using the right method. And when you track that and you start to have a baseline and you track it, that's really where you can accelerate growth.

10:58
How big did you get your team over? You said over, that was 10 years or 15 years? Yeah, let's talk in two halves. So that first 15 and we had gotten to, I think we're gonna say about 22 people. 22. good. Your margins were good. was, it was because there's 20, there's people with 22 employees and they're not taking home any profit. So you're 22 people, healthy place, business is good. 15 years all built pretty much on referral. Is that what I'm hearing? You're nailing it.

11:27
proactive though, were you proactively nurturing your network? Yes,  yes, absolutely tapping the network, working in every which way. We'll probably get into this. I want to give the terminology that I'm a certifiable connector  for people that are into the personality types and things like that. I'm an ENFP. My life giving place is to be with people, to talk and,  and get out there. So this team.

11:56
that doing the amount of work that, you know, we were at a good plateau, I'd say, a growing plateau, but you know what I'm saying,  equilibrium,  enough work coming in, work for people to do was fine. But at a certain point, is it fine? And do you want to grow some more?  And  as we found ourselves excited by the growth we were finding for our clients,  it aligned with my vision that yes, we should be bigger.

12:22
We should niche into a couple specialized sort of industries and make the most of it.  And it is no longer the invisible company that you find us through, if you know,  one or two of  us in the shop.  so then we, around this 2010, built the strategic marketing company  that puts us out there, puts us  in the circles,  in the circles of industries and service lines that we want to be in.

12:52
And so  of content marketing strategy,  putting myself out there in a couple new places. I am not you, Tim. I am not on  so many podcasts and I don't blog a ton and do these things.  But I take those opportunities and I do still lots of coffee and frankly get on a plane and be with people. It would no longer that invisible company.  couldn't ignore this product marketing.

13:20
sort of center of gravity that kept getting bigger and bigger and bigger.  And  we struggled for a long time to kind of define ourselves. Are we a creative shop? Are we a creative agency?  Are we an advertising agency? Are we a content agency?  And the product marketing work and the product marketing needs and our clients as product marketers,  they just  signaled to us so loud and clear that your segment,  this is what you should be going after.

13:49
This is how you should position yourselves and  all of those other things, the advertising, the content and so on. That all falls into product marketing. It's just become so much easier and clearer to  talk about your business, to appeal to your customers when they be like, Oh, I hadn't heard of product marketing agency before.  It's a lot of sense.  I think I need that. It makes you stand out among the, well,  what do you do? Everything for who? Everyone.  And  we do, we do product marketing.

14:19
I'm sure just that alone,  if you're up and you're giving a proposal versus another company, that probably alone  got you a lot of deals. It did. And it was very helpful to not be just another ad agency or creative agency  who would show up to our clients  and try to  pitch themselves as experts in what they were looking for.

14:44
when we would show up and be like, OK, you're a B2B technology company, you're a SaaS application company, and you are having a hard time connecting all of your marketing ideas with the salespeople on the ground. This what we do all the time every day. Now, the downside to that, of course, is if we get into a pitch where like, oh, you want an anthemic TV spot, we're probably not your agency. And there aren't that many of those anyway. So, you know, in terms of like how to to grow and

15:14
Finding your segment, finding your customers,  being clear on what your differentiation is. It means all of the basics  that are still so true in building and growing a company.  Knowing who your customer is, knowing what they need,  proving that you can deliver on what they're looking for. We actually have a whole framework on how to think about this and communicate this.  That's incredibly useful and really easy to remember because it's just telling a good story.  that we live that ourselves.

15:43
You want the key to long term sustainable growth? It doesn't matter if you're a product company. It doesn't matter if you're a service company. Whatever you're doing that day will eventually be obsolete. The thing you're literally selling will eventually be obsolete. Yeah. And so the way to grow, our view, sustainably being enduring company is to prove to your customer over and over and over again that you really understand what

16:13
they're going through. You understand them,  their challenges.  That never gets obsolete. That  always resonates.  And so they end up investing in us and they end up investing in our clients. Customers end up investing in our clients. Yeah.  Because  they believe, oh, they get me. And so their product may be  the same, maybe even a little worse  than the competition  in one metric or another.

16:42
But we trust that they get us and that they will be with us on whatever journey we need to be because they have proven through the way that they empathize with what we're going through, that they understand what we need, not just today, but what we'll need tomorrow. And that is how we have grown sustainably. And so most of your growth has happened by growing with clients and their accounts getting bigger and word of mouth referral. That's your two primary growth channels.

17:10
Absolutely. Yeah. Organic growth, like it is so much cheaper to grow a client than it is to find a new one. You know, it is all about relationships. You know, I talk a lot about proximity is a cheat code. You know, relationships really are the thing that separate us from everything else. And I remember you talked about authenticity about three years ago. It was my second or third live event. It small. We did it in Vegas with my good friend, Bradley at Brad's event space and Gary Brekha came in. It was the first event that Gary Brekha had done with me and Gary did a talk.

17:39
on a study that they did. don't remember which medical journal published it, but he talked about how we as humans emit EMFs, know, electromagnetic frequencies. Like there's a frequency that comes from us. And he talked about the highest frequency recorded from an individual was the frequency of authenticity or when they were in authenticity. There's two things that it takes to be authentic. Number one, you have an understanding of a certain subject. And the second thing is, is you have a deep passion.

18:07
about that subject. And when you have an understanding and a desire for a subject, don't know, whatever it is, it could be selling cars, could be setting up podcast studios, it could be personal growth. But when you have a passion for that thing, every single one of us know when we get around somebody that's passionate, there's something different about that individual. But I'll never forget when Gary said that that day, he goes, it is an understanding about a subject and a knowledge combined with a deep passion. It's the highest frequency we admit, but check this out.

18:37
It's also the most sought after frequency. People are looking for people who are authentic. And I think when you live an authentic life and you're comfortable doing that, and we talk about attracts a lot, right? The people you're attracting your life are absolutely amazing. So if I'm a small business, say like I'm a coach, I'm a marketing agency, or I just got myself going. Where do you see that kind of journey is, you know, there's a lot of confusion. Obviously what we do at Pima is very like

19:05
outbound marketing, we can get meetings, but it does require an investment. It does require there to be, so you have to have some kind of money you can put into the business. Where would you go for that entrepreneur that's like, dude, I need to get some money raised up. Maybe they want to hire Pima. Maybe they want to do something like that. Like I don't have any money. I need to go get clients this week. So where would you go if you needed to get clients this week? Hey there friend. If you're enjoying the podcast so far, make sure that you are subscribed.

19:34
so you never miss an episode.  Subscribe and follow The Takeover with Tim and Cindy wherever you are listening.  New episodes are released every week.

19:46
Local networking groups. here's the thing. A lot of you guys are going to have heard of BNI networking groups. You ever been to BNI Tim? No dude, was, I drank the Kool-Aid for- Oh, that's right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I learned a lot. I learned a lot going on. Invaluable, right? Yeah. So a lot of people avoid that. So if you want to hack the BNI system, you can go to two  networking meetings  absolutely for free. So without signing up, you just show up and you go as a guest.

20:14
And my advice to everybody would be to learn how to talk to a small group like that as a complete stranger in order to  convey what it is that you're doing. Like, you'll know this as well as I do. You've got to be able to convey what it is that you do and what your business  solves as a problem in a short amount of time. You don't have, they're not going to read long sheets. They're not going to do all these things.  You're not going up and be an eye given a slide deck full. Let me give you my presentation.

20:42
Right? So with BNI, one of their staples is that you do like everybody does like a 30 to 60 second presentation at every BNI networking group. And so you'll learn after you go through a few of these, you will quickly learn how to be able to address your business as a value in a short amount of time. I think for me, man, I pay people listening there to, know, like I used to be a super shy kid, but I would see people that could communicate well. How the heck do they do that? How do they own a room?

21:10
So I became a student of like learning that. And I would say for sure BNI specifically was what really allowed me to develop that being able to go into a room, any room and be comfortable and meet people and communicate. That was for sure. So super nervous to do that stuff. And it took work. It took me being in the bathroom, visualizing it going well and all that. But the room, what Jason, what you're saying, man, is very true. It allows you to become very good at communicating.

21:39
getting comfortable speaking with people networking, but then also being able to convey your value in a very short time. Cause  I mean, if they're, they're eating lunch there, man, they're like, you better catch your attention. Let me drop a kind of what I would consider a pro tip with this. And this is the homework that some people can do, you know, after listening to the show, there's basically two types of people that go to these networking events. I'm going to use a realtor as the example for this. There are the people that will show up and say, Hey,

22:08
I'm a realtor. If, you're looking at buying or selling a house or know somebody, let me know. There's that group  and everybody knows a realtor. Everybody's been connected with realtors. There's probably two realtors in that BNI group that you just introduced yourself to. And so nobody, nobody really cares.  Now, if you're a realtor, you're not going to get a customer from that pitch. No, if you're a realtor and you walk in and you were to say, my name's Stacey.  I work with single moms.

22:37
who are trying to buy their first family home. If you know anybody like that, I would love to sit down and give them some tips and advice on struggles they may be going through.  That is where you wanna get with your business. Like who are you really helping so that somebody can identify themselves or somebody that they know with who you wanna help.  we should, I really try and keep people from saying, oh, I'm an architect or I'm a realtor or I sell tires or whatever it is.

23:05
try and go in. And when somebody says, what do do? I work with single moms trying to buy their first homes, like niche it down so that people, I know, know. that. I love that. So when I was in BNI, I was, I had a detailing company and we were very niche down. got in with like the Ferrari club, the Porsche club. And so you're saying like, you know, kind of thinking about what, I was in BI and it's something like, well, we clean cars.  We like, if anybody needs a clean car, it's like, Hey, we specialize in high-end detailing. do stuff for Porsche club, Ferrari club.

23:35
If you've got a car that you love or know anybody that's a car collector and really values their car and loves to keep it clean and pristine, let me know. So it's like, I I wash cars, like really dialing in on who's that kind of person you're trying to meet. I know kind of why that works psychology. Like what, what is it about that that allows the people listening to kind of like, Oh, I know somebody. Well, like, what do you think's happening there? I refer to it as getting people to raise their hand.

24:04
So anytime that we can add in a descriptor that gets somebody to raise their hand a little bit higher, that's what we're looking for. So if I was to say, I'm a business coach working specifically with women, well,  I've alienated half the room in some ways, but I've perked up the ears of the other half of the room. Now, if I was to say,  I work with women over 40 going through a career change, now it's like, that's me, that's me, and that's me again. Wow. So you're not trying to get...

24:31
If there's a hundred people in the room, you're not trying to get a hundred. If you can get out of those people, if you can get people to raise their hand, if you have a gin generic, Hey, I help people with their career. No one's going to raise their hand. If you say, helped these people, you might isolate and only be targeting a small group in those people. But the people you do target, will, Hey, we need to talk. What would you say is some of the most challenging aspects that your agency has gone through in its growth mode? I think.

25:00
A lot of people focus on what it looks like to manage a startup. And there's so much content around what a startup looks like. going through that phase for the first couple of years where we're all in it, we're all doing everything, we're all wearing a lot of different hats,  I actually felt taken care of. I felt like I had a lot of mentors. I felt like a lot of people were there to help me.  After we kind of reached a phase of stable growth where we're 50 plus people,  we have decent revenues.

25:30
That's when I started to feel like, my gosh, I don't have the support that I used to have. I don't have the content that I used to have.  There's  fewer people talking about these problems. So I would say these problems, these challenges that we're facing, it is  how do you maintain profits? You can be a profitable business as you're looking to expand because you do have to kind of get wide for a while before you can grow tall again. How do you manage people? I mean, we've had people who've been here for a really long time.  Does that mean that they...

25:57
are able to take us to the next level? What does team management look like? How do you develop leaders  and what does leadership look like? And then how do you balance management, people management  with the need to innovate? Because once you start getting into a level where you need people managers to create processes and systems, it can clash with the need to innovate.  And so how do you really balance innovation and the need for stability and process?  That I think is

26:24
where we've had to spend a lot of time figuring out how to navigate those two things. And what's interesting is even for our clients,  when we come in, it's often because they are experienced that same friction. We've gotten really comfortable.  And the things that we were doing a year ago aren't necessarily having the same kick that we need it to now.  And what we find is they've lost some of that scrappy innovation that's really needed to get them to the next level. They need to start.

26:49
thinking like a startup again, but it's really hard to do that. It's easy to say, oh, think like a startup, act like a startup. But when you're moving so many different teams and departments and management and leadership,  it is more cumbersome. So figuring out what the framework  is has taken us a lot of time. I mean, you all are doing it and you're rocking it, but I love that you have that lesson learned. And I think for our listeners that are in similar stages and similar phases, some of those points that you mentioned, the people,

27:18
innovation, right, maintaining that startup mentality. It's all important things that need to happen in order to sustain, right, continued growth. Yeah, our mission really started with the birth of MarketWake. I was trying to figure out what we were going to do  and was sitting on this dock in Lake Burton in Georgia. And I was watching all these boats go by and it was a beautiful experience and really trying to center myself, pray and think, OK, what does this next phase look like?  And these boats were leaving awake  and not

27:47
too big of a wake. And then all of sudden, this tiny little bass boat came by and it was going the exact same speed as all the other boats. But that bass boat left a wake so large that it shook the dock that I was on.  And that's really when it hit is how do we help people leave a mark? How do we help them understand that they leave a wake in the world, that their life matters, that their business matters? And then how do we make sure that that week is positive? So we really exist to help connect people with the brands that they love. And in doing that, we combine data and creativity  in order to

28:16
create growth and a lot of it comes back into what is your mark need to be. And what's interesting about that too is  think of the, now, if you're in a boat, you're facing the lake or the ocean head. You are not seeing the wake that you leave behind. All you see is open territory. And sometimes that can be really scary. Sometimes it's really exciting. Sometimes it's overwhelming. Sometimes it's lonely,  but you are leaving a wake. And so we help people figure out, okay, what is it, the mark that you're making and then how do we help you navigate ahead?

28:44
And I think that that's a question that, again, it goes back no matter what you're doing or how you're doing it. Those are really important questions at every single phase of the business to say, are you intimidated by what's next? Are you excited by what's next? Where are you going? Where are you navigating?  And then what's happening to the people behind you, whether it's in your team and your culture or the marketplace  around you, because  it all has impact. And the question they should ask themselves is, where do they want to go as a couple? Who  are they?

29:13
as a couple? What is the vision and the purpose line  of the two of you together? Who  are we? What do we represent? Where do we want to go?  And then reverse engineer from that big picture to say, is it more beneficial that you stay in your business and I stay in my business because we can actually flow to the middle pot and get there faster? Or  does it make sense to where

29:42
maybe one person is willing to  trade in in order to trade up to this ideal life and ideal scene and ideal vision. The next, and that was a lot of questions there, but senior to that, I guess, once you would make a decision to go into business with your significant other would be, okay,  are we willing to  separate and delineate who does what?

30:11
based on strengths and weaknesses, not based on ego. So sometimes a woman might be stronger in a finance or leadership or an executive role, and a man might be stronger in other areas of PR or marketing or whatever and isn't really in operations. And so can they, are they willing to separate  the hat of being equal in marriage?

30:39
from not being equal in the company  if  that effort combined would get you to the ideal scene and picture and purpose that you two have. Are you willing to do that for the greater good and then figure out who does what and go for the goal? So good. The separation of roles has been critical for Tim and I in succeeding in our business and in our marriage as well. And I think having those questions and those conversations upfront

31:08
leads to success. I think far too often some couples are not talking about what their goals and their vision are. They're not talking about what are our strengths and weaknesses. And I think even just taking that  one extra second to do that is going to set you up for success.  Right. It is. It sets expectations and based on stats, you know, not just this ego thing of, well,  I'm this and I'm that. Well, but are you really? Where is the statistic? I would say I would recommend

31:38
based on statistics, strengths and weaknesses, but it does set expectations. And then the next hurdle is to really, for the greater good of winning the Super Bowl ring of life, whatever that trophy is that y'all are going for, being willing to let that person being the boss of that division  or that role. And then the other one provides support in terms of advice or

32:06
a sounding board or whatever, but at the end of the day, trusting the one that's running that division, I call it the IC, the in-charge of that division, trusting them. They're gonna make a mistake here and there. Allow them the time to course correct, support them in that. If y'all decided that you were the boss of the business or the  finances or whatever, let them run point while the other one is maybe the boss of the family or the in-charge of the family.

32:35
And same thing, advice, but not bypass. So once you designate the roles, don't bypass your partner. these are the challenges of what you're going to come across and why it makes it difficult because it's very easy to slip into husband or wife hat or versus what is my role in the business. So  one of the key components to our culture is staying curious.

33:01
And you you've heard the tagline, stay thirsty, my friends. Well, stay curious, my friends, right? Stay curious. So that this culture of curiosity and being curious and asking questions, it has to continue. From the very beginning, when you first start talking to a new lead, you ask lots of questions about their business. Why are they interested in talking to a marketing and PR agency? What are their pain points? You're asking lots of questions. The questions can't stop. To constantly be asking questions throughout the entire relationship.

33:30
because that's what gives you the insights to come up with ideation, come up with new ideas, come up with opportunities for organic growth and sell. You have to sell an idea, don't you? You have to sell a solution. You have to sell a product. You have to sell something. And in our situation, we do have a product that we're selling, but we also are selling our services. And so we can't sell services unless we have at the very, very foundation, a core relationship and we're staying curious about the business.

33:58
and how their business is evolving. What is their strategy? What are their goals? What are their pain points? And oftentimes we do that in the very beginning of relationship. It's like dating, isn't it? You ask people all these questions about themselves. Do you stay curious about the people that you're interested in in your life? you stay curious and you keep asking questions, it never gets boring. It's always interesting. You're always learning something new. So we really try to instill a culture of curiosity with our team. And that's

34:26
extends to the relationships and the partners we have and then to the business that we have so that we're constantly growing.