16 Years of Learning, Loving, and Living: My Business Journey!

What started as a desperate attempt to be more involved in my daughters' lives after divorce became the path that led me to my best self.

My business gives me the freedom to serve our community AND be at every single one of my kids' school events. Every. Single. One.

Early years were rough - hilariously clueless about business, but too stubborn to quit.

But guess what? Being obnoxious and stubborn actually paid off.

16 years later... I'm still here. And growing.

I'm fired up to help the next group of clients who are ready to take their business to that mythical "next level." Jump on board!

PS

And my daughters? We have the most incredible relationship - the kind that makes me emotional and filled with joy at the same time.

Being an entrepreneur is not easy - but it's been my biggest win yet.

Check out today's video for a more in-depth story of journey into my overnight success.

Transcript

00:00:00:00 - 00:00:22:09
Unknown
Hey everyone, Teevee the marketer here. Thank you for tuning in again. Today I wanted to share a really important story. It's it's the. I'm coming up on the anniversary of the of 16 years of being in business. And to be more accurate, of being in business full time. I walked away from my job on March 1st, 2009.

00:00:22:11 - 00:00:42:24
Unknown
It's a really personal story. Most people that know me know this story because it's it's a part of everything that that now is, is true in my life. So let's get into it. March 1st, 2009 is when I actually walked away from my job that I had been in essentially since I was 13. Now, at the age of 15, I started in the grocery business.

00:00:42:25 - 00:01:12:12
Unknown
I was a little sucker, and took people's groceries out. And then I grew and grew in the business and through various other companies, and eventually ended up at Minion suit stores in the last couple of years, ended up in their training department. The story for that will probably have to be on my personal podcast on, how I got there, because it involved a lot of, a lot of risk and a lot of and a lot of trust from some good humans in my life.

00:01:12:15 - 00:01:40:04
Unknown
However, in 2009, I walked away and I had to I absolutely had to because I was divorced. At that point, I think I was about a year into my divorce or so, and I was miserable. Oh, I forgot this little micro detail, but it's a good detail. I ended up back in the grocery stores because the company minions, whose stores sold Carnival, was one of their divisions.

00:01:40:06 - 00:02:01:25
Unknown
And in doing so, we basically were they didn't need a training department anymore. So they started cutting staff and whatnot. And I ended up back in the stores for a little bit in that time of working in the actual stores. I was miserable, and it wasn't so much the work. I worked nights, hour days. I work early, I work late.

00:02:01:26 - 00:02:29:14
Unknown
The problem was, I was obviously divorced and I wanted to be with my daughters. I knew well what was happening is because of the various shifts on my weekends, I wouldn't actually have much time with them. It was really bumming me out that I couldn't see my daughters. I wanted to be more present, more involved. And because of my job, it was actually more it was less possible.

00:02:29:16 - 00:02:53:18
Unknown
Now, when I was in the training department at Maynard's, I had weekends off. So I was able to use that time on the first and third to my to my benefit, to our benefit. I could really maximize that time. And it was really important that I do so. But, I couldn't. Luckily, a couple years before that, I started a business with a friend of mine that I met in NLP class.

00:02:53:18 - 00:03:18:00
Unknown
We decided to start an internet business because we both had read the four hour workweek, and we we decided to try something and we did started to become successful. I started to do some, starting to make some sales, and I was mainly the tech guy and the, the marketing guy. That was my assignment. I had to learn marketing, and that's when I first understood what it even was, because it's not a word that I really understood before.

00:03:18:00 - 00:03:39:05
Unknown
And I think it wasn't really, really useful or beneficial before the 20 tens. Marketing now is like a part of our vernacular, but back then it wasn't so much you either advertise or you didn't, or you did marketing because you're a bigger business or you didn't. I think so, we were working on that. It was doing well, and I was getting really frustrated.

00:03:39:05 - 00:04:08:08
Unknown
And by the time 2009 rolled around, it was it was really bad. And I mean, it was really good and that we were making some sales and I was I was feeling encouraged, and I was starting to get so frustrated that I decided at some point to just quit. They just I thought to myself, what if what if I spent just as much effort as I do at work on my own personal thing?

00:04:08:11 - 00:04:31:28
Unknown
Surely we can make more sales? I thought, and I decided to quit. And I'll keep in mind this is March 2009. So it was probably a stupid decision. At the time, I didn't really keep up with the economy and the trends and the recession, and didn't realize that it was actually probably not a good idea. But I think being so dang naive was in my best interest, and I was committed.

00:04:31:28 - 00:04:53:20
Unknown
I was determined to make it work. So in March 2009, I quit and started helping local businesses do this internet thing. A lot of the work I initially did was in the graphic design space, because that is my my origin and how I, I really. So that is I actually went to school for that. I took commercial art in high school.

00:04:53:22 - 00:05:09:29
Unknown
I was pretty good at it, I thought, but that was before even computers were around, whereas they started being introduced to the schools in mass. But I did figure that out. Once I started the business with a partner, I needed to figure out how to market the business. I need to figure out how to create graphics.

00:05:10:01 - 00:05:32:16
Unknown
And once I started doing it for local businesses, it was my first effort at actually trying to do the online thing. The first 2 or 3 years were really, really difficult because the ad platforms and even social media was at its infancy. So the idea of doing a social media marketing like it's prevalent right now, and like I do for my clients, was not around what we did.

00:05:32:16 - 00:05:56:06
Unknown
How was, old school Google AdWords, PPC, and a bunch of other stuff you could do, but, it involved a lot of a labor. So we did a lot of oh, and sorry and good old fashioned s e o. And that's what we did for the business. But for myself, it was a lot more challenging trying to make that work and eventually stumbled across networking, business networking.

00:05:56:06 - 00:06:15:28
Unknown
And that's how I eventually started to grow the business through personal, one on one relationships and trust that was being built. And you can find a video about that over here, about networking and how passionate I am about it, because it actually was the first, the first time through networking was when I first started to gain some success.

00:06:15:28 - 00:06:34:07
Unknown
First 2 or 3 years, not so much. I mean, it did okay and it started to grow. I started to get some trust. In about year four, I got one of my best clients ever because she's still a client. She that's when I started, working with my first law firm. And it was, it was, it was a different time.

00:06:34:07 - 00:07:02:17
Unknown
It was easier in those times that doing PPC. And I absolutely loved it. I don't charge near that much anymore, thankfully. But it worked for me at the time. I gained credibility. And through her, I got a lot of referrals. And then let's say by year 5 or 6, I really found my groove. So that's when I really started to understand what the heck I was doing, how to how to consistently help clients.

00:07:02:17 - 00:07:33:06
Unknown
They came to me how to get referrals and was starting to get fun, like, and then after that I, I really refinement products and my services to the point where I am now where I essentially just, market myself as, as a business, as an agency that helps mainly law firms and small businesses get in front of as many people as possible by using social media, social media advertising and Google and YouTube, all the all the channels that you would like to get on, I can help you get on there.

00:07:33:09 - 00:07:59:10
Unknown
And I stopped doing SEO. Pretty much. I can't recall the last time I did a website. But it was, it was it's been so thrilling. And the best thing of all is that I got to be involved in my daughter's lives. I was able to go to anything and everything that involved them, whether it be just games or conferences or performances.

00:07:59:12 - 00:08:26:24
Unknown
Do that. I could get take home on the weekends to do poetry workshops. I could take them to do parkour. We did anything and everything imaginable to really enjoy each other's company and and be connected and allowed me to be a present father. It's something that I would not and could not have done if I had continued to work in the retail business, because for anyone that's ever been in it, or if you are yourself now, you know that the hours are wicked.

00:08:26:27 - 00:08:50:14
Unknown
And it's because. And I get why. It's not like I wanted to change the system. I just I knew I couldn't be a part of that anymore. My daughters now are, 22 and 20. I'm a grandfather now. I have incredible relationship with both of them. We love each other. We stay connected. We stay engaged with each other.

00:08:50:16 - 00:09:16:27
Unknown
They know that I love them. And, to this day, they know that I love them. Most interesting thing out of all this is that my older one really fell in love with the marketing and the the space that I'm in, the messaging, communication, essentially. And she decided to do that as well. She got into the same space, and as of not too long ago, she quit her job and she started her own little agency.

00:09:17:00 - 00:09:40:11
Unknown
That's pretty crazy, don't you think? I'm really. I'm really proud of her. And she's actually in charge of. I just hired her to redesign my website. So depending on when you see this. This website is designed by her. Yes, I do pay her, as it just. It's just a thought. I want her to know that what her value is and that.

00:09:40:14 - 00:10:05:19
Unknown
Yes, I'm her father. And I actually should probably get, like, a 100% discount. However, I understand her value and I will pay her for her time because she is giving me her time, and her brilliance. And just helping put this together so I don't have to do it. This is the mindset that I'm in to ensure that she knows, as she moves forward that, she should charge a premium because even her pops paid.

00:10:05:21 - 00:10:30:00
Unknown
Thank you so much for let me share my story, I appreciate you. Hopefully, you got to know me a little better. If we ever meet in person, feel free to ask me anything else. I'm pretty much an open book. I have a lot going on in my life, and I'm thankful for the business. I'm thankful for my clients, for helping me be able to live this lifestyle where I can help them while I'm actually helping myself at the same time.

00:10:30:00 - 00:10:46:28
Unknown
And because of them, I'm able to live the life of my dreams. So thank you. Thank you very much. And also to anyone watching this. Thank you for your time. This is a pretty long video just related to my anniversary. Bad. If you're if you met me, you probably curious is what the hell? Why am I here? How did I get here?

00:10:47:01 - 00:10:55:06
Unknown
Thank you once again, if you want to watch the networking video, it'll be right here. And that's it for today. Bye.