The 3 Simple Steps For Marketing That Can’t Be Ignored | With Mike Michalowicz

[00:00:00] Brian: We'll come back to another episode of the six figure creative podcast. I am your host Brian Hood. I'm here with my big bald beautiful green shirted. Co-hosts Christopher J. Graham. Hi, Chris.

[00:00:11] Chris: Hey, man. I wanted to switch it up today. This is like one of my favorite t-shirts from college and it's got holes in it and I like it and it makes me feel young.

[00:00:19] Brian: Well, that's adorable. So today's episode, we have a treat for you. We're interviewing Mike , who is a New York times bestselling author. He's got so many books over a million readers like this dude is absolutely legit. And not only that, I'm a huge fan of this

[00:00:32] Chris: Huge fan.

[00:00:33] Brian: Chris Graham is a super fan of this guy and we bring up a great conversation about marketing, about differentiation, about Chris.

[00:00:40] You want to talk about the episode, what people are in for

[00:00:43] Chris: let me start, let me start with this, like with a quick story.

[00:00:45] Brian: That's my Chris right there instead of bullet points and tips and great stuff is going to give a tedious

[00:00:51] Chris: Uh, tedious story. Okay. So Mike reached out to me probably six or seven years ago before he kind of exploded because I used to write Amazon book reviews for business books all the time. And I was at this stage where like, I didn't have three kids yet, and I had a lot more free time on my. And so I'm just like reading business books constantly and then writing a review.

[00:01:13] And that just, it was a wonderful chapter in life. And I got an email one day. I don't know how Mike got my email, but somehow he got it from Amazon and was like, Hey, can I send you this book? The pumpkin plan? And if you like it, we, you just write a review, no pressure. Just like whatever you want to do.

[00:01:29] Just write an honest review. And I was like, yeah. And he sent me the book and it was transformative for me. It was one of the better business books I'd ever read. We've talked about it. A number of. On the podcast before,

[00:01:40] Brian: That's my favorite book from him so far.

[00:01:42] Chris: what was so liberating about Mike? And I think what makes him, like one of the most perfect guests we could possibly have on this show is that Mike is a liberated entrepreneur.

[00:01:53] Brian: That's a great way of putting it.

[00:01:54] Chris: Yeah. He, he is not constrained by other people's ideas and rules. He's totally himself. And he's a bad-ass. But at the same time, like I think he could probably beat me up. I think if we got in a fight, I think he could probably take me, but he's also goofy. And he has a lot of eccentricities and I love that about him, that he has leaned into.

[00:02:15] I'm going to be different. I'm going to be somebody that nobody else has been and therefore the best.

[00:02:21] Brian: Yeah. And that's the kind of person that you can, you can get that person to teach you. Being different, which is what his new book is and it talks about, and it's all about marketing and being different. And, and I think you put it a lot more politically, correct? Not even political, right. Just, just nice that I literally called him to his face on the interview.

[00:02:37] Weird. You said, I don't know what you just said, but it wasn't the word weird liberated. Yeah. That's a nicer way of putting weird, weird in a great way. A little eccentric, but yeah, this interview is, is a lot of fun. So Chris, before we get into interview, You came to Nashville recently and we got to hang out and be buddies.

[00:02:55] Chris: It was so fun and I'm coming back in like two weeks.

[00:02:57] Brian: you stayed like right behind me and our guest bedroom.

[00:02:59] Chris: Oh, weird. Oh yeah, that's true.

[00:03:01] Brian: yeah.

[00:03:02] Chris: That's such a brain Buster for me, because I've interacted with you so much over the internet, but that was the first time I had been to your new house. And now I've been to your new house, but now you're back on the internet

[00:03:12] Brian: So for those who don't already know this, like Chris and I live in different cities, we sound like we're sitting next to each other, but Chris is in Columbus, Ohio. Unfortunately, the, the, the, the coffee stain of America. And then I live in amazing Nashville, Tennessee. I was going to start these something way meaner than the coffee stain, but I was like, this is a little.

[00:03:29] This is a little better. I think coffee stain sounds good. You can

[00:03:32] Chris: It's awesome here. I don't know what you're talking about. We're like a little miniature Nashville up here. You've never abandoned. You refuse to come. There's some, there's some issues there. Brian

[00:03:42] Brian: Yeah. But you came down for a, for Nam for, so we had summer Nam here, which was the most underwhelming Nam I've ever been

[00:03:48] Chris: Nam, for those of you that don't know is like this big giant trade show where all the companies that make products that make musical noises. All come together and you just like walk around and see all the fun people in your industry and play with toys and

[00:04:00] Brian: it's in Nashville and the summer, and then it's an Anaheim in the winter, the winter. When's the one you want to go to, but yeah, it was great to hang out as a first time he came to Nashville to hang out with. No, it's not the first time. It was the first time at this new house, but yeah, I'm glad we got to hang out together and it's been the first time we've seen each other since all the COVID crap went down.

[00:04:15] Chris: yeah. Well, and the best part of that is like, you were kicking my ass. I'm in this weird, this weird spot right now, where. You know, I'm trying to navigate the success of this podcast. And as I'm doing that, I'm learning that like, I'm, my superpower is systems and I need to niche to focus on helping people with systems more than anything else that I'm doing.

[00:04:36] it was really encouraging and I, I really

[00:04:38] Brian: I was, I was mean to you

[00:04:40] Chris: You beat the hell out of me and I needed

[00:04:42] Brian: It was like a bootcamp. So Chris and I are both Enneagram eight. So if you know what the Enneagram is it's, it's just a personality thing. And the way you speak to an eight is by just driving a hammer under their skull, with like how they need to do things. That's

[00:04:54] Chris: I have another,

[00:04:55] Brian: yeah.

[00:04:55] That's how I like to be taught as well, but that does not work for the personnel that you cannot do that to. My wife was in Instagram like four and they needed to be guided. They need to be more gentle,

[00:05:04] Chris: I bonded with your wife so much

[00:05:07] Brian: Yeah, she's a, she's an amazing human being and everyone bonds with her. Cause she's the most bubbly, amazing human.

[00:05:11] So

[00:05:12] Chris: We had a really cool moment where we were talking, she had gone to a yoga class. I hope I'm not like

[00:05:19] busting her out here, but she went to a yoga class and sometimes when you're in a yoga class, you gotta quit.

[00:05:25] Brian: Hot yoga,

[00:05:26] Chris: You gotta, you gotta leave.

[00:05:27] Brian: 110 degree.

[00:05:28] Chris: it's not even necessarily a physical issue as much as sometimes it's like the right thing to do for yourself emotionally is to get the hell out of this.

[00:05:36] And your wife had a yoga class like that. And it was so cool. She talked about it and I was like, I've done that. Like you ain't doing yoga. If you've never had to leave a class for emotional reasons, like you weren't, I'm serious. You're not doing it. Right. And it was really cool to be like, oh my gosh, like

[00:05:51] Brian: If you had to listen to this podcast for a long time, Chris does yoga as well. So y'all y'all could be yoga BFS.

[00:05:57] Chris: yeah, yoga is, I was thinking the next time I come down, maybe me and Megan I'll go to yoga. Because I would, I need some yoga variety in my life, more teachers, more classrooms.

[00:06:06] Brian: I'll kick your ass with business. My wife's yoga class. We'll kick your ass with hot yoga, like, cause they're there until you do like the, what is the stuff you do Vinyasa or something like super calm and

[00:06:14] Chris: Um, I do a lot of Hoffa.

[00:06:16] Brian: patho. Sorry. Vinyasa is a little harder. It isn't it.

[00:06:18] Chris: giving us as harder power yoga, which is what Megan was doing this

[00:06:22] Brian: Okay. Power yoga.

[00:06:23] That's the, that's the stuff that.

[00:06:24] like, yeah, like football players and stuff were in there with her. It's like it's intense.

[00:06:28] Chris: Yeah. I love it.

[00:06:29] Brian: Yep. So we should probably transition into the interview here with Mike, but it was good. It was awesome to have you down here.

[00:06:34] Chris: You do a cell phone? Like it was healing for me. It was the first trip I've made post.

[00:06:38] Mike: thank you.

[00:06:39] Brian: Yeah. And my, and again, my wife and I should be in Europe. The time this interview comes out, assuming that Delta hasn't taken over the Delta variant. Cause it's just, it's not looking great right now. It's July the

[00:06:50] Mike: Yeah, it'd be honored.

[00:06:51] Brian: stoked about what's that. And I'm a little worried, but well, by now it's already either sorted itself out or I'm stuck in America still, but that's, that's all I'm gonna say about that.

[00:07:00] So I think it's good time to shift an interview with Mike Chris, anything, any last words before the interview? Oh my God. Here's our here's our interview. Go listen to it. Y'all are amazing. Mike. Welcome to the six-figure creative podcast. Thank you for coming.

[00:07:16] Mike: Brian, it's a joy to be with you. And thanks for the beginner lesson in production with a 1, 2, 3 clap.

[00:07:21] Brian: Yeah.

[00:07:22] Mike: got the rhythm down.

[00:07:22] you know,

[00:07:23] Brian: Yeah. So, I mean, you have an entire book on systems called clockwork. And so we're big on systems ourselves and making sure we have checklists for everything. So whenever, whenever we have the option of, of reaching out to you and try and get you on the podcast, I was personally stoked as hell to get you on here because not only am I a fan of all your work, Chris is a huge fan of all your work.

[00:07:41] You've got tons of books for pretty much every stage of being in the entrepreneurial. And we've talked about many of your books on our podcasts before, but not only that, but you seem to hold this like high legendary regard as like this, this, this, I don't know what to say. You're you're like this perfect combination of like the guy next store, amazing entrepreneur, great teacher

[00:08:01] Mike: thought you were saying there's like legendary douche bag or something. I was

[00:08:04] Brian: no, no, no,

[00:08:05] Mike: ready for you to drop it.

[00:08:05] I was like,

[00:08:07] Brian: Let's it. And legendary douchebag, which

[00:08:09] Mike: I'm like, this is getting

[00:08:10] Brian: the company. No, no, no, no, but you're a little bit weird, which is what we love about you, because like we crave that sort of like uniqueness and, and so that's one of the, some of the stuff that I think we're going to

[00:08:21] Mike: I love it.

[00:08:22] Brian: just to really give our audience a few things just to take away. So they know who they're talking to or listening to on this podcast, Mike has built and sold two multi-million dollar companies. And I think you've built two more since then in that timeframe. And you have, I mean, do you have, I'm just gonna list your books off really quick for everyone.

[00:08:38] The toilet paper entrepreneur was your first book, toilet paper entrepreneur. And that's about building your first business. The pumpkin plan was one of my personal favorites. It's about how to grow fast and. The third book, a clockwork is about getting your time back. These may be out of order, but this is, this is just an intro to all your books.

[00:08:53] It's about getting your time back and building systems in your business. Profit first is your biggest book. I believe over a million readers. Yes. And it's about making more money. It's about making profit. And then you have a book called surge after that, which was about becoming the industry leader.

[00:09:07] And now you have another book coming out called get different, and that's about marketing your business. And I think that's really what we're going to settle in this interview is this. marketing. so just to kick things off here, I want to read just a short excerpt from the intro of your book that I think really sets the stage for the rest of this interview.

[00:09:22] And then I'm going to, I'm going to release you on this because you're the expert here. I don't want to be talking Marta talking too much, but you say this, you offer something, people need something. A lot of people will love, or at least something, a lot of people would love if they only knew. What good is your offer or your service in our, in our creative world?

[00:09:38] What good is your offer or your service? If no one knows it exists. The lack of marketing good, effective, different marketing is the driving reason for small business mediocrity and stunted growth, too many great products and services languish in obscurity. This is that speaking to the hearts of creative.

[00:09:56] So many of us are amazing at what we do,

[00:09:58] Mike: no one knows about it.

[00:09:59] Brian: Yes. Exactly. So let's, let's start from the very beginning of where you talk about it's your responsibility or your duty to market yourself.

[00:10:07] Mike: Yeah. I, I um, do you know, do conferences, thank God they're coming back. With this COVID situation being stabilized, I informally survey folks. I'll say Who in here, honestly, in some capacity is better than your competition really is better than the competition in some capacity or And every hand goes up and it should, small businesses in particular are more nimble. The owner has more vested in a successful outcome of serving the clients. Well, small businesses just general in general are better. And then I said, okay, if you're bending the competition, you have a and responsibility to market. accordingly Because the only thing that clients know about your business, the only experience they have until they do business with you is your marketing. but then I ask you, I say so, uh, so tell me how you market. I want to know like best practices here. and It's always the same thing, client referral, word of mouth, my website.

[00:10:59] And I'm like, oh my good. We're we're in deep trouble here client referral is wonderful. It's an acknowledgement that. your, Services, to creativity is extraordinary. They think so highly of you. They're referring you to the people that they know and trust that is the ultimate recommend. problem is you're at the whim of the customer to do marketing for you.

[00:11:20] So the day they say, I'm not going to market for you, or are they going to business or they stop liking you. You're screwed. So client referral, word of mouth, that type of stuff is icing on the cake, but it surely ain't the cake. You know, we need to some way to deliberately drive business toward ourselves, something that's noticeable.

[00:11:37] Something that represents who we are before they really know who.

[00:11:41] we are.

[00:11:41] Brian: you mentioned something about not just relying on word of mouth, what's so wrong with just relying on word of mouth. If, you know, as creatives, we, we don't, we're kind of allergic to marketing. It seems. So we just want to just let our clients tell everyone about us. What's so bad about. Relying on

[00:11:55] Mike: Yeah. So, so there's, there's no ability to throttle that one day you get two or three leads, like, oh my God, this is amazing. And then like a month later, it's like, why is no one sending me business? And. I'll tell you a typical experience that small business has around this lived. It was, I would go into these like panic service mode because I got two or three referrals in a short period.

[00:12:15] I felt great, but now I got to service it. So I'm not focusing on sales or anything. Then when the service would dry up. Cause I was done doing the work I had to do. then it was a panic. I need work badly. It was so unpredictable. I couldn't grow. I got, how do you hire people when you don't know when businesses coming or not?

[00:12:30] so that Prevents road. And if you're at the whim of your customers going to prohibit you from growing cause you, you, you have any ability to throttle it. I'm not saying ignore that stuff. It's wonderful. But again, it's the icing on the cake. We've got to find a way to deliberately drive leads as we desire, throttle it up, or if we want throttle it down, but to maintain constant stress.

[00:12:51] Brian: So, how do we go about doing that? Because I can speak from experience the feast or famine nature of being a freelancer as a creative it's. It's exactly what you said. You get a handful of leads one month and then you're dry for like two months. And you're like, I guess I'm going to go get a job

[00:13:06] Mike: Oh, God was just like the, the, the sword to the heart for freelancers and entrepreneurs. My wife, when I was struggling with so much my wife's like, you got to get a job. And I felt like she's kicked me

[00:13:16] in the nuts.

[00:13:17] And she did after that she was pissed She was pissed at. me. The how we go about it is first we look at what the industry does to market currently is it's usually considered industry best practices, and usually that's the least effective form of marketing.

[00:13:34] Now.

[00:13:34] Here's why, the human mind, I spent a lot of time studying this for this book is wired to actually to ignore our primary function of the mind is to prevent the of information because the vast majority of information is

[00:13:47] irrelevant. Or you look around your desk right now? or Wherever you're sitting.

[00:13:50] There's tons of stuff that could our attention. I got a purple pen. here. I could on for hours. Like about this pen. What's purple. Who invented the word? Purple? Why is the car look this way? Blah, blah, blah, blah. But my mind is designed to say,

[00:14:04] oh, irrelevant But our mind does allow three things through one are threats. So if some guy walks in here with a gun and by the way, I don't know if I told you guys I live in New Jersey. It's like a 50 50 here. Like someone will walk in with. a gun. If, if if a locked in with a gun, like they have my attention, It's very poor marketing though, because it's a threat. Meaning I'm going to either be in a combative mode, protect myself or run away, I'm not going to be The second mode

[00:14:29] is opportunity. So when an opportunity presents self, I was being with you guys and said, Hey, I want to tell you about my services. Here's a million dollars up on the table,

[00:14:38] so we can have a conversation. You will pay attention. But the risk now is because you may

[00:14:43] say, well, thanks for the million dollars. And You walk out the door, not interested and I've lost all that money, but there's a third way into our mind. And what it is through the

[00:14:51] unexpected. When something unexpected presents itself, The human mind is wired to pay absolute

[00:14:56] attention to It because it can be an opportunity or a threat. It needs to be evaluated. And the class example, examples, if we were meeting outside, maybe having a conversation

[00:15:05] like something wiggles in the grass, we're, we're paying attention we're jumping back is that could be a snake, but it could be someone turn the hose on. We don't know, but our mind focuses on that because our life depends.

[00:15:17] Well, this works with male and a male with marketing. And thinking of the male Like if you ever noticed, when you get junk mail, I'll quickly

[00:15:24] rifle through that stuff and throw in the recycle bin because our mind knows can be ignored. We move at this lightning speed, but sometimes there's something in the mail.

[00:15:32] an opportunity, a check and we stop, right? Oh, this is of interest. I'll open this

[00:15:38] one carefully stored away. Rare. Hopefully never, but there be a threat, May some white powder slips out. be like, oh,

[00:15:44] I got.

[00:15:46] Brian: Well, anthrax store

[00:15:47] Mike: You play annual anthrax.

[00:15:48] Exactly. it

[00:15:50] it happened. And then the third thing that does does work though, is unexpected mail. So you get that like box from someone And they go, well, did I order something? It triggers that curiosity. That's why they say lumpy mail is effective because it's

[00:16:02] different and unexpected invokes, curiosity,

[00:16:04] interest, and

[00:16:04] engagement in our marketing industry. Best practices kind of become ignorable.

[00:16:09] It's another purple.

[00:16:10] pen. What we

[00:16:11] do that? No one else is

[00:16:12] doing and doesn't to be grandiose just in small ways,

[00:16:15] Chris: So there's a quote, that really changed my life in pumpkin plan that I

[00:16:18] want to read. it's right on with this, it says the key to explosive growth is competing reasonably well in

[00:16:23] every area, your competitor competes in and then blowing them

[00:16:26] away in one category. It really is that simple be in the ballpark for everything you do, except for one

[00:16:32] thing for that one thing, swing for the fences.

[00:16:36] And man, that

[00:16:37] That is so cool. That was such a revelation to me. Because in my world, I was an audio as an audio mastering engineer, and we all just try to beat each other. And there's not a whole lot of like differentiation within that, within our, our industry as a whole. And it was just so cool and so liberating for me as a, as a troublemaker growing up to be like, wait, what he's given me permission to beat, like to disrupt and to be a bad guy, a bad kid, like.

[00:17:06] Mike: It's the best thing you can do. And I think the best part, Brian is it only needs to be one thing. It doesn't have to be everything. I think it's overwhelming saying you must be different. And Rick, while there's many things that are different. I do this. And we just I'll give you a hack that I don't think I included in that book, but this is a extraordinary hack.

[00:17:23] If you want more customers like your best customer. And I think all of us do go to your best customer and ask them one question, what am I doing? Right. this is a Jedi mind trick question. I'll give you an example. I used to be a computer services. That was my first business.

[00:17:38] And I would go out and do technical installs. My best client was a hedge fund. I said, what am I doing? Right. And they said, you know, our last computer took a full day to respond. We're a hedge fund where we trade stock. Our system goes down and we have backup systems, but we need to be up fast.

[00:17:53] You respond typically within three hours. What you do right is response time. Now here's the Jedi mind. trick Is not what you're doing, It's actually the number one thing you must improve because it's what your client is you on. That kind of, that guy says, watch how quickly you respond. And I like that you respond three hours.

[00:18:10] I also knew if I respond in a half hour, you'll be blown away. And that's exactly what I did. I started dispatching my technicians and I actually got to say dispatching technicians Cause I wasn't a technician. was myself. I would send myself out to a that was in the constant radius of. him. And if he called, I tell him the existing client, Hey, I got an emergency.

[00:18:29] I'll be back. As soon as I can, by half to head out to this, I started catering to him. He was blown away and started getting a reputation in the hedge fund industry for rapid response, because that was the number one factor judgment factor. The thing I'm doing right. That was the one thing that was my one differentiator.

[00:18:44] I was good at computers. I was good. Just but so is everybody else, but no one could beat the speed. I can get to site a and that's how I.

[00:18:53] Brian: So I actually, I actually want to mention something though. I actually separate in my brain like marketing and the quality of my work into two different areas, because this goes back to the quote. I mentioned at the beginning of this interview, where. You can be the best in the world at what you do. You could be the fastest responder, but if no one knows you exist, it doesn't matter.

[00:19:10] So let's, let's talk, let's go back to this this marketing conversation and talk through, like, how do you actually stand out as in your marketing? How do you stand out? Because, and you mentioned the differentiation thing. This really comes down to that's something we talk about all the time, which is differentiation.

[00:19:24] How does one differentiate? Because it's easier said than done.

[00:19:27] Mike: Totally. Totally. And, and Brian, I'm sorry, Chris. I called you Brian.

[00:19:30] I,

[00:19:30] Chris: Oh, it's okay.

[00:19:31] Mike: I feel like a total jerk now. I was like, oh,

[00:19:33] where are

[00:19:33] Chris: No, don't worry

[00:19:34] Mike: it's the worst interview ever. This guy is a douche

[00:19:38] bag.

[00:19:39] Brian: Well, we're just going to talk here at the end

[00:19:40] of the interview,

[00:19:40] Mike: So Chris, I'm sorry.

[00:19:41] Brian: It's okay. Whenever you leave,

[00:19:43] whenever you

[00:19:43] Chris: the apology though. Mike.

[00:19:45] Mike: so

[00:19:46] the, the, the way to stand out, the one you do is I look at other industries and do some R and D. D

[00:19:52] R D stands rip off and duplicate, you know, what, what other industries doing that you can steal into your industry? When became an author, the first thing I did I asked other authors, how do you market? And they told me the best practices. I was like, okay, those are the things not to

[00:20:09] do.

[00:20:09] I mean, I'm not saying avoid them. In some cases, it's mandated that you have a listing on Amazon. Like, you know, everyone does. But I knew it wouldn't help me stand out and get know. So I looked what, other nurses were doing and I got invited to speak at a cleaning conference.

[00:20:23] So I the entire conference really as a guest and for a little bit. Well, one guy was like, oh, on the back of books, I put an 800 on the back of products. I put an number when someone's in the supermarket buying a cleaning product and they're on the fence about buying it. It says prerecorded message and 800 number. They will call that number. And we get about 50% of the people that call that buy the book or by the. product. Well, put it on my book. It's actually on the pumpkin plan, no longer active, but on the dust, Jack, I don't know if you have the

[00:20:50] dust jacket.

[00:20:51] Chris: I don't have the dust jacket. Ah,

[00:20:52] Mike: a Dasha in the back left. It said call the prerecorded message learn about this book.

[00:20:56] And This is when Amazon and bookstores were, were not being dominated yet by Amazon. So it was Barnes and Nobles and so forth. And people calling them.

[00:21:04] numbers That that started resulting in more sales. So step one is look outside your industry take ideas elsewhere and them into your.

[00:21:13] Chris: Is that is the entire purpose of this podcast. We were a podcast where people that worked in the music industry and we got, we grew like crazy. We got about as big as you could get and then industry. And then we read just re just relaunched as the six-figure creative. And so we talked to creative freelancers who provide services.

[00:21:31] That's our main audience got people outside of that as well. But the big pitch for this podcast is guys, we have to listen to other creatives because photographers are doing a better job than we are. Over in this area and videographers are doing a better job than we are in this area. And one of the things that our podcast did effectively is our entire industry didn't know what a CRM was

[00:21:52] until we start. So we, till we started this podcast, so we're talking CRM and we sound like wizards. I'm like, well, we just learned about it from other people.

[00:21:59] Brian: When you said, Mike, look at best practices in your industry. I really, I was thinking through this most creatives, a lot of industries don't have best practices at all. So really, if you do the bare metal. Differentiating yourself from a lot of people, at least in our world, which is kind of the advantage we have is we're not over.

[00:22:16] We're not like the business niche where it's so competitive and everyone's trying to stand out. It's, it's actually a lot easier to stand out in our world than it is in the other worlds. But I do want to touch on one something is that is look, it's great to learn from what Mike says, but go look at what Mike does.

[00:22:31] Go look at his website. Uh, Which is a great example. We have a link in our show notes page. It's a great example of differentiation. If you hover over all the photos of the hero photos at the top of your website, every book has its own unique photo. That kind of ties in with the theme of the book, your, your social proof photos are hilarious where everyone else might be in front of a Learjet and might be in front of these big celebrities.

[00:22:52] You literally have a photo of you watching Oprah on TV, and that says Mike's foot in front of Oprah. You in the crowd of 10,000 people. Like you circled this little tiny.

[00:23:01] Mike: The guy in the corner.

[00:23:02] Brian: the top corner

[00:23:02] and said, this is me shouting to Tony Robbins from across

[00:23:06] Mike: I love

[00:23:06] you.

[00:23:07] Brian: you're just doing all sorts of funny things to stand out, even in the footer of your website.

[00:23:11] You're like, if you love me, click here. If you hate me, click here. And the hate me thing links to like an anger managers. Thing on like some psychology website, like it's you do? I call it stupid, but it's like, it's clever. And it's funny. And it also builds you up as someone who's different in this really crowded business niche.

[00:23:26] And I think a lot of people can learn from that, that you, you're not afraid of looking maybe a little stupid, but it comes across it's completely uh,

[00:23:34] Mike: It was authentic. It's authentic. Thank you. You said the word afraid. I think that's the magic word. The reason most people don't market effectively is because afraid. It's ironic. We want to stand out by not standing out. We want to be differentiated without having to be different and they don't, they don't work. So there's a risk personnel is out there. And what are people going to say and listen to? This is a true story. So yesterday I'm doing a keynote at this event in Florida and afterwards, I went to the gym to like, do some, like running. Well ends up someone at conference is about 200 people in a room, came into the gym, didn't me there. And he was sitting, our ends up on

[00:24:10] the, running machine right in front of me. So his back is to me, he doesn't see me and he's just walking. He hops on a phone call and the phone call, he starts going through all the speakers. He's like, oh yeah, the speakers today. And he starts going through one after another.

[00:24:20] I'm like, oh I'm on this list here. And then he goes, oh, that Mike Michalowicz, it was fine. His energy was there, but

[00:24:27] you know, the is really. It was so funny, this critical feedback. But I think the power was when I was on stage there and the website you see, and I'm just, I'm just being me. And I also know that means some people will love it because like, oh, this is me and other people, like just fine. Or other people say he's a total freaking idiot, Unless put yourself out there authentically. two things are gonna happen. First of all, you're not going to polarize the audience.

[00:24:52] Therefore, no, one's going to care about you, but when people love you and people hate you, but people love you start rallying because there's people that hate So it's actually a great thing. You need that kind of bipolar thing. But the other thing too is like, it feels slimy. Like not is not being yourself.

[00:25:08] Like I, I never hung out with Oprah. If I, if I got a picture with her, like to put out the and things look me and Oprah hanging out for half a second at the step and picture. No, no. So I'm like th the reality is, I don't know Oprah. She has no clue who I am and never will. so let me let me make that very clear and for the right community, it resonates.

[00:25:28] And I like this. This is my guy.

[00:25:29] Brian: So, how do you balance, how do you balance being different without going too far? The other direction of, of just turning away people, because you're trying so hard to be.

[00:25:38] Mike: Great question. So, in the book at different, I write it out. There's an acronym. Dad is so, so simple to remember these answer differentiate. The second part of effective marketing is a must attract. Last stage is direct. must tell someone what action you want to take. Well, the attractor factor is, is the key. You to speak to what Target audience wants to hear what their problem is, what entertains or educates them, but it also must be aligned with you. So there's this concept out there called pivoting, and I want to call on it before you guys like, oh, I love pivoters now I call on pivot. And here's why pivoting tells us you have an offering, whatever it be, but customers aren't buying it to the level you need it purchased. So ask your customers what they want, adjust your offering to serve that

[00:26:20] customer. And if it's still not satisfied, keep until they're And by. That part makes sense. The problem is many people pivot into a business that they love. I hate what I do. I don't, I never intended to do this. So the argument is not

[00:26:34] to pivot, between align alignment saying true to ourselves while also adjusting to cater to customer demand, but still loving what we do, because yeah, here we go.

[00:26:44] The Lord Jesus says, do what you're called to do. I mean, you got to do this. is. You want customers that love you're doing what you love to do for them. They love you for that. And that community exists, but it requires us alignment. So in your marketing, you can put it out that way. The authentically yourself, admittedly, I accentuate my idiosyncrasies is a hard word to say, I them, but they are truly.

[00:27:11] The biggest compliment. And this is a technique you can do too, is to reach out to your past friends and say, Hey, is me to sound like me? Or even easier reach out to people you haven't talked to a long time and say, what are things you remember about me that made me different? Get the list of like from or 10 people.

[00:27:26] And you'll see your years of life, your true authentic friends will have the same assessment who you are five years ago and 10, 20 years ago. And that's who you should be today.

[00:27:35] Brian: All right. So you, you, you mentioned the dad framework, which has mentioned in your book, which I don't think I've just said the name of your book yet. Your book is called,

[00:27:43] Mike: Oh, check this out. I talk about, again, this is total marketing right here. Get

[00:27:46] Chris: Oh,

[00:27:46] my

[00:27:47] Brian: got the multicam.

[00:27:48] Mike: I got the whole thing going on. This guy

[00:27:51] is

[00:27:51] everywhere. So

[00:27:52] Brian: for true professional here. If you're watching this on YouTube, then you know what we're talking about.

[00:27:56] If you're listening on the podcast, then you

[00:27:57] need to go watch us on YouTube. Cause we're a video podcast now. Awesome. So that's the book and D a D was a different. Attract, but the third thing was direct. I'd love for you to touch on that a little bit. What does it mean by direct? So you've, you've differentiated, you've done something weird or wacky, but still within the framework of your audience, you've attracted them in your world.

[00:28:18] They're engaging with you in some way on social media or an ad or on content you've created now, what is the direct.

[00:28:25] Mike: As one, but we'll ask her, it doesn't have to be like weird or wacky. It just has to be unique and different. You can be the Uber professional in the market where everyone is the weirdo and wacky

[00:28:34] The last D stands for direct and direct is to specific, explicit direction telling the prospect exactly what to do. Now, the caveat here is it must be safe and reasonable meaning maybe I saw cars I can say, Hey, you know, give a hundred thousand dollars. Like at your dream car, you you'll be who who are you What? So if I'm a car salesperson, the next appropriate step that likely is get your permission to communicate with you.

[00:28:58] Let me. simply say, Would you be willing to give me your cell number? I'll send you pictures of the inventory we have now as new inventory comes in, everything matches your interests. You can just text me back and say, okay, it. Now I have that permission to market to you,

[00:29:10] And that's a safe, reasonable

[00:29:11] step. That was a balance here. I don't to move so slowly. I never get to the transaction. You buy the car elsewhere, but I don't want to go so quickly that you're overwhelmed

[00:29:19] and you get, go into a fight or flight state and get out of here

[00:29:23] and go somewhere else. So the direct stage. is it's kind of like the Goldilocks. It's gotta be just right at parge. you want to move the customer forward consistently and persistently toward the transaction,

[00:29:33] but not overwhelm them.

[00:29:35] Brian: I look at this a lot, like dating. I use that analogy a lot in these sorts of conversations. And this is where if you move to a cookie, you're going to scare the person off that you're trying to date. And if you move too slowly, you're going to be stuck in the friend zone for the rest of your life. So it's finding that balance between.

[00:29:49] Asking for the number, but not being so forward that they slap you in the face because you're just a creep.

[00:29:54] Mike: Right, right, exactly. Yeah. I haven't dated in so long. I don't even know what that

[00:29:58] dating is anymore. Honestly.

[00:30:02] Brian: Yeah. So Mike, is there anything else that we, we, we can chat about your book that, that is going to help our audience kind of decide whether it's going to be the book for them because we're huge fans of everything you've put out so far

[00:30:12] and we own most of your lives.

[00:30:13] Mike: Thank you. the last thing is, that marketing um, effective marketing is not a marketing

[00:30:18] plan. as much as marketing experiments that turn into. I think many business owners that I was studying, go in and say, well, everyone else is doing Facebook. Let start doing Facebook. and industry. best practice.

[00:30:27] That's dangerous and make this investment.

[00:30:29] And it just starts blowing out money and it's not serving them. Experiments are where we try out

[00:30:35] new marketing ideas at the smallest level, with the least investment of and money, just to see if it gets

[00:30:41] traction. There's a way to key it, meaning make

[00:30:43] sure that's working. And then once something works,

[00:30:45] we amplify But if it, doesn't work, this is an

[00:30:47] experiment not to

[00:30:48] do when you try some.

[00:30:49] Brian: Can you give an example of maybe one time

[00:30:51] where

[00:30:51] you'd try and experiment the didn't work at all. And then a time when you experimented and said, this is where I'm going to go on.

[00:30:56] Mike: Yeah. Well, yeah, I'll give you an example. here's one of them out right now.

[00:31:00] I'm going to find out if it works, I call it wifi. marketing. I noticed I was traveling, you know, recently again and, uh, notice

[00:31:07] that when I get on an airplane or in an event

[00:31:09] that they'll have the wifi for whatever airline you're on, but also someone will have a good joke password, like a joke, wifi access is the CIA or something. It's like oh, that's so funny. I was, it

[00:31:20] was the time it was funny, but now I see it all the time and I'm like, I get a little bit.

[00:31:23] facetious. I was like, oh, I bought an access point in a It literally costs about $25. And so I plugged it into his battery and I set my access point there's wifi access point to say, buy, get

[00:31:34] different on Amazon, Like the So you, you have more on an airplane. So I have this running, you hop on airplane and I see people going on there. Like, what is this? this isn't United,

[00:31:43] The whole airplane seen my bug. so th that's an active. IX. Yeah, thank you. That's an active experiment I'm doing. Um, people come up to me now and said, dude, do you know, this conference is promoting your book on the wifi network.

[00:31:56] I'm like, really? so

[00:31:57] Brian: I was going to ask you if you do that at

[00:31:58] conferences

[00:31:59] Mike: I can do it everywhere. Oh. So I walk into my bag before I, you know, in the morning before I speak and I go to the, AAV guy or gal and say, Hey, do you mind if I leave my bag Cause I'm one of the speakers like fine.

[00:32:09] Here's my wifi point access point. I'll tell you

[00:32:12] here, here's one that worked, went to a local gym here in our little

[00:32:16] town, in New

[00:32:16] Jersey. There's three little

[00:32:17] studio gyms for retail spaces. They have windows space. Everyone has a before and after pictures clients as practice.

[00:32:24] I'm like this, this will not work because it's a blur we don't see anymore. So I went to wise, Jim just said,

[00:32:29] will you be to try something

[00:32:30] different? And when we got them was the Funhouse mirrors that make you look like, you know, an alien. One that makes you look really short and squat. Another one, looks, it makes you look lean and tall. And on the short squat one, it says before the other one, says after we have a pace at above

[00:32:43] that, And now people are walking by and we love to see ourselves. So people are doing pictures, selfies

[00:32:49] in front of these, and there's a sign next just we just transformed you in mirrors. Let's do in real life, walk inside foot traffic is

[00:32:55] up.

[00:32:56] So that's experience.

[00:32:58] Brian: That's amazing. Well, everyone go check out the book, get different by Thank you so much for coming on the podcast.

[00:33:04] Mike: Brian. Thank you, Chris. Thank you.

[00:33:06] Chris: Thank you so much. This was

[00:33:07] so fun.

[00:33:08] Mike: guys are.

[00:33:08] Brian: So that is it for our interview with Mr. Mike Chris, what did you think? My man,

[00:33:13] Chris: I'm freaking swooning over here, man.

[00:33:16] Brian: Yeah, Chris didn't really say it on the interview, but he, this was a, this was a, a, a fan moment for

[00:33:22] Chris: Yeah, well, and not only that, but it rekindled my super fandom for him. You know, pumpkin plan was a book that really changed my life and I didn't want to be a debug and talk about it on the call with him today. I was on a, on a coaching call this morning, coaching someone through pumpkin, a piece of pumpkin plan and pumpkin.

[00:33:39] That's how I pronounced it as a kid is

[00:33:41] Brian: Pumpkin pumpkin plan. I'm sure Mike would love for you to tell it that way.

[00:33:46] Chris: But yeah. You know, it's funny, Brian, this reminds me of when we first started talking about this relaunch of the podcast, when I originally was thinking about this, I wasn't visualizing so many interviews and this was something that you pushed really hard, man. I'm having so much fun interviewing these people.

[00:34:04] Mike, there was like five or six brain explosion moments for me. And it's so interesting to be doing the podcast now as like a personal education thing, I'm learning so much so fast from these people that we interview. And I just want to do it every day. It's so fun.

[00:34:21] Brian: You got a pretty good look inside the mind of Mike Michalowicz. It's when he talks about the wifi marketing thing. Cause that's such an off the wall weird who would have thought of that? Yes, totally. Mike McCullough woods. Off the wall ideas, but I just love his approach because he's um, if you, if you ever, ever listen to any of his audio books, he always raised them and he's, he's, he's so fun in them.

[00:34:40] And so it makes it interesting to listen to, it's not just another business book that's boring. And like, first you do this and then you do that and then you do this. I don't know why I sound creepy when I say that, but yeah, so. Full disclosure. We haven't read this book yet because it's right now it's July and the book doesn't come out until September, but we've read enough of the material they gave us for this interview.

[00:34:58] And I have full confidence that the book will be amazing and be based on his past books cause profit first, man, we didn't really even get to talk about that at all, but that is like, that is like the bookkeeping Bible for a lot of businesses over a million readers for that book alone. So like, I, I just can't say enough good things about.

[00:35:15] Chris: What's funny is you mentioned his book clockwork about system. And I can't believe this. I had never heard of it. Then they, as a systems guy, like that's my bread and butter. I'm reading another book called systemology right now, but I'm going to read Mike's I'm going to read clock.

[00:35:29] Brian: So we, we recommend a bunch of books on this podcast. We're not gonna mention the others today because we had Mike on today. And so we're going to stick to Mike's books today, but there are other books that we have formerly pushed that help with systems. However, those are can be pretty dry books.

[00:35:43] So with Mike, you get a lot more storytelling, a lot more personality and that sort of stuff. So we didn't, we just like him because as creatives, I think we connect with that sort of weird type of personnel. And I'm not, when I say weird, I just wanna make sure no disrespect to Mike. Like when I say weird, it's a compliment,

[00:35:59] Chris: Yeah. The height of the highest order.

[00:36:01] Brian: Yeah. You don't get, you don't get many weird business owner type people, especially like at his level. So it's fun and refreshing to have that type of person, but it was cool to have him on the podcast. And some of the stories he told and, and honestly like what authors get on, like these book podcast tours, you don't get a whole lot of time with them.

[00:36:15] You get 30 minutes cut off in your, in to have to go. But like, I would love to talk for him for about two more

[00:36:20] Chris: Yeah. Seriously. He was just a bundle of joy.

[00:36:24] Brian: Yeah, so everyone go check out. Get different. If you look at the title of the book, you hear the title of the book. You think that's weird. It's because it's on purpose. Like it's the book, title is different on purpose because he talks about differentiation in that book. And I think it's gonna be helpful for a lot of creatives who struggle to stand out and, and I love what he said, how you don't have to be weird.

[00:36:43] You just have to be different, different doesn't mean weird. And there's something we didn't get to actually talk about on the interview. He talks about how being different. Isn't a one-time thing. It is a constant practice. And I think that I forget that sometimes, like I might set my ways and get a system in place.

[00:36:57] And then this is how I do things from now on. Straight out from that and try differentiating or innovating. And that's the danger you get as you get more and more entrenched in your business is getting stagnant and not pushing forward and doing new things. And then someone ups, someone else comes in with something new or different, or they do some twist on what you're doing and then they take it all away from me.

[00:37:16] So I, I just love to have this kind of reminder from someone like Mike to come on the podcast and kick my ass.

[00:37:20] Chris: Yeah. You know, I, I kept thinking this well, he talked about industry. Practices. And I thought about the different industries that I've worked in and how, especially in sort of the music industry, you notice that the best practice to set yourself apart is to not follow best practices. And that's hilarious.

[00:37:40] That's hilarious that I don't really think about this today. The word differentiate as on a coaching call today. And was just thinking about how challenging it is to get people to embrace this idea of differentiation. And then it sort of hit me like a ton of bricks that like the subject differentiation is a subject unto itself.

[00:37:57] And that's what Mike's book is about, is not taught in schools. It's antithetical to what a school does. A school's a system that teaches everybody the same stuff for the most part, until you get to the really, really, really high level. But man that's so that's so interesting one of the foundational aspects of business of, of entrepreneurship of capitalism is you provide a value that nobody else doesn't.

[00:38:21] So people hire you to provide that value. The only way for that to work is for you to provide value that nobody else does. And in order to do that, you have to flout best practices. You have to do something nobody else is doing. we need a moment, like a name for what that moment is. But I remember when I first had my idea for my mastering company, right?

[00:38:42] I had this, you know, before and after player and at the time nobody else had that, I searched the whole internet. Couldn't find anything like it. And I told one of my mentors about this idea of like, I'm gonna market myself with this before and after player, because people will be able to know what mastering is quickly and enjoy the process when they go on my website.

[00:39:01] And I'll never forget, my friend was like, that'll never be.

[00:39:04] Brian: What a good friend. Is he still your friend?

[00:39:07] Chris: yeah, we still talk every once in a while, but he was like, you know, an older guy uh, that had done a lot more than I had at the time. And I look back at that and I, I didn't, I didn't believe him. I didn't trust him.

[00:39:19] And I've got all kinds of authority issues based on a member of things in my life. And those were benefiting. The me to just be like, well, this guy who knows his stuff has told me I have a 0% chance of success. I don't agree. I'm going to do it anyways. Used to be a little crazy differentiate. And you have to be willing to put up with people who know what they're talking about.

[00:39:39] I'm doing air quotes here saying, well, that will never work because that's just not how quote unquote things are done. you just want to shake people and be like, go read history book. people doing things in a way that no one else has done them before is the way humanity has and will always move forward.

[00:39:57] It is the story of our

[00:39:58] species.

[00:39:58] Brian: So Mike and his book and the excerpt that I read, he, he has this part in it where he says, why do we gravitate towards the so-called tried and true marketing methods at the heart of it is a fear of standing out better is not better.

[00:40:13] Different is better. And I think he's, he's speaking. So much of what you just said there

[00:40:19] Chris: Brian read that one more time, dude.

[00:40:21] That's

[00:40:21] Brian: it's worth, yeah, it's worth repeating. So why do we gravitate towards the so-called tried and true marketing methods at the heart of it? It's a fear of standing out. Better's not better. Different is better.

[00:40:33] I think this goes back to, I think he talked about it early in the, in the interview, this like cave, caveman brain that we have where we. We ignore all these things. And so we can focus on like, what is actually important, like the sound of a tiger who's about to pounce on us or something. I don't know.

[00:40:49] That was an example. He, he said somewhere that I read her, he said, anyways, we also have this, this part of our caveman brains that, that fears being different for, for the potential that will be cast out of the. So we've talked about on the podcast before, where if, if someone, you know, wasn't being a good team player back in the day, you know, when we were in caves and small tribes that they would ask you, and it was as good as a death sentence because you couldn't survive without your tribe.

[00:41:14] And I think it says a similar type of fear we have now when we're trying to differentiate and trying to stand out that that fear holds us back because we don't want to be cast out from. Even though stepping away from the crowd and being what Mike said, polarizing is actually a good thing.

[00:41:31] Chris: Yeah. And I think this. I can an interesting idea here is that people spend a lot of time thinking about the psychology of marketing. Why does marketing work? W why do companies run commercials on TV and the internet? Because it works. I think what's more important as far as psychology and marketing goes.

[00:41:51] What's more interesting to me is what's going on with the psychology of why people with great services don't matter. That fear that he talked about, this fear of standing out and what you're talking about here, we're talking about some old school hardwired. Like this has been part of what it means to be a human for millennia, and now it doesn't make as much sense.

[00:42:11] It's not a survival advantage to blend in with the crowd. It's much more advantageous to stand out in some way. And I'm fascinated by that psychology, especially in regards to, you know, Mike talked about fighting. That you can, what were the three things that you can grab someone's attention with? Something that's dangerous, something that's an opportunity and something that's surprising.

[00:42:34] and that's so interesting because that not, I'm not going to like talk about this for 10 minutes, Brian. Cause I know you'll edit it out,

[00:42:41] Brian: Oh, well, I mean, we're, we're, the guests is gone. You can talk as long as you want now.

[00:42:44] Chris: But yeah, th that's what he's talking about is something that I've spent so much time on over the course of the last year now. As I learned about PTSD, PTSD is something, you know, he talks about the main purpose of the brain is to filter out irrelevant information.

[00:42:58] That is what sucks about PTSD is you don't filter out irrelevant information properly, and the irrelevant information triggers your fight or flight response.

[00:43:08] Brian: And I, and I imagine that also affects your ability to. Mentally get through certain fears you may have that are not based in.

[00:43:16] Chris: Absolutely.

[00:43:18] Brian: And, and, and specifically talking with your business, cause obviously like it affects your personal life, but also affects your business life and your marketing and the services you do.

[00:43:26] Like it can affect a lot of different areas. So that's why, you know, we'll be talking about mental health and some other things on some other episodes in the future, but it's definitely worth mentioning here. Fear can be based. It was from so many things from trauma, from something that somebody said to us in sixth grade, that, that stuck stuck with us forever.

[00:43:43] Like these are the sites types of things that hold us back as fully grown, mature adults that are still affected by that bullying third grade who punched us because we were being weird. Like that's, what's holding us back from being differentiate.

[00:43:56] Chris: You know, what's so annoying is we just spent like the whole weekend together in Nam and then you'd go and say something beautiful like that. And I want to give you a hug, but I'm like, that's what you just said. It sounds so simple. And it sounds like something you just want to gloss over like, oh, your childhood uh, still affects you to this day.

[00:44:13] Like look around you. That that is the whole freaking planet

[00:44:19] Brian: Yeah. There's a reason that there's a reason that when you talk to a psychologist, they immediately go to your childhood.

[00:44:24] Chris: Yeah. It's so powerful. And there, man, I tell you for me, as I've spent the last year and a half, my number one focus hands down has been my own mental health. And I am way beyond where I ever knew I could ever be from a mental health perspective. And my gosh, it's so liberating. Not just in my normal life, but when I go to and sit on it to work, the ability to recognize that's a distraction.

[00:44:47] Ooh, I'm doing that to feel better about myself

[00:44:49] Brian: and that's all we're talking about this now, because this perfectly ties into what Mike was talking about on this interview, where if you're trying to differentiate, but fear is holding you back from doing that. It might be time to do some self exploration to see why that fear is there, because it's there for a reason.

[00:45:04] And until you overcome. That until you've discovered what that reason is. It's going to be hard to get past it and different.

[00:45:12] Chris: Bingo. And let me say, I think the most important thing I've ever said on this entire podcast. The point of what Brian is saying is overcoming your fear. Doesn't mean learning how to effectively ignore it. Overcoming your fear means diving in and experiencing it and feeling it and understanding the why.

[00:45:30] And re-experiencing those emotions and processing them with an adult brain.

[00:45:35] Brian: Wow. Did you sound so woo right now? I mean, I don't know if I can listen to this podcast anymore.

[00:45:40] Chris: This, this saved my life, man.

[00:45:42] Brian: No, it's true. It's true. This is, this is not woo crap. This is like as entrepreneurs, we have to take our mental health seriously.

[00:45:48] Chris: As creatives, we have to take our mental health seriously. And I think for a lot of us as creatives, that the fear and these issues that we had as children drove us into the creative industries and they gave us that initial fuel, those that, that initial spark to begin to do awesome creative work, but that spark can also burn the whole house down. And that's where I think, understanding your own fear, getting into therapy, you know, if you've got lots of childhood stuff going on, EMDR therapy to me is just like, it gives me so much pleasure to just even say that when I know there's an audience listening of like, bro, that stuff is magical and it's fast and you get in there and you process so much more quickly than just like, tell me about how you feel about your mom.

[00:46:31] Like there's some psychedelic,

[00:46:33] Brian: That's where they that's where they like tickle the camera with feathers, right? ASMR?

[00:46:37] Chris: No, but that's, that's my next business. I'm going to be offering a SMR EDMR

[00:46:43] services. So that would actually probably work.

[00:46:47] Brian: Actually it might, I, you could just look.

[00:46:49] Chris: not doing that guys. I'm not,

[00:46:51] Brian: this is the sign. This is the sign to wrap this episode up.

[00:46:54] I think

[00:46:54] Chris: It's true. We've started talking about a

[00:46:57] snake. True snake oil.

[00:46:58] Brian: Yeah. True snake oil. Exactly. All right, man. We'll uh, we'll be back at you next Tuesday morning, bright and early at 6:00 AM for the next episode of the six figure creative podcast until then.

[00:47:08] Thank you so much for listening.