The Power of Connection

Jim Cathcart 00:05 Welcome to the Wisdom Parlor, a thoughtful discussion of important ideas among people who are committed to succeeding in life. This is a gathering of leaders from a variety of industries and our role here is to help you reach the top 1% of your field of choice. I'm Jim Cathcart, so come with me and let's discover how much more successful you could be. Speaker B 00:38 Welcome to the Catholic Art Institute Wisdom Council. We this is the official maiden voyage. We've done one previously, but this is up and running now. And today our topic in a little bit is going to be about finding the immediate revenue. We're going to get into that discussion. Along with that, we're also going to talk about the expectations and protocols for future Wisdom Parlor galleries that again, Jim calls them the parlor. So welcome to the parlor. Kick back, relax, get ready for a great time. So who is this mysterious Scott Jim Rich keeps referring to? By the way, my name is Rich Bontrager, more commonly known as the Trigger. I'll be hosting with Jim, but he's a best selling author of 23 books, hall of Fame speaker with over 3400 presentations worldwide. And by the way, he is the biggest coach encourager that you are going to have for 2023. Jim Cathcart, welcome to Center Stage. Jim Cathcart 01:32 Thank you so much, Rich. It's great to have Trigger on here. Triggered has his own podcast, plus he does podcasts for the National Speakers association and he's just got a big, big following. We have quite a mix of folks today. And let me, let me avoid all the usual startup stuff. I was looking for a way around that word because our colleague Patricia Fripps has never used that word. It's not specific, but I want to get straight to what is the Wisdom Parlor? First off, parlor is a intentional word. As some of you here know, I used to host for about four years or longer at Sherwood Country Club in California the Sherwood Parlor discussion series. And I would bring in that, I did 39 of those over about a four year period. And I would bring in people like, you'll see right here on this podcast, people who are at the top of their industry, top 1 percenters, you know, world leaders, business leaders, industry or profession icons, best selling authors, hall of famers and so forth. And I would bring in like an astronaut. One week I brought in Colonel Rich Serpos who was the captain of the space shuttle and he was our featured guest for the parlor. And of course everybody came to it at first thinking, well, this is a lecture series and they're going to sit back and watch the astronaut speak. But that's not what I did. I said, this is Sherwood Parlor. There are two rules. Since everybody in this room is a substantial person, there is more expertise in the room than there is in me or our guest tonight. So our guest is going to talk for about five minutes and then we're going to all talk. And the two rules are this one, this is your living room. Behave accordingly. Rule number two, be nice to each other. Now, our guest is. And I would start right in. That's about it. Today's topic is finding immediate revenue. So I don't know many people that. That would have trouble relating to that one. You know, it seems it's like Don Hudson, my colleague from Memphis, professional speaker and author, says. He Sundays. He says, J.C. you know what? There's very few problems that can't be solved by more sales. Well, isn't that the truth? There are very few problems in the world that can't be at least lightened by more revenue. So how do you find immediate revenue when you've got a business slump or when you've got a big expense that came up or something like that? How do you. Where do you look? Well, first off, ride the horse in the direction it's going. You know, there's some basic natural principles that apply here. And when I say ride the horse in the direction it's going, I mean, if you want to go from here to wherever and a horse is headed that way, horse being a metaphor for your business, of course, it's easier to ride the horse than it is to follow the horse. So in other words, swim downstream. It's easier than paddling against the current. Go in the direction that things are going. If you're looking for short term revenue, you may want to redirect that for the longer term. But for short term, figure out what's working right now and how can I turn that into more revenue? How can I make that a more reliable source of revenue? How can I turn something that's, say, someone's just helping you to someone's buying from you, Right? And it's also good if you're riding that horse to face in the direction the horse is going instead of facing backwards and saying, no, come on, this way. Right? So enough of the silly metaphor. Figure out what's working right now. Look at macro and look at micro. Which parts of my business are generating even pennies, Anything that is real close to a transaction and put more energy into and more attention onto those things. So for immediate revenue, look at what's working. Right. Second thing, look at who likes you. In other words, look at who's willing to help. I do. One of the things I cover in many of my speeches when I'm doing corporate keynotes or big events is I. I put up a slide of my friend Carl Klesig on a. On a mountain. And in the. In the slide, he is climbing the mountain, Tiwanaugh in the Grand Tetons. And he's got. On a red helmet, and he's got a rope from him going off camera down below him. And I show that to the audiences. I say, what do you see? And they say, mountain climber. And I say, what else? Red helmet. What else? Rope. Tell me about the rope. It's tight. What does that indicate? Somebody's down there. Exactly. There's always somebody on the other end of your rope, and you're always at the other end of somebody else's rope. In that instance, Carl Klesig was roped to Andy Watson. They were both climbing Tiwanaugh, and a few minutes before the photo was taken, Andy was up and Carl was down. And then they traded places going up the mountain. So there's always someone depending on you, and you're always dependent to some degree on somebody else. Figure out who's on the rope. So look at their strength as part of your strength. There's an old story that I use often that I got from Og Mandino, the author of Greatest Salesman in the World, among other books. He was a good friend of mine, and I told about a man who came out in his backyard one morning after a big storm the night before, and the storm had knocked a tree over, and it trapped his son. Son's bicycle under it. And so his son, like nine years old, is out there struggling like crazy to get his bike free and is not working. And his dad said, what are you doing? He said, my bike is stuck under this tree and I can't get it loose. And dad said, we'll use all your strength. So the boy pulled more and he put his back into it and, you know, veins popping out in his neck and just giving it everything he can. It's not moving. And he said, dad, I'm using all my strength. I can't get it. He said, son, you didn't use all your strength. You didn't ask me to help. Oh, yeah, I know it is. It's one of those concepts, but it's the truth. You see, your strength that's available to you is not just within you. It's within everyone. You care about and everyone who cares about you. And it's not selfish to ask for help. It's selfish to not ask. Literally selfish. Because it's all about self, and you're trying to get all the strength from only yourself. I've counseled many people over the years in their careers, and I've asked them, what is it you want to do? And invariably the theme that comes back often is, I just want to help people. Well, why would people want to do that? Because it's very satisfying to help people. It gives us a sense of meaning and purpose that when we help other people, is like the. The JCS Junior Chamber of Commerce in their creed that they recite at the beginning of every. Every one of their civic club meetings, the JC creed says that service to humanity is the best work of life. Isn't that the truth? So allowing other people to help you, not being needy, not being someone who doesn't use your own strength because you've got to help yourself first. But being willing to reach out and accept help graciously and gratefully from other people makes you that much stronger, because then you've got their support as well as yours. Last week, I was going through a webinar on Mastermind retreats because I do the Going Pro Mastermind retreat here in Austin, and then I do the Mastermind Summit toward the end of the year. And that's for the people who have graduated the Experts Academy process. And I bestow the certified professional expert on them at the Mastermind Summit. And that's a longer one in a more exotic location. So I wanted to learn how to do it better. And the thing that stood out to me as I was reviewing the notes from it this morning was where they said, the strength of the retreat in a Mastermind is not you. So forget about you. Just be a facilitator. The strength is in the group. When you assemble the right group for the kind of mastermind that you're going to hold, the power is in the group. And I realized that at Sherwood, because if I'd gone to Sherwood Country Club, where I was trying to meet other residents of the area and get known and accepted among them, this is back in the year 2000, 2 or 3, when I first moved there, I wanted to know more people in a more meaningful way. And so instead of doing the usual social dance at all the social member functions, I offered to host the parlor series. And sure enough, it worked. Some of the more thoughtful and serious people, substantial people at Sherwood, came to this pretty regularly. And the reason they kept coming back was because I didn't make it about me, I made it about them and the subject of the day. And so everybody felt like they were sort of a one of the featured guests. And we always talked about things that they found to be compelling. So that was a power that was available to me that happily I stumbled on the idea of using that power instead of trying to be that power. Well, the same thing's true in marketing. You want short term revenue. How do you get it? What's working? What does that mean? Who's already done business with you or currently doing business with you? Could you be of more service to them? Could you solve more problems for them than you're solving today? Could you bundle some of your services or your products in such a way that you were worth more to them? Not necessarily charging them more at first, but doing more for them? What I call up serving, I coined that term back in the, gosh, the late 80s, early 90s. And the idea of up serving, as opposed to, say, upselling is. Upselling is about a bigger transaction. You want fries with that? Up serving is out about bigger satisfaction. How can I cause this customer, this person to be more satisfied that they're doing business with me? How can I increase the quality and quantity and value of what I'm providing to them without charging them a thing extra? In doing that, the upsell seems to come automatically and you don't have to sell it because the more people are satisfied with you and, and what you're doing for them, and the more they trust you, the more they're open to your suggestions of ways you could help them even more. And the more they're. They alleviate what, suspend their skepticism about whether that's too expensive or not, because they can feel the value, not just see or hear it. Okay. One of the things that I talk about with, with a lot of my clients is we need to be a solution source. We need to. It's like when my Grandson Jason was 10 years old, I bought some business cards for him, and it was Cathcart Institute business card. You know, all the logos and everything. And it said, Jason Cathcart, now he's 10 years old, problem solver. And I gave that to him. I gave him a box of them. And he said, what? What are these? And I said, they're business cards. What's a business card? And I explained to him what it was used for. And he said, what's Jasonathcart.com? i said, that's your email address. I've assigned to you. What's email? And I had to explain that at the time. So anyway, everything got to be explained. The logo, the company name, the concept of a business card, an email. And then he said, why does it say I'm a problem solver? I said, because I've watched you, Jason, and you're very thoughtful. You seem to like fixing things. And I'll. I'll see you looking and listening, and, you know, I can tell something going on in your head. And then you put your hands on whatever it is, and you understand what to do with it better than other people do. I said, look at what you do with Transformers, which were the toy, the most popular toy of the day. He could take those things apart and put them back together, turn them into amazing things better than anybody in the room. And then when it got to Rubik's Cube, he could do that in a flash, even with his eyes shut sometimes. And because he could remember where the colors were. So the kids, amazing. And I called his mom, who's a school teacher. At the end of that day. I'd given him the cards for his 10th birthday at school during recess. And I called her, and I said, well, how did the business cards go over as Jason's 10th birthday present? She said, oh, my gosh, every kid in his school has one. He gave them out to everybody. I said, what happened when he gave them out? Well, he'd give it to someone and. Or show it to someone, and they'd say, what is that? And he'd have to explain what a business card was, and then he'd have to explain all the other things on it. Now, think with me, folks. This kid's 10 years old, so his brain has just now come fully online, because prior to age 10, there's parts of your brain that aren't even physically ready yet. So around age 10, your brain is ready. And the imprints made at your age 10, later, you can reflect on your own life that way, are deep, lasting imprints. So that's why I chose his 10th birthday to do this. How many times that day did he experience a re knowing of what a business card is, what a problem solver is, what Cathcart Institute is, what email is, and the fact that he was part of that organization. He must have given out 50 business cards that day. There were 200 in the box. Cost me 10 bucks or something like that through Insta Print. But that impression will last the rest of his life. And he sees himself as a problem solver, and of course, he is one. So that's cool too. Right? But that's what I'm saying. You look at how do you solve problems creatively for people so that they see you as a bigger solution and they're willing to spend more money with you. And then, of course, you can look at existing transactions and say, how much MLOT is there MLOT money left on table? How much money are you leaving on the table because you're not asking for enough? Many times you could ask for much more than you do, but you don't because you're timid about it, or you think the price would overwhelm them, or you think, gosh, I don't know if they're ready for that much. I might, you know, I might come across too pushy. You know, all the various reasons we use to diminish ourselves. You do that, and what happens is you get a smaller transaction than you could have had. A lot of times people in their own minds are thinking, yeah, yeah, okay, I'm in for. In for a pound, and you ask for a penny. You know, so that's. That's just some of my original thinking on this. And I want to throw it over to you, and I want you to, as we explore this, just offer an observation, suggestion, a twist on what we've been talking about. How do you find immediate revenue? How do the people who are watching and tuning into this later as well, how do they find immediate revenue? Speaker B 19:28 I've always got one for you, Jim. So I'll kind of get rolling here, and then we'll go to Amy here in one second. But you were talking about what's working right now and not fighting that stream. Jim Cathcart 19:40 Yeah. Speaker B 19:40 What do you see are some of the trends right now that maybe we should be paying attention that are helping to percolate just in general out there right now? What are the things that we have on the horizon that we should be probably more active with right now? Jim Cathcart 19:55 One of our speaker hall of Fame colleagues called me this morning and he said, jim, are you finding this to be true? He said, two months ago and a month ago, I was calling meeting, meeting and event organizers, people that would hire professional speakers, and I wouldn't get any return calls at all. And now all of a sudden, the floodgates have opened. So, you know, one thing is it's time of year when people are booking, confirming their engagements. And so when it comes to professional speakers and trainers and people that do what, what you and I do, Rich, there's more activity on that right now, and people are more open to it. But I've also read some of those recent reports where they've done extensive surveys of the marketplace. What topics are hot, what, what services are needed, you know, what kind of events are being booked, what fee levels are being dealt with and so forth. And that's available through the National Speakers Association. And we can also post it here if you've got a copy of that in your own files, Rich, we can. We can post that on the Mentor, the, you know, the Wisdom Parlor podcast site as we get going forward. Speaker B 21:16 Gotcha. Amy, I know you got a question. Camera's off. Jim Cathcart 21:19 Her hand up. And. And also Laban's got his hand up. Speaker B 21:22 I'm gonna see if we can get Amy in here. Jim Cathcart 21:24 So she's jumped on. Speaker C 21:24 Thank you so much, Rich. Yep. Go ahead, Jim, for inviting us to participate in this zoom. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity. And thank you for singing to me in Austin. When I met you last year, I wanted to address the question that you said, where do you find customers, your prospects, your clients? And I just wanted to offer this observation. We at our company go to the playground where our clients gather. We identify where that pool is, and then we put on our swimming gear and we go jump in the pool with our clients. So I wanted to offer that observation. Jim Cathcart 22:02 That's beautiful. Thank you. You know, every person has a natural market of the people they already know and have access to. And then we have chosen markets, ones that we decide. Like years ago, when I did that little program or little program, that long program with Sherwood Country Club, I decided to go after country clubs as a chosen market. I didn't have natural connections beyond Sherwood, but it was easy enough to make those. And that opened up some other doors for me and got me a great deal of other business because I just took what I was doing with them and took it on the road. I wrote an article about it and summarized, here was their problem, here were the approaches they were taking. Here was the solution I implemented with them. Here are the results we got, and here's how you can do that for yourself. And I published that, you know, as an article, as a. As a post on social media, and it got me more business inquiries, and I ended up more business doing what I was already doing. So look at your natural market. Does your family, do the people that you're directly, personally related to or by marriage related to, do they know what you do well enough that they could accurately describe it in a short paragraph? That's a great question. Speaker B 23:28 Even in my family, they don't know that well, so that's a great point, Jim. Jim Cathcart 23:32 Well, I found years ago, Rich, that some of my own cousins and closer acquaintances in the family had no clue what I was doing. And so I asked the ones who wanted to know if they would mind if I put them on my mailing list to just make sure they were in the distribution when I wrote a new book or achieved an award or did something cool. And. And they said yes. One of them, I started sending out before I asked their permission. And one of my cousins called and he said, will you stop? I'm not going to buy from you. Take me off your mailing list. I said, I was not trying to sell to you. I was merely trying to keep you informed. And you're off, so don't worry. Oh, Julie. Speaker B 24:17 Julie Furman. Julie Furman, come on down. You got a question? Jim Cathcart 24:21 There you go. Speaker C 24:22 Yeah, I just wanted to share that what always has worked for me, I'm in the personal services. I do matchmaking and dating coaching, and whenever I'm finding that I'm in a. Oh, my God, I need some revenue. I. I'll just design a really cool constant contact email newsletter and I'll specifically choose who I'm going to send it to. It never fails to generate whatever is I'm looking to generate. So we either have to have somebody on our team who's good at that or we got to get good at it ourselves. So we can just instantly, in lot more than an hour, throw some messages out there. Jim Cathcart 25:01 Very good. Thank you. And. And it helps to have your avatar in mind. Avatar being the, the ideal client for you. You know, like, for me, the. The avatar, I guess, would be for the experts Academy, would be a person between 45 and 60 years old who's already had some substantial success and they feel like they've got it, but it's not quite what they wanted it to be yet. And they feel like there's a whole lot more Runway left. And I call these people success seekers. And if they're not interested in going for the gold ring, you know, if they're not interested in reaching the top 1% of their niche, they're probably not my market. I mean, they could buy my books and, and listen to my recorded programs, that's fine, because that's designed for most anybody but my targeted chosen clients or people like yourselves who are kind of at the top of your game and you realize there's a lot more top available that you haven't yet tapped into, or you want a lot more peace of mind and a Lot less tension in going after it. And I, you know, that's what all of my mentorship is about. And that's why I call myself a mentor instead of a coach, because a coach is going to be much more giving assignments, watching you perform, giving you immediate feedback, correcting you, reminding you things like that, I'm not. I'm gonna be your little elf on the shelf, the guy sitting on your shoulder, Jiminy Cricket or. Or Yoda, the mentor, you know, who's advising you and said, no, don't go that way. You've. Others have done that, and it doesn't pay off. It's. It's a lot of flash, but not much payoff. Go this way. And so I save people money, I save them effort. I increase their faith in themselves to. To generate confidence, courage, and clarity. And that's the whole focus for me. Let's go to Julie. You had a comment? Speaker B 27:04 Sorry, I had. Laban. Jim Cathcart 27:06 Okay, Laban. Great, Jim. Speaker D 27:09 Thank you for having me. Jim Cathcart 27:10 Hello, everybody. Speaker D 27:11 Longtime listener, first time caller. I wanted to ask a question real quick because this has just happened to me in the last week, and it's very cool. If I'm going to. I'm going to give you two titles of who I've been and what I do. Jim Cathcart 27:29 Right. Speaker D 27:29 First one I held onto for about a year and a half, and I thought it was it. Nice to meet you. Hi, Laban. What do you do? I'm the world's best courage coach. Jim Cathcart 27:39 The world's best courage coach. Speaker D 27:42 Right. So that's the first one. Jim Cathcart 27:43 Okay. Speaker D 27:44 The second one is I get a list. Guess on podcasts, even if you don't Jim Cathcart 27:53 have a big audience. Speaker D 27:54 Quick show of hands, who would agree? The second statement is way more clear about how I can serve people. Jim Cathcart 28:03 Yep. That's close to unanimous. Yep. This is. Speaker D 28:07 This is the most epiphanous thing I've had. And the reason I wanted to share this. Right. Is that it took a beating over the head over the last couple of months from people that are far smarter than me in the space. To say, Laban, world's best courage coach is the fuel, but you didn't have a vehicle. And why that's important is that my revenue over the last 12, 18 months has been very inconsistent, and I was only able to take on coaching clients and do other stuff through brute force. I am a force of nature. Right? Jim Cathcart 28:38 You are indeed. Speaker D 28:40 Right. Jim Cathcart 28:41 And I think a lot of people Speaker D 28:42 in this room would agree that that's how they've been able to get income. It's just we're so, like, we have to get it done. But now the sense of effortlessness that's come over me in the last couple of weeks, I've realized I. And I'm not tied to this. And it's very humbling having to step away from it. But that for me has been an absolute game changer. So I just wanted to share that. Jim Cathcart 29:04 Thank you for that. Yeah. And your book. What's the title of your book? Laban bet on you. Bet on you. Hit Get a copy of his book. You will love it. And he proves the fact that he can justify claiming he's the world's best courage coach. And he'll show you how to get more courageous in what you do. And I love that book. When I think about world's best courage coach, I think that's about you. Even though it's saying what you do for others, it's about you. But this second one about getting world class guests, that's about them. And that's. That's a great, great hook right there. Okay, Julie's next. Speaker B 29:52 Here comes Julie. Jim Cathcart 29:54 There you go. Julie Blake, ready to unmute. Speaker B 29:58 You've got the power. You can do it. Speaker E 29:59 I have the power. Well, I don't want to, like, impose me. Magical unicorn thinking, however needy, is creepy. And so if you really need a client, people can feel that a mile away. So for me, what I do is I shift my energy. And how I do that is I first of all make a declaration that I actually am open and available for new clients, because that's not always the case for me. And so I have to check my energy because a lot of times I do very limited one on one. So I'm like, oh, I am open and available for clients. And then what I do is I shift my energy. And I usually do that by singing. Right. Because it can instantly just take me to another state. So I'll sing and get in a really good place. And then what I do is I just serve the person in front of me. It's really that simple. I just get into service and I say, I'll even sometimes ask, whose life can I light up? And I just literally will serve the person in front of me with no expectations, with no agenda, with no, I'm gonna pitch them anything. And then because I've shifted my energy and I am really just creating the value, then they really, truly just kind of magically find me. But, you know, I have gone and I've. This is what I'm available for. And I do have the structures in place of the, this is how you hire me. These are my ideal clients. And then it just kind of comes from that. And it, that's what I've learned. Jim Cathcart 31:32 So excellent. Thank you for that. And by the way, notice a common thread in the responses here. Personal contact, if you're not reaching out, like Cavett Robert, founder of the National Speakers association, said, you got to circulate if you want to percolate. Well, that's an old timey reference to a percolator coffee maker. But you, the point is, is well made, and that is that you've got to make personal contact. And the best contact is always going to be live for real, you know, face to face or the equivalent of it like this. So you got to be in touch with more people so that these messages and these impressions and that energy, that giving heart energy can be felt. And by the way, when you're feeling needy, worst time in the world to initiate a call, get into a different frame of mind before you initiate that call. Because like Julie said, needy is noticeable and desperation is, you know, it's like an odor in the room. You can, you can almost smell it. Because when someone's feeling desperate, if they stay in that mindset, they will chase away any prospects they had going into it. Because even people that are willing and eager to buy or do business with you at least will be repulsed by that underlying vibe of desperation. By the way, Gerhard, you had your hand up a moment ago. I'd love to hear your voice. Speaker B 33:09 There he is. Jim Cathcart 33:10 And there you go. Here I am. Thank you. Of the School of Management, California Lutheran University, from Austria. And he's got an Austrian contingent in the executive MBA program. Pretty super cool guy. And I've collaborated with him many, many times over the many years I've served on his advisory council. Well, thanks for the nice words, Jim and Rich, thanks for, for having me. It's a little intimidating to be in something that's called the Wisdom Council, and that's coming from the dean of a business school. Right. I. I just wanted to mention when, when Amy spoke, I was reminded of an old story that one of my favorite professors told. And that story was, you know, somebody's going home late at night from a bar and he sees somebody else who is on the ground looking for something. Right? And so I asked that person, what are you looking for? The person says, well, I'm looking for my car keys. And the other person says, well, where did you come from? And the guy says, I came from over there. He said, why are you not looking over There he says, well, this is where the street light is here. So I guess if, if you're not, if you're not selling, my lesson is right. If you're not selling, you're doing something wrong. Right. Speaker B 34:22 You know, you're looking in the wrong Jim Cathcart 34:24 place or you need to get better at looking. That's very good. Thank you for that. And that, that brings to mind another distinction. Marketing versus selling. A lot of people in the world are really comfortable with marketing and really uncomfortable with selling. See, marketing's purpose is to create awareness and stimulate interest. Let me say that again. To create awareness. I'm here. And stimulate interest. I'd like to know more about that. Okay, that doesn't generate revenue. Selling generates revenue. What is selling? Selling is converting the interest into transactions. What's the purpose of selling? To get the other people's money. No. To give them a good product. No. To make their life better at a profit. The purpose of selling is helping for pay make their life better somehow and earn a profit in doing so. So first you've got to be okay with the whole concept of profit in your mind. Otherwise you'll never ask full price and you'll always drop your fee until you get a yes. And that's not selling. You could make a kiosk do that. You could develop an app that would do that. Our car costs only $37,000. Sign up today. Person says, would you take 23? No, we really can't take 23. Well, how about 24? 25? Speaker C 36:07 Ding. Jim Cathcart 36:08 You know, you don't need humans for that. You could make software do that. Even, even a lame form of AI could do that. Selling is about showing value, conveying that you care, and helping that person solve a problem through your offer, whatever it happens to be. So I'm just reflecting on the. Where the light is. You know, that's just, that's hilarious gear. Speaker B 36:37 That's a great line. Jim Cathcart 36:38 But it's so absolutely true of so many people. So we got Craig T. Ingram on the line and he's got his own custom painting behind him, which is a pretty amazing big piece of art. I've seen it in his home and it was created custom for him. So how you doing? I'm good. Speaker F 36:59 Thanks for having invited me on this. This is really informative. And no matter how much you know, it's really good to have the reinforcement of this content. Right? Because we can find something and fine tune it or, or make a major adjustment either way. So to answer one of the questions about how do we find, you know, Our ideal client. And what do we say? One of the things that I do in, in most of the things that I do is I'll reach out to a CEO or, or a C level executive and let them know straight up, I'm not here to sell you anything, but I am here to solve a problem. And what I'd like to do is I'd like you to give me one of your problems to solve. And within two hours, either this week or next week, I would like to come back to you, show you how I solve that for you. And then if you're interested in bringing me on or an opportunity, then we can discuss long term or medium term supporting you as a consultant. Right. And seeing how I can relieve those bottlenecks and frustrations that you have in your business. Jim Cathcart 38:04 That's a great idea. Thank you for that, Craig. The, the idea of a trial run is a really good one because it's easy to say yes to, you know, let's dance before we get married. Right? You know, let's, let's date before we, we move in together. Let's something to get started on this. So give people an easy way. Like in my business, you know, my, my main business has now become the Experts Academy Mentorship. And that's a year long program that's got like, I don't know, 15 different entry points on it. And if you think of it like a pipeline and people who are brand new to me or at one end of the pipeline and people who have graduated into the role of full on professional partner with me in some way, you know, because they've been through all of my, my programs, they're at the other end. So what do I want them to do? I want them to enter the pipeline wherever meets their needs and stay in the pipeline until I've been able to help them in all the ways that need or want my help. So what are the entry points? Well, I've got free ones and I've got paid ones and I've got inexpensive ones and I've got more expensive ones. But just looking at mine, you go to free kind of an important word.cathcart.com free.cathcart.com what is that? Well, that leads you to a download of my book, what to do when you're the speaker. 54 lessons on how to do what professional speakers do. And it gives people an opportunity to watch a little video if they want and to sign up for, to schedule an actual strategy. Call with me to see if going pro or the Experts Academy Makes sense for them, but it's a free entry point and that's generated more business for me. I have my own publishing label, Cathcart Press, and Michael Butler's company, Beyond Publishing does the whole back end of that. And so if someone's got a book or wants to have a book or wants to co author a book with me or whatever, they go to book.cathcart.com and that gives them a video. 19 minute video on finding the book in you and turning it into a mega hit. And another little three minute video on how to be a best selling author, not merely have a best selling book, because there's a difference. One lasts the other ones once. And so I've got that and then I've got the Wisdom parlor. Wisdom Parlor is so that I can do what I do out loud in front of other people, with people I admire and enjoy, people that, that are my peeps. And, and if other people like that and they want my influence in their life, then they enroll in the, in the experts academy and I'm with them as long as it makes sense to be with them. Right. So think about your own pipeline in that way, the own, your own value chain of what you're able to do for people and say, okay, what can I do for free or little fee right now that would lead very soon to a transaction and that'll help you find more immediate revenue. The other day I was in a zoom call with Jeff Hazlett, the creator of the C Suite network. Jeff is an amazing, highly successful business leader. And what he said toward the end of that conversation stuck with me. He said, right now you are already connected in, you know, the social media and whatever the other ways people at our level, we're already connected to the people who can make all our lifetime dreams come true. We don't need new connections. We need better engagement with our existing connections and to expand the context of them and then keep adding new connections. But it's. But don't go looking over where the light's shining. Look where you drop the keys and that's in your existing connections. I'm gonna. Speaker B 42:30 Jim, I want. Jim, I want to jump in for a second before we go to Jody. Yeah, you're, you're saying something very magical, but I don't know if everyone always catches it. You're making more doorways to enter you at different entry level points. The more doorways, the more access. Not more clicks, not more button, not more pop up. But the easier access points, the greater the connection, the greater the Clients, Correct? Jim Cathcart 42:53 Yep. And always look at every transaction as the beginning of a chain of new things. So that's something I've been guilty of in the past. I would write an article and not put contact info in the, in the sub heading gad. You know, I would give a speech and not explain to people that there's more and here's how to get it. You know, I would, I would go to a speaking engagement and sell a bunch of books, but I wouldn't tell the people. A week from now, we're going to hold a webinar. And those of you who have the book, I'll walk you through it and show you the highest value items for you. I, I started offering more and I wrote a document I call my Service Commitment to you. And it's subtitled, here's what I'll do when I speak for you in preparation, on the way to the event, upon arrival at the event, during the event, in my presentation, after the event and after I get back home and I explain the whole process and all the things that I will do and the things that they want to be sure I don't do. Like, I won't share private information about your company or about you outside of the context of our work. I won't be rude to an audience member. I won't throw a hissy fit if, if my time gets cut short or things don't go my way. I won't turn my speech into a sales pitch trying to exploit your audience. You know, I put all those things in it and I send it to the client and they go, wow, I was going to ask about that. Right. So, you know, and that's available to anybody that wants it. Just drop me an email at jim@cathcart.com and I'll send a copy to you. I think. Lisa, is it, is it loaded into the, the web page for the Experts Academy? It is, yeah. So for those in the Experts Academy or going pro, which is the first stage of it at the Experts Academy Facebook page, which is an invitation only group page for those enrolled. It's on there. It's one of the documents in the files that you can download easily. Speaker B 45:08 Okay, Jodi, you're up next. Thanks for being patient. There you are. Jim Cathcart 45:12 Thank you. Speaker C 45:13 My first thought is passive income. Having an E course or ebook, something Speaker E 45:19 of that nature, lets you know who Speaker C 45:21 your audience is because they're already buying your course, they're already buying your book. And you can see how far they Speaker E 45:27 progressed and how serious they are. And some of those can be offered Speaker C 45:31 for free, but lead to others that are fee based. I also really like outsourcing. Speaker E 45:39 I don't always have to be the expert at everything. Speaker C 45:41 Sometimes I just need to outsource to the expert to save myself time. Time is money. Those are my thoughts that. Jim Cathcart 45:47 Beautiful thoughts. And what you're talking about is Swiss money. Now that's not the money in Switzerland. That is sales while I sleep soundly. So when you set up passive revenue, you know, then as long as they can buy it without you being physically involved with it, then you're able to establish a pipeline that allows you to have a flow of business going. Even when you're Jody on the golf course or Pamela or when you're down at the marina there in San Diego, you know, of whatever you're doing duet, you're out taking photographs on Molokai. So when you're doing that, there needs to be a way for people to do business with you, even if it's trivial business that at first seems like it doesn't generate much. Okay, Pamela, you're up next. Thanks. Speaker B 46:44 And Craig, thanks for rejoining us again at the power outage. Great to have you back. Jim Cathcart 46:48 Here's one of my wisdom council mentors. Pamela's worked with me off and. For decades. Speaker C 46:55 Yes. And, and I don't know if you remember, Jim, but it's been so great. So when you and I started working together, you may not recall, but it was. Are you going to ask me to be your client? Jim Cathcart 47:12 No, I don't remember. That's good. Speaker C 47:15 Yeah, yeah. And, and it's, it's really good because, you know, the best source of, of any kind of business is referral. And to this day I'm 85% referral, which is a good thing because I don't always remember to ask. But I'll tell you what I just created formally into 2023, which is the context of my year, is sharing care. Right? Sharing care. Like if we, if, if I come to something, that's context is in the background, it's kind of running the show. And if I hold that in place, then any dialogue I have is going to bring value. And any dialogue I have has the opportunity for someone to see for themselves where I might, might add a contribution. Jim Cathcart 48:05 I like that. I like that. Pamela came to me years ago. She had worked with Ken Blanchard and with his companies and with a number of other people. And I was in La Jolla, California, San Diego, and she came to me. We were talking and, and I could tell that having her in my life was going to make my life a whole lot more focused and much more effective. It plus I had a natural rapport with her, so I knew I would like working with her. And she served for at least a decade as my mentor who would come by every week or two, certainly every month, and meet with me privately and then meet with my staff members individually and keep us focused on what would move the needle. As John Mitchell, my friend, would say, it's so easy to get bogged down into making a perfect product that you never offer. You know, I could spend my whole life editing my next book, but it's kind of better to get it out there. So today I had a. I'm working on a new version of what used to be the Power Minute book. And it's, it's got 336 profound one minute ideas in it, but it's all structured around reaching the top 1% of your chosen market. And I'll show you a little graphic here in a second. The top 1% choosing a market and then figuring out what is the top 1% of that market and then identifying how to get there and what, what are the criteria that measures top 1% differently than the other 99. And it's totally doable. It may not be worth doing, but it's totally doable. You know, it's possible. If anybody's done it, it's possible for someone else to do it, and that could be you, but it might not be your strength, might not be your passion, might not fit your values. So you choose where you want to advance and you identify the path. And even if where you start is sweeping floors in that industry for somebody or being a delivery person at first, the fact that you're in it gets you around it. And you start understanding and speaking the language, and you start knowing the players and learning from them and seeing who to avoid and who to adhere to. And more and more, you become known as someone who knows, hey, that's Jim. He gets it. He knows who we are. You know, if you want some advice, get his help. And so that's what I did in, in preparing the next version of this is I put the whole focus on that aspect of it, and I call it Mentor Minutes, how to reach the top 1% of any field. And then I put, I got the, the other day yesterday I got a sample of the new cover and I thought, I, I don't want to sit in my dungeon and, and work on my archives. I want to get this out in the marketplace. So I put it out in private messages to many of you. I put it on Facebook just after that and then I put it on LinkedIn seeking feedback. And I've gotten close to a hundred comments on it already through social media today. And it happened after 10am Central Time today. Wow. Now that's good. And you got comments. That's nice, Jim. Someday you'll sell the book. No, no. The book's going to be out in March and I've already had many of those people say, where do I get my copy? So I've already generated some immediate revenue opportunities that can be converted as soon as they say, here's the link for pre ordering the book. So reach out. Speaker B 52:11 Julie's back with another question. Jim Cathcart 52:13 Okay. Speaker B 52:14 Welcome back. Speaker C 52:14 Yep. Jim Cathcart 52:15 Comment question. Speaker E 52:16 Well, I was just gonna say I went to this ten thousand dollar coaching prosperity school years ago and many of you know Steve Chandler, he, he doesn't do PowerPoints or anything. He just has the big huge white pad of paper and markers and he, this is the first thing he starts with and he draws this big huge circle and then he draws a letter C in the center and he says clients come from conversations. And so I just. And then he would draw a little X. Not from a Twitter, a tweet, not from a blog post, not from all of this. It comes from a conversation. And so I've used that model for 17 years now, enrolling high fee clients. And my social media is a desert because of that. And I just couldn't ever really justify putting all the time and the energy into social media because it was a high fee thing. But now that I'm changing my model, I'm seeing the need for it. And so how I figured out how to do things is I'll be like, okay, my high fee clients come from conversations and I'm building this empire to offer these services. So I just kind of balance out the time between a long tail, long term project and short term. So I just thought I would add that. Jim Cathcart 53:42 Thank you for that. Here you go. Number of conversations about solutions. You want a metric, the metric to measure every single day, measure the number of conversations you have with anybody about solutions you can offer. And if you increase that number, guaranteed your income is going to go up. If you're not afraid to ask for an order. That's good stuff. So we're coming right up on wrap up time here, Trigger. I did. So in our last four minutes. What do we need to be sure we cover and who has not offered a thought or a question that hasn't Speaker B 54:24 yet gotten their time so again, anyone that wants to hit that reaction button, jump on in. I got three key takeaways from today, Jim. I want to see if they match up to the overall arch that you got. Number one, you are the value. You as the expert, you are the value, not all the junk. You need to stand out. And you must be personal, as we just heard. Again. And I think some people have lost some of those three factors. Those are the three biggest takeaways that I've got from today. You're the value. You need to stand out more and you need to keep it personal. Jim Cathcart 54:57 Number four, use all your strength. Ask others to help. You've already got clients that would love to do more business with you or refer you to other people. Have you asked for referrals? Do you. Do you think that's greedy? You know, I think it's wonderful when someone says, hey, Jim, here's something I'm doing for clients now. Do you know anybody that might be interested in that? And the answer is always, no, I don't know anybody. But you know what, though? You might want to talk to Lisa David because. And next thing you know, here comes another. And. And while you're at it, hey, talk with Anathalis because Anna's doing something new and that might just right, you know, fit right in with what she's up to. So, yeah, and I'll keep thinking about that. And then you send them something that allows it makes it easy for them to represent you. Like when someone says, hey, send me something and I'll take this to my board of directors. Okay, send me something and I'll take this to my spouse, my board of directors, my whoever. If you do that, they have become your sales rep. Question, were they trained for that job? No. Were they equipped for that job? No. How much do you depend on how well they do that job? 100%. Hello. If they are in the position where they must be your sales rep, temporarily give them selling tools. Have a good brochure, a summary article item, an icon, a link or something, a video clip. Create one if you have to, whatever. Make it easy for them to do the handoff so that it's handed off with quality, not handed off in the way that so many things get handed off. Does that make sense? Speaker B 56:55 Oh, no, it makes perfect sense. Great. Summary. Final call for anyone that's got a question. Jim Cathcart 57:02 Attack on. I see Ramon on there and I haven't seen his face, but I know he's. I know he's lurking. Speaker B 57:08 Oh, I can see him smiling the whole time. And he's always digesting stuff. Jim Cathcart 57:11 I need to look at more of the gallery here to see some of those faces. All right. Well, anyway, I just want to welcome everybody and thank you for being here. There's Ramon. I was just saying good to be here. Speaker F 57:22 Great learning experience, but I think Laban Jim Cathcart 57:24 has his hand up. But good to be here. Speaker B 57:26 I will bring Laban back down and exit my stage here and take it away. Speaker D 57:31 I just wanted to acknowledge the, the state of this group. You may, you may not realize this, but there is some unbelievably brilliant people in this group. Everyone is in their own right. But Jim, I'm sure it's within the parameters of the group, like get to know some of these other mofos because there's some elite level human beings in this group. Jim Cathcart 57:53 For real. Truly. Yeah. That's the thing I said in the promo for this. This is a gathering of eagles. And people said ego. I said, no, not. Well, yeah, it is gathering of egos, but at the same time it's a gathering of the bird eagles. In other words, people at the top of their game, people who are substantial, people who have already made a difference in the world and are seeking to do more because they haven't run out of juice yet. And that's certainly me. And it, it, I know all of you and I can certainly feel that same thing in you. So I just want to thank all of you for being here and, and God bless you for being part of this. Every first Wednesday of every month is Wisdom Wednesday. And I'm going to be inviting more and more people from my, my broad range of, of contacts in all, all these higher levels of different fields and they're going to be with you on these calls in the future. So come back, bring friends. And we're getting. Those that are enrolled in the Experts Academy are going pro. If you've got a problem you want to bring to the group and get their opinions on it or an idea you want to run by them, as long as it can be done briefly, we'll make time for that. For the other observers and such. You know, they, they can make comments and that. But this is. The airtime is reserved for the Wisdom Council, those that I've invited, and for the people that have enrolled in the Going Pro or Experts Academy and that I've got a lengthy document that explains the Experts Academy. And that one is, is@cathcart.com Anyone? Anyone? Experts. Speaker C 59:43 Experts Academy. Jim Cathcart 59:44 Yeah, you don't even have to put academy, just experts. But there you go. Speaker B 59:50 That's all in the chance. So make sure you're good that Laban gets the final question. I think we're heading to the finish line, Jim. So here comes Laban. Jim Cathcart 59:57 One last comment. And that is for those in the Going Pro and the Experts Academy. That's this Friday at the same time, 2pm it's first Fridays of the month and that's a invitation only forum. But first Fridays of the month is Experts Academy. First Wednesdays of every month is Wisdom Parlor and you are part of Wisdom Parlor. So please come back. And last comments and then we'll have to wrap this up. Speaker D 60:27 The moment's kind of gone, but looking at Rich, Trigger, Craig and myself, we've got a few bull eagles flown around Jim, so I got a lot of Jim Cathcart 60:36 real estate up here that's exposed too. Speaker B 60:41 So Jim, what's your final thoughts? Wrap it up and bring it home for the day. Jim Cathcart 60:45 Final thought is Finding immediate revenue means giving immediate value. What problem can I solve? What value can I bring? What good feelings can I generate? What can what help can I be of immediately? And if it's worth paying for? Don't feel embarrassed to ask for compensation and never, ever initiate a sales call when you're feeling desperate. Work on your mindset first, then get in touch with someone who'll encourage you that make you feel better about yourself. And then get in touch with the person you're going to ask how you can serve them for pay. Thank you folks. You've made Wednesday wonderful and I hope we're all a little bit wiser as a result of this. Thank you for joining us today in the Wisdom Parlor, a thoughtful discussion of important ideas among people who are committed to succeeding in life. If you are committed to making more success happen in your own life, go right now to my website, free.cathcart.com and download my free ebook and then watch the video. If you decide, decide that you'd like my assistance in helping grow your success, then come with me and let's discover how much more successful you can be.