High-Trust Business Podcast

Most financial planning feels cold and technical. Heidi Ardis takes a different approach. She's the founder of Agape Wealth in Mississippi, and she's figured out something important: retirement isn't just about having enough money.

Heidi wrote Simplified Strategies for Retirees because she got tired of the industry jargon that confuses people. Her book is short, written in plain English, and starts conversations about what people actually want from their retirement years.

What makes this conversation different is how Heidi connects the technical stuff with the human side. She talks about why baby boomers struggle with identity after leaving work, how couples need to have financial discussions they're avoiding, and why starting early matters no matter your income level.

You'll hear how she built her practice serving churches and missionaries, why she's writing a series of financial books, and her approach to helping people think beyond just accumulating money to actually living the retirement they want.

Show notes: https://mrstuartbell.com/podcasts/htb/149-simplified-strategies-with-heidi-ardis/

About Heidi Ardis: Website | LinkedIn

Your Book Is Closer Than You Think — You already say everything that needs to be in your book. 90-Minute Books turns it into a done-for-you lead generation tool. Get the Free Book

Today on the Book More Show, we're talking with Mike Tassone, a seasoned producer and editor with over a decade of experience in content creation, about his new book "But What Should I Talk About?'

Mike has a diverse content creation background, and his current podcasting business always starts with the same question from clients... But what should I talk about? His book is the perfect example of addressing client questions head-on & using it to start conversations with people he can really help.

We had a great conversation about this approach and exploring the synergy between podcasting and book marketing, especially how they support each other in the journey to engage and keep potential leads engaged until they are ready to take the next step.

Mike's approach is in tune with ours, and the real win for the majority of business owners is not, how many listeners the show gets, but the opportunity to use if for all the authority, engagement, and door opening opprotunities it provides.

SHOW HIGHLIGHTS

(AI transcript provided as supporting material and may contain errors)

Stuart: Hey everyone, welcome back to another episode of the Book More show. It's Joe Bell here and today super excited podcast expert is in the house, mike Tasone. Mike, how are you doing?

Mike: buddy, awesome Thanks for having me today. It's a pleasure.

Stuart: It's a pleasure. This is going to be an interesting show because we've often talked about before this idea that a book is a fantastic lead captures, all that part of the beginning of the funnel, but then people struggle a little bit in the long term. Engagement with people, and therefore podcasts, have come up as a conversation in the past. Obviously, it's something that we're super excited about. We hear a lot of them across the group here, but this is something that you can help people with directly. So I'm really interested to get your take on the bridge between books and podcasts and then really how people can leverage the podcast opportunity into this idea of staying in front of people all the time. So let me start with a bit of background to introduce who you are and what the organization does.

Mike: Perfect. So my name is Mike Tasone. I've been a producer shooter editor. I'm based in Toronto, ontario, but I've been, I've kind of been able to go all over North America. I've been Western Canada, bahamas, all kind of encompassing the left side of the map, if you're looking at it out of map. So producer shooter editor, which means like the internet calls it it's a funny word but the internet calls it a predator. So, like I said, producer shooter, editor, and that means I've just kind of taught myself over the years how to shoot, how to edit, how to produce, how to create content. My experience spans about a decade. I started doing it. I was always a hobbyist. So since I was like seven or eight, my dad always showed up to birthday parties with the big RCA. You know the boombox camera.

And you know, with the VHS tapes and he had a little Fred Flintstone sticker on it. So it was, and I had like an obsession with cameras for as long as I can remember. But I was also a big sports guy, played hockey, football, everything kind of growing up. So those two loves were kind of like this for a really long time. And then when I got to Toronto I'm from a really small town in Northern Ontario close to St Marie, really rough went like a lot like those Philly winters, really rough winters. You know some hearty people will call them real in Northern Ontario, type, you know, type people.

And so when I moved to Toronto, it created this whole world. There was this entire new world that I just had no idea. I was used to, you know, going to football practice and then coming home making stupid little videos with my buddies. And then you get to Toronto and it was about 2010. And there was a little bit of an industry here which you can make money doing it. And I was pretty naive, I had no idea how to you know the internet remember Instagram was still like a photo sharing app, no tick tock. Youtube was still kind of you know, working itself out. So there was a lot of work in nightclub photography, which is a hilarious. You know, I don't even think it exists anymore.

Stuart: I would call it as a niche. Yeah, he was that. The promoters, the club owners, were using that as their mock. The punters wanted that picture taken.

Mike: No, it was. So what would happen is you would get hired to come in and do like a photo album or make a video of a DJ at a club, Right and yeah, and I had no idea, I just thought, oh, you're getting paid to play with your camera. We're cool, I'm all right with that. I'm trying to put myself through. I'm make money on the weekends, you know, supplements, some cash for those ever important textbooks that I may or may not have bought.

So I did that for about two or three years and that led me to some really cool spots. I was able to cover some really cool I mean, I'm not a big electronic music fan but, like I was able to cover a lot of really cool DJs that now are mega huge, that back in the day they were just, you know, at silly little nightclubs. But that got really boring really quick because it was the same it's the same thing over and over again, right, but the type of edits I was doing. It was really high, intense. You know I had it. I developed a skill set that was different than a lot of editors and a lot of shooters right.

Stuart: It wasn't the best niche because of the way that you kind of came up in my environment. It was very kind of your style match there Like EDM type.

Mike: Yeah, very, you know big crazy, you know edits that kind of made no sense, but they were loud and they looked sexy, and so so I played football at my university and when I stopped playing, the head coach a couple of years later had, you know, had approached the, I guess, the media department and he wanted to make like a I don't know if you've heard of the series hard knocks.

Stuart: Yeah.

Mike: Yeah, he wanted something like that and me being an alumni of the team, sort of. I mean, I was around, I was.

Stuart: Overconnection and need the background.

Mike: Yeah, a little bit of a connection there with the background and knowing the sport inside and out. So I was like, well, I've got the skill set. I showed them my portfolio. It's not exactly sports, but I know sports in it inside and out. Right, created my own job at the school for three years. I followed the football team around. After that it kind of once again starving artists type stuff. I landed a contract at a bank here, kind of just making bank videos, and then the big my Mount Everest was. I got a job as a producer, shooter and editor at Canada's number one sports broadcasting company.

Stuart: So it would be like our.

Mike: ESPN and I was the first position of their kind. I shot, edited, whatever. And that's when I really I mean, I covered the Raptors when they won the first championship here in Canada, which was a highlight of my life. I have the thing right here, that's my media pass, like that was it for me, right? And then to bring it back, that's when I started getting introduced to podcasting and I was involved with three really big shows that were national number ones, number twos, you know, top 10, top fives.

And that's when I sort of under then COVID hit and the work from home phenomenon started happening and I've realized, wow, I can do podcasts from anywhere and this is a really cool thing to kind of be involved with. So, with you know, I got taught by some really good producers and then after that I started kind of going off of my own and that's sort of where I am now. I'm taking this experience and I created podcasts for a few people and it's kind of getting going now and but when you have that big time experience, you want to, like you know, help people out and make the most of it Right, particularly when you see that there's a desire out there.

Stuart: people want to do this and want to get there, but sometimes it's just the technical steps or the hurdles to get started that hold on the back. As we kind of sat here with knowledge in our heads. We just want to share it as much as possible.

Mike: You want to share it. It's funny because I've, over the last, it's been really picking up over the last three years. Obviously, right, everyone's like I need to get out there. And the types of conversations everyone's always afraid to just start it. That's number one. It's number one. Everyone's just afraid to start. And then they're afraid to start and they have no idea what to talk about. So that's where the book kind of thing came from. Or I'm like well, everyone keeps saying the same sentence what do I talk about? So I go well, let's dig into that. And then you know, through experiences and all that sort of, how I landed with this idea to do the do the book.

Stuart: So who are the target audience for? Is it mainly business owners or personalities or people who've got like a passion project? Is it one particular niche or is it just the niche is people who are interested in broadcasting?

Mike: I personally found that businesses can. There's a return not immediately, but there's a better opportunity for a return for a business to start something like this. Because I think if you're a personality, you know it's not that you can't, everyone can and it's a beautiful medium to do. But unless the goal is to become a comedian or a podcast, or you know the divorce lawyer that knows everything and you're the authority in the space, it's obviously incredibly difficult. It's like becoming a pro athlete. It's the same kind of thing, right.

But with businesses, the point isn't necessarily to have 10 million downloads. The point isn't necessarily to make money doing the podcast. The point, if you have a business, you already have an audience. You already have a bunch of people that like your product, like your service. So the point of it for a business is to create a perpetuating machine that you can just get your content out to people and speak to people directly. I don't think people understand how important it is to touch their audience directly. Right, we're doing. You know we have the newsletters and all that, which is great. That's what you should turn the podcast into. But the point of the podcast isn't to make money on the podcast. It's another marketing effort.

Stuart: And trying to get people to understand that.

And it's the same conversation as with the books, as the assets themselves. It's the conversation and the opportunity to, as you say, talk directly to the person who's reading it. That's where the real opportunity comes in. Nothing to do with book sales or podcast downloads or the likelihood of getting advertising revenue from it. All of these things are secondary. If the main job of work is keeping engaged to people who are going to become your clients and give you the hard to get money for the work that you actually do not get paid for, the advertising, for the opportunity to keep in conversation with people that idea Is that something that more people are starting to catch on to? It's not such a heavy lift to get people to understand, or is it still? People come and start the conversation with you thinking that this is advertising wherever you'll make money from the podcast itself and you've really got to educate them into their bigger opportunities.

Mike: All of the conversations are trying to get people to understand what their podcast is going to look like. Because, if you think about it, the only podcasts that we know of are the super successful ones. I don't even want to say the names, because it's podcast. It's a podcast full pop. To say the names of the big dogs, right, but everybody just knows the famous ones and the big ones.

So when I say to an owner of a car dealership or a real estate agent, oh, a podcast would be a great idea, they seem to not understand. Well, what would I bring? What would my podcast even look like? I only know of XYZ podcasts. So what would mine even look like? It's like well, the point is, if you're a real estate agent, you're a highly localized, that's a highly localized sector for you, especially if you're a real estate agent. So if you show up as the authority in the space in your area by talking about it every day, by giving people tips, tricks, interest rate, you know mortgage, whatever people are going to come to you when it's time to get a mortgage, because they know, oh, this guy talks about it every day. I'm going to go to. I'm going to go to Stuart. Stuart talks about mortgages every day. Why wouldn't I go to him when it's time to get him Right, so that it's trying to get people to understand? You don't have to hop on and talk about nothing. Your podcast 10 minutes, right? It doesn't?

Stuart: that is. It's such an interesting point, isn't it? Because when you think about one of the traditional broadcast type of where the show is the product, they have to be a certain length and the delivery is the entertainment within the product itself, within the show, because the show is the product, the product is the show. If the show is the excuse to share something of value, but broadly stay in touch and give people a clear call to action of how they can engage more, take that next step, the level of content. It takes the pressure off so much because you're not trying to produce something that's entertaining.

So right, hopefully it is entertaining so right turned off by it, but it doesn't have to be. It just takes away a whole level of pressure. We had an example with. It was a real estate example which brings to mind. So part of the real estate education piece that we teach in that space is this idea of a flagship broadcast, a regular communication, and for real estate, an easy way of doing it is what we call a market watch report. So just every week talk about what's come on the market this week and just bring some engagement to as the market's changing. So this idea of market watch. So there was one real estate we worked with I mean over 10 years now, up in the northeast, up by main, manchester, boston. So he had been sending out the market watch every week. He decided I'm going to purchase the list Anyone who hasn't responded or opened it or whatever criteria we had not anyone who hasn't done that in two years, I'm going to take them off the list.

I'm just going to send to the people who have engaged In completely pointless why you'd make him some of the necessary judgment anyway.

And then about six months later got a call from a picked up a voicemail and he was at one of our events and played the voicemail and it was well read Hi, it's Bob here. I've been on your list for five or six years but I guess something must have happened with my email. Anyway I stopped receiving it. I had to phone around a couple of other agents in town to get your number, but anyway I've got it now. Hopefully this is you. Give me a call. I've got two beach properties to list.

Mike: Oh, wow, so okay.

Stuart: The properties were worth like $4 million across the two off and one of them was like how long was the site? The guy had to call other agents. I can imagine how that called went. Hi, it's Bobby. I'm looking to list my two beach properties. Do you have Kenny's phone number?

Mike: Yeah, I want this other guy, not you. I want this other guy, yeah.

Stuart: And then for Kenny to purge that list, thinking that someone wasn't engaged. But to bring it back to your point and the conversation we're having here, I can call it already when they're ready, and our job is to stay engaged with them until that point is for them. We can't tell when it is. They're not going to send us a letter ahead of time saying I'm going to be ready in a month or two.

We just need to keep being there, and it's a challenge as business owners Because you've got the day-to-day business to do. But doing a podcast where, if you've been in business for any length of time, it's easy to talk about your subject, you can bridge it into points of interest if you feel we need to do that as well. But this opportunity to create weekly or fortnightly unique content that can then be, which can multiplied in a whole host of other ways, it's by far the easiest and highest value thing that you can do, and even if no one ever listens to it, it doesn't matter because you're still an opportunity.

Mike: It doesn't, and that's another funny thing. It's funny that you say that because it doesn't matter really if anyone's really listening to it, because you're not trying to be a top five podcast, you're just trying to constantly have your hands out there and say listen, I'm here if you need right and if you want to buy that house, I'm here. If you want to join my gym, I'm here. Today we're going to talk about nutrition, but if you want to join, we're also here. And I mean I'd like to say that people are starting to come around to that. I'm still.

There's still people out there that are just like well, who's going to listen? And they want to get the ROI and get into the stats and the minutia. I understand ROI and I understand investment and people want to get the return. But when you have something like that, that you can piece one episode let's say you do for 20, I think I say this in the book but if you have a 20 minute episode, that's potentially 21 minute pieces of content that you can fire off and that's almost a month's worth of stuff that you just have to sit down and do once for 20 minutes and talk about something you love or like, at least right.

So it's very valuable. But I think people are still looking at the vanity metrics, the stuff that doesn't really matter. But if you can, if you just get out, get outside of that and understand you're just constantly out there massaging your audience. That's where the juices are with a podcast.

Stuart: The opportunities as well. So we talked about this in the book sense that there's a lot of additional value from having a book, this kind of societal value that's placed on the book as a product, which is maybe more than it deserves knowing how the, the sausage is actually made.

It's not rocket science, but there's a lot of presence from it, and I think the same goes for podcasts in the sense that it gives you a way to open doors with people that you wouldn't otherwise have opportunity to talk with. So if you are looking at establishing yourself as a stick with a real estate example because it's easy for everyone to conceptualize as a realtor if you were trying to talk to the, to talk to the planning committee, to talk to the restaurant owners, to position yourself as the not even so much as a trusted expert, but as the person who's bringing the trusted experts to the audience, opening those doors and having those conversations with people outside of podcasts is going to be a little bit tricky because people are busy. There's an element of people wanting to be guests on podcasts. There's an element of kind of people love being guests.

Yeah, tickles the parts of them, the ego part of them, that allows them to just turn up and take some pressure off and turn up as the expert and be presented that way, but you as the host being the person who's doing that, connecting quite a different story than trying to recreate that same amount of energy and content and goodwill through any other medium. I mean trying to write that type of stuff or go out and video it like a news news segment. All of that stuff is much more difficult than in a podcast. And then, of course, we get into the technological advances over the last 12 months of the distribution side of things. So the ability to create it in the first place is somewhat easier. Obviously, there's a slide in the scale there, but what you can do with it once it's created and people looking for a business based ROI, I mean, where else, like you say, would you be able to create 20 individual pieces of content from one seed piece? And that's just the first blush like loan code drilling down even further.

Mike: So yeah, this side sorry yeah, just on that point, because that's a great point you just made and it's not even the audio side of just having the chunk. It's like you can turn that into your. If you're a business owner, you know how important your email list is.

That's lifeblood for a lot of business owners, right, being able to tell the people that love you directly. Now, those 21-minute shorts yeah, that covers your TikTok and your Instagram and all that kind of stuff. But let's not forget, you can create an episode into a newsletter, which I think is we. I ran a podcast with I've talked about in the book, but I ran a podcast with a couple of guys who turned every episode into a newsletter and it was more in depth and the author of the newsletter drove in a little harder. You know what we can only cover in an hour. He really condensed it in, so, but it was about the episode as well. It was taken from the episode.

And then let's say you know, on a podcast you can only talk for so long. You can even turn that into a blog. And now you got another thing and throw that up on your website. So it's a great point that it's so juicy in what you can plug it into. It's just getting over the hump of like you don't have to be the next superstar comedian to start a podcast. You don't have to be. You just kind of have to be a brand that loves what you've got going on and throw a couple layers deep.

Stuart: I'm passionate for the subject. It's so interesting as well because once you separate the idea from okay, I've got to be. I'm competing with Joe Rogan, yeah.

Mike: Oh, you said the bit, you said the word, you said the word you said, the demons all come down again.

Stuart: Yeah, once you separate that, it's like books. I mean, no one's suggesting that it makes sense for a business owner to think that the only benefit they'll get from a book is competing with Tom Clancy or JK Rowling or Steve Walsh. I mean, it's the same delivery mechanism and you get some of the shined light from the medium, but the actual thing itself is completely different. One of the other things I like about the podcast idea and it ties in with the newsletter follow up, the mentions is that it ties in with books so well. So this idea of this kind of synergy, of having all of the individual assets that tie together into something much bigger. Again, sticking with a real estate example, you can imagine the real estate. What was the name of the little tenure from?

Susay Marie, so you can imagine being a real estate in Susay Marie and having the show that talks about living in Susay Marie and we're doing a highlight on the school and highlight on restaurants and there's a planning committee development going on over here. So bringing all of the local knowledge but then having the book that ties in with it, the living in Susay Marie, the guides living in Susay Marie, so on the podcast, then you can. A call to action on the podcast would be to get the book and then the newsletter or the blog post or everything that's created downstream links back to those two assets as their way to find out more. We often talk about the call to action on the back of the book covering the three groups of people the IHIC is one of the best and the people who are still in the gathering phase, the people who are interested to move forward, but aren't quite yet ready to reach out and engage you fully.

And then those people are ready to go now.

Three assets of the podcast being the perfect way of just gathering more information and passively following along with the journey until you're ready to move to the next stage. And then the book is a way of generating a little bit more interest or habit as the leading into the overall world and then the easy way to get started. It's such a collective, as I said, the synergy of collected assets bringing together and your book. Then, I guess what do I talk about? This first question that everyone's got that really solving the problem and getting people to think about it in a different way. That ties together perfectly with this kind of synergistic idea. Once you know, once you accept this idea of what you can talk about and that is relatively open-ended, with a small amount of effort up front to think about it, then the world just opens up. That was a long way of getting to the next stage.

Mike: Yeah, yeah, a long way of getting to the next stage.

Stuart: This idea of bridging people into okay, what do I talk about? And then helping them think about that slightly bigger picture. Is that relatively formulaic, in that there's some things that anyone can think about, or is it very much? People have to think about it case by case.

Mike: I got this example I believe I think it was Jim Rohn and he was in one of these marketing books. I forget. This stuff just pops up and it sticks in the brain. But he was talking about the pinwheel of marketing. So the pinwheel of marketing looks a little bit. Obviously it's not podcasting, but I was looking at it going.

Well, this kind of works with a podcast, because if you think of it like a pinwheel, the middle of the pinwheel is the thing you're trying to sell. That's the thing that you're selling, whether it's gym memberships, whether it's houses, whatever. The core competency of your business is the middle of that pinwheel. That's why you're in business, right, and Jim can't run without membership. You need membership dollars, you need someone to keep the lights on right. But then the ancillary thing is on top of it, where you get your momentum, because momentum in a podcast is more important than probably anything. Everyone fades it's a pod fading thing. Three months, everyone, 90% of them, go away, like because you get bored, you get tired, you go. Why aren't I famous yet? Why isn't Spotify here? It's, you know what I mean. So you need that momentum. So when you start adding so I sell memberships, well, it's a gym. So who comes to my gym? Well, people who are into nutrition, people who are into mental health, people who are into wellness.

When you think of a couple layers deep, you can start thinking about how I can get that pinwheel spinning so at least I get some momentum. So you have five topics and maybe you're on a weekly schedule. Now you have one topic every week for at least five weeks. That's about two months. That's about two months of podcasting that you can get through. You keep doing that enough times. Well then you're spinning and you're spinning and you're spinning, and then at least you can get up to cruising altitude and you can be consistent, because everybody quits when they don't want it to slog, and it will be a slog. It's always going to be a slog, but if we can just get people to that three month mark of like I've been doing this for three months, it's now part of my. So let's say, you're a manager and you do weekly meetings, it's now part. It's that ingrained into my habit.

The habit is formed and now you're just going to keep doing it and then you kind of don't care, because then you start going well, I'm having fun, so who cares? I'm having fun now. And maybe a six months down the road someone goes I really love that podcast, you do. I'm in the market to buy an apartment building you were talking something about. I know in the States there's like FHA loans and things like that. You were talking about that. You know, let's do some business right. It's that it's. I say it's that simple, it's not that simple.

Stuart: But it's right.

Mike: I think I say in the book like it's a simple execution wrapped in kind of a convoluted marketing effort. But if you can get your habits you know good habits built, then it's a self perpetuating machine that will keep going and going as long as you have energy for it.

Stuart: Yeah, that model. Actually it's a great way of thinking about it as well, because I think, thinking about a year's worth of podcasts of what we're going to talk about, this, like 50 new episodes that seems like a lot, but if you can break it down, so I love the idea that you were talking about there, the gym has four or five key components.

Mike: Yeah.

Stuart: That's only 12 in a year 12 nutrition podcasts, 12 fitness bodybuilding, 12 weight loss 12 case studies, client transformation stories.

That's much more achievable and not such a daunting prospect going into it. Once you start breaking it down and again, I'm a big fan of kind of like systems and frameworks and just defining the model and then just having to repeat it. Once you've got that broken down, then the people on the other end start getting used to what they're listening to. The model becomes familiar. There's an expectation of a familiarity of what they're about to expect and get from you, and then backing that up with the emails that have been sent out relating back to the shows, taking those chunks out and here's where you can go and find more. It just breaks it down into each piece. Being so much more by its side is then trying to visualize the whole kind of podcast marketing success.

Mike: And people get freaked out when, oh man, I've got to do all of this stuff. And, yes, you will eventually have to do talk the Instagram, the shorts, the YouTube shorts. You will eventually have to do that. But if you can get into a groove of rotating your topics and then what happens is you'll start to get good at rotating your topics and you'll slide in maybe a special episode or you'll in the gym example I gave in the book I was talking about how like a gym has you know this particular gym I was thinking of when I was writing?

It has about 400 members. Well, if you take all of their stories, that's 400 episodes that you can talk about and people will appreciate. Someone in there will have the same story as maybe 50 other people. Oh, you know what? I was a you know what? When I was younger I was a great athlete and then I just fell out of shape. But then I found the gym and you know the guys at the gym are so great. Well, there's probably 50 people out there that might have that same story. Oh, I remember when I used to. You know bench 260, whatever. I want to get back into it Now. You're the gym with the cool podcast that supports its owners or supports its members, and now you have this thing going again, right?

Stuart: no-transcript and it makes it so much more crystal. Like you were saying before, it's a connection with the audience. It's difficult to achieve through any other medium and if you can do it in a way that's sustainable and manageable, it's. We were on the show a few a couple of months ago now. We were with Paul Ross. He was a podiatrist, so he wrote he's written a couple of books actually, but one of them was called my Damn Toe Hood. So he was saying that people will come in and they're excited to see him because he's the person that wrote the books.

There's an element of connection and celebrity that's associated with it, and the same with podcasts. I listen to, I consume quite a lot of podcasts and there's definitely a feeling of knowing. It's a very one-sided relationship, but there's definitely a feeling of knowing the people. I mean we can get it with this show. People will come on board as clients, having listened to and done with the shows, and know the frameworks that we talk about. So not only is there a personal connection there, but they're also educated customers in the sense of they're on board because they resonate with the way that we do it. You're right.

In a specific way and it just makes the whole downstream connections and seamlessness of the rest of the relationship so much smoother, which wouldn't have happened without booking the podcast.

Mike: Right, it's cool because, like you can have, you can line up 10 other producers, 10 other shooters, 10 other editors, 10 other podcast guys, and they'll give you their own story or template and how they do it. And they're going to sit there and say I'm the, mine's the best because we get you to 10,000. Listen, what, like at some point, it's all commodity, it's whatever at some point. Right, you go with the person at this point because there's so many. I mean, I think I said there's about 2 million active podcasts right now, which isn't even that many If you consider there's like I don't know 10 billion websites, but there's 2 million active podcasts.

Like there's a lot of room there to to mess around and there's a lot of room to experiment. And when you realize what the execution of a podcast like you can only do it so many ways, you really can only flip on the mic, you can really only do. Like you can only do it so many ways. Nowadays, it's who's going to climb the mountain with you, who's the producer or the host or your social team, who's going to say you know what, we're going to put in one to three years and we're just going to go and we're going to see what happens. Like that's what you're looking for, more so now. A couple of years ago you were looking for who's the hackier guy who can hack the algorithm. If we post on Wednesdays at 2pm, we get more. You know what like that now I think it's irrelevant now, because it's irrelevant now.

Stuart: Yeah, it's such a move on space and, for the most, it's like SEO to a certain degree. Yes, there is some. There's some things that you can do wrong which would damage it.

Mike: Sure.

Stuart: But for the most part there's not that much that you can do. Extra that moves the needle a massive amount, unless you're willing to just bubble down completely down that route and really go very hard and then you can move the needle at the top end. But that thick middle of not doing anything wrong, a thick middle of we're all in the same ballpark and then it's expensive up at the top, like you say, that middle is where things naturally whether that bell curve type diagram it's that's where the thick middle is. And now you're not looking for tricks and tips, Now you're looking for how does this solicit can tie in with whatever else I'm doing and how much?

time I've got and the personality and the finding the people who you want to work with. It's not just one person you could work with. You could work with a number of people.

Mike: So you could work with many.

Stuart: Yeah, so find the person that you resonate with the best and really enjoy the process.

Mike: And that's the like if you could sit every business owner down and go. One rule of podcasting you have to enjoy this. This has to be like a fun marketing effort that you're doing to get your business out, to get your whatever out to the world and have some fun with it. If you don't like this, if this doesn't, if this isn't enjoyable to you, don't do it, because it's going to be brutal. It's going to be like I mean these, a lot of business owners. You've started something from nothing and you've started a business. It's the use that muscle with the podcast. If you can't connect that and you're you know you're pissed off after two months and you're like oh man, like 10 listens it's and then you want to quit doing it and you know how there's more of those people than people who are actually doing it. You're going to get frustrated, you're going to hate it, you're going to think it's useless. Why am? Why are we not making money off of it?

Stuart: The mindset has to be a little bit different these days across the board, right, it's a great point, because it's not the right fit for everyone Like we can come on here and talk for three hours about podcasts and books and the time the pod just fly by.

But if you're turning up to something that's a hassle, every time you're going to be looking for. Your brain, either consciously or subconsciously, is going to be looking for all of the reasons to quit and, I guess, not showing up missing a week. The download numbers aren't being what you want it to. No one's kind of reaching out and knocking on the door and giving you awards. All of those things are going to prove evidence to yourself that this isn't right, because you've already got that mindset.

Mike: Right.

Stuart: If you really love writing, you can't think of anything you'd rather do. Then just write. Don't try and force it into a podcast unless there's a passion there. Yeah, I think for most people it is the easiest way of getting seed content out there, because most business owners can talk about the thing that they're interested in and passionate about easier than anything else.

Mike: Yeah, agreed, and I think it's a lot more genuine to coming from a business owner, let's say, because you are the guy, you're the one who created the business, you're the one who you're already making money on. You're making money doing something that you like or love or good at it's like, why not talk about it and get other people stoked on doing it as well? Right, that's, it's only natural.

Stuart: Yeah, the other element to that is as well. It's surprising how no niche is too small, like when you start drilling into some of these random esoteric things that you even imagine had an audience. But in today's day and age there's a thousand people out there who are passionately engaged through it and you would be the person who kind of dominated that space because you're the person who's talking about it. I think as well in if you're of the mindset that this needs to be a top 10 podcast with 10,000 downloads every episode, that's a high bar to hit. But if you instead think, okay, this is my business or this is a part of my business, and I know that there's only 100 people out there in the world and only half of them ever listen to Pog, but if I'm talking to those 50 people, then that's success because that's who the audience is. It's not a comparative audience to something bigger. It's how much of the pie am I getting and engaging with Again, it just changes the dynamic so much.

Mike: And also, too, like, think about this right, If you have I don't know, let's, we'll call it 400 listeners a month. Right, If you have 400 listeners a month, imagine how cool it would be if you went downtown Philly and every Friday at 4pm, 400 people showed up to listen to you talk about something.

And it's no matter what 400 people, you're not going to notice the next week. If 410 come and 30 come, you're just going to show them go. Wow, I got. Look at this crowd, I got 400 people every week. That's that right there in itself is like 400, you know, 410 million, sure, huge disparity, huge disparity.

Stuart: It's so irrelevant to.

Mike: But it's irrelevant.

Stuart: Yeah, I think that's the. It's the blessing in the coercive where we are in technology and the access to markets. Like if you said 20 years ago that we could get you a full of 400 people, people would be ecstatic because they were. 20 years ago that volume was that was a decent number of people, but now, in a world where you just see headline numbers and Instagram, famous people and their followerships are kind of pushing people's faces that top tiny percentage is so disproportionately skewed to numbers and people's thinking of what success is to the long end of the spectrum.

Yeah, I think. One interesting way of thinking about it, though, as you mentioned before, is this newslet. Right there, I think we are going to see 150 episodes in.

I'd be better at my technique, so I was going to make a very certain point. Then that's completely gone out of hand. I was going to talk oh, you were talking about the newslet, so this idea of return on investment. So with the books and the clients that we're talking to, with the podcast and the people that you're talking to, it's majoritably business owners with the main job of work of engaging more clients. There's some people on the edge that don't have to read, but the main chunk of these are the people who we're talking to.

And if you could say to someone if from having a conversation once a week with someone, it translated into three clients a year, would that be successful? And most people would probably say yes, because the majority of us are in slightly higher ticket. We're not in commodity businesses where it's very low volume, low cost, high volume, turn out and stuff. We're not selling candies at a checkout and just need volume. It's slightly higher. So three people a year. You would probably accept that if you were joining like a, not a, mentoring a community, a network.

Yeah, yeah, networking. If you joined a local networking group in Toronto then and they said, well, you'll probably get an average three clients a year comfortably, you probably think that was successful. And a podcast is easier to do, it's more convenient, reach, far more legacy and longevity than something like that. Not so equal, but it's different. But this real expectation of the kind of softer benefits and not nothing to do with download numbers, but turning into real connections with real people, I think, like with the book, the same, all of these same conversations we're having or arguments we're making, applies to a book as well and, like we said, in fact the synergy of both of them together it is even better. But yeah, this idea of a more realistic expectation on what success looks like and what is a good, realistic return, it's very easy to take the case that a podcast is a valuable, valuable thing to do.

Mike: I would say so simply, and I mean, you know, as a podcast producer, to people like, if I'm working with someone, right, it's obviously a long-term relationship, and with long-term relationship comes the long-term cost, and I know that and they know that and everybody knows that right. So there's producers out there who understand that, oh, this is a long-term thing, right, that is where it's the producer's job to take someone after six months and go hey man, you know what, this podcast may not be a good idea for you, it may not be the best idea. Say, you're doing something and not only the numbers are bad, but maybe they're not the best podcaster, they have low energy, they clearly don't want to show up. It's also producer's job to be like hey man, I love the ongoing price structure, but I got to tell you this probably isn't helping you as much as it should be.

So I would caveat yes, it is a long-term thing, but as a producer and also as a host, kind of have to have that buffer of like is this actually working? Hopefully I'm working with someone that has my best as the host, my best interest in mind as a producer. You got to have the show in mind as well, because it's very easy to go. Oh man, I got this guy on the hook for a year, for two years. You have to also have a governance process of. Is this the best thing that this person could be doing?

Because at the end of the day, it's a marketing effort. Really it's just a fun marketing effort.

Stuart: And that actually is a great point, as people are comparing who they could be working with, given that there's choice the idea of picking someone to work with who sees it as a marketing effort and not sees it as an entertainment effort. They're not working with a producer who's excited about twiddling the knobs and getting the sound right and putting in a music bed and trying to NPR it to maybe win some awards. That's not as valuable as someone who sees it as a marketing tool and is telling you hey, listen these, looking back at the shows, these particular types of guests have had way more. They've been received much better than these other types. So maybe they've doubled down on that.

Or I noticed that you're not sending the email out about the show. Do you really need to do that? Or here's some clips that we've extracted from the show, some sound bites from social media. Push those into the channel and have those as more market tools. So not all producers are created equal in terms of not only their skills and what they bring to it, but the positioning and the job of working, the outcome that you can be trying to get as a marketing effort as opposed to an entertainment product effort.

Mike: Right, and here's where everyone's going to turn off the podcast right now. Your first hundred episodes to be garbage anyway or your first 50 episodes are going to be bad anyway. So it doesn't matter if your audio is tight, it doesn't matter. You know, try to obviously make a good effort.

There's something to be said for making it look at least like you care a little bit, but you don't. You can't get too caught up in like man. I got to have this particular mic. I got to use this one. I got to have this mic arm. I got to make the background look. Yes, make a solid effort. Obviously, make it look like you're putting life into it, but once again everyone's hitting the stop button. Your first 50 episodes at least are not going to be that fantastic. And that's just. The sky's blue, the grass is green. It just is what it is. And if you can get over that you'll have.

If you can get, if you can understand that you will have a lot more success than thinking I need the five hundred dollar mic, I need the ten thousand dollar set. It'll be a lot easier of a process as we get going.

Stuart: Yeah, and that's it. I mean, you see, we see it with the book business, our competitors out. There's a number of competitors out there who are very prerative. They're very high prices and for the job of work, of what someone has out of the marketing tour, that's a big long return on the investment. If you're spending thirty thousand dollars on a project as opposed to three thousand.

And yeah, yeah the same with you. If someone's spending five grand on equipment just to even put the first show out there, that's a big hurdle to overcome before it's even moving. Before you even see anything, yeah, before you even see any type of anything.

Mike: you have a fifty thousand dollar set up and now you're getting angry because you're like oh, in a month, hey man, I've got all this stuff. Why is?

Stuart: it only a hundred downloads.

Mike: No, it's not going to knock and no one wants to sign me. How come? Well, hey, man, you got to get, get fifty on your belt and then we'll talk about it. Yeah, or you know what I mean?

Stuart: Good thing, I mean the whole marketing conversation around it makes the numbers make so much more sense. So so, understanding that, even if the downloads are zero and all those fifty episodes, the website content of having fifty hours worth of unique on topic content on the website, the fact that as someone goes back and listens to the fifty percent, they're entering something in there, seeing the credibility of fifty previous ones, whether or not they listen to it or not, as you try to invite guests or open doors, this credibility of body of work that you've created already, even if the quality is not where you want it to be, it's it has a very definite marketing benefit, even if it doesn't have an entertainment benefit, if the show was the product, it's positioning as a marketing tool just makes all of the numbers make so much more sense in a much easier and an accessible way for people.

Mike: Yeah, they want to know that you love it. So they go to your YouTube page and they go oh wow, he's got four hundred episodes Like I've never heard of it. But that's great. It's visual confirmation, right.

It's just always treating himself. I say this in the book because I think it's. It's. It rings true, but as a business, you should look at yourself as a media company first, but media company one, and then, whatever you're selling, one be right. You can do that and position yourself as a media company, which means you have all of the things. You have the YouTube set up. Everything is populated. You look like you care about your social presence. People are going to initially it's just by Osmosis go. Oh, they obviously care about their product and their way of doing things. Let's see their story, let's talk about their, or let's come into their ecosystem and see what they're about.

Stuart: I think, like I said, understanding that it demonstrates that you care, both the minimum amount that you care about the thing that you're doing, but also right about the subjects and willing to put it out there, it goes a long way.

Mike: Yeah.

Stuart: I would say to people as we start the shows that I will go for half an hour.

Mike: And then we just keep going.

Stuart: Yeah, we're about 15 minutes in, so people appreciate their time. I want to make sure that people can get access to you and the book and more about what you do. So what's a good place for people to go to find more?

Mike: You can come to the website. So right now, I'm wrapping up the book now, so it will be for free. It's free, by the way. Everyone was listening. I don't want to make money off it, whether you work with me or not, it's just good information to get people in the mindset of you don't have to be Joe Rogan, you can, just you can be you and do what you need to do, so you can go out.

It's talkaboutbookcom. The name of the book is. What Should I Talk About? The website is wwwtalkaboutbookcom. And then I'm a casual. You know I'm a casual user of social media. I'm not a big social media guy. My Instagram handle is Mike the Mike the dot shooter. As in like shooter. I have a website, wwwforbokecom. That's sort of an old portfolio If people want to check out my more creative stuff. And then my LinkedIn is just Mike Tussoni, t-a-s-o-n-e. You can find me there. But if anyone's listening, go to the website. You can find me a lot easier there. If it's podcast related, that's probably a better place to reach me.

Stuart: And I think that's about it.

Yeah Well, we'll make sure that we put links to your LinkedIn profile and the websites as well on the show notes so, as people are listening, they can just click into the podcast player and the link will be there.

We'll check it out on their website, but I highly recommend going across.

I've obviously seen the book, the inside version of it, so well worth looking at if you've got any, even if the thought of having a podcast has entered your head, because it really does a great job of kind of getting over that first hurdle, as you mentioned. I don't know if you're going to be able to do that, but what do I talk about? So there's a lot of great advice and anecdotes and stories there with people who have kind of made that transition and, as I said, the link will be in the website link will be in the show notes so people can check out you and the services we offer and kind of follow up the conversation there. But, mike, it's been a pleasure, really good, to talk about this for hours more. It'll be interesting to get back on the show, maybe give it six months or so and see how the book lands and then how you've been using it and what that's translated to in terms of more conversations, that we can follow up with people and check them back in on the progress.

Mike: Perfect. Thanks for having me. It was a lot of fun.

Stuart: Fantastic Cheers, Mike. I appreciate it. Everyone thanks for listening, as always. As I say, check out the show notes and we will catch you in the next one.

Mike Tassone has spent over a decade creating content, from nightclub photography to covering the Raptors' championship run for Canada's biggest sports network. Now he helps business owners answer the question that stumps everyone: "But what should I talk about?"

His book tackles the same problem his podcast clients always bring him. It's a perfect example of turning your biggest client question into a conversation starter.

We talked about how podcasting and books work together as a content machine. Your book captures leads, your podcast keeps them engaged until they're ready to buy. Mike's approach matches ours: success isn't about listener numbers, it's about authority, engagement, and opening doors.

You'll walk away understanding how to treat yourself like a media company and why creating imperfect content beats waiting for perfection.

Show notes: https://mrstuartbell.com/podcasts/htb/148-what-to-talk-about-with-mike-tassone/

About Mike Tassone: Website | LinkedIn

30 Strategies to Build Your Business with a Book — The playbook behind 1,200+ books that start conversations and bring in clients. Yours free. Get a Free Copy

Today on the Book More Show, we have a great conversation with DeLayna & Leon Elliott, authors of ' 'The Power of OneNess-Winning in Marriage and Money. ' and Relationship and financial advisors

This discussion is fascinating, especially if your business and passion align. As financial advisors, DeLayna and Leon help families secure their financial future, but they are also passionate relationship coaches. Their book combines their expertise in these fields and is the perfect way to start a conversation with the people they can best help.

They know that taboos around financial conversations cause many failing relationships, and their approach is to uncover a unique approach by interweaving financial literacy with conversation and intimate relationship elements to create a holistic approach that empowers their clients.

Having been in business for more than 20 years, they know their financial products are the perfect fit for most clients they speak to about relationship counseling. It removes selling pressure and becomes one of many issues people are excited to resolve.

Their book is the perfect tool at the top of the funnel to help them identify new clients and support even more referrals.

SHOW HIGHLIGHTS

(AI transcript provided as supporting material and may contain errors)

Stuart: Hey everyone, welcome back to the Bookmore Show. It's Stuart Bell here and today, super excited, I'm joined by DeLayna and Leon Elliott, authors who just wrapped up the book. We had a strategy call last week maybe, so I'm really excited about sharing some of their story with you. So guys, welcome to the podcast, great to have you here.

DeLayna: Hi, it was good to be here. Thanks, Stuart.

Stuart: Fantastic. Okay. this is going to be a great episode. I love your story so much. I'm really excited to share some of the background with people and then we'll obviously move into the book and how we plan on using it. I think this is going to be one of those examples where I always recommend that people kind of Head over to follow the links and follow the story, but for you guys particularly, because you've got such an established presence and the book ties in so nicely with that, this is going to be a really interesting story for people to follow along with and see how the book ties in with the business.

Leon: Yes, Stuart, again, we just want to thank you for allowing us to be on your program on your podcast and it means a lot to us to be here with you. When we very first got started, we chatted for a little bit.

Stuart: I always apologize for people in check that they don't have a hard out because I sometimes. I think we said as, as we were talking, when I noticed that my voice gets really croaky, that's a sign I've been talking too long, but it's also a sign of the passion that you guys bring to it.

Leon: we've actually been, working with couples. For many years, and we actually started doing like conferences and events with married couples. We also work with singles that want to be married. We did marriage counseling or coaching. for many years, our background is ministry, church, if you will.

Stuart: And that's,I guess one thing I have to ask first is, DeLayna, do you remember the middle school experience in the same way? I've got visions of, I , I don't on know Spotlight on Leon as he's sauntering over .

DeLayna: I was a, actually, I was a cheerleader, Stewart, so he forgot to, put that little plug in.

Stuart: My wife and I think some people know the story. We were friends in the last year of college back in the 90s, and then our past kind of went different ways and then we always loosely stayed in touch, but she was over here in the States and I was back in the UK.

DeLayna: Okay, definitely. Yeah, right from the start. we knew we wanted to be professionals because I come from a single parent home, where my mother was the breadwinner and most, 74% of our community Stewart, are headed by black women that are the breadwinners.

Stuart: Was your experience the same, Leon?

Leon: Yes. basically what DeLayna is saying. I watched my grandparents raised me until I was about 12 years old. And I watched my grandmother. Put money away and put, make sure that the family was taking care of my grandfather would work, but my grandmother would take care of the money and everything.

Stuart: That generational split, assumedly they'd seen it from their parents, because you'd seen it from your grandparents, but something gets lost in translation and I always think that, I'm guessing that we're similar age. So at school in the UK in the 80s, there was like a, We would call it home economics class.

DeLayna: Yes, yeah, we had it here too. Home economics.

Stuart: I'm glad those words translate. Sometimes I'll say something and I can't quite make the translation quick enough.

DeLayna: Yeah, because people are living Stuart. they're just, they're in the grind, they get married and they think that understanding money is just going to come by osmosis, right?

Stuart: The, I guess that's a good transition into the book. So the book itself is called The Power of Oneness, which reflects the overall program. Those elements that are within that, so there's the communication, the financial and the intimate side of things. Is it a pretty even split, so the people who you help best, who resonate best with the programs, is it a pretty even split across all three of those elements of the stool or do, because of your financial background, is it more the financial element that people resonate with?

Leon: much a split between all of it because we want to make sure that, we cover the whole thing, but finances is a huge part of it because, marriage is split up mostly because of finance, they find that, they can get everything else right pretty much, but then they can't get on the same page with that money.

DeLayna: A wealth building tool. A wealth building tool. Never heard of that. Never heard of that.

Leon: although we've heard of stuff like cash value life insurance. Yeah, we've heard of it, but what does that mean?

Stuart: advantage? Even as professionals, you talk, come from the perspective of people actually in the industry, and there's still that stuff that isn't the central mainstream, the stuff that's slightly on the edge or isn't commonly talked about. Even as professionals, the people closest to it possibly, it was still something that's unclear.

DeLayna: that. Yeah, it's about empowerment. It's about knowledge. We wanted people to have a book, have something that they could, that's, relatable. Leanna and I tell our background, our stories, we don't talk a lot of tech. Techie, even though I am a technologist by, by, financial technologists as well, but we wanted to make sure that people had something in their hands, like I said, Leon and I've been doing power oneness conferences for years.

Stuart: The good thing about it is particularly when you're coming from a perspective of it's not like a hard close. no, Glenn Glammy, Glenn Ross, always be closing type sales pitch. The whole holistic approach is sharing the knowledge.

Leon: Most definitely. we wanted to start, in the book, we started out talking about communication. As one of the chapters is on communication. Communication is a two way street. and that,and then that, part of the book, we talk about, some of what the backgrounds are.

DeLayna: we are. Yeah, like I said, it's not just about a sale.

Stuart: girlfriend or whatever, that's such an interesting insight because I think there's so much, my wife's a kindergarten teacher in a Waldorf school. So over the summer, they had some, the staff had some, collected reading.

DeLayna: over 30 years.

Stuart: it just feels like a year, but it's actually been longer. So Lucy's the same. She's been teaching for 2027 years, so she's starting to see the children of people who were. In the community before. So anyway, long way of saying that generational change. Do you firsthand see that impact on the next generation down as the kids are responding to what the parents decided to do 30 years ago.

DeLayna: Yeah, we have children that are now grown. And they affectionately call us mom and dad, and they're so excited about thank you for helping my parents. One of, one of the families I'm real specifically in my mind thinking about right now, when he got his job and everything, he saw how we were helping his parents and he called, Leon, and he said, I just want to thank you so much because we have food in our cabinet.

Stuart: That's a great point as well. And a good way of switching into kind of, the more business side of the conversation, which is always difficult.

DeLayna: We do that to people. There's

Stuart: two camps of people who write the book. One who are coming to it purely from a kind of process point of view of it's lead generation. We want something that's effective. But really it's part of a campaign.

DeLayna: Yes, definitely a series.

Stuart: yeah. So this idea of how it fits into the bigger picture, was that pretty orchestrated? You've got a pretty clear. Idea now of how to use it and how to use it next rather than a kind of build it and they will come type approach.

DeLayna: Yeah, because we, we also do coaching, and so we saw that people would come in through our coaching, for marriage, for empowerment, do a lot of work with women,and,mind of their money, so they can understand that there's, is a mental aspect as well.

Stuart: pleasure. And I think that's the, when people come to us with the seed of the idea, the fact that we've done a thousand of these, we can just plug in a little bit of a tweak here and a direction here and a use case there and just help amplify.

DeLayna: for both parties, we don't have to feel like we're. selling you or convincing you. and then you don't have to feel like you're being sold. and so it's just, so it's just natural. It's like breathing.

Stuart: I'll switch gears slightly into the process. So for you guys, I think there was more of a, the, the seminars you've been doing were on message with the book and you've got years of experience of doing it in a particular way. Was there. The process of creating the book, we always talk about the work from the outside in.

Leon: team did a great job. first of all, helping us get an outline,

Stuart: yeah. I can imagine, I haven't listened back to the recordings, but I can imagine that as you were recording the content, just the level of energy and yes, yeah, it would have made a very kind of smooth and seamless process. You mentioned there, this idea of being a little bit all over the place.

DeLayna: is out of the

Leon: book. That is a

DeLayna: very good question. Yeah, Leon had to stop me from rewriting the book. Okay, DeLayna hits in. Okay, we'll cover that in the next book, because you want to tell everything you know you're so excited he is You understand the benefits and, what you want to give. and, and then I'm, I'm, Avid reader, so I wanted to make sure that all the grammar and everything was correct. And when I'm going through it, I'm like, Oh, this is so conversational. And,are people going to be, are they going to, are my academics, going to feel like this is too basic, And so then I said, okay, send, content is good. they can talk to us and coach with us. They know that we're real, they'll get it.

Stuart: And that's actually such an interesting point because. The idea of, a conversation starting book, a minimum effective book, is the anti book in a way. It's not this set in stone, typeset by monks, costs 100, 000, in a tone that people wouldn't recognize as you if you then spoke to them on the phone.

DeLayna: job.

Stuart: Exactly. And to what end the people who purchase or the whole marketplace for traditional books is to make money off the cover price of a book.

DeLayna: agree. Yeah, it's powerful experience. And I was in a mastermind book club and we were meeting every Saturday and we were talking and it's just great. And now we're published what, three months. Oh my gosh, it's powerful. The process is powerful. Now I would just implore anyone to get it.

Stuart: idea that you don't know, no plan survives contact with the enemy or what's the Mike Tyson line? Everyone's got a plan until I punched him in the face.

DeLayna: watch it on the next step. Two websites. We have Leon and DeLayna. com. That's Leon, L E O N A N D D E L A Y N A. com. and, yeah, Leon and DeLayna, Leon and DeLayna. com. And that's my little tagline, that's first. And then, the, the URL for the book would be powerofonenessbook. com.

Stuart: Yeah. And like I say, this example, both for people reading the book and consuming the information, because it's fantastically useful and, Mind expanding a little bit in terms of the approach that you take in and the breadth, but also joining along because of this tie in between the business and the seminar and what you do and what you promote in social media and all of the communications with what's in the book.

DeLayna: I think for my Engineers and technology people who don't, not necessarily looking at the relationship piece, world fidelity life is our financial services company here. And,Leon is right there.

Stuart: perfect. So we'll put a link to that as well.

DeLayna: Get to the money. Yeah.

Stuart: Yeah, we'll make sure that's there as well. Okay.

Leon: no, it's been great. I just I've enjoyed the whole process of putting the book together. It's been a dream of mine for oh, 20 plus years, to get this done.

Stuart: what I love. Thank you. Fantastic. guys, it's been an absolute pleasure. I enjoy it every time we get to talk.

DeLayna and Leon Elliott are middle school sweethearts who turned their passion for helping couples into a thriving business. They're both financial advisors and relationship coaches, and they've cracked the code on combining these two fields.

Their book "The Power of OneNess: Winning in Marriage and Money" tackles the taboo around financial conversations in relationships. After 20+ years in business, they know most couples struggle with money talks, and their approach weaves financial literacy together with communication and intimacy coaching.

What's brilliant about their strategy is how naturally their book leads to conversations they can solve through their financial practice. Instead of cold-calling prospects about life insurance or investment products, couples come to them already engaged and ready to work on the deeper issues their book addresses.

You'll hear how they use the book at the top of their funnel to identify ideal clients and generate referrals from people who want both relationship guidance and financial security.

Show notes: https://mrstuartbell.com/podcasts/htb/147-empowering-people-with-delayna-amp-leon-elliott/

About DeLayna & Leon Elliott: Website | LinkedIn

Is Your Book Ready to Collect Leads? — Most books sit on a shelf. This scorecard shows you if yours is set up to start conversations and bring in clients. Take the Scorecard

Today on the Book More Show, we have a great conversation with Phil Telpner, author of 'The GenX Guide to Financial Independence,' and owner and lead advisor of Breakout Private Wealth based in Illinois.

Phil has a great sense of who he can best help and the challenges they face. He starts by sharing his journey in finance and what inspired him to start his own company focused on providing tailored advice to meet the complex needs of Gen X families, especially women.

Understanding his target market helped him create his book to reach out and start conversations with these potential clients.

He emphasizes the book's purpose in initiating important conversations by helping readers feel understood and overcoming the inertia of taking their first step.

We had a great discussion on how books build meaningful relationships beyond lead generation, highlighting a book's role in referrals, connections and refining his messaging.

SHOW HIGHLIGHTS

(AI transcript provided as supporting material and may contain errors)

Stuart: Hey everyone, welcome back to another episode of the Bookmore show. It's Stuart here, and today joined by PhilTelpner. Phil, how are you doing?

Phil: I'm great Stuart. How are you?

Stuart: Fantastic, thank you. We were just talking before we hit record and there's some interesting elements around the idea of having a book that's going to come up. So my mind's racing a little bit thinking down that route. But let's start at the beginning and for people who don't know you and the background, why don't you share a little bit about yourself and the organization and then we'll kind of transition into the book world?

Phil:Of course, my name is Phil Telpner. I'm the owner and lead advisor at my wealth management firm, breakout Private Wealth. We serve the complex needs of Gen X families, specifically I suppose Gen X women. People think somewhere around 45 to 60 or so, right when life really gets complicated, and we'll go into some of that. Perhaps my story is I've been involved in finance, so to speak, my whole life, since I've been 18. First half of my career was as a member of the Chicago Board of Trade. I traded off the floor for a private fund. I did some other stuff was trained, classically trained.

I guess in this industry by big Wall Street firms Morgan.

Stuart: Stanley oh.

Phil: I shouldn't say that, but a couple big Wall. Street firms and, quite honestly, stored. It just came to a point where I was so constrained with the advice and way that I can impact and transform, take people from where they are, I suppose, to where they desire to be in that ecosystem sales driven. All that, and right about in the middle of the pandemic, I pretty much had enough and started my own company and I'm grateful that a lot of my clients followed, which is amazing, and we've been going strong.

Stuart: That's the issues and that traditional finance into machine and it can turn people up because it's a hard kind of high pressure environment that's constantly moving, but also, I think, as you identified, the ability to make that personal connection with people and really offer advice and guidance that's specifically tailored to them and not driven by the needs of either sales quotas or what was in scope or out of scope of what you're allowed to sell. It's very constrained and I think a lot of people don't realise customers this is don't realise they're looking at it from the outside, thinking that a financial advisor they just have seen that everyone is fiduciary without knowing what the term even means, which isn't the case.

Phil: Yeah, no, far from it. It's just it's impossible to provide the right kind of advice when your, I'll say book of business has almost 200 people in it. Some are retired, some are in their 80s, some are in their 20s or 30s, everywhere in between. It's very hard for me. I left work every day feeling I don't know sad's the right word but frustrated that I just wasn't able to go deep enough with the clients to, like I said, impact them the way that I wanted to. Yeah, and like, I guess, in layman's terms, it's about selling more stuff, and selling more stuff has no benefit to the successful outcomes of your clients, really doesn't.

Stuart: Particularly with the experience you've got. I mean, it's not like you want to two years into the career. So having a wealth of experience but not being able to execute on that, I can see why you took the decision to branch out by yourself.

Phil: Yeah, I wrestled with it for a long time and then, when COVID hit, I had 180 clients, most of them I didn't know, but then, all of a sudden, everybody wanted to know me. So while I did my best, it just reinforced the fact that you know, that's just not the business that I wanted to create for myself in order to really feel like it was a triage. It was like put a band-aid on it and move on.

Stuart: Move to the next one.

Phil:Yeah, yeah, it wasn't.

Stuart: You know, the ability to have thoughtful conversations, the ability to bring in subject matter, it just wasn't conducive to that Right, but you know, by yourself and kind of tying it in with the book which, as you mentioned, is the odd one. Maybe we didn't mention the title. The title is like the target group that you're working with, so the Gen X Guides of Financial Independence, that group of people you were talking about Gen X families, many female, that group as a target audience, as the group that you knew that you could help. The best was that intentional kind of you left the close the office door of the corporate world and open the other one, intentionally looking after those people. Or is that just what's transpired in the last couple of years and you found yourself doubling down in that group because perhaps it's something that's resonated or there's more, a better opportunity to help that group of people?

Phil:Great question. So, you know, sometimes, I think, when you're struggling or thinking about a niche, a lot of you know, a lot of times the niche is huge, no, and so a build on this niche and acquire clients, and all that is. I speak their language because, oh, that's me, I'm trying to. You know, career, marriage, aging parents, college, like you name it, and it all converges right at this time and it's overwhelming. It's overwhelming for anybody, and what happens when most people get overwhelmed is they do nothing. And unfortunately, we're too. I want to be careful, I want to say old, but we're too far along in our career where, like, doing nothing isn't an option.

Stuart: Right, the inevitable March of time. I think it's the same as financial services or retirement planning, particularly within that bigger genre. But that and the doctors that we've worked with, in some circumstances at least. Obviously they're also constrained with what they can and can't say. But both of those areas doing nothing and outcome is going to happen. Doing nothing is going to mean that it's probably the least beneficial one. Ideally, starting things 10 years ago would have been the best idea, but we are where we are today and nothing is a bad outcome.

Phil: But one of the things that started me kind of on this, because of the situation I was in, I would have conversations with somebody, let's say, 10 years past, where I, you know, they're like staring at retirement or whatever, and we're having these just very difficult conversations because their vision of what they want to do now that is not sustainable and of course I have to be the one to tell them that. And the real sad part behind that is, had I had them in my office seven, eight, nine, 10 years ago, we'd be popping champagne right. So you know, it got me thinking, just like. Well, you know, it is such a critical time and we can really make, like I said, such an impact on the trajectory of somebody's financial life, maybe even life, just at the time when they feel most overwhelmed and just for whatever reason, inertia or whatever, just don't quite raise their hand and say I need help.

Stuart: And that's the idea. So we often talk in terms of the books, about this job of work. What's the job of work that a book is doing and it's not? We're not. We're not selling books. Books aren't the product. We're not authors in the sense of fiction authors, where our career is around the books. So the job of work is doing something else and that doing is typically starting a conversation.

But it's very interesting to think about from the perspective of having identified in niche, understanding that group of people, understanding what their problems are and what's preventing them from getting the outcome that they want, and then writing something that starts that conversation. So the book itself isn't will of technical advice on stockpicking and the various different retirement options. It's really helping people identify and overcome the inertia, like you were saying, of raising the hand and taking that first step. So was that something that came naturally, as you were kind of working with the team to put the outline together, or did you start from the position of, okay, we need to share some technical stuff and people need to do X, Y and Z, but actually, as it turns out, it's a slightly different conversation?

Phil: Yeah, no, I had, I think, worked it out prior to us working together that I needed the book. I wanted the book to be there for people to identify and say, hey, this guy gets it. These are my oh, I'm feeling the same way and I'm not alone and oh, I think he can help me. Let me get some more information and that's the that I wanted to write the book like nobody's going to read or have any interest in. You know a 10 step plan to do a backdoor Roth or something. There's people you can do that, right.

Stuart: You can get.

Phil: Amazon, you can do all that. My goal for this was, like I said, to help people understand that. Number one, you're not alone. And number two, we work with a lot of these people. These are what we see, and all including what we have in our own life, Because, you know, I take off my advisor hat, I have a family and all these other things too, and that you know we can help. And if it's, you know, if that's not for you, then even better, totally cool.

Stuart: Right.

And number two because it's helps people identify who you can help and identify what the next steps are, who you resonate with, why they can resonate with you, identify themselves in the problems and the concerns that are raising and just start that comfortable journey.

It's interesting, I think the we always say to people in terms of the funnel, the campaign, and kind of identify people at the first level and then kind of sift and sort of the second level, rather than trying to filter people out too early. But that comes from the perspective of. It's such a subtle difference I'm trying to think of the best wording to describe it that almost comes from a scarcity perspective of people sometimes want to filter out what they perceive as the tire kickers. They don't want to waste time on people who they don't feel they can make the most or get the most value from, as opposed to going out there with something broad that is broadly applicable. But there is an element of self identifying and if not sifting and sorting is a right word, but identifying and that I think, is a good way of thinking about it, much better than I want to write something that excludes the people who I don't want. Instead write the thing that is broadly valuable to the group that you've identified. But then if people don't resonate, that's fine.

Phil:It's a subtle difference, but yeah, no, I think that makes sense and you know I'm not selling widgets so I don't need. You know, we run a very high touch practice. So, yeah, it is clearly not for everybody and that's totally cool, but for the people it is for Right, it very much is for it is for them, right.

The cool thing about that from a professional standpoint is those are really good people for the most part, and really good people attract other really good people, right, and it may business enjoyable work enjoyable Right. It makes me want to work forever and because it's very rewarding, far beyond the P and L of my business. It's very rewarding.

Stuart: I think that's all elements.

So oftentimes people will think of a book as kind of like a lead generation tool or a referral orchestrating tool and just think in terms of that kind of first level nuts and bolts of how it works in that campaign.

But there's so many subtle elements to the fact that it now exists, one of those being, if someone resonates with the content, by the time you actually get to a phone call or a zoom call, they come into an office I was talking to. We did a podcast probably a couple of months ago now, but Paul the podiatrist was saying that he'll have people come in the office and quote back to him the things that he was saying. So it was no longer the case that he was trying to tell people for the first time they should follow this procedure or take this wellness routine or be mindful of their feet in this situation in a particular way, but people were quoting back. So imagine the same thing is going to happen with you. It's not no longer you having meetings with people where the fact that you're approaching their retirement in a certain way is new or novel. The whole reason that they're there is because they resonate with the ideas that are in the book or in the follow up.

Phil: Well, that's Wicked Smart, I think the one I'll say book, but everything that comes around the book does the heavy lifting for you. For lack of a better word right and like we just spoke about those people, the invisible. Like they'll raise their hand and by the time that we talk, or they come in, or we grab a breakfast or whatever it is, they're already drinking the Kool-Aid, I guess for lack of a better term right there, already aligned with our values with our way that we run our practice, with the value.

I don't have to pull out a PowerPoint and like put people to sleep with PowerPoints about how much money you should save, or something like that.

Stuart: Yeah, that idea of rapport building, and there's a baseline expectation that anyone who's dealing with a professional services provider they're going to provide that service. There's no one makes a call to someone and with a question of what can you actually do? What you say to the assumption is that you're doing it. So the difference is then either nuance of approach or the report that you're building with them, and I think that's such a leading with the kind of an empathetic approach to here's some broader problems that you might be suffering with or things that you're looking to fix, and a number of those come down to a financial burden or lack of certainty or outstanding questions or concerns. But building that empathy first and going in with hey, we're on the same page, we're suffering from the same problem as here's how we've helped people just like you, that's the thing that builds the report and a book.

I was talking to someone yesterday saying that they were kind of cross shopping us with some of the organizations and I was saying to them we're absolutely not a publishing company. Although a book is the thing that you end up with, we're not a traditional publishing company in the sense that book sales or ownership or intellectual property or that we want to give all of this back to you and the reason is because we want this to be a living document that you can take and run with and develop and tweak and change as the business is or as the feedback that you get from those real people changes. So that opportunity to build that rapport that we have with the authors and people who are thinking about doing it again comes from wanting to make the most for the other people, just as you are with the clients.

Phil:That you're bringing in so well said. So, the one thing that I struggled with for a little bit was perfectionism, of course, right, and I finally got to the point where I was pretty confident it was about 80% or so, roughly of the way I wanted it. And then I just said you know, okay, yes, let's go right, and I think you know your point about being able to. So you know what I'll change it. It'll change a little bit based on conversations I have there. I might add some track, you know, and that's totally cool, you have to do it, you have to start right, right, I think that's what people. It's just hard for some people, I guess.

Stuart: And just as I didn't think about particularly thought by this before in this way, but it's come up through. This is why I love these conversations, because there's so many different perspectives and way of thinking about it in the live conversation and the idea that for your clients, the kind of the something that's holding the back from making those decisions either fear or lack of certainty or something around the process or procedure it's exactly the same for the people that we deal with. I mean hundreds and hundreds of people that we speak to, as I've had this idea for years but I've never got around to it. There's a lot of nuts and bolts and annoying little nuances that can trip you up and just you get stuck in the weeds and caught up. But one of the reasons why we intentionally keep the books, so we say to people quite clearly up front this isn't ghost writing.

We've got a very specific process that leads to the content, the main reasons we do it that way. Not only does it make the cost more accessible for people, but it brings your tone, your voice, your way of speaking. The nuance in the language that you use in the creation process comes through in the final product, which then ultimately comes through when people walk through the door and talk with you and it's that familiarity, that rapport building. It's such a again a subtle and kind of third or fourth tier difference. But the idea of having something that's 80% good enough, that gets out there and starts the conversation, I mean separate from the whole kind of readership levels out there and the fact that we're not writing these books for entertainment. We're writing these books to help people take the next step and whether they actually read it or whether they just skim it and jump on a call and who not higher over your shoulder there in the back, yeah, talking about perfectionism.

So I'm referenced in that book because there's a chapter about Dean, my business partner, and my name's mentioned in there. But I spell my name in the weird British way S T U A R T and in the book is S TE A R T S T W.

Phil:A R.

Stuart: T, I did not let in perfectionism stop you from putting out there. It's definitely a plus.

Phil: That's why it's up there. Because, number one, I got a. I'm in a back office, but like that mindset is so important, whether you're, you know, writing a book or hiring a financial advisor is like I work with. I only work with smart people, so are they capable of doing it themselves? Probably is that the way that they want to spend their valuable resource, which is time. You want to do all the all everything that we do for yourself and not go to your kids, game or play or dance or side. I'll have date night, hang out with the boy or whatever your other life is. We are not going to get along anyway. So you know. But for most of my clients, like just being able to know that we are taking care of it and that we're co creating this plan and ongoing discussions with them.

Stuart: And building that relationship over time.

I think that's the benefit.

So you bring in all of the expertise you've got from all of the years of background and distilling that into the thing that is the most beneficial for the particular group of people who've decided you can help the best and through the pages of the book they've identified themselves as having some of those problems.

The issues that are in there resonate with them. But to be able to distill all of that expertise into the thing that gets the result for them and then build that report over a longer time, I think that's another element of the book opportunity that is maybe not the one that people think about initially. So a lot of times people are thinking about the lead generation and having the book out there and people will identify and then join the path in. The conversation goes from there. But one of the more subtle opportunities is in referrals and having the book as a thing that existing clients can share with people who they hear talking about, talking about retirement issues or concerns or worries that they have and this whole idea of the book as gift giving and you're enabling your clients to be the hero to their friends by giving something of value, just creating something that has that downstream benefit. I think that's another more subtle element of, as I say, a second or third order element that's often overlooked.

Phil:Yeah, no, it's really. It's so interesting and I've spent some time on the marketing side of this so you know, having that tangible it's so important, probably in any business, I would guess for sure in a service business where, like, you're buying an outcome but that outcome isn't in 2024, most likely.

Stuart: Right.

Phil: Let's just say you're buying peace of mind, right, peace of mind is an overtime thing, right? And your comment on rapport couldn't be more spot on. And people forget. In my business, clients die, right, you know, maybe not the first phone call, but we're up there. Yeah, you know, things happen and divorce, all these life things that happen. We're on the front lines of all of those things. So, having that conversation, being able to have rapport, feeling comfortable with your advisor, knowing that you'll get a prompt return phone call, all these things are, you know, talk about like next level to the business, way more valuable than your asset allocation or something like that. That's table stakes at this point.

Stuart: That's the point, isn't it? It's table stakes because, especially as we're moving into a interesting time in history where the opportunity that AI provides to do a whole load of base level things across the board some of them, a lot of them, may be better than people could do, but the thing that is, it's the relationship side of things and the actual understanding, not the knowledge, but the way that knowledge is implemented. For many service businesses, that is going to be a key differentiator over the next three, four, five years, as things kind of stabilize, to whatever new reality turns out to be. And I think the opportunity to create something in a book, where a book has a different, there's a psychological humans attribute a psychological value to a book as opposed to a document on a screen. But to be able to create something like that in a way that shares your opinion and your values and for those people who it resonates with, that's the connection. There's such a big separator between the people who, I think, understand that and those who are maybe looking at AI as a shortcut to not do the work. That's not going to be successful for them.

There's going to be a whole load of baseline stuff that's just now out there. Like I wish you remember, there's a chart out there that shows the available hours of YouTube content since 2003,. Four whenever it started, and it just goes up into the trillions of areas of content. But if you were to have some kind of qualitative measure on that, not just a quantitative measure, that's going to be the same for content for everyone going forward.

So those people who, those business owners who do nothing, are just going to get left further behind, because the next group up, the people who do the minimum possible automatically generated stuff, which is still better than the current level, but it's still not quite as good as doing individual stuff. So do nothing to get left behind. Do the bare minimum of just automated stuff okay, maybe, keep up. But if you've got the opportunity to create something that really is making a personal connection with people and then use AI to kind of augment it and distribute it in a more effective way or create variations on the theme in a more effective way, because it's scalable. But this idea of authoring your ideas in your way, of presenting it, passing that to actual other real human beings, that, I think is going to be the separator over the next period.

Phil:I would agree 100%. There are certain things in life you need to be able to look somebody in the eye and have a conversation and understand somebody. And AI, like you said, for some things, I think in a lot of ways, the more people are going to rely on that, the more they're going to crave for AI to AI, personal connection. The further away we get away from personal connections, the more I think people feel disjointed, not connected. I mean, like, pick on Facebook, right, I mean it's trying to connect people, but do you really feel connected? Or when you go for a beer with somebody, do you feel connected? Right? Or for coffee, commenting on somebody's adorable kids is great, but it's not a substitute for, hey, let's go grab a cocktail or something like that, and we're humans. I mean, we need personal interaction, right, we need that.

Stuart: And, as you say, not every industry is going to be the third or fourth in the list for that phone call when something traumatic does happen. But in our own ways we're all on the spectrum of that connection and really trying to help. And I think for the majority of people who we work with, for the majority of people who you're dealing with, it's a subset of the bigger community. We're not high volume businesses, we're high touch businesses and to be able to have the book there as the start of that conversation, to show that, to demonstrate that it's something that you care about and you're passionate about, it's a separator for that subset of people who have the opportunity to enter your world, your sphere of influence. It just starts everything off on the right foot. We should check back at some point in the future because we're just we're just getting to the point that your book's being finished. So the marketing bit we're just kind of starting that journey. We haven't got there's not some strong feedback to share with the world.

Yes, we should definitely check back on that. But one of the things I did want to touch on that you mentioned just before we started recording was almost like a pre-release, even before the book's done and out there and there's no. It's kind of like don't tell anyone. This isn't an official marketing campaign, but still, you made a couple of posts about the book and that it was just about finished and coming soon. Do you want to talk a little bit about what happens kind of unintentionally?

Phil: Yeah, so I was sitting on my deck on a Sunday afternoon and I pulled up a copy of the cover and I'm staring at it going should I do it? Should I do it? I don't know what. Okay, so I'm fairly active on LinkedIn, so I just put the picture up there and said coming soon and first 10 DMs or whatever, get a free copy in one to two weeks or whatever it's available. I mean my, it exploded. And I did the same thing on Facebook, but I'm not active on Facebook, barely at all. And same thing on Facebook and same exact, and these are one post on each platform.

Stuart: Right.

Phil: Same, exact. I know I walk into the gym in the mornings they're calling me Hemingway and stuff like that. So, like you know, I mean Dean always talks about invisible prospects, right, and that's kind of anecdotally what I've seen. People that you know I mean I know, but don't whatever are all of a sudden somehow pulled into my orbit or my sphere of influence, if you will. Whatever, literally just for one post.

Stuart: Right and almost the I mean it wasn't.

People get so ramped up in their heads around the campaign and what to be structured and what's the followup and all of these details, which is almost kind of like a psychological procrastination against doing something.

Just quickly throwing a post up there just with a cover shot and saying, hey, come and see me if you want a copy, and again a hundred or so people replying and saying, hey, yeah, I'm in, send that to me. And it's difficult to tell the downstream impact of that. Who then shares that with someone else and talks to someone else, and almost from the smallest effort. And this is why books at the moment and for the foreseeable future, I think, have such a outsized value or outsized opportunity to share, over and above the actual effort or cost to create something. It really is this idea that it's. It's a great way of starting a conversation. It's a great way of showing how much you care by the words you've included in the advice or guidance that is put in there and it helps people who resonate with that idea. A clear next step to start that conversation and move it forward.

Phil: It's like you said about AI the more people consume podcasts and all these other digital formats which are amazing the more impressive or cool or whatever word you wanna use it is when you're holding a physical copy Right Of the book. It's like so the same thing, like we discussed with AI, perhaps, where the more valuable that human connection becomes.

Stuart: Yeah.

Phil: The more valuable that book becomes. So that's kind of my theory on it and, like I said, I'm not here to get 10,000 clients, so I mean, you know. So it just though the whole goal was to have it help some people. If it does, to inspire somebody to say, oh, this firm, this guy kind of gets me a little bit. I'm going through that too. Let me see if he can help me. Awesome, yeah, and it was fun. You guys made it fun. All my interactions with you, your team were very helpful and you know, just like I said before, us entrepreneurs could be a little crazy, so your team's got a lot of patience too, which is appreciated.

Stuart: Well, I appreciate it. It's always exciting to get people on the phone talking to the progress to the project and progressing towards having it done at the end, Because one of the best things is to see people when they actually receive the copies and it's there and done and this thing that's been on their mind for a period of time and now gets completed, and now we can move on to the next stage in the really exciting bit of getting it out there in front of people, sharing the message, starting the conversations, and that's what that makes us excited to get to that stage. So, whatever we can do to help facilitate that and get through the pain in the neck bit so that it's out there in the world yeah, no it was.

Phil: here's something else I'll just add real quick as we're wrapping up. Maybe your listeners will find value to this.

Stuart: One of the things that this whole process helped me was to refine my messaging.

Phil: So just the whole process of having to talk about it, having to write about it a little bit, helped me clarify my message, helped me think deeper about my perspective, clients or who I could help the most, and I don't even, couldn't even put a price tag on that. So I probably owe you like tens of thousands of dollars more, but honestly, I mean I was thinking about that the other day how interesting that was for me, because it did force me to stop and think and, like clarify my thoughts and communicate, and there's somebody that has to communicate with prospects and clients.

That's what. I do improving the clarity of those conversations is so valuable.

Stuart: Actually that's a great point. It's necessities for the mother in invention. So you're forced to sit down and go through that exercise for the purpose of creating the book and now you've got 50, 60, 70 pages, eight, nine chapters of those subheadings, the bullets, the important things that people talk about, where that clarity of thinking is just more front of mind because you had to go through the process in order to get it down on the page. It's a great added bonus that again in and of itself will have legs and benefits outside of just individual project Because, as you're talking more broadly about it and making those connections and spreading message in different ways, it just all ties back to this 10-pole asset that you've now got of the book. That makes the language and the consistency of the framework and the methodology and the approach. It just really ties it together in a nice bow that's got a good-looking cover on it.

Phil: Yeah, it's great, yeah, no.

Stuart: Where can people find out more about the practice? And you want to make sure that people, as they're listening, can check out what you're doing over time.

Phil:Oh, that's very kind. So breakout private wealth is the name of our company, so you can hit the website brandigoutprivatewealthcom. I'm active on LinkedIn. So Phil Telbner, breakout private wealth. Through the website you can jump in and we keep 15-minute time slots or so open for anybody to jump in through the website and we'll just chat a little bit. Fantastic. Most of the time I can help answer a few questions or guide you and guide people in the right direction. That's cool. If it makes sense, they have another conversation.

That's cool too, and the book coming out soon check social and all that good stuff for the book. We're putting together not just the book but a whole Gen X financial independent toolkit that's gonna come with the book too. So it's gonna be some cool stuff. I'm psyched. I'll send you one.

Stuart: Yeah, that'd be fantastic. I'll make sure that I put, but I'm definitely not in the sweet spot of Gen X Me right.

Yeah, yeah, that's that drum beat of the marching time I can hear in the background as well. I'll make sure that we put links to the website and your LinkedIn profile on the show notes for the podcast and on the podcast feed as well, so as people are listening or watching along, they can just click through and connect. I highly recommend doing that. And then, as we get more into the full release and put some of those marketing steps in place, it'd be really great to have you back on and we can talk a little bit more kind of about the strategies that you've used and some of the more nuts and bolts of getting it out there and share with people how that's been going.

Phil::Oh yeah, I love it. It'd be fun.

Stuart: Fantastic. Well, Phil. Thanks again for your time. These always go fast. Enjoy the rest of the week, Everyone listening or watching along. Definitely check out the links to Phil's business and the LinkedIn profile, and then we will catch everyone in the next one.

Phil:Thank you.

Phil Telpner runs Breakout Private Wealth in Illinois, working specifically with Gen X families when life gets complicated. Career, marriage, aging parents, college costs all hit at once, typically leaving people overwhelmed and doing nothing.

After years at big Wall Street firms with 180+ clients spanning every age group, Phil got frustrated. He couldn't go deep enough to actually help people. The breaking point came during COVID when everyone wanted answers but he was stuck playing triage.

His book, "The GenX Guide to Financial Independence," starts conversations with people who feel understood rather than filtered out. It's not just lead generation. Phil uses it for referrals and connections, helping him refine his messaging while building real relationships.

The conversation covers why Gen X women specifically face unique challenges, how books do the heavy lifting in client conversations, and why understanding someone's problems matters more than having all the solutions upfront.

Show notes: https://mrstuartbell.com/podcasts/htb/146-making-the-connection-with-phil-telpner/

About Phil Telpner: Website | LinkedIn

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Today on the Book More Show, we have a great conversation with Michael Soos, author of Don't Leave Money on the Table, and a consultant who helps financial advisors create more effective Social Security and Medicare solutions for their clients.

Michael has a wealth of experience and talks about the opportunities advisors have in partnering with a specialist to deliver more value for their clients and create larger income streams for their businesses.

His book is an excellent example of introducing a new idea to people rather than discussing a problem they want to solve. Financial advisors are what we refer to as 'visible prospects' because you can get a list or access that group directly compared with 'invisible prospects' who aren't identified in a list or group for us, for example, people feeling unsure about their Social Security options. Michael uses his book to introduce the idea they are leaving money on the table by not having the capability to offer more comprehensive services and, of course, offers a solution to help.

We also talk about Michael's 5x5x5 outreach strategy, something that can be amplified with a book and something I'd recommend everyone steal!

I really enjoyed this conversation & you'll get many ideas on how to use a book in your business, especially if you're talking with peers.

SHOW HIGHLIGHTS

(AI transcript provided as supporting material and may contain errors)

Stuart Bell

Michael Soos

Stuart Bell

Michael Soos

So you know, I've been doing this for a long time. It actually started about 20 years ago with my father, who was 63 at the time and trying to make decisions on what to do with Medicare. There was no real guidance and there was nobody to help my dad and he was just asking neighbors and friends what you know, what they should do. Obviously it's not probably the best advice you should get. So you know, I saw that as a challenge and just really the reason I wrote the book was to provide some guidance and understanding to financial advisors about those claiming strategies so they can help their clients. It's really sort of a you know, a do it all book, you know do it yourself book, but for financial advisors to help their clients understand those strategies.

Stuart Bell

Michael Soos

I think it's not just you just turn it on and start collecting it and it's that easy. I think it's for advisors. I think it's an overall part of an overall financial plan Sitting down with your clients and figuring out how much income do they need, when do they need it, what's their longevity in their household, what's their health history. There's a lot of different complexities or questions that they can ask and frankly, it leads to a lot of what we call product solutions maybe life insurance or annuities or other types of solutions that might tie in to help them if something happens. So I've taken a great passion at this because of what happened with my dad 20 years ago. But what I'm starting to realize is, through all the questions and all the calls I keep getting from financial advisors saying, can I pick your brain or can I ask you a question? That's why I wrote the book. I wrote it as a guide, really to help advisors help their clients make those important life changing decisions.

Stuart Bell

Michael Soos

But I want to make one point that I think is real important and that is if you looked like 20 or 30 years ago, the state of our retirement system is much different than it was today because many people that were retiring with a defined benefit pension plan you know probably 70, 75% of the people working were retiring from their company and they got a pension plan, which is a guaranteed paycheck for life, and then they had Social Security so that's another guaranteed paycheck that they could receive.

And then they had very smaller nest egg. 401ks weren't really even relevant back then, 20 or 30 years ago and they had a small nest egg that they really, you know, relied on. Well, if you think about today, back then there was about 16 workers for every retiree paying into the system and paying taxes. Today there's less than three workers per retiree. People aren't getting pensions anymore. I mean, just ask any company that's hiring. If you ask them what their benefits are, they'll say, well, we have a good, a nice lucrative 401k. And you say, well, what about the pension? And they say, well, we don't have a pension.

Our companies aren't hiring and younger folks today aren't retiring or won't retire with the pension, so they'll have Social Security. It's more of a reliance on that income and then they're going to have to rely on the money that they save or they invest. It was a much you know. Again, it's a much different model than it was 20 or 30 years ago. Social Security was never designed to be your only source of income when you retire. It was designed as a supplement to your existing retirement plan. So you have to look and engage with your advisor or your planner and find out. You know, what other sources of income do I have?

Stuart Bell

I'm only very superficially touching on it, but one of the big things that you hear in the US is our Europeans socialist countries and we don't want socialism. It's the worst possible thing in the world. But in a number of cases, like healthcare and retirement and the two that spring to mind, there was previously a situation where there wasn't socialized care here, but corporations were expected to take care of it. Now we're in a situation where everyone fights against the socialization of it. It doesn't want to get companies, doesn't want to have government involved, but it's also either oblivious or quite happy that companies are no longer involved either. So where the gap falls on the individual, who is probably, out of the three, the least capable, except at the extremes, the least capable of doing anything about it.

Michael Soos

Non discretionary is your. You know your mortgage, your car payment, your taxes, your bills, your utilities, all those things that you have to pay for. You know I call it the difference between you know the things you have to pay for and the things you want to pay for. Right, the difference. But if you think about the things you have to pay for that non discretionary spending, you need a guaranteed source of income and I can't stress that enough you need a guaranteed paycheck. You're not working anymore. Therefore you need a guaranteed paycheck coming in every month To pay your bills, pay your mortgage, pay your expenses. Even if your mortgage is paid off, you still have insurance, you still have taxes. You still have, you know, other expenses and upkeep.

So the way I just try to simplify it for a lot of folks is you know you need a sense of guaranteed income to cover your non discretionary Expenses, anything above and beyond that. If you don't have, if you have a gap or you need to pay for additional Cost, then you have to create either create your own annuity or create your own guaranteed source of income. You know, to complement that or supplement that. So I mean I try to simplify that because I think a lot of folks don't realize that they need A guaranteed source of income and there's only three. There's only three that folks can rely on Social security, a pension we talked about that before and you know their own nest egg which they can turn into an annuity Ensured by an insurance company that can give them a guaranteed source of income or guaranteed growth. So you know, again, it's education. I always say education without implementation is just entertainment. It's kind of a funny.

Stuart Bell

Michael Soos

Stuart Bell

The conversation applies just as much, because you could write a textbook Three inches thick trying to cover absolutely everything, but what you've done is positioned it at the right level to give some knowledgeable people Further information. That takes them a step closer, but still it's pretty obvious if they want to really master the subject or go deep, there's more than could be contained in the pages of the book. So did you have, as you were thinking about pulling it together? Did you actually think about what that limit was? What makes sense to be in the book and what is? Maybe it's just going to get into the weeds?

Michael Soos

I don't expect people to read my book and become experts overnight. I mean, I didn't become an expert overnight. What I do expect them to do is to read it and say you know, can I take action on this? Can I? Is this giving me enough information to say it's important to me and my clients for me to contact Michael Right to have a conversation. It doesn't cost anything to have a conversation with someone. Have a conversation. If you want to go further, we can go further with that, but that's why I, you know that's I use the book, or, you know, I guess, creating the book in mind as an entree, you know, to my business, to open up the door for more people to contact me.

Stuart Bell

The financial services, the other financial services clients that you work with the other advisors. I'm guessing they're coming to you with all sorts of different levels of understanding In terms of converting a lead that you might get. Who's read the book and reached out for a call Into a client who's actually doing some work? Is your business set up? We've got a relatively formulaic program that brings people on it. They kind of buying a Michael product or is it more of like a service-based thing and you know generally what they're trying to get to?

Michael Soos

But a lot of people know me by my last name. It's a unique name backwards, forwards, upside down. It's. A lot of people don't even know my first name, they just know my last I. So I created my company in mind. You know, with my last name, people that know me that can come to me and Ask me information or ask me you know anything about. You know social security, and these are folks that already I've already had a relationship with or they've put me in front of their clients or they put me in front of their CPA or their attorney. Obviously I'm trying to forge new relationships and you know the great way of doing that is with the book right.

Yeah get them to read the book. And I'm to understand that you know I am sort of a resident expert in this, in this field, and that if they want to continue going forward, I don't charge anything for my initial consultation or an initial group meeting. If they want me to come in and talk to a Group of advisors or folks, just to see you know, are you interested? Do I have value? And if you find value in what I do, then we can proceed forward. But that's pretty much how I set it up.

Stuart Bell

The thought of now that the book is complete, you've got the existence, free of influence and the people who know you, like you, entrust you already. You've got the opportunity when meeting people you can hand it out or follow up with people afterwards. But the idea of now that the book is created, it's the flagpole around which a lot of other content can be created. One of the things I really like to talk to people about, particularly where they've got a very targeted market, is the idea of, for example, linkedin marketing.

Unless we're a champion addict, which most of us aren't, it's always a bit of a headache to think it's something they have to remember to do. But having the book created now in a way that you can just excerpt individual lines or sentences or the key phrase and then elaborate and illuminate it with hey, if this was interesting, there's more. Just get a copy of the book here. Have you thought about that level of not LinkedIn necessarily, but that level of using the content to get out there? Are there any ways that you're excited to try or have tried and have got some traction?

Michael Soos

I don't know much about it, but doing little clips on excerpts and from my book and just simply doing the excerpts and then getting them out on social media, whether it be Facebook or Instagram or whether it be LinkedIn. I have a pretty large network of contacts on my LinkedIn as well and I find that reaches a lot of folks. I'm getting a lot of people messaging me back saying, hey, can I get a copy of your book? Hey, when it comes out, can you send me a copy of it? And it hasn't even come out yet and they want it. So I think using social media today, versus maybe what we did 20 years ago when we didn't have it. I think I'm leveraging that as a tool to get in front of a lot more people.

Stuart Bell

So there's the opportunity. You've gone out to amplify the book and just take those excerpts, even if you did it like lay the track as you go for the first six months, but now you've got 10 years worth of perpetual content all tied around this one main asset that you become known for and it's self-supporting. I like the idea of this. I think it's a persuasion. It's in persuasion. Robert Chaldini's book, where talks about kind of laying the track three or four steps ahead, often talk about this idea of imagine the customer journey a year down the track. So they've seen a piece of media. They didn't know you before. They've seen a piece of media that resonates with them. They've requested to copy the book and the language is mirrored, in that you're sending them an email sequence to try and engage them in the first instance, and the language is mirrored again. Then they'll reach out to schedule something and the person that's scheduling the thing, or the text on the page where they're scheduling a meeting, again represents or reflects the same language.

Now they eventually, after all of these stages, they're either sat down in front of you or, like we are on zoom, and you start talking to them and saying, okay, the key thing about social security is this idea of needing an annuity, you need a fixed income because you've got all these non-discretionary things that you don't want to stay up at night. They're not hearing that for the first time. It's not getting on a call with Susan. It's the first time that you're hearing it, it's the eighth time. They've heard it in all sorts of different ways.

And the likelihood of them taking action the point you made before we're not doing this for entertainment, we're doing it for education and movement, all of these persuasion things with all of the authority that books brings to it and all of the authority that social media at presence brings to it. But the fact that when they sit down in front of you. You know eight, nine, ten steps down the process. That, I think, is something that is so undervalued, because people think about writing a book, because they want to write a book, they don't necessarily think about all that. They want something to have in a campaign, they don't necessarily think of all of it. But yeah, that idea of really reinforcing your approach is a game changer.

Michael Soos

Now, if you think about that, if I send out five on Monday and they receive five copies of my book and I follow up with them, let's say, on Wednesday or Thursday, I only have to make five phone calls. If I make five phone calls, I follow up with those five people. When I might get two or three of them that are interested the next day, I just do it all over again. Follow up with five. Again, I have the capacity to do five. I don't know if I have the capacity to do 125 right and the overwhelm.

Stuart Bell

Michael Soos

I mean I'm sure if I asked you and I said you had to do it, in order to write your book you have to come up with a list of 125 names, you would write down 125 names, whether you knew them personally or you didn't. You would come up with those names and that's where you really start with that list. Scratch them off if you don't really want them, but you know, create the list and then figure out. There's no importance over who are the first five, who are the second five, it doesn't matter, it's just having a process. Yeah, and most people they start marketing and they don't measure their progress, they don't measure how successful that marketing is. That's why it did the five by five, because after five weeks I can sit down and study it, observe it, understand it. You know, did I have success with it? Do I need to do ten a day? Do I need to do three a day? Do I need to switch it up a little bit? You know I can change it if I want to do that right, but I think you know, not just to give you a plug on 90 minute books, but, going back to what we said before, I'm not a writer, I'm a speaker, I'm an educator. I've been in the business a long time. I know what I know and I know how I want to communicate it, but I didn't know that I could actually write a book before.

I mean, I thought it was a very complicated process. I have to give 90 minute books a lot of. I know you didn't ask me to do this, but I have to give them a lot, a lot of praise because they made the process very simple, very easy. And doing the transcription, you know, interviewing you and just going through. You know that was a lot easier for me than sitting down and writing my own book on my own. You know, just going through and editing the transcription and then, once we edit it, you realize it's actually, and now and now it's a book or the contents of a book, and then you can add to it, delete from it, take away from it. You know whatever you want to do. It made the process so much easier for me. But, as you know, you have to invest in yourself and invest in your business. So if you're not, then you're not going to get anything out of it. But I give I give 90 minute a lot of credit. I would have never done it if I had not engaged with your company.

Stuart Bell

But I often have strategy calls with people as they've got to them in the process and I've got five things which are low hanging fruit that everyone can do, which stem from a number of calls, but this isn't on that list. I'm going to add it now. How straightforward is it? Like I say, anyone can create that list. When we were talking mentally, that immediately came up as a block for me oh yeah, that's that I could do that. That definitely sounds like something I could and should do.

Oh, but the list, the list. But you immediately got rid of that barrier because if I was forced to write down 125 names, I could do it. If I didn't want to do that, I could give it to one of the team and they could do it. If they didn't want to do it, I could give it to someone on up desk, or I work, work rather and outsource it and probably in July 2023, I could go to chat TTP and get chat TTP to give me a reasonable first draft. So just to be able to get that done and then reaching out becomes straightforward. And what a benefit. It'll be interesting once the books. Like you mentioned, we're just in the final stages of wrapping up the book, but it'll be really interesting to check back in six months or 12 months and say okay, you've got the stats from a five by five three years ago, when you were using something else. What differences it made now that, on the delivery stage, you're actually delivering your own book. That'll be really interesting to hear.

Michael Soos

Stuart Bell

We've got I mentioned before we've had large footprint with financial advisors, just in part from our history and in part from relationship with coach. As people are listening to this and perhaps financial advisors are there thinking I've got a great business here, but some specialization in social security medical would really move the needle. What's a good place for people to find out more about what you do and, ultimately, what you offer?

Michael Soos

Like I said, I don't charge anything for an initial consultation or just have a conversation with someone to find out a little bit about them and their clients and what they need. And then, more importantly, I would just say it's just like going to a doctor. If you went to a doctor and you had a problem with your heart, you know your general practitioner doesn't operate on your heart. He sends you to a cardiologist or a cardiothoracic surgeon. So you know I see myself as a specialist in our industry and so, rather than doing it yourself, if you want to utilize my services, have me come out and speak in front of your clients or speak in front of a group. I'll be happy to do so.

I've been doing that for 30 plus years, so that's really how they can get information for me. They can go to my website. There's even a chat function, stuart, where they can just chat. Click the chat button on the bottom of my website. So they don't want to contact me, they can just send me a question, or you know something that they want to say and then I'll respond back to them.

Stuart Bell

Yep, this idea you mentioned being a specialist and I think, no matter which industry you're in, there's this idea that we've got in the beyond the book element of leveraging the book.

One of the things I talk about a lot is this idea of complementary, non-competing businesses, so reaching out to those people who aren't direct competitors. But really in this day and age, that idea of who is non-competing it's very close. I think in the old days if there were two CPAs in town and they're literally competing for the same clients because their footprint is the same, 300 businesses within 20 miles. The days of that are long, long gone and the reality is again take a strategic coach, game changer, free zone, frontier, amplifying technique or idea. The reality now is, even if you're thinking competing with someone and even if you're concerned about talking to a Medicare or social security expert because you're a CPA or your financial advisor and you should know it, the reality is the clients are going to get way more benefit and you'll make way more money by talking to a specialist and finding that one thing that has 5, 10% across the board. It's yeah, we're in a different world.

Michael Soos

In the financial services business.

Stuart Bell

Time goes fast, I say at the end of every episode, but time flies by. It will be really great to check back in in a few months time after another five by five, five by five sequence of views in the book, because I think that will be an eye opener for people and definitely one worth checking back into. So we'll make sure that we put the links to the website and connecting with you in the show notes and our website where the show is hosted so, as people are listening to this, they can just click through and get directly. But again, I just want to say thanks to you time. We've really enjoyed catching up and look forward to hearing more on the next one. Thanks, stuart, I appreciate it. Thanks for the time today, fantastic. Thanks everyone for listening and, as always, we'll catch you in the next one.

Michael Soos spent 34 years watching financial advisors stumble through Social Security and Medicare questions they couldn't answer. Only 17% felt comfortable discussing these topics with clients, despite them being top retirement concerns.

His book "Don't Leave Money on the Table" targets advisors directly, not consumers. It's a peer-to-peer play that introduces the idea they're missing revenue by not offering comprehensive Social Security and Medicare guidance.

Michael shares his 5x5x5 outreach strategy for getting books into the right hands. He also explains why writing for "visible prospects" (people you can get lists of) versus "invisible prospects" (people feeling uncertain about Social Security) changes your entire approach.

If you're selling to other professionals or have expertise that could help peers serve their clients better, this conversation shows exactly how to position your book as the bridge between problem and solution.

Show notes: https://mrstuartbell.com/podcasts/htb/145-don-t-leave-money-on-the-table-with-michael-soos/

About Michael Soos: Website | LinkedIn

Your Book Is Closer Than You Think — You already say everything that needs to be in your book. 90-Minute Books turns it into a done-for-you lead generation tool. Get the Free Book

Today on the Book More Show, we're talking with John and JJ Checki. Father & son Financial Planning team based in Texas, and authors of a great book,_ Spend Time and Save Money_.

Their book is a fun introduction to their approach to retirement and helps people approach the subject from the perspective of living a great retirement rather than getting stuck in the weeds of financial planning.

We had the opportunity to discuss the process and the simplest way to create a book that starts the conversation. We also spoke about the idea that your book should be a living document rather than something carved in stone, allowing you to tweak and update it over time as you get real-world feedback on what resonates with clients.

The episode has some great ideas on how to use a book to find more leads, no matter what business you're in.

SHOW HIGHLIGHTS

(AI transcript provided as supporting material and may contain errors)

Stuart Bell

John Checki

JJ Checki

John Checki

Stuart Bell

For you to stress, you've had it.

I want to say a few weeks ago, but it was probably a few months ago and I where they had that exact experience and in fact it got worse because they had some that were ordered but it had gone out of date some of the content and they needed to update it. But I think the original company had gone out of business but everything was printed in the company's name so they couldn't get access to any of the assets, so it really became a bit of a gravestone of a project that was then collecting dust in the back of the room. So this idea that we're creating a living document and the fact that we happened to be in a point in time where a book is a very effective way of starting a conversation with people, but the book itself isn't the product, it's a living version, why don't we jump back a little bit and think about how you guys came to the point of wanting to write a book in the first place? Was it a long burning passion or specifically thinking about the market.

JJ Checki

John Checki

JJ Checki

So John had a much more in depth answer to that, but that was my experience.

John Checki

But in terms of a message, jj's had a great period of time while he's networking, mentioning the book, passing out the book to people without asking immediately for an order. I was at a place called Osteo Strong and I was just chatting with a little lady because basically, people of our age I'm only 75, working and getting to be more than 75. And I just said to the lady because I gave their first speech, they gave on what Osteo Strong was about the advantages of aging, which is great fun. And I handed her the book and she looked at me and said huh, start a conversation, hand me a book. What do you ask me to do next? Write you a check. And I said I'm sure you have met in your lifetime or like that. But I'm just giving you a book. If you enjoy it, great.

JJ Checki

Stuart Bell

John Checki

Stuart Bell

John Checki

JJ Checki

John Checki

Stuart Bell

John Checki

JJ Checki

Stuart Bell

John Checki

Stuart Bell

Now, even though it's two, three years later after the first version was out, reaching back out to those existing clients and say, hey, we've just made it up to the book. Many people get it as possible, the great feedback. If you want to get it on social media, that's fine. If you want to, just let us know and we'll send you some copies to give to the person that you're thinking of. This idea of treating it as a living asset. It can update itself and flex and change depending on the market conditions or the rule changes. It's such a more empowering way of thinking as a book as a tool, rather than just the book is the product trying to write something, it's got an ISBN and that's it for all an eternity.

John Checki

Stuart Bell

John Checki

JJ Checki

So, and your question was the writing process or the dictating process. It was actually pleasure to be a part of. So, obviously, the outline you start with that. What are we writing about? What's the purpose of the book? Set that make sure it's set up in place.

And then the actual interview was, which was a lot of fun. We enjoyed it. We had a good time, which you would expect from the title and the subject. As far as how we operate and finances, it's a serious thing, but at the same time, we like to have a good time with it. We like to actually exchange with our clients, not just to drive financial reports. So actually getting to write it and share some personal stories about the family, about some of the just the different stories that are in it. It was just a lot of fun and enjoyed the opportunity, of course, to work with my pop, and also it's fun to have both of us be on the back cover, so as we handed out, you guys like you might recognize somebody on this book in front of you, so it's a lot of fun.

John Checki

JJ Checki

Stuart Bell

John Checki

So, there's a long history not just Johnson and the Ford Motor Company of businesses which are family businesses. So I encourage you to go look at those various sources and, for those of you who are having trouble finding people that you'd like to hand it off to you might take a look at your family and find the one or two or three responsible ones out of the kids that you have, who you can do that or you can do the get off this ramp. You use the Roman custom of adoption, where you find somebody who's amazing and you have him or her or they sign an agreement that will actually take over your business but make sure your family is okay, which is where the word adoption came from.

Stuart Bell

John Checki

JJ Checki

John Checki

JJ Checki

Stuart Bell

John Checki

Stuart Bell

John Checki

So we have a procedure that goes into circle which is never ending in terms of getting to know you, because we're not so brilliant that we can say at hello, I have got a great idea for your money, yeah, congratulations. And I talked to those people and if you're on LinkedIn, you get about 10 messages a day from people who want to connect with you and then have a value add, which is not a value add, it's just a bit. Would love to talk to you. But we first get to know our clients, get to find out what they've done, what their values are, who has already picked their pocket, who they really enjoy, who their golden apple or eggs are, who their kids are the good ones, the bad ones and the ones they hate to talk about so we can give them some helpful hints in terms of that sort of stuff.

And yes, we do it in a humorous way, but we also record things and document every stinking thing, because I spent five years doing litigative support on a criminal tax and securities cases. So if it's not documented, it didn't happen. So it was absolutely that way. And then we send people a mind map which actually gives you a visual picture of you, your family and what it is you want to be when you grow up, whether you decide to grow up or not. And then we follow up and follow up like like made an ant that have nothing better to do.

JJ Checki

John Checki

So we drew a mind map for he and his wife and we went over each one of their kids, and their kids had a lot more stories than I've ever heard before, which is really saying something. So I just said, okay, we're going to put a diagram together in terms of a couple of different trust ideas for you, because one of them had lots of assets and one of them had lots of stories, which is a common situation. And this person was not some incredibly knockdown drag out lovely woman, just two normal Christian people who just were lucky enough to find each other, both widows. He was a widow or she was a widow, which is a great idea. Kids, you can't hear anything If you are a widow or a widow, you're much better off with a widow and widow, or as opposed to, yeah, the hunters of the world. But anyway.

So we did that and that document changed over time. She started to identify some of the problems within her family and decided to take measures. It reminded me when my kids were in college and I married a lady who had a couple of kids and I was paying half the tuition and her first husband father the kids was paying half the tuition. And then one day I got really tired of doing that. So I invited my darling wife to go ahead and start to get a job and help support her kids college habit. And when she discovered that she was making money and hadn't turned it over to the kids, she really got on their case and helped them straighten up and what have you? And eventually cut them off A lot of interest.

Yeah, yeah, because once somebody starts to pick your pocket, so we kind of help people with their blind size. And for husbands that think they can do everything all by themselves, we are great stress relievers and we can give you peace of mind because when markets change or other things happen, instead of pointing that finger at you, she can say or you can say you better call JJ or John or both of them because it's their fault, or thank them.

JJ Checki

Stuart Bell

The other thing that sprained the mind as you were talking this idea of the mind map. In the scorecard book that I've got for the book blueprint scorecard, one of the ideas there is a purposeful outline and I'm a big mind mapper as opposed to like nesting or drawing things out. So the visual representation, both the clarity in the situation as it develops and the avoidance of doubt and the unique way that you're packaging it. I mean, I've done lots of these calls and we've helped a thousand people and a lot of them are financial advisors. It's the first time I've ever described someone doing the KYC and again to know people type thing and then mind mapping out so as a unique tool to help the whole process, talking about that, potentially having it mentioned in the book or, if not in the book, mentioning it when you first come in and then reinforcing it all the way through the process. It's just a way of building on itself in a way that amplifies the instructions or that further.

John Checki

But in terms of families, almost everybody has a reason why attorneys invented a spend thrift trust or a special needs trust and what we do to kind of underscore what check your financial dose is. We find people who think, whatever problem you have, one specific problem was the most interesting question they ever heard in their life and they researched the BG's out of that and they usually the top gun, whether it's Dean Jackson who comes up with more marketing ideas and one throwaway conversation that anybody ever talked about in your entire life and they just kind of have everybody in a state of awe because everybody who knows anything has heard of that person and wishes they had lunch with that person just one time and got to actually talk with them. And at least one of us has been lucky enough to pick the brains of some of the smartest people and their dues to pay to get to go ahead and talk to those people. You don't just hop in one day hey.

Tony, you got a minute that's not coming up, so when as you're paying your dues, and JJ is absolutely amazing at being in groups and making speeches and being on panels and he also publicizes the people that he sees on a regular basis, and JJ, why don't you highlight that? Yeah?

JJ Checki

Or it's the local coffee shop to chai for that we frequently go to. So just, you know, to highlight other people. Back to the give and the influence is helping other people get in front of the audience that they want to get in front of and we're going to get taken care of. People are going to come and see us in one way or another. So it's just great getting to highlight others and, in the process, build up community and when it's the right time for someone to talk to us, then they know where to find us.

John Checki

doing? Why don't you come to the lab they're hiring? It was 1967. An interesting time. But periodically you'll just run across people who really are amazing and if you highlight them they might remember you. I'll tell you the last joke on that. Perhaps and here it is If we do a bad job, or if you do a bad job, people will stop strangers on the street corner to talk about you. But if you do a great job somebody who asks you again and again do you know anybody who does that? You might actually mention that person's name.

Stuart Bell

John Checki

Stuart Bell

John Checki

So there's nothing frightening than anybody talking to you about your most sensitive topic after health, and that is about your money, because everybody fears losing everything, living under a bridge and regretting that decision that you made that cost you your family, your future and your home.

Stuart Bell

John Checki

JJ Checki

So by no means I like to do this one, by no means is hey, here's a container, who wants it? No, it's. Who are you? What do you want? What do you want to accomplish? Now let me, if I don't already know the answer right away, let me go and research that with other experts who are passionate about what they do and bring the right solution to you and let's talk. So it's a very least. That to us is that is the backward, that's the way it should be done and is done.

John Checki

JJ Checki

John Checki

Stuart Bell

JJ Checki

John Checki

Stuart Bell

John Checki

Stuart Bell

JJ Checki

John Checki

Stuart Bell

John Checki

JJ Checki

Stuart Bell

JJ Checki

Stuart Bell

John Checki

We encourage people to do videos, and JJ does them highlighting other people's businesses, which is a very generous thing that you do, jj, so congratulations on doing that.

JJ Checki

Stuart Bell

John Checki

And I said you know, you have no idea the trouble I went through to get that one. But so I said, just to shut you up, we did that. So I just pointed to JJ and said JJ, what have you learned over the last couple of years? And you can see a very proud father when it's on the YouTube and it's John Checke TV channel on YouTube where JJ reshotted exactly what we do, how we did it. And you can see a very proud father realizing that his son has actually listened to us and learned what we actually do and can actually say it all by himself, with no prompting other than just being asked a question. So that's a vintage JJ way back when he knows even more now than he did back then.

Stuart Bell

John Checki