INspired INsider Podcast

David Meltzer is the Co-founder of Sports 1 Marketing with Hall of Fame Quarterback Warren Moon. David formerly served as CEO of the renowned Leigh Steinberg Sports & Entertainment agency, which was the inspiration for the movie Jerry Maguire.

In his early 20s, David quickly rose in the business world, becoming a millionaire. In his 30s as a multimillionaire, a chain of events caused a rapid downward spiral that ended in bankruptcy. He has since emerged to even more rewarding heights.

He is now an international best-selling author and the executive producer of Elevator Pitch and Bloomberg TV and Amazon Prime television series 2 Minute Drill. Some of David's books include Game Time Decision Making, Connected to Goodness, and Compassionate Capitalism. David is also the host of The Playbook podcast, where he has had guests from Dan Akroyd to Ray Lewis and many more.

When things go uncontrollably wrong for you, do you consider it a mountain you need to get over, go under, go through, or around? What if you embraced it and asked, 'what did I do to attract this to myself, and what am I supposed to learn?' David Meltzer took that same approach to save his marriage and bounce back when he lost millions and went bankrupt. He knew he had to take stock of who he was, what he wanted to become, and how to get there.

Unfortunately, not many people do that, so they lead a life of liability, blame, shame, and justification. They suffer from the fear of missing out and the fear of other people's opinions. The good news is you can change all of that by learning and applying these five daily practices that changed David's life. So what are these daily practices, and what are the values that drive them?

Listen to this episode of the Inspired Insider Podcast with Dr. Jeremy Weisz, featuring David Meltzer of Sports 1 Marketing, to discover the five daily practices that can change your life. They discuss how David developed these practices and how his mother played a pivotal role in their creation. David also shares lessons he's learned from his mentors so far. You don't want to miss it!

JeVon "JT" McCormick was born the mixed-race son of a drug-dealing pimp father and an orphaned, single mother on welfare. He was raised in the slums of Dayton, Ohio, suffered incredible abuse and racism, and had multiple stints in the juvenile justice system. He barely graduated high school and has no college degree.

He started scrubbing toilets, hustled, and worked his way into the banking and mortgage industry. He did really well… until the mortgage industry fell apart, and he lost his job — and all of his money. He had to borrow from his friends to make rent.

JeVon springboarded to even bigger heights. He made millions in the stock market and eventually became President of two multimillion-dollar companies.

Now, JeVon is the President and CEO of Scribe Media. This publishing company helps people write, publish, and market their books. They have worked with over 1,900 authors, including David Goggins, who has sold over two million copies of his book, Can't Hurt Me.

JeVon is the author of the book I Got There: How a Mixed-Race Kid Overcame Racism, Poverty, and Abuse to Arrive at the American Dream. He lives in Austin, Texas, with his wife, Megan, and their four children.

Think about this for a second: any chance that a boy who is one of 23 children born to a poor pimp and drug-dealing father will escape crime and poverty? Not only did today's guest JeVon McCormick go into juvenile detention more than once, but he barely graduated high school. He had every reason to fail and stay poor, but…

JeVon made it out. He started to work his way out of poverty by scrubbing toilets, learning about stocks, and eventually making a lot of money. Unfortunately, he lost it all. But that didn't deter him from starting over and becoming the President and CEO of Scribe Media. How has JeVon braved the odds to get to where he is today, and what lessons can you learn from his journey?

Listen to this episode of the Inspired Insider Podcast with Dr. Jeremy Weisz featuring Scribe Media's President and CEO, JeVon McCormick. They peel back the layers of JeVon's heart-wrenching childhood story, the force behind JeVon's choice to lead a better life than his upbringing (or lack of it), and how he emerged the President of two multimillion-dollar companies after losing all his money. You don't want to miss a minute of this insightful episode.

Yadin Shemmer is the Founder and CEO of Intrinsic, an acquirer and accelerator of Amazon-focused health and wellness brands. Before founding Intrinsic, Yadin spent 15 years building and running consumer health businesses, including Mango Health, which sold to TrialCard in 2019. He also ran the consumer business at Everyday Health, which sold to Ziff Davis in 2016 for $467 million and Better2Know. Yadin had started his career in finance as both an M&A advisor and later as an investor.

As a vision-driven entrepreneur, you build businesses to last. But when you have to sell it or acquire another company along the way, you want to make sure it aligns with your vision. Unfortunately, we tend to make many mistakes when trying to buy or sell a company. According to Yadin Shemmer, Founder and CEO of Intrinsic, one of such mistakes is making your choice to sell or buy a company primarily about financials.

You may think, "this company is profitable. I'm just going to buy revenue and profits, put it together, and it's going to work." If business is about revenue and profits, what's wrong with deciding on that basis? The issue is that there's a whole strategy you're missing. Want to learn more about this strategy — and other mistakes to avoid?

Listen to this episode of the Inspired Insider Podcast with Dr. Jeremy Weisz featuring Yadin Shemmer, Founder and CEO of Intrinsic. They talk about how Yadin began his journey building, selling, and acquiring companies — and the lessons he's learned. They also discuss how Yadin's attracted top advisors, the types of companies he buys or partners with, and of course, the big mistakes people make when buying and selling a company. Stay tuned.

Craig Hagopian is the Founder and CEO of Chalk Digital. He has more than 30 years of technology sales and consumer service marketing experience. Craig started Chalk Digital in 2013 to democratize mobile advertising by pioneering self-serve instant mobile advertising solutions.

The Chalk platform powers advertising solutions that can launch a campaign anywhere globally in less than 5 minutes (from start to finish) for national brands and local businesses by automating local display, video, and connected TV advertising.

The argument against going digital for some brick and mortar businesses has been the pain of targeting their biggest buyers: local consumers. But the problem lies in the limited reach of their native advertising efforts, which are often uncoordinated even within their target market. What if you could build and launch a highly targeted and personalized ad in minutes without any human intervention or costly operational support?

Craig Hagopian founded Chalk Digital to do just that. No matter the size of your business, there's a Chalk Digital use-case, from ads for dog adoption to big product launches. Would you like to know more about the Chalk platform and how it can help your business?

Listen to this episode of the Inspired Insider Podcast with Dr. Jeremy Weisz featuring Craig Hagopian, Founder and CEO of Chalk Digital. They discuss the inspiration for founding Chalk Digital, the team behind the platform, how it helps serve businesses of all sizes, and more. You'll love every minute of this episode!

Karl Pontau is the Owner of Squash and Stretch Productions. They help established startups and small enterprise companies grow and succeed by creating high-quality, custom animated videos and motion graphics. So when companies need to explain complex concepts, generate more revenue, or strengthen their brand presence online, Karl and his team help them do so by telling unique stories through animated content.

According to CEOs and professional firm leaders, Bruce La Fetra goes by the nickname 'The Client Whisperer' because he takes the guesswork out of marketing services. He is the Managing Partner and Growth Strategist at Eastwood Strategy Advisors. By going to the source and asking the right questions, Bruce believes you need to "think like your best clients" to attract more of your best clients.

Jason Ciment is the Founder and CEO of Get Visible, a digital marketing agency with local and national clients. Jason helps companies with their website so it adds revenue to their bottom line. His agency creates unique websites and promotes them with search engine rankings, online ad campaigns, and social media channel engagement.

Most people think about the services they render — which often inform their marketing communications — as the value they provide. However, that is only their task-based value. By focusing on your task-based value, you miss the chance to differentiate your services and show your clients your impact value.

What is your impact value, and how does it define how clients perceive you and decide to work with you? For starters, impact value is client opportunity in relation to your services. But there is more. Jason Ciment, Karl Pontau, and Bruce La Fetra are here to share the details and explain how you can communicate impact value.

Listen to this episode of the Inspired Insider Podcast with Dr. Jeremy Weisz featuring Jason Ciment, Founder and CEO of Get Visible, Karl Pontau, Owner at Squash and Stretch Productions, and Bruce La Fetra, Managing Partner and Growth Strategist at Eastwood Strategy Advisors. They explain the difference between task value and impact value, how impact value serves your brand better, how to communicate impact value, and lots more!

Martin Greif is a conversion rate optimization expert. He is the President of SiteTuners, a strategic conversion rate optimization agency. SiteTuners helps companies with conversion optimization, A/B Testing, personalization, and much more to increase sales and profits and improve user experience. They have worked with Nestle, Expedia, Costco, Verizon, Google, and many more.

Martin has over 25 years of sales and marketing experience. He is also the author of the book, True Connections: Relationship Marketing in the Digital World.

Your website is your first (maybe the only) chance to show people what you can do for them, why they should trust you, and convince them to take your desired action. Unfortunately, many websites do little to achieve this goal — and some websites even do the opposite. What if you could make some quick changes to your website and convince more visitors to take action and become warm leads?

That's where conversion rate optimization comes in. It's what makes some websites convert better than others. From the website logo, tagline, menu arrangements, and call-to-actions, every element of your website should be answering three questions for the site visitors. What are these questions? What does a poorly converting website look like, and how do I improve my website?

Listen to this episode of the Inspired Insider Podcast with Dr. Jeremy Weisz featuring Martin Greif, President of SiteTuners. They discuss website design woes and conversion rate optimization best practices, including the tools to use and actual live case studies. Stay tuned.

John Corcoran is a recovering attorney, an author, and was a former White House writer and speechwriter to the Governor of California. Throughout his career, John has worked in Hollywood, the heart of Silicon Valley, and has run his boutique law firm in the San Francisco Bay Area catering to small business owners and entrepreneurs.

John has been the host of the Smart Business Revolution Podcast since 2012. He has interviewed hundreds of CEOs, founders, authors, and entrepreneurs, from Peter Diamandis and Adam Grant to Gary Vaynerchuk and Marie Forleo.

John is also the Co-founder of Rise25 Media, a company that connects B2B businesses with their ideal clients, referral partners, and strategic partners and generates ROI through their done-for-you podcast service.

Dr. Jeremy Weisz is the Co-founder of Rise25. He has been involved in podcasting for 11 years and was a Senior Producer for one of the early business podcasts; he assisted in putting all of their systems in place and helped them add volume, feature, and edify various business leaders.

Dr. Weisz has also been running his podcast, Inspired Insider, since 2011. He has featured top entrepreneurs, founders, and CEOs of companies such as P90X, Atari, Einstein Bagels, Mattel, the Orlando Magic, and many more.

In addition to running Rise25, Dr. Weisz owns a nutritional supplement business and continues to run his own chiropractic and massage facility, Chiropractical Solutions & Massage.

You can get a ton of exposure by being a guest on others' podcasts. The more carefully selected shows you get on, the more likely you are to make great connections and generate more leads. But the big question is, how do you get on more podcasts? Short answer: cold outreach, being a great guest, and having your own podcast.

Cold outreach can be super effective if it contains exceptional direct response copywriting elements — especially personalization. Unfortunately, not many people know how to effectively outreach, and they're unaware of the pros and cons that come with hiring someone else to do it. So, what's the right way to do cold outreach, be a great guest, and use your podcast to get on other shows?

Listen to this episode of Inspired Insider Podcast with Dr. Jeremy Weisz featuring the Co-founder of Rise25, John Corcoran. They discuss the process of getting on more podcasts for exposure and the strategy for extracting the most value from each interview. From cold outreach best practices to taking connections further following a show, you don't want to miss a second of this short — but packed — episode. Stay tuned.

Shaun Buck is the CEO of The Newsletter Pro. The Newsletter Pro is a company that offers completely custom, done-for-you newsletters that are profitable, easy, and fun. Although The Newsletter Pro has only been operating since 2011, Shaun and his 60+ member team have grown the company into one of the nation's largest custom print newsletter companies. They print and mail millions of newsletters annually for diverse industries spread across four countries.

Shaun is a regular contributor to Entrepreneur and has published his own book, The Ultimate Guide To Newsletters (the second edition of Amazon best-seller, Newsletter Marketing). He collaborated with marketing guru Dan Kennedy to co-write the No B.S Guide to Maximum Referrals and Customer Retention.

Since the pandemic hit, one of the most important things you can do is take care of your existing clients. Unfortunately, many businesses make the mistake of going after new clients at the expense of existing ones. However, existing clients will keep you in business. So, how do you retain clients — and keep them happy?

Shaun Buck suggests nurturing them. Nurturing your clients leads to excellent retention and a more profitable business. It is about providing clients with incredible value, educating and entertaining them, and giving them offers they can't refuse. How do you maximize all these moving parts and reduce your churn rate?

Listen to this episode of the Inspired Insider Podcast with Dr. Jeremy Weisz and his guest, Shaun Buck, the CEO of The Newsletter Pro. They discuss the best way to grow top-line revenue and maximize sales. They also talk about nurturing campaigns and clients, which leads to greater retention, upsells, and referrals. You don't want to miss a minute of this insightful episode.

Tim Ash is an authority on evolutionary psychology and digital marketing. He is a sought-after international keynote speaker and the best-selling author of Unleash Your Primal Brain and Landing Page Optimization.

Tim has been recognized by Forbes and Entrepreneur Magazine because of his online marketing success. He has worked with companies like Nestle, Google, American Express, Verizon, and many more.

Tim was the Co-founder and CEO of SiteTuners, a strategic digital optimization agency, for nineteen years. He developed deep expertise in user-centered design, persuasion, understanding consumer behavior, neuromarketing, and landing page testing. In the mid-1990s, he became one of the early pioneers in the discipline of website conversion rate optimization (CRO).

As an agency owner, you're constantly trying to convince and influence people — employees, clients, and others — on behalf of your clients. Not only is that one of the most challenging things to do, but it is also exhausting when you don't have a full grasp of human decision-making and behavior.

After running his own agency for 19 years serving companies like Google and Nestle, Tim Ash understands the power of evolutionary psychology too well. He explains it in his book, Unleash Your Primal Brain: Demystifying how we think and why we act. But how did Tim come up with these ideas, and how do you apply them to your business?

Listen to this episode of the Inspired Insider Podcast with Dr. Jeremy Weisz and guest Tim Ash, author, speaker, and agency founder. They discuss the mental struggles an agency owner faces and how to think about marketing to better serve your clients. You don't want to miss any part of this insightful episode, including why marketing messaging should also convey pain, psychological hacks to upgrade your marketing, and more!

Randall Kaplan is the Founder and CEO of JUMP Investors, a venture capital firm. Since its formation in 1999, JUMP has invested in more than 60 early-to-late-stage technology companies, including Google, Seagate, Lyft, and Chime. They also invest in real estate and private equity.

Randall is also a Co-founder of Akamai Technologies. Akamai Technologies is a content delivery and security software company. They serve nearly 30% of the world's web traffic, are a member of the S&P 500, employ almost 8,000 people with 64 offices in 28 countries, and have $3.2 billion in 2020 revenues.

Randall has several other ventures like Sandee, Thrive Properties, CollarCard, and hosts the podcast In Search of Excellence. He is also an accomplished drone photographer. His coffee table book, Bliss: Beaches, features his beach photos from around the world and will be released in June 2021. When he's not working, Randall loves to wakeboard, toss the football, play the drums, fly his drones, and most importantly, spend time with family.

Ever wonder what makes a multimillion-dollar founder successful? Here's a clue: the DNA of relentless persistence. That's how Randall Kaplan, JUMP Investors' Founder and Co-founder of Akamai Technologies, describes it. At the start of his entrepreneurial journey, Randall researched deeply into Fortune 500 CEOs and wanted to meet with them. He had to send 300 cold letters — and with persistent follow-ups, he landed 65 meetings, 15 callbacks, and a dream job at SunAmerica Inc.

Beyond the job, Randall came out of those meetings with lessons and insights that have shaped his rise to becoming a multimillion-dollar founder. Do you want to hear Randall tell these stories about the lessons he learned? Have you been looking for a way to connect with him and discover how to succeed as an entrepreneur?

Listen to this episode of the Inspired Insider Podcast with Dr. Jeremy Weisz featuring Randall Kaplan, Founder and CEO of JUMP Investors. They discuss how Randall quit a struggling law career to become a thriving serial entrepreneur and investor. He shares his hustle story, big unexpected wins, the mindset that helped him prosper, his love for drone photography, and lots more!