Diana Fryc is the chief sales and marketing officer at Retail Voodoo - Brand Builders for Food, Beverage, Wellness, and Fitness. They help marketers, founders, executives, and investors in the food, beverage, wellness, and fitness industries develop new brands, restore growth to declining brands, and accelerate growth on established brands.

They are the food, beverage, and wellness industries’ long-term ally for brand strategy, brand development, brand positioning, identity & architecture, innovation & new product, packaging development, integrated brand communications, integrated marketing plans, consumer segmentation & insights.

Diana is also the host of the Gooder podcast where she introduces you to the powerhouse women who have found success on every level. Her goal is to give you direct access to their insights and expertise in order to help you make your business “Gooder”.

Well, now it’s our turn to unlock her inner expertise!

Simon Schwartz is the Founder of Locasaur - the company that’s built a simple personal messaging app for local businesses to engage directly with their regulars, and empower them to help grow the customer base by referring friends.

For small businesses with limited marketing and outreach budgets, Locasaur turns regulars into a dynamic growth team with a digital version of good old word of mouth. Their Goal: Be an unapologetically pro-local ally in technology, and help local businesses thrive by making their personal touch the bottom line.

SJ Barakony is a tough man to define. 

He describes himself as ... The Education Sherpa. Super Connector. Futurist ( the intersection of the futures of education x work ). Thought Leader. Podcast guest ( and future host ). Guest Blogger & Historian.He is 100% committed to the "E" (Entrepreneurial) Pathway because he sees this as the very best vehicle to serve, solve, & share. It enables win/win's in all of their forms and aligns with a producer x growth mindset. SJ presently is (or previously was) involved in the following mentorship and/or advising channels:

YEA ( Young Entrepreneurs Academy ) Teen Entrepreneurial Camp SeaChange AcceleratorOWU's Real Life , EMF, & APP programs AWANASundown Group's 'Ask an Expert' ProgramHECOA's special events ( 12 separate talks over 5+ years ) ECDI 's Professional Advisory Network (PAN)AskMentor.comTurtlewise.net

He's impacted many lives and he's not close to done yet!

Brian Sohner is the Director of new business development for Team DDS - Central Ohio's premier provider for the professional medical and dental community. TEAM DDS has been been working in the Dental Office construction business for over 30 years building or improving over a half-million square feet of office space.

They are a full-service design-build construction company, offering construction drawings and documents, commercial cabinet & millwork manufacturing, and licensed plumbers and electricians on staff.

Prior to this role, Brian has been a General Manager or an Ops Manager with other companies.

I have a unique understanding of Brian’s capabilities and capacities because the building I sit in right now was built by Brian and his team.

Two organizations are provided the most support for catapulting our business over the last 2 years. Those are Sean White and the Team at Whiteboard Marketing (Episode 2) and Brian with Team DDS. They transformed our space and by virtue, our brand, and I can’t wait for you to hear our conversation.

Tyler Ross is the owner & broker at Ross Real Estate and he enjoys pursuing other endeavors such as improving his health & fitness, writing, and making investments. Not only is he a successful entrepreneur and broker, but he’s also a writer, podcaster, inventor, and all-around productive mind.

 

And his wife has said “He’s the most annoying person I’ve ever met…” So we have something to commiserate over… He was born and raised in Warrenton, Virginia. He has a wife & two children and continues to work and live in his hometown.

Mark Miller is currently the owner of an Edward Jones Financial Advisory firm, which he’s been practicing in since 2008. He is a Certified Financial Planner as well as an Accredited Asset Management Specialist (AAMS). He also holds the following registrations and licenses: Series 7, Series 66, life, health, long-term care, and annuities.

In addition to his role as a financial advisor, he often trains and hosts new financial advisors in his office for mentoring. And when he’s not working to train the next generation, he’s busy building wealth for his clients as well as growing his business!

In the first part of our conversation, Mark also tells us how he and two fellow high-school soccer coaches have coached, prepared, and mentored 5 teams to achieve the highest level in their sport - a state title!

(... And stay tuned for Mark's rapid-fire segment where he tells us about the Lambo currently parked in his garage...)

We’d love it if you’d take 30 seconds to leave us a review on Apple Podcasts and share MikedUp Pod with a friend. One last thing, if you’re just finding us on this episode, please head back into the MikedUp Pod feed and download some of our previous episodes featuring awesome guests like Jen Wells of TalentID, Nate from Coffee Connections, Jo from the Jo Henderson Project, and the Monfredi ladies, Joyce and Dr. Monica. One who taught me about entrepreneurship and the other - my wife and business partner! Thanks for supporting and we hope you enjoy!

Today we're stoked to welcome Jo Henderson - Owner of The Jo Henderson Project - to the Pod. Josephia (Jo) Henderson is the "Queen of Empowerment"! She has trained over 3000 clients, lead over 5000 classes, and has helped hundreds of people transform their bodies and minds.

Jo is a certified personal trainer and corrective exercise specialist through the National Academy of Sports Medicine (NASM), as well as a certified sport nutritionist through Precision Nutrition. She earned a Business Administration Degree from Florida A&M University, And she’s a MikedUp Pod certified badass…

Here’s Jo on Instagram- https://www.instagram.com/the_jo_henderson_project/  

We talk all things running the business of a solopreneur (personal trainer) as well as talk the ins and outs of improving fitness... Something all business owners need!

We’d love it if you’d take 30 seconds to leave us a review on Apple Podcasts and share MikedUp Pod with a friend. One last thing, if you’re just finding us on this episode, please head back into the MikedUp Pod feed and download some of our previous episodes featuring awesome guests like Jen Wells of TalentID, Chris & Chuck from Edly, Jim Dixon from Valpak, and the Monfredi ladies, Joyce and Dr. Monica. One who taught me about entrepreneurship and the other - my business partner! Thanks for supporting and we hope you enjoy!

Back in March, I had the pleasure of talking virtually with Nate Grenier, the co-founder, owner/operator of Coffee Connections in Hilliard, Oh about all things coffee, running a business with your spouse, and some honest conversations about where we could both improve as business owners and people.

If you missed his first episode, please head back in the feed and give it a listen for some great background information… (Here's a link to help you out)

And I wanted to have him back on today for 2 reasons…

1) He’s a wealth of information as an entrepreneur and his company is doing so many great and forward-thinking things in our community and in his business. And

2) Coffee Connections has navigated 6-months of our new Coronavirus-dominated economy and we can all learn a few things about how they’ve performed and thrived during this time.

Ronnie Ross is currently the English Department Chair at Highland School, a Pre-K2 to Grade 12 independent school located in Warrenton, Virginia, where he’s worked for over 11 years.

There he is also the Freshman Dean, a current English teacher in the upper school, as well as a previous Director of Character and Leadership. He’ll also appreciate me mentioning that he’s a 5-time state champion soccer coach.

However, for the purposes of this interview, Ronnie was previously a candidate for State Senate in Virginia’s Senate District 27. In this interview, we’ll be exploring how he ran his campaign, managed his budget, motivated his staff, and generated cash flow to keep the campaign moving forward. We’ll also learn that running a campaign is very similar to running a business - with a few basic differences.

We're taking the week to prepare some of the excellent content we have ahead and diving back into the archives to give you some great content from our first 6 guests... But in a unique way.

Our regular listeners know that we like to run each guest through our rapid-fire segment before signing off on an interview... And this episode is somewhat similar. We're just skipping the actual interview for each of our first 6 guests and fast-forwarding right to the (at times) hilarious, informative, and worthwhile rapid-fire segments that have kept us entertained over these first 19 episodes. 

We hope that you enjoy - and we'll be back next week with another great guest!

In this rapid-fire palooza we have the following great individuals:

Dr. Monica Monfredi - Owner / General Dentist of Monfredi Family Dental (also Mike's wife and boss)

Sean White - Owner of Whiteboard Marketing

Steve Carroll - CEO of Findigs (also MikedUp Pod's inaugural sponsor)

Carlie of Carlie Write Now

Kevin Ridenbaugh - Co-Founder of Seitan's Realm

Nate Grenier - Co-Founder, Owner/Operator of Coffee Connections