The Business Generals Podcast | Helping You Maximize Your Entrepreneurial Dreams - Every Single Week

Sarah Shaw is the CEO of Sarah Shaw Consulting. She started her career as a costume designer for Hollywood movies, went on to build several businesses and sold millions of dollars’ worth of products including the Sarah Shaw Handbag which got a lot of press, TV and movie placements. The bag is sold in over 1,200 stores and over 70 of the world’s most famous celebrities have worn or carried her products. Within a year Sarah Shaw Handbags could be found on the pages of InStyle, Oprah, People, Lucky and Marie Claire magazines. 

Sarah provides private one-on-one coaching packages that give entrepreneurs the overall know-how to create and launch a product as well strategies she used to grow her own million-dollar company. One of her special areas of coaching is teaching clients how to get their products into the hands of celebrities and then leveraging their celebrity clientele for press and sales. He experience in production and entertainment has lent itself to unique approaches to packaging, marketing, distribution and public relations. 

Sarah also founded Entreprenette, a company through which she coaches female entrepreneurs through the process of taking their fashion, home, lifestyle or accessory product ideas from concept to reality. 

Period in full-time business 

Sarah started her first company in 1994 but has been in full-time self-employment since 1998. 

Core revenue streams 

Sarah’s current business is Sarah Shaw Consulting through which she works with entrepreneurs to help them launch their product-based companies. She works with them for 6+ months in building their businesses. 

Starting the consulting business 

Sarah started Sarah Shaw Consulting in 2009. 

Starting out in business 

After college, Sarah started working in the film business doing costumes for movies. She never thought of entrepreneurship back then. In 1994, she started a clothing company that made clothes for movies. She partnered with a fashion designer and manufacturer who produced the clothes for her. 

Her second business was buying wardrobe trailers and renting them to the film business. She later got the idea for a handbag in 1997. She made the bags, sold them, and they took off very well in the market. The handbag was taken up by 20 to 30 stores, and in 1998 she got a big order from Anthropologie, which drove her to quit her job as a costume designer. 

Role of a costume designer in Hollywood 

Sarah says costumes are the visual aspect of a movie and are therefore very critical in developing a character in the audience’s eye. She was a costume supervisor working under costume designers and some of her roles included managing the budgets and making sure all the costumes were on set when needed. She also performed a lot of other tasks and worked a minimum of 12 hours a day. 

Take away from the costume supervisor job 

The costume supervisor job enabled her to discover her tenacity and willingness to succeed. She learnt how to manage budgets, how not to take no for an answer, and how to put her vision to paper in the best way possible. All that helped her as she started her entrepreneurial journey. 

Starting the handbag company and growing it 

When she was first creating the handbags, she used to create rough designs and create samples. She consulted her former business partner in the previous clothing company she had, and he connected her to the people who eventually helped her get the first order from Anthropologie. 

She had initially contracted a family that sewed the bags for her but she later started using a factory she knew to do the sewing in mass. At that point, she had a small office where she managed all the operations from. She eventually got orders from Nordstrom stores and other boutiques across the US.  

Sarah did a lot of cold calling and sometimes mailed out her printed catalogue to get new buyers. Later on,

Carissa Reiniger is an entrepreneur and small business growth expert. She started her company, Silver Lining, at the age of 22 and has been highly involved in the world of small business ever since. She spent over a decade of her life learning how to effectively help a small business grow and developed the SLAP methodology which has managed to influence over 10,000 small businesses.  

Carissa has written 3 books on how to grow and help small businesses succeed. She has also been featured in many publications and media outlets including the New York Times, Forbes, TechCrunch, National Post, Globe and Mail, Inc., Entrepreneur, CNN and more. She speaks often on entrepreneurship and has worked with the small business teams at The White House, Google, RIM, Staples, American Airlines, Citrix, and many more.  

Carissa is also the founder of Thank You Small Business, a big movement to help more small businesses succeed. She is extremely passionate about the arts, has 2 books about relationships, and a play based on her book that she produced across Canada and many other projects under her belt. She is currently working on writing and directing her own play in NYC and producing and directing a documentary. 

Period in business 

She started Silver Lining eleven years ago when she was 22 years old. It was her first official business. 

Core revenue streams 

When she started Silver Lining, it was a consulting business which didn’t work in the long run because the overheads were too high, their consulting fees to high, and it was not scalable. She eventually changed the business model to a training model where they were getting paid to train small businesses. The revenue streams changed because they were getting paid large sums of money by large organizations, companies and government agencies to train small businesses. Though that business model was highly profitable, they could not support the small businesses in the long term so four years ago Carissa came up with another business model through which she invested heavily in the development of a software product that enabled Silver Lining to become a SaaS business.  

That business model has so far been very successful because their prices are affordable, it’s profitable, they can scale, and they can work with small businesses long term. They have three different SaaS package levels depending on how much support a business owner needs. 

Core service offering 

Carissa wanted to help small business owners successfully sustain their businesses while making more money doing what they love. She first interviewed 400 business owners trying to figure out why it was so hard to grow a small business and why the failure rate was so high. She discovered that small businesses never have enough time or money; and they need more time to make more money, and more money to make more time which Carissa called The Cash Flow Capacity Catch 22.   

To solve that problem, Carissa developed the Silver Lining Action Plan (SLAP!), better known as the SLAP Methodology, which is based on behaviour change psychology; and it’s more of a modern, provocative, interesting, action-oriented, interactive business growth plan. SLAP is a one year program where business owners spend the first 30 days building a one year growth plan.  

The business owners start by thinking about where they want their businesses to be, evaluating their business models, setting financials goals, deciding who their ideal customers are, and building an action plan to go into the market and meet their target customers. Once they are done, which usually takes 10 hours, they have to implement that action plan within a 12 month period. Silver Lining offers them support, structures, resources and training for the 12 months to help them achieve their growth plan. 

Current business model 

Silver Lining’s business model is SaaS overlaid with consultancy and their pricing is...

Joel Boggess is the go-to guy for clarity, confidence, and direction. He is an author, life coach, and online radio host (ReLaunch Show). He teaches professionals and women on-the-go how to find clarity, confidence and direction even when they feel stuck, overwhelmed, or unchallenged. He helps entrepreneurs, owners, and business leaders make better decisions, take bolder actions, and get greater results. 

With a Master’s degree in counselling and many years’ experience working one-on-one and with special interest groups, Joel has the know-how, skill, and wisdom, to help you tune into fully expressing your voice. He is a No. 1 Best Selling Author for his book, Finding Your Voice, which hit the top spots on Amazon. He is also a contributor to Huffpost and Success.com. 

Last corporate job 

His last corporate job was in the Dallas, Fort Worth area working for Morgan Stanley. He officially left formal employment on November 30th 2006. 

Core revenue streams 

Joel has been doing podcast coaching and one-on-one coaching. He has helped people create, launch and grow their podcast shows. He recently tweaked his business model to focus exclusively on speaking to get paid, where has had some experience. 

Tip: Podcasting is the new networking and the best way to make connections that you would never make through any other channel 

Starting out in business 

One month after leaving formal employment, Joel got a speaking engagement. During that speaking engagement, Zig Ziglar was seated in the front row which challenged Joel to do his best and also motivated him to move forward as an entrepreneur. He initially started as a one-on-one career and life coach and that was his primary revenue stream for a long time. 

Replacing the Morgan Stanley income 

Joel says it took a couple of years to replace his Morgan Stanley income.  

Tip: If you live under the same roof with someone who is highly involved in your life, make sure you have an agreement with them before you leave formal employment. 

Why podcasting? 

Apart from having mixes of experience in radio and TV, Joel knew he had to be in the podcast industry and be a leader. Podcasting is of great value to him and he says that having a podcast has been one of the best business decisions he has ever made. 

Monetizing the podcast 

He says this is not the most important thing because he views his podcast as a door opener and relationship/opportunity maker. It has helped him get on stages and develop relationships with million-dollar speakers, actors, best-selling authors, and athletes. Inviting those people on his podcast show enabled him to bridge the gap between him and them. 

 

Reason for success so far 

Joel says focusing on what he wanted to accomplish enabled him to create a show that would add value to people and help him get some growth opportunities. He has been focused on creating that show, getting quality content from the guests that he hosts, and developing the show’s social media presence. Focusing on the show has helped him get to the point where he can now move forward into diversification.   

Tip: Focus is the number one competitive advantage 

Initial wrong move 

He says one of the mistakes he made in the beginning was counting on his previous guests to drive his show growth by directing traffic to his website and social media sites. The results were disastrous for him despite having all the biggest names on his show because the show was not growing. Taking ownership of the show’s growth later on was a big game changer. 

Tip: As a podcaster, add value in the conversation and to the conversation, and that will change the way the interviewee views you 

Leveraging the networking aspect of the podcast and the current social outreach strategy after each show 

Joel says that he has learnt the importance of repurposing content which involves...

Jeremy Young is the founder and CEO of Tanga.com, a company he built from scratch to become one of the fastest-growing privately-held companies in Arizona (#14 2015 ACE Awards) and the largest bootstrapped company in its market, with no outside investors or debts. The company has had over 5 million orders shipped and served more than 2 million customers.

Tanga was honored by Phoenix Business Journal in 2014 and 2015 as one of Arizona’s 25 fastest growing private companies and included in the Internet Retailer’s lists of Top 1000 ecommerce companies. Jeremy was named the 2016 CEO of the Year by Phoenix Business Journal at the AZ Top Tech Exec Awards.

…………

Book recommendation for entrepreneurs: 

* Founder’s At Work: Stories of Startups’ Early Days – Jessica Livingston

* The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference – Malcolm Gladwell

* Other Malcolm Gladwell’s books in general

>>>

Legacy:

To leave a mark, do something that changes the world, and leave the world a better place – Jeremy.

>>>

Best way to connect:

www.tanga.com – Jeremy’s Business Website

[email protected] – Jeremy’s Business Email

Jeremy Young – LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook

For more info including show notes and resources check out www.businessgenerals.com

Thanks for tuning in!!

-Davis

#TheBusinessGeneralsPodcast

 

Dave Hirshkop is the owner and creative force behind Dave’s Gourmet which is a Gourmet products manufacturer that is made up of several brands including Insanity Sauces and Snacks, DG Sauces, Palette Fine Foods, and Chile Today Hot Tamale. They have won dozens of awards, are in national distribution and have a ton of media coverage including The Today Show, Good Morning America, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Time Magazine, The Food Network, NPR, and many more.

…………..

Tools and Resources:

* Blinkist: An app that offers very informative summaries of diverse useful books

Book recommendation for entrepreneurs: 

Dave reads audio books and has now been reading book summaries on Blinkist, but doesn’t have any in particular that he can recommend. He advices entrepreneurs to read books on management. He says Seth Gordon books are also very gainful.

He still recommends “The 4-Hour Workweek: Escape 9-5, Live Anywhere, and Join the New Rich by Timothy Ferriss”

>>>

Legacy:

To be remembered for having created ideas and products that had a positive impact in people’s lives – Dave.

>>>

Best way to connect:

www.davesgourmet.com – Dave’s Business website

[email protected] – Dave’s email address

For more info including show notes and resources check out www.businessgenerals.com

Thanks for tuning in!!

-Davis

#TheBusinessGeneralsPodcast

 

JV Crum III is the founder of Conscious Millionaire Institute, which works with coaches, consultant and people who want to make their first million dollars and do something bigger – even if they have not yet fully identified every aspect of what that is, or how big they truly want to play on this planet.

JV is a true master at helping clients discover, craft, and expand their “Big Impact Vision”. Conscious Millionaire works with business coaches and consultants who are next-generation thinkers, people who seek to create a transformational shift – for themselves, their clients and our world.

You can find more about JV at http://consciousmillionaire.com/

Join us in this awesome episode between me and JV, and I know you will have a blast!!

………

Book recommendation for entrepreneurs: 

* Conscious Millionaire: Grow Your Business by Making a Difference – JV Crum III

>>>

Legacy:

To help at least a million people achieve the financial freedom they want by building businesses that make a positive impact in the world – JV Crum III.

>>>

Best way to connect:

www.consciousmillionaireshow.com – JV’s Podcast (Send Email or Voicemail)

www.consciousmillionaire.com/freebook – JV’s Business Website

 

Zvi Band is a software developer and entrepreneur, the CEO and co-founder of Contactually which is a software service that gives people everything they need to easily organize and stay in touch with the most important people in their network. He built the company from an idea in his Evernote to 60 employees (and growing), millions in revenue, 12M+ in venture backing, numerous awards, and thousands of paying customers in SMB and mid-market.

He previously led Workstreamer as CTO from its initial product development to acquisition. Prior to Contactually, Zvi ran a software consultancy firm, working for clients such as Ford, NYSE AND Volkswagen. He also serves as a mentor to two DC-Based incubators, 1776 and Acceleprise. He founded DC Tech Meetup and ProudlyMadeinDC to promote DC entrepreneurship. He has been named a DC “Tech Titan” 3 times.

………..

Book recommendation for entrepreneurs: 

* Crossing the Chasm: Marketing and Selling High-Tech Products to Mainstream Customers – Geoffrey A. Moore (has been a key part of the business strategy behind Contactually)

* The Hard Thing About Hard Things: Building a Business When There Are No Easy Answers – Ben Horowitz

* Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future – Peter Thiel

>>>

Legacy:

To be remembered as someone who made a positive impact in the world and made a lasting effect in some way – Zvi.

>>>

Best way to connect:

@skeevis – Zvi’s Twitter Handle (His favourite way of communicating)

www.contactually.com – Zvi’s business website

 

Russ Perry is the founder Design Pickle, the number one flat rate graphic design service in the world, offering clients unlimited graphic design support at a flat monthly fee.

Design Pickle solves a lot of problems for just about everyone, from the small business that doesn’t have an in-house designer to the entrepreneur who shouldn’t be spending time trying to put Facebook ads together for hours on end.

Russ has been involved in branding and marketing strategy for over the last decade, and has worked to shift the status-quo with brands like Apple, Morgan Stanley, Pebble Tec, LG, Botanicare and Harlem Globetrotters.

……….

Book recommendation for entrepreneurs: 

* Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World – Cal Newport

* The 7 Day startup: You Don’t Learn Until You Launch – Dan Norris

>>>

Legacy:

To be remembered as the enabler that ensured his family had amazing, unforgettable experiences – Russ.

>>>

Best way to connect:

Russ Perry on Instagram

www.designpickle.com – Russ’ business website (Fill out contact form)

 

Darryl Lyons is the CEO and co-founder of the PAX Financial Group which helps people improve their financial planning and quality of life through strategies for investing. He is a licensed financial planner and the author of Small Business, Big Pressure. Darryl began his career in the financial sector right after university and throughout his career; he had won awards for recruiting and development form Fortune 100 companies. 

He started PAX Financial Group back in January 2007 with his co-founders Andres Gutierrez and Joseph Schuetze. He has built the company to officially become “one of the best places” to work in San Antonio. 

Darryl also served as the Chairman for the Brooks Development Authority which earned him the honor of having Mayor Julian Castro name a park “The Darryl W Lyons Park”. He was also named to the 2010 San Antonio Business Journal’s “40 Under 40 Rising Stars” which honors people making a difference in business and the community  

Period in full–time business 

Started out alone about 12 years ago and after 2 years, brought in 2 partners to form PAX Financial Group. In the beginning he had a sole proprietorship business. 

Current Revenue streams 

The main revenue sources for PAX Financial are managing people’s money, insurance services and group retirement accounts. Darryl and his team take pride in liberating people when it comes to managing their money. Their services enable their clients to focus on what they are good at.    

Starting out in business 

His entrepreneurial journey started while in college. He used to work at a bank full-time to pay for college and that’s where he developed his interest in finance. Decided to study accounting and finance which enabled him to go into the banking and investment world. He started by working for big companies. Started his own firm about 5 years later. 

Transition from formal employment into self-employment 

It was a painful process for Darryl. His father had always motivated him to be an entrepreneur. Getting his first child was the first factor that pushed him to quit his formal job because he had the fear of losing his job while having so many personal responsibilities. A series of other difficulties eventually led him to go into entrepreneurship and despite the challenges he faced in the beginning, he persevered until he achieved success. His faith in God played a major role in his success to date. 

Working on his new business 

Working in the corporate world taught him how to create a habit of excellence. He used to do aggressive cold calling coupled with direct marketing and they helped him achieve solid sales leads which turned into long term clients. He applied the same to his new business and it helped him achieve sales while also maintaining his previous clients. 

Getting the first set of clients 

He engaged in a lot of networking which helped him get a fresh list of clients after losing all the previous clients he had when starting out. One of the people he met at a networking event appreciated Darryl’s level of integrity in his work, which led to Darryl being endorsed by Dave Ramsey. That endorsement became the new catalyst to his growth. He started getting 100 referrals per month from Dave Ramsey. Still works with Dave’s team to date. 

Working towards getting endorsed 

Darryl had a high degree of authenticity in his work and that naturally led to influential people endorsing his work. 

Tip: Doing what you are passionate about will eventually make you visible in your area of business and if you maintain a high level of integrity and professionalism in your work, the right people will endorse and validate your work. 

3 minute talk to 30,000 people 

Darryl was offered an opportunity by his pastor to talk to his 30,000 strong congregation about financial and investment management. He enjoyed making the talk. 

Gavin Zuchlinski is the founder of Acuity Scheduling, a clever online automated way for businesses to manage their appointments online, allowing clients to schedule themselves. He is a self-professed tech geek and espresso maniac who wholeheartedly believes that business should be fun. 

Gavin says, “At Acuity Scheduling we are obsessed about helping businesses like yours offer and manage appointments online so you can focus on what you’re good at.  

It all started with seeing my mom spend hours scheduling her clients. I knew there had to be a better way, so I built it. It transformed her life and now does the same for over 50,000 businesses.” 

Effect of relocating to Acuity 

Gavin started by working in a government job before leaving to start Acuity Scheduling. He recently moved from New York City to Pennsylvania to be closer to family. His move didn’t affect Acuity’s operations because it’s a completely remote company. Every Acuity employee either works from home, a co-working space or other suitable location. Whenever Gavin needs to hire new employees he still sources them from New York because it’s easier to carry out training and on-boarding. 

Current core revenue streams 

Acuity is a subscription based SaaS business where every client who goes to their website can sign up for a trial and later pay for the service either monthly or annually. 100% of Acuity Scheduling’s revenue comes from the subscriptions. 

Target clients 

Gavin originally built Acuity for his mum’s small business and he has continuously ensured that they only serve small businesses that have less than 10 employees. Acuity offers 4 pricing plans including a free plan, $10 plan, $19 plan, and a $34 plan. They also have larger clients who pay the same low prices which enables Gavin and his team to ensure that clients are treated equally in terms of service delivery. 

Acuity has tens of thousands of low paying customers. That has helped the company avoid being reliable on one segment clients for its major revenues.  

Starting out in business 

During a long drive with his mum, Gavin realised that she was having a hard time scheduling, cancelling or confirming appointments, and that inspired him to develop a program that would help her efficiently manage her appointment scheduling so she could concentrate on her core activities. That software program was what became Acuity.  

Gavin also set up a web development business around the software but in the beginning he didn’t succeed in getting clients. He still kept it running and eventually people started organically signing up for it. Back then, Gavin was still working in his government job so he would work on Acuity during his free time. In 2013, he decided to go into Acuity full-time because it had grown considerably and needed his full attention. 

The idea for Acuity 

Gavin came up with the idea for Acuity in 2006 and started developing it immediately in his free time. He is a developer by trade and thus built the software himself. It took him a few weeks to build the first version and take it to market. 

Getting the first set of clients 

The first client for Acuity was his mum and even though he can’t remember the second client, he could recall that one of his one first hundred clients is a fly fishing instructor in the Mid-West US who has been a client ever since. 

To get the first clients, Gavin put up a self-service marketing sign on the Acuity website to direct new users on how to sign up and pay through PayPal while also setting up their subscription. He did a lot of search engine optimization which the sustainably increased the number of clients directed from Google search results. He also got a lot of clients from diverse recommendations and referrals. 

Acuity’s ranking on Google 

When starting out, Acuity didn’t rank on page one. Gavin didn’t have Google Analytics to determine...