Bedros Keuilian Podcast Show - The Secret to Creating a Winning Partnership - 088

Episode Date: March 2, 2019

In this episode, Bedros Keuilian and Craig Ballantyne will share their love story with you! From early business ideas to building empires of their very own, they have both been entrepreneurs fighting for more success. Watch or listen now to discover how they made this partnership the gift that keeps on giving.   “We constantly try to outwork each other” - Bedros Keuilian “If you’re excited about something your going to grow it out of sheer passion” - Bedros Keuilian   Here’s what you’ll discover: 4:20 - How Craig came at Bedros with a giving hand; and why you should start relationship like this 7:05 - How they went from a small idea to a decade of dominance 8:40 - Why you shouldn't start a partnership unless your partner compliments you; and why you should always try to outwork each other 13:40 - How they better themselves by constantly pushing each other to become better 16:30 - Why you should always surround yourself with like-minded people, and people who can help you move the needle forward   “Figure out a way you can help people.” - Craig Ballantyne

Hey, you know how artists tend to think in colors and shapes and stuff? I'm like, yeah, and I didn't know where you were going. All right. You go, I tend to think in Instagram. One of the most common questions that I get is, how did you and Baderos meet? My name is Craig Balentine. My business partner here is Badegros Kulian. Welcome to the Empire podcast show.

And today we're going to go through the history of Empire and teach you some amazing lessons about how we've grown our businesses. And also, what's coming next? You ready, B? I'm ready, man. Let's do it. All right. So it all starts back in 2007 when I saw this terrorist online. I don't care now.

So if you don't know, this beautiful man with a beautiful hair beside me used to shave his head for some strange reason. Right. Yeah. Well, actually, let's share the reason. We might as well share this. So there was a time in the, let's see here, early 2000, so actually late 1999, 2000, I was broke. You didn't have lice at this point. No, no, no, no. I was so broke that I lived out of my Toyota Pick. for a few months and in that time I had I was trying to save money anyway I can so instead

of paying $16 for a haircut I had a pair of clippers yeah and so every three days I would just shave my own head and it went from like using the guard one day the guard breaks you know how like the guard has like those little plastic teeth on it well it breaks and now I'm leaving like using little skid marks on my head and so I just take off the guard and just go you know zero and so that's how I ended up bald for I think a period of like four or five years did you get married Bald? I did. Wow. I got married bald. And it wasn't until one day my wife said, hey, it doesn't look like you have male pattern balding. Why is your hair always, your head always bald? I said, you know what? I'm in the habit of shaving it. She goes, you might want to consider

growing it out, considering there's bald people everywhere who would love to have the kind of hair that you probably have. Seems like an Seinfeld episode right there. So, so anyways, 2007, is that when you had Fitness Business Summit for the first time? First fitness business summit was 2007. And you had Julian Michaels was there? Jillian Michaels, yeah, man. She was just starting out a couple years into the biggest loser show. And so we thought it would be great to have her as like the big keynote speaker. And that woman drops F-bombs like a fucking trucker.

Wow. It was so bad that we couldn't use any of the recording for any kind of social media stuff because we knew we would offend people. But the audience loved her to pieces. Wow. And that was back when you didn't have a stage. No stage, man. The first fitness summit, we had about 100.

14 people in the audience, no stage. I was sweating profusely. I was so nervous. But I think it was right around then, you and I started sending each other books. That was 2009, but I think the big lesson from that is, is that imperfect action beats perfect inaction, right? True. Yeah, absolutely. So he didn't have a stage, but he wanted to have an event. And you didn't know what you didn't really know how to monetize it because you weren't selling masterminds back in? I didn't make any money from that. I lost $13,000 at that event. Right, right. Okay. And then, so what was the big lesson that you learned from it for the next year? The big lesson, I think there's two big lessons.

One, get a stage, two, have something to pitch, have something to sell, because if you don't, you're never gonna monetize it. We didn't even have sponsors, so have sponsors who are gonna bring in money, right? Have a stage so that people in the, it was embarrassing. Everyone in the front can see me, but no one behind the front row could see me

because all these people are in the way. So get a stage, number one, have sponsors who are gonna pay for the cost of the event and then for you to start making money, have a product or service to pitch. And of course, these days we sell our mastermind from the events. One more question. How did you get Julian Michaels at this event? She's already on TV.

Dude, I just got stupidly lucky. We reached out, and I think her star was just starting to take off. It was her second or third year, I think, on Biggest Loser. Got it. It wasn't as big as it became. Yeah. And so it cost us, I want to say, $15,000 to get her at the time. And I went all in. So, like, what money I had left over? I'm like, here you go, Julian. It's going to help draw an audience. And it did. Sure.

I probably would have only got like 40, 40, 50 people, to be honest with you. had I not had Julian. Yeah, so we didn't know each other back then, and then I don't know what happened first, but when people asked me that question, how did we meet? I say one of us sent a book to one another. So I was on your email newsletter list.

You had heard of me, and I sent you a book, or you sent me a book, and you sent me one back, and the next thing you know. I think you had sent the first book. Okay. I wish I would remember what book it was. Yeah, I don't remember the book. I know one of the books,

because we kept sending each other books, and one of them ultimately was maybe the third or fourth round in, was The Go-Giver by Bob Berg. An amazing book about the power of giving, coming with a giving hand. I highly recommend reading The Go-Giver. Yeah, send a lot of those out to a lot of people over the years. And so you and I are like, oh, okay, this guy is friendly, he's helpful. You know, we're sending each other books back and forth.

That is us being Go-Giver. So you're probably thinking, how do I establish a relationship with somebody? Well, now in this day and age, you can connect with them a lot faster on Instagram. But try and figure out a way that you can help people, okay? a way that you can help them when you're trying to start a relationship. So there's a really great book by a guy named Keith Farazi. It's called Never Eat Alone. And in the book, there's a couple of lines I took from the book,

and one of them was when you want to establish that connection with somebody is ease their pain and help their kids. So you figure out, oh, man, this person, you know, I just read that they had back problem or something. I'm going to send them like, you know, this thing helped me with my back pain. I'm going to send them that. I'm going to send it, you know, whether it's $150 or whatever it is, you know, that a piece of equipment that's going to help them.

And then, of course, you got to be careful. You don't want to ease their pain, help their kids. You don't want to be rooting around their garbage or anything to find out their pain, but just simply add value to somebody's life, and that's how you start the relationship. Yeah, and that's how we did. We just started sending each other books.

And quite honestly, I remember very specifically, after he sent the first book, I just looked you up online. I'm like, oh, he's got an online information product. And it's like, wow, I didn't even know this guy was on my list. And quite honestly, I looked up to you because I was just starting to get online, right? So I had my first fitness business summit, but I wasn't making the kind of online money that you probably were, at least the attraction that you were getting. Sure. And then, but then you started a mastermind group.

Yes. And you, how did that go? You sent me an email about it? Yeah, so it was 2009, and I thank you for the book, and you started kind of emailing back and forth. And, you know, this is about how we met and how the empire started. Craig had this crazy little habit of not responding. Do you remember this, he little fucker? You had this habit of not responding to people's emails. And I remember Vince one time saying years later, yeah, the only way I could get Craig to respond to an email is if I said, hey, I want to give you money.

You were selling from day one, which is God bless you for it. But he had this habit of either not responding or he would do just a one word response. Sure. Yeah, and you did a good job of it. So I thank you for it for the book and stuff. And then when I started the Mastermind in 2009, the seven-figure Formula Mastermind, the first time I started a mastermind program, I reached out to you and I said, hey, man, I'm starting a mastermind. I think you might be a good fit.

I think I can help you sell more of your online stuff. And you're like, yeah, I'm in. And then going back to being a go-giver, you said, by the way, you should reach out to Vince Del Monte as well. Let me introduce you. And I'll work on getting him in as well. Cool. And Vince was part of that very first mastermind group as well. Yeah, absolutely.

And so from then, we decided like, you know what, we should start one in the online space. And we did. We started one with Vince, and we had a big event. And you sold it from a stage. You were really great. We had 40 people in that mastermind, which started in 2009. So we are going on a full decade of dominance here. And a decade of decadence, too, with some of our evenings out, especially in Miami. And so listen, so then we fast... Was that the epic hotel, by the way, that we had that crazy-ass meal where we talked about dinosaurs? Zoom up. We talked about dinosaurs. We talked about Jesus. And we ate steak that was so expensive. Sold like, I don't know, it was like, I don't know, $200 an ounce.

And we just kept saying, hey, bring more ounces. And I don't know if it was a waiter or waitress. The waitress was either disgusted or disturbed by us. Yeah, she goes, you do realize this was sold by the ounce. We're like, yeah, yeah, it's sold by the ounce. Keep bringing it. But we were having such a good time eating steak and talking about Jesus and dinosaurs. Yes, it was good.

It was an epic, epic evening at the epic hotel. So, you know, in 2009 or 10, we were sitting in a room. I remember when we hatched this plot to start the mastermind, which is we were drinking Heineken's. He was. That's right. I ordered room service of Heinekenks. Room service, Heineken's.

And we came up with the idea. of, you know what, this is a lesson that I want to teach. So a lot of people ask about partnerships. And most of the time, we say don't do a partnership, right? Because, well, there's a million reasons. There's a million reasons. And I think, have we done an episode on. Yeah, we have done one.

Yeah, go back and listen to why you shouldn't have a partner. Having said that, we're business partners, but we've got a very unique relationship. And if you can create this type of relationship and we explain that in that episode. But, yeah, we talk about don't start partnerships yet. We're in a partnership. Yeah. And the one reason is find somebody who has complex. implementing skills and attributes.

And back then, and we were just joking about this last night, back then you were like the real social one, and I was not the social one. And I had the online stuff, and you had the offline stuff. Today, we both have the online and offline stuff, but you're a hell lot happier and social and I'm just a crumagny motherfucker, aren't I? I don't want to talk to anyone, I don't want to see anyone.

I just want to mind my own business and grow my empire. Yeah, and here I am. Let's go, yeah, up with people. By the way, I want to tell everybody this. Friends, yesterday we're having dinner. We're having sushi at sushi 10. Big shout out, by the way, to Aaron at sushi 10. Get the eel roll.

Get the eel good roll. Yeah. The eel good roll and the PW roll, and the PW does stand for exactly what you think. The PW roll also crushes. But we're sitting at a sushi 10 right here in Chino Hills. Oh, what were we just talking about right now? Well, I was going up for dinner, like three nights in a row and stuff like that. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I lost my train of thought, man. The social stuff? Oh, yes, the social stuff. Yeah. And then you're like, hey, you know how artists tend to think and, colors and shapes and stuff. I'm like, yeah, and I didn't know where you were going. Oh, right.

You go, I tend to think in Instagram. This is why I do so well on Instagram. And you nailed it. You really do think in Instagram. I'm thinking about Instagram right now. When I got home, I logged on to Instagram, and I see in my messages that there's a post from you. And the post is just me typing away as you're like sitting across the table for me in Sushi

10 filming me. Right. Yeah. I'm just always thinking about it. You think in Instagram. So get your partner who can, compliment you. That's a big, big lesson. So that's what we did in 2010. That's when we started our first Info Mastermind. One more lesson in that. Yeah, yeah. Okay. And I think you're being

modest here. But even though we're 50-50 partners on the Empire Mastermind and our coaching program, we both work like we own 100% of it. Yeah. Like we constantly try and outwork each other. And then when you're in a time of, you know, you're just neck deep and shit to do, I try and do more of the heavy lifting. Times like now, when I'm neck deep and the growth of Fit Body Boot Camp, good Lord, man, you put the, all the outlines for these Empire podcast shows, I don't have time for it. Right. And you make it easy for me.

And so if you can find a partner- And we're having the competition to find the best speakers for the Empire Summit. Yes, yeah. So, you know, if you can outwork your partner or at least attempt to, you're going to have a great relationship. Most partnerships are the opposite, right? Right. If you can outweigh your partner where you know they're trying to outwork you.

Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Otherwise it becomes lopsided and one guy gets entitled, the other guy gets pissed. Yeah, yeah. So we start our info mastermind. 2009, 2010. That was like the info mastermind that launched a bunch of millionaires, that's for sure. Holy smokes. They have like legends in the industry, right? Jason Phillips Phillips,

Philips, Shauna Kaminsky, Vince Tomonti, man, we didn't go on and on and on. We had so many people. It'd be great to have like a Robin Blanchard who's running traffic for like legends now. Yeah, I mean, that guy's machines. So we did that for several years and we loved it, but then we outgrew it, I guess he would say. Yeah, yeah. And, you know, great thing to talk about. great lesson for you. There comes a time when you're excited about something, you're going to grow it out of sheer passion and because you're just going to lean into it and make the needle move. Yeah. And we were both doing online marketing at the time. We had online courses and stuff. And so we got excited about doing that stuff and coaching people on that stuff. Then I started launching the coaching or the Fit Body Boot Camp franchise. Yeah. You went down the road of the Perfect Day Formula book. Sure. Of course, you were coaching the coaching program. And I remember us sitting somewhere. After a mastermind, and I remember saying... Let's just say it was merchants in Nashville, because we have such great memories of eating brisket at merchants in Nashville.

Hey, there's another great place. So we talked about Zuma at the Epic Hotel in Miami. And sushi tan here in Chino Hills. We talked about sushi tan here in Chino Hills. The merchants in Nashville, Tennessee, they've got a thick, giant piece of brisket that they put on a big brick of cornbread. Oh, yeah, that's right. And it was so good. And duck-fried tater tots.

And that meal was so good that when the lady came back around with the dessert menu, What did I order? Brisket. I ordered another round of brisket and cornbread for dessert because it was just that good. And one more shout out? Joe's Stonecrab. Joe's Stonecrab. That's right, man.

Not just the one in Vegas, which is good, but the one in South Beach, Miami. And you know, if we're giving shout-outs to other restaurants, you'd have to drop in Prime 112 in Miami as well. Game change. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Just took Ed and Joan and fried Oreos. It'll change their life. And the view is not so bad either. Beautiful view of the ocean.

That's what I was talking about. Absolutely. Absolutely. So listen, we were pushing and challenging ourselves. And one of the things that you took, you might have been doing it already, and then you kind of took like one of these ideas that I talked about at the, about the deadlines at one of the masterminds. We were pushing and challenging ourselves. So you did these six-week challenges throughout the years that I've known you. Well, it started because of what you said. Right. And so go through that little story. And then how, I mean, you've grown a lot of valuable skills over through these six-week challenges, which people can listen and can say, you know, I can do something for six weeks in my business or in my personal. Yeah, let me tell you this, man. If you guys want to really excel in your business,

what I'm about to tell you is a prescription for success and not a suggestion. So we're sitting in the Info Mastermind group that Craig and I ran. This was probably about three or four years into it. I know the year was 2010, so maybe it was one year. Yeah, it was early. It was early. It was one year into it was one year into it. And Craig is just leaning into one of our coaching clients, in the nicest, kindest way possible, in a very crusty way. And he's leaning into the coaching client. And I forget who the coaching client was, but they had some easy deadline about making an but the deadline was like six months out yeah right and you're like look I want you to cut your deadlines in half and then cut them in half again and so as you're leaning into

this person you're talking about how they have an obligation and a duty to get this product out because there's I remember the line you said there's people crying themselves asleep every night right because you haven't launched your product yet that's gonna help them yeah and so you need to cut your deadlines in half and then cut them in half again I'm getting so pumped up in that moment see what you didn't realize is years earlier I promised my wife to run a marathon with her I was like like, hey, I'll run a marathon with you at some point. Well, here, nine years have gone by, and I never ran the marathon.

So I felt like a liar. And I kept kicking that deadline for the marathon down the road. And so as you're pumping this guy up, I'm getting so pumped up. I'm like, that's right. I'm cutting my deadline in half. And so I text her under the table. I'm like, hey, when is your next marathon? She goes, well, the next marathon is actually is in San Diego, the rock and roll marathon,

26.2 miles, full marathon. I was like, great, sign me up. I'm doing it. Because you had me all hyped up, right? And she goes, no, it's not a half marathon. It's a full marathon. I go, I'm doing it. And so in that group, so the lesson here?

You didn't tell you. You didn't say how long it was yet. Oh, six weeks. Right. Right. It was only six weeks away. In six weeks. So here's two lessons there.

One, cut your deadlines in half, folks, and then cut them in half again, and you will accomplish it. I ran and finished that marathon, and my goal was to run and finish it before they cut the marathon short. Because, remember, they can't shut down the city all day. It starts at 6 a.m. ends like at 12 noon or something. And if you haven't come to a certain point through the marathon, marathon they just cut it short and move everybody to the finish line so they can open up the city and hell or high water I was gonna finish a full marathon and so one cut your deadlines in half cut them in half again your body is resilient your mind is resilient can do anything number two I was like shit I just signed up for a marathon that's six weeks from now right I hadn't run more than half a mile a mile and not by choice maybe because I need to run to the gas station because my car ran out of gas and I can get some gas or something half a mile away but in that group that was Jill the running coach yeah Run with Jill.com.

I don't know if the website is still up, but there's a shout out to Jill. She was a running coach. And during the lunch break at the master run, I go, hey, Jill, Craig got me so hyped up right now when he was reprimending that guy and telling him to cut his deadlines in half. I just signed up for the San Diego Marathon, and I'm running it in six weeks. I need you to create a running program for me, right? And she goes, oh, 16 weeks, we can do that. I go, no, no, no, you heard wrong.

Six weeks. And I'm wearing Chuck Taylor Converse when I'm running. Yeah, yeah, yeah, and I wear Chuck's, right? And so she, again, hire a coach. A coach can help you time collapse. She created a program for me. I reached out to her every three days. And she got you through the shin splints and all that.

Yeah, got me through the shin splints. I got proper shoes for it because obviously you can't run and train in Chuck Taylor's. But the lesson there of cutting your deadlines in half and then getting a coach to help you time collapse and get the results were huge. Yeah, absolutely. Game changer there. So pushing yourself, pushing yourself, pushing yourself, and surrounding yourself with like-minded people is great. And then so in 2015, we were moving on mentally. and then you came to my perfect life workshop,

my very first one in November, November 11th, 2015, and you, at one point in the day... You're like a rain man with all these, like you remember everything. I know, I know. Well, it's good and bad. And so I remember you had this moment where you're like, yes, I had a,

you had a huge breakthrough, and that's like one of the things I love seeing in people over the course of the day is when they have that huge breakthrough. And it was something about building an empire master. Yeah, yeah. So, dude, by the way, in that group, we had Jay Faruja,

who now you help him get clarity in his domination workshops that he's doing, right? Yeah. Samantha Taylor, who now has six, is it five or six? Five or six? Fit Body boot camp locations. Brian Stecker, who's crushing it in Vancouver, Washington with his gym. And Megan Kruger. Megan Kruger, Fit Body Boot Camp owner, crushing it. Awesome woman.

And, of course, I was in there, too. I don't know how I snuck in, but you were kind enough to let me in. But it was in that moment, because I remember thinking, like, if I have to teach someone to create another opt-in page, I'm going to just gouge my own eyes. And I remember venting to you about that, like, hey, dude, I think we've both outgrown the 100K Info Group Mastermind. I think we had shut it down then. Maybe we had, yeah.

But it was that day in that Perfect Life Workshop that you were running, did I have the clarity that, hey, we're building empires now. We're not building opt-in pages, and we need to teach others to build empires like we are. And that's where the idea of the Empire Mastermind was spawned. And then, of course, that led to the Empire Podcast. And, of course, what we've got coming up in August of 2019. The first ever. Empire Business Summit.

Yes. Yeah. So tell us more about that, because it's going to be two days, August 16th and 17th, and San Diego, California. And it's going to be amazing. Yeah, yeah. So the Empire Business Summit is really, if you're in the real estate world, in the financing world, in the fitness world, coaching and consulting,

if you're a thought leader, if you're a entrepreneur of any sort, a publisher of a book, online course, any type of business, where you want to scale in getting more customers, scale in increasing profits, and scale in your leadership abilities, and building leaders under you, you've got to come to the Empire Business Summit in August because those two days are not only going to be jam-packed with actionable information, we're also bringing some badass presenters there, who we can't talk about right now, but these are people who are crushing it in their specific industries, from nutrition to real estate, to New York Times bestselling authors, you name it.

going to be absolutely amazing. So save the date, August 16th and 17th in beautiful sunny San Diego, California. You'll be there with the handsome Badros Koolian and good old Canadian Craig Ballantan, and we will be there to help you grow your empire. So again, this is not for people who want to stay in a business where it's like a job and you're working and trading time for money. No, this is like if you're serious about going to the next level, you'll want to find out more. I mean, this is straight up about like building legacy wealth. Yeah. And an empire where we're talking generating five million plus right and if you think your business has the ability to go five million ten million twenty a hundred million dollars right but

you just don't know how to get there you need the blueprint yeah and you need the skill sets installed in you that's what we're doing over those two days at the Empire Business Summit in August and it's gonna be a game changer but you know obviously we're talking about how how we met in the history of the Empire Show and the Empire Mastermind and right the Empire Business Summit listen folks in life you're going to go through different phases. You know, Craig and I, I had a gym and I was a personal trainer. You were a personal trainer. I was. Yeah. You worked for a supplement manufacturer for some time. We go through different phases where you went into creating an online info product. Yeah.

I opened up more gyms. Then I sold my gyms and went into coaching and consulting personal trainers. Then you started coaching and consulting. And we joined the mastermind. We created the mastermind together. And we decided that, hey, we're outgrowing that mastermind, the info group, because we don't want it. If we teach one more person to create an opt-in page, we're going to kill our at least I was going to kill you first. If I'm going, you're going, so I was going to kill you first, and then think about killing myself. Right.

Ultimately, decided not to. But, why not? But truly, you're going to go through different phases of life. Yes. And it's okay to move on and either sell that business, and we've done that, or to shut it down and take the profits from that and parlay into your next passion or into your next phase of life. Yeah, absolutely. And that's what I did in the fitness space is we actually used the recurring revenue

from the fitness space to kind of give me that cash profit insurance that gave me the cushion to move into the new business and now we've ramped it up. So that's a really great point is, listen, we're always going to evolve, we're going to grow as people, as you grow as people, you get surrounded with new people and new ideas, and that's absolutely what you must do. Environment is everything.

Environment is your destiny, and so if you're ready to change your future, make sure you get to the Empire Summit, August 16th and 17th in San Diego, California. All right. Until then, my friend, Make sure you go to iTunes and Stitcher and all those good sites and give us a five-star review. Tell your friends. Tell your mama. Tell your mama.

And make sure to see us in San Diego. Hey, thank you so much for joining us on the Empire Podcast Show. The best way you can thank us is to leave a five-star review on iTunes, Stitcher, or your favorite podcast platform. And of course, leave a comment and share this podcast with a friend. And if you'd like to grow your business to the highest level of success, go to bedroscuhlion.com forward slash empire and fill out the application where you can join myself and Craig Ballantine in the Empire Mastermind Group.