EntreLeadership - #209: Jeff Goins—Capitalizing on Your Creative Strengths

Episode Date: June 19, 2017

Entrepreneur and best-selling author Jeff Goins stops by the studio to discuss thriving in today’s creative age, whether you’re the next Michelangelo or a business person looking to launch that next great idea. Also on the show is social media expert Melissa Anthony Sinn, founder and CEO of anthonyBarnum Public Relations. She shares how to market in today’s digital world. entreleadership.com/podcast All Access Membership Discount Super Selling Cheat Sheet Identify Your Target Market   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

helping business leaders grow themselves, their team, and their profits. This is the Entree Leadership Podcast. Now, here is your host, Ken Coleman. Broadcasting from the Music City, this is the podcast of leaders by leaders, for leaders. As always, thank you so much for joining the conversation. Jeff Goins is our feature, and then Melissa Anthony Sin will join us. Let me tell you what you're going to get.

Jeff is a very well-respected writer and entrepreneur. I love this guy because honestly he started it from scratch. He has proven that you can win. And I really like what he writes. I really respect him. He lives here locally, so this is always fun. He's got a new book out called Real Artists Don't Starve. Timeless Strategies for Thriving in the New Creative Age.

I think this is an important conversation for everybody. So if you just heard that and you said, I'm not an artist, yes you are. It's kind of like everybody's in sales. You don't get to disagree with those two universal facts. So you're going to enjoy this with Jeff. And then we thought we would get specific on some things. So how do you market your work in this new digital age? I mean, 2017, it's a jungle out there.

And you need some tips on how to do it well. Certainly you small business people who don't have the luxury of hiring a PR firm like Anthony Barnum, which is Melissa Anthony Sins PR firm. So she's really good. Her firm is good at the B2B and B2C social media expertise. And so we thought, well, let's spend a little bit of time, shorter interview, but some practical stuff that'll help you. So that's what's coming your way. All right, folks, we're going to get right to

Jeff, but don't move a muscle after the conversation. Jeff offered a very nice bundle of content for you. I'll tell you, when the conversation ends. Here is Jeff. Well, folks, this is a real treat. Jeff Goings is in studio with us and let's give folks in perspective because I find it so fascinating how many great thought leaders and creative people are in this little town of Franklin, Tennessee. How far would you say it is from your house to the studio? Two miles. Yeah, I was actually dropped off my son at school and then came over here. Well, we're glad you're here. We're talking about your new book,

Real Artists Don't Starve. Timeless Strategies for Thriving in the New Creative Age. And there's so much great stuff in here. We're going to get to some practical stuff. Yeah. But I thought it would be really fun. I was doing research on this. I thought it would be fun to start with Michelangelo. Because the story and the facts of Michelangelo's success, I think, are foundational to what you're doing here in the book. Right. So I thought it would be fun to set that up because the title is, real artists don't starve. Is that true, Jeff, for the cynics out there? How does Michelangelo prove you right? Right. We live in Nashville in the city full of creatives. And when

I say creative artists, I mean anybody from an entrepreneur to a baker to a writer, anybody who has a creative gift to share with the world. And so we're surrounded with these people. And I have been surrounded with people like this my whole life. I am a creative. And I've always kind of heard the same story, which is you have to starve. You know, if you're going to make a living as a speaker, you know, as a painter, as an author, you're not going to make a full-time living off of that.

So don't quit your day job. Well, it turns out this doesn't have to be true. And I think being a starving artist today with all of the opportunities, all the technology, is a choice. And not too long ago, I stumbled across this story about Michelangelo, arguably one of the greatest artists of all time. Turns out he was incredibly wealthy. I spoke with the professor in Florence, Italy, who discovered this. And he was trying to date the different scenes of when the Sistine Chapel were painted, because Michelangelo painted over a course of a few years. and he thought, well, you know, we can't figure out like, when was that little thing right there painted?

And so he goes to the bank records. And he's just trying to look up when Michelangelo got certain commissions for when he painted a certain piece of the Sistine Chapel. And he sees exorbitant amounts of money in those bank accounts. And he starts adding it all up. He forgets all about the Sistine Chapel. He adds all of it up. And Michelangelo, when he died, had about the equivalent of $47 million to his name, making him the richest. artists of the Renaissance. So that kind of poses an interesting question for me, because I think

today we tend to go, well, art is over here and business is over there. And everybody wants to be more creative, but we're afraid that we're going to starve or it's going to hurt our business or, you know, whatever. We're going to go poor doing this. Well, here you have arguably the greatest artists of all time and also the wealthiest of his time. So that to me says art and business can go together. Creativity, making a living off of your passion, these things can go together. You don't have to sell out to sell your art, whatever that looks like to you. So let's go back, because I'm sure you know a little bit more of the story. So he is doing his art, building his business all along, and it's only towards the latter half, I guess,

of his career that he begins to do these unbelievable works in his current time. I'm just curious. How does that apply to us? Because we're going to break this down. So let's go a little deeper on the Michelangelo's story. How did he build it that way so that he wasn't starving? I think it begins with mindset. And this is where I start the book. You know, there's kind of three areas, mindset, market, and money. These are the areas that you have to master. If you don't want to be a starving artist, again, this can be at your day job. This can be, you know, running a mom and pop business, or this can be, you know, being an actual author, artist, you know, somebody who is what we think of as a technical creative. And he, from the very beginning of his career, thought of himself at

an aristocrat. And the reason for this is because his father told him growing up that they came from nobility. It turns out, and I talked to several professors and researchers on Michelangelo's life, he didn't have noble blood. But this was something that he was told his whole life. And so he goes through life thinking, I've got to bring the family name back to, you know, honor. And so what happens when you believe something, when you tell yourself a story long enough, you begin to believe it and you begin to start living like it. And so Michael Angela has this dignity at a time when artists didn't have any dignity. There weren't wealthy artists during his time. And what he did, because he thought differently, he acted differently, and he created a precedent that many artists

in the Renaissance followed, meaning it was possible for an artist to become an aristocrat, to become wealthy. And it all started with his mindset. All right. So let's start to play this out. We've got some people listening in here and they're saying, okay, I have a passion to create, Jeff. It's something that's burning. I've got to get it out. And, you know, I just don't know. How do I know if people like it? It's that early stage. We're going to get into some other practical things, but let's just talk about those embryonic stages where you start to get that art out. What's the best way to do that? Because this is not just a strategy question. This is also a courage question. Yeah, I think what Michelangelo did was really smart. He apprenticed. He thought like a

student first. So what does he do? And I think this strategy still works today. You know, we don't have patrons and master artisans and artists like we did, you know, back in the Middle Ages and Renaissance where, you know, if you were a master broadcaster, I would go to you, Kenna and say, I'm going to be your apprentice, and this is going to last seven years, and I'm going to bring you coffee and just study it. We have internships and we have versions of that, but it's not a part of our culture. So we have to kind of create these apprenticeship experiences ourselves. So what Michelangelo does is he goes to one of the most well-known artists in Florence at the time, a guy named Domenico Gearland Dio, and he goes to him very boldly, and he says, hey, you need to bring me on as an apprentice.

And typically, you started this at like 12, 13 years old, and Michelangelo was about 14. And he goes, you're too old, like, I can't take you on. And if you were an apprentice, you typically paid the master. You said, you know, like, here's my family's money, and this is my education. So, you know, teach me how to do what you do. Michelangelo goes to Gearlandi on this other story goes. he says, no, no, no, you need to take me on. And here's the thing, you're going to have to pay me.

And Gierland I was obviously taken aback and he goes, okay. And he brings him on. And within a year, he is the top artist in his studio and is invited to the palace, the Medici Palace, and earns a patron and starts meeting all of these people who are future popes and very influential well-networked people. Renaissance, it all happens because Michelangelo is bold enough to go up to somebody who already has the platform, who already has the influence, and says, I want to be your student, I want to learn from you.

We can still do this today. You can do this right now with umpteen podcasts and blogs and books. And I call this the case study strategy. It still works today. What you need to do, if you want to kind of skyrocket your success in any field, you need to go to somebody who's already made it and don't ask them for a handout. Don't ask to pick their brain, ask to serve them, serve their platform, their message. And even before you do that, because lots of people are doing that, right?

Lots of people are offering to help because they want to get something out of it. Even before you do that, you need to prove that you're worth investing. And I call this the case study strategy. What it means is that you go to that person and you say, I've already applied the things that you teach. Now, can I have some more? And it's very simple. Like, I encourage people to do this via email.

And this is how I started to kind of make my way as a writer. I started emailing people that I looked up to. And I just said, hey, so-and-so, thanks for X. It helped me do Y. Now, what about Z? This is a very practical formula that you can use to reach out to influencers today. Because we all have people that we're looking up to. Social media makes this easier and more visible than it's ever been.

So reach out to that person and say, hey, Ken, thanks for your book. It helped me ask better questions. And now I'm wondering, how do I find people to interview for my podcast? Now, tell me, Ken, if somebody reaches out to you like that versus, hey, I want to want to pick your brain or can you have me on your show or can you do this can you tweet about my new podcast how much more like there you respond to a message like that 100% yeah and it's a beautiful formula jeff it really is and the reason is i've had that happen you've had it happen course you and i've both done that yeah it's a great formula because the influencer like that when they see a specific

question they go okay this person's extremely intentional yes and what happens is i believe the influencer puts themselves in your shoes. Yep. Because they've done it. And they go, all right, I'm helping this person. Yeah. But the general, hey, listen, can I spend? You've got this one.

This is the one I don't like. Hey, listen, could you give me, listen, 30 minutes on the phone, just 30 minutes. And all the compliments in the world. Oh, you know, you're wonderful. No, I'm not giving you 30 minutes. Yeah. Well, because you actually don't have 30 minutes. I don't have it.

Yeah. But to that email formula that Jeff just gave you folks, let me tell you something. That's a two-minute response sometimes. Yep. And it's going to be chalk full of. goodness. That's right. Rewind that, write it out, and live it. That's really good stuff. All right. Now, you set up something beautiful. So, folks, you know I like to kind of skip around the book. Part two, the section of the book is Market. Now, I want to jump to chapter six, because I think

the comments you just made this idea of getting with somebody and getting that apprenticeship. It leads into this whole chapter, and I think this is beautiful, and I think it's all about getting in the right place. Right. I say that all the time. Get in the right place, then the right time will happen. You call it join a scene. Go join a scene. I think this is brilliant. Unpack what you mean here by go join a scene. And then what happens when we join that scene? Why is it so valuable? So I experienced this living in Nashville. I've been here almost 10 years. And I've been a writer for about five of those years. And so for the first five years I lived here, I was watching this scene start to emerge, this online marketing and online business space. And I was seeing bloggers that I was seeing bloggers that I was. I followed become authors and I was seeing people launch these online businesses and I was going, well, what about me? Like, why can't I do this? And I was frustrated and I was bitter.

And I think we've all seen somebody succeed and go, I think I'm smarter than that person. I think I'm better than that person. Why are they succeeding? What do they have that I don't have? And sometimes the answer is they know more people than you do. And it sounds unfair, but this is the way the world works. Absolutely. And so I was watching this online going,

how do I become a part of this scene? And I realized these people are all going and having coffee in the same place and they're all just kind of showing up in the same places. And at the same time, I was reading a lot of biographies of artists and creatives.

I know you love biographies. I was reading one about Ernest Hemingway. And I realized that Ernest Hemingway's career as a writer did not take off until he moved to Paris, and not just moved to Paris, but joined the scene of expat authors and artists living there.

people like Picasso and James Joyce and Gertrude Stein. What did he do? He just hung out with them. He went out for drinks with them and he tried to help them grow their own platforms. He helped Gertrude Stein get published. He taught boxing lessons to Ezra Pound. He did whatever he could to be a part of the scene, serve the people in it. And guess what happens when you do that? You form a network. And so I believe that every city, every place has a scene and they're all unique. So those of you are listening to us and you're going, well, I'm not a part of that national scene. Therefore, I can't be successful because in any place, there is a personality. There is a group of people that are doing interesting work that you can be a part of.

And with the internet, we can create these digital scenes. But I found that geography does influence how creative and how successful you can be. And so what our job is is not to go, oh, like, I wish I lived in that city or whatever. And sometimes, if you can, moving to a new city can help your country. career, but I think you begin with the scene that you're a part of and really just join it and find ways to serve people in that network. And you'll be surprised at how many connections, how many quote-unquote coincidental things happen when you just start showing up and hanging out with the people who are doing the kind of work that you want to do. So true. Now this is from page 93 of the book,

the rule of the scene. That's what we've been talking about. This is Jeff's rule of the scene. I love this. He says, it says that places in people shape the success of our work far more than we realize. I love this. You've got a quote from Mi Hai. She sent me high. You like that I said that so quickly, didn't you? Yeah, it's fun to say, hard to spell. It's very hard to spell. Don't even try that. But he says, creativity is more likely in places where new ideas require less effort to be perceived. That's a mouthful, and that's the whole point here.

Proximity really does matter. It does. It does. To people that are going to shape you, influence you, give you opportunity. It really does make a lot of sense. It does. And we can sit here and moan the lack of opportunity. we have all day long. I could sit here and go, oh, I don't live in New York, right? You know,

the publishing mecca of the world. Instead, I said, who are the people in my city that I can get in front of? And what are the advantages of the city that I'm a part of that don't exist elsewhere? One of the things that's great about living in Nashville, it's a city that feels like a small town. And so getting in front of somebody bumping into them is pretty easy. And so look at the scene that you're already a part of and figure out how you can join that. What is unique about? the place that you live in right now and how can you use that to your advantage to connect with people who can help you and whom you can help okay that leads us to the next chapter chapter seven now i am an extrovert are you an introvert i think you're an introvert i am a shy

extrovert i am a shy extrovert well people think extroversion is about being shy or not shy it's just about that's right where you get your energy that's exactly i can go to a party and get a lot of energy from people but i won't walk up to somebody and shake their hand right so you know I'm kind of right on the line. Yeah, gotcha. Well, I love to collaborate, but I'm an extreme extrovert, so I just naturally, to your point, get energy from just talking to people, bouncing into them. And I have a strong opinion, but I love to collaborate.

And I think this is a problem for a lot of people. And you take a whole chapter and you say, all right, this idea of being an artist, a big part of this, a successful artist, is learning how to collaborate. I think you're spot on. Why did you give this a whole chapter and what's the challenge? Well, so when I started my business, I run this small online business teaching writers how to succeed and then write books and teach writers. That's kind of my model. When I started that business, it was before I quit my job and I joined a mastermind group. I didn't even really know what a mastermind group was. And this guy that I talked to like once a year invited me, like we just randomly ran into each other. My wife and I just had a baby. I had just published a book. I hadn't quit my job yet, but I was starting to see momentum. And he wife came over to bring us a meal, you know, and her son was a few months old at this point. And we just started talking about what we were doing. And then like a week later, he calls me and says,

hey, we're starting a mastermind group. Do you want to join it? So this was, you know, about five, almost six years ago. And being a part of that group of 12 local entrepreneurs and artists has catapulted my career, my success. It has accelerated everything faster than I could have ever dreamed of. Why? Practically why? Because I'm regular. meeting with a group of men every week who are asking good questions, holding me accountable, and helping me see things that I otherwise couldn't see, helping me recognize blind spots. And, you know, it's unlike any group that I've ever been a part of because we are all committed to helping each other succeed.

And it's consistent and we all have the same kind of vision. And it's not just a group of friends, which I think is great. But, you know, as you start to kind of go down your path, you'll realize that certain friendships, there's a seasonality to them. And so I wrote this chapter because I realize when you create a collaborative circle, a group of people that you're intentionally living your life with and sharing your successes and failures with and they're giving you really hard feedback that you need, that's amazing. And I also realize a lot of the people I looked up to, they were doing this.

They were a part of these mastermind groups. So about the introvert, extrovert thing. I hear this a lot because I work with a lot of writers and artists and they go, well, I'm shy. I don't want to go to that conference. I don't want to walk up to that person at a coffee shop. And I think that's okay. Let me tell you about a couple of guys that I assume were introverts. C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien.

They were a part of a mastermind group, what we would call a mastermind group today, called the Inklings. And for decades, they met. There were 19 of them. They were professors at Oxford. They were all literary, and they would get together once a week, and they would share their pieces of writing with one another. and some of the greatest works of literature, English literature, were written because of this group. But here's one fascinating story. So a few years into this group, J.R. Tolkien had published The Hobbit, and he was working on his new book that he called The New Hobbit, and he was stuck.

And he just couldn't get past it. And he was a perfectionist. And he was kind of a solitary genius, somebody who worked all alone, and he was stuck. He was a few chapters in his new book. The publisher was like, do you have any more? Do you have any more? And he didn't. And he was boring himself, which is the worst thing for creative person to do.

do. And so he goes out to lunch with his friend Jack, C.S. Lewis. And they're talking. He says, oh, man, I'm just bored out of my mind. This isn't working. And Jack says to Tolkien, he says, well, don't you know that hobbits are only interesting when they're put in unhobbit-like circumstances. And this, you know, kind of blew Tolkien's mind. He's like, oh, yeah. And then he gets unstuck, and he goes back and he writes the book that becomes the Lord of the Rings, which have you have seen the movies or read the books, you realize that's true. Like when they're in the shire, Nothing exciting is happening, and the story takes off when they leave the shire. And so you've got literally, like, one of the most popular, most successful novels of all time, and this idea that we think, genius happens in solitude.

It's not true. This book was written and read every week in this collaborative circle called The Inklings, and this is how J.R. Tolkien and all these other guys produce some of their finest works. And so if that's what it takes for a genius, and these guys were geniuses, if that's what take. for a genius to produce great enduring work. How much more do we need groups like this? Yeah, absolutely. And I've long been fascinated by songwriters, and we sit here in arguably, they call it music city. I mean, it's a very influential city. And I've always been fascinated by people who write songs together, multiple people get in a room, you get the artist. You actually reference, I forgot about this. You referenced Beyonce in this chapter, and the idea that

There was like, what, 170-some writers, or 72. Yeah. It's a detailed story in here, but the point is that she took a lot of criticism for that. I'm going to find it. But it's like 70-some different writers, and she took tremendous criticism on it. That's right. But I think there's great, see, that's the whole point. And in kind of hip-hop and R&B in the rap world, this is even more the norm than in rock and pop.

But, you know, I was watching this YouTube video. I've never watched this, but John Mayer has this reality show where, he surveyed these like three college age girls and he was asking them questions. It was like a focus group. Did you ever see this? No. It's all a big joke. He's punking them. Sure. But he says, he says, you know, I don't write any of my own songs. And all their jaws drop. You know, and he goes, no, no, no, this guy named Ronnie, he writes all the best songs when he gives you a call. You know, you take the call. And they're just devastated. I find out that John Mayer doesn't write his own song. He's lying. He's just trying to be funny. But I think that's our attitude towards creative success. You don't play all your own instruments. You don't write your own songs. And so this happened with Beyonce when her record Lemonade came out. You know, there were dozens of, you know, writer credits in it where she gave credit to other people that helped her write these songs. And people took to the Twitter and just, you know, went nuts saying, oh, and they call her a genius,

but, you know, she has all these other people working with her. And I think we think that genius and collaboration don't go together. But the truth is, and there's a creativity expert by the name of Keith Sawyer who wrote a book called Group Genius. He argues that all of our most creative innovations from the inventions of Edison to Sigmund Freud to even, you know, the literary groups like the inklings were almost always produced, not by one person, but by a group of people. You know, I'm going to pull a word out that you just mentioned. You just said produced. That's right. And I just want to speak to leaders for a second because what Jeff is sharing with you is so, so important.

You may be stuck on something because you're not truly collaborating. And at the end of the day, we know what a producer is. a movie producer is not the person who's directing. They are not writing. Now, sometimes they do. Sometimes you'll see the director have producer credits, but the reality is the function of a movie. You have a producer who pulls the whole thing together,

has a vision for it, hires a director, the director's got a screenplay writer and all the myriad of positions and functions to put out a creative piece that we pay, good money to sit down for two and a half hours and watch. And I think the takeaway here is, folks, I want to make sure that you realize

that you can see yourself as that executive producer or the director and bring in other people to help you push out your vision. There's nothing wrong with that. In fact, I think it's much better. I think it's a great point. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, the bottom line is the most creative innovations that we see in our world today are never the result of one person's big idea. And they're always the result of a collaborative efforts of at least a few and sometimes many people. So quick review. The book is put into three sections here, mindset, market, and now money. So we've touched a little bit of each section. But this is the most important section. This is the whole premise of your book. Real artist, don't starve. So you've got a whole section here on money, and chapter nine starts

that section out, and I love it. Don't work for free. But this is difficult for people. So let's start with why you have to say don't work for free. And the reason you have to say it is because so many people feel like in the early days, oh gosh, I'm so new at this. I can't possibly charge somebody. I think that's a psychological barrier. Would you agree? I do and I think the world will not take your work seriously until you do. All right. So is that right out of the gate? Yeah, right out of the gate. You need to value your work. Now here's the thing, Ken, if you're going to go be a speaker, right. It's something that you and I both do and we kind of understand the economy of it. That doesn't mean you have to start charging 10 grand a pop. That's right. But you should charge something. And when I started out as a speaker, I was, you know, I didn't want to do that. And everybody wants to invite you to come speak for free or for that special lovely currency we call opportunity. opportunity. And the problem is opportunity doesn't pay the bills. It doesn't put food in my kids' mouths. And the truth is sometimes, sometimes speaking in front of an audience of 5,000 people for free can benefit you. But you can't build a career around that. And so I'm not a fan of setting the precedent. You're just going to give your best work away for free. So I say always charge something. Always be working for something. And when I started out speaking, people say, well, we want you to come speak for free. And I'll go, okay, I'll go do it. And then I had a friend of mine, Ken Davis, coach me on this, say, don't do that. Charge something. It doesn't have to be a lot, but charge something.

So I started saying, well, you know, can you, you know, swing 500 bucks? And they would go, no, but we could do 250. And I would go, okay, you know, because really the number was zero before. That's right. And gradually, I started charging more and more, and I got better, and I got more confident, and the value increased over time. And I think the same thing is true. I tell the story of a visual artist in the book who was creating these hand lettering pieces and just giving them away to her friends but just costing her money to make these things.

This is why I think real artists can't starve because all this stuff costs money. You know, not just your rent and your food, but, you know, the very things that you use to create your art at costs, money. So she created this hand lettering piece for a friend of hers and her friend insisted on letting her charge her.

And so she charged 20 bucks. And so all I'm saying is with whatever you do, whether you're a handyman, you want to be a chef, or you're a writer, start charging something. It doesn't have to be a ridiculous amount, but you will find that the market can always bear more than you think it can. And when you do this, you value the work more. I have a friend who's a speaker who charges $25,000 a gig. And this group, it was a ministry group, actually. They wanted him to come speak for free. And they couldn't afford for him to do it. And he says, I'm sorry, I don't work for free. And so he had a wealthy friend pay the honorarium for him. And a few weeks later,

he flew out there to do the speaking gig. And he gets to the airport. Nobody's there to pick him up. So he picks up his phone, calls them and says, hey, I'm here to do the event that you have going on. And they said, oh, yeah, we canceled that. And the reality is, if somebody doesn't pay for something, they don't value it. So what did my friend do? Well, he got back on the plane, flew home, tore up the check, and never took a free gig again. And in that case, he was still getting paid, but the people who were putting the event on weren't paying for it.

That's right. And so if I do not value the art, whatever it is, enough to exchange some kind of value for it, I'm probably not going to use it. I teach online courses, and sometimes we give scholarships to people for $1,000, $2,000.

And sadly, I'm not opposed to scholarships. I got through college on scholarships, but sadly we see a lot of people who get the course for free. end up not completing it. I mean, it's just the reality we don't value things as much that we don't pay for.

Wow. All right, so you conclude and you talk a lot about making money to make art. I want you to touch on that, this idea of, okay, how do I balance? Because I want to make sure people don't misunderstand what you're talking about here.

You've got to make your art, but you're saying you need to be making money at the same time. And you propose in Chapter 12, make money to make art. I want you to explain that and then take us through to your final challenge, join the new Renaissance.

So somebody once criticized Walt Disney, kind of in the middle of his career when things started to take off. And he was almost always broke, went out of business, several times went bankrupt, kept doubling down on the Disney company, and eventually got this point where it was profitable, and they were doing great. And somebody criticized him in a letter one time and said, oh, you just want to make money.

And he wrote back to this person and he said, we don't make films to make money. We make money to make more films. And I think if you're an artist in the sense that it's not a, you don't want to be, you don't care about being rich. You care about the thing that you get to do, the art that you get to create. And so I say that money is a means, but should never be a master. You're not working for it.

You're using it as an opportunity to get to do more of the work. And I think that's true for most of us, you know, even, accumulating wealth. It's just about buying time, buying options. It's not about, you know, hoarding this like Scrooge McDuck, you know, so you can go swimming in your, you know, gold de bloons. And so how do we do this? Well, I think we have to have the right mindset that we have a responsibility to make money so that we can make more art. I had the privilege of interviewing the fourth man who walked on the moon, Alan Bean. And he is a fine artist today. And for the first 50 years of his life, He was a Navy man and an astronaut.

He flew on one of the Apollo missions to the moon. And he came back and he'd always painted his whole life. And at 50 years old, he's looking around at NASA. And painting was just always something fun than he did on the side. And he realizes, anybody can do what I do. Anybody can fly a space shuttle was his thinking. But he's looking at all these people at NASA that can do what he can do. And at this point, they're not having any more moon missions.

And he realizes we may never go back there. And I've seen something that nobody else has seen and can paint. There were no other astronaut artists. And so he realized that he had a duty to do this. And today, Alan Bean's paintings sell for hundreds of thousands of dollars. Is he doing it because it was a great way to make money? No. But he knew that he had to make money to make more art.

And he considers it his duty. He said, you know, the way I think of it, this isn't a passion of mine. I'm a man who's always done his duty. And when I saw that I was the only person who could do this, I considered the art my duty. And so that's my challenge to you who are listening. What is your art? And what if you thought of it as more than a frill, more than a hobby, you considered it your duty? What would have to move?

What would have to change in order for you to make this your living, your livelihood? Not so that you can make money off of it, so that you can make more art. And that's the whole idea of this thing we call the new renaissance is I believe that today. being a starving artist is a choice, not a necessary condition of doing creative work. And you have a responsibility, a duty to take whatever creative gift you have and find a way to make a living off of it. Does it have to be your full-time job? No. But you should be taking this art seriously.

And you should be finding ways to go pro with it. First in your mind, then in the relationships, the market out there. And then eventually, yeah, I mean, if you're doing good work, you should be getting compensated. for it. Going back to the charging what you're worthing, there was a study not too long ago about paid and unpaid internships. Turns out that unpaid internships rarely lead to jobs. And paid internships are twice as likely to lead to real jobs. So if we start at the beginning, we think like Michelangelo did, I've got art that the world needs, and it's my duty to share and charge for it, and I've got to start taking it seriously before anybody else does. It can lead to amazing works of art

that the world won't soon forget. It's so good, folks. This is really about narrative. What Jeff just laid out in those final minutes is really true. You're training everybody else to value you the way you value your work. I think that's what the big takeaway is. The book is Real Artists Don't Starve, Timeless Strategies for Thriving in the New Creative Age. Jeff writes that this is a myth that you have to be a starving artist, and here's what's great.

The book takes you through timeless strategies that you can actually apply and begin to win. So if this hits you where you're at, you need to run and go get this. Jeff, I know you've got all kinds of goodies. I just know who you are. You've got probably some freemiums. You've got some all kinds of stuff. Tell them about the website. What else can they get around this book?

Yeah, if you go to don't starve.com, there's access to free online course, a free community, and then you get access to all of the video transcripts and interviews that I did, talking to hundreds of people who are doing this. And this is the thing that I hear so often. And well, you know, my cousin or my aunt or, you know, Vincent Van Gogh, they starved. And so, you know, you're going to have to starve too. Well, it turns out that many of history's greatest artists were not as poor as we thought. Pablo Picasso said, I would like to live like a pauper, but with plenty of money.

Yes. That's what he did. He had plenty of money. Yeah. And so it turns out that a lot of these people out there today are not starving. They're doing a great job. And as you said, the story of the starving artist is a narrative that we tell ourselves. And if we choose to believe it, yes, it comes true.

But if we choose to believe another narrative, the story of the thriving artist, that can be true, too. And you can find out more about the book at don't starve.com. Jeff Goins, good to have you in studio, buddy. We need to get you around a little more often. Yeah, my pleasure. Two miles. It's all that separates us. Appreciate you, man.

I could walk here. Yes, you could. Yeah, thanks. I told you we had a special offer for you, and big thanks to Jeff and his team for offering this. When you order the book, Real Artists Don't Starve, we're going to give you a free online course on how to succeed in a creative profession. And you'll also get a workbook. So the link is in this episode's show notes, or you can just go to don't starve.com slash entree. That's don't starve.com slash entree. You know, I love towards the back end of that conversation as Jeff talked about

J.R. Tolkien. And how he had been stuck on arguably one of the greatest novels of all time. And he was in a weekly group of other writers to spur on his creativity, the inspiration, whatever was needed out of this amazing group of people. Can you imagine, by the way? I mean, just imagine being part of a mastermind group with Tolkien. Are you kidding me? So here's the deal. It reminded me of something that I experienced on a crazy cool level at our entree leader. Summit. Now, we're just fresh off of that event, but I met so many men and women who knew each other through our all-access online community, which includes weekly mastermind groups of like-minded men and women. They've met each other online, and then they come to our signature event of 1,500-plus

leaders, and they're hanging out together. I'm interviewing one of, two of them, on the Facebook live stage, and they're in tears. And then there's six other women. that are in this mastermind group with these two very successful business women, and they're crying. Now, that's community. It's not just about tips and techniques and best practices. It's about caring for one another. When I saw those women crying, that wasn't some silly emotional thing.

That was a deep connection. I interviewed them about it. You know what they said? the theme that kept popping up, different words, same message. We encourage each other. We understand each other. Community. Let me tell you something.

The work that you men and women are doing is too stinking important to try to do it on your own. You will burn out. You will get discouraged. And you will stay the course. If you have other people holding your arms up when you cannot. That is community. That's why it matters so much. Now, I hardly ever talk about all access, but I'm talking about it because this is not something I've been told to do.

I'm talking about it because I saw it firsthand. I've seen it at Entree Leadership One Day events all around the country. We created All Access because men and women like you said we need more than just just a one day or a four-day event. So all access is very simple. It is an online community. 2,000 plus men and women every day, every week, every month, every year, they are engaged with our team.

Now, there are three big Cs that you get out of all access. You're going to get coaching from our team. You're getting the Dave Ramsey playbook, which, by the way, it's working and it's winning big. you're going to get world-class content that you can apply. It doesn't just motivate and educate you, but you can then apply it. And then finally, the community, which I've been raving about. Coaching, content, community.

That's all access. Now, here's the deal. I am so passionate about this that I asked Daniel Tarty and the team, can we do a special podcast discount for the people? You the people. I am a man of the people. And so I've got a code here, all access. Very simple.

Just smash the words together. All access. Text all access to 33-444. And you're going to get a special all-access discount. Now, it's a monthly fee. And they're going to walk you through all the details. But listen, it is minuscule compared to the amount of money and time you're spending on bad decisions and bad people. And here's the best part.

Are you ready for this? We don't make you sign a contract for All Access. What does that mean? It means if it doesn't work for you, you're out. You're not signing a long-term commitment. You know what you're signing? You're signing a dedicated growth plan. That's what you do.

Because if you engage in All Access, guess what? You will not quit. So there it is. Why wouldn't you try this? Try it for two, three months. It's a minuscule amount. And I'm giving it to you at a discount. And oh, by the way, if you don't stay with it, then you can drop out.

That's yours. That's all you. It's all on you. You don't have to feel bad about it. We're not going to make you feel guilty. You're just out. So why wouldn't you take advantage of this? All right.

I got that off my chest. Folks, I'm seeing it work, and I've got to tell you, when I see something work and to the results that I'm seeing and hearing about from real people, I get fired up. I make no apologies. All right. now, I told you that we were going to give you some really practical stuff on social media. How do you tell your company's story? How do you tell that brand story on social media? Melissa Anthony Sin has a firm that helps small businesses figure this out. We brought her in to give you some practical advice. Here it is. Well, Melissa, this is fun and a very important topic. So social

media is no longer a new, fresh phrase, concept, or platform. Yet, so many companies, are still struggling with it. So many companies are essentially, Melissa, they're not even engaged with social media. So I want to start there. Why? Why are so many people late to adopting this all-important strategy? Well, I have a lot of theories on that. And let's start with the fact of a differentiation. We're going to start in the B2B complex sector world versus the consumer world. The consumer world of social media is a lot more knowable. It's got a lot of thought leadership around it, you know when you're going to go forward with a consumer brand that you've got to build this entire image and marketing around it. Now, complex sector of B2B companies recognize that

social media is important, but they have been far slower to adoption. And when they did see opportunity in it, nobody understood how to implement the right resources to carry it forward. So one of my theories about why social media is so bad in B2B companies has to do with a massive generational shift going on. And a lot of mid-market and a lot of entrepreneurial-driven companies, they're led by baby boomers. And they understand how to get revenue based on a model where they built their business, right? They understand RFPs maybe. They understand trade shows. They understand relationships.

Now, look at where we're at. We have millennials that are 35 years old go into 40 pretty fast. We have gen Xers, young gen Xers that are 40 years old. These people are making decisions and they want to engage in the social media. And yet, kind of the leadership doesn't have as much familiarity of the relevance and architecture of social media. that's one thing, but that one thing leads to it being really under-resourced. And then there's the whole issue of how do you spend time on something when you don't know what its ROI is going to be? And some leaders are very rigid, some businesses, because they've been successful on this way of thinking,

they're very leery to put any kind of resources in something that they don't necessarily understand, don't necessarily like, don't necessarily get, can't put a great metric on it. Okay, you just absolutely nailed a lot of the barriers. So let's walk through some of these barriers and how to begin to scale them and get past them. Let's start with ROI. I know exactly what you're talking about. I've been telling a couple small businesses that I give my business to here locally. You need to be engaged on Instagram. You need to be offering things and creating stories. And they kind of get it, but they just, come back to, oh, I just don't have time. It's like a lot of people don't have time to work out. But this is vital. It's super important. How do you get them across the barrier? People are listening

right now and they're going, I just don't see how there is an ROI. How do you help blow that myth up, that there is ROI and how do they begin to specifically measure ROI on social media? Okay. So we need to get, we need to get militaristic now. I just shared with you before we got online that I'm the mother of three-year-old twins. And you use the analogy of working out. Yes. The only way I'm going to get out there and work out is if I literally, which I do, set my alarm for 4.30 in the morning.

Yikes. Sorry, it's not my favorite either. Right, right. But these are the things that we have to do. That's applied to business. Back up. What you have to realize on social media. Let's say you're complex company.

You're a law firm. You're a architecture firm. You're selling something B2B. You're going to have three press. typically, right? So that may be LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram, or Facebook, or maybe you're only doing LinkedIn and Twitter. The reality is if you have three platforms, get ready, that is 70 to 75 pieces of content per month. Social media is a little bit about math. So we need to first understand what is a best practice in cadence of social media so you understand what you're up against.

then you need to try to understand context of what you're going to deliver in terms of content. So that starts with what are you trying to accomplish? Are you trying to recruit the best and the brightest? Are you trying to increase awareness of your brand? Are you trying to discuss an issue that's important to your business in order to influence key decision makers? If it's any of those three things, it's going to take a lot more investment, conceptually. So not only do you have to have this window of content, you then need to look at

what is that content going to be made of. Here's what drives me nuts. I see businesses big, really big businesses. And I go to their social media and they're posting horrible pictures at trade shows. They're posting work anniversaries in the break room. They're posting employee birthdays. Okay, all of that is garbage. That should actually represent less than 10% of those 70 to 75 posts, right? The biggest chunk of what you have to post on to be meaningful, and this matters then what industry you're in, and that's going to be owned thought leadership,

meaning your own thought leadership of your company, needs to be one of the biggest segments of content. Then the other proportion of content needs to be focused on commenting on things that are relevant and tangential to your industry that your potential followers would care about. So before we dissect ROI, we have to understand, you're not going to have any ROI if it's a guy in a break room celebrating his work anniversary, because no one wants to look at that. Right. To calculate ROI, you must first have a platform that's going to be conducive to engagement with complex industries, B2B industries,

That means you're going to have to look at the differentiators of your company and then build up the platforms of concepts that are going to be truly meaningful to your target audience. Easy thing to say, but you have to then know who your target audiences, define who your target audiences, define what segments you're going after. I'm not only an expert at PR and social media, but I actually own and run a business. So I really recognize that the barrier for growth of a business is really about when you get systematic. So if you're a business that understands and is at that turning point that you're beginning to get absolutely systematic about all facets of how you generate revenue and marketing and sales and how that all works together, then there's a way to do the

formula. If you're still kind of not into that systematic mode, then you should make less of an investment because to really get this right, you're going to have to get pretty systematic. And when I say systematic, that means you can't just come up with owned content on the fly. You've got to like be very thoughtful about who you're going after as a client and be committed to that. Now, this is a huge thought. This idea. of system because a lot of people, they don't put a system type approach to social media. And as you gave us an example earlier, you're looking at 70 to 75 posts a week.

So you're thinking through that. And it has to be as strategic and systematic as everything else you do. So let me ask you this. Is that advice any different for B to C? Because you've been mentioning B2B, which I get that, business to business. But what about people, small businesses that are going direct to consumer? Same as central advice? So I think people that are going direct to consumer, that's a really big category.

Is it nationals, at internationals, that local is a regional? There's a lot of packages that you can buy from companies like Main Street Hub. That's actually a company headquartered in Austin, Texas, that will kind of do that all for you if you're a Main Street business. And it is very different because the content doesn't have to be as deep or meaningful. It can be more engaging, interesting, deal-oriented. Whereas in a complex sector, say you're an engineering firm, you know, these are just more deep, intense kinds of areas where the person, the thing you're selling is really expensive and it's really in depth. So you've got to match that with your content. Good.

All right. And that's why I ask that, folks, because there's a real difference here when you're in a B to B. type business because what we're essentially talking about here is social media needs to be in your mind, I'm guessing, Melissa, correct if I'm wrong, but because you're a PR expert, and we're talking about social media for B2B, it is a new form of PR. Yes, it is. Yeah. And so it can turn a business around. We're talking about clients, relationships. It is a huge part of it. So I want to go back in, because you gave us so much to talk about, I want to go back into some of the advice you just gave So when you're thinking through that 70 to 75 pieces of content, and a couple times you said

own content thought later, I want to go back to that thought. Define that a little bit more and practically guide us through for an organization, a firm that says, okay, we've got to get some of our own thought and we've got to get that out. How do they begin to mind that within the organization so that they get the right stuff to then put out on social media? Well, so it depends. And I'm thinking about a lot of companies that are at inflection points.

Maybe there are a few million in revenue and they're a really meaningful inflection point. I think in a B-to-B organization, one of the best places to start from a thought leadership perspective is the commitment of the CEO to being a thought leader on behalf of his organization. I have seen companies up to $50 million in revenue where the CEO is deeply committed to writing blogs, concepts, and analysis. I think it's one of the roles in the very distributed type of communications environment that we conduct business in today. So the way that a CEO starts is they really need to look within themselves and their expertise in the vision of their company and begin to lay out the pillars. What are the things impacting their landscape? My gosh, they certainly

know that because they're driving the business forward every day. And then be having, the discipline to get up at 430 and define those concepts so that they're blogging, right? Creating a series of blogs, investing and authoring in micro papers, micro blogs, micro-e-papers, looking for people within their firm to collaborate with them to develop some meaningful e-papers on a subject matter that's important to a revenue base that's important to their business. They can also outsource this. They can do this with freelancers. They can do this with marketing freelancers. Depending on their size, they may look at hiring a firm, kind of like ours, like an Anthony Barnum, but you have to be of a certain scale. But there are a lot of pieces and

places below that where you can help invest in that marketing to get some assistance. So it's defining the concepts, and that's within the CEO and the other part. of the firm and then executing by finding writers and other talents to help you create the content. I think I'm paying attention here, but correct if I'm wrong, Melissa. The number one goal or the most valuable type of social post on a B2B type outreach is obviously content, thought leading type content. Is there a second and third bucket? And to further this question, what would those be and how much of it is bringing in? a little bit of the, here are some other organizations are benefiting from us.

Absolutely. So you want to have a really strong 40 to 50% owned thought leadership, and then you want 40 to 50% or 40% to be articles and other thought leaders and putting some very brief commentary on top of it. And then you have a portion that is 10% that is cultural to show a little bit of your personality of your organization and the people within it. So it's not just own thought leadership. That's just the most painful portion of it or the biggest investment. Let me ask you this. Who is doing it well? You know, sometimes we talk about all the things that maybe B2B organizations

aren't doing well there. I'm just curious, are there a couple organizations that we can look to and you say, you know, I admire what they're doing. Well, that's a very interesting question because there is know how-to guide or broad-reaching how-to guide on best social media practices. In fact, our team at Anthony Barnum conducted a tremendous amount of research to create an e-paper on that topic. And so also to crystallize how we do this with our clients. We looked at a lot of different social media presences. We looked at everything from McKinsey. We looked at other national PR firms. we looked at commercial real estate companies. I mean, yeah, there's amazing companies like Intel, McKenzie.

They have amazing dynamic presences. But in that next genre of mid-market companies, they get so busy and posting about obtuse awards and mid-management promotions that that's kind of all you see in the mid-market companies. I know there are some, but I can't think of a really strong mid-market B-to-B presence. Most of it is at the, these companies have really, really taken a lot of intensity with it. Let me correct that. The industry that has the strongest practical experience, and I'll even tell you why, the industry that is the strongest on social media is going to be the technology software industry.

I mean, there's just a number of companies. in that sector that really master social media and make it very valuable. And I'll tell you why. It's because they have to create, they're selling this non-tangible thing that they have to create markets for. They're solving really specific problems, right? And they have a problem to solve. They need to be the leader in that market.

They also do demand generation and lead generation strategies. strategies, which are the strategies where you're either really targeting and advertising, and I'm talking about the B2B world on LinkedIn and really trying to target and get in front of your customer profile, or you have a big database and you're offering great thought leadership, and you're trying to stay in front of the target individuals within companies that your company's targeting, right? So they have these very sophisticated marketing strategies already in place. Their social media has to be good because it's married to their demand and lead generation strategies. And this is really interesting because there's two types of companies doing social media.

There are companies who do not have demand in lead generation strategies and those who do. And so this is the conundrum. What you notice is that if you really want to assign a numerical quantifiable value to the output of your social media, you were going to have a CRM, a customer relationship management software tool that's integrated with a best in class marketing automation tool, okay? Because that's the way that you're able to see how all the pieces fall together into the lead and sales pipeline. That is sophisticated, advanced marketing and social media. And then you can really get into the dollars and cents, literally. Now, many companies are doing that and understand that.

Many companies who have gotten their revenue and established a brand presence from more traditional ways of marketing, you know, they're steering down into the future and they have to go from written RFPs and lunches to this new realm of communication and this new realm of communication and this new realm of. marketing. And it's a very painful transition into what essentially software tech has been doing for a number of years really well. But you need to start, right? If you want to be there by 2018 or 2019, you need to start with that owned thought leadership, take a look at how technology companies have been doing this and so successful at it for so many years and begin to adopt. That's the path forward. All right, Melissa, before I let you go, we have a diverse audience. And we've been talking a lot about B2B strategies, yet we have a lot of small business owners here who are B2B. We've talked about some of the barriers earlier. I just want you to encourage these leaders with the importance of what we've talked about today and how they can get started, how vital it is going forward, importance in growing their customers, obviously their revenues and their reputation out there.

What would you say to them on getting started and doing it over the long? long haul. So I think to our listeners out there in small businesses looking to go to the next level, scratching their head about social media, first of all, it's understandable. This is complex stuff. This is a high volume. It needs to first become a priority. And then you need to look at the total business strategy of your organization and determine the series of steps you're going to need to take to transform to become more of an owned content. marketing entity. Maybe you do something really great. You provide a service that's really great. You provide a product that's really great, but niche. Social media is about transforming your company

into a company that not only does what it does great, but also markets it really, really well. So instead of going to the extreme, take basic steps. Go and look at your competitors. go and look at the companies that you admire in fields that are tangential or competitive and take a look and analyze for yourself what they're doing. Look at their followers. Look at their engagement. Look at their rates. Lay out your platforms that are going to be the most meaningful for your target audience. If you have a more traditional kind of client base, you very well may want to start with LinkedIn, which has very broad professional appeal. If you have more of a consumer-facing product, then obviously Instagram and Facebook are better fits. You don't have to do all of them.

Take a look at your business and who your customer is and where they are. Then you need to really, as the owner of the company, or one of the owners of the company, you need to take a look at what are the key differentiators of this organization in context of this market, identify those, and identify the things that you need your target audience. to know. And that's really where the own thought leadership comes from is what you need to know. It is very easy to hook up to a Hoot Suite, to hook up to a Sprout, and be able to track engagement. I would say that to make your first priority, though, to be about engaging your own internal performance and consistency of delivering meaningful content, because that becomes a very meaningful

part of this. You can't be inconsistent and then make a decision about the value. You have to really assign a key metric to how you're able to perform and consistently deliver content on the channels that you've chosen and stick to plan. Then you can begin to focus on how you grow content and how you grow followers. And there's a lot of resources related to that. Then you begin to look at how you distribute and grow your own content and social media as part of your entire marketing mechanism. But those are the places to really, really begin. I certainly invite people to take a look at our, it's free, it's our e-paper on best social media practices, which has all of the percentages of what in our experience makes a really

compelling percentages of campaigns. The other thing I would tell everyone is to, if you're B2B complex industry, you're not necessarily going to have super magnified inflection points. Instead, I would look at a cadence of evaluating engagement and growth over a series of months, so maybe quarter to quarter. Social media is not fast in the world of B2B complex sectors. It's slower. It takes time. Wow. So much stuff here to act on. And as Melissa said, they have published this e-paper. We're going to make this available to you in the show notes, folks. So make sure that you go click on the link. We'll have that available to you in this episode, show notes, because it's so much

more there, and you can really begin to take this conversation and go much, much deeper. She is, Melissa, Anthony Sin. Thank you so much, Melissa, for spending time with us. We're much better for it, and we appreciate it. Thank you so much, Ken. Big thanks to Melissa. Hope you can apply that and win big. Speaking of applying things, how about the amazing tools we bring you? Entree leadership's tool. Super selling cheat sheet. We've given this to you before.

It's very popular. We're bringing it back. What's the secret to serving your customers well? It's actually not a secret because we're giving it away. So Melissa was telling you about social media and strategy. So we're going to build on that. We've got an amazing resource here. We're going to cover the disc personality and how those different personalities need to be dealt with

from a communication standpoint. when it comes to actually selling. Can you imagine if you could read your customer's mind? That's what this does. We're also going to give you a checklist for your team so that they can see how they're doing when it comes to succeeding in sales. What's the process look like,

really walks it through for them? And then I think this is the most valuable. We're going to give you six sample closes and strategies on a sales. So there you go. All of that coming to you absolutely free. Just text the phrase, EL sales, that's all one word, EL sales, text that to 33-444, or of course, we have the link in this episode

show notes. And then, if that wasn't enough, InfusionSoft, how do identify your target market? Chad Kirby spoke a good bit on this at Summit during a breakout session, wildly popular. He is a vice president at Infusionsoft, been a frequent guest on this podcast. We use Infusionsoft. that's why they're the only outside organization we talk about on this podcast. We just love them that much. This worksheet is going to help you pinpoint customer paying points, establish why your customers actually buy from you,

and help you build that target customer. I like to think of the Mr. Potato Head. Just build it. What's it look like? That's going to help you. So, folks, this is also another amazing resource to help you with sales to go along with our Entree Leadership tool. Here's how you get it.

The link is in this episode. show notes. So just go to this episode show notes at entreleadership.com, click on podcast, find this episode, the link is there, and you need to be using this stuff. It's absolutely free. Why wouldn't you take it? Spend a little bit of time on these resources each time we tell you about them, and I promise you're going to find the stuff that really, really helps. All right, folks, I want to do a special shout out. Eric, the producer, and Will Rudder, the engineer. Now you wonder why I don't say Eric's last name? Because it's Polish and I can't say it.

And if I said it, your brain would immediately stop thinking about what I'm saying and try to spell it. And so he's Eric the producer. And I guess we'll call Will the Engineer. And we'll stick with that. But these are two young guys that are really killing it. And I got to tell you, I am blessed to hear from you folks on social media. You email us, podcast at entreleadership.com. I see you at live events and you say really nice things to me about the podcast.

And I appreciate that. I really do, but it is not a one-man show. I could not do what I do without Eric, the producer, and Will, the engineer. And so I wanted to give those guys a shout out. They absolutely killed it recently with these daily episodes coming out of the Entree Leadership Summit. And I appreciate both of them so much. They're world-class of what they do. And if you appreciate them, send them an email podcast at Entreeleadership.com.

They really are a fantastic part of the team. We really are the Three Musketeers. So appreciate those guys so much. On behalf of Eric the producer, Will the Engineer and the entire Andrele leadership team, thank you so much for listening. We'll talk with you again very soon.