Start With A Win - Consistently Building Trust with Jeremy Ryan Slate - Part 2

Episode Date: May 12, 2021

This episode is the conclusion of Adam’s interview with Jeremy Ryan Slate. We pick back up in the conversation on building trust and why brands aren’t able to establish their presence. Jeremy says that people forget about public relations until something goes wrong, and they suddenly want to make sure that everyone knows all of the good things about them to offset the bad. PR should be integrated into daily, weekly, and monthly rhythms within the business so that leaders always have open lines of communication with their customers. This approach allows brands to proactively answer objections and solve problems before customers even get to that point in the process.This presence and communication is epitomized by overdelivering in every customer exchange, focusing on building relationships rather than closing transactions, and eventually creating brand evangelists that will be the best PR you can hope for. Many businesses strategize their communications months in advance and try to be on all of the social media platforms. However, over-planning can take the spontaneity out of interacting with customers in real-time on the platform(s) that best fits your niche. Jeremy encourages leaders and entrepreneurs to focus on doing one thing well and stay in their niche and then expand your footprint as your business grows and your team expands. To sum up this two-part conversation, Jeremy breaks down his recommended action items for those people looking to start something new, particularly a podcast:Find out what’s out there alreadyArticulate how you are differentResearch the influencers in that spaceCurate your audience based on the audiences of those influencersFocus on one platform at a timeInterview people in the nicheGet interviewed by people in the nicheConnect with Jeremy: https://www.jeremyryanslate.com/https://twitter.com/JeremyRyanSlatehttps://www.linkedin.com/in/jeremy-ryan-slate-bb7b284ahttps://www.instagram.com/jeremyryanslate/?hl=en Connect with Adam:https://www.startwithawin.com/ https://www.facebook.com/REMAXAdamContoshttps://twitter.com/REMAXAdamContos https://www.instagram.com/REMAXadamcontos/ Leave us a voicemail:888-581-4430

Every day is filled with choices. You're here because you're choosing to start with a win. Get ready to be inspired, learn something new, and connect with the win nation. All right, welcome back. We're here with Jeremy Slate. He's a podcaster, founder of the Create Your Own Life podcast, which studies the highest performers in the world. He's had some amazing interviews on his podcast. Make sure you check it out. He's also got a book coming out here right at the first of the year. So be watching for that as well. But Jeremy, you and I have been talking about kind of building your presence, building yourself as an influencer, establishing your position and where does the customer go and how do we, how do we capture them and keep them? So you mentioned a word that was really, really important here.

And that is trust. You know, it's, they come across you every now and then you're like, Hey, what's, what's up with the customer? You know, I had these people show up on my podcast or something, but I didn't gather any emails or I didn't gather any information. Um, how do we build that trust? Give us, give us kind of a fly over what your perspective is on that. Well, I think the first thing is actually like, let's talk about the problem, right? Like, you know, I've had so many people come to me and they say, okay, so I need some help with reputation management. Now we're on reputation management now. Our first result on Google is a ripoff report. And you're like, wow, well, you started entirely too late in this process. I think so many times people don't do PR actions or kind of skip them until something goes wrong.

And you really want to be building these all along. And whether that could be community events, whether that could be, you know, different charities you're working with, whether it's the media that you're doing, but this should be an action that you do each and every day, each and every month, you know, new business awards, business awards, Inc. 5000, whatever it is, you should be doing these things all the time. I find too often business owners wait until there's a problem and then those things are really hard or really expensive to get because you have a problem. So I think first and foremost, it's getting that out of your head. Like, okay, I'm only going to do this when something goes wrong. The second thing is

so many times you'll get somebody in a sales cycle and they say, okay, well, you know, I have to think about it. Or can I talk to one of your previous clients? Or, um, you know, I, I need to, to really check with somebody else on this. And one of the missing things there is trust. When you leave somebody leaving a sales cycle with a question, they're not going to come back to you to get it answered. So your job is to know all the things that they're thinking, wondering, are going to ask before they even get on that sales cycle. And that is about the content you're creating. Like I said, you want to handle objections in the content you're creating. You want to, even in your sales cycle, handle those

before you start selling and presenting your product. Because people have those ideas and their attention's stuck on those ideas. If you don't handle them, they're gone. So I think that trust is so vital and it creates more trust in your customer, especially in a sales cycle, when you handle it at the beginning. It's like, okay, I like this guy. Like for myself, many years ago, I was, um, I had, uh, financed a car when I was kind of, uh, uh, down on my luck and it wasn't in a very good place. I had, I had went to look at a new car and I really didn't have good credit at the time, so I couldn't get it. And the salesman was super nice. And they go outside and he, he jabs me in the arm and he goes, well, I'll tell you what, man, I've, I've kind of seen where this car is at next time it rains. You may want to go find a parking lot and park it there. And hopefully your insurance takes care of them he goes, well, I'll tell you what, man, I've kind of seen where this car is at. Next time it rains, you may want to go find a parking lot and park it there. And hopefully

your insurance takes care of them. Like, well, I'm not going to do that, but I like you. So let's talk more about how you can help me. So it's also meeting your customer where you're at as well. It's when you handle those things before you're creating a level of trust where you're actually friends with the person you're selling to. And that's different. Let's unpack this a little bit because there's some gold in here. I've talked about a couple different concepts, especially- I'm from Jersey, by the way, so I talk crazy fast. No, this is fun. There's some good energy here, man. This is a lot of what our entrepreneurs go through on a daily basis, or all entrepreneurs go through on a daily basis. And really,

if you're running a business, you should be thinking about these things. Even, you know, I'm CEO of a public company and I think about these things every day. And I know our single operator business owners do. But the first thing you said, use the phrase all the time. And I think that's incredibly important because people swoop in thinking they can show up, do the deal and boogie on out of there. And that's a bunch of BS in my mind. That's not a relationship. That's a transaction. People don't want transactions. Now they want relationships and they want to exchange product and service during that relationship. So something we've been pushing Jeremy is, and I love this phrase. I want to share it with you. Presence creates trust. Presence creates trust because you don't get to do the deal without the trust you've said. And how many times,

you know, we've heard the different Google stats. Oh, you got to contact somebody three times. No, it's seven times. No, it's 11 times. No, it's 23 times, you know, all this, all this garbage about how many times it is, but what truly defines all the time and how often should we be thinking about actually as some sort of a benchmark communicating with our customer base? Well, even this, there's like you have to think about like general communications, like, you know, what you're doing right now and having this podcast. That's a trust creating vehicle as a host because you're creating value for people that want to, to, to learn from you. So I think that's first and foremost is you have to, is, and this has happened in the business world, I think in the last 15 years, especially is there's this shift on companies realizing they have to be valuable in the eyes of their consumer because it is super competitive right now. Like, um, you can, you can correct me on this if,

if I'm wrong, but I think the, it's like 5,000 messages someone sees a day. So why are they going to remember yours? Well, so I did Smile Club Club Direct last year because I used to have this horrible snaggle tooth. And I got the braces and I got done with the program and I wasn't happy with it. So I approached them and I said, hey, guys, you know this. I approached you to handle this tooth and I'm not super happy with it. And they said, oh, that's fine. You know what? We have a free program we're going to do for you. We're going to do another six months. We're going to handle your problem and we're going to get it served for you. I've recommended 50 different people to them. So that's what you really have to think about is how can I over deliver and how can

I do more for the person I'm talking to? Too many people look at what is even exchange. You want to over deliver in every exchange that you're doing because you're not just creating trust, but you're creating more affinity for the people you're talking to. And I think that's where it's really at because then they're willing to tell other people about you. And when you create evangelists for your brand and your consumer, that's a big deal. That's interesting. That, that story with the smile club, they dug for your, I mean, you, you put it on a silver platter, but they actually recognized your challenge as a human being and they cared about it. And so many businesses are like, uh, you have to check out a return policy, you know, that type of thing, or go on. I mean, my wife bought one of those, um, fancy fitness scales that tell you your BMI and all this other stuff from a, uh, a fitness

influencer the other day. And everybody's like raving about it. We tried it and it was crap. I mean, it was, I'm like, uh, was she trying to get her, was she trying to get her body fat from standing on it? Yeah. So those don't work. And the reason is because, um, they, they read water in your body as fat. So the percentages are always off. You always want to get like the caliper test is the best one. Yeah. It's well, I mean, I'm like, I don't think these things work. And she goes, this influencer is like a, you know, IF whatever BB something or other competitor and all this other stuff. I'm like, that's great, but this doesn't work. And so we tried to send it back. You know what the company said?

We need you to take a video of you hitting the reset button and then standing on it this way and then do a video of you changing the batteries and do a video of this, and send us all this stuff. We're like, no, no. And then they wanted to fill out a five page form as to why we wanted to return it. We're like, no, it's not going to work that way. And they go, oh, OK. And then they just refunded the credit card and ghosted us. And we're like, that's- Your customer service should not make your consumer, your potential consumer, hate you more. That's not the purpose of this. Like you need to look at every customer service thing as a, as a potential chance to have a win, right? Like solve my problem, right? We've run into challenges with customers and that's actually created a better opportunity for us to serve them. And that's really half you have to

look at it. Right. I think that's, it's huge. It really is. Yeah. Friends are there for you when you have a challenge in life. So be a friend to your customers. I mean, that's what it comes down to, but it's all right. Let's we'll be. And, and from to that perspective as well, like, and, and, and, and then I'll let you wrap us back around. But from that perspective, right? Like when you've left a review for something, how many times is it because you're angry, right? People are less motivated to leave a review when they're happy. Um, so you really have to think about like people that have used your service or experienced your service. Um, at some point in time, they're going to talk about you. You want it to be positive. So let's talk about that. Let's, let's wrap it around to that point and, and kind of start, um, putting a bow on this thing because everybody's like,

oh my gosh, this is overwhelming to me. I've got my business. You said I got to be there all the time. I have to build this trust. I have to build a relationship. That seems like a lot. It's actually not. It's actually not. It's these little bite-sized bits of value and relationship building pieces that you deliver every day to your customers. And the hardest part is people are overwhelmed by, I have to make a video. I have to make a Facebook post. I have to make an Instagram post. I have to get on Tik TOK or I have to get on Twitter or whatever it might be all these different places, Jeremy, what's the easiest way for us to one, come up with somebody's challenge that we're going to overcome and to talk about it in a very simple way that doesn't take up

our entire day. Well, this is like super simple. It's, uh, you know, hopefully have some customers. So if you do talk to them, see why they work with you, see why they like you, see what challenge they're trying to solve. Like surveys are the biggest thing to figuring out how you can solve a problem. I find too many people, you know, they put out a product or they put out a solution, they put out anything and they don't even know what people want. You have to find out what's needed and wanted first before you're going to do that. So surveying first is vital. The other thing as well is looking at, okay, well, what part of that can I do now? You know, there's like, I don't even know how many social media platforms out there now. There's

like a new one every day. You know, it's like, seriously, I saw a press release this morning, there's somebody else putting out another social media platform, like seriously. So like find the one that you can confront and the one that you know your audience is on. Um, I, I know for us, we do extremely well on LinkedIn. So yeah, I'm on the other platforms. Like I've got the blue check Mark and Twitter and Facebook, but like I spend most of my time on, on LinkedIn because that's where my audience is. So you want to find out what works for you, where your audience is and talk to them there. Just ask them what their challenges are and how you can help. But I find too many times people spread themselves so thin when they don't have a team in the beginning and they'd have to put this thing here, put this thing there.

And because they try to be everywhere, they do nothing well. So find one thing, do it well. And as you grow, make sure you're documenting. Because I know for myself, I do a screen recording of everything when I create it, and I write it down. Because then it's very easy to hire somebody to do that, because people don't know what's in your head. So then you can start putting people on running your Facebook page, running your Twitter, running your LinkedIn, helping you with clients.

But you have to see see what can I do right now to do that? What's the smallest bite out of the elephant I can take now before we try to eat the whole thing? I just think it's vital to look at it like that. That's a great point. We started doing that. So start with a win has been on since June of 2018. And we started doing that where we have somebody go through and pull these quotes out from the podcast and from these videos. And then those all become content. It's kind of that Gary Vaynerchuk model of, okay, one thing creates 29 pieces of content. And I'll tell you what, that is, you're spot on, man. That worked really well because I'll walk away from the podcast and I'll be like, what did I just say? And I got to go back and listen to it again. And no, I followed my outline that I wrote down the five or six key points I wanted to get. But you said some things that iterated as ideas. You talk about the ideas coming to shower and you're like, you're a hundred percent correct, man. And I keep

my phone there and I reach out and I'm like, okay, in the notes. Cause I know I was just saying to my wife this morning, like I want my Bluetooth shower speaker to have Siri work on it. So I can like have her take notes for me in the shower. So most of the time I have to figure out like how I can like note this down somewhere. But like, if I can start talking to Siri in the shower, I'll be in better shape, man. Yeah. Wear your AirPods in the shower or something like that. I don't know if we get electrocuted if that happens. Like, how does that work? You can swim with them, I guess. So really? Yeah. Okay. You can wear those things in the water. I mean, don't ruin them on my behalf, but my understanding is you can do that. I was talking

to some guy. He goes, I ride my bike and I dictate things. I'm like, how do you do that? He goes, well, I use Siri and I go, don't you sweat on your AirPods? He goes, they can get wet. I'm like, oh, oh my gosh. Cool. Well, Jeremy, you've dropped a lot of bombs here. This is, this is amazing. A lot of great content. Can you packages up real quick for us in just a couple of minutes and say, everybody, when you hang up this podcast, when you hit, you know, when it's after you hear producer Mark rolling through, um, go do this. What, what can we tell them? I would say to people like that, that are listening to this, like, okay, so what do I do from here? Well, the first thing is find out what's already out there, because I think that's where people already mess up is they

try to put their ideas out there. And I did this the first time, like the first version of my podcast was called rock your life. Somebody already had, and it was trademark, which means I couldn't do it. Um, so you want to find out what's already out there, then find out how you're different from that and find out who the influencers in that space are. So you know where your listeners are. Um, the other thing then would be to really figure out, okay, what is the content platform I'm going to focus on? Is it a podcast? Is it YouTube? Is it Twitter? Is it Facebook? Whatever it is, focus on one platform. And then I would say, um, I find interviews, whether they're in written form or whether they're in verbal or video, like we're doing now is the best way to connect with people

because it establishes networking and also positioning. So interview people in your niche. And I think to me, that's one of the best things that you can do to get out there. And then once you start seeing some attention, start getting yourself either in industry blogs or interviewed in places in your niche. And when I say niche, I find most people start out way too wide, start small, like that is so vital. So figure out what's out there, differentiate, pick a platform, find out who the influencers are, interview them, then get yourself interviewed. Like that is going to be the biggest thing to really getting out there and getting seen and known and heard and trusted. Perfect. Great information. Jeremy Slate, founder of the Create Your Own Life podcast on a two-part series here. Thanks for all of this

amazing marketing and sales information, man. And I do have a question for you that I ask every guest on the show. Our listeners love to hear this. Jeremy, how do you start your day with a win? So I take a cold shower every morning. And when I get through it, I'm like, man, I did it today. The hardest one I ever took is on a ski trip up in Lake Placid. I've never felt water that cold before in my entire life. So I start every morning with a cold shower and has a few benefits, man. It wakes you up more than you've ever woken up before is one of them, but it also supports your immune system. It supports fat loss because it actually, you know, works on the thermogenic fat in

your body to make it burn other fat. So it's a really good thing. Good way to start the start the day. And if you can do that, man, you'd be surprised what things you can do after that. Awesome. Thanks, Jeremy. Appreciate you being on the show and got a baby coming here real soon. Congratulations on that. Thank you. Thanks for starting your day with a win. Thanks for having me, Jeremy. Appreciate you being on the show. And you got a baby coming here real soon. Congratulations on that. Thanks for starting your day with a win.

Thanks for having me, guys. Hey, thank you, Jeremy. Hey, and thank you for listening to Start With A Win. If you'd like to ask Adam a question or potentially tell us your Start With A Win story, leave us a message at 888-581-4430. Don't forget to go onto iTunes and subscribe, write a review and rate the show. It helps us get the word out and reach more people. For more great content, head over to startwithawin.com. And until next time, remember, start with a win.