Determined Society with Shawn French | Adversity & Mindset - 2000 Percent raise with John Cerasani

Episode Date: September 26, 2022

In this episode Shawn French sits down with the Founder of Glencrest Global, John Cerasani. They recount John’s rise in corporate America as a high performing Insurance Broker. Years into his career he realized that no one in this esteemed brokerage was doing half the work he was doing. Meetings were paused and productivity was brought to a halt for inner office birthday parties and it drove him crazy. John began his own brokerage at his kitchen table shortly after the realizations mentioned above. He didn’t start by chasing down smaller clients. John went after the whales just like he did while being employed by someone else. After a short time period a large private equity group bought his company for 10’s of millions of dollars. John is now an author of 2000 Percent Raise and has his own podcast launching today! You can find John on IG at @johncerasani --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/shawn-french/message Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

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It's up to you. We'll take the laundry. Rinse. It's time to be great. In a sales environment, that should be the last concern. What should be a concern is the motherfucker sitting at home, never hitting their number and stealing money. You know what? Now that it's my own company, there is something to do at 9.50 at night.

And that's really a paradigm shift for me. That was a big, I generate everything to build in that company, man. Everything. All my thoughts. And it's just like, you ever have like, um, uh, shit? Like, um, like a little kid. that has too much sugar.

I dated this girl once I had a two-year-old. And if you gave him like too many pixie sticks, he'd like start shaking because he didn't. He didn't know what to do with his energy. He didn't know what to do with his energy. Are you serious? He literally would shake. He literally would shake.

And it was kind of like funny. Oh, shit. We'll give him a lollipop. And it was not like we weren't overfeeding the good sugar. And he had like two bites. It's how we reacted to us. And watch this motherfucker shake. What?

What is up, everybody, Sean French here with another podcast of The Determined Society. I have with me today, one of my good buddies, John Sarasani. Man, I met him on Instagram. And it's so funny because I feel like every time I get on my show, I talk about how many cool dudes I'm meeting on social media sites. I don't want you guys to get the wrong idea. But here's the thing. Like, there's very few people that in my immediate circle here on a day-to-day basis, I can really connect with. And when I get the opportunity to meet somebody like John, man,

I really embraced the opportunity because he's a high level dude. You know, he, he understands business. He's a serial entrepreneur. He's got a great eye for things. And like, I just absolutely love interacting with him on a day-to-day basis. So I just want to tell you a little bit about him before we get started. And I can promise you this. This episode right here has been requested by probably more than a dozen people.

So we're trying to give the world what they want. Hopefully those 12 people can share the shit out of the show. and get amazing reviews because, you know, this is going to be a dynamic conversation. So, you know, like I said, John is a serial entrepreneur, business expert, and venture capitalists. He splits his time between Los Angeles and Chicago. And he has been featured on Fox, NBC, WGN, and CBS. Notably, though, this is a good one. He was featured in Crane's business 40 under 40 at the age of 27.

He is recently retired and then unreasonably. tired and I want him to talk about a little bit about what he does. I won't steal all this thunder, but man, this guy is an amazing jack of all trades, brilliant fucking mine. And I call him a good friend. John, welcome to the show. Thank you, my friend. Thank you, my friend. You know, as you're telling that story, I'm trying to remember, did I slide into your DMs or did you slide into mine? Dude, you slid into mine. I was like, dude, you know, it's the way to win. You're out? You out? You're out? Well, sup. What's up? Like, no, dude, you did. You did? You did. I was like, dude, you man, you slid into my DMs and you complimented me on my content. It's really funny because

that was like right around the time when people were starting to do that. You were like, I think you're the first one. Yeah. You're my first slider of DMs. Well, I think a lot of us have started to learn, especially the people that are newer to the, I guess to the influencer Instagram game, especially. Everyone else is probably that's been doing it has seen it come and go. But, you know, Getting comments on Instagram might be the equivalent of finding a needle in a haystack. It is very difficult to actually get people to comment. And other influencers, I think, understand that. And I don't know.

I just try to shout out to people. Hey, good shit right there, bro. No, bro. I definitely appreciate it because you're right, especially now. It's like I feel like it's one of those things I think I was talking to the other day. I'm like, fuck, man. Am I shadow band? What's going on?

This content is better. Like, why the fuck isn't it performing? And, you know, it just is what? it is. And so I appreciated it. And you know, guys that are listening and girls that we started communicating back and forth. And what I realize is like we had way more in common than I actually realized. And we were kind we, we have that same edgy energy. We got a same sense of humor in so many ways. And if you watch his stuff and then you kind of take a peek at my stuff, you could see how we would be connected. But man, I'm just super

happy we finally got this fucking done, dude. Yeah, man. I'm happy to be here, brother. Happy to be here, man. Funny story for everybody listening. You know, John and I both have a very considerable following on Instagram. And he all of a sudden has blown up on TikTok. So this motherfucker asks me to do a live with him on

TikTok. It was the most embarrassing thing I've ever gone through in my life. Like, honestly, like, dude, you motherfucker. Like, literally, we're sitting there. And by the way, Like, I wish this was recorded or being able to be accessed somewhere in the, in the interwebs because he's literally sitting on this fucking TikTok live. Like, where's my guest? He's supposed to be here.

I'm like, mother's fucker. Like, I couldn't go live. Apparently on TikTok, it's like you have to have a thousand followers on TikTok to go live or even to be a guest on someone's live. So I'm sitting here and everybody, I'm watching this whole shitstorm, you know, just surround him. and everybody's like, hey, try this, try that. And he couldn't keep up with the comments. But, man, it was so funny. Like, I'm humble enough to say, like, I suck on TikTok.

I got to figure that shit out. And I will. I've got some things. Don't you worry, ladies and gentlemen, I have some things in the works. And we're going to figure that thing out shortly. But there's a little funny story about me and John. And, man, it was fun to watch you squirm, dude. Yeah, yeah.

Well, I ran out of shit to talk about because it got up to, like, I don't know, like 90 live viewers or some shit. And that's a lot for a TikTok live. And, you know, I only had, I think, a 5,000 or so followers at the time. And 90 are sitting there watching. I'm like, dude, what the hell, bro? So I'd like... When it comes to what your family eats and drinks, you know your choices matter. You're the expert because you know what fits your life.

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Learn more at finra.org. slash trade smart. Is there reading a book? Oh, here's how I started off as they were waiting for my friend Sean to come in. Yeah, it's, I guess it's better guys that he said, I just, I don't know where he's at than to say like, well, the fucking loser doesn't have a thousand followers. Well, dude, honestly, I did figure it out at one point that that was the issue and I didn't want to freaking say it out loud on the damn thing. So, but you said it on the podcast. It's all good.

I'm sitting there on the comments section. Like, bro, take this the fucking Instagram where I'm relevant. like this but whatever but no dude like again this has been something that you and i have been tossing around for quite some time right man um you know about coming on the show and uh we we never made it happen until you know i finally called you out the other day i'm like hey bro like are we gonna fucking do this are we gonna do this and so when you said like hey let's let's let's do this i you know i cleared out i got to be honest i cleared out my schedule because i want to make sure that you and i could get on here and have this amazing conversation and one of the things i was thinking

about is like where in his fucking castle is he going to be you you have so many fucking amazing backdrops like i just want to kick you right in your nuts real too it's not a it's not a it's not a green room this is yeah no like like my favorite i think my favorite's the fountain yeah that fountain bro i got that fountain i had uh if you've ever been to for your your listeners if you've ever been to like a nice office lobby where like in the backdrop behind the secretary of receptionist they have like the waterfall with the mirror behind it with the company is like logo when I was living at the Trump Tower when I turned 40 years old and in downtown Chicago. And, you know, a lot of 40-year-olds will have some type of midlife crisis like buy a

Corvette or, you know, whatever. My midlife crisis was, you know what, I'm getting a freaking custom fountain made that you're getting an office buildings. Call around and everyone's like, you want to figure a house? What? And they literally had to weld it together in my condo at the, the Trump and it turned out amazing. But eventually ended up renting that place out and moving out to a big house out here in the

suburbs. And moving that thing was very, very difficult. We had about a half inch to work with by fitting through the doorway. And because it was molded together. And yeah, so anyway, it was. Yeah, because I know at one point you, you know, I didn't know you rented out the residents at the Trump towers. But like, I knew that you moved to the suburbs.

when your kids got to a certain age, you moved out there. Yeah. Well, here's the thing, though. I rented it out. Actually, if anybody's into private equity, a big firm out in Chicago, it's called Jackson, Dearborn. And, excuse me, Jackson, Dearborn, Madison, Dearborn. And one of the original founders there was renting my place from me at the Trump. And he was in between houses. He's built some big place down by you, I think, Sean, and a little bit further down in Naples.

And he goes, I'll take it rented because we're putting all our shit in storage or getting new shit. And I go, okay, perfect. She's taking it furnished. I don't need to do anything. He comes and looks at it. Well, wait a minute. The waterfall can't say it. Stay.

It has your damn name on it. You got to get that out here. I'm like, motherfucker, please. Can I take it out through a big screen TV? That waterfall is very difficult to move, my friend. Not the easy thing to move, huh?

Yeah, exactly. So you hire someone to do it, right? You didn't do it. Dude, yeah, I hired movers to do it. And then they couldn't do it. So I paid, I had to pay these guys an extra like $600 bucks under the table to not tell their boss that I'm helping them,

that they're going to move the thing because they didn't have the right insurance for it or whatever. And literally, I was right there with them moving that. Jesus. Anyway, man, that's a mid-life. Someone with your background, you know, you know, bribing people with extra dollars, you know, to do something they don't have fucking insurance for. God dang, that's hilarious. Exactly.

Call the teamsters. It's like the people that tried to jump on your roof. Yeah. Well, dude, that was not a good move by there. Jesus. I will expose you. You do a legal shit around me. I will expose you.

I'm just kidding. I'll be, I'll be general about it. it. I won't be a snitch. I'll just make it. Exactly. I'll make it. I'm going to hang out. He's too scared. He's too scared. I'm going to bring down his street cred. I'm too crazy. Yeah. If you don't know how I responded to something you offered me, I just just watch my TikTok and you'll see it. You won't be named, but you might. You know who you are, motherfucker. Yeah. You know it's you. You know it's you. Actually, someone's watching that. I'm like, dude, he's talking about us.

Dude, seriously. We're fucking famous. Well, it's amazing. And for your audience, okay, so I did a TikTok on, contractors come into your house and telling you they want to look at your damn roof and repair it. And, you know, I'm like, okay, well, whatever they say. They try to tell you there's hail damage. That's a big thing in the Midwest. There's hail damage. And then they freaking find hail damage and give you a free roof and bill your insurance company for it.

First of all, that's usually not hail damage. They're doing it to get the free thing, but you're not going to go up there with them during the endemic inspection. Well, and then they start talking about waiving your deductible. Dude, you're a contractor. You can't waive my deductible. It's between me and the insurance company, bro. Right. So it starts this whole damn conversation on TikTok and Instagram, actually, about if that's insurance fraud or not.

And it's funny watching people come out of the woodwork. The good contractors are like, yep, this shit happens all the time. These scumbags, I lose business to them. But then you got the consumers that are like, well, what's the problem here, bro? Sounds like, why you snitch in? Or so a lot of people just disagree that it's not illegal in the first place. So anyway. And that is how you go viral.

have people arguing in your comments, my friend. Dude, seriously, I got to piss some people off, man. Yeah, seriously. You got to get a page out of your book. It's common. It's common. All right. Dude, so listen, man,

the one of the things that, you know, I love about your background is, you know, we have a similar, you know, Division I experience in, you know, college athletics. For those of you don't know, John played football at Notre Dame. Actually, got to play for Lou Holtz.

That's pretty fucking amazing. And then he went on and played at Northwest. Western. Yep. So I love that part about you because, you know, it's just like, all right, the upbringing, the, you know, the everyday life was probably the same. Right. A lot of, hey, what looks good, what is perfect. How do we get better? But the thing is most impressive is what you, what you did in your career. You were with a big box insurance company and you decided, hey, fuck it. I'm going to start my own shit. And you laid quiet for a while because, you know, you didn't want to be on the radar. But then finally he said, fuck it. You know, I'm going to go after. I'm going to go big. And you, I think in your words, you just, you know, lived your truth. And, you know, tell everybody else's story. Once that happened, like, where did that take your life from there?

Yeah. So out of college, once I realized there wasn't going to be playing professional football due to an injury, not because of due to a lack of talent, by the way. I've seen highlights, man. I'm not. I'm not good at least. Yeah. I went into the insurance world and, you know, it was pretty cool because I'm glad I fell into that space.

I went into that space because of the potential of money. I could see that, that, you know, you eat what you kill. You could rise up relatively quickly, recognize that with, you know, in my job interviews and decided to go that direction. Well, after a few years in the industry, I stopped looking around, man, and I'm like, you know, gosh, I'm at with this insurance. giant right now. And it was my second job in the industry. And I'm like, dude, this, these guys are supposed to be the creme de la creme of this insurance industry. And everybody's looking to them. Like, they're the, you know, the gold standard. And I'm a 26 year old kid right here. And dude, I'm not even delegating shit to the 40 and 50 year olds that are supposed to be my account management

team or customer service because I don't think they're going to do as good of a job as me. They're not going to send an email and be all over this damn thing following up two hours later to make sure, hey, is this getting done right? And I remember visiting their underwriters offices one day. And I was like shocked scratching my head. They're, we're sitting there waiting for proposals back from the underwriting team. And they're freaking having a birthday party for Susie or some shit. And, you know, every birthday, Susie. Yeah.

And, you know, everyone's leaving at 455 p.m. and that's just the way the world works so it was kind of an epiphany to me okay that you know maybe it's lessons I learned playing football or maybe it's just maybe I was good at football because I already had this in me you know the chicken or the egg

right exactly you know but but but but it forced me to the clients I was bringing in I'm supposed to delegate this account management team to no man I didn't want to the hardest part was getting the client the easiest part was keeping them

So I've already demonstrated I could bring in the clients. And I'm not even trusting the people that are supposed to keep them. So I'm doing that myself too for the most part. It don't matter that that company I worked at had 20,000 employees. 19,999 of them weren't doing shit on the damn account. So guess what? Why don't I just go do this shit from my freaking kitchen table? Go after the same damn types of business.

Usually when people do this, it's because they couldn't make it at a firm like that. and they're going to try to go downstream and start calling smaller types of clients, maybe like the beauty salons or the restaurants with like 12 employees. Fuck that noise, bro. I'm going to go after the 200, 300, 400, 500 plus clients just like my former employer was, just like all the big boys were, the ones that are worth 90 grand a year residual that you'll never freaking lose if you do your job. Well, what's your job?

Responding to motherfucking emails thoroughly and timely. You fucking asshole. They fucking emailed you at 3 p.m. Friday and you didn't even say, you didn't even reply at all until 2 p.m. Monday to tell them you need a day or two. What's wrong with you, brother? It's almost six figures, one client, man, respond to the email. Thank you. Thank you. And what I learned was it wasn't necessarily just the people. It's the environment that corporate America was what I call bringing you up in or raising you in. Okay. Corporate America, you know, yeah, that client's worth 90 grand. But, but, but. But, you know, Jennifer, the account manager or, or, you know, marry the client service rep or Jeff, the account executive, they weren't making $90 grand on that account. They had a $3 million block of business. And each of them were probably averaging $80,000 or $90,000 salary. Yeah, I'm a big shot producer.

I'm making $140. Big, you know, there was a lot of money back then. It still is now. Don't get me wrong. But, but, you know, wait a minute. Wait a minute. what if I bring in a million dollar block on my own and do this shit from my house? How's that math going to work?

Well, it'll never happen. They're never going to come with you, John. Well, why wouldn't they come with me? Now, you need this big time name on your business car. They're not even going to take the meeting. Let's find out, brother. Let's find out. So it was a grind of that first year.

But, you know, you get a couple clients under your belt. You demonstrate that you're able to follow up properly. You are going to do things thoroughly. And that's what I would tell clients, hey, guys. I could go get a job at the big dogs that you're with right now. I already had one. Okay. But the environment of me working there is going to make me spread myself thin.

You're going to get the same exact service with my attention. And here's why, because I'm making all this money on your account, not the corporation that has nothing to do with your actual service. And it worked out for me. It's sure the hell did, man. What was the result long term? Yeah. So, um, I don't know the answer, but. Yeah, yeah. So I built this company up and I just wanted to replace my income the first couple of years that I was making.

I blew through that and then I was up into the seven digits by the third year. And it just kept going up from there. Ultimately, nine and a half years later, sold my company to a private equity firm, which is a whole other conversation, by the way. You know, it's not just the additional money you're making along the way. It's the equity you're building. And I have something to sell at the end of this damn thing, too. Of course. Yeah. And if, you know, I'm private equity entering the insurance space really kind of made me and others in similar situations offers that were difficult to refuse because, as you probably

could realize, they have a lot of money to throw around. They sure as hell do, man. You know, what they want is what they want, right? And they see value and they see what, you know, where they can make money. And, you know, your company was, was one of those things. So it's a great story, right? and I love hearing it. And I think that, you know, what you get better at every single day and every single week is the ability to tell your story a little bit better.

Yeah. Hey, thanks, man. Yeah. We had the conversation like last week. I'm like, fuck, man, you can tell it. You can tell a story, bro. Thank you. Well, that's why it's kind of funny that we, uh, you know, you were giving me a hard time about how long it took to get on this podcast together.

It's kind of better that we're doing it now instead of six months ago. I feel like I, uh, could focus on the points that people actually give a shit about. Yeah, no, absolutely, man. like, you know, it would have been a great show then. I mean, hell, if we waited another year to be a fucking phenomenal show. Exactly. It's still, it's still great now. I mean, like, I mean, this is, like I said, I wasn't bullshit.

And like people have been asking for this collaboration for ever since you and I have been connected and we've been engaging on each other's platforms. It's just like, I feel like my people go follow you and your people come to my page and follow me. And it's just like, I've made some great friends that are, you know, from your platform. Awesome. And from your page. So it's just really, really nice, man.

And, you know, I really love that, you know, what's really cool about you. And this is something that you have like this, you know, you give this, you know, athletes mentality to where, you know, you know, quite honestly, guys, like, you know, John didn't have to work another fucking name his life. I mean, it's, it's a fact. It is what it is, right? It's not, it's not private information. You can just tell by, you know, the shit that you see on, on, you know, and the shit things

that he talks about. Like, that's the case. But so what does he do? He retires after he sells his company for loads of money. But then now you unretire and you started Glink, Glenn Crest, you know, global. Yeah. I could. It was getting tongue-tied.

I was going to like a phone service. I think it's commendable, man. So what's your experience been with that so far? Yeah. So what happened was once I sold my company, talk about a shitty five years, bro. And I probably shouldn't say that because the company that bought mine, I do owe a lot too. Well, I mean, somebody else would have bought me if they didn't, I guess.

But part of our deal was that I had to work there for five years. And it wasn't shitty because of the company that bought mine. It was going full circle. You realize the pitfalls of corporate America. Now you get bought. You sell out to corporate America, even though it was backed by private equity. It was still corporate America. And now you have to work in this environment where for five years.

And now it's Susie's fucking birthday again. Oh, my God. Dude. Yeah. So I had to relearn what I had already learned and unlearned once on purpose. And, you know, anyway. But, you know, you get to the tail end of that. And all right, man, shit, I sold that company in 2015. You'd think I'm freaking going to the Bahamas for a month after that sell. Dude, I grew up middle class. You kidding me? This is crazy. Yeah. I'm going to mid from this. But no time to do that because the way the private equity world works, you come over to that new place. Don't get me wrong. I had some fun. a little bit vacation, but it wasn't like a two-month thing. There was incentives in place during that five-year period to even make more money. Oh, shit. These guys know what they're doing. You're not just going to sell your company and say, hey, fuck yourself, have a nice day.

No, they're going to make sure you are. Keep feeding the machine. Keep feeding it. Let's go. And they projected that shit. They knew your projections. And what would it be, you know, annual residual, you know, and renewal. It's like every single year.

Yeah. If they had Johnny Boy crank and shit. shit out for him for another five years well and it wasn't just the salary either they had they had a way for like they program i don't want to say the specifics of it but but let's put it this way somewhere around that two or three year mark they we were going to re re look at your revenue and compare it to the revenue of when they purchased you two or three years prior and whatever that difference is assuming it's more they were then as part of your purchase later we're going to now pay you a multiple of that delta.

So let's say you went up five bucks in revenue per year from year three to year one. They might say, okay, we're going to give you two and a half times that five bucks on top of all the money we just paid you. So you talk about a company that knew the formula to motivate a guy like me that you just paid all this shitload of money to. They know the salary ain't going to cut it. There you go. Now somewhere after that year three, I still had to stay there until year five. And that that two-year period became a little bit a little touchy, I guess you could say. But yeah.

So anyway, I got out of that. This is the end now of 2019. Finish it. Now I get to go to the Bahamas, brother. Now I'm going to retire. Now I'm going to do all this shit. And, you know, I'm a few months into this crap. and I'm throwing a little bit of money around in L.A. as like an angel investor.

And I always kind of had an affinity towards doing that. I invested in Chicago and a couple like restaurant groups and some other things. And just had like my eye on unique things to be involved. And I was involved in Broadway musical once, believe it or not. But I started getting a name for myself relatively quickly in L.A. by people that, you know, first of all, they knew I wasn't full of shit, like a lot of people in LA that claim they have money are actually just full of shit. And also I didn't act like an L.A. person.

I acted like a freaking Chicago person, which, you know, I didn't really realize it at the time. There was not an act involved with this, but there is a difference in how people go about things. You know, you actually doing what you say you're going to do and actually only, you know, actually being able to back up what you're doing, whether your intent was there or not. So I got my name out there pretty quickly as an angel investor. and I decided, you know what, dude, the term angel has a connotation to it. There's not like an exact definition, but there is a connotation to it that you're only writing, you know, relatively small checks and, you know, like 10 grand or 25 grand checks.

And the checks I was writing were much larger than that. So what I decided to do is say, you know what, by saying I'm retired and shit, I kind of sound like an asshole anyways. Everyone's, oh, how old are you? And then that becomes the, you know, the whole conversation. Sure. Fun for a minute, but let's move on from that. I actually met Zach Afron once, and we were in a group. We were all out together, and I told him, he asked me what I did, and I said,

retired. And then that's all we talked about for the next hour. Like, it dominates the conversation. Right, sure. You know, how much of a shit? You know, how much other shit I would have liked to talk to Zach Afron about then, you know, I'm retired. But anyway, you know, so I've decided to say, you know,

let's let's um i guess rebrand what i'm already doing and really formalize the approach and with that i started an LLC called glencrest global um which is the equivalent of say like a family office where it's not a fund where we're bringing in all our outsiders money it's my own capital um and we evaluate usually early stage startup opportunities where I have a 16 person team of advisors that help out and I try to get into stuff

that not only could I infuse capital but help them with my experience there's a lot of entrepreneurs out there that you know haven't run a business their first time entrepreneurs there's going to be things within my network or just my actual business expertise that I could help them with

so that that's really the focus Now, I'm also in some other cool shit beyond that. I try to just get in stuff that, you know, insurance was lucrative for me, bro, but it wasn't the most exciting dinner conversation. So, yeah, an investment group that's buying the damn Newport Beach Marriott, you know, surfaces and somebody just fell out and they need someone to fill it. And I met these guys some other shit that a bunch of billionaires were at. I'm not a billionaire, but I'm around these guys now.

With a B? A billionaire with a B. Yeah, that's my pet peeve, by the way. Someone said on my podcast the other day, I almost jumped through the phone. But anyway, you know, so it's not like Glenn Crest Global is solely early stage venture capital. We are in some other cool stuff like a hotel deal. Yeah. You know, it's funny you say that because like if you haven't been an entrepreneur before, right,

there's so much shit that you don't know that you're going to deal with. Right. I mean, I can take, you know, for me, I've always been very successful in corporate sales. It's very, it's just what I've always done. I know the lay of the land. All I got to do is figure out the sales process for this new company. You know, what the, I hate saying this. It bothers the shit out of me, but I'm going to say it.

But then I'm going to follow it up with something. The features and fucking benefits, right? Like the whole features and benefits selling method. Like, there's a fucking better way to say this, right? Well, hey, here's this. This thing is nice and shiny. What that means to you is like, just fucking stop. Like, let's have a good conversation about this.

And let's let's see how we can bring, you know, the solutions to the customer in more of a conversational manner. But so for me, it was always very easy to define my lip, my, find my sea legs. Yeah. In corporate America. I'm going to tell you one of my biggest challenges. And we've had actual conversations about this, you know, just me and you're talking on the phone is like, dude, like being an entrepreneur, especially in the online space is very, very difficult. There's a world out there that, that motherfuckers. like me and you are just learning.

Like I learned more shit yesterday. I'm like, what the fuck? Like, and we'll talk about it offline. But it's just like, wait, that's, that's a thing? Yep. Like, what in the hell is going on? Right. And, you know, I guess there's probably a bunch of people that will be listening

this episode like, dude, fucking, you know, elaborate. No, I'm not going to. Not on that one. No, not on this because, you know, like, because it's, because it's an opportunity for somebody like myself and even you to, you know, expand our offerings and in things that we're doing in the online space. So, but it's just, it's really nuts because unless you have somebody there and I have an amazing mentor in this business, actually the best mentor, Paul Gitter. He's the best in the business. And as far as the online marketing and just

kind of building brands and, you know, his network, it's incredible. And I tell you what, I learned things from him that are almost shocking to me. Okay. None of them are bad. Like, they're not like bad or like, you know, they're, they're just like, oh my God. Yeah. Yeah. The light bulb goes out.

But if you don't have people around you in your, in, on your team and in your orbit that can help you through shit. Yeah. Maybe not very, very difficult because you're just, you're just left there, you know, freaking slamming your head up against a fucking wall. Well, you said something really interesting in there, too. Like to compare and contrast, just the mindset, okay, it's, you know, you talk to the benefit and features and the business to business sales process and how you'd rather have a conversation. And I think you were taking this a little bit different direction than I'm about to, but, but compare that to the entrepreneurial world, okay? Like what you learned, what you're just talking about with this whole digital marketing thing, you know, this is new to you. This is fresh to you.

You're excited about it. And at some point that sales rep in that business to business environment, you know, everything was new and fresh to him too. You know what I mean? And over time, okay, you know, as salespeople, we like to be the smartest person in the room, all eyes on me. But if you're not in something that's complex enough where you could do things like what you just described Sean, where you could say, hey, let's have a conversation. There's going to be moving pieces here. Let's find you a solution. If you don't have that to motivate you in that B2B environment,

you're going to outgrow that job. It's going to become mundane. And you're going to feel like you're just reading the damn PowerPoint presentation. Every buyer is asking the same damn questions. There's very little you could do from a pivoting perspective. They ask one question that's like that buzz question. And right away, okay, I know we're not getting that. because we don't have a good solution to that.

They just identified that's important because we don't integrate with XYZ software or whatever the hell the case may be. Sure. But guess what? You got to finish this 40 minute freaking presentation. And it's like a freaking knife in your damn ribs like grinding with each slide. You hoping they don't ask any more questions because you know they're not going to get an account. Like that's what I call the worst.

Like you don't want to be. If that describes your everyday job. job, dude. You have one life to live, man. You're only here once. Like, this is what you want to spend your time doing. I don't give a shit if you make 300 grand. Like, like, you know what I mean? That is a lot of money. Like, you can't be, um, torturing yourself, you know? No. No. And that's the thing, man. It's like, you know, I've always been, you know, able to, and I'm humbled by this. I've always been able to take that process and identifying if I do it like this, ultimately long term, I'm going to burnout and I'm going to hate this.

I got to make this mind. So I use my entrepreneurial spirit within whatever, you know, whatever I'm selling, right, in my corporate life. And because, I mean, I don't even think most people know that I actually have a nine to five corporate job. You do, you know, but not many people do. And, you know, I think I need to talk about that more because you can do it all. You can have, you know, separate successful things, right?

As long as you're not to budget your fucking time. Right. And, but like, so what I've learned is to be able to. switch the narrative a little bit in my day-to-day environment. So I handle conversations how I want to handle them. Now, do I talk about all the different points? Absolutely, but it's done in my way. Yeah.

And it's, you know, to a point of we're going off on a tangent, but, you know, when you talk, talking about it's nice to have, you know, 16 advisors around you to help you. And then also to help your potential, you know, clients or customers, whoever you guys are dealing with to walk them through the process. You might have somebody, you know, trying to sell something for the very first time. Right. I like, yep, that's, that's exactly right. And, you know, you just talked about something there where you have your corporate job and then

you could still have that entrepreneurial spirit and do something else beyond that, which, obviously you're a great example of. I just think about in corporate America, and I'm not talking about you at this point, Sean, just in general, though, how you get like almost like haters. I remember a job that I had before I went on my own. And somebody kept overhearing me on the phone dealing with some rental property. I was like 24 years old. Like six rental properties was before the damn freaking recession.

And everyone was buying rental properties. And the hate that was, you know, bred from that is just incredible. And people are like using it against you. And I remember one of my managers had a owned horse that the Arlington Park Racetrack was near where we live. It's like it's owned by Churchill Downs and horse racing there. and even part of a horse. And, you know, he would always make the damn comparison. Like, yeah, you know, yeah, it's not, it's not going to make me money.

It's not an investment. It's for fun. Like a lot of people golf, I like to go watch my horse race and blah, blah, blah. You know, your hobbies golfing or going to the concert club. I like to go do it horse racing. Okay. Well, I like to do my freaking fair time, neither. My fair time, I like to build businesses and motherfucking dominate, dude.

So why the fuck would you have a problem with me when you don't have a problem? problem with people fucking golfing all the time. What the hell is wrong with you? And, um, and, and, and, and it's just simply because my hobby makes money and your hobby costs money. And that's a fucking problem for people. And the sales organization is the last place. That should be a problem. You know, it's funny. You say that because like, you would think like, okay, wait a second. Like, if I'm a, if I'm a leader in the corporate setting and I have somebody on my team that is out they're doing other shit still producing, right? Still hitting his or her number every single year, overproducing.

Yep. And they're doing this other thing, you know, to, to, you know, build that entrepreneurial muscle that's actually going to help them in their career here. Like, for me, like, like, it would benefit me to have, you know, 12 people on my team that I'm leading that are just absolute dogs after hours. Like, all right, so wait a second, you mean to tell me you're working all day and then you are coming home, you're being with your family. And then from like the time that your kids are going to bed, like you and your wife are in the trenches building your business till what time? Like midnight.

What time do you wake up for? What the fuck? Like, yeah, bro, that's what it takes. Like to, but it is, I mean, we can go down that road because it is taboo. Yep. Yeah. It is taboo. And in the far as the haters go.

like, get in fucking line because they are fucking, hey, you're thick as thieves, bro. Anytime I put something out, there's, there's, you know, Susie in the corner there, you know, just chatting away. So it's, it's interesting you said that because as in a sales environment, that should be the last concern. What should be a concern is the motherfucker sitting at home, never hitting their number and stealing money. Yeah, yeah.

And I'll tell you what, man, it's funny too, because I, I remember, so while I worked for other people, I would always have these side hustles going on. Once I left and started on my own, I still kind of had that mindset of side hustles in addition to the core money I bring in. And I would still do littler side hustles, like rental properties and that shit. But as far as other businesses concerned, you know, they were for the most part side hustles because they're side hustles. Once I was on my own, I was just able to generate, okay, it's. It's 9.50 at night. If I worked for ABC company, maybe there's nothing to do.

But you know what? Now that it's my own company, there is something to do at 9.50 at night. And that was really a paradigm shift for me. That was a big. I generate everything to build in that company, man. Everything. All my thoughts. And it's just like, you ever have like, um, uh, shit?

Like, um, like a little kid that has too much sugar. I dated this girl once. another two year old and and if you gave him like too many pixie sticks he'd like start shaking because it's fucking cocaine he didn't he didn't know what to do with his energy he didn't know what to do with his energy you're serious he literally shake he literally would shake and it was kind of like funny we're like oh shit we'll give him a lollipop and you know and it was not like we weren't overfeeding the good sugar and we have like two bites that's how we reacted to and watch this motherfucker shake i was like we make a tic talk about i'm just kidding uh i'm not going to

say her name, but if she's listening, I'm sorry. We're not saying. You're sorry. I'm sorry. I hope her name's not Susie. Happy birthday. I thought it was funny. That's not, uh, yeah,

but anyway, my whole point is like, like compare that to when you're working for somebody else, all right? Like, you can't make calls in the middle of the night sometimes. You know, there's nothing to do,

but your mind is still going. Your mind's still wanting to build, build. There might be nothing you could do at this. You can't just sit there practicing your damn power presentation or rechecking the freaking pamphlet pamphlet for errors or or again memorizing everyone's name and checking their LinkedIn for background. At some point, it caps out. Okay. When you're an entrepreneur and you have your own company, it never caps out. There's always something.

All right. So working for someone else, that's great. But like, there shouldn't be that problem. you need to fulfill that entrepreneurial spirit and you still with with something else. And it could be it could be buying and reselling football cards online. It could be, you know, my daughter now is doing something where she's found this way to buy shoes and resell them for 40 bucks more. I don't really understand that. I'm just hoping it's not illegal, but it's right. You know, it's not.

I'm just kidding. Nice college job. You know, it's just one of those damn things, man. And anyhow, that that's a. kind of, I never really said this out loud before, but that right there was a big shift for me in mindset. What I just described, and it was probably over about a two-year period where I had to like realize it was happening, which was kind of cool to talk about.

You know, it's really cool because like I can, I can relate, right? So although I'm doing two different things right now, I'm, you know, doing my, my, in my business at night. And then, you know, when it's time to shut down, kids or go to bed, you know, I do a little bit to work and I do everything that I need to with me and my wife will do whatever we need to do. She's my business partner and she handles all the back end stuff, the things that I suck at. And then I close my computer. Yep.

And then I'm like, fuck. I forgot this. Like we have to do this. And it's just like, okay, this is something that I can do on my own if you want to watch a show or if you want to go to sleep. Yeah. Cool. Do you. But I really need to do this for tomorrow.

And it could be content, right? Because that's the other thing. It's like, you know, like, I'm cool. If, like, I don't have something on a Saturday or Sunday to put out. Like, I don't, like, whatever. Fuck it. But it can't be Monday through Friday. You know, like, I have to put something out.

Typically, Monday through Saturday. Like, I need something out there. So if I don't have anything or if I'm kind of running out of shit or if I feel like, hey, this isn't going to perform. I need to do something different. You know, which right now is like the fucking Da Vinci Code. You can't figure out what's going to perform and what's not. But, but, you know, that's the thing.

It's just like your mind, never shut up. off. I'm the fucking kid with the pixie sticks. Yep. You know, it's a thing, man. But like, listen, dude. I'm going to tell you what, man. So if you, if probably some of your audience that's in sales or the entrepreneur mindset is, uh, anyone that ever has trouble sleeping because everything you're just

describing me, describing right now is like anxiety where I, I, I would wake up. When I'm in the thick of things, I can't sleep. So my recommendation, if anyone else has this problem where they're going to bed at 10 o'clock and waking up at 2 in the morning, wide awake and run. and run gentleman right in your computer that's not healthy to do you got to sleep um unisom you n i s o m it's over the counter it has i've heard about that i bought my wife some of that you wake up dude you're not garagi when you wake up it's uh so anyway no it's good i you know like this thing like it is it is one of those things where you just

sometimes your mind doesn't shut off and it's crazy for me because like no matter what's going on in my life i'd be going through the worst part of my life like it could be fucking raining fire. And when I go to sleep, I sleep all the way through the night. Yep. Yep. You know, let's go to get up and go to the bathroom, but I don't have the wake up at 2 o'clock anymore.

And I used to have that when I was at my, my, um, HR company sales position because it was very transactional. It was like all the time. Like, oh my God, do I got docs on this? I'm supposed to run in two days. It's going to wake up and like, fucking payroll is supposed to run. I don't have a shit. If they don't run a payroll this week, then it's going to the next month.

I can't tell my boss that. So I got to get it to run. Right. So like all that kind of shit. shit, right? Yeah, would bother me. But fuck all that. So listen, you have a new book coming out called a 2000

percent raise. Yeah. Yes, sir. Fucking tell these people about that, man. 2,000% raise, 2,000% 0.00% spelled out raise.com, if anybody wants to get on our mailing list. It is

also the name of the podcast that started in a couple weeks as well. And it's really for our It's talking about, you know, sitting around waiting for your boss in corporate America to give you that raise and, oh, hopefully it's at least a cost of living. Hopefully it's more than cost of living, although with inflation right now, maybe a cost of living increase would be a higher end. But, you know, screw that. Give yourself a 2,000% raise by putting yourself on top of the org chart.

Build equity in yourself instead of building it for somebody else. and it's really an examination of the realities and really the pitfalls of corporate America combined with evaluating yourself to figure out if you could cut it on your own. And it goes through a self-analysis. And not every good salesperson should own a business. Not every employee that's on the fast track, you know, to should stay in corporate America. I used myself as a guide. You know, I was 27 years old.

I had an office. I had an assistant. And this was an insurance giant in, you know, publicly traded company. I was on that fast track, man. For sure, I was going to be in management, mid-tier management in the next few years. And probably upper management have kept going the right track. And it's a very well-known company that's based in Chicago that people look to. And, you know, I almost gave my parents both heart attacks when I said, Aaron, told them I'm quitting that job.

Wait, you're leaving there? Are you kidding me? Sharon's husband has worked there for years, and he's rigging, look at how much money they have and all this stuff. And it's, you know, it was a difficult decision. But I had an epiphany, Sean, that I don't think a lot of people have. and I saw a path that is just not visible to many. So I talk about what I call the macro brainwash and the micro brainwash in the book. And the macro brainwash is society.

It's our conditioning in society, you know, to think that it's kind of like in the 1950s. Oh, homeownership's the right way. Okay, well, have kids or get married and have kids. do it in that order, you know, things of that nature. And, you know, here we are in 2022. And if somebody came out and said that, what I just said, you know, many would consider it offensive. You know, you got shows like modern family on TV that, you know, quite frankly, are high in viewership because people relate to that. It's okay.

So there's been a paradigm shift over the last 70 years in mindset. There's been an evolution, okay? there has not been the same kind of evolution on how we view work life. All right. Start your career. Climb up that corporate ladder. That is good. Entrepreneurship and risk is bad.

Okay. And that's what I call the macro brainwash. The micro brainwash is what's happening within the organization you're actually working at. All right. And it happens to all of us. You know, oh, man, I'm just. just assistant vice president right now. Shit, I want to get Todd's job eventually.

I'm going to report to Todd and kiss his ass harder than other people kiss their ass and laugh harder at his jokes because in six years, I want to be vice president one day. And things like job title and making you incented because of that. Oh, wow. Dude, that's Joe. He's a freaking vice president at Merrill Lynch. Oh, shit. He's the vice president of Merrill Lynch.

Holy shit. He must be a freaking billionaire, right? No, I actually know he's a vice president like a thousand other people with that title at Merrill Lynch. Give me a fucking break. You know what I mean? And I'm not picking on Merrill Lynch. I love Merrill Lynch. Sure.

There's a lot of different titles. Dude. Thank you. Any bank, any sales organization, every bank, any sales organization, everyone's got these damn vice president titles, bro. Like, it doesn't make any damn sense. So this is, you know, and it's not just titles. It's what we all put emphasis on in that organization. We've been brainwashed to place value on things that really shouldn't matter.

One of the things for me was looking at the client deliverables. Hey, listen, when I was working for the Big Dog, look at these vendors, man. Holy shit, they want to take us to golf outings. Oh, my God. They're taking us to a Cubs game. One of them flew me out to Tennessee for some freaking shit. Dude, why? Because I worked at that company.

And oh, wow, they're going to look good to their boss that they got somebody from my company, from that company to come out. Look at us. What the F was this doing for the client? How was this being a deliverable to the client? Nothing's happening. Us drinking at a golf course all freaking day. You think we're freaking talking about analyzing how we could better serve our clients? Give me an effing break, dude.

Nothing's happening there. But we placed value on it. We felt more important because of it. Dude, isn't our job to enhance the deliverables for our client? That's our damn job. 1,000%. So this is all part of the micro brainwash. And it's things like this I really get into pretty heavily within the book.

And obviously, I use my background as a guide, but by no means is this supposed to be a biography on me? It's really to help people out there right now. I'm excited, man. When's it coming out? Because I need this shit. Yeah. Well, it's going to, it'll be right around the holidays. Probably a week or two before Thanksgiving.

It's already written. I just kind of have to press the button on Amazon to put it out there. But we're getting close. Gotcha. Yeah. Your boy's going to need a fucking sneak peek, bro. All right, man. Well, congrats on your book, by the way. Thank you.

Thank you. What did you think, man? I love it. I love it. I'm not a big reader. There's very few books that will actually sit down and read. Got through quite a bet of yours. Still referenced it.

It's sitting by my laptop. And yours is written in a way that I appreciate, man. You get to the point. It's not overly wordy and easy to follow. I don't know too many fucking words, Sean. I mean, that's the fucking point, right? Like, I'm not a super intelligent guy, right? I have some skills and I'm marginally smart.

But the thing with my book, and I appreciate that, I'm blessed that you read it and you liked it. I just, I wanted to write this first book and it was a very quick read. And I really just wanted to get something out there. just like, hey, like, we're all alike. We all have these things that we, that we've grown up with or, you know, things that we deal with on a day-to-day basis. It could be fucking limiting beliefs. What the fuck ever. But like, hey, the fucking work needs to get done.

And we have a choice. Are we going to fucking fall victim to our emotions and how we feel at that certain moment? Or are we going to push forward and we're going to do what we said we're going to do because it's part of our process. And it is the main ingredient for our success. And that's what I wanted to get out in this book. And I did not think that, and dude, this thing hasn't even, I mean, I'm going to be honest with you. I haven't even put ads on this thing yet. And every single day, I'm getting somebody message me about this book.

I'm getting somebody tagging me in this. We had somebody from the Middle East tagged me today, dude. I'm like, wow. Dude, this is fucking incredible. That's amazing. It wants to like, hey, man, I would love to work with you. Like, this is what I do. If you ever are in, you know, the market for somebody like me, it would, it would be.

like a dream for me to work for you. I'm like, good for you, man. How many words? How many words was your book? Just shy of 15 G's. 15,000. Okay. Yeah, mine's not too. Mine's like 23,000. So mine's not, not increasingly long either. I mean, and dude, and I got to be honest with you, the reason why it was so to the point is because I did videos. Yeah. I did videos and I type the shit out. Oh, really? Okay. I, you know, I mean, for me, it worked like that because I can sit there and I can

get on camera and get on video and and just go to town. Yeah. It's easier for me to get started, right? Yeah. And so once that happens, I'm just like at that point, I'm a court reporter. Right. I love it. I'm going on.

So, you know, the next one is going to be, I have some checkpoints and I've got an idea already about it. And I'm waiting for the right time to probably start writing. I'd say probably about six months. Yeah. And I'll shoot to get that thing done to completion within three weeks. Okay. Like I'm going to crank that. bitch out.

Awesome. You're doing speaking, Sean, or no? Yeah. Yeah. I actually have a conference this, not this weekend, but next weekend for a big network marketing fitness company. And they have a leader retreat in Destin, Florida. And I've been invited up there to, you know, in my family, they got this big old

mansion on the beach house. And we're going to, I'm going to do a two-day event there. Awesome. So we're pretty excited. Awesome. And then, yeah, man. So we're stacking up the speeching, the speech. you know engagements and yeah all that stuff so excited man what about yourself are

you any speaking you know I'm not so my I'm a little bit different you know thanks for pointing out earlier with me that I had you know that I don't really need to work so I'm not really I'm not um I guess not really monetizing things as much or looking looking down that pipeline as as as much as as people that you know other influences I guess in in social media but but I feel like speaking is is such a big thing to take on. I would love to do it from an ego standpoint, but gosh, you got to put so much time and effort into number one, getting the gigs, but number two, making sure you deliver on that damn thing. As you know, you're going to prepare the health for that thing.

And I just don't have any kind of follow up for the people at my events where, you know, if I was doing business coaching or anything really, then it would make a lot more sense for me. It would be engaging. But, you know, I guess if something came, I had actually the National Boy Scouts of America asked me to do something for their Eagle Scouts, which were a bunch of 19-year-olds. Yeah, make sure they're fucking adults because, like, you know who they're asking?

Yeah, well, I'm going to tell you what, though. I did it. And I spent a good, you know, a good week really preparing for it as a big deal. Is their jamboree thing or whatever? And, you know, it felt great. It felt great to do the damn. thing but but at the same time there's no like there's no takeaway for me i just don't know how much time i

could i could put in stuff um you know well i'm i'm actually um like i haven't said this to anybody so i guess i'm going to say it on the air um i am creating my own speaking conference like my own speaking events oh really okay yes yes awesome and i've got some people lined up already so um the cool thing is is um you know i'm going to make you speak out one of them so sorry i'll do that man i'll do that well we'll just We'll fly you down here and you'll have a little vacation in Naples, Florida. You'll fucking, there's worse things in life. Dude, you'll get people to go.

Yeah. Venue matters for that shit to get people to show up to that stuff. Venue matters. So I think you get, like, the fact that you're in Florida already is helpful. Yeah, I think there's a lot of places in Florida that I could do it at too. And then I'd even travel if it made sense. Like, we could do that. But man, listen, dude, we got to land the plane.

And I absolutely cannot wait for your book to come out. I can't wait to read it. I am already subscribed. I believe you'll have to confirm on your website. I believe I did it, but I told you I'm not very smart. So if it didn't go through, you got to shoot me a text and let me know. But listen, guys, if you got anything out of this episode today, which I would venture to say that you did,

I'm fairly positive. You learned something from my boy, John, and just that his story inspired you that you can do and be more in your life, that you just have to make a fucking decision and just double down on yourself. and it can happen at any point in your life, but you got to bet on you first. And the next thing you got to do is you got to take action because too many people have these great ideas

and they don't take action. And let me ask you question, what's the cost of inaction, right? So if you got anything out of the show, like I said, please share the show out. You know, share it to your stories, tag us on social media, all have his information in the show notes.

Tag us both. We'll both add it back to our socials. And we want to hear from you. I mean, like, straight up, like, I want to know what you got out of this episode. So with that being said, John, my homie, thanks again. Yeah, man. And it was a great pleasure.

Long overdue and I'm super jacked. We got to do it. But guys, until next time, take care and be safe. Awesome. Next up is a little song from CarMax about selling a car your way. You want to sell those wheels. You want to get a CarMax instant offer. So fast.

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