00:01 There's one thing when you're doing something entrepreneurially as a side hustle and another thing when you're trying to figure out how to keep the lights on and food on the table and all that fun stuff way. Hey, Hey, what's up everyone. Welcome to the rock, your brand podcast. I'm your host, Scott. Voelker a serial entrepreneur on a mission to help you. This show is designed to teach you to inspire you, to motivate you, to take massive action and build a future proof business. So whether you're just starting out or taking your existing business to the next level, this is your home. Now, if you're ready, I'm ready. Let's rock your brand. All right, guys. Welcome back to the rock, your brand podcast. This is episode eight 76 and today, well, I've got a special guest on the podcast. Someone I wanted to have come back on the podcast because, well, he's been on a couple of times, but the one time that we talked about how he fired his boss, well, how he left his job.

01:10 And it's been two years, almost two years since that's happened. And I wanted to get him back on because, uh, well, a lot's happened. Things have changed. Things have opened up for him in certain areas and kind of wanting to go through the ups and downs with mr. Kevin Sanderson. Also the brains behind brand accelerator live, which is, which is happening here very shortly. So Kevin, thanks, man. Thanks for coming back on the podcast. How things going, I'm honored and excited to be back. So, um, I must've done a good enough job the last time I was on the podcast to be invited back. So I'm excited to be here. Yeah, well, you know, I remember the Voxer that you sent me one morning. It was the morning. I believe of you telling me that it was going to happen, right? Like that you are going to be leaving your job.

01:57 You were going to basically let your boss know and, and all of that stuff. And I remember you telling me, like that was a huge moment for you, like a huge risk. Um, and we, uh, we actually went through that on episode. It was six or six 23. Um, and the title of that was how Kevin fired his boss after three years of starting his business. Um, so what I want to do though, is I don't want to go through all of that. Okay. Go through what it's been like since the day that you walked out of the office, what has it been? And let's go through kind of some of the ups, some of the downs, some of the things that you've learned along the way and the direction that you're moving now. So why don't you pick us up from that day? Okay. Yeah. So I remember that day, it was, um, I had Vox heard you to let you know, cause you know, you, and I've gotten to know each other pretty well. And just to give people a little bit of background, I, I started off Scott was my virtual mentor.

03:00 So Scott didn't know who Kevin was. Um, but you started off as my virtual mentor. And then, you know, as we got to know each other from, you know, going to conferences and then working on brand accelerator live together, you know, we got to know each other and become friends and you become my actual real in-person mentor too, which is cool. And so I wanted to make sure to let you know that day, how much of an impact you had for me to even get to there. So it wasn't an overnight process of, Oh, I listen to the podcast now I'm quitting my job the next day. It was no buildup to the point with my e-commerce brand that I could do that. And so, um, I still want to, you know, give you kudos and credit for that because you know, I, and now having been behind the scenes and a lot of things, I've gotten to see a lot of people come up to you and thank you and not just stuff that you even have, you know, put out there publicly, but you know, they just come to you privately and you know, Hey Scott, I just want to thank you because I left my job and have a seven figure business or whatever the case is because of the work that you've done.

04:01 So, um, I just want to give you kudos to that for all the stuff you've done along the way. And yeah. Yeah. So, you know, going back to that moment of leaving the job, it was like, okay, this is happening. And so it's kind of that surreal, you know, trying to figure things out. Um, it's like a lot of things you don't truly know what it's like to be in that arena until you're truly in it. Cause it's one thing when you're doing something entrepreneurially as a side hustle and another thing when you're trying to figure out how to keep the lights on and food on the table and all that fun stuff. Right. And you know, it's a, it's a lot of figuring things out along the way. And a lot of figuring out what are the right moves to make, because when you don't have a boss anymore, you have to figure out what are your next strategic moves? What are the next things you do moving forward? And you have to keep trying things and some things are going to get completely wrong and other things you're going to realize, okay, I didn't realize that was going to work out as well as it did whatever the case is. So,

05:12 Okay. So like when you get all done, you're, you're now on this path first off, I want to just back up to the moment of you left your job and you're sitting now in your office, your new office, your home office or your office that you were actually,

05:31 I think you were actually, um,

05:32 You worked out a deal with someone that you knew that had some, an extra space and you decided to just use that, but you're sitting there now, you're your own boss? What are you feeling at that moment? Because I want to go through that. It was probably a little bit of a high, but a little bit of a Holy crap. Um, but then from there then I want to go down the road of it actually like unfolding. And then let's talk about like that experience and kind of where you are now and what got you to where you are. Cause you're not on the same path you were even back then. Like there's things that are different and that's because of the path that you chose. And I always tell people like, as you start going down that path, you're not going to realize it right now because you're not there yet.

06:13 But when you get there, you're like, Oh wow, I could do this. And I probably should do this because this is now becoming clearer. Right. So give me the sense of like that day you're sitting there and you're like, all right, mr. Sanderson, I'm your new boss. Right? Like you can do whatever you want, you know? Cause I know some people, they just can't be their own boss cause they'll never get motivated. But how do you, like, what does that feel like for you? And like take me through that moment in your head. Yeah. So it was

06:43 Basically, it was one of those situations where, you know, it was now January, 2019. And so I knew based on, you know, holiday sales are just got, and my products are giftable. So I had an amazing holiday season and I knew I had X amount of money in the bank. And then plus assuming certain, you know, money coming in, that I could carry myself for awhile to have time to figure everything out. And you know, one of the things that worked well for me early on in the we'll say it more side hustle type career was, um, expanding from Amazon in the U S into Canada and then into Europe and trying other different marketplaces. And so going into a bunch of different countries and I was starting to notice people ask me a lot of questions about it. And I just thought that was just the next path of what people did.

07:32 Then I came to realize it was actually a little bit more unique. And a lot of people, they liked the idea of selling in another marketplace and another country, but it was kind of a little nerve wracking going into another country marketplace. So, um, it was then figuring out like, okay, how do I, what can I do to serve people and help people? But then at the same time too, that's also going to be, you know, reciprocally, if that's a word, um, also, you know, exactly it is now, so we'll put it in the dictionary. Um, but it is now something that, you know, could, uh, be a business opportunity for me, you know? Cause when you're a business owner, you have to think in terms of, yes, you want to serve people, but you also want to like, is it going down the path that eventually it could be something that the boomerang could come back and sometimes it's hard to know because truly when you're your own boss and especially when you're doing something that's not directly amazon.com, keywords, PPC launch get sales relatively quickly when you're doing other things.

08:40 And that's not just online business, that's just in general in life. We're kind of spoiled with Amazon a little bit. Yeah. It was that, you know, you're, you're having to try different things to see what you can do to get the boomerang, to come to you. So I think Kevin is, the boss was trying to figure out like, what are some of the things I could do that aren't going to be a total distraction and shiny object versus legitimate things I should do. And that's a balance I'm still trying to figure out to be honest. Yeah.

09:12 Yeah. So, okay. Let's, let's dig into a little bit of the struggle. Okay. Um, so let's, cause again, you know, me, Kevin, I'm not going to sugar coat things. I mean, you know, my journey has been an open book, um, and it's, it can, will continue to, like I had mentioned, you know, last year was a huge year for me. The event was a big one, right? The writing of the book and all that stuff. I had a lot of stuff going on, but it was actually one of my more stressful years, you know, and I had to take a step back and go, wait a minute here. You know what I mean? Like my health is worth something, you know what I mean? Like it's not all about just trying to do more and more and more and more. And it wasn't just for the money.

09:47 It was actually for the opportunities that are there. So let me ask you, and I want you to be like open and honest, like with triple cause. I want people to understand that this is also part of the journey, right? So what, what is a struggle that you were kind of first faced with? What would you say that you're like, Ooh, okay. I got to figure this out. You know what I mean? Like, was it sales dried up and now you got to figure out more ways to get sales on that business or was it like, okay, now I'm starting to see this other opportunity over here. I'm doing it, but now I'm starting to see that, eh, you know what I mean? Like, so, and I don't even know the answer to this, so this is going to be new to me. So I kind of want to know, like, what has been one of the bigger struggles for you that you've had to overcome and maybe you're still overcoming it. What is that thing? And then we can kind of dig into kind of where that led you next. Okay. Yeah. Great question. And so one of the,

10:38 The things was I started a service to help people expand into international marketplaces or basically I'm the project manager, essentially. It's kind of the way I phrase it. Um, and so it was, you know, figuring out that process to serve clients as best as possible and also to get clients and you start realizing there was a, it was actually a book. I think it was called the one page marketing plan I just finished. And there was something the author said, this isn't a huge book. It was just one I've kind of found an audible. Um, and the author said something that really resonated, which fits into what we're talking about here is that in more old world, traditional business, it was all about production and efficiency and all, you know, you kind of build it and they'll come. And so when you're, when you're under the umbrella of a boss, just everything's coming to you, you don't, you're not really worrying so much about customer acquisition.

11:38 And even if you are in the business of customer acquisition for another company, the customers are likely coming to you or they're someone else's job is to bring them to you or your job is to bring them to someone else. So you're not really in the hole sales cycle, I guess would be the word the, the whole, the whole cycle of bringing people in the funnel, so to speak. And so I think that was probably one of the biggest struggles was figuring out the funnel. And then also too, as I'm sure a lot of people can relate if you're selling on Amazon, I had basically two families of products and one of them suddenly became more competitive. And it was the one that was probably the more profitable of the two and sales started to not completely dry up, but it was starting to affect things.

12:27 And then of course, you know, fast forwarding a little bit too, which we can probably zigzagging around here a little bit and come back to it is, you know, in COVID happened well, as I said, you know, 2018 and holiday season gifts, my stuff was jamming. I was doing great. Um, you know, had more sales in a 30 day time period than, you know, a lot of sellers will have in a year and then fast forward to COVID. And at one point I was down for a 30 day period, 80% year over year for amazon.com. And so it became one of those like, Oh, wow. And then at the same time to brand accelerator live, we're trying to figure out what are we going to do with the word that I don't know if I don't want to mess up any algorithms by talking about it too much.

13:23 Yeah. But you know, the, the, the thing, the 19 thing. Yeah, exactly. The things that ends in 19 March becoming an issue for a lot of industries, industries. Yeah, exactly. And, you know, even though a lot of people on Amazon, we're seeing a boom. I was one of those niches that was seeing a decline. Cause you're not, if you're not going to people's houses and you're not going to your office or parties, chances are, you're not buying people, guests. And so that was hurting me, especially for the States, wasn't as bad internationally. In fact, we can get into that later, but it actually internationally helped me get through that period. But at the same time too, on the kind of, we'll say helping people with physical products, not the actual selling of physical products, but helping people with physical product side, I was starting to get a funnel of people coming in for the service.

14:17 And of course I had put out and all of a sudden that pretty much dried up because everyone's trying to figure out what to do. You know, I've got a podcast and YouTube channel and pretty much my downloads and, um, views, you know, depending on the platform, you know, the, whatever the metric is was pretty much drying up. So Amazon was drying up the, um, the, the, the leads were starting to dry up. People didn't want to do anything. And then all of a sudden too, there was the, um, you know, the more content side of things we're starting to dry up. And then also, you know, we were looking at brand accelerator live and we were just about to pull the trigger and start really marketing September, 2020. Right. And then all of a sudden it's, well, let's hold off. And I remember I was going to go to prosper show, which is, you know, Amazon focused show.

15:13 And this was, this was like in late March and one day it's, Oh yeah, we're doing it. Here's the things that hotels doing to keep everyone safe. And then the next day, uh, we're moving it to August, which they've even since canceled or really pushed it again to the following year, um, which they, they did the right thing. They did the right thing with everything they did. And also our friends, Steve Chu and Tony Anderson and talking to them, what are you guys going to do with your seller summit, which was in may, which was just a couple of months down the road. And so trying to figure out what are we going to do with, you know, you know, you meet Chris, you know, we're all trying to figure out like, what are we going to do with Brandy's lawyer live? And so basically everything I've put the last year ish into is now starting to look like the sky is falling and that's not on unique. It's not unique. You know, a lot of people had, you know, a lot of weather, whatever their issues were, especially during that time period of uncertainty, but it was kind of like one of those OMG, what am I going to do next type of thing, and just trying to figure it out.

16:26 And so how did you deal with that? Like mentally, uh, how do you deal with that? Because I know there's a lot of people that are faced with that. Just having a brick and mortar business, or maybe they got laid off from their job. And I actually, I just interviewed, uh, actually I had a guy on it for a hot seat that's in our Academy. He literally went and trained to be a pilot, got his pilot's license and got, got hired. And then as soon as he got hired COBIT happened and he was told he probably wouldn't have a job for at least three years.

16:59 Oh my gosh. Yeah. I can't even imagine something like that because you spent all that time and resources. Like I have a friend of mine from like elementary school who went to the air force Academy and became a pilot for the air force. And he basically, I don't know if it was full on retired. Maybe he, it was long in there long enough to have retired, but he left the air force, like where, I guess like at a certain point, like once you sign the papers, you can't really go back in. Um, he had done that, uh, right as covert left because he thought he was going to be able to get a job, you know, flying for American airlines or whatever. And that happened. So I can't even imagine, cause at least it was paid for by the air force. But yeah, you're talking about like, that's expensive. Like that's like going to med school basically. Yup. Wow. Yeah.

17:42 So, you know what I mean? Like, so how do you get through that? How does Kevin get through that? I know you take a lot of walks and stuff, but what does Kevin do? I mean, again, you've got, you've got kids, you've got a wife, you know what I mean? You've got a household to, you know, and you've got all this and you took a leap and left your job. Yeah. Right. And now it's all riding on your shoulders really. I mean, obviously, you know, your partners with your wife and stuff like that. And then you guys kind of take on the responsibility, but still at you, you're still feeling that pressure at some point. So how do you get through that? Where's the light at the end of the tunnel. Yeah. So for me it was

18:16 A lot of, I think at first it was a little bit of Holy cow, what do I do next? And maybe a little bit of feeling, sorry for myself at times a little bit of what am I going to do? Um, and the same thing too. It's like, you know, at that time 0.2, like everyone's pretty much confined to their house. And so it's like, you know, at best you could leave to go get carrots at the grocery store, you know? So it's like, and that's not all that. And that loses its luster pretty quick. Um,

18:49 I go grab the carrots, right.

18:52 We're going to do, you know, is, is the economy ever going to come back because you just kept hearing the news of how, um, more and more of, you know, people are being laid off and stuff like that. And I, I just started having to like take some deep looks at things and say, you know, like what, what what's going on. And I think sometimes when your back's against the wall, you come up with some of the best solutions. And so maybe it was actually a gift in disguise that now my back was more of a against the wall. So like Amazon was almost like the job in a way, like it was paying for all my bills, everything was great. And so, you know, the stuff I was trying to do with more on the help people's side, maybe I didn't have as much motivation, you know, to do certain things.

19:45 And so one of the things I kept hearing I'd go on like webinars and Facebook lives and stuff. And I just kept hearing more and more people talk about like relationships, relationships started, like, you know, I can't control the output of necessarily what all is happening in the world, but I can control the input of what I do into the situation. So I started really like, what can I do to like, you know, double down on relationships and stuff like that. And so, you know, trying to connect with people more, just check in with people, you know, time to time, um, starting to just trying to figure things out because, um, I started realizing like, this is a, it's not, I'm not in a unique period, you know, like everyone was going through a lot of, what am I going to do here? I mean, even people that like, maybe they're selling something, there were selling masks on Amazon and then all of a sudden, you know, it just took off, they had their own issues.

20:45 So like even when things were good, like things as Tony Robbins says, sometimes growth can put you into bankruptcy. Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, there's a lot of stresses that everyone was having. So when there's so much change it's what do you do? But then I started thinking like, um, what are some things I could do? Because, you know, there's, you keep hearing of all these different companies that they started in the great depression, or, you know, more close to home, you know, when you start looking at like, you know, companies like Instagram and Groupon and, um, I think Airbnb, there's a, there's a handful of like really big tech companies that started during the great recession in 2008. And so it's like, there's something to this that you can, you can, you can choose two paths is the way I really started looking at it.

21:37 Like, I could feel sorry for myself. I can watch Netflix. I can, you know, study to death, whatever position I have on something, which you start seeing people on Facebook, it real passionate about fill in the subject. Um, and I know a little too much about it. And I was like, you know, so it's almost like some people, like they're like want to know every stat on every baseball player or whatever the case is. But now when people knew whatever their position was on, COVID the economy politics or whatever people started like doubling down, I'm like, well, that's not going to be beneficial. So maybe you need to double down on like mindset and relationships and kind of trying to figure out like, what's that next move. So I started feeling like, okay, as I start putting more of a positive input into my mind and slowing down some of the inputs of, you know, the sky is falling and, you know, really turning off the news, you know, doesn't matter what the administration says happening today.

22:40 You know? Cause I think for a lot of us were watching the, the daily updates that were happening at the time from the white house. And it's like, these people don't actually come to realization. They don't know what they're doing. And I don't mean that as a slight and that's not a knock on anyone in politics, we're all trying to figure this out. And so the more it's okay, figure this out. Some of the decisions are going to be messy. Some of it's going to work. Some of it isn't. But then I started realizing the more I realized what I'm in control of here the better. And so if I can focus on the things I can control, I'm going to have a better outcome. Yeah, yeah, no, I agree. I think, you know, we have to focus on what we can control, not what we can't control.

23:22 I'm a big believer in not tuning into the news. I mean, a lot of times, you know, I don't hear of anything unless someone tells me, you know what I mean? It's kind of like, did you hear this? And I'm like, no. And then they're like, this happened. And I'm like, Oh, thanks for letting me know. Like I I'm pretty much, you know, kind of in my own bubble in a sense. Um, yes, I want to know what's going on in the outside world. But I also, I know that I can't control that. I just need to be safe. Um,

23:46 And I also need to, uh, really look out for where I'm going, like where, you know, where am I going? What do I have that's assets that I can lend to the marketplace or to, you know, our businesses, you know? And I think that's the same thing for you. So let's kinda move into, so you talking about relationships, I'm a big believer in that. And I think, you know, it's something we heard over and over and over again, it's like, you know, dig the well before you're thirsty. It's like, you may be creating relationships with people right now that you might not really use until eight years from now. Right. And it's okay. Right. It's like, I'm not doing it for that reason. I'm doing it to broaden out my network and to be able to have people that you can just lean on from time to time or they can lean on you and you can help them.

24:30 So let's talk about that because you did start now, now you still are helping people get set up in kind of launch their products on, you know, international marketplaces and you and I had a conversation the other day and you're like, I'm really not helping people get started. I'm helping people to take their existing suite of products and potentially, you know, if it works out for them that they validate it and stuff like that, that we can then leverage other platforms and you know me like, I'm, um, I'm like your customer. I don't want to do that stuff. So it's kind of like, okay, can you prove to me, there's an opportunity here for me to take my existing products that I don't have to resource. I don't have to go manufacture. I've already got this stuff down. Then I just put them up on a marketplace and start selling them. If you'll do it for me, I'm good. Or maybe you can help someone just by showing them the, the, uh, you know, the steps. Cause it is a scary process. So you're doing that, but I've also noticed, and you know, I've had counterfeit conversations. You're also doing these, you know, these small summits where you're having people come on, they're free, you can get these groups. So walk me through, like, what's the idea behind all of that? What are you looking to achieve? Yeah. Great question. So, you know, looking at it as

25:43 Taking a kind of a little bit of a step back and kind of looking at the world and what all is happening, I would say in the kind of more Amazon world, there was kind of a belief for the longest time of, Oh yeah. Just go down, double down on amazon.com and everything else that is describe distraction. Yeah. Yeah. And then, you know, when Amazon starts saying you can only put an X number of units of a new product, or we're going to not let you send stuff in for a month or, you know, it's going to sit in our warehouse for four weeks and you know, all these things that are happening, we're going to take away your prime badge. We're going to, we're going to now say, it's going to take a month for it to get to the customers. Now it's going to destroy your conversion rate and increase your cost.

26:23 So all these things are happening. So all of a sudden I was noticing people now are a little bit more after, you know, I was saying before, all the kind of leads dried up for people that were in that funnel. Now, all of a sudden people are starting to come back to me, talk a little bit more about that. Or, you know, people are, um, I was starting to find, you know, now all of a sudden my podcast downloads and views are starting to go up and especially the stuff related to, um, international selling. In fact, now all of a sudden this one video that I had on YouTube that didn't really get a lot of views now suddenly is like one of my top videos. And that was starting to funnel people into that world of, you know, me potentially helping them out. And so then it started just had me thinking like, okay, people are a little hungrier now to diversify their revenue in one way, shape or form.

27:16 Yup. The thought of Amazon in the U S and go all in is not necessarily going to be beneficial for most people. And that mindset is starting to wane. And now all of a sudden people are getting a little bit more interested because international selling, if you're selling an Amazon in the U S and you have products that sell at least similar products sell in other markets, you're leaving money on the table. If you're not doing it. And a lot of people are going through big growth periods. Now they're like, okay, I don't feel comfortable having all my eggs and just Amazon in the U S as basket, but I could make money relatively quickly by getting up and running, but I don't want to spend the time to figure it out. So then all of a sudden it got more people coming to me and asking me, you know, more about, you know, the services I offer and, you know, it's it, it's now I'm starting to realize, okay, it's shifting back towards this is now a beneficial.

28:12 Thanks. So now with the summits, some of it was you and I had, um, you know, joined this one Facebook group when we were trying to figure out what to do the brand accelerator live before we had figured that we were going to make it virtual. And so just the talk of virtual started to work out. And there's a gentleman who's I think is a friend of yours. Uh, Mark Wade, who has a podcast called the virtual summit podcast. Yep. I was just like, started thinking about that. And I started listening to his show. And one thing I've learned about myself and entrepreneurship gives you a lot of chance for self reflection, especially when things aren't going well. But one of the things I started realizing about myself is I'm a procrastinator. And if I don't have a deadline, sometimes it's hard. And sometimes you can give yourself a deadline I'll has to be X day or whatever.

29:03 And, you know, thinking back to my working career, you know, the reason we're working on brand accelerator lives, cause I used to work in the hotel world, um, managing events. And so, you know, in the world of events, like I can think back to there's a large tire company that we did their, uh, dealership meaning for. And, you know, they had a dinner and I'm going to do back of the envelope, math. They probably spent a half million dollars between the name entertainer. They had the decor, the food, the wine, everything. I was like, I spent a lot of money. You know, it was a couple thousand people in that room and you know, there's no, Hey, I'm sorry. I know it was supposed to open at seven boards is busy. So we're going to, it's going to be next week. How about that? There there's no, it's seven.

29:52 O'clock at six 45, 15 minutes early. We're going to be ready if we're not 15 minutes early, we're late and heads are going to be rolling and monies, large amounts of money are going to be going back to the clients. So that world where, you know, if there something's supposed to happen on a certain date, like it, it there's no way around it. So it was kind of ingrained into my mindset. So one of the things I was thinking, like, how do I force myself to do things? And so looking to at like, okay, how do I force myself to do things? How do I work on building relationships? How do I serve people in a way that the boomerang might come back? Might not, but you know, if I'm not doing it with an expectation, the boomerang will come back. I'll probably serve people better.

30:44 And so I was thinking about it like, okay, and it was conversation you and I had one time about, you know, what you're putting in the top of the funnel, the facts, what you get at the bottom of the funnel. So if you're not putting the right people in the top of the funnel, you're not gonna get the right people at the bottom of the funnel. Right. And so you're gonna lose people in the funnel along the way, but the more you got the right people coming in. So I started thinking it was, um, I think it was, uh, I had ed, you know, PPC ed from seller labs on my podcast. And I might've had someone else who was PPC driven. And I started noticing like, you know, like with YouTube, like the average watch time and make much higher if I'm talking about PPC or if I'm doing, um, a, you know, a podcast about PPC, it gets more downloads than average.

31:37 And so I started thinking like, okay, my target customer, if they want to sell internationally, that's a kind of one time type deal to find them in the right time is going to be hard. It's possible. YouTube's helpful with that because, you know, people search for keywords. And so the keywords they use, you know, take them to the right content, which can help. Right. But you're only, you're, you're very limited with a kind of a niche service if you're going the search based content route. Yeah. For that exact thing. So then I started thinking like, what's a pain point. All of my potential customers would have, well, it's one of my own pain points, which is PPC feeling like, cause you know, my PPC at times was going through the roof during COVID. So it was like, well, that's something a lot of people are very curious about.

32:33 So I was like, what if I just started getting with people that are PPC experts and doing a virtual summit on PPC. And so I decided to go test that out and I had no ideas. This is going to work, not going to work. Um, how, how am I going to do it? So for maximizing, e-commerce the helping people with physical products that I use a system called Kartra, which basically stores your, um, your landing pages, your, um, your emails and also membership areas where you could have like, you know, a course or something like that. And so I started looking into it. I'm like, well, Kartra would work for a, um, virtual summit actually Mark Wade for his summit. He, yeah, he uses Kartra. So it was like, okay, I have, I at least already have the tools. I have some infrastructure in place for this.

33:29 So why don't I start reaching out to people I know that are PPC related and let's see if we can get anyone. If I, if, if anyone shows up to this, you know, it we'll test it out. And so, you know, sometimes when you listen to podcasts about a thing, you always hear the biggest success stories. And so, you know, like, Oh, you can get 10,000 people on your list and stuff like that. And so, um, you know, I ended up doing that PPC summit and I had about 500, but it's a niche audience and it's the right targeted people. Right. Exactly. Like, you know, you want a room with 500 people. Like that's pretty good thing. So I was like, yeah, I know some of, many of those, um, speakers, you know, they picked up clients or, you know, uh, customers for their software or whatever the case is.

34:17 Um, or they just felt like they got good exposure for whatever they're doing. So I'm like, okay, I'm, I'm helping these folks. So I'm serving the relationships of that audience, of the speakers, the people viewing it, you know, it was free for the days of the summit to attend. So they're picking up things. Um, I ended up doing a group coaching program out of that. So serve those people at a higher level. Um, some people ended up purchasing the recordings and then other people they're just kind of new into my world and the over time, because maybe they found me on that. They ended up hiring me for their service or something else. And so it's, you know, starting to attract people into the world, um, who are the right type of target audience for that. And then also serving a lot of people along the way, knowing full well, most of them will probably never be a paying customer.

35:08 Right. But if they're leaving with a Goodwill, to me, it's, it's, it's now a win. And so I started going more and more with that kind of philosophy. So now I've done, um, two virtual summits and I have a third it's actually going to be next week, which probably as this airs will be finishing up. So this will be airing on I think September 2nd. Okay. So it would have finished finished by then and then probably do another one for fourth quarter. And my goal is to also do another one for like maybe starting the year off. Right. Which I would love for you to be a speaker at one

35:43 Of those two as well. Of course, of course

35:46 You were speaker at my second one, the brand mastery summit. Um, because I ended up doing that one because I was like, you know, there's more to this. And so then I started realizing like little things like, okay, now that summit is an asset. Absolutely it's. So that's someone who's an asset. So that summit, the PPC summit became an upsell for people that purchase the recordings for the second summit. So that increased my revenue for the second summit. I learned a lot of things I could do better for the second and third summit from the first one. And so the second one had about 900 people register for it. Um, and it was one of those things. I was just like, okay, this, this is starting to work. This is making. And then magically just people are like all of a sudden, Hey, you got that service. You talk about the service. Um, uh, what, what's it going to be? So I started getting new clients. So now I'm actually at a point I've got to, I'm hiring another person to help me with the backend stuff of the servicing of the client work. So,

36:44 Oh, wow. That's great. Yeah.

36:46 One of the things that if I didn't take the risk to try the summit world, I wouldn't have gotten to, you know, to a point now where it's like, that's now paying the bills and Amazon is now just it's self fulfilling thing. Um, and it's now divided.

37:08 Yeah. I want to highlight a few things there. So speaking of like, okay, who you're attracting, I want to highlight that real quick. Cause we talk a lot about building your email list and all of that stuff. So basically what you're saying, just so people understand is like, you are, you're not, you weren't looking for people that were like how to start selling on Amazon. Cause that wouldn't have been the right person that could have used your service. So you're like, I don't really want to attract them if they want to attend. That's fine. Absolutely. But it that's not who I'm attracting. So you're putting out the right kind of bait if we will, right. That will attract the right people. And the people that are looking to improve their paper click means that they have products. It also means that they're trying to improve their sales and increase their sales.

37:46 Right. So, you know, if they're ready to increase their sales, they might not be selling internationally. And a way to increase their sales is to sell more of their stuff on another platform. Exactly. So it makes perfect sense to do a paper, click one for you. Because again, you're putting out the message that, Hey, if you have products and you want to increase your sales, here's some tips on how you can do it and you don't even have to be the one that's giving the tips. You're having experts come in and do it. So I'm just going to say full disclosure here. Like this is something that Kevin is good at something I don't want anything to do with, right. I don't want to do summits. Like I I'm going to do one this year. We're going to do, and it's not a summit. It's an event that is brand accelerator, live virtual.

38:27 And that's actually happening September 12th. And Kevin will be organizing that because he's so good at it. Right. He's good at them live. And now he's at organizing these things online, but he's also going to be emceeing it for us this year and it's going to be a full, a full day workshop style. So we're going to actually literally be teaching all of the aspects all the way from content creation, to building your email list, to email marketing, to, uh, even some Pinterest stuff. And then we've got a Facebook ad marketing, a whole workshop. So everything is really designed to be actionable. And workshoppy so I'll throw a little plug out there for his cab, Bal tickets.com B a L tickets.com. Um, and so what I'm saying here is, is like, because it works for Kevin doesn't mean it works for someone else. Right? Right. And so there's so many different ways to do it.

39:18 Like I personally don't want to go down that route and I won't, but I'll speak at something like that. And I encourage Kevin to do it because he's good at it. And it works for him to attract those right people. I also want to highlight this. You never intended on doing summits to offer a service that you had no idea that you would also offer when you left that office that day and you were on your journey to be an entrepreneur, right. Full time entrepreneur, that stuff happened because of the situations or the things that came your way after leaving. So a lot of people think that they have to have the whole roadmap. They have to have the whole plan, or they want to know all of the things like what's going to happen. If this, and what happens if this, you can't go that far, you do have to have a plan.

40:05 You don't have to have a roadmap. You don't have to have a safety net in a sense kinda, but you won't really know until you get out there and start doing it. And like Kevin said, your back's up against the wall. And in his case back was up against the wall a little bit. Right. Didn't go as a hundred percent planned, you know, after the first six months, right. Things happened and we get hit with this, you know, this virus and all of this stuff. Right. It just changes everything. Um, but to me, and look at what you've done, look at the growth that you've had just as far as like skills, like setting up a summit and organizing it a, an email autoresponder in connecting all of the dots there and the connections and the outreach and the people that you've met. So man, you're, you're wealthier because of that.

40:51 Not just financially, but the information and the skill set that you've created. So number one, I want to commend you and just say that, you know, you've done awesome. I'm proud of you. And I think that, you know, you're just going to continue to go down this path. My thing I've always said, you I've said this privately is Kevin. Let's put those blinders on a little bit. We don't want to get distracted too much. Right. Because once you add another piece to the, to the funnel or another piece to the, the equation, it gets more complicated. And I know you like complicated stuff cause you're good at it. Right. You'd like to organize things. I don't, I like to keep things really simple, but there is a time time that you can be like, Holy crap. Now I'm working again. Right, right. That's not necessarily I want to do so in wrapping this up, um, give us like, I guess what are some of the big takeaways, um, that you would say, I would say even like talking about like the summits that you have done and like, what's the future of that look like for you?

41:50 Like where do you want to see yourself a year from now? Let's go there. Yeah. Great questions. So

41:58 One of the things with the summit is now, like I was saying, like the summit itself could be a product that attracts the right people. Well, I could also partner with people that are in the summit, like, okay, can we work together maybe to make some of this content that I'll help send people to you because you were a contributor author, whatever we're going to call it for some sort of, you know, maybe paid guide or something like that on listing optimization, PPC is something that's going to help me find people that aren't picking their first product, but people that are actually launched bringing more people in, actually this is something that you kind of inspired when you were like, okay, if we can get something that like, you know, will offset the cost of ads and bring people in, you're now getting people on your list essentially for free.

42:47 So even if it breaks even, or even loses a little bit, that person, there's nothing wrong with people that sign up for free stuff. But if they've paid something, they're probably going to be more likely to pay for something else down the road. And so bringing more people in. And so I see myself doing more partnerships with that. I see myself doing more summits. I probably will space them out a little bit more than I've probably doing. I can foresee the next month and a half being a little bit rough. Um, but, uh, other than that, I, I'm probably more strategic in signing them up. But you know, as, as a learning, I would say the big thing is, you know, you learn so much more by doing and being in the arena than by watching. And again, sometimes it's one, your back is up against the wall. You just have to make that decision. I'm going to figure this out in a way.

43:43 Hmm. Well, I would actually say one step further, like being in the arena is fine. You're watching the game, but we've got to get you in between the lines on the football field. Right. I mean, you're a, you're a referee. So, you know, and it's like yucky, you know, spectators are out there watching. They're not getting hit. They're not getting hammered right in the game is when you start to learn, you gotta, Hey, that played in work. We gotta do a new play. Right. So I would say, you gotta get in the game. Right. And you know, we can sit here and talk about, you know, this might not work that might not work, but we don't know until you start doing it or see it start running some ads to it. Right. That's all another thing we could talk about all the time. Right.

44:21 It's all another animal. Um, but, uh, I've got some ideas for you too, that I'll talk to you off, off air and then maybe come back on and we'll, we'll see if Kevin A. Little bit more of my advice and we'll see what happens. So we'll leave it as really speaking. It's worked out for me when I've taken your advice, Scott. So I'll be very curious. Yeah. I've got a little, I got a little nugget. I want to share with you that, uh, that I'm going to be testing myself and uh, we'll, we'll see. And it's a, it's a way that, uh, you might even be able to simplify a little bit more. So we'll, we'll, we'll talk about that. We'll leave that as a cliffhanger for people so that we then come back on the next episode with Kevin Sanderson. And maybe we can give an update on that, but yeah, Kevin, I just want to say thank you, man.

45:01 And I'm excited about brand accelerator live 20, 20 virtual. I'm disappointed that we're not going to be there in person. Cause last year was fun. One of the biggest highlights for me and I didn't know it was going to be, I was, I was stressed. Um, but it was fun. And I had one of the best times of my life being in there with over 200 people that were all brand building people, my people, and you were a huge part of that. And actually the one that made it come to life, really, if you want to get down to cause you're the one that proposed the idea to me in the first place. I want to thank you again here, publicly for doing that. And I'm excited for the virtual that's coming up on September 12th. So again guys, Bal tickets.com. You can go there and check it out.

45:44 And then Kevin, how can people learn more about what you're up to and maybe even, maybe even join in on one of those free summits? Yeah. So I'm one of the things I can do. Just go to, I've got maximizing e-commerce, it's both a podcast and a YouTube channel go there. Um, and if they want to go to maximize e-commerce dot com, sign up for my email list, I probably can get a lot better about email marketing, but if they're on the list, they'll at least start hearing about, um, when there's another summit and things like that. So. Cool. Awesome. All right. Well, Hey, let's wrap this up together cab that way there, we can just go ahead and close this baby out. All right guys. The show notes to this episode I said was, what did I say? It was, it was eight 76, eight 76.

46:28 I had to, I had to cheat there in 76. So brain creators.com forts us eight 76. And that's going to wrap it up here once again, Kevin, thank you so much. And let's wrap this up together, guys. Remember I'm here for you. I believe in you and I am rooting for you, but you have to, you have to come up. Say it with me, say it loud, say it proud. Kevin's going to say it on the count of three with me. Ready? One, two, three, take action. Have an awesome amazing day. And I'll see you right back here on the next episode. Now let's rock your brand.