Sheila Mac: Are you ready for a reboot? Welcome to the Sheila Mac Show reality at its finest history reminds us those hit hardest often become the change makers. This year we've all had crazy economic, social and emotional rock bottoms, we all get knocked down something hits globally locally. Personally, it affects our health, finances, our relationships; we have to recreate a business or career. Each show Sheila and her special guest will be sharing their reboot stories guiding you with real solutions to upgrade and up level emotionally, mentally, physically, spiritually, and financially. Here on NVC`s KCAA radio if you're ready to pull yourself up by the bootstraps and bra straps, enjoy. Listen here Sheila.
Sheila Mac: Welcome to the Sheila Mac show reality at its finest. Here we have real people sharing real stories, and actionable steps to help you reinvent, rebuild and reboot your business and personal life on your terms. I'm your host, Sheila Mack and today we have special guest, John Morley. John is a serial entrepreneur. He is the engineer of marketing. And he is also a talk show host with a couple of different talk show. So welcome to the show, John.
John C. Morley: Thank you very much. It's great to be here.
Sheila Mac: Yes. And I like to start off each show by asking a question related to my bestselling book bootstraps and bra straps, the formula to go from rock bottom back into action in any situation. And this last, I guess, 13 months or so now, we have had just about every situation we could never imagine happened to us all. So do you have a story about a time in your business or personal life where you hit a tough situation and how you got back? On track?
John C. Morley: Absolutely. It was a several years ago, and people around me were constantly telling me that I couldn't do something. And what I learned is that when people tell you can't do something, they do that for a couple reasons. One, because either they're jealous. They don't want you to succeed. And what I also realize Sheila, and I only learned this in last few years after learning the other lesson several years before is that if people don't like me, I don't mean that people don't like me, because everyone likes me. But if there aren't a few people that are a little intimidated, or maybe they're just not scared of what I'm doing, then John's not bringing his a game to the table. And he needs to really step it up.
Sheila Mac: Very good.
John C. Morley: And when I did that, I realized that I was able to go further than I even thought was possible.
Sheila Mac: Nice. Nice. Now do you have an example of a time maybe where you felt challenged with that? Where you were kind of playing small?
John C. Morley: Playing small?
Sheila Mac: Yeah. Like you didn't you didn't want to offend anybody by being who you are maybe? Something like that?
John C. Morley: Yes. So I was just doing what I was doing. I'm also president, my local chamber. And I was just trying to do this very nonchalantly, and very humbly, and put a lot of time into it. And I turned it into a not for profit, a 501 c three. But everyone just said, you know, john, when are you going to go away? Like, what are you going to give up? Because I only had three or four members in the beginning. Now we have 70 and growing. And they said to me, john, what are you going to give up? And I said, Man, I'm not going to mention the person's name. I'm going to give up, sir, when a little baby boy, or a little baby girl tells the parents that they don't want to learn to walk anymore. He looks at me and he says sits in his chair. It's like when the blank is that? And I said, well, you're an intelligent man. You tell me when have you ever heard that? He he's you knows, rubbing his face a little bit pioneers to take your time. There's no rush. And he says to me, never see, I knew you were an intelligent man. Is you know what, john, you're arrogant now get the hell out of my office. So I think in these situations, the same thing happens is a person doing want you to succeed. So in this case, what happened to me Sheila is that this thing that I was doing, nobody wants I would say this. I like to say this lot Sheila that nobody wants to be part of a train while it's still in the station. And I still use this today. Even with some new groups that I'm growing. Everyone wants to almost kill themselves. To jump on the train as it's leaving the station, or it's moving at several 100 miles an hour and I joke about this with people, it's like, why is it that you don't want to come on the train? Yet? We haven't left the station, but we're building a great train. Yeah, you know what, john, when you get when you get a going, let us know. Yeah. Not interesting, get back with you. So it's like, people just don't want to support you. And I am so much for the beginning that you know, you need to support people more so first responder. And I feel it's so important that you have to nurture it's almost like that dog. If you like dogs, the one dog you come over one day, and I don't have a dog because I travel. I don't want the dogs to be sad. But you know, you come over and you see the dog opening the door and you're like, gee, what a smart dog. But if you were there a few weeks ago, and you saw the same dog grappling to open the dirt cheap, what a dumb dog. Same dog different perception. And I think what I've learned Sheila is that the way we were many years ago, and the way we are today, it's like the story of the elephant, you know, the elephant that's tied to the little tiny change of the rope.
Sheila Mac: Mm hmm.
John C. Morley: And I had a very similar situation where that happened to me just recently got my flu vaccine. And I was petrified to get the shot. And I just realized that I was using old behaviors, to motivate me to not get it. And the night before, I was a little bit nervous and even nervous up to the point. But I said, you know what, I'm going to face my fear, and I’m going to get over this. And what I realized is that when I was younger, so the doctors were not really being honestly being fair, but they were playing games, and they were sneaking things on you. So I realized that I can face my fears. And I'm like, this is stupid. Why do I fear this? And when it's over? I'm like, why do they even do that. And I think it's because of the perception that I had when I was younger. And now that I'm older, we keep playing those tracks. I went back when I graduated college to get certified hypnosis and NLP, just for fun. Because I was always paying people to help me remove these anagrams are these tracks in my mind? I said I could do this myself. And when this happened just this past week, I said, john, you know how to do this? Why are you playing this game, you're being the little elephant on this chain. And you've grown up and the chain is still the same size, you can break that chain. I think we all kind of put in prison ourselves, where we don't want to go further. And I think that's the reason why a lot of people aren't successful because they do fear not failing. They're fearing being very successful. And what am I going to do when I'm successful? Oh my gosh.
Sheila Mac: Wow, that that is so true. And very interesting. I think about my own life and how many times I've had friends and family that were so loving and caring and meaningful about helping me and giving me this advice to do what they're doing. And for instance, my house burned down in 2017 in the California fires, Oh, wow. With that, it was it was like, Okay, I lost my house and the car at the same time. And so I kind of got demoted really quickly. And I was like what the heck. And you know, I'm not used to all this. They told me, honey, why you don’t just go to the grocery store, get a job there, go live in an apartment and take a few years to get your life back in order. And I was like, I don't think so. Within a month, I was moved to Beverly Hills and leading new teams and closing lots of sales and running real estate teams teaching courses. And it had a home in Beverly Hills by the end of that year and a new car within a couple months. So I could have listened to them. And they came back to me and they're like, wow, How'd you do that? You know, you Sheila, you're kind of crazy. But you got something you know what you're doing when it comes to earning money. I was like, thank you. So that was that was me not listening to the good intentions of others. And it came from a really heart space from them. It was just what they would do.
John C. Morley: Right? What they would do is not what you would do. And I think that's the same reason why someone else if you're given that advice, and they don't have the training, they're not going to have to apply it. You know, when something happens, I always say something to a lot of people, and challenges are going to happen to you and me to everyone in this world, right? It doesn't matter. But what really shapes and builds the character of the person is how you choose to respond.
Sheila Mac: Yes, very, very true. The response is everything. And sometimes, some things are not worth the response at all. They, you know, they're in a different place, they're coming from a different place, love them, thank them, send them love, but they're not where you're at. And they're in a different part of the journey, maybe where you and I were 1020 years ago, whatever it is, and that's okay. It's not a judgment against them. It's just kind of a judgment for, for what your goals are in the now. And so you have to kind of walk away from people and places that are not aligned. And sometimes it's really a difficult thing, because you might be the only one in the room that like you have, you want to have 70 people instead of three, but nobody wanted to do the work. Know exactly. It's like the work is the fun part. That's where you learn and grow. And you suffer and you struggle, and you figure it out. And that's when, when you're done, you feel good about all that you've done to create that,
John C. Morley: Well, um, a quick story on that is that, you know, being a first responder, we're very busy with that. But then when the vaccines and stuff weren't available, I kind of pulled back a little bit. Because, you know, the response, I was getting one a week; you're healthier than most people and other people in more dire need than you.
Sheila Mac: Hmm.
John C. Morley: So, but I guess what have I done is I've just embraced the fact that, okay, so we can't do business in person. So what? So what can we do? Well, we can do business virtually. Now, that's not the case for all businesses. And like I said, I own a few businesses. I own a technology company, where I'm an engineer and the CEO and owner of it for 30 years young. And after, I'm gonna say 10 years back from now, for many years, the tech company had a large marketing and advertising company that was doing all of its advertising, marketing, and they're supposed to know what they're doing. They're on Wall Street; they're supposed to be like, the top. But you know, you're written them checks every week. And you know, you're working with the wrong company, when they make a decision on where to take you based on your deposit. I know this sounds stupid, but I'm going to use the money 515 and 20. And that's not the amount if I give them $5 Well, we're just gonna go do a quick breakfast at the diner or get some doughnuts at dunkin donuts. And if you give those 10 well, let's go do something. You know, for lunch. Let's have a sandwich and meet up then. And then if you give them the 15 you know what, why don't we do some quiet evening at Ruth's Chris, and go to a steakhouse. So I tried this one time I tried playing around where one time I was supposed to send them the 15. And I said on the five Hey, john, it's Brian's office. What can I do for you? Listen up. I know you guys were supposed to go out I believe tonight at Ruth's. Chris, we need to change it in the morning. You see his mother in law is coming in and the wife and then they don't have one car. There's one of the shop so they just asked, we just do like a quick breakfast because he just got a real smash day, huh? And then another time I decided to change it from the five to three. Hey, John, this is Melissa. Yeah, calling from Brian's office. What's up? Well, you know, you guys are supposed to get together for breakfast. But unfortunately enough, you know, Kara has daughter, I don't know her now. Well, Kara is teething. And unfortunately right now the other cars in the mechanic, and he has to take her to the doctor, and then they have an emergency meeting after lunch that his boss cool. So he was just wondering, because it's gonna be a crazy day. If you guys could just does a late dinner like 10 o'clock at Ruth's Chris? Just have to like, say, there's something to this. So then I decided to do some research and say, well, how I become what these people are supposed to be, but they're not. Remember my whole life; she'll everybody's telling me you can't mark it. You can't do this. You don't know marketing. And I didn't go to school for Mark MC. And so, you know, I had been in my head that you can't do this. And I'm like, well, everybody else is saying I can't do this. I never said I can't do this. Everybody else is telling me I can't do this. I said, Well, I don't really believe that I can't do it if I could just figure out how to do it. And I remember going to Xerox at the time and asking them for a production machine and what it would cost and once I got some numbers and came back, I went to the wonderful PR marketing firm and I walked into this guy's office, his name was Greg, and my account rep. His name's Nathan was Brian. And I walked in. I said, Greg, I say, Greg, I just want to say thank you. Thank you. So that’s just wanted to say thank you. It's been a good run. You're fired. He nearly drops if you want a cup of coffee or something like water or drink or bagel or something. No, I'm good. He's like, we could talk this out. But why don't we talk it as it? Does? Brian have as I said, I've kind of told Brian that we were getting tired. Well, let me just see if I can get him. Brian, could you come in here for a second? Yeah, sure. Comes right in? Are you aware that he's pulling the account today? Know what happened? Well, I've only called you like, umpteen times telling you that I'm not happy. Wow, this is a shock. I didn't know anything about I said, Come on. I said, I've called you for the last couple of weeks. I told you I'm not happy. You made a mistake on the brochure, you made all these mistakes, you know, I was gonna get rid of you. I'll tell you what we can do. We can drop it down. We can give you a 30% discount. It doesn't matter. We're done. Huh? He says, Well, how are you possibly gonna exist? How are you gonna survive? I said, well, we kind of bought our first production machine for 150 grand. He's like, but you don't know anything about I said, that's where we're taking 80 hours of fire retraining, and we're hiring graphic people. Yeah, but you don't know what I said. I don't know anything, but we're gonna learn. Yeah. And we slowly built the small print company. Then we built a marketing company. Then we did advertising, graphic design, public relations, put that all together. And now they're calling in and saying, hey, how we doing? We're doing great. You don't need anything? No, we're all good. I said, I said, we handle the whole thing for us. And you know, we did a press release for the entire countries like, really, as you guys may want to consider talking to us, we may save your clients some money. As they can see, we actually know how to do this the right way. He says, well, how you know all these people, so I'm not going to share all my tricks with you. But what I am going to share with you is something I'm really proud of when I was coming home from college one weekend. And I said to the person next to me on the plane, I was just talking with them. And it was actually coming home from Florida. I was visiting my parents actually from Florida. They're in Naples and I was visiting them. I was talking this gentleman on the plane and he was telling me about this alumni dinner they're having for Harvard. And I said, Okay, and he says do you do keynote speaking and I first thing I said, Oh, yeah, sure I do keynote speaking. And he's like, well, we have this challenge. You know, we need a good speaker. We don't have a big budget. And actually we have no budget. And we need somebody to come in and speak about something really creative about Y2K. I said, Yeah, I do a talk all the time that I didn't even do this talk, minor, major advances of y2k. I just can't put that toffee. That's awesome. You see we've done it before. Yep, done it many times. Wow. So we can't pay you to what we can do is give you a great seat. We can give you a nice dinner. And you'll have the recognition that you spoke for Harvard, as well. That's amazing, says yeah, he says I think you'll enjoy it. So after all these years, I decided to call and I also spoke for Yale. And I decided to call one of these people back that attended the event. And I said hi. You might remember me on such and such and I gave the keynote at Harvard minor major inconveniences of Y2K. Sorry, I don't remember you Do you remember December such and such at the such and such house? You were actually wearing if memory serves me correctly, were sitting at the table just to the right of me. You had a red suit on with a white blouse. And there was a lady next to you who had a blue top on. And I think you ordered steak. And she's like, who are you? I said, I'm John Morley. I was the keynote for the Harvard alumni for minor major inconveniences of y2k. Here, she's like, I remember the talk. So that was me. She really said, yeah, it was me. She's like, wow. And so now I made a friend. Actually, I had made her made a friend with her a long time ago. So then I started connect with other media people, Mike, Hey, I know such and such. I spoke for Harvard and Yale, I was just wondering, you know, hey, I'm building a database; I'm not going to spam you. But I wanted to send you quality stories that I think you'd like to read that your readers would really value. And I'm not gonna let anybody have access to this, I'm either gonna write them, or we're gonna vet the stories before they go to she's like, oh, that would be so awesome. So I build a database of several 1000 people. And everyone says, john, I'd love to have access that database. I said, I'm not selling that database. And so what this taught me Sheila is that I had no idea how I was going to do this. But somehow I built a PR company. And now I get authors and different people. And if you ask me many years ago, if I was gonna have a tech show that interviewed authors and people around the world, I would have said, you’re crazy. But it happened. And you know, becoming an expert in the field and now becoming an expert in marketing in LinkedIn. I'm actually the father of the LinkedIn banner is what they've been nicknaming me. So if you know, LinkedIn, there's a banner. I've come up with a very unique way of creating that banner and putting a personal story into it. And so I lead a monthly, LinkedIn master class on how to use LinkedIn. But you know, all these things, Sheila, were not in my plan 20 or 30 years ago, they just kind of unfold. And I think the biggest thing I can share with you and with everyone else out there, whether they're business owner, whether they work for a company, or you know, whether they just want to start a business, or they're a serial entrepreneur, is you have to be open o p n. So if I'm expecting, I don't know, a million dollars to come in, you can't expect it to come in from this channel. It might come in from this channel, or this channel, you just need to be open to where it happens. And I think that's the biggest challenge most people have is they want it to come from a certain place in our minds. A quick story, you might remember, it was a religious story. And the person was somewhere in they need to help. Well, they needed help. And so suddenly, the Let's call a god he sends in person to help them with a ladder and he goes No, no, no, no, no, no, no, I'm not leaving. God's gonna help me. Okay. Guy comes in later on with the boat. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, God's gonna help. Okay, so we have we have the ladder. We have the boat. Now they send in let's just say it was a helicopter. No, no, no, no. God's gonna help me.Finally, God shows up. Later, he goes, all your he said, what are you doing? He's like, I sent you three things. I said, Sure ladder, I sent your boat. I sent you a helicopter.
Sheila Mac: Oh
John C. Morley: So, I mean, it's a funny story. And I kind of changed it around a little bit. But you get the point that sometimes we expect help from someone, but it may not come in that way. Mm hmm. And so that's something that led me to another discovery, which is every single morning, I do a motivational tip every morning, people think I'm crazy. But I get on my phone and I record a motivational chip, we share what a good morning. And I publish that out. Today's tip was actually for the letter, I'll get lit, lit. The taste tip was W. And it was for welcome. And we get to the end of the alphabet, we started again. So what I said is when you get an idea, or you get people in your life or concepts, whether they're good, whether or bad, you need to welcome everything with an open heart. And if you can do that, then the things you actually want will show up in your life.
Sheila Mac: Yes, I love that. It's almost like surrendering to what will show up as long as we're showing up.
John C. Morley: Yes. And you know, you get people out there that have challenges every day. And like, oh, but I need it. Now I need it. Now I have to do it now, like, I understand you're in this mindset. And the way you're thinking right now is lack. So you need to think for abundance. And like, I think you're drunk, it's not my drinking. So you understand what I'm trying to explain to you that you have to focus on having abundance. So one of things I love to do when I'm walking, and I take an hour and a half walk when it's not raining or snowing, you don't have snow by you is I do an abundance exercise and I love doing it, I will count and think of all the abundant things around from the letters of the alphabet, I see. There's an abundance of air, there's an abundance of birds, there's an abundance of cars, and I just kind of keep going through and get into that abundance mindset. And I just love doing that. And then I do something or once in a while it's called my attitude of gratitude, where I'll use the same alphabet, but instead of a, the abundance, I'll be grateful for something. I'm so grateful for all the people in the world. I'm so grateful for all the birds, but now you're being grateful, which is a little bit different. And so what I've learned is that there are going to be people out that are going to rain on your parade every single time. I mean, you just gonna have that. And so what I like to say, Sheila is that if somebody wants to do that, which is their prerogative and their choice. It's a free world. I just tell them, I'm not really supporting what you're saying, or I really am not happy with that. So could you please like knock it off? And if they don't, I just leave the situation. And people like, oh, where you going? I'm just not gonna be around like this negative behavior.
Sheila Mac: Wow.
John C. Morley: Yeah, I'm just I'm just gonna leave.
Sheila Mac: Okay.
John C. Morley: And some people get it and some people never will get it. But I can't worry about the people that won't get it Sheila. Yeah. You know, I think a lot of those people are selfish. And one of things I always tell people you probably know Dale Carnegie, who wrote an amazing book, How to Win Friends and Influence People. We need to strive to become interested in the other person and less worried about ourselves. So when we don't matter, it's the other person that matters. This is one of the reasons that when I do one on ones with people, when I meet them virtually, I have a very unique way of doing and I say, look, here's how it's gonna work. 30 minutes, you're going to get 15 minutes at the beginning, I'm going to get 15 minutes at the end, we're going to time them. And there's no sale pushes here. It's just getting to know each other. And a lot of people really know what they tell me all that am okay, I'm not interested. Why? Because now they want they want to do a sales call. And I'm like, well, that's not what we're doing. We're doing a mutual what I'm one of them, but I usually do is say, Hey, uh, okay, so you'll go first. That's great. Listen, would you do me a favor? Just give me a second, I have my pen. I have my pet. Would it be okay, if I take notes? Because I talk to so many people. And I just want to make sure I get everything right. Would that be okay with you? Andrew, what I have found is that, when I do that the people that are going to resonate, well still want to meet with me, the other people because it says read on my scheduling page. For planning purposes, this is how our meeting will go. You're like, What do you mean, you get 15 minutes of a white time at 15 minutes for you 15 minutes for Mary? Oh, well, what if I need 20 I'm like, well; you get 15 I get 15. And I think people that are trying to, I guess get more over on you. They're really takers. And they're not trying to give back. Mm hmm. And I think that's what I've learned she'll, I always have a good heart. But a lot of times people they take advantage of that heart. So by using a tactic like this, which I've never had to do before, because of COVID, you've never had to deal with this before. But now, your time is precious. So when you meet with people, you need to set up a little boundary of what's going to happen. And if they can't respect that enough, then I don't want to spend the time meeting with them.
Sheila Mac: That makes so much sense. I think that sales the way a lot of times the way people get sales training, they forget how to connect with the people at all. And their goal is just to sell something, and it just loses everything. And I think sales you can look at it like sales is kind of like dating, would you as somebody say, Hey, you know, let's go, let's go to the hotel are very good, whatever. Would you say that before you even got to know them? Or what?
John C. Morley: Give me your phone number. And we'll figure it out later.
Sheila Mac: Yeah, I mean, it's like you have to there's a certain level of connection that we need in just even in sales in communicating and caring. And when people feel that you care for them. And you care about the community in all the difference. Now, when I was 23, I opened gift stores, I Okay, and then I opened five, and I bought all the buildings in California, because it was so successful. But in that store, I trained everybody that worked for me, everybody that comes through the door is royalty, and everybody has to be me. When you work here, you're going to do what I would do. And so that was the thing. And I also helped over 200 kids that were emancipating from foster care; go through a job training program, the government worked with me on that. And we helped all these kids and the community felt it. And that's why I was able to buy the other buildings. Because it wasn't about selling stuff. It was like an extension of family. People felt safe there, they felt happy. Sometimes they bought a little thing for dollar, or they got free tea, and left. And other times they'd spent a lot of money, it didn't even matter. And it made all the difference.
John C. Morley: That's the difference between a personal store and big corporate America, they don't get the one on one, and they don't get the connection. And even though, you know virtual meetings are great, it doesn't replace us meeting in person. Energy is not the same. And so I think any kind of meeting you have, whether it's in person, whether it's online, I run a lot of networking functions. I have a model, and it's really simple. If you don't follow it, you're out. There are basically no hard sales allowed. Everyone's gonna be treated with respect. There are no drip campaigns and no auto email subscriptions. Should we find out that anyone has done that you'll be removed from the group permanently? You'd be surprised you'll a lot of people get angry about that. And I explained to them that we're not looking for 1000s of people on our group, we're looking for a high caliber of people. Now, I'm not saying this to be nasty or be a snob, but what I am saying is that I want to work with people that understand the level of integrity that I expect. And a lot of people don't want to do that, because they're just trying to push a sale. And I think that's how their company has trained them. And that's what's really wrong with America. They're just always out for that next sale, and they don't really care about you or I, or how we feel after we get the product. Well, you got the product, okay, you're done. I mean, there's a lot more that goes into it. After it happens. How many people do you know? Or how many realtors? Do you know that when they sell the house, I tell them to go get a bucket of either chicken or pizza, and bring the pizza, bring the food to them after the sale is close, and meet their family and say, Hey, you know what, how do you like your new home? Well, this is great. I want to come and have some pizza with you and sharing your home. Oh, this is wonderful. Listen, I have one request for you. The pizza and I also brought the kids ice cream. I have one request. And the request is that the next time you have somebody happened here that's moving, or if you're ever moving, which just given my name,
Sheila Mac: Makes all the difference. I actually somehow after the gift stores and during I got into real estate because the other owner wanted me to help them buy their own buildings as well. And I can like make a commission and save on commission and why not? So I got no, and I wasn't like they came to me because they trusted me. I wasn't trying to be a real estate agent at that time. I was, you know, like an investor more buying my own buildings are like, okay, fine, I'll help you. And it was interesting, because even though I had teams and I still have teams, and I teach an online course in real estate, believe it or not, and that's my other hat that I wear. And so with that I still have people that are like, No, but I want you to help me with the house or help me with buying tips or this and that. And I'm like, Well, I don't I have a whole team. But they still want to work with me in some respect or another. I'm like; I'm not even like marketing that right? So that they know that they're going to get they're going to be safe, they're not going to get sold on the most expensive house. There yet the house that fits their needs. And it's going to be the best or the commercial building. And they're going to get the best honest approach. It doesn't I don't care about the commission, you get to a point where I've really never did I care about the people, it's people first. And the Commission's show up, even when you're not even like marketing, you're doing something they're like, please.
John C. Morley: Okay, fine.
Sheila Mac: And so that happens. They just know it's coming from a heart space versus try to get what’s in your wallet and goodbye. How are you going to refer you wouldn't refer that real estate agent to somebody else.
John C. Morley: I love that. Because when you can talk about the heart, and you can talk about what I always say is beyond the sale after the sale, then you know, you've done a good job in our technology business all the time. You know, obviously we're calling to see other technologies working altos requirements earlier. Yeah. So how's the family doing? Yeah, it was good. And that kind of comes naturally. Because like I would call is like, everything's fine.
Sheila Mac: Okay.
John C. Morley: So that's the problem. I see. You know, I said, I think we fix things too well. And, you know, I think people today, a lot of them, like that trust, but then there are a lot of people, unfortunately, that are about the dollar, unfortunately. And they are about non loyalty. So I think in all industries, there is that tossup. And so especially now with like COVID, or something happening, I rather support my local places because you know, they need it. And you know, that's important with businesses going out every day. But I think it's just about caring about the people knowing not only that they care, and that you care, but also that you're going to give what I call value, and value is not money. Value is something else you're going to do for the client, where the perspective that no one else is going to do. And that's why somebody is going to connect and do business with you. One of the things I do with everyone is I offer them a 15 minute consult. And I give them a free few free tips on their LinkedIn. And I say look, this is what you should do this, you should do this. You should probably do this and I would change this color, does that make sense? Oh, yeah, that's great. Where do we go from here? I said, that’s it, huh? Okay. I said I have another appointment; I have to move on to. What do you mean? I said, well, we're not done. That's, yeah, it's a 15 minute consult. I just, well, no, I want to go further. I said, what do you need to hire? It's all I want to do they Okay, well book another time on our calendar, pick this by a time. So I don't even ask them for the sale. Sheila. I just said, well, this is what you should do. I would do this. If I was in your shoes, and I don't like that color. I would switch that what color when? I'm not sure. What can I call you back again, and then they want to keep calling you for 15 minutes. Woman, I need to hire us, like, you know, it's like the 15 minutes was, so you could kind of see what we're about and get some free tips, right? I think a lot of people, they you know, you want to go to a site, you want to put an email address in and I get it for an email list or a book. You know, so people could mark it the but I see sometimes if you could just get them to contact you, and you have a meeting with them. But then you don't bother them anymore, you just let them stay. And that's why after a meeting, I don't even follow up with them. If somebody wants to join my email list, that's fine. But I don't make people that want to come and meet with me join email lists, because I know a lot of people do that. And I feel that's like very cheap, because it's like, it's much shafted, where they know, I'm going to go after them. And they're going to have to buy something. And that's just not my approach. I just want people to get value. And you know, we do things like we do give away sometimes. And the only thing we ask is Hey; would you do us a favor? If you like what we did for you? Would you give us a testimonial?
Sheila Mac: Right. Now, john, you're in it. Also,
John C. Morley: I have an engineer who owns an IT company. Yes, Sheila.
Sheila Mac: Okay. So I have had, and I have so many friends that are coaches and authors and everything else that have hired it, companies for one way or another and have gotten burned in one way or another. And sometimes the people have great intentions, but then they hire out to some people in another country. And the work doesn't get done. Even though you think you're getting the people in front of you. It's not who's going to work with you. And so things fall by the wayside, and it happens, or the people just leave I you know, build a website or do something for you. And then they take off.
John C. Morley: They don't know. You know, I mean,
Sheila Mac: I learned Word Press; let me tell you, I built my own site because it was dropped. And I was like, Well, I guess I've got this. And I just like you, you have to learn something, you have to figure it out yourself. That's fine. I don't ever want to do it for full time work. Thank you very much. It's something that happens a lot. How can people that are listening in screen for that, especially those that are just starting a new business or maybe a side business, and they're investing their money in an interesting time? Where they want to make sure that investment gives them the results that they want?
John C. Morley: Answer your question about how do you know because I've been developing software for many years, and I know what you're talking about. And so the challenge comes in, I get somebody a quote, to do a website or to do something. So my marketing I my marketing company does, designs the websites, but a hires j more to do the back end, because the marketing company is not an IT company. But the client doesn't need to deal with that. It's just we did a website or customer thing back end. But here's what we do. We put together a scope of work. Okay, I also recommend that you not pay the people in full. This is what happens. Now somebody who wants to work with you won't suggest this, I usually say half a front half at the end. Or if it's a larger project, well, let's get a third. Now once we've done the first milestone, once we've shown this, let's get a third on this. And let's get a third on that at the end. So that's one good way. Another thing you can do is you could put the money into an escrow account. So it gets escrow in there usually a small fee. There online escrows. And what they do is they make sure you're satisfied before the money is fully released. But I think it comes down to understanding what you want. And that's communication. If somebody is trying to build a website for you, and try to get money out of you very quickly, that's a red flag. When I talk to somebody, like for example, we were developing an app for somebody who was patenting something. And we had a couple conversations I said, you know, go shop around, do whatever you'd like. And this is what we can do. This is our price tag. Well can you go any lower and like this is the best we can do. Oh, my friend could do it for this but then go get your friend. And then they showed us some work that their friend didn't they? So what do you think of the work? I said, Look, I'm not here to give you. I'm not here to criticize, okay. But from a professional standpoint, we're going to do differently. Well, what's wrong with it? Well, again, I'm not here to criticize what they did or your family member did their standards that are followed, and that didn't follow best practices. Well, what do you mean? Well, I don't think it's professional to get into it. Right. And so I think at the end of the day, Sheila, it comes down to, you know, talking to the people that are going to do the work for you. But again, not being in a rush when somebody is, for example, we're New Jersey, if somebody hired us from out of state, they might be a little bit nervous. But I say, look, this is what we've been doing. We've been doing this for x years, we have a national talk show, and we have a TV show in Princeton. So we've been around for a while. A lot of people don't have that. I tell people, look, you can call me anytime you want, you can call our office anytime you want. Here is my extension. When you dial my extension, you're going to get me during the week, it's a new concept. Whether I'm here whether I'm on my phone, you're actually going to get me. Wow. So yeah, that's something new. So we don't hide behind the phone, we call people back, I think to advise people is that they need to understand what they want. If they don't know what they want, then it comes down to something called consulting. If somebody has no clue when it's beyond a quote, and we have to figure out what they need, well, then you got to charge for that. And if somebody doesn't know, like, you know, I'm starting a new business. Well, what do I do? And there are obviously things we could do to help somebody, but then spending four hours on the phone with them, and then hiring someone else. So I think you have to know what you want. Do you want a website? Do you want a VPN? I mean, what are you trying to accomplish? And then getting an understanding of what are you getting? So we build custom PCs, but we also use name brand PCs, and knowing that you got a warranty so that if something happens with that company, do you have coverage, we use one no all the time. They're one of the highest and the lowest break rate the industries, but I make sure the customer knows look and click on this icon you see over there, it shows five year warranty. That's what you paid for. You got a five year warranty, not just with us, but with Lenovo directly. You can call them that you can always call us, but you have a direct warranty with them. And that number. A lot of people play games, they play game shield with licenses. Where we actually lost a client many years ago, we were doing great work. And the guy said, well, your competitor can actually do it for $500 less. Okay, I said, well, $500 is the cost of the license. Yeah, he's making it disappear. Yeah, we'll get we'll give you like 50 bucks, and you can do whatever you want with them like, well, that's illegal. So we're not going to operate like that. So a lot of these places that you've dealt with, if you deal with some place overseas, that's, that's a red flag right away. And if you can't get them on the phone, and you can't physically hear them, which are another red flag. Where they say, gee, you know, Whats App, us, or, you know, you need to text us. That's another red flag. Okay, I never tell people I don't want to use WhatsApp at all. No, oh, yeah, just WhatsApp, us. And then we go back and forth. And, and WhatsApp is not secure. By the way I like telegram. And if you send messages from iPhone, iPhone, you have to make sure I messages enable. But the moral of the story is how you can make sure that you're getting a good company, as you'll ask questions, are you insured? So we're short asked them how much you're insured for Who are you insured with? How long have you been with that company? If you're with a company for x years, do you have workman's compensation? Who is your workman's compensation through? Nobody thinks to ask these questions? So you've done work up? What other websites have you done? What can you share with me? What are their work? Can you share with me? What's the standard timeframe on this project? Things like that. What are you doing? What happens at the end of the year? Who owns the name all kinds of things like this? And I find that a lot of these companies, they play game Sheila, and then people have the surprise back in? Oh, that's gonna be $1,000. Why? Oh, big? Because if that's the fee that comes up, well, you never say anything about it before? No, no, it just something you have to pay. Everybody does it. And they don't explain it. So I think it's about communicating Sheila and knowing what they're getting involved with. So, again, a website of different systems are out there, but just knowing what they're trying to achieve and accomplish. And that's the first goal and if you don't know what you're trying to accomplish, then you need to consult because if you don't even know what you want, you may know you want a website, which is fine. But if you didn't even know what you want, or even in the world of social media always says oh gee. I can get this company to my post for $39 a month. I said, that’s not us. And they're overseas, and now they have access to your social media said, Oh, that's just that's just that's terrible, right? That is that is terrible. And, you know, when you see accounts, and they go on these other platforms, somebody's gonna mention, and then their accounts get blocked. And you don't want to go on these platforms, oh, well, we don't allow you to use a phone number, you cannot communicate with your partner, you could only do things through text, and you don't want to work with companies like that. So I think what people need to understand is, yes, they're going to pay a little more money for US company. And that is warranted. But to avoid a kind of challenges, ask some questions, and at the people are rushing you to do something, or, you know, you don't feel right back off. You know, ask some questions, like, you know, how is this gonna work? Or what do I do later on? What if I grow? Is it gonna be scalable? Oh, no, it's not gonna be scalable, that's gonna be another 10,000. So you have to ask these questions upfront. And if you could do that, then you're at least halfway there. But I think there are no 100 questions you can ask. It's just doing your knowledge about feeling comfortable, and really just feeling comfortable about the company, what they've done, see some of their projects, and you know, asking some intelligent questions. And if somebody has to give you an answer, if somebody tells you, hey, it's gonna be my power went out or something? That's the common question, oh, my power went out, we're gonna have to have a meeting and that they want to have meetings with you like another time zone, not three hours behind her head. You're not working with a ripple company? Oh, we're gonna talk to you at 3am in the morning.
Sheila Mac: Oh, yeah.
John C. Morley: This is the problem. But when you get those companies and they're working for $10 a day, you think you're getting this great deal. But if they suddenly have access to your bank account, or all that information, you don't want to do that. And you don't want their information to be in there. And also, a last thing I want to tell you are that there are big attacks now coming from Russia and China, as you may be aware, and people are getting, we've had hundreds of these coming in. And we've had to change IPS like crazy. All because China and Russia decides they want to try to attack a site. Now they're not getting in, but we still detect them. And they have nothing better to do with their time than keep buying IP addresses that are overseas, and there are no rules over there. So we must have literally blocked about 200 IP ranges now, not one dress an entire block. And so they have nothing better to do with their time. They're just trying to hack into something because they think it's gonna be worth it. We had a medical company just last week, and we flagged the company that was doing business with us a medical company saying, hey, john, we can't get to the billing set. I'm like, I know what, and we’ll fix it. I said, we can't because the company you're using has a certificate, that's not valid. Well, we'll just fix it. So it works. I said, so you're asking me to lie to the firewall to tell it, its okay. Yeah, just put us in. Okay, so here's what we're gonna need from you. We're gonna need a letter signed, stating that you agree that you want us to go against the firewall policies we've set up to allow this certificate to masquerade as something else, and you release us from liability, sign that and fax it back. We're not going to do that like that, then we talk with a third party company, and they're like, Oh, you know, it's not really a problem. Like, yeah, it is. I said, let me let you know that it's a $20,000 fine, per violation, and you could be brought up and my client could be brought up, and I could tell you something, they're probably going to sue you. Hmm. Okay, we're gonna research this as well. Let me tell you this. If it's not fixed within the next two weeks, I'm going to personally recommend that they leave your services. Okay, well, don't get so excited. Because, you know, we want to keep everyone happy. I understand. But I also don't want a lot of smoke and mirrors here. I want to fix. Alright, um, we can tell you how to fix it. How do I fix it? Well, what modifier? Well, we know what you're going to tell me is had a band aid on it. So it works is that that's not fixing it. Yeah. And so I think that's the problem. Even big public insurance company are doing this. So we don't trust I have something called zero trust when it comes to technology. I don't trust anyone except us.
Sheila Mac: That makes a lot of sense. So now we are coming to the end of our talking time. So I'd like to ask you how people can connect with you and learn more about your companies and all you're doing.
John C. Morley: That'd be great. So the easiest way to connect with me is gonna be on LinkedIn. You can actually just go to linkedin.com forward slash n forward slash John, the letter C m o r le y IV. That's one of the best ways One of my websites and also you can check out my show there is J mo are calm and under associated see all the shows that I do for a marketing company, it's our pre connection, that's Oh, you are pre-connection calm. And the last thing I would tell you to check out is my national network, which is on YouTube, envisions networking, two words. And every week, I publish a science experiment of how to network and just kind of giving people tips like the rubber band. We actually have a hard-boiled egg coming up later this week, but I will get that out of the bag. So we try to spend a lot of time putting together things that are going to be like, that's interesting. And that's what I really want to do. I want to create those aha moments, and maybe one of them will go viral. Who knows?
Sheila Mac: Hmm, sounds great.
John C. Morley: All right.
Sheila Mac: Well, thank you again for being a guest on the show. And if you are listening in we'll be back after these messages. All right, if you're just tuning in, this is the Sheila Mac show on NVC's KCAA radio the station that leaves no listener behind. And I would like to invite you to get started if you are looking to reinvent, rebuild and reboot your business and personal life. And just want to start with the guidebook. Get bootstraps and bra straps the formula to go from rock bottom back into action in any situation. It is a great beginning guide to start getting back on track and rebuilding and rebooting your business this year. It is available at Amazon audible Kindle and sheilamac.com. Also, if you'd like to go a little bit deeper in your business reboot, sign up for the business leader reboot course at Sheila mack.com. That is if you want to lead your team or your company to even more success. I help you using the boots formula and my years of experience in business so that you can quickly and easily have even more success. Go to sheilamac.com and under courses look for business leader reboot.
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