The Jody Maberry Show

Here is one thing you need to know about getting big work done; It is all about influence. Many people think if you work hard you can make things happen. They are only about 10% correct. The work you do account for about 10% of making something happen. The right opportunity accounts for about 20% of making something big happen. Influence is 70% responsible for getting big work done. Yet, many people focus intently on the work they do. They put 90% of their effort into something that will only account for 10% of the results. People with more experience understand this concept enough; they focus more on finding the right opportunities. Sure, things can happen when you find the right opportunity, but big things happen because of influence. Once you understand the importance of influence, and you know what to do about it, you can begin getting big work done. If you want to go deeper in a discussion about Influence, CLICK HERE to sign up for a series of emails all about influence. Thank you to Paul Johnson, host of the God Zone Show, for the review on iTunes.

This episode we are going to take a close look at telling a story with Joe Sindorf. I discovered Joe when I interviewed him for Great Escape Radio. Doing research before the interview, I admit I was impressed with his record of telling great stories. Better yet, telling great stories people were noticing and paying attention to. Joe has won an Emmy and a Peabody award. But it got better. After our interview for Great Escape, I liked him so much I asked him if he would also do an interview for The Jody Maberry Show. I knew you could learn a lot from Joe about storytelling. During the interview, Joe suggests the elements of a great story are simply a beginning, a middle, and an end. That has to be in place to build a great story. Along with the great insights on storytelling, Joe reminds us we need something bigger than our work to be proud of. Joe Sindorf's website - JosephSindorf.com Joe Sindorf on Twitter - @joesindorf

One of the wonderful opportunities I have is to host podcasts for other people. Shows like Creating Disney Magic with Lee Cockerell, Catalyst Sale with Mike Simmons and Mike Conner, Great Escape Radio with Lori Allen. There are more shows, I just listed a couple as an illustration. Because of the work I do, I am often asked a question like this "Why should I have a co-host on my podcast". Or, "What value does it add to my show to have a co-host". People like Jeff Goins and Ken Davis, who would certainly do a great show on their own, use a co-host format. A few popular podcasts used to be solo based shows and now use a cohost. Michael Hyatt did 100 episodes, I believe of his show This is Your Life before he changed formats and added a co-host. The Ray Edwards Show is one of my favorite business podcasts. Ray used to do the show solo and added his son, Sean Edwards, as a co-host. Here are the five reasons you should consider having a c0-host for your podcast; You will build an on-air rapport with the co-host you just won't have on a monolog based show. When you have a co-host, the show move from a presentation to a conversation. Having another person on the show encourages you to go deeper with your content. You do not have to carry the workload by yourself. A Co-host will sharpen your In-Front-of-People persona.

On the Jody Maberry Show, we often talk about marketing and branding on this show, but you may be surprised to know the best lesson I learned about branding came on a sheet of ice. Now, you know some top marketers have been on this show. Ray Edwards and Mike Kim understand branding like no one I know. But they have nothing on Homejuice. What is a homejuice is what you just thought? Right. Who is Homejuice is the better question. In this episode, I share a story about a boyhood friend called Homejuice to illustrate a simple, but powerful lesson about branding.

Kary Oberbrunner returns to the show to talk about his new book, The Elixir Project. After writing several non-fiction books, Kary wrote a young adult fiction thriller. It was a risk to move from traditionally published non-fiction books to write a fiction story. In this episode, Kary will discuss the story behind The Elixir Project, what you can learn from the book and how he is offering a way for people to go deeper after reading the book. Take the Hackability Assessment HERE. Sign up for the Elixir Project Webinar HERE. Get the Elixir Project book HERE. Connect with Kary on Twitter. Listen to Kary's first appearance on the Jody Maberry Show.

If you took a flight anytime during 2016, you understand how much of a pain in the neck it has become to fly. Some airports are much better than others, but my home airport in Seattle has terribly long lines to get through security. Sometimes you have to get there two hours ahead of time and barely make your flight, but other times you can zip through security and spend two hours waiting to board your flight. I thought I would apply for TSA pre-check to eliminate the process. Do you know TSA-Precheck? You go through a back ground check and what not, pay $85, and in return, you do not have to wait in the long lines at the airport. You begin with an online application. The second part of the process requires you to be in person at one of the screening locations. Since I live in a remote area, it took me two hours to get to a location to get the back ground check. I had an awkward experience during the TSA Precheck process, which is the basis for this episode. There is no excuse for a customer having an awkward experience with you. You should know the exact experience your customer is going through. The only way to truly know what your customer experiences is to have the experience of your customer. You have to know what it is like to do business with yourself. You may feel your training has been effective. Or your policies and procedures are working just fine, but you never know how it looks and feels from the customer's side of the counter until you have stood there yourself. And things you may not think are a big deal, can certainly turn out to be a big deal. So I had to stand awkwardly at the counter for a couple of minutes before anyone acknowledged me, even though there was someone right there at the desk. No big deal, right? The lady who helped me had an attitude like I was an inconvenience. In the big picture, does this really matter? Maybe the bathroom is dirty, or you hung up a paper sign three weeks ago, and it is all tattered and beaten up now. Does it matter? All of these things matter. But this also takes me to a third aspect; we have talked big business, we have talked small business, but what if you are so small, you are the business. This is the case with me. I am the business, I am the one who hosts podcasts, writes copy, or does the consulting. People are working directly with me, so how can I find out what it is like to do business with me? Even if I asked my next door neighbor or my cousin to work with me and tell me about the experience, I would likely treat them differently and make sure I did everything the best I could. So how do you handle it? For starters, treat everyone like they are your friend, neighbor, or cousin when you do business with them. Everyone is important, and if you act as such, you will not have many problems, unless they ask to sleep on your couch. The other thing you do is ask for feedback. And be open to feedback. Here are the three things I want you to remember from this episode about improving customer service and experience; You are never as good as you think you are. You have to find out the truth. Remember, people remember the way you made them feel long after they forget the work you actually did. Just ask.

Some stories never die. One of those stories for me has been about an incident with a squirrel from my time as a park ranger. Usually, episodes of the Jody Maberry Show are filled with ideas, advice, and content you can take action on in business. This episode I want to just have a little fun. Is that OK? You won't get much advice in this episode, but you will get a good story. I spent 8 years as a park ranger. As a ranger, you see so much. Most of it wonderful, some it awful, and some of it bizarre. And park rangers love to tell stories. Early in my ranger career, there was one incident that happened that labeled me the rest of my career. In the years since this incident happened, I have been asked to tell the story hundreds of times. It is what I imagine it must be like being a musician and having one hit song everyone wants to hear. Everyone wanted to hear the squirrel story. Jason Harrod provided the music you hear during the story portion of this episode. Next episode I will be back with content to help you market, mobilize, and master your message. For now, be careful of those squirrels. If have a podcast, download my best ideas about building a profitable podcast.

One thing I have run into, mostly working with personal brands, people like myself whos business is built around the person running the business, is the reluctance to offer content for free. Some people are worried about giving away too much. The thought there is that you might be giving away something you could have charged money for. The other concern is the work it takes to create content, and just give it away is wasted time. It is time you could have used to create something that would bring income. Both of those ideas are wrong. At least in my experience they are wrong. Not giving content away for free will likely have the exact opposite impact you expect it would if you are holding back so you can get paid for your work. Here are five reasons you should give away content for free; You have to give a lot of value before you ask someone to spend money with you. People can sample you before they buy you. You are playing the long game. As Ray said, over time people come to know, like, and trust you. You will have a bigger reach. If your reach were only people who bought from you, you would not be getting your message out to many people. Offering content for free allows you to discover what connects with people and why. All of five of those reasons funnel into something Ray Edwards told us, Serve First, Profit Later. Let me tell you one example I have seen of this in action. Sure, you may know some of the names Ray mentioned like Dan Miller, Michael Hyatt, or Jeff Goins. Maybe you don't know them, but in internet entrepreneurial world, they are well known. But this idea works with the little guys too. Take Todd Smith. I host the Agents in Action podcast with Todd Smith. Todd put out high-quality actionable content twice a month on the Agents in Action for many months before he ever asked the listeners to purchase anything from him. Finally, he put together some live workshops for Realtors in the Dallas area where he is from. Like most of us, Todd had a bit of fear his workshops would be a flop. But as entrepreneurs must do, Todd moved forward anyway. And what happened? His workshops sold out. Why did they sell out? Is it because Todd is a nice guy. No. Todd is a nice guy, but people didn't show up to give him a hug. Did his workshops sell out because he has 25 years experience as a high performing Realtor? No. That helped, but it is not why people paid money to attend his workshop. The workshops sold out because Todd had been giving away bonafide content on every episode of his podcast. People who listened to the podcast knew how good he was. They had a free sample and knew what he offered was worth paying for. The concept of giving stuff away for free does not just apply to Ray Edwards. It applies to you. And it applies to Todd Smith. And it applies to me, which is one of the reasons I do this show. So maybe the secret is out. I do this show so I can serve you. So you will know me and like me. And perhaps someday, you may want to learn more from me in a manner that goes beyond listen to me talk on a podcast. But if you don't, if you just enjoy hearing me talk, that is fine too. If you find value in this podcast, but never pay me a dollar for anything, that will still make me happy. That is how this works. You have to decide to give no matter what you get back. And how does this work for you if you are not a personal brand or a business driven by a personality? What if you are a physical store? The principle is the same. Find some extra way to give and serve. If you are a chiropractor, offer education in a newsletter, podcast, or a blog. A local example for me comes from one of the hardware stores; they put on classes teaching kids how to build stuff. The class and the materials didn't cost anything for the kids. And of course a parent came along with the kid, and when the time comes, it is the parent who is going to decide to shop at the hardware store and spend money because their kid learned to build a birdhouse there. My last word on this, if people find value in your free stuff, what impression will that leave for your paid content?

It is possible to get too comfortable in business. I was reminded of that on a recent shopping trip. It is the season to shop, and I recently visited three stores that left an impression on me. 'First, was the Disney Store. Have you ever been to a Disney store? It is everything you would expect. It is a magical place. Of course, what they sell is outstanding, but it is bigger than that. The displays, the cast members, the layout of the store are all wonderful. Every detail of a Disney store leads to you having a great experience, and hopefully spending money while you are there. You may not be able to have products that are as magical of what is on the shelf at a Disney store, but you can pay attention to everything else they do. Find the Disney store closest to you and spend some time there. Don't go there to buy anything, just watch. Watch how people flow through the store. Watch how customers interact with displays, products, and cast members. You can learn a lot spending an hour in a Disney store. Next stop was the Lego store. This was an impressive experience too. Just like walking into a Disney store, you feel like you walking into a special place. They are doing a lot of things right in the Lego Store, too. You can always find an employee. There are more working than you would expect in a store that size, and they are easily identifiable in their bright yellow aprons. There are built Lego sets to look at, there are loose legos to touch, there are some lego sets exclusive to Lego stores. Plus, there is even an interactive display where you hold a Lego box up towards a screen, and right in front of you, the Lego box is instantly built on the screen. There is one thing that really impressed me at the Lego store, though. That was the shelves. They were never empty. If a customer took a box off the shelf to purchase, an employee immediately went into the back, grabbed a new box of the Lego set and put it on the shelf. I don't know they reason behind this, but it gave the impression that they had everything you wanted. I ever saw when one Lego set sold out; they did not leave the space empty. An employee immediately rearranged the displays on the shelf, so the spot that was empty a moment ago was now full of lego boxes. Within a couple of minutes, there was no trace of the lego set that sold out. Everything they did in that store gave the sense of an abundance of Legos. My third experience was even more memorable, not because of the store, which was nice, but because of something an employee said to me. The third stop was Sierra Trading Post. At Sierra, I tried on a pair of dress boots. Once the boot was tied, I stood up and was immediately poked on the heel by something. I took the boot off and, I know this was not my best idea of the day, I stuck my thumb in the boot to see what poked me. Well, it was a nail sticking up from the sole of the boot, and now not only did I have a puncture in my foot, but I also had one in my thumb as well. Not wanting this to happen to someone else to that pretty size 11 boot, I told one of the workers. I showed him the boot and then he went on to open every box of those boots and check every single boot to make sure no other pairs had that problem. While he did that, I was still browsing shoes, and we talked for a bit. He told me he had a nail come up through his boot once and poke him in the foot. The difference between his story and mine is he is a Marine. He was on one of those long marches Marines do. In the middle of the march, the nail came up from the sole of his boot to poke his foot. I asked him what he did about it. He said nothing. I am a Marine. Pain is just weakness leaving your body. I lost a lot of weakness that day. How incredible is that? I am a park ranger, but I would have sat down and tried to fix my boot. But this Marine kept on marching. I thought about the marine the whole way home. Especially what he said about pain is weakness leaving your body. I had never thought of it this way. But I can also apply it to business. The pain you feel in business is helping you get rid of weakness. The pain can come from stretching beyond what you are comfortable with. Pain can be doing something you have never done before. Pain can be rejecting "we have always done it that way." Pain is making mistakes. Pain was apologizing to a customer when you didn't perform the way you should have. All of this pain is weakness leaving your business. If you are not experiencing the pain and instead focusing on your comfort, you are being left behind. If you are comfortable, you are being left behind. Think of the Marine who I talked to at Sierra Trading Post, when the nail from his boot was poking his foot he felt pain. He could have stopped to fix his boot and felt comfort, but all of the other Marines would have left him behind. So think about the pain you feel in your business. Is it a sign of growth? Is it an indicator you need to do something different? You should worry if you aren't feeling pain because you are being left behind.

You can look great on camera every time. Not long ago, I did not know this. I thought you stood in front of the camera and hoped the photos turned out in the end. Early in the year, I had a photo shoot. It didn't turn out real well. I wasn't comfortable using any of the photos on my website. Yet, I still needed photos, so I scheduled another photo shoot. Luckily, between the first and second shoot I met Val Brown. Val Brown is an Emmy award winning producer. She has been preparing people to appear on television for more than 30 years. I was fortunate to work with Val before my second photo shoot because she set me up to improve on the first photo shoot, the one where I did not do so good. Now, we are both fortunate to have the opportunity to sit down today with Val Brown. I want to walk through the process Val and I went through to prepare me for the photo shoot. I know you are going to learn plenty from Val, so let's get to work. In this episode, Val Brown will walk you through the process we went through to prepare me for a photo shoot. After listening, you will realize you can look great on camera every time. If you want to learn more, don't miss out on more tips from Val. To get Val's guide, How to Prepare for Your Next Photo Shoot, just click HERE.