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The Transparent Podcast
The Transparent Podcast
Jordan Agolli - Dreams, Marketing, and Entrepreneurship
Dive into the world of entrepreneurship with Jordan Agolli, the founder of Force Media, a full-service marketing agency specializing in various industries. In this insightful episode, Jordan shares his personal journey from a teenage entrepreneur to the leader of a thriving business, bringing invaluable lessons on resilience, teamwork, and the importance of transparency in client relationships.
Jordan emphasizes the role of grit and tenacity in overcoming challenges and scaling a business. He provides a candid look at the financial strategies he employed early on and the growth pains he faced. He illustrates how collaboration among team members results in better decision-making and nurtures a healthy company culture.
Listeners will discover how honesty and transparency are not merely ethical choices but strategic business advantages, leading to stronger client relationships and sustainable growth. With a focus on personal well-being, Jordan encourages aspiring entrepreneurs to prioritize mental and physical health as they navigate their paths.
This episode has actionable insights for anyone interested in entrepreneurship or those looking to enhance their business strategies. Tune in to learn how to create a prosperous business while maintaining authentic connections and a clear vision for success. Don't forget to subscribe, share, and leave a review to support the show!
Hi, my name is Nick Ford and I am the host of the Transparent Podcast, where we believe in bringing transparency to the world of small business. Today, I'm joined by Jordan Jordan. I'll let you introduce yourself, Nick.
Speaker 2:Thank you so much for having me today. I'm excited to talk. Hey everybody. My name is Jordan Ngole. I am the founder of Force Media. We are a full-service marketing agency. Jordan Ngole, I am the founder of Force Media. We are a full-service marketing agency. We work with brands in the healthcare industry, in the home services industry and in automotive as well Not just limited to that, but those are the main areas we work in. We do full-service video production commercials, branding, videos, everything in between, social media management, email marketing, graphic design and really anything that companies need to help grow their business. And then, outside of Running Force Media, I emcee and host a lot of events and have my own podcast as well. So happy to be here, Nick, Looking forward to talking.
Speaker 1:Yeah, very excited to have you on the podcast. I'm sure I could learn a lot from you about just podcasting in general here. But yeah, my name is Nick Ford.
Speaker 1:I own Transparent Staffing and, similar to the theme for the podcast, I'm a big fan of transparency. I think. To me, that just means being open, honest, having clear communication with people, and that is why I started Transparent Staffing. I wanted to bring transparency to the staffing industry and for me, that has led to a lot of success with how I work with people. I think it's led to good business relationships because from the first conversation I have with people, I'm very direct, very open with how I work, how I expect things to be in a business relationship kind of delivering clear expectations to the people I work with and that's led to good, you know, success in staffing just because the more people can know about a job before they can get into it, the less surprises there are, and people's greatest fear is the fear of the unknown, so if they can get as much information as possible in the front end, it helps a lot.
Speaker 1:So, started back in January 2021, and still going strong. But how did you get into? I'm curious how you got into media. It's something that I'm not super familiar with, haven't had a lot of experience in, so I'm excited to learn from you.
Speaker 2:Yeah, man, absolutely. And I definitely want to talk about the transparency later as well, because that's really important to me too, and I appreciate it and respect that you made that a foundational tenet of your company. Man, if you would have told me 15 years ago that I would have this agency today, I would have laughed at you and said, not a chance. I had no interest in creativity or storytelling or anything like that. I come from an entrepreneurial family. My dad's a doctor. Everybody just had businesses. Growing up, I thought everyone's parents had a business. You go to work with mom and dad after school, and so I just always had that entrepreneurial spirit. And I got started marketing when I was a teenager for my pressure washing and landscaping business with my best friend. I ran my first Facebook ad when I was 15. We started getting business from it and I was not some marketing savant that there's this genius. I just literally liked social media. I saw that you could run an ad. I put it up. That was that, and through that, I ended up discovering podcasting in 2013.
Speaker 2:I bought an online course called Podcasters Paradise, created my own podcast called Teenage Entrepreneur, where I would interview business owners and tell their story from their childhood and birth all the way up to how they built their business, cause I saw a big disconnect that you have all these business owners talking about all their success but people really struggled to understand how they built it and for it just personally. For me it was kind of a selfish act of like, hey, I just want to learn how all these other business owners did it along the way and then maybe I can reverse engineer it and figure it out and spoiler. It worked. I did learn how they did businesses and so podcast is still out there. We did 80 episodes and, man, I learned about storytelling, interviewing, media production. I grew my thought, my podcast through Facebook and Instagram ads and then, man, I joined a marketing agency for a couple years.
Speaker 2:After that, learned a ton about marketing and web design and kind of everything you could about the internet. And frankly, man, I how could I say this properly without getting myself in trouble? I caught them doing things that lack transparency. I caught them doing wrong things with finances and there was a toxic work environment and I said you know what I'm out of this thing, I'm going to go start force media and at that time, man, all it was was just a podcast production agency and marketing consulting. I was about two to four years too early on the podcast bubble. Nobody in 2016, one of the podcasts for their business. Which thing? You just hear that sentence. Say it out loud no one was interested in podcasting for business.
Speaker 2:Now it's everything Multi-billion dollar market, and I was struggling to make money and I had an orthodontist client ask me if I could make a video for him some patient testimonial videos and I said you know what? I don't know how to make videos, but give me a month or two. I bought a camera and some lights and I just started offering free patient testimonial videos to every doctor that would take me in exchange for looking at their marketing. And so video ended up becoming a lead gen tool to get me in the door for all these businesses, because my videos were not good but my marketing skills were. And long story short, man, over the next six, seven years, that's what I built up, and each year we'd add on a new service. A client would ask me hey, can you do this? And I'd say no, but I can figure it out for you. And that's what we built in today Five full-time employees, we've got a studio and office here in.
Speaker 2:Atlanta, georgia and great clients all over the country.
Speaker 1:That's an amazing story. I love that you had the exposure from a young age to the entrepreneurial itch because your family was into it and, like you even said, that's just what you grew up with and what you expected everyone kind of was exposed to, which is great.
Speaker 2:I hit the parent lottery. I just told my parents this last week I'm so grateful for them, had an amazing childhood and I am exactly where I should be Like for everything I've been given. I feel like this is exactly how hard I should be working and this is what I'm expected to give back to society. And that's no pressure from my parents, that's just pressure I put on myself that I think is important.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and similar to me, similar for me. My granddad owned a large insurance company in Texas called Lone Star Life Insurance. He ran that successfully, grew it to be over 300 employees by the time. He exited and sold that business and so and my parent, my dad was a Delta pilot, so he wasn't an entrepreneur, but he was a investor and very successful investing, and a lot of that came from my grandfather teaching my parents, you know, investing strategy, and then my grandparents and my, my parents, taught me investing strategy and so, you know, beyond the transparent staffing and that level of entrepreneurship, I love investing too in the stock market and real estate and things like that.
Speaker 1:And so I think the one of the outside of my relationship with God, which is the best thing that instilled in me, but in seconds of that is understanding money and finances, because I have a we go to. I go down a rabbit hole with that, but I just really feel like people in high school really need to be educated better on personal finances and how to, how to, how to understand money, because that's something so many people obviously struggle with. But that was you was like I said. I just thank my parents and my granddad so much because they equipped me with that and that's why I'm able to work for myself now and could take that risk to go out into the great unknown of entrepreneurship, which is not for everybody. But I want to inspire more people.
Speaker 2:We both hit the lottery there.
Speaker 1:It sounds good. Oh yeah, we both hit the lottery there. It sounds, oh yeah. Oh yeah, we both hit the lottery, for sure. And there's so many resources out there, um, like this podcast or books and things that you can read to learn more about entrepreneurship and things like that. Yeah, but, uh, you know, as far as the the business side of things, tell me, take me back a little bit. How long ago did you start force media? How long have you been doing it full time and that kind of thing?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I started force media January of 2016. And so we've been business full time nine years and I, I mean I've been full time, uh, every time, every, every year. Since then, like it's always been full time, I've worked awesome. Let's see the first year I did. I did Uber and Lyft on the side and trivia hosting on the side for extra income, and then, really from 2017 on, I haven't had a side job but and I say that I mean I- feel like I've worked every job in the business, so they're all side jobs technically under one company.
Speaker 1:You wear all the hats anyway, but All of them man team members and things like that. So yeah, that's. I just was talking to my business partner this morning about just all the different stuff I have to deal with outside of, just like the things I want to do in the business. Like right now I'm doing a lot of administrative things I really, really wish I could pass off to somebody else, but I just don't have that option yet. But we'll get there as we scale.
Speaker 1:But you know, one of the things that a friend of mine he gave me advice on in the business world he was a executive minister. He was talking about how he implements things in the ministry world. But he was saying in an organizational level that a B plus idea that you can come together with your team to form and implement is actually better than an A plus idea that you come up with alone and try to implement alone. So I'm curious to get yourplus idea that you come up with alone and try to implement alone. So I'm curious to get your take on that. You've got I think you have a team now you've got some people that you have to work with. How do you view that? Do you think it's better to just say, hey, this is what we're doing, or like kind of take a team approach into decision-making.
Speaker 2:Great question, absolutely Team approach. And I think and I'm just going to speak for my industry right now you know I my best skill on my team is marketing strategy and operations. I have this this is not a joke, actually but when I die I wanted to say my tombstone Jordan, he got the job done. A goalie, that's what I care about. Like, I want to be known as the guy that helps bring it across the finish line and so, but when it comes to creating concepts and working at a high level of creativity, I'm not the best guy and I really would not have my business where it is today without my team. So when we, when we have something new come to us, I regularly consult all my team members. Now, sometimes I know what the best decision is for the company just because I've been in it for so long, but I will regularly change my opinion and my thought process on something if my team members can justify why they feel the way it is. But I want them. I also am not just going to be like, oh, you want it this way so we can do it now. No, no, no. Tell me why you think this is, justify it and let's come to a conclusion together.
Speaker 2:I strongly agree that the collaborative team approach and, on that note, owners that run their business like tyrants that just control everything, lose people, burn out and it just doesn't go well. I want to have the company where, if I call my staff after hours or I need something on the weekend, they'll actually get back to me because they want to, not out of fear or like they're going to lose their job, but like actually genuinely because they're invested and they care about our clients. And it's not always going to work that way, but it's a balance. I feel like sometimes business owners think oh, you work for me, I pay you money, so I own you. No, no, it's not that way at all. Everyone's human beings too. It's all about respect and I think if you give it, you can receive it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I couldn't agree more. I think that's the attitude of just telling someone that they have to do what you say because you're paying them, is just never going to go super well. Obviously, obviously, there's a level of if it gets down to the wire and you're having to make a executive decision on something that does have at some point have to be respected. But you really want to get people invested in, in in the mission and the vision and what you're working toward and get them to be on your team. You know, working toward that same goal. That's the only way to really get people to be invested and, uh, you know, want to treat your business as an entrepreneur.
Speaker 1:It's very hard to get people invested the same way you are, you know, like shedding the blood, sweat and tears that you which, that you would, and so that's. That's something I have to learn. You know Matt is he's doing an incredible job. He came on in November as my vice president of recruiting and sales and he's crushing it. But he doesn't do things the exact way I would do it, which most of the time. I say 85% of the time. That's a good thing, because he's doing it. He's finding a better way to do it than I would have done it.
Speaker 2:It's weird though, isn't it? I know what you mean. It's a weird feeling because you've got to kind of manage it and people, because it's your brand and culture and you just got to let them man. I'll give okay random example.
Speaker 2:We have a big project with a very big client for ours right now and we're trying to get to the finish line. We had to go back to their headquarters to get one simple video shot and I couldn't make it that day, so I sent one of my team members, deanna, and she came back and she told me about the compliment that the CEO gave her and this is an intimidating guy and he took her in her office and he complimented her, and in that moment, nick, that compliment never would have happened if I was there, because I had the relationship and he got to tell her directly, and it boosted her confidence and it really opened my eyes as an owner. Not that I want to be absentee and not on site all the time, but, like giving people the chance to learn and grow and even make a mistake on their own, um, they could also thrive, and so I I am very vigilant about controlling our brand and culture, uh and so it's it's.
Speaker 2:It's a learning process for me too, as I grow as a leader.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's delegation is never, uh, easy. I don't think you know this. We brought on a new client back in November. Right the first week that Matt started, we met with this new client to kind of onboard them. And I had to kind of decide am I going to let him just run this client or am I going to be involved and be the kind of point of contact for them? And I decided to just let him run with it and he's been out of recruiting for a while. So it made me a little bit nervous. How much am I going to have to be coaching him? How much am I taking a risk by letting him completely run? Point on it.
Speaker 1:And that HR director did not want to work with us at first. Her owner told her to take the meeting with us and she asked us in that first meeting do you have logistics experience? This is a very niche, the very specific market, know specific market I've been in. She was like you know, I've been in this market for 15 years. If you don't know it, it's not going to be very hard for you. She was kind of trying to sell us out of working with them and I kind of overcame that and you know, we talked through things and I kind of told her you know it's, we can learn the industry and we do an active search on every position. Anyway, we're going to be actively looking for new candidates. We're not just mining a database of resumes. We're going to be out like headhunting, old school headhunting, like we're going to be contacting people.
Speaker 1:And so she, you know, kind of got on board and then, like within a month, matt had made a placement with them with very hard. She told us in the first meeting if you can fill this job, we will roll out the red carpet for you, cause the what had happened was this company that we're working with had acquired another logistics business and the owner was holding on tight to his book of business. He did not want to let it go. So they were trying, they needed an account executive to take over this guy's business so that he they could face kind of phase him out and let him move into a different role at not just handling his book of business. And he had gotten 12, 13 people to the final interview and declined them. And so she was like, if you can fill this job and convince this guy to hire somebody, that is a good fit, with the right experience, we will roll out the red carpet and within a month, after they had been trying to fill it for six months, we filled it.
Speaker 1:And so then she was. She told Matt which I've not had a lot of contact with them since then the client, she told Matt, you're the best recruiter I've ever worked with, like within a month. And he's like I've been out of recruiting for seven years and she's you know, this is how well we're able to do for them. And so that's just such a great testimonial to Matt, but also to just, you know, being willing to learn, being willing to just take on a challenge, because that was a difficult, that was a difficult role to fill, but now they're trusting us with more business, that's, you know more in our sweet spot of how we, how we work and stuff.
Speaker 1:So but for you, you know, you're a little bit further down the road. You have I think you mentioned you had four or five team, team members that are working with you at force media. How do you handle scaling challenges as far as like bringing on new clients, and how you scale and grow, while you know, for me it's just I'm doing the baby steps of getting out of just being a single operator. How have you been able to handle that and implement new systems to be able to scale?
Speaker 2:Probably one of the most challenging and anxiety ridden things that I've dealt with is the financial side of the business. You know, I have had one business partner before not in Force Media but with another business and it ended very poorly and it left me with a sour taste in my mouth and so I made a goal of keep it 100% ownership under me. So a few things. To start the business, I took out a loan from PayPal and maxed out the credit card from Amex in the first two years of the business, so that was like $60,000 right there that I used to front everything and then help pay it off over time Uh, which, by the way, people listening don't do that. You know, be smarter with your money.
Speaker 2:My accountant yelled at me he's like, don't ever do this again. Uh, but also I was like 22, 23, trying to figure this out and and, respectfully, I got the money immediately, like, and that's, that's the other side of like. I like to move quickly and so I had an opportunity, I took them and and it worked out well for me. But I think at some point you either need to invest your own money or take out some type of loan or investment or something to front the money. Um, that that was really important from a cost perspective, and then what I've done is man the first. Frankly, and keep in mind everybody listening I started this business when I was 21,. My monthly nut that day people that don't know like the amount of money I had to cover each month was less than a thousand dollars for everything rent, food, utilities, like I was living with roommates. I was 21. I had nothing, no bills, you know.
Speaker 1:Now it's it's 30.
Speaker 2:X that with all the bills to the business. So what what I did was is I took a very small paycheck for the first few years. I remember my accountant looked at me. He's like, dude, you're broke, like how are you living right now? And I was like, look, I'm just bare bones, I'm keeping it simple. And uh, two things I did is I would land new clients and then I would take the money from that and bring on contractors to help me and I would pay myself less. I would bring on contractors, get new clients and then eventually I hired my first employee and I took the money from my first employee that I could have paid myself and I hired the employee and I would just continuously reinvest, reinvest, reinvest.
Speaker 2:I don't recommend a 100% reinvestment strategy. I definitely could have more money in savings or just more cushion right now and I definitely spent a little bit too much, but that helped grow the business into where it is today. And then, once we hit a certain point, I made a decision that we're only bringing on two new clients per month and, very specifically, it's a type of client so we could bring on multiple video projects we could bring on. I'm trying to think of an example, what I would classify as two new clients would specifically be when we're taking over their marketing strategy. If we're doing a one-off video project for people, those are anywhere from one to six months long, so you can really manage a lot at one time. But when we're taking over someone's marketing, where we're in charge of everything, there's so much onboarding issues that you have, and I hate churn and burns. The other agency I worked out we would sign 10 clients, lose five, sign two, lose five, and so it's. It'd be very difficult and I hated that churn and burn and so I have it on my website Like we take on two new clients a month and we turn away a lot of business now because if it's not as an agency, I'm only as good as my client's worst team member.
Speaker 2:Specifically, let's say I'm sending you a hundred leads. If you have the person following up the leads and they don't know what they're doing, I get in trouble. I got fired from an account two years ago for sending them too many leads. What the hell is that I get fired from that? Then I find out two of their managers are out to their other people are not doing the right job, they're backlogged on leads and it's like, oh, this is actually not my problem, you guys have an operational issue, and so I've actually found myself doing a lot of operational consulting for my marketing clients because they can't handle the work that's coming in so long. Answer to your question took out investment money, paid that back, uh, took the money that I would get from accounts, hire people, use that to grow, scale that more, take the money. I mean I literally just did it. We just signed a big account. I took the money from some of that account, hired our next employee and it's working so far.
Speaker 2:I'd be curious if people think that's a good strategy or not. I don't know, I've never really asked.
Speaker 1:Well, I'll tell you. Do you follow Mr Beast? Do you know who, mr?
Speaker 2:beast is.
Speaker 1:Oh, yeah, yeah, absolutely so you probably know his strategy of just like spend everything, millions of dollars, um, and he was on joe rogan's podcast. And joe rogan was like so you pay yourself some, though, like you're saving, you're putting away money because, like this, this could end up drying up one day and you're gonna have nothing. And mr beast was just like no, not really. I just reinvest everything, literally reinvest every dime. And uh, he's like even, he's like I even go into debt.
Speaker 1:And joe rogan was like how are you going into debt with how much money you're making? And mr beast was like, well, I'll sign a new car, like a brand deal with someone, and then I'll get promised, you know, let's say, 10 million dollars for this brand deal, and then I gotta go spend that 10 million dollars before I get it to do the brand deal, because I gotta do video production, do these sets pay people. I gotta spend that money and so I gotta take out a loan to pay to build the, the product, the production and all that stuff. And joe rog was like you gotta save more money. Like you can't just send in everything, everyone, I mean it's working for you. So I don't know how people could argue too much with you about that?
Speaker 1:For me, I probably err more on a conservative, cautious side as far as wanting to make sure that I have a nest egg put away, that I have enough to pay myself. I also have personal bills with three kids and all that kind of stuff, so I have to make sure that that's taken care of. But I do want to scale too, though.
Speaker 2:Real quick, though I will say this was single, no children, barely any bills. I'm in a totally different place now. Now, present day, I do things very differently Like I manage the finances much differently in the company. And I don't agree with Mr B's strategy long term. Honestly, I one I don't believe that he doesn't pay himself stuff. There's some scandals come out.
Speaker 1:There's some stuff come out about him.
Speaker 2:And I and I love Mr Like. I don't think he's a bad person by any means, but I don't fully believe that if he's not paying himself. And two, there's going to be a point where, like, it's going to blow up in your face and I'm not speaking about Mr Peace, but just in general. And I would say advice to anybody, someone that understands finances. I am not that guy.
Speaker 2:I've made so many mistakes, you know, I wish I knew more about finances like get an investor and ultimately decide what a level of anxiety can you manage and what lifestyle. Because I will say this I remember when I signed my office lease it was a three or five year lease and I was like, oh dang man, like I'm, I am due for this money and I went out and sold more. It motivated me. I remember when I bought my house, my monthly mortgage went up and I was like, dang, like, this is more than I wanted to spend. I went out and I worked harder and there's arguments between that, like sometimes you should not spend more than you can, and then other times build it and they will come and push yourself, and a little bit of anxiety and stress makes you work hard. And so you know to the listeners out there don't do as I say, do as you think you should do. This is just me putting it out there.
Speaker 1:I like. The advice is, like you know, handle have a good gauge on what level of anxiety you're comfortable with and stress.
Speaker 2:yeah, Because if you look, man, I don't have any hair anymore. That's related to all the work that we do.
Speaker 1:I'm wearing a hat because I got some of that going on. Brother, it's okay, we'll get you on our side. Yeah, I mean so for me. I was lucky because I worked in an employee benefits brokerage position where they were very flexible and one of the things you said that when you got started, you go offer things for free to just build the connection with the client. So that was a piece of advice that I got when I was an employee benefits consultant. My VP of sales was like you know, you're skilled in recruiting. Just go offer to help people for free and become a trusted consultant advisor to these companies. So that's how I got my first client, this lady director of HR.
Speaker 1:She posted on LinkedIn I need help with job post writing, with job boards, with recruiting. Can someone help me? Like I just posted that on LinkedIn. I need help with job post writing, with job boards, with recruiting. Can someone help me? Like just posted that on LinkedIn. So I immediately messaged her and I was trying to sell her benefits at the end of the day, but it's a long term sales cycle like 12 to 18 months for benefits typically and so I was like I'll help her with writing job posts. I've done this for five years, you know I know how to do it and I'll just help her advisor job post. I've done this for five years, I know how to do it and I'll just help her, advise her, and maybe she'll be willing to talk about benefits at some point. As that goes along. And so she immediately responds and was like can you talk this afternoon? And I was like sure, so I get on the call. I'm not talking to her, I'm talking to the owner of the company.
Speaker 1:And then turned out he owned four companies. He owned a steel manufacturing, survival, storm shelter business. He owned a real estate holding company that had over 500 properties, and then he had a government contractor that built basically on Air Force bases and things like that. So, and then he had another third. He had a fourth company that did some other things, but he was just a serial entrepreneur and he basically took the call to interview me to take over all his recruiting. So he was basically interviewing me on how I would recruit for all of his companies and by the end of the 30 minute conversation I kind of just told him what I would do. He was like okay, well, send me a proposal by Friday and we'll meet with the president of the company and we go from there. And so I was like, yeah, and I was not expecting for him, I wasn't expecting to charge him anything, I was just he, just at the end of the conversation, was like send me a proposal. I was like, yes, sir, no problem, I've been wanting to start a recruiting company. So I was like, sure, so send them two proposals. That was a sales tactic, cause usually if you send two proposals, they'll choose one rather than just say no. So they chose one.
Speaker 1:We met Friday and that was my first client and so I got all that to say. I got to scale a business while I had a salary and my boss was totally fine with it. Because I asked him like, hey, this company wants to pay me to do some recruiting for them. Is that? Do you see that as a conflict of interest at all, or is that OK? And he was like no, he's like we all have side businesses. You know he owned real estate, like airbnbs and stuff. Yeah, he's like, sure, yeah, just make sure you talk to him about benefits and you know, become a trusted advisor for him and as long as you're not selling insurance for another broker, we don't care, and I was like, okay, sweet. So that was a unique opportunity to be able to be transparent with my boss, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:Any other job I had had before that, they would have said absolutely not. That's not okay, you can't do that 100% and I get it.
Speaker 2:I get it from both sides. But, man, the advice about offering the free stuff and this is what I tell to everybody you have to become the guy or girl for someone. So right now I've got clients on my phone that have me penciled in as Jordan the video guy, jordan the marketing guy, jordan the host, the emcee, the auctioneer, whatever, like we're all known as someone to something, and then they pass referrals and things like that and that's how you get a good business started Reputations, everything. Do good work for someone and it'll come back around to you for sure It'll come back around to you for sure.
Speaker 1:Well, you know, I study a lot of business type entrepreneurial content and videos and podcasts and things like that, and one of the things you see a lot is that more than half of businesses fail in the first three to five years. They just don't work out and most people end up being dependent in some way in their life on you know not themselves. They're not financially independent or they're not independent in general. So I'm curious, you know, I think that what separates the people who succeed and fail? If I had to tie it to one thing, I would the number one thing I usually think about is just people who have goals are going to have a higher chance of succeeding than people who don't. If you're don't have a goal, you don't have a destination that you're moving toward, so where, like how, could you be successful if you don't, if you're not reaching for something? But how do you? How do you see that? How do you? What have you seen? Or how do you try to make sure that you stay on that successful track?
Speaker 1:So would you say, like question is like how do I maintain my success and how can others do the same? Yeah, what do you think separates success from failure with especially in entrepreneurship, for you and for other people you've seen?
Speaker 2:Relentless grit and tenacity. Relentless grit and tenacity, truly truly. And the thing is, man, I, as I say that I don't want it to sound like a buzzword of like you can never give up, you can't stop. No, it is exactly that. It is truly exactly that. It is getting up day in and day out, getting your teeth kicked in, getting punched in the face, smiling, going home, crying your eyes out, thinking about crazy things, thinking about I'm a loser, I'm this, I'm that, going to bed, waking up the next day and saying no, I can do this, because. So that's kind of the top level. I would say the deeper level is taking care of your mental, physical and emotional health. The stress is going to happen, but here's the catch man People are stressed, broke, and people that are rich are stressed. So what's the common denominator? They're stressed always, and I'm having a total mind blank right now. But like, the more money you make, the bigger your problems are. More money, more problems, is the saying. More money, more problems. And it is true, it is true.
Speaker 2:And so, for me, I take care. I work out regularly, I stretch regularly, I go to the chiropractor, I eat well, I don't drink alcohol anymore. There's a lot of stuff that I do for my body, mind and soul to take care of me. Otherwise I physically would not be able to handle the workload and stress that is on my plate, the amount of things that I have to balance, and so I would actually actually change my answer. I the amount of things that I have to balance, and so I would actually actually change my answer. I would say the first thing you have to do is take care of your health, because you can't be relentlessly tenacious if you're physically not well and or mentally, I would argue, or mentally, yeah and sorry. When I say physically, I mean both. Like the mental is actually most important. If you don't take care of your physical health, your mental health is destroyed. Like you're, you're going to, and I've I've dealt with a lot of mental health struggles over the years severe anxiety, debilitating anxiety that I that I have a good handle on now because of all the things, and so that's great. Um, I would say, take care of that.
Speaker 2:But then truly look at yourself in the mirror and say why do I want to do this, do want to do this? Do I want to have a business because I want to be a business owner. Or simple example I have a friend who used to own a bakery. She loves to bake. She told me, jordan, when I was a business owner that had a bakery, I baked 20% of the time. When I was a baker for hobby, I baked 80% of the time. I sold my business because I didn't want to be a business owner, I just wanted to bake.
Speaker 2:Now here's the flip side. I want to run a business. I love business, each business I mean. I care about the business that I'm in, but ultimately I'm an operator, businessman at heart. I can enjoy different parts of it, and so that's what I tell people. I see a lot of times people have a service and they're like this would be a great business. No, don't turn your hobby into a business. You're going to end up hating your hobby and I think that's why a lot of people burn out.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think you have to be passionate about what you do, but you don't have to be it doesn't have to be your greatest passion, and your greatest passion maybe should not be what you're doing as a career or to make money. So, yeah, I think those are all good points. I haven't actually ever heard anyone talk as much as you did about the physical, mental well-being and taking care of that first, and I think that's a very valid point that people should think about taking care of your physical and mental well-being Because, like you said, especially if you're an entrepreneur but for me I was a scholarship baseball athlete, was in sales of some kind my entire career you have to get very comfortable with failure in sports, in sales and as an entrepreneur, you have to get comfortable failing, and if you're not failing you're not trying, I would argue.
Speaker 1:So you should be comfortable with failing and getting rejected and not take that as a debilitating blow, but just be able to learn from it and move forward quickly. I love this quote from Roger Federer. I love tennis and he's, to me, the greatest tennis player. He's just such an inspiring person. But in his commencement speech that he gave, he said that he lost 50. He only won 54% of the points he played in professionally, but he won 80% of the matches. And so he was like if I took every point and let that failure of losing a point mess me up in a game, I would not have won 80% of my matches, but I would take that point and let it go by and maybe try to learn something from it to strategize the next point. But you got to move forward and you got to be able to take the punches and move on. I mean that was shocking to me that Roger Federer law only won 54% of his points he played in barely more than half.
Speaker 2:I would, but that should also show you. Statistically you only need to be a little bit above half and more than that. You have to rent.
Speaker 1:Win the right points and thank you for that comparison, that's exactly right.
Speaker 2:I'm obsessed with tennis too. I'm a big. Federer would be number one, then probably Djokovic for me, and then Nadal and a couple of people behind that. But man, I completely agree, and I want to add one more quote to that is observation does not equal criticism. So a lot of times people will observe things about you and your business and they'll make a note or comment, and people take things very personally. Just because someone is saying something does not mean they're criticizing you, and a lot of people take things as a personal attack, and sometimes someone's just trying to help you grow and learn, and that's something too of like. Truly, do not take things personally. Just let it come into your brain, listen to it and then let it flow out, and your life will be a lot more peaceful, I can assure you that Well, jordan, this has been a lot of fun.
Speaker 1:I've really enjoyed our conversation. I would like to know you know a lot of people who listen to the podcast. I call them entrepreneurs. They're thinking about getting into entrepreneurship. Maybe they've taken a first step, maybe they haven't, but what you know, kind of closing inspiration would you give to them and what do you want people to know about force media?
Speaker 2:inspiration would you give to them? And what do you want people to know about force media Closing? Inspiration I would give is it's never too early, it's never too late to start. You could always start now, make mistakes, go do something else and come back and rebuild. You never, it's just it's never too late. Frankly, it really isn't.
Speaker 2:And then also, I would say you don't got to be an entrepreneur. You can be an entrepreneur and work for somebody inside of a company and own that section of a company. Those are actually just as, if not more, important because guess what, bro, you can't scale your company without someone that isn't invested. I can't scale mine and I promote entrepreneurship. Own what you have inside your business. Own that. I love that. That's great. That's what I would do. And then what I want them to know about Forrest Media if you are a company that is looking to grow and specifically looking for a marketing partner to come in and really understand your brand and business, reach out to me.
Speaker 2:We're not the right fit to work with everybody. We'll be very honest with you and if we're not the right fit, we will point you in the right direction. All I want to do is add value to business owners. I've seen hundreds of people get screwed over. We do things with honesty and transparency. We're very transparent with our pricing. We're going to tell you what's going to work and what's not. If we work with us and we're not doing good, we will fire ourselves. We've done it before because sometimes it's just hey, it's not the right fit. Sometimes we fired ourselves from two accounts in the last few years. We missed the mark. It's okay, yeah.
Speaker 1:I respect that. I respect the transparency that you were willing to say hey, this isn't the right fit, let's you know, let's move on and that's okay, Not everyone is going to be so real quick.
Speaker 2:Funny story about this we signed a client, um in the shutters and blinds industry last year. We were running Google ads for them very quickly. Early on in the campaign I went to the owners and I said, listen, and this is a small husband and wife owned business, two kids, one on the way. And I said, guys, I looked at the data and your competitors are spending 10 times more per month. We cannot even compete with these people. I recommend you turn off the ads and save your money. This is just not worth it. We'll cut our fee. You only pay us for the first half that we did. And I was like I don't want you to waste your money because every dollar is very, very important to them. And I said hey, you know what? Guys, I really appreciate you. Why don't we, why don't I give you a video in exchange for the value that you did pay for? Cause I just didn't feel like they got the value from us that I was really hoping for.
Speaker 2:So, long story short, that was last year. We ended up shooting the video with them yesterday and it was such an amazing experience Met the husband and wife, ended up going to the factory where they get all their stuff from. The owner of the factory said Jordan, I love your guys' work. Could you make a commercial for us? I had no intention of doing that. This is a massive place and now I have a better relationship with the husband and wife. I now have other ideas to help them. They're going to get value. We're going to get value. And dude, it wasn't, it was just because I felt bad that we didn't get them the results.
Speaker 2:Well, now the relationship is even stronger.
Speaker 1:Dude. Well, you were rewarded for doing the right thing. That's what goes around, comes around. You did the right thing, you treated that client how you should and did the right thing for them and that resulted in, you know, a positive outcome for everybody. So that's, that's awesome.
Speaker 1:You for me, I just think, uh, for people who are thinking about getting into entrepreneurship, I just encourage you to take the first step. You know, I I spent a long time I say a long time. I was 26, I guess, when I started transparent staffing, 27. And, um, you know know, I just felt like I waited too long. I felt like I wanted to be an entrepreneur from a young age.
Speaker 1:And just taking the first step is just as easy as thinking about whatever idea you have, and the more that you're able to just even just research it. You know, give away. If you're a service based company, give it away. Like, just use a company as a test pilot to see is this worth doing or not, is this offering value? And just take the feedback as gold, because whatever feedback they give you is gonna be so valuable to you as you try to get the side hustle going or turn it into a full-time thing. But just test the market, take the first step. That's the closing advice I would give. And so yeah, jordan, thanks so much. I appreciate you being on the podcast and I'm sure we'll continue the conversation, and you know. Thanks again, my pleasure, nick. Thanks so much for having me.