“To be successful and happy, you don’t have to be big. Business owners think bigger is better. The only way that you are a success is if you keep growing.”
Adam Witty is a world-renowned entrepreneur, author, publisher, and speaker, who has helped numerous entrepreneurs and businesses grow for the benefit of mankind. He stands firmly on the belief that when building a business, you have to define what is happiness. A business should not only provide a good income for yourself and your employees, but it should also provide products and services that add value to the world.
The reality of entrepreneurship is that you should have passion and belief in energy for what you do—what your business does. Your motivation should be to help poor people and get your product or service in the hands of more people. Scaling business growth should not be based on money. True entrepreneurs are motivated by their mission. If you are successful, money will follow.
Join Adam Witty as he shares his entrepreneurial journey and how he believes that the key factor for entrepreneurial success is not money but happiness and offering value to the world.
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/adamwitty/
Email Add: [email protected]
Twitter: https://twitter.com/adamwitty
Website: https://www.adamwitty.com/
John: Thank you for tuning in to the Business Sphere. Don’t forget to subscribe and share this episode. My guest today is the founder of the Advantage family, Adam Witty. He has a marketing company, automation software, online community and Adam has authored 7 amazing books. Thanks for being on the show, Adam.
Adam: John, great to be with you.
John: So I’m excited! Because before our conversation for all the listeners, we’re talking sports but before we get into that rabbit hole. If you don’t mind sharing with the listeners a little bit about yourself, what’s your expertise? And how did you become who you are today?
Adam: Yeah, so it really starts John with entrepreneurship. I think that’s really who I am at the core of it all. I have started, scaled and run a number of businesses, The company that I run today is called Advantage/ForbesBooks a publishing and media company. We work with CEOs, entrepreneurs, business leaders and brands to help them create their own media. So we actually help our clients essentially run a media company within their own business.
We also have a large book publishing division that’s part of that where we help publish a lot of great books that are similar to the books that are on the shelves behind you, so your book lover as am I. But my expertise is probably in marketing, marketing automation and certainly really creating a value proposition that gets consumers to take notice and ultimately to buy. My background is in marketing, my love is marketing and as a CEO and entrepreneur who starting and running businesses, if you can’t make the cash register ring, you don’t have much of a business. So figuring out the marketing is really important, especially in those early days.
John: That’s amazing to hear, Adam. And before we get into some of the businesses that you run, if you don’t mind sharing with the listeners a little bit further back in terms of your back history. Before you got to entrepreneurship or even marketing per se, did you have family members that were business owners themselves, entrepreneurs, or mentors like what was your upbringing like? And how did you know marketing was what you wanted to do?
Adam: Yeah, great question. I really feel lucky because I was growing up as a kid in a household where my father decided to take a really big risk and start a business of his own. And So what that means is I had a front-row seat to entrepreneurship. And I saw the good, I saw the bad, I saw some of the ugly but it really forced me to build a deep appreciation for starting a business from scratch, right? And there’s a lot of risks associated with it but there’s also some really incredible satisfaction that can come from starting and being able to grow and scale something literally from scratch. So it was definitely my dad’s experience that I think got me thinking about entrepreneurship. And really once I got into college, as I was figuring out what I was gonna do with my life, I think it was my dad’s story that really inspired me to go forward and try to start a business of my own. So that’s kind of the kernel and the origin story I went off to school at Clemson and when I was in school, I had an idea for a business. So you and I were talking John, you’re a huge Toronto Raptors fan and when I was a kid growing up in Orlando, FL, I was a huge Orlando Magic fan. And these were the days of Shaquille O’Neal and Penny Hardaway, what a great time to be a fan. And my first business idea was to create a marketplace online where season ticket holders could sell the tickets to games that they could use. Now probably everybody on Business Sphere is familiar with StubHub, that’s not the company I started. The company was called Ticket Advantage and it was similar to StubHub, It was a marketplace where fans could buy tickets from other fans. And ultimately, that business had a little bit of success but not like a huge amount of success.
So that business doesn’t exist anymore but what I learned in the process of starting a business I would take with me for the rest of my life. So fast forward a year later, I just had graduated from Clemson, and I was at home in Orlando, FL, And I was having lunch with a mentor of mine. Now the mentor is named Pat Williams, and he started from scratch the Orlando Magic basketball team in 1988. Now I’m sitting down so nobody will know how tall I am, but I’m really tall. And because of that, of course, as a kid I played basketball. So I always wanted to be a professional basketball player and as I got a little bit older, it became very clear that I was not gonna be a professional basketball player. So I said, well, what’s the next best thing to being a player? I’d like to be the general manager of the team, wouldn’t it be fun to run a basketball team? So Pat Williams had written a book and the title of the book was “Making Magic”. It was the story of the creation of the team. So I read the book and I wrote Pat Williams a letter and I cross my fingers and hope that maybe I would hear back from him. And to my great surprise, I got a letter back from Pat Williams. So I wrote him a letter back and I asked if I could take him to lunch and this literally John, was when I was a much, much younger man. And so ultimately, Pat Williams agrees to have lunch with me and that began a friendship and really a mentorship that is now over 23 years in the making. So fast forward, I graduated from college at home in Orlando, FL, and I’m having lunch with Pat Williams. And what my mentor, Pat Williams knew was that when I was in high school for two summers, I had worked as an intern for a publishing company. What I didn’t really think I would like that much, I was fascinated with and really, really interested in.
Now I worked for two summers at this publishing company, I didn’t really think much more about it. I went off to Clemson, I started ticket advantage, then I’m back in Orlando after graduating and I’m having lunch with this man, Pat. And he looks at me John, And he says Adam, you need to start a publishing company for CEOs and entrepreneurs because every business leader needs to write a book on what they in their company do. And I remember John, I looked at him and I said, Pat what do I know about starting a publishing company? And he said, Adam, you know more about book publishing than 99.9999% of all humans. It was a great lesson for me that whether you think you can or can’t, you’re right. And at that time I didn’t believe in myself, I didn’t have the confidence that I could go out and start a business. And it was only through Pat Williams’s insistence and coaching and hand-holding that I realized that I could actually go out and start a business of my own. And so really with that in 2005, I started Advantage Media, which is today Advantage|ForbesBooks. We have a strategic partnership with Forbes Magazine and Forbes Media. We’re one of the largest independent business book publishing companies in the country. And during that journey, I also started and ran a few other businesses. I owned magnetic marketing for four years, that’s the company that Dan Kennedy is the founder of. And then I started a marketing automation software company called mLive which creates multi-step marketing campaigns that automates communication between companies and their customers. And man for the last 17 years, I’ve just been ingrained as an entrepreneur working to start scale and grow businesses.
John: Wow! I mean, Adam that’s so amazing. I love your storytelling and I love how you’ve been able to take things early, learn from it and move forward, right? So early days, I now wanna ask you because I’m curious, was success happening right off the bat or did it take you some time? Like, share with listeners. You know everyone wants to be an entrepreneur or business owner, but is it easy?
Adam: Oh yeah, It is not easy. And anybody that tells you that it’s easy, is either really lucky or they are not telling you the truth. I don’t think entrepreneurship is easy. I am now 17 years into my entrepreneurial career and you know, it’s been a lot of hard work over those 17 years. You know, we built a very large business but it didn’t happen overnight. I mean, this is really been like a 17-year process in the making and you make a lot of mistakes. The key is to learn from the mistakes so you don’t repeat them a second or third time. But none of this is easy in regard to success.
Probably John, a lot of people around me would say, Adam, is really successful but as an entrepreneur, I’ve never thought of myself as a success. I appreciate and acknowledge what I’ve been able to accomplish but I remember the famous words of Herb Kelleher, who Is the founder of Southwest Airlines. And he said many, many years ago I read an interview with him and he said as soon as I start thinking that I’m a success, that’s when things start to go downhill. And so I think that there is some wisdom there for entrepreneurs that acknowledge what you’ve accomplished, but don’t start thinking that you made it. Because once you do, that’s when bad things can happen.
John: And that’s a great point that you’re mentioning because goal setting and achieving certain milestones help you to grow, to get to the next stage, right? And this is the biggest hurdle a lot of entrepreneurs have as well, defining success for each individual is different. Freedom, time, success on monetary levels or just being around certain people, right? Success, scaling, growing and selling. But then there has to be foresight of what’s the next thing. Like are you trying to make as you mentioned, multiple businesses help more people make an impact, share, volunteer and give because different stages give you a different perspective on your journey.
Because you know how hard it took, how long it took, and it’s not easy. Everyone reads a book or sees a little Ad on social media thinking they could make $1,000,000 in a month, click. I can lose 100 pounds in a month, done, right? Magic pill. Like can you explain this to some of the listeners? Because I mean, you’ve probably had to rejig your entire business many times over based on different milestones yourself.
Adam: Yeah! So I’ve got a couple of lessons to share with your viewers, John. I remember one of our authors wrote a book many, many years ago, he was a financial advisor. And the title of the book was “Worry-free Retirement”, he defined that as having the money to do what you want, where you want, when you want and with the people you want. And I was recently listening to a book titled “The Psychology of Money” and the author said that happiness is really having enough money to do what you want, when you want, where you want and with who you want. And it’s not about being the richest person in town, right? It’s really about having the money to do what, when, where, and with whom. And for a lot of people, it doesn’t take as much money as you probably think to be happy. Now that’s one lesson that I learned many, many years ago and then in that great book that you just put up on the screen, Morgan Household, the author repeats that and I believe that that is true. The other thing that I learned about success, is that if you spend your whole life comparing down, you will always be grateful and if you spend your whole time comparing up, you will always be disappointed. There’s always gonna be somebody that has more money.
There’s always going to be somebody that has built a better business. There’s always gonna be somebody that looks more handsome or attractive than you. There’s always gonna be somebody that runs the marathon faster than you. And if all you’re doing is comparing yourself to the best, you’re always gonna feel less than. Instead, if you compare down to the people that have far less, you know, the US Small Business Administration will tell you that eight of every ten businesses started in America at the end of three years have gone out of business, right? So you may not be a gazillionaire but if you’ve made it for five years and you have a business that’s growing or is at least profitable. Man, you’re in that two out of 10 categories, so be grateful for that. But the bigger thing is this when you have passion, belief and energy for what you do for what your business does your motivation is really to help more people, your motivation is to get your product or your services in the hands of more people. Now, money oftentimes will follow, right? But true entrepreneurs, they’re motivated by mission, it’s not the money. When you were motivated by a mission, if you’re successful, the money follows. When your pure motivation is money, then the mission gets blurry and kind of washed away and your business is gonna fail. So those are a few of the things I’ve learned the hard way about success.
John: That’s amazing that you’re sharing this because it’s hard to explain unless you’re an entrepreneur yourself. ‘Cause, when they read and see and they glamorize success in magazines, social post videos, people are driving nice cars, living nice homes, travelling the world, business classes that and everything. And that’s what motivates people to wanna get to do that themselves but in reality, no one shares the 20-year journey to get to that stage. I always reflect and refer to athletes, football players, and basketball players. They start at such a young age, time, commitment, health, exercise, fitness stretch, whatever, coaches, mentors every single day. That habit of I need to get better, I need put in the time and as I mentioned before, that marathon that I’m planning on, it’s all these time commitments, dedication to devote out of your busy schedule, whatever stage you’re at in your life.
You have family commitments, relationship commitments, you got bills to pay, whatever. You gonna carve up an excess time to get you closer to whatever that aspiration is. But most business owners read, start a business but they don’t even plan to put in the time to learn anything about business ownership. They want a miracle pill to get things done quickly and they get frustrated after a month, two months, a year or three years. But in reality, it should have been in the works many years prior. Do you know what I mean, Adam? So how would you say to a lot of these business owners, because you know if I want them to realize the truth of business ownership and entrepreneurship.
Adam: Yeah, everybody wants a silver bullet, right? Everybody wants it now, and we live in a world today where people are so impatient. And you know success, sustainable success happens over many years, it doesn’t happen instantly and so the dirty little secret that John and I both know is that it’s not a silver bullet, there is no magic pill. And if you wanna build a business as an entrepreneur that is either very valuable or helps a lot of people, it doesn’t mean there aren’t tricks to scale up faster. But it’s gonna take time, it’s gonna take energy, it’s gonna take dedication. And for most people, it’s gonna be years in the making.
John: This is great advice from someone that is seasoned, that started many businesses and continually enjoys and is very passionate. And that’s the biggest challenge because of this new tech world, the tech age that we have, real-time Instant messaging, and real-time content at your disposal. People have been so used to it. Growing up in a fast pace environment, living with tablets and smartphones, you know, there are no ads on TV or Netflix, you get things right away. YouTube, you wanna get rid of ads, right? Click on the button. How do you change that perception for business owners that are thinking of starting a Business Today because their mindset has always been, I need it now and I’m so used to it.
Adam: Yeah, so if you think about any business that is uber-successful, right? So think about three brands that you greatly admire. So I’ll give you three, will go with Apple, Chick-fil-A ’cause I really like the chicken sandwich and uh, let’s go with my favorite airline, Southwest. So Apple, Chick-fil-A and Southwest are all kinds of leaders in their category, right? They are the company that all the peers really kind of aspire to be. Obviously, all of them had a founder, Steve Jobs, at Apple, S. Truett Cathy at Chick-fil-A and Herb Kelleher at Southwest. And all three of them in their lifetime were very wealthy people, right? They could do whatever they wanted, whatever they wanted, whenever they wanted, whomever they wanted, wherever they wanted and they could probably fly there on their own airplane, right? Even the guy at Southwest, even Herb, could fly out on his own airplane. And so like they had all the success that probably many entrepreneurs would love and hope and want to have. So Truett Cathy started his first Chick-fil-A in, I think it was the late 60s. So that would be like probably 40 to 50 years ago. Herb Kelleher started Southwest in the 70s so that would be almost 50 years ago. Steve Jobs, of course, started Apple in the 80s. Then he was fired and run out of his own company and then he came back and save them, right? And of course, Steve Jobs died a number of years ago. So if you look at those three companies and I just picked three random companies. If you want to be a company whose name everybody knows then you’re probably gonna have to be pretty big. And if you’re going to be pretty big, you’re gonna probably have to need a lot of people working in that business, right? You can’t do it alone like the one-man shop.
It would just be very hard, so in order to grow and have a lot of people working in that business, what do you need? You actually need time and that’s the one thing that nobody wants to talk about because we live in this tech world where AI and you know social media allow you to just have that hockey stick, right? That hockey stick growth. it’s very rare that it happens, so let me share the name of one other person, Warren Buffett. Most people probably know Warren Buffett, the famous investor, and one of the richest people in the world. So the one thing that most people don’t talk about with Warren Buffett, is that he started investing when he was in his 20s and now Warren Buffett is I think in his 90s. And so if you started investing 50 years ago, and you were disciplined, and you withstood the storms, and you let the power of compounding work for your investments, 70 years later you would be a very wealthy person too. So I look at it John, as compounding. Investments compound and investing in your business compounds too. And so the dirty little secret that nobody wants to talk about, is that in almost all cases someone’s success is largely a result of compounding time and energy and compounding making smart decisions and letting all of that come together letting time work its course to ultimately build a business that’s big, that’s remarkable, that people know and recognize. You know, are you gonna have that overnight success story every now and then? You know, probably right? Mark Zuckerberg with Facebook got really rich much faster than Bill Gates did with Microsoft 25 years earlier because social media didn’t exist 25 years ago and social media is viral. But everybody thinks they’re gonna be the next Mark Zuckerberg and that’s not reality, right? So, what is the best formula for success? Compounding time energy and smart decisions.
John: it’s great that you’re sharing this, thanks a lot, Adam! Because a lot of business owners only look at the most successful people when in reality you don’t need to be ultra billionaire status to be happy. You might just need a business to support your family, to have a little bit more choice, abundance, access to some sporting events or travel here and there. That’s what people want, just a little bit more choice and freedom. So when we hear someone having a private jet going to these places, is that gonna fit your lifestyle? Is that something you really, really want in your life? Because when that happens, if that ever happens you’re gonna be bombarded with other things that you never want as well, like paparazzi and PR and people following you here and there. I mean you won’t have a normal life anymore because your friends, you don’t know who are your real friends anymore because there’s gonna be a lot of people throwing themselves at you, right?
So you know, it’s interesting to see, like us being business owners or were you know a little bit wiser than people that are just starting off. You see it, you hear it, you see it in person, right? And you know people that have been Uber successful or you know just uber- happy. And life takes you a lot of journeys, like the last two years as pandemic really taught you, like what really matters in the world? Like, does it matter if you’re ultra-successful, if you have no family and friends? These moments are probably more precious because it’s limited. So, you know what I mean Adam? Like these business owners just had to have a realization of what’s important in their life to really go for it and when you start having that master plan then you can go for it.
Adam: Yeah, one of the books on your shelf right behind you is titled “Small Giants” and I love that book because Bo Burlingham makes a very important point, that in order to be successful and in order to be happy you don’t have to be big, right? Everybody in business thinks bigger is better and the only way that you’re a success is if you keep growing, growing and growing and getting bigger and bigger and bigger. If we go back to the first point of this discussion, that happiness is really having the resources to do what you want, when you want, where you want and with who you want, what you quickly learn is that you actually need far less than you think to be happy. We’ve been talking about some people that are really, really rich whether it’s Warren Buffet or the Cathy family that owns Chick-fil-A.
And what I would tell you is that you might be surprised some people, many people that have lots of money actually have lots of problems that come with that money and they are some of the unhappiest people in the world. So for you, if you’re going to start a business you have to defy what is happiness for you in that business and if you have a business that provides a good income for yourself that provides an income for your valued employees and provides a great product or a great service that adds value to the world then that may be all that you need. So please don’t mistake me for thinking bigger is better and certainly don’t make the mistake of thinking that bigger is how you get to happiness because that’s not the case at all.
John: That’s great that you’re clarifying that, Adam. Because a lot of people have to be fully understanding of what their real aspirations are. And without that mindfulness, like really understand what you’re asking for because if it does happen and you’re not grateful or your family gets you to know, there’s a lot of negativity going on even if you are successful yourself. Let’s pivot a little bit Adam, let’s talk about your book industry and your businesses, so why should business owners and experts write books in the first place you know, because this is your publishing world. What have you seen? What have you liked? What distinguishes you from others? And what would you have to say to people that are thinking or had never even thought about writing a book?
Adam: Yeah, so the first thing that I’ll tell you is there are three types of media in the world. And my business partner, Rusty Shelton wrote a book many years ago where he really talked about this in-depth, so I wanna give him full credit. But what he pioneered and what I’ve really kind of come to be a big believer and a teacher of myself, is that there’s three types of media. There is rented media, so that’s where you’re renting somebody else platform, you’re renting access to people on somebody else’s platform like Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and Google. These are all platforms that a lot of people and a lot of brands spend a lot of money on to reach people. But ultimately you don’t own your audience, Facebook does or LinkedIn does and if they change the rules or the regulations or for whatever reason they just decide they’re gonna kick you and your business off their platform, that rented media goes away instantly. The second type of media is earned media, that’s where you earn your way into somebody else’s media. So if an article was written about you and your business in the New York Times, you’re earning your way into the New York Times. And people that invest time energy and money into publicity what they’re going after is earned media. The final type of media is called owned media, and that’s where you own the connection and relationship with your audience.
Now we call it Authority Media because we think authority media is the best form of owned media, so what is authority media? It’s taking your expertise and turning that into media when you write a book you just created media, if you have a podcast that is media, if you have a blog or a newsletter or if you write a white paper or if you go give a speech, all of that is media. And instead of it being an advertisement it’s providing knowledge, information and education. And so when you provide knowledge, information and education your audience begins to see you as an authority and if they see you as an authority they’re going to trust you more, they’re gonna be more apt to listen to and do what it is that you suggest. So you got to own your own media, you got to own a direct relationship with your audience and we believe the best form of media to own, is authority media. Where you create your own content, you publish and distribute that content and you, yourself essentially become a media company. And this Authority media becomes the primary way that you market yourself to new people.
John: That makes so much sense and I’m in alignment with you because I own an SEO agency. And it’s all about building authority or expertise in your own digital world footprint on a website and ensuring that there’s a lot of rented space like you mentioned. There’s a lot of PR space in which you spend a lot of money on publicity on a one-time moment where maybe you got big hits but it dries off or you own it yourself. And I mean we’re in alignment Adam because publishing your own content videos on YouTube, your content creator and you’re positioning yourself as a leader in whatever niche industry you are, that means a lot of time and effort as well. A lot of people want to be that expert but they don’t wanna put in the time and effort to do it. So when is it a good time for these experts or industry leaders like CEOs and entrepreneurs to start that process of thinking of writing a book or starting that speaking engagement or creating that kind of portfolio because the sooner they do, it kinda speeds up and amplifies fairly rapidly.
Adam: Yeah, so I’ll answer the question with this example. if you asked Warren Buffett what’s the best time to start investing? He would say “as soon as you were able” meaning as early as you possibly can, right? So the second that you have one more dollar than what you need to survive, he would tell you at that point you need to start investing. In an ideal world, you know as soon as your child is born you open up a little investment account for them and you just start putting a little bit of money into it. Because over the course of that person’s life, the advantages of compounding will reap significant rewards. Well, authority media has a compounding advantage as well, and so that is when you write a book that opens up new doors and new opportunities and creates more media opportunities. And so what happens is authority media can very quickly become a virtuous cycle, where one piece of content begets another. So, of course, I’ve written seven books and because of that I am invited on a lot of different shows whether it be a radio show or television or in this case a video podcast with you John, well my book helped open up a lot of those doors, right? And now by being a guest on your podcast and you have an audience that’s viewing your podcast if somebody sees it and likes me and likes what I have to say, they’re gonna e-mail me or call me and say “ Hey Adam, would you come on my podcast” and so this virtuous cycle.
Now the biggest thing I’ll tell you is that most business owners have what the late Zig Ziglar called “stinking thinking” and the stinking thinking is they say, I’m not ready I don’t know enough to write a book, I need more time in my career before I would be ready for that. And the truth is that you know more about your business and your industry than you give yourself credit for. As Pat Williams told me, John “Adam you know more than 99.99999% of all humans and it’s true I know more about book publishing and hybrid publishing and using a book to create media to promote yourself”. I know more about that topic than you know, there’s probably only five to ten other people in the world that know as much as I do about that one little thing. The same is true for each of your listeners, they have a thing that they know so much about and they could write a book on it tomorrow. Now if you can’t write the book yourself, that’s okay. Get a ghostwriter you know, we have a team of hundreds of ghostwriters, 220 ghostwriters in all who work with our CEOs and entrepreneurs to help them share their expertise with the world. But even if you’re not ready for a book, start with something, a blog, a podcast, or a white paper to create that virtuous cycle, the time to do it is now.
John: And I love it you mentioning that people analyze, over-analyze, they procrastinate, they feel there’s not enough time in the day, it’s like all these excuses, right? But if you commit and you put time and I talked to you about me running and planning it and making sure I put my mileage in every week, like all these things, just go out and do it. Like no one’s gonna hold your hands while you’re planning on doing it, you gotta just jump right in and it’s the same thing with business ownership. You need to jump right in and learn on the fly, you gotta go out there sell, learn to market yourself, learn to deal with customers, deal with objections and deal with staff clients. Because over the years you’re just gonna improve and get better but no one knows everything right off the bat.
I’m still learning after nine years and I’m sure after 17 years you’re just tipping the iceberg of knowledge on how to run a business because there’s so much going on and there’s change constantly. There’s new technology constantly and there’s new ways to do things constantly, so as we evolved in this ever-changing world. Just get in, just start moving, start doing, start trying and the hardest thing is how do you know when it’s not gonna be for you. Because a lot of people could be wasting a lot of time and money and energy and then they are depressed or they get frustrated like a lot of business owners like you mentioned 8 out of 10 just isn’t gonna be successful. What can you say to those types of people? Because business ownership entrepreneurship is definitely not for everyone.
Adam: Yep! So here’s the classic question I learned this many years ago from one of our board members. He said to me, Adam is the stock rising? Is the stock flat? Or is the stock declining? And he didn’t mean the stock of a company like he didn’t mean shares of a company, right? Like you would think of investing. He meant the stock of a person or he meant the stock of the business not figuratively the stock but is the outlook in the business positive and rising? Is it flat? Or is it declining? And so for somebody listening that wants to start a business or have recently started a business and maybe you’re into it and your questioning yourself, man did I make the right decision to do this? I would tell you to ask yourself the question. Is the stock rising? Is it flat? Or is it declining? If the stock’s rising, keep putting the energy and calories and maybe even money into it if the stocks rise, right? If the stock’s flat, how long is the stock has been flat? And have you tried to do things differently to get the stock from flat to rising?
And if the answer is the stock’s flat and I’ve tried everything that I know and it just isn’t gonna rise then you may know it could be time to close it up, to throw in the towel. If the stock is declining, why is it declining? And are you committed and willing to do what it takes to move it from a decline to an incline? And if the answer is “No, you’re not willing to do what it takes” or you don’t know what to do to get it from a decline to an incline then that may also be a sign, that may also be the answer that its time to throw in the towel. So it’s my favorite question in business, whenever you have a big decision to make about yourself, your business or a person in your business. I love the question, Is the stock rising? Is it flat? Or is it declining? Make your decision based on that answer.
John: And that’s great advice, I always reflect and ask for a gut check and morale boosts, right? To see where everyone is. Let’s look at the benchmark, let’s look at the state and let’s look forward like in three, six months and a little past and see where we’re at. It doesn’t even have to be a milestone, in revenue and sales, it could be just “are you guys still excited going into work? Are you still motivated to want, to do these different projects and take care of these clients or whatever it is?” If the morale is great, then you know that you’re building something. And everyone’s along that with you on the ride on the ship.
But a lot of people don’t even consider this because again, entrepreneurs and business owners if you’re solopreneur or if you have five or ten people, it’s different than someone that has 200 staff. And how involved you are? Do you have managers C-Suite? Depending, right? But it has to be in alignment with your vision ultimately, the culture has to be in alignment. And this is more in-depth based on where you’re at and what kind of business you’re growing and building. So I know we only have a couple of minutes, Adam. Regarding that other software space ’cause I know that’s something new aside from the publishing or is it similar? If you don’t mind sharing with the listeners on that?
Adam: Yeah! So the company is called mLive and it is a multi-step marketing automation tool to help businesses engage their audience at a higher level, right? So a lot of authors that we work with, they write a book and they create content all to build an audience. And once they capture an audience, they’re so focused on building and growing their audience that they don’t do a good job of nurturing and engaging the audience they’ve already created. And it’s somewhat of a natural human instinct, we’re always focused on go get more as opposed to take care of what we already have.
And technology has allowed marketing automation can easily take a very big complex job and make it much more manageable and much easier. So what mLive does is, it’s a platform where we work with an author, we create Evergreen content, we create a multistep engagement campaigns and then when a new person comes into your audience, they go on a drip sequence and they run through multiple campaigns. So you as the author are always communicating with this new member of your audience and it’s 100% automated.
John: That’s amazing! And I know you co-authored Magnetic marketing. I mean drip campaigns, personas and bucketing on different stages and where they found you and how they found you, It’s amazing Adam, this has been so much fun. Where are some of the places people can check you out, visit your site, reach out to you if they have any further questions. If you don’t mind sharing some of the handles for them.
Adam: Yeah, absolutely! So adamwitty.com, A-D-A-M-W-I-T-T- Y. The only social media platform I am actively on is LinkedIn. But I love to connect with your listeners and viewers on LinkedIn. And then advantagefamily.com, where you can learn all about my business.
John: Amazing, Adam! This has been a lot of fun, we will definitely stay connected. Hopefully, a few listeners got some great tremendous value. I know you’ve been very generous in sharing your journey and some of the businesses that you now currently operate and run. And I’m sure to reconnect with you in a couple of years to see what’s going on, you might have already started writing multiple other books on things that you’ve learned. But I’m excited to see where things go for you and will definitely stay connected, Adam.
Adam: Thank you, John! It’s a great pleasure to be with you.
John: Thank you so much.
