Episodes

  • How to Navigate the Path Between Relationships and Revenue with Lady Jen Duplessis

    How to Navigate the Path Between Relationships and Revenue with Lady Jen Duplessis
    Jun 23 2026
    You can’t run a business on relationships without revenue. At the same time you can’t try to sell everybody you meet. Where’s the middle ground? In this episode, I discuss how to navigate that path between relationships and revenue with my guest, Lady Jen Du Plessis. Lady Jen is known as The Business Scaling Architect and The Sovereign Leadership Mentor, boasting 40 years in finance and over $400 million in revenue generated. She is a celebrated numerous Barnes & Noble and Amazon #1 International Best-Selling author, 3X Podcast Host, and TV talk show host who delivers real transformation, not just fast profits - so her clients achieve both business success and personal fulfillment. We dive into topics including: ● Jen’s relationships to revenue origin story. ● The problems with most “one-to-one” networking meetings and how to avoid them. ● How to stop trying to sell and start trying to build relationships instead. ● How to know when it’s the right time to sell your services. ● An example role play of an effective relationship-building first time one-on-one. ● How to successfully grow your business without being “pushy”. ● The five questions that you need to ask in every first-time one-on-one meeting. ● How to prepare for productive and meaningful one-one-one meetings. ● How to know when to start building a relationship after your first meeting and how to do it. ● How to qualify people that might become part of your business’ inner circle of referral partners. ● Why you should aim for 56 people in your inner circle of referral partners and how often to connect with each of them. ● The one thing, above all else, that you need to do to successfully navigate the path from relationships to revenue. …and other golden nuggets of advice!
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    Less than 1 minute
  • How to Create Engaging Virtual Meetings & Events with John Chen

    How to Create Engaging Virtual Meetings & Events with John Chen
    Jun 16 2026
    Making virtual meetings and events engaging can be an arduous task. You must have some key strategies to work with. I discuss some of them with my guest, John Chen. John is the author of the #1 Amazon Hot New Book Release, Engaging Virtual Meetings. He’s been meeting virtually for over 38 years. He has produced over 4,000 virtual meetings including an EIGHT language meeting and the only 100% LIVE virtual conference in the training industry. He’s one of only 400 Certified Speaking Professionals designated by the National Speakers Association. We Dive into Topics Including: ● John’s origin story for getting into the virtual event space. ● What most companies do wrong with virtual meetings and how to avoid their mistakes. ● Pro-tips for virtual event facilitation. ● How to create truly active and engaging virtual meetings. ● The importance of “psychological safety” in virtual meetings and how to create it. ● What you need to do in the first five minutes of any virtual meeting or event. ● How to define the purpose of your meetings and address a problem that needs to be solved. ● The ideal part of any engaging meeting or event. ● The structure of a great agenda for a meeting and how to create one. ● Why the sequence of the activities in your meetings and events is of paramount importance. ● The importance of vulnerability from the event facilitator/speaker to create open discussion with your audience. ● How to close your virtual meetings and events strong. ● The one thing, above all else, that you must do to have a successful virtual meeting or event. …and other golden nuggets of advice!
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    25 mins
  • How to Write and Publish a Successful Business Book with Weston Lyon

    How to Write and Publish a Successful Business Book with Weston Lyon
    Jun 9 2026
    Writing and publishing a business book is an art and science. I discuss pitfalls to avoid along with proven writing and publishing success strategies in this episode with my guest, Weston Lyon. Weston is the author of 23 books, including The Book Writing Blueprint, and the founder of Plug and Play Publishing. Known as one of the only authors to write nine books in 11 months, he has delivered more than 600 presentations and interviews over the past 25 years. Weston helps entrepreneurs and business owners write the right book and use it to build authority, attract clients, and grow their business. We dive into topics including: ● Weston’s origin story when it comes to authorship and profiting from his books. ● Where the book writing process begins. ● The three phases every author goes through when writing a book. ● A deep dive into the five-step process of writing and profiting from your book. ● The concept of time blocking and its necessity in the authorship space. ● The two things you need to look at to set your book up for success. ● How to find a topic that fits your target markets. ● The biggest problem people face when writing a book and other things not to do. ● The two types of book outlines you need to create. ● The three subconscious questions you need to answer for every chapter before you write them. ● The first thing you need to do after you finish writing your book. ● The five steps to successfully publishing your book before you start marketing it. ● How to start the profiting phase of your book after it’s published. ● How to leverage and profit from your book for the rest of your career. ● The one thing, above all else, that you need to do to successfully write and publish your business book. …and more golden nuggets of advice!
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    29 mins
  • Visioneering: How to Design Your Successful Future Self with Barbara Daoust

    Visioneering: How to Design Your Successful Future Self with Barbara Daoust
    Jun 3 2026
    Regardless of where you are today you have the power to design your successful future self; also called “Visioneering”. I discuss the pitfalls to avoid and the strategies to embrace to do that in this episode with my guest, Barbara Daoust. In a world where high achievers often struggle to break through the limits they impose on themselves, Barbara is helping leaders, entrepreneurs, and business owners step fully into their greatest potential. Based in Los Angeles County, California, Barbara is a certified consultant with the Proctor/Gallagher Institute, guiding CEOs, entrepreneurs, and business owners to achieve measurable personal and professional results. We dive into topics including: The definition of “Visioneering”How to get started with creating your ideal future self.What your reticular activating system is and how to engage with it to create more opportunities.Why your reticular activating system helps you notice opportunities that will get you closer to your desires.The power of writing down exactly what it is that you want and why it helps you.The fact that our subconscious mind doesn’t see words; it sees pictures and the power of visualization.A look at “The Actor’s Technique” and how it helps you create your future self.The first sign of transformation and how to recognize it when it appears.The importance of creating “success habits” and how to do it.How imposter syndrome sets in and how to overcome it.Why there might be some truth to the advice “fake it ‘till you make it”.How to solidify successful change in your life when it happens and not backslide.The importance of taking inspired action every day.Why seeking failure will help you grow in the long run.How to keep on keepin’ on during the tough times.The importance of acknowledging your successes, even the small ones.The one thing, above all else, that you need to do to create your successful future self. …and other golden nuggets of advice! Barbara’s Origin Story In what seems like a past life Barbara was director and ran a theater company. She had success in her field. She has a master’s degree in directing. She was also a personal acting coach for the Olson twins for ten years. Barbara also ran an acting academy, and a lot of her past students are now doing very well in the entertainment industry. She also had a show at the Kennedy Center. Barbara directed one of the Olson twins’ videos and their animated series. She has a lot of experience in the entertainment field where people are constantly using their imaginations. And now she’s entered another field and works with high achievers, peak performers, and other people who really want more from life for themselves. The comments Barbara hears often is “There’s so much greatness inside of me and I don’t know how to get it out of me.” “I’m so frustrated with Underearning.” They may not say that they have low self-worth or low self-value, but essentially that’s what they’re saying. Things like “I’m not earning what I think I really should be earning, and I’m not accomplishing as much as I know I can accomplish, and I just don’t know what’s in the way.” Solving problems like those became her passion to pull performance out of a lot of those people who said that they wanted more and started showing people how to get into bold action and becoming their future self. It’s closing that gap between where they were and where they want to go, and doing it in a way that is a little bit more bold and radical. Where does future visioneering start? How does one get started with it? It starts with allowing yourself to fantasize and being honest with yourself; truly honest with yourself. Getting relaxed and allowing yourself to imagine all of the things that you would like to do in your life. What are things that you would like to accomplish? What are some goals that you have in your mind? One of Barbara’s first goals that she started thinking about a while ago was having enough money where she could pick up the tab in any five-star restaurant across the world for anyone who was sitting at my table. That was something that really excited her. So, in that excitement, she started to practice picking up the tab for eight people at the Hilton. It wasn’t a five-star hotel, but it was a start. A start of just starting to activate her imagination; how does that show up in her life? That then that pulled her in a direction of thinking about what is going to help me make more income in order to achieve that desire? It’s really to sitting down with yourself and asking “What is it that I really, really want?” That means thinking of something that you want, not what somebody else wants for you. Not the idea of becoming the lawyer, the doctor, or something else that’s going to make you a lot of money because you were told that it would. There’s an illusion of a title being the thing to go after, Barbara doesn’t believe ...
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    28 mins
  • How to Successfully Build and Scale Your Service Business with Rick Elmore

    How to Successfully Build and Scale Your Service Business with Rick Elmore
    May 19 2026
    There’s an art and a science to scaling your service business. A big part of it is learning to work on your business and not in your business. I discuss how to do that with my guest, Rick Elmore. Rick Elmore is the Founder and CEO of Simply Noted, a technology company helping businesses build stronger relationships through automated handwritten communication powered by real pen and ink. A former college and professional football player turned entrepreneur, Rick has combined his background in sales, marketing, and relationship-building to create one of the fastest-growing handwritten outreach platforms in the world. We dive into topics including: Rick’s early days in sales that lead to his multi-million-dollar discovery. The importance of getting the right people in the right seats of your business.How to work on your business instead of in your business.Where and when Rick started working on his business instead of in his business.Your life cycle as an entrepreneur from inception to scaling your business.The importance of building an ecosystem of trust in your business and how to do it.What you need to do next after you build the core team of your business.How to scale your marketing initiatives.How to keep your sanity when you’re scaling as an owner/operator.The importance of discipline and how to develop it.Why scaling is a lifelong journey that never ends.The one thing, above all else, that you need to do to successfully scale your service business. …and other golden nuggets of advice! Rick’s Origin Story Rick has a pretty unique background. He was an athlete growing up. He played college and professional sports, even though athletics didn’t come to naturally to him. Athletics was something that Rick was able to be successful at because he was a hard worker and didn’t overextend himself. A lot of people discredit what you can get done in 10 years versus all the pressure they put on themselves to get done in a year. Rick had 15 years of experience working on not overextending himself before he became an entrepreneur. Rick made it to the NFL in 2010, but he was an athlete for a long time before that. His first year in the NFL he was playing for the Cleveland Browns, and he was with one of the back office people. They showed me his draft profile and it said, “This guy plays above his potential, is an overachiever, and wins with effort.” Back then he used to think that was like a stab. But now, being 38 years old, Rick looks back and he believes that all of those were his strengths. He used that and leveraged his ability to keep working hard to push on and persevere through any of life’s problems. Then five years in the NFL Rick went back and got his MBA. He was a typical B or C student; nothing special as he recalls. His mindset was that he was just there to memorize stuff and take tests. But he fell in love with learning because he was passionate about and interested in business. He wanted to learn how to start a business. He wanted to learn about what made businesses work even though he was completely green in the entrepreneurship space. When Rick went into sales that was one of the turning points in his life. Life After Sports Because he found something he was interested in, it became a lot easier to dedicate his life to it after sports. He had a marketing professor that said something that changed his life. About a year into his program, the professor said that handwritten mail had a 99% open rate. Rick realized that if you got something in the mail, and it was handwritten, you were going to open it. He grew up in the nineties, when people used to write notes to their friends. It became a lost art over time. BUT there was no way to like do it efficiently at scale. It took Rick a lot of time to sit down and write a holiday card to each of his clients and put them in envelopes. Rick started researching and there was a technology called a “pen plotter” out at that time. It had no paper feed, no technology behind it. He got it from China, built it and went to his friends and said “Hey, this is my idea. Can you help me?” He knew nothing about software, nothing about software integrations and software coding. Rick’s a-HA! Business Scaling Moment But he DID know that if his idea could be flushed out there would be an opportunity for a business because nobody else was doing it. Rick made it work. He created 500 handwritten notes using that simple handwriting robot and sent them out to clients and prospects. The response rate was amazing. Many of his clients and prospects were doctors and many of them responded to his note that it helped Rick bypass his $50,000 a month quota. Rick made over $270,000 in sales. That was the most money he had ever made. He laughed because people think just because he was in NFL, that he made a lot of money, which is not true. Only about 1% of the athletes who go to the NFL make all the money that you think they do. The CEO of his company ...
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    27 mins
  • How to End Self-Sabotage and Boost Self-Confidence with Dr. Robyn Lynette

    How to End Self-Sabotage and Boost Self-Confidence with Dr. Robyn Lynette
    May 13 2026
    Entrepreneurs face self-sabotage more than most people. We can also experience powerful self-confidence when we have the right strategies. I discuss how to overcome self-sabotage and replace it with life-altering self confidence in this episode with my guest, Dr. Robyn Lynette. Dr. Robyn is an executive strategy partner who has spent nearly two decades working privately with CEOs and founders during the highest-stakes moments of their professional lives. Drawing on business and sport psychology, she identifies the hidden patterns that can quickly undermine decision-making and leadership at the top, where the pressure is high and the margin for error is thin. The leaders she works with aren’t looking for help; they’re looking for an edge. She’s also the author of the memoir I’d Like to Thank the Cartel for Getting Me Out of a Cult. We dive into topics including: Why playing competitive sports helped form Robyn’s mindset for success in all areas of life.How your brain can either help or hinder you.Specific examples of the best way your brain can help you.The unfortunate reality of our “Fight or flight” response and how to overcome it.The power of intuition and what it really is.Examples of what happens when you ignore your intuition.Where self-sabotage comes from and why it’s there.How to recognize self-sabotage and stop it in its tracks.What your logical brain needs to do to step in and “save the day” on bad days.How to build mental habits to automatically break your stream of self-sabotage.Why people stay stuck in self-destructive or self-sabotaging habits.The definition of self-confidence.Where building self-confidence starts and what it looks like.Examples of confident behaviors and how to develop them.The all important role of self-talk in your life, especially when it comes to self-confidence.The origin of self-fulfilling prophecies and how to create good ones.How to change negative emotions when you realize you’re feeling them.How to maintain self-confidence over time even on the “down days”.The role your logical brain plays when combined with your emotional brain.The one thing, above all else, that you need to do to end self-sabotage and boost self-confidence. …and other golden nuggets of advice! Robyn’s Introduction to Self-Sabotage and Self-Confidence Robyn’s story goes back to when she used to play competitive beach volleyball. There were some days when she could get on the court and just nail it; she felt like a phenomenal volleyball player. And then there were other days when she would get on the court and her partner would hold out a volleyball and ask, “Robyn, this is a volleyball. Have you ever seen one before?” Robyn wondered, “Where did my game go?” Because of that, Robyn’s interest was sparked. She had the opportunity in college to study high performance people and how and why they achieve more than the general population. The thing that she noticed was that across all professions, whether you’re in business, sports, or the military, is how your brain can either help you or hinder you. She likes to joke and say, “Whether you’re using your brawn or your brain, your brain is still gonna be in the way.” Your Brain Can Help or Hinder You… It’s Your Choice! Obviously, your brain can help with critical thinking. For example, we can manage stress and override our fight or flight response. You probably know that in the modern world; we’re constantly in fight or flight mode. Because of that we have all hormones that are constantly flooding our brains; for better or worse. If you’re going to succeed, you must be able to set that mode aside and realize, “I know I’m not being chased by a saber tooth tiger; I can do this.” Doing that starts to help. The hinder part, or problem, is if you’re constantly overcoming fight or flight and pushing down that fear, you’re also eliminating your gut instinct and your intuition. Things like those that can help you get pushed down because you’re in fight or flight mode. Which leads us to intuition… Entrepreneurs and Intuition Intuition is an interesting phenomenon. There’s a lot of science around it that talks about how intuition is your sunconscious picking up on patterns before your logical mind recognizes them. Which means your emotional brain is the part of your brain that makes you think of the perfect thing to say 20 minutes after the argument. That’s the part of your brain that was overriding things. If you want that intuition to come through, you must listen to your emotional, or subconscious part of your brain. So many of us are ignoring it, and we’re all in critical thinking mode most of the time. That’s what keeps us awake at 3:00 AM because we’re thinking of all the things that we didn’t share when we had the opportunities to do so during the day. You should make time during the day to listen to that part of your brain. There are many ways you can do that. It...
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    26 mins
  • How to Package and Price Your Service Offering with Alex Shartsis

    How to Package and Price Your Service Offering with Alex Shartsis
    May 5 2026
    How to package and price your service offering are difficult decisions to make. Most entrepreneurs wrestle with them for years. I discuss how to do it faster and more effectively with my guest, Alex Shartsis. Alex is a multi-exit founder and go to market strategist who has led go-to-market at venture-backed startups including Drawbridge, acquired by LinkedIn, and TripIt, acquired by Concur, and ran corporate development at Opendoor. Today he’s the co-founder and CEO of Skyp — an AI-powered outbound email platform that helps founders and sales teams book more meetings without hiring an sales development representative. He built Silverwood Advisors, an advisory practice focused on GTM strategy, into a go-to resource for teams in Silicon Valley and beyond. We dive into topics including: The difference between charging hourly, project-based, or retainer pricing options.Where to start when you’re packaging a service.The importance of understanding your clients’ needs before determining pricing models.How to make promises that you can follow through on.The importance of setting expectations before the sale and how to do it.How to do research about how to price your service offering.The importance of having a deep understanding of your clients’ business models.How to position yourself for success in the marketplace.Why most service providers underprice themselves and what to do about it.Why pricing low to win business rarely works.How to pick the most profitable target markets.The one thing, above all else, that you need to do to package and price your services successfully. …and other golden nuggets of advice! Living in the Startup World Alex has worked with a lot of startups, at least 20 or 30 at this point. He prefers early-stage startups where he must figure out their product market fit and figure out what their customers want. Alex has been advising and selling consulting services for six years now, and he’s become great at packaging his own service as a result. In addition, he’s spoken with many other consultants about how they package themselves successfully. Alex has ended up with a wealth of knowledge that he never intentionally set out to get; but he’s grateful to have it now. The Origin of How Alex Packaged His Service Offerings and What You Can Learn from His Experience For Alex, it’s a funny story. Originally Alex wasn’t looking to get into consulting. He had just left his startup, and it was a rough time. A venture capital friend asked Alex to become an advisor to one of his companies. Even though he was planning to take some time off, Alex agreed. Alex spoke with friends who were in the consulting world. One had only done consulting throughout his entire career. His advice to Alex was to charge $300 an hour. The challenge with that was that startup founders often don’t know how many hours they need. More Ideas and Suggestions for Fee Structures Alex continued his conversations. Next, he spoke with people that worked only on project-based fee structures. He liked that because he believes people don’t want the surprises that come from charging hourly rates. It can hurt your relationships if the hours go over the amount initially proposed. The project-based work they discussed involved payment at certain milestones. When you hit a milestone with your clients, they pay you $10,000 and so on. That structure aligns the work with the results. And then the third fee structure Alex discovered was the retainer-based model. For example, he would charge $10,000 a month for one day a week, and $20,000 a month for two days a week. Then there was the option for $30,000 to have Alex for a full week. Alex realized was that he had a strong opinion after having been a founder who hired consultants, and that was that. Immediately, he didn’t want to underprice. He believed the biggest risk he faced was underpricing his time. And second, he wanted to make sure he didn’t get stuck in a cheaper-will-get-you-more-clients mindset. He didn’t want to be the poor salesperson who drives a Honda Accord, who asks “Why would you ever spend $150,000 on a car?” Thinking that way is self-defeating when it comes to pricing your services. If you put yourself in your buyer’s shoes, they may have a completely different perspective of budget and value than you do. Value and budget are equally important. Alex didn’t want to make that mistake and didn’t want to have to track his hours as the sole way of delivering value. He notices that the consultants that took the hourly route were working with founders who had lots of different things going on and needed a variety of consulting services. An hour here for this project; an hour there for another project. More Decisions About Pricing Models For example, if Alex took the hourly route and asked a client to review his work on their website and then move onto the next step, if it took the client two weeks to get to the next step he couldn’t ...
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    25 mins
  • How to Go from Employee to Solopreneur to Entrepreneur with Sys Savanh

    How to Go from Employee to Solopreneur to Entrepreneur with Sys Savanh
    Apr 21 2026
    The journey from employee to entrepreneur can be confusing. Where do you begin? How to create a mindset to get you there? In this interview we answer questions like that with my guest, Sys Savanh. Sys is the founder of 7 Figure Expert Academy, where he helps entrepreneurs package, position, and scale their expertise into powerful offers that actually sell. In this conversation, we’re going beyond theory! We’re talking about what’s working right now; how to stand out, how to monetize what you know, and how to build something that doesn’t just look good online… but actually grows your business. We dive into topics including: The fear of making the leap from employee to solopreneur and how to overcome it.How to start building a business as a solopreneur.The difference between a business operator and a business owner.How to make the shift from being an operator to an owner.The four pillars of a successful business.Why you still need people working for you when you’re a solopreneur.How to know when you’re ready to make the leap from solopreneur to entrepreneur.Why you can’t build a brand first; you have to sell first.The characteristics of entrepreneurs that make them different than solopreneurs.How to automate your sales and generate consistent leads.How to maintain success as an entrepreneur and not slide backwards.How to hit the milestone of placing most of your focus on marketing instead of selling.The importance of developing procedures and processes.Why your main job as an entrepreneur is to get yourself seen more and how to do it.The one thing, above all else, that you have to do to be successful on your journey from employee to solopreneur to entrepreneur. …and other golden nuggets of advice! Sys’ Journey from Employee to Solopreneur to Entrepreneur Sys believes that when you’re an employee, there’s often a point when you have something brewing in your gut that tells you there’s something more out there. Just like Sys did for three years as an employee. He just knew that he was meant for more, like he was meant to do something great. Sys believes that if you have something tugging at you, you start asking yourself questions like “What’s my purpose, what’s the meaning of life and is there more to life than this?” Those are the types of questions he started asking himself as he was being the best employee possible for the companies he was working for. Ever since Sys was 10 years old he has always been a hard worker. He would go around his neighborhood knocking on doors asking if he could cut his neighbors’ lawns. When somebody allowed him to cut their grass for five bucks, he did it. Sys considered himself to be the best grass cutter. Then he went onto Burger King and then the VFW where he was the best dishwasher. At every company he went to work for, he was always the best. Then in 2002 he read a quote, “If you don’t build your dream, someone will hire you to build theirs.” That hit him like a ton of brick as an employee. Sys realized that he wasn’t building his dream but he was hired to build someone else’s and he was trading his time for money. That didn’t sit well with him. He realized it was time to… Stop Trading Time for Money There was a catalyst for him to make a transition two years later in 2004. Sys saw another quote from Jim Rohn; “If you didn’t come from a wealthy family, make sure a wealthy family comes from you.” He considered that to be his second sign from God. With that he decided enough’s enough. Sys decided God was speaking to him and he went for it. He started to figure out a plan. He went back to school to get his business degree. Then what started it all was when Sys was a manager at a very large company called ITT and he went into a board meeting one day. The CEO came out and told everyone he has lay off 57 people because people didn’t sell enough services. That stuck with him. Sys realized the CEO was right. It doesn’t matter what the economy is like, it doesn’t matter what’s happening in the marketplace. If somebody doesn’t sell, they have to lay people off. He had never done sales before, so he took a sales position just to learn how to sell and how to communicate. He was presented with two options. Do you want to get paid $55,000 a year plus bonuses, or do you want to make as much as you want? That would mean he would be on a hundred percent commission. He chose the hundred percent commission. He thanks God he did that because he just crushed it. Sys realized that it’s not that he was great at sales, he was just really good at being himself. That’s how his sales journey started and that’s when it really gave him the confidence to move from employee to a solopreneur. Making the Leap from Employee to Solopreneur Sys says there’s always fear involved with the decision to go from being an employee to being a solopreneur. There’s negative self-talk. He calls it “the crappy committee that’s ...
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    31 mins