Shownotes
Business Building Insights
- Play with what you’ve got to survive.
- For maximum impact, you've got to be memorable.
- Know your audience well so you can speak with them in a way that will peak interest and spark interactions and support.
- When you’re talking to potential customers, catch their response in facial cues and adjust your message accordingly.
- Your material (the information on your business and your product) is your fallback in a presentation. First play off of those in the room and the situation at hand.
- Make sure your website is responsive and gives correct information. It should generate leads and help you succeed and grow. Find out what people need and walk them through how you can help them accordingly.
- Make it easy for people to become your customers. Once in a while, step back and approach your company as a first time visitor. Does it present things as you'd like?
- When someone lands on your website, make it immediately obvious what it is that you do.
- You just don’t shut off what you've learned previously. A past career, learned skill or experience can be used in a new business venture.
Resources Mentioned
How Starbucks Saved My Life by Michael Gates GillContact Links
Website Facebook Instagram LinkedInGift Biz Resources
Join our FREE Gift Biz Breeze Facebook Community
If you found value in this podcast, make sure to subscribe and leave a review in Apple Podcasts or Google Podcasts. That helps us spread the word to more makers just like you.
Thanks! Sue
Transcripts
Gift biz unwrapped episode 241 and you find out what they
Speaker:need and then you respond to them accordingly.
Speaker:At Tinton,
Speaker:gifters, bakers,
Speaker:crafters, and makers pursuing your dream can be fun.
Speaker:Whether you have an established business or looking to start one
Speaker:now you are in the right place.
Speaker:This is give to biz unwrapped,
Speaker:helping you turn your skill into a flourishing business.
Speaker:Join us for an episode packed full of invaluable guidance,
Speaker:resources, and the support you need to grow your gift biz.
Speaker:Here is your host gift biz gal,
Speaker:Sue moon Heights.
Speaker:Well, hi bear.
Speaker:You too,
Speaker:and thank you so much for joining me here today.
Speaker:Before we get into the show,
Speaker:I have a question for you.
Speaker:How'd your day go yesterday?
Speaker:Maybe a crazy question.
Speaker:I know and yes,
Speaker:you heard me right?
Speaker:If you were to rate yesterday,
Speaker:how much did you get done?
Speaker:How far did you advance toward your goal or maybe in
Speaker:your mind you're saying what goal?
Speaker:Many of you have told me you aren't sure whether what
Speaker:you're doing is the right thing for your business.
Speaker:You're confused that you may be focusing on the wrong things
Speaker:and wasting time and money and you compare yourself to others
Speaker:and feel like you're just not keeping up.
Speaker:Sound familiar?
Speaker:Maybe you find that you're busy all day long,
Speaker:but when you finish up,
Speaker:you haven't accomplished much of anything at all.
Speaker:I've been there too until I started working with what I
Speaker:now call the power of purpose.
Speaker:I made a free video for you that explains how to
Speaker:boost your productivity and get results using the power of your
Speaker:purpose. Isn't it time to make all the effort that you
Speaker:put into your business and your life do for you what
Speaker:you've intended.
Speaker:Now full disclosure,
Speaker:this video does lead into showing you my brand new inspired
Speaker:daily planner.
Speaker:But listen,
Speaker:you don't need the inspired planner to get all the advantages
Speaker:out of the power of purpose that I show you in
Speaker:this video.
Speaker:So if you're interested in discovering a new way to work
Speaker:through your days so your time is intentional and your results
Speaker:are real,
Speaker:I encourage you to go over and watch this video and
Speaker:you can find it at gift biz,
Speaker:unwrapped.com forward slash planner.
Speaker:That's gift biz,
Speaker:unwrap.com forward slash planner now,
Speaker:in the four plus years that I've been doing this show,
Speaker:I've come to know a lot about you and truth be
Speaker:told it's pretty easy because we're a lot of like you
Speaker:take great pride and can talk all day about your products
Speaker:with an interested party in one on one conversations.
Speaker:You can talk about what you make,
Speaker:the story of how you got started and the intricacies of
Speaker:your creation and production methods.
Speaker:These all roll effortlessly off your tongue,
Speaker:right? But then you reach a roadblock talking about these exact
Speaker:same things in a public environment.
Speaker:Now that's an entirely different story.
Speaker:The idea of speaking in public is petrifying to most.
Speaker:Yet. As a small business owner,
Speaker:this is essential to getting the visibility necessary to grow.
Speaker:Whether it's networking,
Speaker:exhibiting at a craft show or doing Facebook lives.
Speaker:You aren't going to go far without the extended exposure that
Speaker:these activities bring and if wholesale or corporate accounts are part
Speaker:of your sales strategy,
Speaker:you'll need to present your business and product in a public
Speaker:forum here to many,
Speaker:I won't say all but many of you will decide to
Speaker:stay small and continue selling only to family,
Speaker:friends, and maybe friends of friends,
Speaker:but the truth is this is only going to get you
Speaker:so far to grow.
Speaker:At some point,
Speaker:you have to display and present your business and your products.
Speaker:This is where today's guest comes in.
Speaker:I've turned to a comedian for some guidance on this issue.
Speaker:Now you might ask,
Speaker:how is this going to help me?
Speaker:You may think comedians naturally have what it takes to deliver
Speaker:one liners and tell stories that end up in that explosion
Speaker:of laughter coming up.
Speaker:You're going to find out that that's not necessarily true.
Speaker:Larry doesn't make tangible and tasty things like we do,
Speaker:but he creates art through entertainment and his profession relies 100%
Speaker:on putting himself in the public eye.
Speaker:Let's turn to him now and find out how he can
Speaker:help us deal with our anxiety around speaking out in front
Speaker:of people we don't know.
Speaker:Really excited to introduce you to Larry bloom with funnier by
Speaker:the Lake comedy now.
Speaker:I have no idea what's going to be happening here,
Speaker:but I know it's going to be a lot of fun,
Speaker:so buckle in and get ready.
Speaker:Larry has been writing jokes and making people laugh his entire
Speaker:life growing up North of Chicago in Wilmette,
Speaker:Illinois. What interest in talent Larry lacked in sports.
Speaker:He made up for it with a passion for the standup
Speaker:comedians and actors from movies and television of the sixties seventies
Speaker:and eighties Larry was a remarkably horrible high school and college
Speaker:student. You guys can guess.
Speaker:I'm reading from his bio that he provided me,
Speaker:so I'm just going with that and he often says that
Speaker:if those years were a book it would be titled fear
Speaker:and loathing on campus.
Speaker:I told you to get ready.
Speaker:Larry's standup comedy Springs from a lifetime of experiences and a
Speaker:view of the world seen through a comedian's filter in which
Speaker:humor can be found in everything and nothing is off limits
Speaker:unless it's not funny.
Speaker:He can be seen performing on stage throughout the Chicago area
Speaker:and through funnier by the Lake comedy Leary has made it
Speaker:his mission to bring live comedy to the North shore of
Speaker:Chicago. Larry,
Speaker:I am so excited to have you on the show.
Speaker:Thanks. So I've warned you.
Speaker:And so you have to be ready for my traditional candle
Speaker:question, which we use to start every interview.
Speaker:And that is if you were to share with us what
Speaker:your all about by way of a motivational candle,
Speaker:what color would it be and what would be the quote
Speaker:on the candle?
Speaker:I don't know what a motivational candle.
Speaker:I'd have never been motivated by a candle,
Speaker:but if I had to pick a color it would normally
Speaker:be blue,
Speaker:like kind of medium,
Speaker:kind of cool.
Speaker:Blue would normally be the color that represents.
Speaker:So I guess that's the color that comes to my mind
Speaker:I guess.
Speaker:Okay. And then the quote,
Speaker:which is like my favorite quote,
Speaker:which is actually from Hunter S Thompson,
Speaker:it's a part of a longer quote,
Speaker:but it's basically buy the ticket,
Speaker:take the ride,
Speaker:which basically means whatever you do,
Speaker:good or bad,
Speaker:you've made that decision,
Speaker:you're in it and you got to go for that ride,
Speaker:see what happens.
Speaker:There you go.
Speaker:I like that.
Speaker:How would you relate that to someone who's starting a business?
Speaker:I don't think you can start a business and actually not
Speaker:have that sensibility because if you go into a business thinking
Speaker:I'm going to do this and it's going to go this
Speaker:way where I want it to go this way and you're
Speaker:not prepared to just take those steps and see where they
Speaker:take you and see what blows up in your face and
Speaker:then you still have to deal with and you still have
Speaker:to go down that road or pick the roads to go
Speaker:down based on what happens.
Speaker:I mean you shouldn't even be starting a business.
Speaker:The people that start with these concrete expectations are almost doomed
Speaker:to failure.
Speaker:I mean I think you know,
Speaker:cause you run a business,
Speaker:I mean there's just absolutely no day.
Speaker:That's just like exactly the way you expect it to go.
Speaker:Right. And I also think you're right because when people start
Speaker:a business,
Speaker:they think everything is going to be smooth.
Speaker:If they've planned enough thought about it,
Speaker:enough took enough classes,
Speaker:whatever it's going to be,
Speaker:that everything is going to be perfect from the get go.
Speaker:And then the second that they meet with resistance or something's
Speaker:not going quote unquote according to plan,
Speaker:then they think,
Speaker:I'm not cut out for this.
Speaker:You know,
Speaker:or it's not going to work for me.
Speaker:Where where you're saying take the ride.
Speaker:It is going to be a ride.
Speaker:There's going to be bumpy roads,
Speaker:there's going to be smooth roads and that's what you've kind
Speaker:of bought into when you bought the ticket.
Speaker:That's exactly right.
Speaker:Good. I'm on the ride with you Larry.
Speaker:Okay. Take us back.
Speaker:How did you get into,
Speaker:now I know comedy isn't all that you do,
Speaker:so feel free to share what you want to talk about,
Speaker:but I know we really want to focus on the comedy
Speaker:part as well and give biz listeners.
Speaker:I wanted to do that because that also more relates to
Speaker:what we're talking about here with you.
Speaker:If you're a Potter or any type of a maker.
Speaker:Creating comedy is also making,
Speaker:I thought this was going to be a fun and interesting
Speaker:twist to other things that we're all doing together.
Speaker:Okay, so Larry,
Speaker:take us on back.
Speaker:Tell us how this all happened,
Speaker:How, what happened to the comedy part of my life?
Speaker:Whichever way you want to go with us.
Speaker:Well, I mean we're talking about comedy,
Speaker:we're talking about funding by the Lake.
Speaker:Like you'd read in my bio,
Speaker:I've always written jokes and I've always been funny people my
Speaker:entire life were like,
Speaker:you should be a standup comedian,
Speaker:but I was always enough of just a student of the
Speaker:arts that I knew that it wasn't like when you're at
Speaker:a party and you're standing in a group of four people
Speaker:and you say something funny and then other things happen and
Speaker:people say stuff and then you say something funny and everyone
Speaker:thinks, Oh,
Speaker:you should be a standup comedian.
Speaker:But that's like a huge difference between standing up in front
Speaker:of a room full of people and having to say like
Speaker:30 or 40 or 50 things in a row that are
Speaker:funny. Plus when I was younger I just did not have
Speaker:the personality or fortitude to get on stage and do anything.
Speaker:But then I had an opportunity a handful of years ago.
Speaker:I used to run a business groups.
Speaker:I used to be in front of a groups all the
Speaker:time. There was a standup element to that always.
Speaker:I would always write jokes for those actually.
Speaker:Yeah. I was more excited about writing the jokes to the
Speaker:stuff that actually the business part of it,
Speaker:so I was really accustomed to doing that in front of
Speaker:large groups.
Speaker:I used to like the MC comedy nights.
Speaker:I had done that because that was low risk and you
Speaker:don't expect a lot from,
Speaker:the MC just introduces me.
Speaker:Maybe you throw in a joke or something,
Speaker:but they don't expect you to be the comedian.
Speaker:Then there was a business group I was in and they
Speaker:were doing a comedy night.
Speaker:I asked the venue owner if I could emcee it and
Speaker:he said,
Speaker:well, the people who run the group,
Speaker:we're going to do the emceeing,
Speaker:and he asked me if I could do a set.
Speaker:Now, just to put it in context,
Speaker:I was actually at that point,
Speaker:I was in my mid forties and my dad had just
Speaker:died like a few weeks before kind of suddenly,
Speaker:and he probably had plans for six months out in the
Speaker:next year.
Speaker:And so I was really,
Speaker:living in a life is short kind of a sense and
Speaker:I, I just didn't think I could say no because I
Speaker:couldn't say I want to do it next year cause I
Speaker:was just in a place where next year sometimes it isn't
Speaker:available to you.
Speaker:So then I went on Facebook and I posted,
Speaker:I've just tentatively agreed to do stand up comedy at this
Speaker:place in a few weeks or whatever.
Speaker:And the response was like,
Speaker:yeah, you have to do that.
Speaker:Oh come and see that.
Speaker:That's what people were like very excited for that because they've
Speaker:been telling me to do it for a long time.
Speaker:And then part of the reason I even posted it was
Speaker:like if I post it,
Speaker:I cannot back out at this point.
Speaker:It's a public thing.
Speaker:I mean I can,
Speaker:but I'd feel awful.
Speaker:I'd never live it down in my own head and the
Speaker:thing that I did that was completely ridiculous was like I
Speaker:had been speaking in front of groups so I was really
Speaker:comfortable and I knew how to write jokes and perform jokes,
Speaker:but I had never done like open mics.
Speaker:I'd never done anything in standup comedy like in pure standup
Speaker:comedy and the request was that I do 15 minutes,
Speaker:which is insane to do the first time I normally go
Speaker:to open mics.
Speaker:You do three minutes,
Speaker:you five minutes,
Speaker:you do eight minutes,
Speaker:you do four minutes and you kind of work on what's
Speaker:called your tight five.
Speaker:That's what you wore.
Speaker:You people worked for years to get their tight five to
Speaker:go out and be a comedian and I agreed to do
Speaker:15 minutes and I didn't know any better to know how
Speaker:dumb that was,
Speaker:but I wrote 15 minutes and I did really well,
Speaker:which was kind of amazing.
Speaker:That is so crazy.
Speaker:I want to talk about that some more in a second,
Speaker:but I also want to underline the point that you're talking
Speaker:about here that way back when you were young,
Speaker:people were already saying you were funny.
Speaker:Like that was innately something that was part of you.
Speaker:And I think it's so interesting for all of us to
Speaker:reflect on what do other people see in us that we
Speaker:don't allow ourselves to see.
Speaker:Because it might be a little uncomfortable.
Speaker:It might be scary.
Speaker:You might not identify with it really,
Speaker:but it already is naturally you.
Speaker:That's what I'm hearing from you in the story.
Speaker:Yeah. Though I knew I was funny.
Speaker:I mean that was sort of like my stock and trade
Speaker:and that also got me in trouble and also got me
Speaker:out of trouble a lot of times and just that,
Speaker:Hey, you know,
Speaker:I'm not a big guy.
Speaker:You know,
Speaker:physically I'm not a big guy.
Speaker:So you play with what you got to kind of survive.
Speaker:So I've always been funny.
Speaker:I always think of there's a North shore magazine or Chicago
Speaker:magazine article with a,
Speaker:it was an interview with a Harold Ramis from like the
Speaker:nineties they asked him when you were in high school,
Speaker:I think he went to sin or something about it.
Speaker:He was like,
Speaker:when you were in high school were you the class clown?
Speaker:And he said,
Speaker:ah no I wasn't at the class clown,
Speaker:but I was the class clowns writer.
Speaker:I identified with that greatly.
Speaker:Yeah, well we've known each other for a long time.
Speaker:Larry, and I've seen you as the meeting leader in network
Speaker:meetings before.
Speaker:I've seen you with your breakfast groups groups that you've created
Speaker:and you are so comfortable and you are hysterical in front
Speaker:of the groups.
Speaker:And dare I say,
Speaker:I think,
Speaker:and this is a question for you,
Speaker:you were always really relevant and I think that's just what
Speaker:a comedian naturally does.
Speaker:You are really relevant to things that were happening at the
Speaker:time, like in the news and all of that.
Speaker:But you also always almost crossed the line.
Speaker:You know,
Speaker:like you had that gasp of factor.
Speaker:I don't know what you'd call it,
Speaker:like I can't believe you just said that type thing.
Speaker:Do you do that intentionally?
Speaker:Is that part of your thing?
Speaker:It's interesting because when I ran the chamber morning breakfast that
Speaker:you were always at,
Speaker:that wasn't my group.
Speaker:I just led it and so I would bring it to
Speaker:a point and then yes,
Speaker:and bring it to a line and kind of inch over
Speaker:it. You know,
Speaker:breakfast of champions,
Speaker:which was full on my group to run and it was
Speaker:mine to do whatever I wanted.
Speaker:I could be a little even more outspoken,
Speaker:but I didn't know what we were there for.
Speaker:But yeah.
Speaker:Here's the thing,
Speaker:and this is,
Speaker:I was just telling the story the other day,
Speaker:which is not going to say the word on your podcast.
Speaker:No, you can't or I have to do an E.
Speaker:That's fine.
Speaker:My wedding speech,
Speaker:I dropped the F bomb and I did it because it
Speaker:was part of a story about how when I first met
Speaker:my wife,
Speaker:when we were introduced and we were out with another couple
Speaker:who introduced us,
Speaker:I was on my best behavior.
Speaker:Like normally I talk like Joe Peshy,
Speaker:like in casino,
Speaker:and I was like,
Speaker:I'm not going to swear,
Speaker:I'm going to be a mention about this.
Speaker:And I wasn't.
Speaker:And we were sitting around drinking and Deborah,
Speaker:who became my wife when she was talking,
Speaker:she like dropped the F bomb really casually.
Speaker:And then my friend's wife was talking and I interrupted her
Speaker:and I said,
Speaker:I look back at Deborah and I said,
Speaker:wait, did you just say Athens?
Speaker:She said,
Speaker:unapologetically. She was like,
Speaker:Oh yeah.
Speaker:And so in my wedding speech,
Speaker:I tell that story so that at the end of it,
Speaker:the is so I could say unequivocally with all sincerity,
Speaker:you had me at F,
Speaker:that was the joke and it got a huge laugh.
Speaker:And then people still talk about it today and they're just
Speaker:like, I can't believe you said F in your wedding speech.
Speaker:And I say,
Speaker:how many weddings have you gone to?
Speaker:Oh, Dustin's like,
Speaker:all right,
Speaker:tell me any other wedding speech you remember.
Speaker:And they can't.
Speaker:That's the only one they remember.
Speaker:Oh there you go.
Speaker:Yeah. That's why one part of my other business,
Speaker:which is marketing and branding is always like be memorable.
Speaker:That's it.
Speaker:You gotta be memorable.
Speaker:And so my style,
Speaker:my sort of,
Speaker:the thing that I do is communication is words that that's
Speaker:what I'm all about.
Speaker:And when I'm at a big networking event or something like
Speaker:in one of these chambers where there's a hundred people in
Speaker:the room,
Speaker:I mean you got to say something people are going to
Speaker:remember or it's just in and out one year.
Speaker:Yeah. But you also said something really important too,
Speaker:which is know your audience and know why you're there.
Speaker:Because when you're talking about with the chamber you were a
Speaker:little more reserved,
Speaker:like a little bit of a filter was there.
Speaker:You crossed the line of tad like a toe across the
Speaker:line, but you treated it differently than you treated your own
Speaker:event. Yeah,
Speaker:exactly. So knowing your audience is important.
Speaker:Yeah, and like I just was booked at a show,
Speaker:a comedy show down in Bloomington,
Speaker:normal and central Illinois.
Speaker:That's where I used to live.
Speaker:I went to school there and I went down there.
Speaker:I agree to do the show cause I still knew some
Speaker:people down there so I wanted to go down and do
Speaker:it. But there were just all sorts of jokes I have
Speaker:not been able to do like up here on the North
Speaker:shore that I was able to do in Bloomington normal that
Speaker:they just hang it up and then vice versa.
Speaker:There's stuff that I could just couldn't do down there that
Speaker:it just wouldn't relate.
Speaker:Right. Yeah.
Speaker:I guess I would circle this back to people who are
Speaker:listening know your customer and when you think of email language
Speaker:that you're using,
Speaker:images that you're presenting,
Speaker:et cetera,
Speaker:you want to make sure that you're speaking with things that
Speaker:will be received well.
Speaker:But to Larry's point,
Speaker:I think that also captures attention.
Speaker:So really,
Speaker:really good point there.
Speaker:I see this a lot that when I go to these
Speaker:networking things and the people that have,
Speaker:they've got their nuggets,
Speaker:you got to leave with a nugget and sometimes it's like
Speaker:you have to do this so you shouldn't do this.
Speaker:I don't like when people speak in absolutes like that.
Speaker:That's why you really do have to know your audience and
Speaker:your audiences or your customer base.
Speaker:Actually your audience is your potential customers and then once you
Speaker:actually have them like in front of you at a trade
Speaker:show or on the phone and like a call or even
Speaker:just a networking and you're doing your pitch,
Speaker:I mean you have to respond to,
Speaker:you have to look at their face like how are they
Speaker:responding? Is there a face opening up because they like what
Speaker:you're saying and you can go a little further or is
Speaker:there a brow offering and you know what?
Speaker:They're getting a little upset.
Speaker:You just don't have your pitch and you just lay it
Speaker:out and then just walk away.
Speaker:I mean the people that are responsive or sensitive to who
Speaker:they're talking to,
Speaker:they're just more successful at least from that point.
Speaker:Right. Well like when you're doing your comedy,
Speaker:you can see that cause you're live right in front,
Speaker:you can see what the audience's reactions are.
Speaker:Well, like the first two rows,
Speaker:it could be 500 people in the room.
Speaker:You really only see like the first 25 Okay.
Speaker:All right.
Speaker:Got it.
Speaker:But I think also like for some of us,
Speaker:if it's emails,
Speaker:you can see what email opens you're getting or how much
Speaker:interaction you're getting on Facebook.
Speaker:You know?
Speaker:So I think your point is really,
Speaker:really well made,
Speaker:Larry, is it's not just throw the information out there and
Speaker:then move on to the next bit of information,
Speaker:put information out and then go back and analyze and see
Speaker:what's really resonating with your audience and then do more of
Speaker:that. Yeah.
Speaker:And I was in my other business,
Speaker:which is,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:branding and marketing and web development.
Speaker:I've always told people,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:your website needs to be responsive to who's,
Speaker:it can't just be just your information,
Speaker:some pretty pictures in your information that just you like to
Speaker:see who's coming to this.
Speaker:There might be three different types of people that are going
Speaker:to come to your site.
Speaker:That could be B to C,
Speaker:there could be distributors,
Speaker:there could be reps who want to work with you and
Speaker:you have to appeal to them and speak their language,
Speaker:take the work away from them.
Speaker:And again,
Speaker:it all sort of ties together and just knowing who you're
Speaker:talking to and being sensitive to that.
Speaker:Yep. And I'm so glad you brought up your website.
Speaker:This is going off course a little bit.
Speaker:We're going to get back onto comedy in a minute,
Speaker:but Larry,
Speaker:I have quoted you at least two or three times in
Speaker:different podcast episodes.
Speaker:Okay. What do you say about your website?
Speaker:Well, I used to have a marketing thing that was,
Speaker:is it the,
Speaker:what type of employee is your website?
Speaker:Yep, exactly.
Speaker:Yeah. What type of employees?
Speaker:Your website,
Speaker:does it sit at home all day doing nothing or does
Speaker:it generate leads and help you succeed or grow?
Speaker:The whole point is that it should be as close to
Speaker:a human representative.
Speaker:It can't be because it's a website,
Speaker:but if you can just cover all those bases about just
Speaker:not just throwing the information in front of people,
Speaker:but actually thinking about who's coming to the site.
Speaker:There's different channels of people and there's different conversations with each
Speaker:of them.
Speaker:Get them to the right conversations,
Speaker:the right information.
Speaker:Your conversion rate is going to be exponentially better because they're
Speaker:getting right to the information that applies to them,
Speaker:like within a click within a second or two instead of
Speaker:like they have to weed through everything that you've got on
Speaker:there and figure out.
Speaker:That's the whole thing.
Speaker:It's like what people never seem to understand.
Speaker:Even big companies with big budgets,
Speaker:they just seem to miss the boat on like you took
Speaker:the web out of it.
Speaker:The technology.
Speaker:Yeah. You would never set up an office or a retail
Speaker:store or a restaurant or something where people came in and
Speaker:had to figure out how you could help them.
Speaker:No. Yeah.
Speaker:They come in and you find out what they need and
Speaker:then you respond to them accordingly.
Speaker:Right. And what I remember you also saying is your website
Speaker:is one of your best employees.
Speaker:Is there 24 seven It's the first point of contact,
Speaker:probably 90% of the time now.
Speaker:Because even if it's somebody you know,
Speaker:a relative,
Speaker:it could be someone you went to high school with,
Speaker:whatever you write into them,
Speaker:this is what I'm doing now.
Speaker:They want to do business with you or they're interested,
Speaker:they're still going to go to your website and check you
Speaker:out. And you may never even have known they've been there.
Speaker:Right. And that's the thing.
Speaker:I have an article on my LinkedIn,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:one of those long form articles and it's something called,
Speaker:I don't get business through.
Speaker:My website is a big fat lie that people tell themselves.
Speaker:And it's because people are like,
Speaker:I don't get business through it.
Speaker:Like they think,
Speaker:well it's like,
Speaker:but no,
Speaker:it's part of an aggregate and you don't know if you
Speaker:don't have a website or if you're not tracking like the
Speaker:activity and conversions.
Speaker:You don't know what sent people away.
Speaker:You don't know what people didn't do.
Speaker:You can only try and get them to do what you
Speaker:need them.
Speaker:Do. People think,
Speaker:I don't get business through my website because people didn't search
Speaker:whatever I sell,
Speaker:find me and then give me money.
Speaker:As opposed to like,
Speaker:well maybe they found you some other way.
Speaker:Maybe they heard about you,
Speaker:maybe they met you,
Speaker:they go to your website and whatever.
Speaker:They're uninspired.
Speaker:The whole idea is it's supposed to inspire and motivate people
Speaker:to do whatever you need them to do,
Speaker:which is give information or give money or make a purchase,
Speaker:whatever the case may be or download information hopefully.
Speaker:Right. Yeah,
Speaker:and I think the point is we need to take control
Speaker:of what actions actually happened by making sure what you were
Speaker:just talking about a little bit earlier,
Speaker:that when people come to the site they can self select
Speaker:what's important to them.
Speaker:And it's very obvious where they should go next and that's
Speaker:all under our control.
Speaker:It's not up to them to figure it out.
Speaker:Yeah. And people don't like the word manipulation because they think
Speaker:it's kind of negative and it's kind of sleazy,
Speaker:but it is a manipulation.
Speaker:You do have to manipulate the people in a certain way,
Speaker:not necessarily in a bad way,
Speaker:but just you need to get them to do what you
Speaker:need them to do to become your customer and what they
Speaker:need to do to become the customer,
Speaker:to make it as easy,
Speaker:less the least time,
Speaker:the less clicks,
Speaker:the less thinking involved.
Speaker:They found your website somehow they're on your website,
Speaker:make it easy for them to become your customer.
Speaker:Right. Or else they'll go somewhere else.
Speaker:If it's too confusing,
Speaker:they'll go somewhere else.
Speaker:Yeah. Even if it's somebody that knows you and likes you
Speaker:and they might not do business with you or go away
Speaker:from your website,
Speaker:not even out of malice,
Speaker:just because they got distracted and they didn't come back.
Speaker:And then they had somebody else on the list that they
Speaker:were checking out and they went with that.
Speaker:And I always tell people,
Speaker:you can hope that they come back to your website or
Speaker:they come back to your website to get your phone number
Speaker:to give you a call.
Speaker:You can hope they come back,
Speaker:but you have to depend on them not coming back.
Speaker:So you have to do everything you can to make sure,
Speaker:whether it's your website,
Speaker:whether it's offline,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:printed collateral,
Speaker:whether it's you setting up meetings,
Speaker:whatever. You have to do,
Speaker:whatever you can to make sure all that happened.
Speaker:Yeah. That you get the most out of that one shot
Speaker:that you can because it might be your only chance.
Speaker:Exactly. Yeah.
Speaker:Alright, let's go back.
Speaker:I want to go back to the funny,
Speaker:we're going to reenter the funny Larry,
Speaker:so we're back to,
Speaker:you made this commitment.
Speaker:It wasn't exactly the best time,
Speaker:but probably it was because if you weren't in that mindset
Speaker:about time is limited because of your dad passing,
Speaker:you may not have committed.
Speaker:Right. And I guess you might say yes,
Speaker:you for sure know you would have tried to delay it,
Speaker:right? Yeah.
Speaker:Again, I can get it to you.
Speaker:Well, I probably would've been like,
Speaker:well maybe cause it was only a few weeks away,
Speaker:so I went,
Speaker:well maybe I'll do it the next one and maybe the
Speaker:next one would have never come.
Speaker:So I do have to say that on that night there
Speaker:were three comedians.
Speaker:There was me,
Speaker:there was another member of this business group that was like
Speaker:an amateur comedian and there was a hired professional comedian who
Speaker:was like the headliner who did 20 minutes or something like
Speaker:that. And I went on first and I just crushed the
Speaker:hell out of it.
Speaker:I'm smiling here,
Speaker:Larry. That's awesome.
Speaker:That's not a brag.
Speaker:That's not a humble brag.
Speaker:Whatever. I mean that is like I tell people all the
Speaker:time, you know what if I did those,
Speaker:it actually I wrote 15 minutes and went about 16 and
Speaker:a half minutes and I have the,
Speaker:I have a recording,
Speaker:I didn't even think to record it.
Speaker:A friend of mine was there with his phone and recorded
Speaker:it. So I do have it,
Speaker:but it's like if I did a horribly,
Speaker:but I just had like two or three jokes land in
Speaker:that entire 16 minutes,
Speaker:I would have been completely hooked.
Speaker:So the fact that I did really well is great.
Speaker:But I think even if just a couple,
Speaker:cause it's also a comedian's personality is,
Speaker:is we're all very needy for that instant gratification,
Speaker:that instant approval.
Speaker:But I will say that evening I went up first and
Speaker:I've just crushed it.
Speaker:The second guy who was like an amateur,
Speaker:he was horrible.
Speaker:And the headliner who was the paid comedian,
Speaker:he bombed so bad.
Speaker:He bombed so bad that he had actually set up a
Speaker:video camera to record the entire thing.
Speaker:And he said he had sent me my clip and he
Speaker:never did.
Speaker:So. Wow.
Speaker:You were the winner of the night for sure.
Speaker:Well, yeah,
Speaker:I didn't really judge it by winning or losing.
Speaker:I just,
Speaker:I did really well and that really was great.
Speaker:And the funny thing is that same comedian,
Speaker:a couple years later after I'd already been doing funny by
Speaker:the Lake,
Speaker:we're doing a ton of shows.
Speaker:Like I've booked like over 200 paid spots a year for
Speaker:comedians now and different shows.
Speaker:And a couple of years ago that guy started calling me
Speaker:and he didn't remember that.
Speaker:And he gives us,
Speaker:yeah, yeah.
Speaker:Would it be on one of your show that I'm a
Speaker:comedian and like okay,
Speaker:some of your clip,
Speaker:whatever and send me his clap and I just kept blowing
Speaker:off until they stopped calling me.
Speaker:That's called karma cause he never sent me my clip.
Speaker:I asked him a few times,
Speaker:he just blew me off.
Speaker:So, Oh yeah,
Speaker:there you go.
Speaker:But I think a good point here also for everyone to
Speaker:think about is even if you're not prepared,
Speaker:think back to Larry's story.
Speaker:Like if you have an opportunity that comes up and you're
Speaker:like, that's too advanced for where I am in my business
Speaker:right now,
Speaker:or I don't have everything in place yet to do.
Speaker:It may be an opportunity that will never come again.
Speaker:So take it even if you're not sure and then just
Speaker:make it happen.
Speaker:Which is what you did Larry.
Speaker:Yeah, you definitely had experience already because you've been up in
Speaker:front of people not to that level yet.
Speaker:Right. But you had not with the more structured now 15
Speaker:minutes versus the five,
Speaker:right. The tight five you talk about,
Speaker:but you took the opportunity and just by your own ambition
Speaker:right now,
Speaker:you probably wouldn't have done it when never would have happened.
Speaker:I'm sure I wouldn't have.
Speaker:And I shared what had just been like,
Speaker:Oh, you know what,
Speaker:there's not enough time to write.
Speaker:I've never done it before.
Speaker:I'll do it the next time.
Speaker:They do accommodate.
Speaker:And actually I don't think they ever did a comedy night
Speaker:after that.
Speaker:So that group,
Speaker:so I would have never had that opportunity.
Speaker:Well there you go.
Speaker:And then I love the fact that you posted about it,
Speaker:that you had no choice then,
Speaker:but to be accountable and to go through with it.
Speaker:Yeah, I was interested to see what people would say and
Speaker:people were just like,
Speaker:that is awesome.
Speaker:I will go to that.
Speaker:You have to do that.
Speaker:But people were just like completely positive about it.
Speaker:And then at the same time I just thought if I
Speaker:post it and then people are like,
Speaker:Hey, whatever happened with that.
Speaker:And I was like,
Speaker:Oh I decided not to do it and I would have
Speaker:felt bad.
Speaker:You would have been disappointed in yourself.
Speaker:Yeah. So it would have been disappointed because that's not necessarily
Speaker:my personality.
Speaker:I usually try and rise to those challenges.
Speaker:So what did you do to prepare?
Speaker:Oh for that first
get yourself psyched up?
Speaker:Obviously there's content creation,
Speaker:all of that.
Speaker:But walk us through what you had to do to get
Speaker:ready for that.
Speaker:I have,
Speaker:I'll tell you,
Speaker:you should do,
Speaker:which I didn't do cause I was dumb like I had
Speaker:mentioned earlier.
Speaker:Okay. If you live in Chicago or New York or California
Speaker:or Texas,
Speaker:I really almost anywhere,
Speaker:but especially as Chicago,
Speaker:you can go to an open mic,
Speaker:comedy open mic in every night of the week there's this
Speaker:plenty. That's what you should do.
Speaker:You should start writing some jokes and trying it out at
Speaker:open mics and the community is pretty welcoming at least as
Speaker:far as I found it.
Speaker:And find it open mic where they're going to give you
Speaker:four minutes or five minutes,
Speaker:something that's kind of easy to kind of wrap your head
Speaker:around. You write some jokes and then that's what you do
Speaker:and you do that like a whole bunch of times before
Speaker:you actually get booked on an actual show.
Speaker:I did it the opposite.
Speaker:I had absolutely no idea.
Speaker:I just went home and I just like,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:I have a lot of jokes about like living on the
Speaker:North shore that I just kind of told just like in
Speaker:passing and conversation and stuff like that,
Speaker:just to make people laugh.
Speaker:So I kind of had that as a starting point and
Speaker:then I did some topical stuff that was going on in
Speaker:the news and then my first step for like the first
Speaker:year, so it was actually,
Speaker:it was pretty dirty,
Speaker:it was pretty blue and it was just fun writing those
Speaker:jokes and saying him out loud.
Speaker:And a lot of it was just like I'd written stuff
Speaker:based on like conversations I'd had.
Speaker:Everything is from like my personal experience.
Speaker:I had a bunch of that and I just kind of
Speaker:put it together as a set and then I've had to
Speaker:write a whole bunch of stuff because I had to do
Speaker:15 minutes as a long time.
Speaker:I mean at least it was back then.
Speaker:Well for joke after joke and story,
Speaker:I'm just thinking probably a lot of the jokes that you
Speaker:have are triggered by something someone's saying or a situation that
Speaker:you're in.
Speaker:But then when you're having to do like a show on
Speaker:stage, you don't have those triggers.
Speaker:You have to figure them out for yourself.
Speaker:So there's timing.
Speaker:How do you flow one into another?
Speaker:Like there's all of that behind it.
Speaker:I'm thinking,
Speaker:Well there's some of it a lot.
Speaker:I wish I can remember the comedian,
Speaker:I've seen this quote before and I just saw recently and
Speaker:I can't remember who it was from,
Speaker:but I agree with this quote and wish I could live
Speaker:up to that standard,
Speaker:which is the comedian was saying that your material is your
Speaker:fallback. So like you go out there and like every time
Speaker:I go to a new venue,
Speaker:a new town,
Speaker:I learned about the town,
Speaker:I drive around it or walk around it.
Speaker:I learned about the venue,
Speaker:I look around,
Speaker:I look at the people in there,
Speaker:I look at what's on the walls,
Speaker:what they're serving,
Speaker:all that stuff.
Speaker:And that gives you a whole bunch of stuff to talk
Speaker:about and joke about it.
Speaker:And then you've got your material.
Speaker:I mean there's been times where I've just been,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:the word is riffing,
Speaker:just riffing or winging it.
Speaker:Basically just kind of talking to the audience and responding to
Speaker:who's in the audience,
Speaker:what's going on in the venue,
Speaker:what's going on in the town,
Speaker:whatever. And then it gets like 10 minutes in and you're
Speaker:just like,
Speaker:hi, I should do some jokes now.
Speaker:You want me to some jokes Because you were in the
Speaker:flow for the first part.
Speaker:Then you go to material if needed.
Speaker:Yeah. And then usually kind of like goes back and forth.
Speaker:The only time I really stick a hundred percent to scripted
Speaker:material is like sometimes there's a show that they do at
Speaker:one of the Xannies around Chicago and it's sort of an
Speaker:audition show and I've been on it a few times and
Speaker:you get six minutes and the whole thing is like,
Speaker:it's gotta be,
Speaker:you can't go over the Booker wants to know if he's
Speaker:going to book for six minutes or 10 minutes or 20
Speaker:minutes that you can stick to your time.
Speaker:That's the most important thing.
Speaker:A second to making the audience laugh.
Speaker:And that's the only time where it's like you really practice
Speaker:it out to the second to make sure that you're going
Speaker:to get through it.
Speaker:Usually a little shorter because you have to allow for like
Speaker:laugh breaks and stuff like that.
Speaker:So you know,
Speaker:like they get six minutes and like I'm going to write
Speaker:something, it's gonna be five minutes.
Speaker:Exactly. So that I know I will not go over six
Speaker:minutes. That's the only time when that's a big issue to
Speaker:it. But other than that,
Speaker:it really is like,
Speaker:and again it is like that in business as well where
Speaker:you have your pitch and you can't just like sit down
Speaker:and just like do your pitch and like not kind of
Speaker:react to respond or maybe like see when people are kind
Speaker:of getting confused or whatever.
Speaker:Or if somebody chimes in,
Speaker:you have to be prepared.
Speaker:I mean that's why I don't really like improv,
Speaker:but improv is a really good thing for people in business
Speaker:because it helps them with that point where they're doing their
Speaker:pitch or they're having a sales call or whatever,
Speaker:and then someone just shifts the conversation or throws a monkey
Speaker:wrench in there.
Speaker:And you have to be able to go from that point.
Speaker:Right. You know,
Speaker:I could see this could relate a lot of people in
Speaker:our audience.
Speaker:I really,
Speaker:really am pushing them to do networking because a lot of
Speaker:people are going to get business right from their local area
Speaker:and when you talk about networking,
Speaker:you talk about the elevator speech.
Speaker:I actually call it an introduction message.
Speaker:People get really nervous about having to do that,
Speaker:so if you have something already structured that could be like
Speaker:what you're saying Larry.
Speaker:The fallback as you were talking about this,
Speaker:I know that I do this with my introduction message when
Speaker:it's my turn to stand up and say whatever I'm going
Speaker:to say about my businesses is I will try to improv
Speaker:like you're talking about spinoff of something that someone just said
Speaker:right before me or something that has to do with the
Speaker:event before I get into my spiel because it just also
Speaker:lightens the mood I think,
Speaker:versus just getting up and being so wrote,
Speaker:I'm Sue Monheit,
Speaker:blah, blah,
Speaker:blah. Right.
Speaker:It gets people's attention.
Speaker:It goes back to what I said earlier.
Speaker:You're in a room with 50 or a hundred people and
Speaker:I've always said that you have a hundred people in there,
Speaker:man. If you're like the fourth person to introduce yourself,
Speaker:nobody's going to remember you.
Speaker:Right, and just personally,
Speaker:I always say that I get a handful of people in.
Speaker:I just start playing the movie,
Speaker:Goodfellas. In my head,
Speaker:I was like,
Speaker:I can't even,
Speaker:I went to a chamber,
Speaker:local chamber event a few months ago.
Speaker:I woke up late,
Speaker:I got there late and I forgot my phone.
Speaker:I didn't even pitch my business.
Speaker:All I said was like I woke up at 10 after
Speaker:seven and I left home without my phone.
Speaker:So I'm really looking forward to actually listening to all of
Speaker:you and learning what you do.
Speaker:Oh, that's fine.
Speaker:Well, and that gives you a little peek into Larry's humor,
Speaker:you guys.
Speaker:Then you know what the next month,
Speaker:because we have those things that just every month,
Speaker:the next month somebody made a comment to me like,
Speaker:Oh, did you remember your phone today?
Speaker:Wow. You know,
Speaker:they actually remembered that.
Speaker:What else did they remember from that meeting of people introducing
Speaker:themselves? You probably know,
Speaker:you know?
Speaker:That's a really good point.
Speaker:Don't worry.
Speaker:We'll hear more from Larry After a quick word from our
Speaker:sponsor. This podcast is made possible thanks to the support of
Speaker:the ribbon print company.
Speaker:Create custom ribbons in your store or craft studio in seconds.
Speaker:Visit the ribbon,
Speaker:print company.com
Speaker:for more information.
Speaker:Okay, so a couple of things I just want to highlight
Speaker:from your story so far.
Speaker:The things you should do,
Speaker:not necessarily that you did do right,
Speaker:is to start practicing.
Speaker:Even if it's raw,
Speaker:even if it's uncomfortable,
Speaker:because those first times that you do whatever it is,
Speaker:maybe it's a craft show,
Speaker:maybe it's going to networking events,
Speaker:maybe it's doing comedy on stage,
Speaker:I don't know,
Speaker:whatever it is for you.
Speaker:The first one,
Speaker:go back and listen to my first podcast,
Speaker:like I want to cringe,
Speaker:right? I would never get to where I am now.
Speaker:If you don't go through that really rough and raw stage,
Speaker:you've got to do that.
Speaker:Everyone has to put in their time,
Speaker:so consider it that way and it might be a little
Speaker:bit easier and then prepare.
Speaker:Like Larry,
Speaker:you're saying,
Speaker:you know you were preparing because you knew that was a
Speaker:fallback. I love that.
Speaker:I'm going to use that because it's a great way to
Speaker:think about,
Speaker:you've always got that ACE in your pocket,
Speaker:which is your material or based on your situation,
Speaker:whatever it is.
Speaker:So great points there,
Speaker:but, so then how did you,
Speaker:and I'm thinking back to this event again,
Speaker:how did you get yourself prepped emotionally to get on stage
Speaker:to actually follow through with what you went to do in
Speaker:the first place to get up there?
Speaker:You know what?
Speaker:I have no problem,
Speaker:no stress about speaking,
Speaker:performing in front of a big group.
Speaker:I'd been doing it for awhile just in business,
Speaker:so I had no problem with that.
Speaker:I mean,
Speaker:again, some people they just can't do it.
Speaker:I don't understand that.
Speaker:I understand fear.
Speaker:I don't understand the fear that they can't overcome,
Speaker:but some people are just like,
Speaker:I can never do that.
Speaker:It's the majority of people actually.
Speaker:Yeah. Most people,
Speaker:I guess it never really bothered me.
Speaker:And I did a string of shows at a Xannies in
Speaker:old town Chicago,
Speaker:which is,
Speaker:that's like the Mecca.
Speaker:That's like the place you want to.
Speaker:I mean it's really cool to be asked to be on
Speaker:that stage and I was driving down there with somebody who
Speaker:had been accommodated longer than me and I actually hadn't been
Speaker:in comedy that long and I was doing ended up being
Speaker:like a series of like four shows over a month or
Speaker:something like that,
Speaker:or a couple of weeks or something like that.
Speaker:He said,
Speaker:Oh, the first time I did Zane,
Speaker:he's here.
Speaker:I was so nervous and I was just like,
Speaker:I didn't want to make them feel bad,
Speaker:but my head,
Speaker:I'm just like,
Speaker:I'm not nervous at all.
Speaker:I'm not intimidated by it at all.
Speaker:Which is weird.
Speaker:You're right that most people would be intimidated.
Speaker:There's all sorts of things.
Speaker:Luckily you know now you got the internet,
Speaker:you can go to YouTube and you can find all sorts
Speaker:of videos about people who can help you,
Speaker:like give you some devices for the challenge of getting up
Speaker:and speaking in front of people who if you're not someone
Speaker:who's comfortable doing that.
Speaker:Again for business people,
Speaker:even if they don't want to be in comedy,
Speaker:they can go to,
Speaker:again like in Chicago you can go to second city and
Speaker:you can take it.
Speaker:Most of the people go take classes at second city.
Speaker:Don't end up being actors or being on SNL or being
Speaker:standup or working standard comedians.
Speaker:A lot of people just use it just to be able
Speaker:to function in business to get that skill of standing up
Speaker:in front of a big group and having that confidence.
Speaker:It's sort of the buy the ticket,
Speaker:take the ride,
Speaker:not being shaken by a heckler or in business.
Speaker:Somebody throwing out some weird monkey wrench question can,
Speaker:I guess if there's one thing that I overcame that I
Speaker:was just talking about with somebody else recently was the point
Speaker:where I used to script it and practice it and if
Speaker:I was driving into the city,
Speaker:I would just go over the set,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:the 10 minute,
Speaker:12 minute,
Speaker:15 minutes.
Speaker:I would just do it over and over again until I
Speaker:knew it wrote,
Speaker:I just know word for word,
Speaker:but the problem that a lot of people have that I
Speaker:had early on is if you get thrown off like somebody,
Speaker:a waitress drops a bunch of glasses or some heckler chimes
Speaker:in or something happens.
Speaker:Going back to the place where you left off.
Speaker:When I developed that skill and it only came from repetition
Speaker:and doing it wrong and watching other people,
Speaker:the time when I developed the skill of like I'm doing
Speaker:my side,
Speaker:I'm doing some bit.
Speaker:Yeah. And then all of a sudden I think of something
Speaker:else or somebody chimes in or a heckler says something and
Speaker:then it gets us all thrown off.
Speaker:Alright, go off on something like five minute kind of ad
Speaker:lib kind of thing or kind of like crowd work or
Speaker:something like that.
Speaker:And then where was I?
Speaker:And then you just go right back to it.
Speaker:When I developed that skill that gave me such a different
Speaker:confidence level of like I don't sweat getting booked,
Speaker:I'm out now I'm just like,
Speaker:okay, where is it?
Speaker:What time?
Speaker:What's the date?
Speaker:I don't worry about it at all.
Speaker:Like I don't have to worry like how much time do
Speaker:I have?
Speaker:Okay, I need to know those 12 minutes.
Speaker:I need to know this 15 minutes.
Speaker:Cause now I know like whatever happens happens.
Speaker:Right. So something made me start thinking while you were talking.
Speaker:So tell me what you think of this idea Larry.
Speaker:So I'm thinking,
Speaker:okay, so you obviously on stage comedy get interrupted.
Speaker:Like you just said,
Speaker:I could also see this applying.
Speaker:Let's say somebody is in a corporate meeting and they're meeting
Speaker:with a company they've wanted to do business with forever and
Speaker:they come in with a presentation and they might get thrown
Speaker:off because someone else walks in the room.
Speaker:It's not going to be structured the way they heard intended,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:like um,
Speaker:million different things could go different.
Speaker:What do you think about this?
Speaker:It's more important to understand and know what your objective is
Speaker:with the audience versus the material you're presented.
Speaker:So what I mean by that is for you Larry,
Speaker:your intention is entertainment.
Speaker:Good time.
Speaker:It's not that you get every single joke out in order.
Speaker:So let's say you got totally thrown off and you just
Speaker:abandoned your script and you ad lib the whole time or
Speaker:improv the whole time,
Speaker:I guess is the way I should say it.
Speaker:The end result is still that you are providing entertainment.
Speaker:People are laughing,
Speaker:engaged for a business meeting.
Speaker:The difference is you're delivering the information or getting information from
Speaker:your potential customer that helps advance towards a sale regardless of
Speaker:whether you get out every little tidbit in your presentation.
Speaker:So it,
Speaker:by looking at what the goal is versus your content delivery,
Speaker:that could be helpful.
Speaker:What do you think about that idea?
Speaker:Well, yeah,
Speaker:I agree with that.
Speaker:Yeah. I mean,
Speaker:you have to focus on the goal.
Speaker:The goal is what you want from the customer,
Speaker:the potential customer or the audience,
Speaker:right? So that's the goal.
Speaker:So like in comedy it's like,
Speaker:Hey, if I just go out and I do my,
Speaker:uh, if you think of the movie the blues brothers,
Speaker:you remember the movie the blues brothers,
Speaker:we've all seen it 200 times.
Speaker:Okay. They go to the country bar,
Speaker:right? And John Belushi's characters like,
Speaker:okay, let's do our standard set.
Speaker:And they just start going into one of their blues tunes
Speaker:and the audience just starts throwing beer bottles at him and
Speaker:booing and throwing stuff at them.
Speaker:And then actually the venue cuts off all the electricity and
Speaker:the lights to the stage and their instruments.
Speaker:What do they have to do?
Speaker:They're like,
Speaker:well, do we know a country song?
Speaker:And they start playing like the handful of country songs that
Speaker:they know.
Speaker:That's a really good example of that.
Speaker:So again,
Speaker:what's the goal?
Speaker:The goal is to entertain the audience and get paid at
Speaker:the end of the day.
Speaker:That was their goal in that.
Speaker:So my goal when I got on stage is like,
Speaker:yeah, I got some bits I love doing the,
Speaker:I have a set,
Speaker:I have like a fail safe that I can always use.
Speaker:Then I know it could take seven minutes,
Speaker:15 minutes,
Speaker:a half an hour or whatever,
Speaker:however much I want to draw it out.
Speaker:But if I get there and other things are happening and
Speaker:there's other things to joke about and there's people in the
Speaker:audience that are worthy of your attention to make everyone laugh,
Speaker:you have to do that and then to get the best
Speaker:end results.
Speaker:So yes,
Speaker:as you're saying,
Speaker:if you go to a business meeting and somebody throws some
Speaker:questions or a comment or again,
Speaker:let's say you've got it all down,
Speaker:but then three people,
Speaker:real important people come in late,
Speaker:they've come in 10 minutes late,
Speaker:you might have to double back.
Speaker:You may have to kind of integrate the previous stuff with
Speaker:the stuff from the point where you're at.
Speaker:Okay, that makes sense.
Speaker:I mean,
Speaker:because your goal is to make sure everybody in your shot
Speaker:understands what you're selling them so that they want to buy
Speaker:from you and you do have to adjust.
Speaker:It always goes back to like knowing your audience and knowing
Speaker:the room.
Speaker:Yeah. Knowing your material so well that you can adjust it
Speaker:and change it as you need to.
Speaker:But then being really,
Speaker:really in tune with what you just said,
Speaker:the audience,
Speaker:how it's been received,
Speaker:et cetera.
Speaker:Right. So like if like I just said,
Speaker:you're in a meeting and you're doing a pitcher presentation and
Speaker:a few people come in and they're actually really important.
Speaker:They need to know what you just said.
Speaker:You have to make it interesting for the people who are
Speaker:now going to hear it again,
Speaker:you kind of have to break it up.
Speaker:You have to kind of present it in a different way,
Speaker:whatever, but you have to make sure that like the people
Speaker:who just walked in who need to hear what you just
Speaker:said, they get that information,
Speaker:but you don't lose the other people in the room.
Speaker:They don't check out mentally because now you're just repeating yourself.
Speaker:You starting over and your pitch,
Speaker:right. You have to kind of,
Speaker:I mean it's a skill.
Speaker:There's a nuance to it so that in the end you've
Speaker:kept everyone's attention.
Speaker:You've given everybody the information they need to hear and sometimes
Speaker:it's not.
Speaker:I stand up and I pitched to the room,
Speaker:my sales presentation for 10 or 12 minutes or something like
Speaker:that. I just go through it and I sit down and
Speaker:I don't care that a few important people came in late
Speaker:and they didn't hear it.
Speaker:Well, I don't care that I just repeated a whole bunch
Speaker:of it and then everybody was annoyed at me.
Speaker:Like it can't be like that.
Speaker:You have to focus on the goal.
Speaker:That's a great example.
Speaker:Okay, so what's happened from that first night?
Speaker:Where's funnier by the Lake comedy progressed and where is it
Speaker:today? So after that evening,
Speaker:at that venue where I did my first set,
Speaker:yeah, the venue had actually asked me at that point if
Speaker:I wanted to run a monthly open mic,
Speaker:a comedy open mic.
Speaker:So that's what I did that for at that venue for
Speaker:almost two years I read,
Speaker:it was an open mic slash it was like a hybrid
Speaker:of a book show and an open mic sort of.
Speaker:And I did that for awhile.
Speaker:But as I was doing that,
Speaker:I was actually finding other places for myself to do comedy.
Speaker:If I started to get booked places,
Speaker:I was up in the suburbs of Chicago and the Chicago
Speaker:comedian, he gave me some really good advice.
Speaker:He's just like,
Speaker:Larry, do you have a good show here?
Speaker:You do this really well.
Speaker:Nobody knows you're here,
Speaker:you gotta go into the city.
Speaker:You got to meet all the comedians and the producers that'll
Speaker:get the comedians to come up to your show.
Speaker:That'll get the producers to book you.
Speaker:And that's what I did.
Speaker:As soon as I started going into the actual community and
Speaker:not just stay being up here hoping people heard about me,
Speaker:that's when everything started to change.
Speaker:I had to do a couple of things,
Speaker:which is one,
Speaker:I didn't start when I was like 21 or 25 I
Speaker:had to kind of calibrate my expectations.
Speaker:I have a house and a mortgage,
Speaker:kind of an expensive life,
Speaker:so I couldn't just ditch everything and just start bumbling around
Speaker:and doing comedy wherever for gas money and for meals.
Speaker:So I really do think,
Speaker:and I've run a lot of business.
Speaker:I've run my main business for 22 years.
Speaker:I used to run a business for a division of Eastman
Speaker:Kodak, so I know how to start a business.
Speaker:I know how to develop a business.
Speaker:That's sort of where I lean to.
Speaker:I see the opportunity,
Speaker:so I thought,
Speaker:you know what?
Speaker:At the time there was just no like live standup comedy
Speaker:and the North shore North suburbs of Chicago.
Speaker:There had been,
Speaker:but we were just in a place where they're just,
Speaker:there was not happening really except my show in the little
Speaker:suburb I was doing.
Speaker:So like a year into it,
Speaker:I developed funnier by the Lake comedy.
Speaker:It's sort of a sub entity of my main company to
Speaker:start looking for venues and also private events to bring shows
Speaker:to showcases too.
Speaker:And then also just to get myself booked on like private
Speaker:events and fundraisers and stuff like that and also different clubs.
Speaker:You made it off a presence for myself and for funnier
Speaker:by Lake as a hall.
Speaker:You made your own stage really in a market that needed
Speaker:it because I know we love comedy up here.
Speaker:I want it to monetize it because it was starting to
Speaker:take a lot of my time and so I needed to
Speaker:monetize it.
Speaker:So that's how I find venues.
Speaker:So we'll do things like we've got like these long running
Speaker:like dinner and a show comedy showcases that we do at
Speaker:different venues,
Speaker:primarily in the burbs.
Speaker:I just started a couple of things in the city of
Speaker:Chicago. I just started one a couple months ago on the
Speaker:North side and I got one starting this month in the
Speaker:South loop,
Speaker:but it was primarily in the burbs.
Speaker:So that's how I have a partner in some of these
Speaker:and that's how we get,
Speaker:we monetize it.
Speaker:Basically we go,
Speaker:we sell the show basically the due to a venue and
Speaker:hopefully we do it every month and we either do it
Speaker:by a flat fee or a split of the door or
Speaker:however we work it out.
Speaker:And so that actually generates money and it creates a stage
Speaker:for not just me cause I don't perform at every one
Speaker:of those.
Speaker:A lot of times I just produce but it creates a
Speaker:stage for up and coming and existing comedians.
Speaker:And then also it gets me out there and then other
Speaker:producers hear me and then I get booked on stuff.
Speaker:Just my shows that I can just go to hang out,
Speaker:do my set and I don't have any other responsibility whatsoever
Speaker:there. I tell my jokes,
Speaker:I get paid and then I go.
Speaker:So timewise,
Speaker:I won't ask income wise,
Speaker:but time wise,
Speaker:how do you balance that then with your other business?
Speaker:It was kind of a struggle,
Speaker:like how do I do these two things at the same
Speaker:time? And there was a point a couple of years ago
Speaker:where all of a sudden I realized like I had somehow
Speaker:naturally balanced it where I wasn't like interrupting my main business
Speaker:to do stuff for funnier by the Lake.
Speaker:There's a to be done for funnier by the Lake for
Speaker:every event.
Speaker:Cause you know my,
Speaker:I'm a marketing person so that's a big part of what
Speaker:we sell to the venues,
Speaker:which is like,
Speaker:Hey, we do all the marketing collateral,
Speaker:the design,
Speaker:we do a lot of the promotion online.
Speaker:So there's a lot for each event and all of a
Speaker:sudden, and I don't even know there's,
Speaker:I can't even say how by design I did it,
Speaker:but all of a sudden it just sort of like organically
Speaker:I was doing my main business here and I was doing
Speaker:funnier by Lake stuff,
Speaker:like at a separate time.
Speaker:Just didn't interfere.
Speaker:It's and somehow it just kind of shook out that way.
Speaker:Perfect combination somehow.
Speaker:But the investment in time and funny about Lake has been
Speaker:paying off because that's actually been growing and it's exciting and
Speaker:it's fun and it's been growing as a business and I've
Speaker:been getting lots of different opportunities from that.
Speaker:Again, either for funny by the Lake as like setting up
Speaker:shows places or me just getting booked basically and private events.
Speaker:So if you were to look into the future and create
Speaker:the best outcome that could possibly happen for funnier by the
Speaker:Lake comedy,
Speaker:what is that?
Speaker:It would be that I had multiple venues every week doing
Speaker:shows, whether their dinner and shows at restaurants or just straight
Speaker:up showcases and making that being my primary source of income
Speaker:would be great.
Speaker:Now it's growing,
Speaker:it's getting there.
Speaker:We're doing bigger venues with bigger names now.
Speaker:We have a place in Buffalo Grove,
Speaker:suburb of Chicago,
Speaker:the performing arts center,
Speaker:which is a newly rehabbed,
Speaker:the 320 seat theater.
Speaker:And we do that.
Speaker:We fill that up,
Speaker:we make some money,
Speaker:we make decent money.
Speaker:And even after paying the comedians and doing whatever we need
Speaker:to do,
Speaker:there's a place opening up locally.
Speaker:Again, it's going to be a 300 seat theater and they
Speaker:want me to do the booking basically.
Speaker:So, and then production for the comedy end of that and
Speaker:then that more of those things it turns into that's my
Speaker:livelihood at that point.
Speaker:Yeah, I can totally see it flipping,
Speaker:but I think to what you were just saying when we
Speaker:were talking the balance,
Speaker:you'd still want that marketing aspect in there.
Speaker:My main business,
Speaker:which I started like in 1997 I started it when I
Speaker:was 29 years old,
Speaker:had tumultuous couple of years and I haven't really just personally,
Speaker:which took away from my business and I ended up really
Speaker:just working at that business part time.
Speaker:So now I was working at that business part time and
Speaker:working at funny by Lake part time as well.
Speaker:And I had to take care of somebody.
Speaker:So that was just taking a lot of my time.
Speaker:So, um,
Speaker:I started the business when I was 29 and now I
Speaker:have to decide do I rebuild that,
Speaker:that business or do I put all the energy into funnier
Speaker:by the Lake or do I do something else?
Speaker:And it probably ended up being a combination of all three.
Speaker:Do I have the energy I had at 29 to go
Speaker:after business through my main company doing marketing and branding,
Speaker:consulting and content and web development.
Speaker:I don't know if I've got that energy like I used
Speaker:to. I like doing the projects.
Speaker:I like when they come to me,
Speaker:do I have the energy and the interest to pursue it
Speaker:like that or do I shift more of that over to
Speaker:funny by Lake Barre?
Speaker:It's funny because I've been doing this other business for 22
Speaker:years and when people introduce me,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:like networking things,
Speaker:they always introduce me as a comedian Because that's so you
Speaker:Larry. I mean it's so natural.
Speaker:I knew you were from your other first,
Speaker:but there was always that element of humor to you in
Speaker:your personality overall.
Speaker:I totally get that.
Speaker:Well when they know that I do or that I have
Speaker:funny by the Lake,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:I get booked at clubs and I do private stuff and
Speaker:I am a writer and all that.
Speaker:Knowing the two businesses I have,
Speaker:when they introduced me to somebody,
Speaker:like at a networking event or just out when we just
Speaker:run into people,
Speaker:they don't say this is Larry Blum from ATI creative consulting.
Speaker:No, they'd say Larry bloom,
Speaker:he's a comedian and he does a funnier by the Lake.
Speaker:They always introduced me as that.
Speaker:It's almost like where do I put my energy and then
Speaker:what do people even want from me at this point?
Speaker:Think of me as the latter.
Speaker:Not the former.
Speaker:Yeah, But you're good at both.
Speaker:And to your point from the very beginning about being on
Speaker:the ride and changing and not knowing what comes,
Speaker:it's not only what comes to you,
Speaker:but what you want to do.
Speaker:And I think that's what I'm hearing from you is you
Speaker:know, where is your passion now?
Speaker:And I know like a lot of your listeners,
Speaker:it's all about taking your hobby and monetizing it or turning
Speaker:it into a job or a career,
Speaker:a business.
Speaker:The interesting thing is a big part of why I'm becoming
Speaker:more successful with funnier by the Lake is because I'm not
Speaker:just trying to book me at places and I'm not just
Speaker:trying to book shows and just bring comedians.
Speaker:I'm taking what I've done for 30 years basically,
Speaker:which is the branding and the marketing,
Speaker:all of that.
Speaker:And I'm bringing that into the package of what we offer.
Speaker:So like when we go to a new venue,
Speaker:when we decide to do a show,
Speaker:I brand the show,
Speaker:I name it based on the venue.
Speaker:So like,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:we do show it to max and Betty's,
Speaker:we've been doing,
Speaker:we're at the end of the year a traditional Jewish deli.
Speaker:So the show is called the comedy notch.
Speaker:That makes sense.
Speaker:Yeah, Yeah.
Speaker:No, it's beautiful.
Speaker:You're combining two things that you do well and that you
Speaker:have been passionate about and come naturally to you and that
Speaker:makes you very unique onto yourself with that combo together.
Speaker:Yeah. And then you know,
Speaker:so I brand it and then I do all collateral materials.
Speaker:I design it and then you know,
Speaker:I give that to the venue and we can either actually
Speaker:create a printed materials for them to use or they could
Speaker:do it themselves,
Speaker:but they don't have to worry about the design and the
Speaker:branding and they also don't have to worry about how to
Speaker:promote it.
Speaker:I also consult on how to promote the shows.
Speaker:I promoted through my own channels through funny by the Lake,
Speaker:but then how to get them to do it right as
Speaker:well. And that's what a lot of people,
Speaker:especially younger people,
Speaker:they just don't know just because they're younger,
Speaker:they just don't have that experience.
Speaker:So when we're bringing that show to a venue,
Speaker:cause all I deal with it,
Speaker:bring it to venues is all these restaurants they might have.
Speaker:What's the day of the week that you struggle?
Speaker:What day is that?
Speaker:Tuesday, Thursday,
Speaker:Sunday, whatever it is.
Speaker:Yeah, let's do a show there.
Speaker:Instead of having an empty restaurant,
Speaker:let's bring 50 or a hundred people in there and then
Speaker:capitalize on that,
Speaker:promote it before it happens,
Speaker:promoted while it's happening and promoted after it happens.
Speaker:And then now,
Speaker:yeah, they've paid us to do the show,
Speaker:but they've just got exponentially marketing value out of that.
Speaker:Absolutely. And so I guess my,
Speaker:the point I started out with is your audience is trying
Speaker:to segue into taking a hobby or craft and turning it
Speaker:into a job or a career or some sort of business.
Speaker:And it's like you don't just shut off what you had
Speaker:done previously.
Speaker:And I always think back to,
Speaker:there's a book that I recommend to people who when they're
Speaker:in between jobs and they might be kind of worried or
Speaker:flailing and,
Speaker:and there's a book I recommend all the time.
Speaker:It's a very quick read.
Speaker:It's called how Starbucks saved my life.
Speaker:It's about a guy,
Speaker:he's in his sixties everything came very easy to him.
Speaker:He was in marketing and advertising agencies very high up his
Speaker:entire, he was kind of born into privilege and he was
Speaker:always at the top of these firms and then it all
Speaker:fell apart.
Speaker:Like the firm he was with got sold.
Speaker:And his friend who started it was no longer there.
Speaker:And then he got laid off and he had nothing to
Speaker:do. You used to dress up like he was going to
Speaker:work and he would go to Starbucks every day and just
Speaker:sit and he didn't know what to do.
Speaker:And then one day one of the young women who was
Speaker:like the manager,
Speaker:Starbucks was putting up a sign,
Speaker:it was going to be like a job fair Starbucks and
Speaker:she joked,
Speaker:you want to fill out an application?
Speaker:And he said,
Speaker:yeah, actually I do.
Speaker:And so he did that.
Speaker:He ended up working at Starbucks.
Speaker:And the thing that always reminds me of it is down
Speaker:the line,
Speaker:he started using all the stuff he had known as being
Speaker:a marketing and an advertising person to help the Starbucks to
Speaker:create events,
Speaker:to help people who work there with their presentations.
Speaker:And so he didn't just shut off everything he had done
Speaker:previously. He used that in the new phase of his life
Speaker:and his work.
Speaker:And that's what your people have to know.
Speaker:It's not like,
Speaker:Oh, I'm not just chucking my job as an accountant to
Speaker:do a gift business,
Speaker:because you know what?
Speaker:That experience as an accountant is actually going to give you
Speaker:an advantage over somebody who's really good at the gift stuff,
Speaker:but has no idea how to manage the finances of a
Speaker:business and that's going to give them such an edge.
Speaker:And again,
Speaker:to me it's like I get a lot of credit for
Speaker:how I produce and promote the shows and it's because I
Speaker:have a system to do it.
Speaker:And I have a system because I've been doing this for
Speaker:decades. Marketing and creating messaging and branding and creating effective collateral
Speaker:that looks like it's,
Speaker:you know,
Speaker:the, when people see it,
Speaker:they know this is a real thing.
Speaker:I want to go to this thing.
Speaker:It's not some ramshackle thing that someone just threw together.
Speaker:Right. I mean this last comment that you just talked about
Speaker:in terms of what's your experience,
Speaker:what else do you bring to the table?
Speaker:It might not look like it connects,
Speaker:but it can be so powerful in terms of your advantage
Speaker:going forward because people don't have the same experience that you
Speaker:do. So that is golden.
Speaker:Larry, thank you so much for that.
Speaker:So how can any of our listeners who want to know
Speaker:more about you or if they're in the Chicago area perhaps
Speaker:they want to come see you perform.
Speaker:Yeah, I'm a really accessible online through funnier by the Lake,
Speaker:so I've got funny about lake.com
Speaker:it's got all the information about what we do as far
Speaker:as like events coming up and also services that we offer
Speaker:because one of the things that we offer is helping people
Speaker:like punch up their presentations and their pitches and their content
Speaker:to make it interesting.
Speaker:So that actually might help your constituents of the podcast.
Speaker:All that can be found as well as clips of me
Speaker:doing some comedy in my bio and all that@funnierbyblake.com
Speaker:you can also follow funny by the Lake on Instagram and
Speaker:Facebook just look up funny by Lake or the links are
Speaker:actually on the funnier by Lake that com website and then
Speaker:also you know if you're a business and you're local to
Speaker:Chicago, the Chicago area and you want to actually be a
Speaker:part of it and you're not funny,
Speaker:you can actually attach your business to sponsoring shows.
Speaker:You can actually sponsor shows which gets you pulled into our,
Speaker:what I always referred to as shameless promotions.
Speaker:I'm a shameless promoter,
Speaker:so if anyone wants to be a part of a show,
Speaker:get some exposure for that.
Speaker:Just even be a part of like the industry of what
Speaker:we're doing.
Speaker:They can actually sponsor shows or if they have a venue,
Speaker:doesn't have to be a restaurant,
Speaker:doesn't have to be an entertainment venue.
Speaker:We've done shows in all sorts of weird spaces where we
Speaker:can set up a show and then that again is just
Speaker:an amazing marketing tool.
Speaker:It gives you a reason to promote your business and get
Speaker:people who don't know your business in the doors.
Speaker:And again,
Speaker:it's something what I preach is it gives you something to
Speaker:promote weight before it's happening,
Speaker:while it's happening and after it happens.
Speaker:So those are all things that you can learn about it
Speaker:funnier by lake.com
Speaker:Perfect. Yeah.
Speaker:And I saw you actually at a yarn shop perform at
Speaker:one point.
Speaker:Yes, We did like a Friday afternoon after hours.
Speaker:That's a good example because I knew the owner of that
Speaker:shop and I walked in there and I always look at
Speaker:every space and see like,
Speaker:Oh, could this be a space we could do something?
Speaker:And the hook for her was she really needed help with
Speaker:getting people to know that our business existed.
Speaker:So they had this community thing where they're doing it on,
Speaker:I think on a Friday or Thursday.
Speaker:I don't know what the day was.
Speaker:It was a Friday night.
Speaker:Friday. Yeah.
Speaker:And so my kind of pitched her was like instead of
Speaker:just doing hors d'oeuvres and drinks that people come in here
Speaker:for five minutes and wander out.
Speaker:Let's do a show here and then,
Speaker:Oh by the way,
Speaker:let's think of a cause a local cause,
Speaker:a charity and we'll make the show taking money for that.
Speaker:So now you've got like three reasons for people to come
Speaker:here. It's part of this community event.
Speaker:It's to get people in your doors in general to watch
Speaker:comedy and it's to support this cause that you want to
Speaker:support. I don't know which one you are at.
Speaker:We did two there.
Speaker:The first one was packed.
Speaker:It was packed.
Speaker:That's the one I was at.
Speaker:And you know,
Speaker:it wasn't a huge,
Speaker:huge venue either.
Speaker:So if you're a brick and mortar and ears perked up
Speaker:at this idea,
Speaker:you don't have to have a huge location either.
Speaker:You can just pack the area you have,
Speaker:I would say Nan,
Speaker:she must've had like 40 60 people there.
Speaker:And it was a small venue.
Speaker:Yeah. And again,
Speaker:it doesn't have to be like a place where you've done
Speaker:events. You don't have to have event lighting or sound.
Speaker:We actually could bring lighting and sound.
Speaker:It's not a big deal.
Speaker:It's just if you have the space to fit a few
Speaker:dozen people that you move some stuff out of the way,
Speaker:you put some chairs down.
Speaker:You know what?
Speaker:When people go to those things,
Speaker:they're kind of prepared.
Speaker:You know,
Speaker:people come in,
Speaker:they stand on the sides.
Speaker:I used to do a show in Highland park at the
Speaker:tea house that Billy Corgan owned.
Speaker:I did it for almost three years and there weren't a
Speaker:lot of seats in there,
Speaker:but we filled the place every time and people gladly just
Speaker:kind of stood along the sides and watched the show.
Speaker:Right. You don't have to be intimidated by like,
Speaker:well, this isn't an event space.
Speaker:No. If you've got space,
Speaker:if you have square footage,
Speaker:we can do something.
Speaker:We can create a quote unquote stage area and we could
Speaker:make it look and actually be a show and everyone will
Speaker:have a good time.
Speaker:Oh, gift biz listeners.
Speaker:I want you guys to go back and listen to this
Speaker:last five minutes,
Speaker:like rewind and listen right now and you're going to see
Speaker:Larry pointing out not only with his business but also this
Speaker:outside venue,
Speaker:multiple ways that you can add additional areas of monetization to
Speaker:your business.
Speaker:So this was fabulous in terms of a perfect demonstration.
Speaker:Lots of great ideas.
Speaker:So rewind,
Speaker:come back forward.
Speaker:Larry, thank you so much.
Speaker:This has been absolutely fabulous.
Speaker:I'm so glad we had an opportunity to get together and
Speaker:chat. Well,
Speaker:I appreciate you having me on.
Speaker:Thanks. Okay,
Speaker:gift biz listeners.
Speaker:I encourage you now when an opportunity comes right in front
Speaker:of you,
Speaker:say yes,
Speaker:go to those networking meetings,
Speaker:sign up for a farmer's market or a craft show that
Speaker:you've been thinking about but just haven't conjured up the courage
Speaker:to do.
Speaker:It's all out there waiting for you and you can see
Speaker:just by Larry's example that you not necessarily ready when you
Speaker:say yes,
Speaker:don't wait to be ready.
Speaker:Say yes and then prepare and make yourself ready and I
Speaker:guarantee you miraculous things will happen up next week.
Speaker:We're looking at a product development success story.
Speaker:Do you have an idea brewing in the back of your
Speaker:mind but have no idea how you'd ever get from that
Speaker:idea that you're thinking about to actually holding in your hand
Speaker:the product that you envision?
Speaker:If so,
Speaker:then you absolutely must listen in next Monday.
Speaker:Meanwhile, make it a great week and I look forward to
Speaker:being together again.
Speaker:Then bye for now.
Speaker:After you listened to the show,
Speaker:if you like what you're hearing,
Speaker:make sure to jump over and subscribe to the show on
Speaker:Apple podcasts.
Speaker:That way you'll automatically get the newest episodes when they go
Speaker:live, and thank you to those of you who have already
Speaker:left a rating and review.
Speaker:By subscribing,
Speaker:rating, and reviewing you help to increase the visibility of gift
Speaker:biz on wrapped.
Speaker:It's a great way to pay it forward to help others
