In this episode of the One Small Change Podcast, host Yvonne McCoy engages with cybersecurity expert Rob Ruder, who shares insights on improving business networking by focusing on communication and relationship-building. Rob reveals key strategies on how asking the right questions can enhance business connections and outcomes. He also offers valuable advice on cybersecurity for small businesses, emphasizing the importance of backing up data and maintaining a secure network. Additionally, Rob provides a free resource to help listeners ensure the safety of their online information.

Guest Bio:

Rob Ruder is a seasoned entrepreneur with over two decades of experience focusing on technology and cybersecurity. As the founder of Idic Designs, Rob specializes in helping businesses protect their digital assets through innovative security solutions. Known for his engaging approach, Rob combines his technical expertise with effective communication, enabling him to build strong professional relationships and offer tailored solutions for his clients.

Key Points:

1. [00:01:25] - Rob introduces himself and discusses his journey in business discovery and his focus on cybersecurity.
2. [00:02:12] - Discovering the impact of asking the right questions when networking and shifting the focus from self to others.
3. [00:06:28] - Rob's advice on the importance of in-person networking and how it complements online networking.
4. [00:10:08] - The importance of diagnosing client needs through strategic questioning to offer tailored cybersecurity solutions.
5. [00:20:25] - Essential cybersecurity steps for business owners, including physical security and data back-up.

Main Quote: "

So the answer is be sure. Have experience with it and know you've done it. Not believe that you did it."

Guest's Website:

Idic Designs

Free Dark Web Compromise Report - https://pages.idicdesigns.com/darkweb-report2

Welcome to the One Small Change, and I am thrilled that you're taking time out

of your life to come on this journey of exploration and transformation.

I'm your host, Yvonne McCoy, and I bring almost 30 years of entrepreneurial

experience and passion for discovering growth through the power of

seemingly small change. And I want to thank you

for joining me and doing this, and I'm hoping that you're gonna find

some inspiration that's gonna help you through the week. And this week,

we are talking with an amazing person that I came to

know, Rob Ruder. Rob,

thank you for being here and taking time out of your very, very busy

schedule. And what I want is I want you to tell

us a little bit about what you do, and share with you how

the small change that you're gonna share had an impact on you either

personally or professionally. Okay. Well, thank you,

Yvonne. I appreciate you sharing your platform with me and

give me an opportunity to talk today. I am,

as you mentioned, Rob Ruder with Idic Designs. Infinite

Diversity and Infinite Combinations. And I've been

a business owner for, 23

years. I started my business in 2001.

And it has been a

business discovery of what I do. And so there's a lot of

things that I have accomplished.

Technology is my main focus. But one

things that I've been in lately has been cybersecurity.

And the challenge of the cybersecurity

world is not so much the

technology issues of it. There are a lot of resources and things. But

it's communicating with people, especially in networking settings.

I'm sure you do networking and

working to grow your business. And the

one small thing I've discovered is that when I walk

into a network situation and announce I'm in

cybersecurity, nobody wants to talk with

me. But I

have discovered through through some recent education over the

last year that I can grow my business when I

turn around and actually approach somebody

and say, what what makes your business

so special? And what are you trying to accomplish?

So when I take the focus off of what I can do for

them and or I'm sorry. What if I take the focus

off of what I am looking to do for

them and instead let them share with me

what they're looking for, and I use my

resources in their, to their benefit.

They're more receptive to what I do. And and isn't that

that old saying nobody cares what you know until they know that you

care? Exactly. And and other

people like to talk about themselves. So

if they're listening to you talk,

it's nod your head. Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Uh-huh.

But not only are you nodding your head, let's let that you're actually

actively listening. I think that, you know, one of one

of the big changes for me about networking is

I well, first of all, I came to networking very late.

And so when I first started networking, it it was I'm

going to get a client. When I

made that shift of I'm not going to be a client, I'm

coming to help the community and to help people

and took the the eye off myself, not only did it

open me up to potential clients, but it

opened me up to collaborations and a whole lot of other things. I mean, if

you go in with that narrow view of I'm only looking for a client,

you've lost opportunities. Exactly.

And that and that was the lesson I learned, in my

local area. So as a as a cybersecurity specialist,

I needed to grow my network. I had built a business on on the

back of just like 4 or 5 clients. I didn't have

a wealth of of individuals that I was talking to.

And so my mentor in marketing told me I

needed to go out and do in person marketing because my

best audience was local. But one

of the things I found was it didn't work. Because

nobody I get I get have this statement of

what I did and nobody would approach me. So then I did

discover somebody who said it's about communication,

connection, connecting with people with what they want

to be talking about, and then collaboration with them

to help them achieve what they're after.

So, you know, one of the things that I think is interesting about you

I mean, there are lots of things that are interesting about you. You know, one

of the things that we share is kind of, you know, how do people learn

and how they educate, and we we'll put a plug in for that later.

But, one of the things that I found really

interesting with working with you is most people

are networking online. You do the majority of your networking

in person. Mhmm. Right. You know, in some

ways, that seems to me to be like, I'm a I'm a

cyber person, but I'm networking person. I don't

And it it is. And the the issue

is sometimes there is a different

relationship you have when you see somebody 1 on 1. And

I think anyone who is digital

should also be looking at their local area. Now,

I, the to be fair, there are some really small

communities out there with very few people. But if you're

in any city of any size, I think you should be both

online and offline. Because you develop skills

in both places that are really valuable,

especially having these conversations like we're having

today. Well, you know, you are you

are a cyber you are a tech person, but one of the things we talked

about was developing relationships. And so

you've got an interesting, take on that.

And it comes both from, a clarity exercise

that that we've been doing in a group that we're in, but it also comes

from a couple of people that you're following now. Right.

So can you share a couple of things from that that that could help

us? So the

the primary the the simple rule that I

have whenever I go into a networking situation

is ask more questions than

give answers. Because the

point of connecting with somebody

is to not be satisfied with

the obvious answer. So I'll I'll

give a give a quick example. I had a call with

somebody, and they were approaching me about

cybersecurity. And simply

saying, tell me about your cybersecurity program.

And I said, well, could I ask you a

question first? And she said, sure. And I said,

well, let me let me ask this. What

changed? You've been in business for

4 year you know, for 5 or 6 months now.

And you're you've told me your story about how you have

such big clients that you work with.

And now you're suddenly concerned about cybersecurity.

What I wanna know is what changed?

And she suddenly opened up and

said, well, my client wants to send me

computers and do all this stuff so that they're protected.

And that started a whole long conversation

that it wasn't me selling what I did. It was

just us exploring her business and the

challenges and issues she needed to be aware of. Well,

you know, I think one of the things first of all, I I love that

question, what changed? I mean, what what I say is why now?

You know, what made it different? You know, this now becomes an urgent

issue for you. And a lot of times, like like you

said, what they're coming to you for is not really

what the issue is, or it's not the the thing that they

need to do. And I think the other thing that is,

to me important in part of the connection is when you're asking

why now and you're asking questions about their business,

then they see that you're not just giving them an out of the box

solution. It the the the solution that you

have is for them. You know,

you're considering all the parts in the movie. I you know, one of the things

I often say is people kind of have a have a same pattern that they

have to move through, but they stay in different places for different amount of

times based on So you may have to use all 4 of your,

you know, skills or tools or whatever that you have, but you use

them differently, which is what makes what you have to offer

so customized and so personalized, it makes you stand above

the crowd. So can you

give us some examples of some of the other questions that you asked? I mean,

what changed is a great question. So so some of some

of the other ones I take I take this perspective

from a a speaker, by the name of

Beck Holland. And the thing I've I've learned

here is as an expert, I

have as you and I talk a lot, we have systems. We

have our our our knowledge in how we do things

and so on. But our customer or potential

customer is trying to achieve

something. And they have one of 2 primary problems.

One of those problems is that they have a

misdiagnosis. They have gone and looked out

there at the world of the internet and said,

Oh. I need this.

And they don't understand what we understand.

And so they have misdiagnosed the problem that they

have. So we should be asking them, Why do you think

that? How what's your, you know, what's your proof

that this is what needs to to change?

And the other one she talks about is very close.

So listen carefully to the difference. But the other is

missed diagnosis.

They're busy looking at the the

vehicles stopped with red lights in front of them.

And they're not paying attention to the sports car going,

you know, a 150 miles an hour coming up behind them.

And which one is the problem they need to solve.

And so that's where where we have to help them

understand what it is you're looking for,

and do you really need the solution,

or is there something else you should be concerned about?

Well, you know, one of the things I think

that that I love

with working with you is that you are always asking

questions. I mean, it's like, you know, part of part of my

plus and my minus, you know, it's like your greatest strength is also your biggest

weakness. Right? So I'm the person that always like, this is the problem, here's

the solution, let's go. Right? And so I have to slow

myself down because, you know, to

go through the steps. But the

more that you can connect, the more that you can ask and

dig in, even though you think you know the

answer or the answer is obvious to you, the more the

connection I mean, one one I learned this lesson,

in a totally unrelated thing where I was doing a a person's tax

return or what, you know, and it was it was a little old

lady who had a retirement. So, I mean, it

was like it wasn't even before computers, and it was zip, zip,

zip, zip, and we were done. And I got a client complaint

because she said, she didn't ask me these questions.

She didn't ask me if I was over 65. She didn't ask me

if I got the x you know? And I was like, well, she was over

65 the year before in her tax return. I figured it

was. Right? Yeah. But she did not feel at all as

I mean, I did not connect with her at all. And the flip

side of that coin was I got somebody whose tax

return was really complicated that I didn't understand

at all, and I asked that man every question

that I could think of, you know, aside from what color is your

underwear. Mhmm. And he said to me, I never had

anybody take this much interest in my tax return before.

And I was like, that's because I don't know what I'm doing.

But but but but but but sometimes we know so

well Mhmm. And the situation

that they have is normal or

small in our world. Mhmm. But we all wanna think our problem

is important. We all wanna think that our situation is unique

and be able to help people see.

Yes. I understand. That is you know, I can see how that could be

unique to you. So I think part of the other question that you have to

ask is, you know, what problems is

this causing you? Yep. Because,

What's the impact? Yeah. What is the impact? So, you know,

for some people, the impact could be, you know, I can't handle, you know,

payments. For somebody else, it might be, I just can't

track what's going on or whatever. And and what I do know

about you is that you're very good at the

data stuff. So talk about

this may be not what you intended to talk about, but if you could just

take a minute. For me, one of the big issues with networking

is is the follow-up. And, of course, you can get all the networking things, make

all the connections you want. But if you don't follow-up,

you know, you wasted you wasted your time. So do you have any

any Sure. So it well, I think

I think the hint the hint is is right there in the question you

asked about the data. And I

so so full disclosure time. You're

right. Follow-up is the biggest, you know, is the biggest

issue. In fact, even my marketing coach

identified, you know, at not too long ago. She

said, Rob, your problem is you need to get

better at the follow-up. You're great at meeting people. You're

great at having warm, generous

first conversations, she says, but you have to follow-up

because the deal isn't gonna happen in the first

conversation. It's gonna be the second or the third. And

so I finally after years of resisting

it, I finally had to break down and get

a simple very simple. I don't want complicated things. I

want a simple customer relationship management

database that helps me track where I'm

at in the conversation with somebody. So if I set a

goal that I want to schedule an

appointment with them, the first thing is I need to reach out and see if

there's something we can talk about. The next thing is to

respond to them and then schedule an appointment.

And I have to be that methodical. And that's where

systems and systems thinking comes in. So so

just let me ask you, you don't have to say what you're using, but

does that does that, CRM that you have help

you put in, like, part of the conversation that you have with

them? Yeah. So It covers it covers and

my criteria for choosing this CRM was

it had to have a pipeline. It had to be

strategic in helping me know where am I at in

this in this relationship. The second part of it

had to be that it allowed me to track notes

and, of course, the important how to reach them, contact them.

But the third part was it had to be zero cost,

because there's no point in buying

something that I pay for over and over and over again if I'm not

using it. So, you know, someday, maybe I'll need a

complex one and complicate it with all kinds of bells and whistles.

But right now, I'm a solopreneur. I need one that

small, easy to use, and

consistent with my goal of being follow

through. So here I wanna jump into into

your your specific,

what you do. I mean, and and Yeah. So when you go network, nobody

wants to talk to you about cybersecurity. And so one of

the things that I'm finding is the

more I network, the more

I become aware of a lot of things that are happening. So for instance, I

just I just had did something. Somebody tried to use my booking

link. And when I went in to check it, it came up suspicious

link because it's I made it into a Bitly link. And

so, you know, there's so much weird stuff that's going on in the

Internet. Right. When we're networking or

or I don't even know what the you know, sometimes you have the the right

question. I'm not sure I have the right question. Is it

do we need to be more concerned about cybersecurity the more we

network, or do we need to be concerned about cybersecurity

in general and networking is just one of the areas that

it'll impact? Can I say both?

Sure. Go for it. So so

my my position my position is this.

Every business owner needs to be concerned about cybersecurity

in the sense that they need to be building a

plan for their business.

And it's now when they're small businesses is the

best time. Because I've been I I have

clients that are big businesses, and they spent tens of 1,000 of

dollars to get their cybersecurity

done. Whereas a small business with a little

bit of guidance can build their plan of

what they're going to do. And then if something were to happen

to them and say a state attorney general

knocked at their door and said, what did you do to protect

our citizens, you know, from this breach?

If they don't have a plan, they're liable

for failing to protect the data that

they're responsible for. On the other hand,

there is always a need. The more you spread

yourself out there, we have to be more protected because

we don't know who we're coming in contact with. So

monitoring your systems and monitoring

your identity is really important. And that's

where you'll hear lots more people talk about dark

web and dark web searches and things like that. Because

that's what we do to find out if, in

fact, we've been compromised already, and there's

work to be done. So

that brings us to your gift.

Exactly. Yes. So so tell us about what you know, and

then I want you to give us a couple of steps that we need to

take. Okay. So

so the gift is that one of the things I do in my

cyber security business is I help my clients

track whether or not their email

address, their passwords, their

contact information. Things have been compromised and released

to the dark web. So dark web is

this hidden but very vibrant

environment where people buy and sell, but mostly what they buy and sell

is illegal, including people's identities.

So I have a tool that lets me put in your email

address and give you a report that shows

you whether or not your domain or whether your

email address has been compromised. So I

can do that for free, and then follow-up with

you, to share that document with you

and answer questions, that you may have about

your business tech. That is

amazing, and that is really generous. Any gift of time. Information

is a wonderful gift, but information plus time

is even more valuable. So give us a couple of quick steps

before we end. We're gonna run out of time. Okay. You suggest

So couple of quick steps. 1, focus on

physical security. So

number one thing is be aware around it. If you do

business, you know, if you do business in a coffee shop, don't get up

and walk away from your your laptop or or things like

that. You always need to be aware of who has access

to your resources, to that. Biggest breaches have

often been people threw a laptop on their passenger,

seat. And then their car got broken into and the data

stolen. The other the other thing

is write your policies down

and your procedures for maintaining your system.

Because you have all this knowledge in your

head or you're maybe you have a VA who has

that knowledge in their head. If that knowledge was suddenly

lost, what would happen?

So if you want to if you want your business to

thrive and to be resilient,

you need to write it down in a document and

have multiple copies of it. So you can't

lose it in a fire or anything. And how how

often should how often should we back up on a, like,

an external driver or something like that? As often

as you want, you would not want to have to go back and

recreate what you lost. Okay. So

so it's always a as I always measure it in that, you know,

what's your time worth? And then the idea is how

much of your time do you wanna repeat because you lost

Yeah. That data. Alright. Here's your

question. When was the last time you did something new for the first

time? Oh my.

1st first for the or yeah.

Boy, that is a good question.

I unfortunately, I have been spending so much time at

home that I'm trying to think of what it what it would

have been that I've done first. It could have been in the summertime.

Yeah. But that's that's how habitual my life is. It's like

going you know? I do I do so much the same thing. I

I was thinking I was thinking it was sometime when when I was

with, my cousin. I did have I did have,

well, okay. Here's here's one. So I went,

a first for me was to go to the

same play, live play, with the

same actors, 40 years after the

first time I saw it. That's amazing.

Yeah. Yeah. It was it was it was one of those

things. In the 1980s, they had they had put together this

play when they were college students. And

this summer, they got back together

and did the play again. They had never done it

since. But for for various reasons, they

all got back together, and I had a chance to go watch them. So it

was kinda like a time warp. Yep. Time warp. Yeah. It was a cute time

warp. They were they were, one line of

the play was modified a little bit. And it says it it

was, when did when did you turn when did you

go from 12 to 60? Because

40 years ago. Yeah.

Alright. We are running out of time, and and I think and Rob and I

have talked for a long period of time. One of the things

I'm gonna, there gonna be some additional information

that's that you're gonna wanna get, but you definitely wanna grab that gift. And

so, you know, I have to I have to be sure to say

to you as a podcaster, be sure you subscribe and share and engage

in social media so that you can supercharge your

business through connection, which we talked about. And the podcast

is my way of giving back to the community and helping you fuel your quest

for growth and impact in a way that can be fun and

just enjoyable. So I hope you will continue to join me in the

one small change and and, you know, look

for the tiniest shifts that's gonna give you some kind

of monumental transformation. And you can go and listen to the first

the first episode and some of the other ones if you've missed them.

And, Rob, before I let you go, you

got some last words of wisdom?

I would so so this is when it came up recently.

To this comes from John Paul Sartre.

And that is, to believe

is to know you believe. And to know

you believe is not to believe.

So the answer is be sure.

Have experience with it and know you've done it.

Not believe that you did it.

It's pretty heavy.

Welcome to my world. Welcome to your world. I have to tell you

that Rob is is a very thoughtful person and

poses these interesting questions in the group that we're in,

and, we're gonna invite you to something so that you can

you can experience that, once a month. But I

want you to remember that change is simple, but it's not always

easy. And it takes a certain amount of

courage, and it takes a certain amount of resilience, and it takes

a definitely takes curiosity to step out of your your

comfort zone. So if you'll join me on the one small change every

week as we embark on this journey for you to come up with innovative

possibilities, that would be fantastic because I love

connecting with you. And until the next time, stay

curious. Rob, thank you for all your time and your thoughts.