Episode 191 – Josh Zepess

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Automated Transcription

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Josh Zepess  0:00  

I would say my kryptonite has been my IQ. You know, the smarty pants engineer, that kind of thing. Smart people, unfortunately, don’t get a whole lot done. Because we spend most of our time trying to figure stuff out. We spend most of our time trying to perfect things, to make them a little more efficient. And we don’t spend enough time just frickin taking action. Just frickin starting dirty. So I learned how to start dirty. That was the key when I just started to forget about being perfect. Here’s the cool thing. If you start dirty, that doesn’t mean you have to stay dirty. When I heard that, it just clicked. I was like, wait a minute, I can start and I can make it better along the way, a revelation! That was it, that was the lightbulb, I was like eff this, I’m starting. And then off to the races I was. So I love helping people get their first clients. That’s one of my favorite things. Because that’s the best way to start dirty like, hey,  you need your website, you need this, you need that. Okay, great, let’s get your first client first. let’s go for it. Because if you can get one client, you can get 10, if you get 10, you get 100, if you get 100, you can get 10,000 There’s no difference, it’s just rinse and repeat.

 

Richard Matthews  1:17  

Heroes are an inspiring group of people, every one of them from the larger than life comic book heroes you see on the big silver screen, the everyday heroes that let us live the privileged lives we do. Every hero has a story to tell, the doctor saving lives at your local hospital, the war veteran down the street, who risked his life for our freedom to the police officers, and the firefighters who risked their safety to ensure ours every hero is special and every story worth telling. But there was one class of heroes that I think is often ignored the entrepreneur, the creator, the producer, the ones who look at the problems in this world and think to themselves, you know what, I can fix that, I can help people, I can make a difference. And they go out and do exactly that by creating a new product or introducing a new service. Some go on to change the world, others make a world of difference to their customers. Welcome to the Hero Show. Join us as we pull back the masks on the world’s finest hero preneurs and learn the secrets to their powers, their success, and their influence. So you can use those secrets to attract more sales, make more money, and experience more freedom in your business. I’m your host, Richard Matthews, and we are on in 3…2…1…

 

 

Richard Matthews  2:13  

Hello, and welcome back to the Hero Show. My name is Richard Matthews. And today I have the pleasure of having on the line. Josh Zepess. Josh, are you there?

 

Josh Zepess  2:20  

I’m here.

 

Richard Matthews  2:21  

Awesome. Glad to have you here. So where are you calling in from today?

 

Josh Zepess  2:26  

I’m in Orlando, Florida right now.

 

Richard Matthews  2:29  

You know what’s fun about that. I was just in Orlando, Florida three weeks ago. And we just drove all the way across the country to California, which is where my family is for the holidays.

 

Josh Zepess  2:39  

Nice. That’s a good drive. Let me tell you. I’ve made that drive. I used to live in Central Oregon. So we made the move to Florida and that was a drive with three cats. My wife has three cats.

 

Richard Matthews  2:49  

We did it with my wife and our 60-pound poodle and four kids in the RV. This is actually my RV, my back bedroom office. You can almost say it’s too big. Yeah. So we travel full time for my audience who keeps up with where we’re at. But anyway, my shoulders are all sore from lots of steering for the last five days driving every day.

 

Josh Zepess  2:52  

It will work out, for sure.

 

Richard Matthews  2:57  

Yeah, absolutely. So what I want to do real quick, is just do a very brief introduction for my audience who may not know you, and then we’ll just dive into your story. So, Josh, you have a company called The Identity Archaeologist. And what you do is basically it says, In a world where dreams are crushed, souls are forgotten and rust never sleeps, the Identity Archaeologist is on a mission to ensure talented solopreneurs turn every business first impression into a second impression where the sales happen by raising their ROC, which is Return On Conversation so they can profit more without grinding more. So with that introduction, why don’t you tell me a little bit about what it is that you do, who you serve, and what you do for them?

 

Josh Zepess  4:04  

Absolutely. And by the way, it’s an honor to be here, I’m so happy to share. And like we were talking about before, nothing’s off-limits. So let’s just have a real honest, open conversation, this is exciting. So I’m on a mission, my mission is all about bringing humanity back to business. I’m trying to get rid of professionalism. I don’t think we need to be one person in business and a different person in our personal lives. Because if we’re two different people, then one of them has to be a lie. And I don’t think that’s profitable. And it’s also a very difficult way to live. It’s a very stressful way to live. So everything I do is focused on that. Everything I do when I help create personal brands, when I help people present better, network better, get their message out to the world in an authentic, genuine, and powerfully persuasive way. That’s what drives me. That’s why I do what I do and the Identity Archaeologist is just how I do it, that’s all that is. People like Josh, what does this Identity Archaeologist mean? Really, you want to be honest, it means I have no competition, in business, that’s pretty cool. You have to admit. But really, it’s how I take my genius, my superpower, and I apply it to a commodity called personal branding. So that’s really all that came to mind, I didn’t just make it up. It came from that specifically.

 

Richard Matthews  5:31  

That’s actually where the Hero Show and the hero brand, and everything comes from it’s the same kind of thing. Because we talked about building heroic brand, which is the same thing as Identity Archaeologist, and it allows you to create a category of one by having your unique way of talking about how you solve problems because you have the ability to bring your perspective and your story to bear on the problem you’re helping someone solve, which is something nobody else can do. Only you can bring your perspective to bear on the problem.

 

Josh Zepess  6:00  

And that’s a good point. Let’s go ahead and bust that myth right now for all your entrepreneurs listening, or all people that are thinking of getting into entrepreneurship. Let’s bust this myth because there’s a myth out there that they tell you in school about competition. There’s no such thing as interpersonal competition because nobody can do what I do the way I do it. I am unique, I cannot be copied. You, Richard, you can’t be copied, no one in this audience can be copied. So the moment you start thinking, I don’t know if I should do this, because there are so many other people doing it. No such thing. Stop that talk, it’s false, it’s a myth. The way you do what you do is so unique nobody else can copy it. There’s no competition, don’t worry about that. The only competition that exists is internal. It’s with yourself. It’s getting that identity out, getting that belief internal. So I just want to throw that out for everyone.

 

Richard Matthews  6:53  

I’ve had that conversation a number of times with clients and with my wife and with other people. Is that the people who don’t want to buy from you, aren’t your customers, and that’s okay. Because there are plenty of people who are and for them, no one else is going to do it.

 

Josh Zepess  7:11  

Exactly.

 

Richard Matthews  7:12  

Magic is just finding the right people, finding the people who perfectly match with what it is that you can offer them.

 

Josh Zepess  7:18  

Yeah, and even a step before that the real magic is finding yourself getting clarity on exactly why you exist. And then it becomes obvious to everyone else. So you can’t help anyone else understand what you do until you really understand what you do. It’s the energy behind it, it’s your confidence and your conviction that lets people know what you do not so much the words.

 

Richard Matthews  7:41  

Yeah, absolutely. So I want to talk a little bit about how you got into this game of personal branding and helping people get authentic about what they do. We talked on this show, every good comic book hero has an origin story. And it’s the thing that helped them turn into the hero they are today and we want to hear that story. Were you born a hero? Were you bit by a radioactive spider that made you get into personal branding and archaeology? Or do you start in a job and move over? Basically, where did you come from that brought you here?

 

Josh Zepess  8:10  

Excellent question. I’ll give you not the short, short version, but the medium size. So I grew up as a soldier. Seriously, I grew up as a soldier. I was the good soldier. Yes, sir. Yes, ma’am. I did every single thing I was told to do. You know what I was bitten by, I was bit by the mediocrity bug. I was a comfort zone bug. I just thought I’ll do what I’m told. So I went to school. I got grades. I’m not gonna say good grades. But I got grades. I got multiple degrees. I went into Corporate America and climbed. I was a shy, negative, skeptical, introverted engineer for 20 years. And I climb the ladder. By the way, I was successful in corporate America, multi six-figure by the end of my career, manager, parking space, stock options, all that stuff. And then one day, everything I thought was right wasn’t so right. I wasn’t as happy as I wanted to be. I wasn’t as wealthy as I needed to be, and I wasn’t free. And that was the biggest thing for me. Freedom is my favorite “F” word. Back then I had a different favorite “F” word. Your audience can figure that one out. And there’s a point in life when you start seeing the code in the matrix, you start seeing the glitches, and I can’t unsee it now. So I got some Wake-Up Calls. And I was like, I gotta escape. I gotta get out. So I did. I escaped into the financial industry. I escaped into entrepreneurship in the gym industry. I owned a 20,000 square foot gym in Central Oregon. And I’m doing all these things to make money. And one day, I’m just like, wait a minute, timeout, Josh. What is your genius? What are you so good at, what are you better at than everyone else you know, what is your expertise? What are you passionate about? Let’s take all these things. And then I challenged myself, how can I provide value to the world in a monetizable way. And that’s where Identity Archaeologist was born. Now I don’t work, I play. In fact, I did paint too much to play, to do what I love. And it’s a weird feeling because I was always told you are not supposed to love what you do and make money. That was one of those myths I was told growing up. So I’m happy to bust those myths.

 

Richard Matthews  10:31  

What’s interesting to me is that the big change came over when you started asking yourself better questions. Particularly the ones that you started asking is what’s my genius? What’s the one thing I do better than everyone else? We run a couple of small mastermind cohorts with successful entrepreneurs, and one of the things we do to help ourselves and the people who are in our groups, take their business to the next level is asking that question specifically, because a lot of times your business gets stuck at certain revenue numbers. And the reason is, you haven’t figured that question out. It’s what’s your genius, and how do you apply your genius to your business? And I know that when I really sat down and started going through that question myself and asking other people and went through several weeks of exercise with people trying to figure out okay, what is my genius? My superpowers as we call it on this show. That’s when my business exploded. And I’m five times bigger now than I was when I answered that question the first time.

 

Josh Zepess  11:30  

Exactly. And what’s cool is to your point, we all have the right answers. We really do. I can prove that, I can use an example from when I was doing personal training in the gym industry, people would ask, what do I need to eat Josh? What should my diet consist of, so I can lose weight? I said, well, you already know that. Why are you asking me? Pizza or salad? I’ll give them a choice. Do you think she would say, oh, I should eat salad? There you go, you already know the right answers. What you’re not doing is you’re not asking the right questions. The right questions are absolutely everything because we already have the answers. And that’s beautiful. Because we are superheroes, we do have superpowers. But you’re right, getting someone to help you ask the right questions is the key.

 

Richard Matthews  12:16  

Absolutely. So I think that’s actually a really good transition into talking about what your superpower is, what your answer to that question was. Every iconic superhero has a superpower, whether that’s a fancy flying suit made by their genius intellect, or the ability to call down thunder from the sky, or super strength, heroes have what I call a zone of genius, which is either a skill or a set of skills that you were born with, or developed over time, that set you apart from everyone else. They allow you to help your people slay their villains and come out on top of their journeys. And the way I like to frame it for people is if you look at all the skills that you’ve developed over your life, there’s probably a common thread that ties all of them together. And that common thread is the thing that’s below the surface, that’s where you find your zone of genius, your superpower. So what do you think your superpower is?

 

Josh Zepess  13:03  

I’m very certain of what it is at least some of my superpowers. What I excel at, is asking the right questions. I’m very good at digging very deep into a person through all the credit and crust and crap and conditioning and all the BS we’re told about, oh, honey, there’s no money in that or just obey the rules and everything will work out. You know, that BS we’re told, growing up. 

 

Richard Matthews  13:28  

That we’re going to get a good job with good grades.

 

Josh Zepess  13:30  

Yeah, exactly. Keep your head down. Otherwise, if you stick your head up, it might get chopped off all that BS. So I’m really good at digging past that, and finding someone’s treasure, bringing it to the surface, we bring it to the surface to the light of day, we’ve dusted off all that crappy conditioning. And then we refine it and polish it into a message that just shines for thousands of miles, people come from thousands of miles to watch your treasure shine. That’s what I’m really good at. So people have all this stuff in their heads. They got confusion and fear and haziness. And I think I want to do this, and I’m not sure and I’m doubting myself here. I could take all that complexity and simplify it into a very digestible message into an identity and into the confidence and conviction to shine forever. That’s what I do. And that’s what I do now, in business and in life.

 

Richard Matthews  14:26  

Okay, so I’ve got at least three questions about that. The first one is, essentially, how do you do that with someone? How do you help someone discover their value?

 

Josh Zepess  14:40  

It’s a very personal process. I basically have to create a very safe space. We get vulnerable with each other. And it’s a one on one I do concierge consulting. This is not something where you go into a workbook and you’re filling out what is your mission and what is your vision? No. This is me interviewing, this is me pulling that out. And then I go offline, and I create the brand assets. So it’s a very personal process. And that’s why I’m very picky about who I work with. It’s got to be someone willing to take a stand in life. Excel superheroes need to stand. All superheroes have to stand for something, stand for something, or stand against something. When someone’s at that point, they’re like, I’m just sick and tired of being nothing. I’m tired of mediocrity. I’m tired of hiding. I’m tired of being shy Josh when I get that feeling. I can work with that person and the first step of the process is me digging deep and interviewing, thinking with questions.

 

Richard Matthews  15:44  

So the next obvious sort of question is, if that’s how you do it, how do you take someone’s value and their personality and their mission? And then translate that into a brand for a company?

 

Josh Zepess  16:00  

I’m gonna give you the real answer. And then I can give you a different one if you want. The real answer is I have no freaking idea. That’s why it’s my genius on it. No, seriously?

 

Richard Matthews  16:10  

No, that makes perfect sense.

 

Josh Zepess  16:12  

I can’t explain it. Like, how does Michael Jordan close his eyes and hit every shot? I don’t know. He doesn’t know. Yeah, he practices? Yes. And of course, I do tons of personal development, tons of professional development. But how do I take that and create that message? I have an antenna, that’s how I look at it. I have an antenna sticking out of my head and I get these messages from the universe. They just come out. It’s easy for me, I don’t have to think about it. I don’t have to try to do it. I just do it. So I don’t know if that’s the answer you’re looking for.

 

Richard Matthews  16:48  

No, that’s a really important answer. Because one of the things we talked about all the time, again, with my clients, and I’ve talked about this message with my kids all the time, is that the things that you think are easy is where your genius is. Because if it just comes natural to you, like my wife, for instance, she does things with cakes, and with art and things that just blow my mind. And she’s like, what do you mean, it’s easy. And I’m like, it’s not easy. It’s easy for you. And because it’s easy for you, that’s where your superpowers lie. So anyway, that’s an important and very honest answer for people to hear.

 

Josh Zepess  17:29  

Yep. But as a result, too, it’s my responsibility to share that gift. And I think when we don’t share our gifts, we don’t take what’s easy for us, and we don’t share it with other people that don’t find it quite as easy. That’s like a crime against humanity. That’s what I call that.

 

Richard Matthews  17:48  

Yeah, absolutely.

 

Josh Zepess  17:49  

I think that’s the key. The key is helping people realize they have a responsibility to share that genius that they have.

 

Richard Matthews  17:58  

So my last question is when you have your personal brand, something like my Richard Matthews.me is my personal brand Hero Show and my mission is to help change the conversation people have about entrepreneurship. Because we’re often culturally drugged down in thinking entrepreneurs are the villains. And literally, in every movie you watch, the villain is always some kind of entrepreneur who is pouring metaphorical oil on ducks in exchange for the dollar. And I’ve always hated that message. So that’s what this show exists for. But that’s like a personal brand and a personal thing. And when you translate into larger companies, where you have maybe a CEO or board of directors who are looking to build their brand, how does this same sort of process apply when you’re talking about a CEO or a C level team that is looking to build a brand for their company?

 

Josh Zepess  18:55  

Yeah, excellent question. Most of my work is with people themselves. So let’s say, I work with the CEO, but it’s not to create the company brand. There are lots of agencies out there and lots of people that will take this company, this non-personal thing, and brand it and that’s fine. I tend to work with the person because even under a company umbrella, I believe everybody should have their own personal brand. Everyone should have their own thing that they personally stand for that gets them excited to wake up every morning, that is beyond what their company offers. It’s kind of their own asset. You see, let’s say, for example, I work with someone in insurance, which is a very common insurance agent. They got Allstate behind them or state farm or hey, great company, wonderful. But that’s not your company. That’s not what you stand for. What is your brand that you get to own that stays with you forever? Because what happens is if we don’t have our own personal brand, we borrow another brand. And then what happens when you borrow something, and the company leaves you or you leave the company, you’re now nobody, you’ve completely lost your identity. Now you’re lost. And I hate to see that happen to good people. So everyone inside corporate, outside corporate needs to have their own personal brand, they need to have something that they personally believe in, they stand for, and their own value that brings into the world into their company. So hopefully that makes sense.

 

Richard Matthews  20:27

It does make sense. And I was just curious about that because I run a larger company as well outside of my personal brand on the Hero Show, which is we run a full-service podcasting agency, and I’ve got staff and the whole bit going on over there. And I was just curious how you approached branding on both of those different things. And it makes a lot of sense that you’re talking about how each person has their brand and what they’re bringing to the table. Have you ever done coaching with larger teams to help the team have their own personal brands? I would imagine if everyone in the company sort of has that sort of tie into their own identity that they show up better, and it helps a company because companies are run by the people.

 

Josh Zepess  21:16  

Exactly. And that’s a perfect point, that we are all human. And so the company brand becomes what I call the credibility you’ve heard, as people buy from what they like and trust, likability comes first, then you have an opportunity to earn their trust. So that brand, the company brand, or the team brand, is the credibility. That’s the trust, that’s the product, the service. But that’s not really what people buy, people always buy you first, then they’ll buy your product or service second, and that’s not just for selling external, but that’s in the team dynamics. How do you get along with other team members, if you think this person’s after my job, or you’re taking my responsibility, and then starts to get very contentious, because people are borrowing identities, they’re not sure of what their role in the team is. So when you get to team dynamics, it’s even more important to have your own personal stand, your own personal brand. And this doesn’t have to be a huge brand, by the way, I do what I call a micro brand. It’s just the very core pieces of your mission, your vision, your values. And then how do you articulate effectively? So it gives you the confidence, it gives you the confidence to be you. And now all that stress and all the what are they thinking about me and all those weird dynamics and politics that show up in corporations, that stuff goes away. There’s no need for that.

 

Richard Matthews  22:42  

And when you realize that nobody else is thinking about you, they’re too busy thinking about themselves.

 

Josh Zepess  22:47  

Exactly. They’re worried about what you’re thinking about them.

 

Richard Matthews  22:51  

Yeah, they don’t have enough time to worry about what you’re thinking about, because they’re worried about what you’re thinking about them.

 

Josh Zepess  22:56  

And by the way, for the entrepreneurs listening, I get entrepreneurs to tell me well, what are they going to think about me, Josh? Because I challenge people, I say, what do you really want to tell people? Like coming from a place of good intention? What do you really want to say with no filters? And they’re like, Josh, if I say that, what are people going to think about me? I said, hold on a second. You’d be lucky if anyone ever thinks about you again. Because the number one killer of business is obscurity, the number two killer is being forgotten. So don’t worry about being thought of, worry about not standing for something, worry about not telling the truth.

 

Richard Matthews  23:36  

I love that. And I almost want to just let that sit for a minute because that was really good. Yeah, because we’re worried about getting forgotten is far more important than getting thought about because nobody’s gonna think about you unless you are out there. I used to tell people way back in the day, when I first got started a business, one of the things I was doing was helping people build websites. That was one of the first things I helped with. And it always cracks me up how many business owners are like, so if I build a website, my business will grow. And I was like, no, you don’t just build it and they come, you have to add marketing on top of it. It is a marketing channel, where you can go to bring attention to you. It’s like building a business out in the middle of the desert with no roads that go to it. You have to then build the roads to the place that you have built. And put a billboard out on the freeway so you can get people to divert the traffic. So you got to talk.

 

Josh Zepess  24:27  

Absolutely. And you want to see people’s hackles get up. I usually make a list of what’s not a brand, your logo, your website, your business name, your name, your personality, your good looks, thank goodness for me, your title. All these things people like I’m branded Josh, I’m branded. I’ve got my website, my logo, and my 500 business cards. Which by the way, business cards, this is 1982 what are people doing out there? But I say you think that’s a brand? Oh, no, no, no, no, I’m so sorry. That might be a recognition of your brand. And that might direct people to your brand. But that is absolutely by themselves not your brand.

 

Richard Matthews  25:06  

Yeah, that’s your brand style guide, which you should have. 

 

Josh Zepess  25:10  

Yes, absolutely. Those are fine. But a logo is to a brand, paint color is to a house. That’s how I usually describe it.

 

Richard Matthews  25:18  

Yeah, the way I tell people if you have to build your house, like, where’s the rooms and the kitchen, and the floor plan and the garage and the whole thing and like, how big is your backyard gonna be and you build all of that. And then you come in and you put your brand style on top of it, you’re gonna put paint on it, you’re gonna fill it with furniture, and you’re gonna make it look like yours. But you have to build the structure first.

 

Josh Zepess  25:46  

Absolutely. 100%, the foundation. Start with the framework, the footers, the foundation, and then build from there, yes.

 

Richard Matthews  25:54  

Absolutely. 

 

Josh Zepess  25:54  

We’re on the same page. This is cool.

 

Richard Matthews  25:57  

Yeah, I think we have because we both do a little bit of work in branding, or I used to at least, it’s very important stuff. So I want to change gears a little bit and talk about the flip side of your superpower. So if your superpower is that ability to get down deep and really understand someone’s personal brand, your fatal flaw is the flip side of that coin. Just like every Superman has his kryptonite, or wonder woman can’t remove her bracelets of victory without going mad, you’ve probably had something that’s held you back in your business, something you struggled with. For me, it was a couple of things, I spent a lot of years struggling with perfectionism, which kept me from ever shipping any products or services, because I could always tweak it just a little bit more before I told the market about it, which is not a very profitable way of running your business. And the second thing that I struggled with for a long time was lack of self-care, which really presented itself in not having good boundaries with my clients or with my time, and I would work 18 hours a day and wonder why I didn’t get anywhere. And learning how to fix those things was a really important part of growing my company. So hopefully, what I want to find out from you is what your flaw was, but more importantly, how have you worked to overcome them so you can still grow?

 

Josh Zepess  27:04  

Fantastic question. And I appreciate you’re sharing your flaws because I can relate to those as well. I would say my kryptonite has been my IQ, being the smarty pants engineer, that kind of thing. Smart people, unfortunately, don’t get a whole lot done. Because we spend most of our time trying to figure stuff out. We spend most of our time trying to perfect things, making them a little more efficient. And we don’t spend enough time just frickin taking action. Just frickin starting dirty. So I learned how to start dirty. That was the key when I just started to forget about being perfect. Here’s the cool thing. If you start dirty, that doesn’t mean you have to stay dirty. When I heard that, it just clicked. I was like, wait a minute, I can start and I can make it better along the way. Revelation. That was it. That was the lightbulb I was like, eff this, I’m starting. And then off to the races I was. So I love helping people get their first client. That’s one of my favorite things. Because that’s the best way to start dirty like, hey, yeah, you need your website, you need this, you need that. Okay, great. Let’s get your first client first, let’s just go for it. Because if you can get one client, you can get 10. If you get 10, you can get a hundred, you can get a hundred, you can get 10,000. There’s no difference, it’s just rinse and repeat.

 

Richard Matthews  28:27  

I always tell people, you shouldn’t worry about building a brand or logo or business cards or any of those things until you’ve got a client to pay for them.

 

Josh Zepess  28:35  

Yeah, you’re 100% right, and you’re gonna learn so much in the process, it might actually change your approach to business, it’ll change your approach to your service.

 

Richard Matthews  28:44  

Yeah, absolutely. There’s so much there I want to unpack, one of the things that I do to grow my company. And actually, the whole growth of the Push Button Podcast brand came out of this exact exercise, which is going to clients and offering them a service for either a discount or for free to test the market. And to actually build the service.  I actually suggest charging for it but charging, just whatever your costs are. Because you want people to be invested in whatever you’re doing. But I’ll go to clients and be like, hey, I have this service, I want to test out, here’s what it is, here’s how I think it’s going to work, here’s what I think the value would be to you. And if you’re willing to invest with me to help me build this, I want to offer the service to you for a cost in exchange for getting some feedback and how I can make this work. And I’ve turned that into several six-figure businesses over and over again by following that sort of approach. Because you can get your first couple of clients which really will solidify what it is you’re doing and what you need to do for them and help you build the systems and everything to make it happen. So I think that’s a great way to approach.

 

Josh Zepess  29:56  

I 100% agree. It’s interesting you mentioned that. The call I make right after this at 12:30 my time, I’m launching a pilot program for a new offer I’m doing. And it’s the exact same thing I got from people around the world. It’s called the MBA program, a micro brand attraction. And this is the pilot for it. And I’ve got a group of folks that are going through it. And it’s a four-week program. And it actually starts right after I get off this call with you. So full in with it. And they’re getting me video testimonials. I said I want honest feedback. I need video testimonials and in exchange, I’m not going to charge you the full price, I’m going to give you this really crazy amazing discount, actually. But I want you to be cheerleaders for it, if you believe in what we do, which I know they will, it’s going to completely change their business. One other thing I’ll mention, too, that I did in the beginning, is I actually went to volunteer service and I volunteered my services to a nonprofit. And in exchange, I got testimonials back, which helped me build my confidence in what I’m doing, it helped me realize that holy crap, I really have something here. And when they came back and like oh my god, Josh, this is the most amazing thing. Thank you so much for your help. This is going to help us raise money, blah, blah, blah. So now I’m doing a good thing for a good cause. And I’m getting valuable feedback. And I’m getting testimonials. That’s how I launched my business originally, just by volunteering.

 

Richard Matthews  31:19  

Yeah, absolutely. It’s a great way to do that. The other thing I wanted to pull out of what you said was about starting dirty, and I want to give you my take on the same thoughts because this might help someone in the audience. But I have a concept I’ve been developing in my own head for the last couple of months on helping to defeat my own desire for perfection. And it’s something I call completion stacking or micro completions. And I’ve started instead of looking at my list of things to do, as a to-do list right, where there are all sorts of things about you try and have a to-do list and get it done every day and you can check it off on the calendar and keep these things going or you don’t ever put more than six items on your to-do list or make sure that they’re always the important things instead of the urgent things. There’s all this, I’m not gonna call it BS, because they do work for some people, but they’ve never worked for me on how to accomplish what you need to accomplish. What I have noticed is that if you complete something, and just complete something every day, then that snowballs really, really fast. The way I approach that is I look at what something that I can take from start to finish all the way right now in whatever time slot I have available. I got an hour, I’ve got two hours, I’ve got all day, whatever it is that I’ve got, I’ve got this amount of time, what is something in my business, it doesn’t really matter where it fits on the important urgent scale, but I need to be able to take it all the way from start to finish. And so whether that’s getting my inbox to zero, finishing a process for my business, or doing an onboarding call with clients. It doesn’t really matter what it is, it’s just something that I need to be able to take all the way from start to finish. And there are a few core concepts that I’ve sort of started building into that are realizing that you have to build with inefficiency in mind when you do that, which really helps the perfectionist that is in the audience. So as an example, I’ve been working on renovating the RV and replacing the floor. So the flooring in the RV, and we have several but we’re living in it and traveling. So I can’t just rip all the floors out and have no floor for several weeks, I have to work on it in sections. And so I look at okay, how much of the floor can I finish all the way? And so, a couple of weeks ago, I pulled out all the floor in the bathroom, all the way up to the next part of the RV, and laid all the new floor down. And then actually, because there’s that transition into the other room, I know I’m gonna rip all that other room out eventually. But I don’t know when I’m going to be able to get to that I have to cut tiles and put them into the right spot that I’m going to have to rip out later when I go to finish the transition into the next room. Because in order to complete it and have it usable, right now I have to build that sort of inefficiency into completing it, so you complete the thing. And if you translate that into business stuff, it’s like you have a campaign, and I tell people, we do long term email campaigns like six months long, but you can’t write six months of emails in a day, and just finish that, it’s a mini month process of building campaigns and doing all that stuff. So you take your welcome sequence and you finish it all the way and you get it started and implemented and you put it like a puzzle piece into your business. Even if you build the next thing, which is maybe your evergreen webinar sequence is going to attach onto the back of your welcome sequence. You may have to change the transition email in the last part of your welcome. That’s okay, it’s okay to have inefficiencies. You’re going to have to go back and fix for the benefit of stacking completions every single day. So anyway, that’s how I’ve approached the same start dirty is, what’s something that you can complete right now?

 

Josh Zepess  35:06  

Yep. And what I hear you saying is you’re talking about setting expectations. As long as you know, you’re building inefficiencies. And as long as you know that you know your strengths, you know your weaknesses, you can build that into your expectation, because that’s what trips us up. What trips us up is when we set unrealistic expectations, and then we don’t meet them. And we kind of let ourselves down. And then our identity goes down a notch. And we go down this downward spiral.

 

Richard Matthews  35:34  

And the other thing that’s really cool, just on the whole upward spiral thing is when you’re like, hey, I’m going to complete this thing, and then you complete it because you’re like, I’ve got 20 minutes, what’s something I can complete in that time? Which is a much smarter question, than what should I do next? Right to the point of asking better questions, hey, I’ve got 20 minutes right now, what’s something I can complete, then you’ve completed something. And you can implement it and put it into place in your business or in your life, or whatever. And you do that over and over again, man, that not only do those stacked together and make for a lot of progress, but you feel really good about it. 

 

Josh Zepess  36:06  

You’re actually reminding me of the one percenter rule. I don’t know if you’ve ever heard about this. But if you actually just get 1% better every single day for a year, this is math, not my opinion, you’ll be 37 times better by the end of one year, that’s just 1% better, that’s just moving the needle 1%, not 10% in a day, not going for the goal, not the Hail Mary. Just get that extra inch every day, get that extra inch, and you’re going to be so much further past what you expect, by the end of the year, or by the end of the month.

 

Richard Matthews  36:41  

It is crazy to me since I started doing that how much progress you can make in a very short amount of time. And because we travel, at this point, I run two very large businesses at this point, with staff all over the world. And I spend less than four hours a day, four days a week running both of those companies. 10 years ago, I spent 18 hours a day barely surviving on one business. And it all comes down to that one thing of like, what can I complete next? Because you can make a tremendous amount of progress when you actually complete things in your business.

 

Josh Zepess  37:25  

That’s right, 100%. And one of the generals said, once you create a plan, throw it out because it’s going to change. That’s the other poison of perfectionism, we create this plan, and we think it’s gonna go perfectly and it doesn’t anyway, so why try to do that, get that thing done. I love that. Just, what can I do in 20 minutes? What can I do in 30 minutes, accomplish something, anything that will move your business forward?

 

Richard Matthews  37:53  

100%, even if it’s like, hey, I’m going to sit down and write the headline for this blog post, and then write, boom, check it off. And then once done, you can move on to the next stuff, in your next 20 minutes. And that fits in with people who have heard of the Pomodoro Technique and other things. There are all sorts of ways you can implement that. But for me, just thinking about it in terms of stacking completions is really helped. So maybe that’ll help someone who’s listening. So my next question for you is I want to switch gears and talk a little bit about your clients, the people that you actually work with, and talk about your common enemy. So every superhero has what I call an arch-nemesis, and it’s a thing that they constantly have to fight against in their world. In the business world, it takes a lot of forms. But generally speaking, it’s in your clients. It’s a mindset, or it’s a flaw that you’re constantly having to fight to overcome right after they sign on the dotted line. If you had your magic wand, and you just bop them on the head and not have to deal with that anymore, you could actually get them the results they come to you for. What is that common enemy that you regularly find you’re struggling with?

 

Josh Zepess  38:57  

Yeah, which one do you want? There are enemies all around. Here’s one that comes to mind real quick. The marketing myth. When I talked to some of the solopreneurs and professionals out there, they’re under this myth that marketing is everything. Marketing is the answer. Like it’s this global thing it’ll solve all their problems. And I have to remind them of the truth about marketing. And marketing is great, but you have to understand how it works. Marketing is an amplifier. That’s all it is. It’s a directional amplifier. It takes a message, and it amplifies it, but it’s not the message itself. So what I see a lot of folks do is they go and they go mark in, hey, Josh, I’m doing Facebook ads. I’m doing this, I’m doing that. And they’re like, but it’s not working. I’m like, what are you saying? I don’t know, I’m putting some stuff out there. So what you’re telling me is, you haven’t done the work upfront, the branding, the messaging work, and you’re amplifying garbage, and you’re wondering why it’s not working. But that’s how we’re sold. We’re sold this idea that oh if you market it, they will come. Bullshit. Sorry, not true. You actually have to have your message together. You can’t be amplifying confusion and garbage. So that’s one thing, 

 

Richard Matthews  40:14  

You can, it just won’t work.

 

Josh Zepess  40:16  

Exactly, exactly. And then you’re at a business and 15, 20, $30,000 later, you’re out of business. And that’s a shame. That’s a crime. So one of the enemies is the marketers out there that are just not telling people the truth about how to effectively market.

 

Richard Matthews  40:32  

Yeah, and what’s interesting is you find that just like any other business, the people who are professional marketers, a lot of times are tacticians in their space, I am a Facebook ads expert. And so they can run really good Facebook ads, and they probably are good at it. Otherwise, they wouldn’t have a business, but they’re not. You have to come to them with your message already in place in order for them to do good work. And that’s just an example. And there are probably plenty of Facebook marketers out there who are capable of helping you with your message. But it’s up to you as a business owner to know that that’s going to be a thing that’s gonna happen. And it’s not just Facebook, it’s any brand of marketing, whether it’s Google ads, or putting billboards out. Most people who are doing those businesses are tacticians in that space. So you have to bring your message to them.

 

Josh Zepess  41:23  

They don’t have the magic pill. Unfortunately, a lot of folks are looking for the magic pill, the marketing pill, just market it, it’ll work. But you’re exactly right. There’s pre work to be done.

 

Richard Matthews  41:35  

Yeah. And a lot of that has to do with figuring out who you serve, and what you do for them. And I think my next question drives into that a little bit, which is your driving force. So if the flip side of your common enemy is something you fight against, so your driving force is what you fight for. So just like Spider Man fights to save New York or Batman fights to save Gotham, or Google fights to index and categorize all the world’s information, whether or not we like that might be a different question entirely. But what is it that you fight for in your business? What is your mission, your message, so to speak,

 

Josh Zepess  42:10  

I fight for humanity. I am fighting to bring humanity back to business. I’m fighting for us to be real and honest in our businesses because professionalism is killing us. It’s a poison, professionalism is a poison. Having these two separate lives, having a business life and a personal life that are not the same. One of them is a lie. You’re lying to your family, you’re lying to your clients or both. So I’m for humanity, that is really what I’m bringing back to business. And for two reasons. One, humanity is easier, it’s easier just to tell the truth. It’s easier just to show up as yourself. That’s one. But even more importantly, number two, it’s more profitable. People today are dying for authenticity, they’re dying to be told the truth, they say, please just tell me the truth. Don’t be an asshole about it. Like you don’t have to shame me or judge me or anything like that. But please tell me the truth. I’m tired of being lied to. I’m tired of trying to do things that aren’t working. I’m tired of marketing, and it’s not working. I’m tired of going to these networking events. And I can’t seem to get anyone to sit down and listen to me for two seconds. I’m just tired. Tell me what I need to do. Help me please. Empathize with me. Please help me along my journey. So those are two really good reasons to really bring your humanity back to business. And that’s what I stand for. That’s my purpose.

 

Richard Matthews  43:39  

Yeah, absolutely. And I know, in my company, the more we have worked on figuring out how to talk to people, the faster we have grown. It makes sense to me in my head this way, I mentioned, we have my agency, and I used to try and think of my agency as like this bigger business because it is a bigger business. There are more people, there are other things involved. But really, it’s how do I make the big business personal? How do we have the individuals who are there who are working with our clients? And you mentioned you were a personal brand concierge? And we started talking about how we don’t have project managers anymore. We have a client concierge. And everything we’re doing is trying to figure out how to bring it down to the Hey, it’s you and me across the table. Working together doesn’t really matter where the person is in our business. If it’s me at the top, or the people who are making up the organization, it’s figuring out how to do that, how to bring humanity back to the business, which it’s not nearly as hard as I thought it was gonna be, because that’s what people want.

 

Josh Zepess  44:56  

It is, and they tell us in business school that business and emotions don’t mix, and yet here we are, we’re all human beings. So I think it’s about giving people permission to be themselves. People right now in corporate America, don’t feel like they have permission to be themselves. They feel like they have to put on a facade, there’s this ego shield, there’s this, I have to say a certain thing, ook a certain way, play the politics, if you can get rid of that, if you can dissolve all that false expectation and give people permission just to be themselves, you’re going to be off to the races.

 

Richard Matthews  45:32  

I think one of the best things to have come out of our whole global pandemic situation is a lot of that has started to go away, because the whole work from home thing where like, I’m going to get interrupted by my two year old, like, it’s going to happen. There’s no way around it and don’t be ashamed by that. And now it’s to the point where like, all of my clients have met all of my children. And they’re excited when we get interrupted by the two-year-old and that kind of stuff. Because it’s part of real life. And instead of hiding real life, we have, like you said, our personal life that nobody gets to know about or see, and our business life, we’ve sort of been forced to blend them together a little bit. I think we’re gonna see the benefits to that for years to come.

 

Josh Zepess  46:17  

100%, all my clients know my 18-year-old Murray, when he sits on my lap. He’s a cat, by the way, I should probably say that.

 

Richard Matthews  46:28  

Oh, that’s funny. I don’t have a cat. I do have a dog who regularly comes in, he’s asleep right next to me here. But he’ll come up sometime. Just like, I’m ready for attention and bonk you in the middle of something you’re like, that’s just what I needed in this meeting is it’s not stamped on a dog.

 

Josh Zepess  46:44  

Yeah, thank you very much. But it’s all right. It keeps us humble, right? It keeps us happy.

 

Richard Matthews  46:50  

Absolutely, by the way, I was asked by my wife this question. I’m curious if maybe you know the answer. Dogs noses are wet. And I’m like if it’s not snot, what is it? Because as far as I’m concerned when he bonks me with his wet nose, it’s a snot stamp.

 

Josh Zepess  47:06  

Hmm, that’s a good question. I think they licked their nose a lot to keep them moist. But I don’t know if it’s snot or…

 

Richard Matthews  47:13  

Actually, I don’t know. And I was like, I’m just gonna go with a snot stamp. That’s what it is when they bonk you with their cold wet nose. It’s a snot stamp from a dog.

 

Josh Zepess  47:20  

How about we just call it a love tap?

 

Richard Matthews  47:24  

A love tap, probably. If you’ve ever watched a comedian Michael McIntyre, the five star love dog, you look it up on YouTube, it’s hilarious. That’s my dog. He’s a five star love dog. So I want to switch gears a little bit and talk about something very practical. Let’s talk about the hero’s tool belt. Just like every superhero has a belt with their awesome gadgets, like their batarangs, or their web slingers, or their magical spinning hammers, or laser eyes. I’m going to talk about the top one or two tools that you couldn’t live without in your business. It could be anything from your calendar, to your notepad, to your marketing tools that you use, or something that you’ve created, like your own process for product delivery. Something that is essential to you getting your job done.

 

Josh Zepess  48:15  

Yeah. Okay, so let’s talk about productivity first. Honestly, calendar, time blocking. Time blocking has been one of the best things I’ve ever done, I teach all my clients time blocking as well. Here’s the key though. The key to time blocking is you have to schedule in not just your work responsibilities, but you have to schedule in fun. That is the key because if it only works, you’re not gonna want to look at your calendar, you’re gonna ignore it, you’re going to hate it. But if you schedule in fun and fun becomes a reward for getting your work done. Because you’re fitting all your things into your time blocks. All of a sudden, you love it. And then you look back and like, holy crap, I actually got everything done today, I actually move forward, I move the needle-like we were talking about. So time blocking, I use Google Calendar, but I’m sure there are other apps and other ways to do it. That’s just been a godsend for me, honestly, in my productivity, in my focus.

 

Richard Matthews  49:11  

I have a couple of thoughts on that. One, the time blocking is super valuable. And one of the things I found interesting is I’ve asked this question to more than 200 guests now on this show. Probably 80% of them have responded to their calendar in some form or fashion, which I think is very telling. And so that’s an important note. And then the other thing I want to talk about is you mentioned getting your work done and then play as a reward. And I want to flip that on its head a little bit because one of the things that I think is a problem with entrepreneurship is we look at life as I will reward myself with rest and recreation when I get my work done. One of the things we talk about on the show all the time is giving yourself permission to play. And the reason is you can’t show up and do good work if you are not well-rested if you’re not taking care of yourself. And so we as entrepreneurs all frequently think of, I will accomplish my goal, and then I will reward myself with rest and recreation, and I tell people that what you should do is prioritize the rest and recreation first because that will allow you to show up and do good work. And so to flip that a little bit, that was one of the things that I did halfway through my business career when I was struggling and working 18 hours a day. And I was looking at my life and figuring out how do I get something done. And I was spinning my wheels because I was always tired. And I never really focused on what I needed to focus on properly. And I read a book called The Ant and the Elephant by Vince Poscente. And he talked about how we respond to boundaries, how creativity thrives with boundaries. And I started looking at how can I put boundaries on my time, what if I only work five days a week instead of six, and what if I only work eight hours a day instead of however many I can get. And what I’ve started to realize is that every time I put restrictions on what I was doing, my productivity went through the roof, which comes down to that time blocking, essentially, it’s a form of time blocking. And I started just taking that to the extremes of like, what if I work five hours a week, or four hours a day. And instead of five days a week, four days a week, I’ve got myself down to working four hours a day, four days a week, and running two companies in that time. And it’s that time blocking with creative restrictions. And it sort of forces me to change my mindset on it. I was like, hey, I scheduled my business around my recreation, not the other way around. So my business comes after my family, it comes after my health and my fitness. And it comes after all of those things. And since I’ve started doing that I mentioned this earlier, my business is five times larger than it was when I was on the other side of that

 

Richard Matthews  49:19  

100%. And I think I misspoke too when I said as a reward. Because when I say time blocking when you schedule in fun and rest and relaxation and family time. That’s not conditional. That’s not if you get your work done. It’s on the calendar, it has to be done. It’s got to be done because you scheduled it, there’s no negotiation. It’s not like, oh, I didn’t get my work done, so I can’t have my fun time. So I misspoke, I think I said the word reward, I probably shouldn’t. But here’s another cool benefit of time blocking.  Let’s say you don’t get something done on time, or you just goof it. Let’s just say you totally spaced that you goof that time block, you pick it up and you move it to a different time. You don’t ever have to forget about it, it never becomes this thing you’re carrying in your past like this burden, like oh, I never got it done. And now you’re depressed. And now it affects your other productivity. You just move it, you allow yourself to move it forward in time, and it’s back on your calendar. So it keeps everything in sight. And that’s what I love about it.

 

Richard Matthews  53:21  

I think the other thing that is useful to know about time blocking, and in to my term, the completion stacking is, you’ll get better over time and figure out what you can accomplish in a given time. So when you start out, you’re gonna be bad at it. And that’s okay, 

 

Josh Zepess  53:37  

You’re be moving around, 

 

Richard Matthews  53:38  

Yeah, you’re gonna be moving a lot of stuff around and you’re gonna be like, I can do the entire floor in an afternoon and you’ll find out no, you actually can’t. And so you’ll get better at looking at what can I actually accomplish in this period of time when you give yourself that grace to move the time blocks. Yeah. Oh,

 

Josh Zepess  53:58  

Yeah, along the same lines as the other little tool in my kit that ‘s been fantastic is a morning routine, which kind of fits into the time block idea. But I always start my day with intention. It’s a walk, I listen to an audiobook, I have my coffee, I do breathing exercises. There are certain things I have to do in my morning for me, that comes first before anything else and it’s non-negotiable as well. Affirmations as part of it. So there are things that I think everyone should have a morning routine, because how you start your day really dictates how the rest of it’s gonna go.

 

Richard Matthews  54:36  

Yeah, if I don’t shower and shave in the morning, my whole day doesn’t work. It’s got to happen. It helps me get myself into the working order. 

 

Josh Zepess  54:44  

You get the shower inspiration, all those thoughts. 

 

Richard Matthews  54:50  

Yeah, absolutely. I tell my wife all the time my showers are not negotiable. Like I have to take a shower every morning or I can’t show up. 

 

Josh Zepess  54:53  

Perfect. 

 

Richard Matthews  54:54  

Like I feel dirty, I don’t feel I’ve started my day well, and sometimes stuff happens. I don’t get my shower until noon or in the afternoon. I’m like, that’s when my day starts.

 

Josh Zepess  55:09  

Yeah, exactly.

 

Richard Matthews  55:12  

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Richard Matthews  56:44  

So I want to talk a little about your own personal heroes. Every hero has their mentors like Frodo had Gandalf or Luke had Obi Wan or Robert Kiyosaki and his Rich Dad or even Spider Man had his Uncle Ben and I want to talk about who were some of your mentors, were they real-life mentors, speakers, or authors, maybe peers who are a couple of years ahead of you, and how important were they to what you’ve accomplished so far in your company?

 

Josh Zepess  57:05  

I’ve had many fantastic mentors, I’ve been very blessed to have fantastic business mentors, no one that anyone’s going to recognize. But as far as public mentors or public heroes, Martin Luther King, Jr. But not for the reason people think, he’s one of my heroes, because he had enemies, not people enemies, he had enemies as things he stood against poverty, he stood against inequality. And I just appreciate that he gave his life for it. He’s one of my heroes because he had enemies. Bruce Lee is a hero of mine because he was able to bring western and eastern cultures together. And each arm I’ve got secrets of success of western culture and eastern culture, one on each arm because I really believe we can learn a lot from nature. I love his focus on, never pray for an easy life, pray for the strength to endure a difficult one. Like just accepting life is not always going to be easy. That doesn’t mean you got to become a victim, it means you just got to get better. And then my third hero would be Abraham Maslow, a lot of folks think that he’s kind of a more obscure character of the 20th century. But he was the first psychologist to ask the question, what is right with people? Instead of what was wrong with people, which was the common theme, psycho sees Freud, Jung, they’re all looking at why do people do weird things? And he comes along and says, why are happy people happy? And he created this amazing construct, and his stuff is fascinating. So there’s my three Public Heroes.

 

Richard Matthews  58:41  

I have to look him up. Yeah. I love that. And it’s one of the things that I’ve been fascinated by, by asking that question so many times now is how very infrequently the heroes are big public figures. It’s generally mom and dad or a teacher in grade school that believed in you, and how common that is. And it’s always struck me, too, for myself, just to remember that your kids are going to have a hero. And if you’re not worthy of that, they’re going to pick someone else. I always use that in my own way of thinking is, how can I show up and be a hero today? For whoever I’m working with whatever I’m doing, and it’s just a mindset, am I worthy of someone picking me as their hero?

 

Josh Zepess  59:32  

Yes, that’s a great mindset. 100%.

 

Richard Matthews  59:38  

Absolutely. So I’ve only got a couple more questions for you. And one of them is about your guiding principles. And heroes live by a code. For instance, Batman never kills his enemies, he only ever puts them in Arkham Asylum. So as we wrap up here, I want to talk about the top one or two principles that you live your life by, maybe something you wish you’d known when you first started out on your own hero’s journey.

 

Josh Zepess  1:00:01  

Yeah, that’s a fantastic question. For me, I suppose, wow, something I wish I would have learned. There’s a lot of things I wish I would have known when I first started off. I think one of my principles is, and I don’t want to say brutally honest, but I want to say, honesty from the place of love and compassion. I wish someone would have just told me the truth, I wish someone would have trusted me enough to handle the truth and to make my own decisions. So I take that approach now, like, look, you may not like what I have to say, but I promise, whatever I share now is going to be the truth. But it’s going to be coming from a place of love and care and concern, not from a place of shaming you, not to make you feel bad, not to insult you. But I think it’s so important that we really care enough about someone, I tell people, this might be the first time someone loves you enough to tell you the truth. I think part of love is being honest. So many people think love is something different, like enabling. When your brother has an addiction, and you don’t want to call him out on it, you’re like, I just love him, but I don’t want to upset him. There’s a difference between being polite and being nice. It’s polite not to bring up his drug addiction. But the nice thing to do is to get him help. The nice thing to do is to stage an intervention and do the right frickin thing. Because it’s right, which I say is another one of my principles. Do the right thing, not because it’s easy, not because it makes you look good, not because it’s profitable. Do it because it’s frickin the right thing to do. And everybody, I’m gonna make this bold claim. Everyone knows what the right thing is. It’s the golden rule, the platinum rule. You know what the right thing is? When you look at that dude across the street, you know what the right thing to do for him is because if that was your mom, what would you do if he’s being attacked? And should you look the other way if that was your mom, no, but don’t look the other way when it happens to some stranger. So that’s a couple of my principles.

 

Richard Matthews  1:02:05  

I have a personal experience along those same lines. I had a longtime client and good friend, who got himself into some drug and alcohol addictions that he had struggled with as a kid and got back into them as an entrepreneur and made some very poor decisions that included defrauding some of his clients. And I remember, at one point, he asked me, he’s like, hey, can you cover for me? And I was like, I can’t. And I was like, what I’m going to do is I’m going to turn you into the police, because I love you, and I care about you. Because that’s what needs to happen. And I remember it was two or three years later after he served his time and got everything fixed and put his life back in order. He called me up and he was like, that’s one of the best things anyone’s ever done for me, I appreciate that. That’s how you love someone.

 

Josh Zepess  1:03:02  

Yes. And it’s not easy, that could not have been easy to turn him in.

 

Richard Matthews  1:03:08  

No, not at all. Yeah, it was rough, too. Because I helped build all the systems that he was using in his business that he had started doing illegal things with and so like when the cops called, they were like, what do you have? And I was like, I’ve got access to everything. I built it all. What do you mean? But yeah, that’s a rough place to be.

 

Josh Zepess  1:03:30  

It is. But what we’re talking about is courage. That takes courage. It takes courage to do the right thing. It takes courage to love someone that much to do the right thing for them.

 

Richard Matthews  1:03:42  

Yeah. So I think that’s a cool place to wrap our interview on a note about courage. But I do finish every interview with a challenge. I call this the hero’s challenge, and I do this to help get access to people I might not otherwise find because not everyone is out doing the podcast rounds like you and I do. So the question is simple. Do you have someone in your life or in your network that you think has a cool entrepreneurial story? Who are they, first names are fine, and why do you think they should come to share their story with our audience here on the hero show? The first person that comes to mind for you.

 

Josh Zepess  1:04:15  

Yeah, the first person that comes to mind is a guy named Scott and he was working on something actually called Hero to you. He’s a psychologist by trade. But he has this passion for helping people and also finds that superpower. And I know, he just came to mind, partly because he’s also like my doppelganger. Literally, people think we’re brothers even though we’re not. So he’s the first person that comes to mind. He’s such an empathetic and heartfelt person. He’s such a good dude. And I just love to see him succeed.

 

Richard Matthews  1:04:50  

Absolutely. So we’ll reach out later and see if we can get an introduction to him and maybe bring him on the show. They don’t always say yes, but when they do we get good interviews out of them, and good stories. So in comic books, there’s always the crowd of people who are clapping and cheering for the works of heroes. So as we close, I want to know, where can people find you if they want your help, where can they light up the bat signal, so to speak, and more importantly, who are the right types of people to light up the bat signal and say, hey, Josh, I would like your help establishing my personal brand.

 

Josh Zepess  1:05:26  

Absolutely. Easiest way is my website, which is JoshZepess.com. Also, on social media, I’m the only Josh Zepess out there. I’m the only Identity Archaeologist out there. So everything I have out there is public. And if you want to get to know more about my thoughts on personal branding, I will do a signature talk. It’s a webinar, you can go to PersonalBrandWebinar.com and find the next time I do a live version or watch a replay on it. And really, the person I’m talking to is the one stuck in the sea of sameness. That solopreneur, that talented professional, that they’re trying, they have a gift, they know they have a gift, but they’re unable to get noticed, because they’re trying to shout over the crowd. It’s too noisy, and their message isn’t clear enough. That’s the person I just love helping them shine, I want them to go from shy to shine. Because in business shy equals broke, and we don’t want anyone staying shy or being the best kept secret, it’s time to shine.

 

Richard Matthews  1:06:26  

Absolutely. And I love that. One of the things that really helped me because I’m a shy introverted person naturally was realizing that doesn’t mean you can’t interact with people, it just means you need to build in the time to recharge afterwards. Because of extroverted people, they get energy from being out with people, introverted people that saps their energy. So you just need to know that, know where your limits are, and know how to build time into recharge afterward. And then you can go out and shine and give your value and interact with people. You don’t have to be shy. So anyway, I love that. And just to finish that off, it’s JoshZepess.com is at the right place?

 

Josh Zepess  1:07:13  

That’s correct. Yes. 

 

Richard Matthews  1:07:14  

And then the personal brand archaeologist, and if you are listening to this, and you don’t know what your message is clearly take the time to reach out to Josh, I think it’s one of the most important things for your business. Personally, you could probably tell we’ve got a lot in common about personal branding and how important it is. So definitely take the time to reach out and talk to him. Josh, thank you so much for coming on today and sharing your story with us. It was fascinating. Do you have any final words of wisdom for our audience before I hit this stop record button?

 

Josh Zepess  1:07:49  

Yeah, let’s go back to the Start dirty. Let that be the final one, whatever you’re thinking about doing. Just start doing it. And take a small immediate action today. In fact, within the next hour, set something in your mind and set some intention that you want to accomplish some goal and take immediate action. What’s the smallest thing I could do to move a millimeter forward? Whatever it is, take some immediate action and I guarantee you that’s going to start the momentum. And momentum is magic.

 

Richard Matthews  1:08:18  

Yeah, absolutely. I think momentum is magic. it’s a great place to leave the interview. So thank you very much, Josh.