Ed Hooks Jr: Welcome back to the
perfect fit presents. I'm happy to have Mr. Joel Buhr friend from
clubhouse, a 10x partner also, I believe direct marketing is the way of
the future, I believe. And we're going to learn why with Joel right now. Good
morning. Thanks. Thanks for carving out some time for me. I know you're
you're you're on your way through town. This is a hotel setup is not
your home studio and all that. So I appreciate your flexibility. And I
look forward to seeing for the snooze m
attress franchise
rollout. Is that going to be the first outlet for them outside of Puebla? Joel Buhr: No, it's not actually no,
they actually have four other locations, or no three, three other
locations. And they got probably another 25 to 30 slated in the queue.
So they're rolling fast, Ed Hooks Jr: right on. And first,
direct marketing is helping them with all the important stuff, I'm sure Joel Buhr: first direct solar first
direct comes into play is we come into play, helping them with buil
ding the
strategy, understanding the market better, and then executing that
strategy on the data that we put together for them to help them to grow
and succeed in their business. Ed Hooks Jr: Right on, I got one
question I need to ask you, Joel, you're a sales professional. You're a
marketing professional? Have I've seen you a action around different places,
you know, not the least of which is your your Instagram stream on in mind,
and I appreciate your contributions to my life. I got to ask you
, what was
the most proud moment in your evolution from amateur to professional
sales? Joel Buhr: If I were to look back, I
would say one of the one of the most memorable moments like just like some
pivot points and says, There was a really, really big deal that I was
working on with Assurant group, which is an insurance company. So if you got
cell phone, you probably may be a part of a short group and, and was working
with on that data licensing deal. You know, it was something that took took
p
robably about three to four years to get to fruition, but it's just that
was a pivot point. So it's not not probably one of the most memorable
deals that I've done. The def is one of those ones that along the journey,
it was it would help me help me kept keep alignment of where I wanted to
go. Ed Hooks Jr: So what was the path to
get to opening up First Direct Marketing? Joel Buhr: You know, I think it's only
fair to say it's like the path of sales started when I was a young kid.
You know, if we
, we were we were raised, we didn't have much at all we
were we were low income, we were you know, there was not extra money for
anything. So if me and my brother wanted anything, we had to go earn the
money to get it. So we started everything from a mowing business to
Curb Painting Business to so shoveling to you know, all those different types
of activities. Finally, teenage years, working for a telemarketing company.
And you know, this this thing sales man, I loved it, I was getting
commissio
n right as I can increase what I was making per hour, and I
controlled what I earned. And so that opened the door of how can I how can I
go bigger, right. And that was a it was an exciting journey there. I
worked on a number of different consumer projects on that in the
telemarketing space from US West sprint, a number of others, but then
that was on one program for Occidental Petroleum mc squared, it was a b2b
program, when natural gas got deregulated in the Chicago, New
England market. And I e
nded up getting flown it like 18 years of age, end up
getting flown back and forth to Chicago to actually work in the
street, you know, door to door in businesses selling natural gas, you
know, sign up. And so I mean, I was I was hooked. And that led me to where
I'm at right now. Just simply because when I got back, I had a good friend.
He's like, he's like, Hey, let's go let's go work for American business
information that we'll be doing sales anyway, we'll be on the phone, we'll
make more mone
y, the online site, you know, your your 18 1818 Was it
mattered, right? So you know, you know, that's, you know, making more
money sounds good, right. So I went over there. He's actually named my
brother in law so I've ended up marrying this is my best friend and
and that was well over as back in the mid 90s. And you know, from from there
the rest is kind of history. I went from ABI was a compiler of data. And
then I went to work for brokers of data. And then in 2005, I started
first direct. Ed
Hooks Jr: WOW another fearless door
to door salesman be made No, Barbara Majeski in the clubhouse, she was a
fearless door to door knocker as well. And yeah, it's I mean, however you can
get it the, the some will, some won't. So, I mean, you got to find your
people, I strongly believe that that about 20% of the population would do
business with me and only with me, as long as I'm in business, selling real
estate, for example, but I gotta find them, I just gotta get out and find
them. And face to
face is the fastest curious connection for sure. Personal
is the most powerful. Yeah, but having said that, it doesn't scale. So to
scale, we need guys like Joel at first direct, I really believe that there's
been some shake up, and a lot of noise gets created. And I'd like to get your
perspective on what is third party data and first party data within your
space. And with respect to Google, or Facebook, and all the rest of those
guys, what's the real plan of attack going forward? Joel Buhr: Ri
ght? Well, so first,
first party data always means it's the data that you created, that it's your
data, right? It's you own that data. third party data is any data that
you're acquiring elsewhere, right? And it's not your data. And but you're
using it, so I bought a list, I bought a list from some data broker like me,
so that that could be third, that's third party data. Now, you can use
third party data to create, you know, create your first party data, right.
And that's, you know, it's where t
he big changes in the shake up is because
of misuse of data, right data is a very, very powerful thing. Just like
just like anything that man creates, if it's used the wrong way, it causes
problems. Right? So data is the same way. There's always new ways, though,
at the end of the day, we're always still selling to people. And we need
to find ways to connect with people. And data is one of those powerful fuel
items that help in business to connect with people and connect with people at
scale. An
d also know more about how to connect, right? So if you if you
understand more about, hey, where are your customers are, what similarities
they have, or these prospects that have to your best customers? Well,
that helps you to target your marketing be more efficient on
spending your advertising dollar. And if you're more efficient on spending
your advertising dollar, number one the consumer, whether it's on a you're
selling business programs, or consumer programs, or services or products, the
co
nsumer has a much more enjoyable experience. Frankly, when that that
message is relatable to them, it corresponds with them. Right? So data
is a pretty powerful thing. But as far as privacy and third party data, those
types of things. You know, I'm a big believer in the privacy and privacy,
right. In recent recent months, over the last couple of years, more and
more states have rolled out privacy regulations regarding data, Colorado
being one of them just recently. Right. So they're they're givi
ng the
consumer the right to know more about what's going on and control their
privacy. Now, that's all well and good. And I'm a big proponent of
because I think that that should be always respected. However, what a
consumer always needs to understand is they are giving their data every time
they turn it around, right? So this this little thing that we have, that's
our black box that we carry with us, you know, you want it to provide a
certain feature for you, while the developer has every right
to ask that
in exchange for the feature. Right? They want to give you what the
feature, they want the data and data they're going to use in a few
different ways. If you don't like how they're going to use it, your only
choice is simply this find another app. Right? Shut it off. Yeah, find
another app, you know. So now, some people may say, well, that's just not
fair. But, you know, if the roles were reversed, what would you want? Right?
And if you were actually running the business, the the the
perspective, a
lot of times these laws get put into place is you have somebody that
doesn't understand what why is the data being captured? Why is it being
used this way? What are the protection guards currently in place? How is it
you know, how is it being guarded? Is it really an impact? Where is the
consumer, you know, aimlessly just you know, submitting their data left and
right. Ed Hooks Jr: Sure, and it's got it so
it's got a privacy, it's got to be a two way street. And I have to manage
the value proposition for myself to open that app and give Google all my
information, my locations, my movements, or whatever, for the
ability to safely and efficiently navigate my way across town or, or
not, right, I can go I can still go by a map. Um, Joel Buhr: yeah. If you don't want to
use the map services is right there, there you go there, it's, you know,
there's some things, it's like, hey, you know, they're gonna use it for
average. And they clearly out, you know, right now it's what's
really
nice. Here's what I think that that they've done nicely is like on iOS and
Android, is this much more clear to the consumer, hey, this ask is app and
you know, asking to track your location, and it's going to be used
for advertising purposes. Right? You want to allow it? You know, your
choice, right? Ed Hooks Jr: That's right. How am I
here learn about stuff. So on the ala carte of options for marketing, as I,
as I have said in the past, I'm going to keep championing up and in fact,
I'm g
oing to come up with a webinar, if you do not develop a personal
brand, as a real estate agent, as an insurance agent as a solopreneur. If
you do not develop a personal brand, and five to 10 years, your business is
going to be really, really important. If it's not today already. The right
well, Joel Buhr: that's, I don't think it's
a it's a new thing, that you need a personal brand. Right. The always the
people that have accelerated have developed a brand, a business brand
and a personal brand.
Ed Hooks Jr: Yeah. So let me let me
expand that you're 100%. Right. I mean, beyond having my face in the
shopping cart at the grocery store. Right, right. I need to, I need to be
able to get into bedroom at 10 o'clock at night, whenever they're scrolling.
You know, that's, that's, that's where my customers need to find me. Not
because I want to be awakened at 10 o'clock in their bedroom. I'm not
creepy like that. I'm not politics yet. But that's, you know, that's,
that's leverage and scale, righ
t? Whenever I can have people
interacting, consuming my content at their convenience and not mine, right
or not? Once a week in the shopping cart, basket or whatever. So we need
to develop a personal brand. What are some tips? That one? Why is first
directs opportunity for access to third party lists or for targeted
advertising? Has that differentiate from a Facebook ad or a Google Pay Per
Click thing? Joel Buhr: I appreciate that question.
It's a solid question. So what first rec does, we are a
marketing agency.
And we help companies identify the right data, insights and solutions to
empower their growth and success. And so what we do differently, so you can
you can easily go to Facebook and just simply boost a post or try to run an
ad and use Facebook's data to do that, where first direct comes into play as
we help clients more intelligently target their market, we're able to
push in unique data to you that's used for targeting. You know, for example,
you got a picture of Ed Hooks Jr
: Facebook is a pin and a
diameter. That's all the targeting I get with face. Joel Buhr: So so let's let's just use
this as an example. It says like your you got that that airport picture
behind you the ramp picture behind you. And you know, let's just face it,
anybody that's sitting in those planes has money, if they're sitting in the
planes, even the pilots, right, they can influence money. So if you if you
are somebody that's selling something, so let's say for example, you are a
real estate
agent in a more remote area, but all the time you got planes
like this coming in and out all the time. Well, what do you think they're
full of there's full of probably business owners that are you know,
that are either on their pitstop on the way through the country, right?
Or, you know, for for some other reason, well, if you want to move real
estate in your area, they need to know who you are, is that simple. And so
for example, we can use big data technologies that help us create geo
frames o
n that ramp. And we can pull historical data of the devices that
were sitting in those planes, if they've given their permission, right,
this is where the privacy is, is great. If if they haven't, then we're
not going to see him. But if they've given them permission, and they're
active on their phone, and that geolocation pops them right there, we
can grab that audience. So simply put, just think of it like, you know, we're
putting them in the bucket of the audience that now you're going to use
on Facebook. So now you're only going to serve ads to anything that's in
this bucket, nothing else, all the other noise you're not going to spend
the money on. It's going to it's going to do that. So that's how we help
clients target more intelligently and use their budgets more efficiently
when you're using data. So we always start with a client. We always start
with data first data first we want to understand the audience and we want to
help them to understand that audience better as well. So
the big changes, I
think that are really going to impact personal branding here, too, is number
one, yeah, you gotta have it. You do have to develop a brand. What are you
known for? It's got to be really concise. And then, I mean, you need to
shout it from the rooftops? Because if you're, if your brand is that
powerful, right? Are you believe it's that powerful that everyone should
know about it, or definitely first your audience that can buy from you
should know about it. And if you use data th
e right way, then they're going
to feel like you're everywhere. Right, you're gonna, you're popping on their
Facebook, you're popping on the inside, you're popping into LinkedIn,
you're popping on, you know, all those different places. So if you use data
the right way, it can be very, very impactful. What's going to change, I
think, for a lot of businesses and entrepreneurs, is just there's more
noise with technology, more opportunities to create noise are
easier now. So more people are making n
oise. Now you have to fight more
against it to get the noise out. Right? Whereas, you know, for example,
driving down the interstate, you see billboards, billboards used to be, you
know, a paper, right, they had to put new paper up, if the billboard was
gonna change, they had to get out there, change the billboard, that
takes time. Right? Ed Hooks Jr: It was also limited real
estate. Yeah, you had less opportunity for noise. Right? Not that many.
Right. Joel Buhr: Right. So So now though, if
you
think about it, right, is now with a digital billboards, for example,
just using that as an example. If you have your face on the Billboard, in
the next net, the very next day, I can have my face there, and all it takes
is a little bit of programming, right? And done. So now you gotta be willing
to fight against that, you know, and buy that inventory, that inventory
does cost money. So, you know, when companies do get started, it's like,
you gotta you gotta be willing to invest in developing th
at brand. Ed Hooks Jr: Does dip into cost just a
little bit? What are the major hurdles? So I do believe 100%, that if
you can establish a cost per customer identified, and it pencils out, then
why don't you just spend as much as you possibly can and get all the
customers? Joel Buhr: Well, so. So a lot of times
what we encounter too is is you have somebody that says, Well, okay, well,
the cost per acquisition is is is x, but that what they're looking at is
only that first sale, right? So some of
the things to keep in mind would
be, you know, if, for example, in real estate, you're looking for that person
that's ready to do a $5 million deal. Yeah, I guess that's all I want. I
want those people. Right. Okay. Ed Hooks Jr: That's, that's a scarcity
mindset. I'm in abundance. I mean, I did, I did do a Facebook focused thing
last year. And I've looked at all the numbers, the cost of setting up the
software with the CRM, the cost of the interface between the ad manager,
which I hate, and Fac
ebook, its worst software on Earth. And then the ad
spend on a monthly basis as I as I had throttle it, and I know how much it
cost and looking at all of the deals that I did over the last year. Right?
That was probably that was accomplished probably 80% of my sales
last year. So I do understand how the math works. I do understand that when
I when I spend more money I can get more customers acquired. Helped me
help me over the fear of going direct, Joel Buhr: right. So so in marketing,
right mar
keting, there's all these different things. Some of these tools
have been around since the longest of time, right. And some of them are more
or more recent tools. Digital Advertising is a more recent tool,
right for for acquiring customers, before that email marketing before
that SMS, fax broadcasting, right those types of things, and direct mail
and it's been a it's been a mainstay, well, now fax broadcasting is kind of
out. I don't see that as a comeback at all, because fax machines are kind o
f
dead. But all of these different things are simply tools in a toolbox
if you think about it, right so that you can get them to work in concert
together, you can actually increase the overall value of your of your
prospect. You're going to increase what they spend with you. If you're a
brick and mortar store, you will increase what they spend with you if
you're touching them on on digital ads here as well as you're hitting them in
your mailbox. And then you're also touching them with email and
those
types of things. You're going to increase your actual return on return
on adspend they're going to spend more with you have a high happier
experience all those different things. So the Ed Hooks Jr: first direct at first
direct y'all you guys you got how many of those facets or aspects are you
hitting? Are you hitting all of them? Joel Buhr: So yeah, first direct as an
as a marketing agency, we help companies develop a complete omni
channel strategy. Because data is at the center of what we
're doing, we can
help them bridge from direct mail, to digital to TV to all those different,
you know, those positions. And that's, that's important. However, one thing
to get back to real quick, as far as lead acquisition is, a lot of times,
you know, if you're trying to sell I'm using the phone as a good example, you
know, this is a, you know, what, 1212 to $1,400 product, right? The more
zeros you add, the more it's gonna cost to acquire that that particular
lead. So if if for some reason, n
ow, obviously, you know, I wouldn't have
bought the air pods if I hadn't bought the iPhone, those types of things. And
so there's, there's a few things to think about for business owners when
they're doing marketing, right? Is, is there a lead magnet, something I can
get them to get ahead of time that they would they would grab as they're
part of their journey to buy the more expensive product? And I want them to
buy the more expensive product? Yes. But if I could nurture the person that
bought
this into buying that, right, that lead acquisition is going to be
lower most likely for this? Right? So it's a lot of times it's, it's we got
to pause. So anybody that's an entrepreneur, a business owner,
whatever, think about who your customers are, and what their journey
is coming to you. Right? What were the decisions they were making that made
them eventually buy your product or service makes perfect sense Ed Hooks Jr: I'm tracking. So
unfortunately, that that particular example, you don't
buy the earpods, if
you don't have something to use them with, but that's true, that's true,
what you're saying is actually it's more appropriate than the iPhone
example, that you can get them in on some pain point, then, then that will
add your your know like and trust ability, and then you can move on to
bigger and better things like that wrench. Joel Buhr: Well, it's not just that
it's this, okay? Companies, when companies get bought, they don't get
bought, typically, for always the product o
r service that they're being
that they're producing, they get bought for their list. If for example,
as a real estate agent, what you're trying to get is more people to buy
homes from you. Well, are majority of those a year or two ago where they
renter's apartment renters, right. All right, advertise to the apartment
renters, there's more of them. Right, start the journey early so that they
know who you are, and give them something that they will exchange
their name and their email or their phon
e number for now nurture that
list. Like that's, that's that's what we're talking about. So it's, you
know, then there'll be willing or able, if they were, for example,
living in, in the apartment complex, A versus B, which was more high end,
right, that A was more high end, you know, and you're trying to sell high
end houses. Well, those high end renters typically might migrate to the
high end houses. Right? So advertise to those people, Ed Hooks Jr: my real estate market
could shift this Frida
y night with some action that happens in a ballroom
in Washington, DC, right? I just saw, or, or Wall Street, they could just
turn our world upside down this Friday night. So you need to be always
thinking for sure. Right, before we wrap up our main segment here, I
really appreciate the insights and the knowledge and skills you have a cafe
list of all sorts of data, you can bring it all together. In one stop.
You guys did you guys do do creative as well as pulling data together and
spraying it o
ut across the airwaves? Joel Buhr: Apps? Absolutely. So again,
the main areas that we help clients with is the data side. So
understanding that could be as simple as you need a list, right? You need a
list of make some phone calls, sides to understand more about your market
and your existing clients. And then execution. So that includes creative
services, print and mail, digital, all of those different services all Ed Hooks Jr: in one. Okay. And you
guys are headquartered in Nebraska. So does th
at mean like the all the costs
for all your services are not like New York City or Philadelphia lawyers?
Well, Joel Buhr: you know what we we charged
appropriate fair value for the services we render right on if it
wasn't going to be worth it, you wouldn't spend the money with us. Ed Hooks Jr: Amen to that. So, Joel,
you can find on the internet. Joe bird.com Joel Buhr: There we go. I just I just
heard you as a visitor pop on my site. Ed Hooks Jr: What's your Instagram
handle Joe? Joel Buhr: My
Instagram handle is Joel
dot Biewer. But if they go to first direct marketing.com They're going to
find all of the different ways to also follow us and sign up for our vibe
newsletter. We, we put out a lot of good content to help business owners
make decisions, learn about marketing, be empowered, get something that's,
that's beneficial that they can put into action and understand more about
how to grow and scale their business. Ed Hooks Jr: That's awesome. I really
appreciate you carving out ti
me for me this week and your schedule. I look
forward to seeing you guys over at this news. grand opening. And awesome
10x, man. Joel Buhr: Absolutely. Come Come get
pressure, Matt that yeah, definitely come get pressure mapped and get the
perfect sleep going. Ed Hooks Jr: I'm orphaning stress and
drama, so I have no pressure. Okay. Sounds good. For anybody that hangs
out further, Joel and I are gonna roll into an after party. I'm gonna ask him
about general aviation and maybe some top secret st
uff that he's doing for
for real estate in his data land. So thanks again, Joel. I really
appreciate you. I look forward to seeing you soon. You bet. We're gonna
roll into the after party. Now. As I said earlier, I will chop this up.
Tell me about Captain Joel. Of I've seen you in the light aircraft. When
you start flying, what are you flying? Joel Buhr: When you say captain? I
mean, I mean, there's there's I could I could be called a captain in two
different ways that I'm a certified boat capta
in to Oh, right on. So I
just got that here actually, in the last six months. But no, just for
general aviation. I'm a private pilot. So the the planes I fly right now are
Piper arrows and Cessnas. So it's mainly, you know, single engine land.
Yep, single engine land. That's all I'm rated for right now. So still got
to work on getting the instrument rating. But it's, you know, what I've
been, I've been focused on business scale and those types of things
lately. So that's kind of taken a little b
it out of my, my flying time. Ed Hooks Jr: Sure. Well, hopefully,
we'll get a lot more flying time soon, your business is going to be wrapping
up because we need you. We need you. We need your data. We need you. So. So
that's that you had mentioned to me the other day that you've got a top
secret realtor program you're trying to put together? Can you share any
insights with me on that? Joel Buhr: Well, it's whenever I make
applications is not always for just one specific industry. So we're
worki
ng on some tools that will be beneficial for real estate, the real
estate market as well as many other markets, right? And it's just simply
it's again, access to data in such a way that is going to help you grow and
succeed. Right? So it, it's, it's trying to figure out, you know, hey,
what's a better, you know, there might be many different tools out there. But
just because somebody else already has a tool out there doesn't mean I can't
make a tool that, that people would, you know, want to use
because of
something I do differently in it. So we're just just we're trying to
incorporate the surgence of AI into into the process, and make it so that
it's, it's something that, again, helps businesses grow and succeed.
That's our mission, for first direct, is to do that for 100,000 businesses,
and I can't do that if I don't continually try to look for ways to
help them do it. Ed Hooks Jr: So where does Where does
AI fit into into the marketing campaigns? Is it automated email
responses? Or
is it is it better use of the data sets that you actually
have on board that Facebook and Google will not give me access to for pay per
click? Joel Buhr: Well, so I mean, AI fits
into a number of different areas in marketing. And you know, there's,
there's artificial intelligence that's used for bidding engines, when we
serve display ads. To, you know, if it was looking at you and I as an
opportunity to serve an ad to, it's going to try to identify which one of
us is more likely to take the acti
on desire that is to click or watch a
video all the way through. And so instead of serving it to both of us,
it's going to serve it to the one that's most likely to to actually
respond to that. So that's where that's where artificial intelligence
is definitely feeding into the the the marketing space or the data space in
that regards to, but also to identifying patterns and behaviors.
You know, the models to identify someone's behavioral pattern is much,
much more, much more exact than it was ye
ars ago with some of the
segmentation products that were available in the 80s and 90s. Ed Hooks Jr: Is that off the shelf
software is that stuff that you're proprietarily developing for yourself? Joel Buhr: So the stuff that we're
developing, it'd be it's 100% proprietary, that we're developing
Right on. Ed Hooks Jr: But many, many, many
people, I think, think when they hear AI now they're all I mean, I don't
know how many different ways we'll be able to access chat GPT. But it seems
like there'
s a new one or two every day being marketed as Oh, I got it.
We're partnered with open AI. Well, who the hell is not partnered with a
open AI that has AI anywhere in there? Yeah, Joel Buhr: they're doing is they're,
they're just writing off of the current hype. That's it. So some of
that some of these folks are not making, you know, all it is, is a, the
open AI with just one small tweak as a preset, right, as a preset parameter
for the interaction. And that's all it's doing. You know, so, you kn
ow,
you know, but hey, that one little small tweak could be very valuable,
right. And there's also ways for companies to develop some of their own
machine learning and their own models. And so that's definitely something
that, that businesses will will benefit from more and more. Is it
something that's going to dynamically affect the marketplace? I think I
think it'll affect it pretty strongly. However, at the same time, I think I
think over fretting about it is also not productive. You know, so
, Ed Hooks Jr: yeah. Fear, nothing, fear
nothing. Joel Buhr: Some still rose this
morning, you know, it came out of the out of the out of the right side this
morning. It Ed Hooks Jr: definitely did. And,
okay. God in the universe has far more to do with my future than then than
anything. Man is going to unpledged to have a renaissance instead of a
recession. So we're going to skip this recession. There you go. That's the
plan. And it's, you know, it's not like it was a lot less work last year,
b
ut I avoided the recession last year. So that's why it is. Yeah. Right. On
any, Joel Buhr: any you can choose to
participate. Simple as that. Ed Hooks Jr: Yeah, exactly. Well, not
fret about it. Fear, fear or faith, I believe are mutually exclusive. Well,
fear. Can't live in fear. Fear should make you move. Act. Joel Buhr: Fear. Fear is, you know,
false expectations Appearing Real. Right. So, Ed Hooks Jr: feeling excited and
ready. Joel Buhr: Oh, I never heard of that
one. feeling excited and re
ady. That would be the more appropriate angle of
fear. Right, right. It Ed Hooks Jr: should move you too. It
should. It should. It should provoke. Yeah, get out of the fire. Get off the
stove. Joel Buhr: Yeah, exactly. So, you
know, it's one of those things like a lot of times, I'll ask myself, like,
hey, how does this make me feel? And if it makes me feel like I want to
hesitate? But I know it's not bad. But I want to hesitate. Right? That's when
I usually know it's something I need to lean int
o. Yeah, so Ed Hooks Jr: right on. Well, it's been
fun. I want to ask you, is there any, any topics that you that you'd like to
to end on? That we haven't gotten into or something we didn't get in deep
enough? Joel Buhr: Oh, man. Well, there's
there's tons of topics that we can go into. I mean, I mean, it's Ed Hooks Jr: what's what's on your
what's on your heart this morning that you need to get out? Joel Buhr: Oh, man, it's right now.
It's just it's just simply the the, the innocent necessity o
f a business
owner to always pivot. Right. Yeah. And and that's, that's, that's the
main thing. I think that's the that's a true thing, no matter what, right?
You always have variables that you could don't expect, you have things
you have to adapt with. You know, communication is a critical thing
within that whole chain of things. When working with clients, because
you're, you know, as a, as a business owner, you if you have employees, you
depend on upon those employees that providing the final
deliverables for
clients. And when when unforeseen occurrences, so the scriptures talk
about unforeseen occurrences, but follow all one of those unforeseen
occurrences before it's like the only way that we can offset off of that is
by making sure that we communicate, you know, communication is is a big
problem solver. So if we can solve the problem, and it's it's, that's how you
handle it. So that's number that's Ed Hooks Jr: probably second only to
that, Joel, I believe is I believe in radical
responsibility. And radical
responsibility is not jumping up and say I apologize and then go on about
my life. Like the political perspective is on apologies, but
radical responsibility is I'm going to take responsibility for fixing this
current situation, no matter what it is, and who caused it. Joel Buhr: Right. I think there's, I
think there's an importance there. You know, when we talked about taking
responsibility, there is an importance there of taking responsibility and
move Moving on, ri
ght? Sometimes fixed human. Well fix it. Sometimes there's
no fixing that one thing, right? Sometimes the fix if we if we really
want to get down to it, sometimes the fix is, frankly that that person needs
to acknowledge they screwed up. That's it. And apologize. Genuinely. Yeah, I
didn't say I didn't. Ed Hooks Jr: I wouldn't even insinuate
that the beatings will continue until morale improves. Yeah. Right. Or
quality or quality reaches 100%. Joel Buhr: Actually, hey, that that
beatings, by the
way, that phrase is not a, that's a sailing phrase. Just
as a side note, if you research it, I believe it. It's a sailing phrase,
it's, it's you're beating the wind, the beans will tell you no, no, there
you go. Anyway. So, you know, but actually, that's an interesting topic,
though. And just in general, though, because a lot of times we as human
beings want to freeze other people in time. Right. So, you know, I say one
thing, and you take what I said a certain way, but it's not what I
meant. Ho
wever, You never let me explain it further. Or prove different
otherwise, you still have it locked in your head? Ed Hooks Jr: Well, sure, based on my
based on my experiences, I create a frame for that notion. Joel Buhr: Exactly. Right. So so a lot
of times you know, you spoke at the opening you know, we talked with we
were we were both on clubhouse and stuff like that. I think that's how we
met even to but in clubhouse you have people that will sit there and say
this, that or the other about som
ebody, and they will lock that in
time. Right? And you see how not just clubhouse but you see how on any other
any other interaction with human beings like when we do that. We don't
allow for progress. You know, we're expecting perfection out of somebody,
when we wouldn't expect them to expect the same out of us and then not a
single one of us are perfect yet. Ed Hooks Jr: And nor will we be it
kind of frustrates Donna my wife from time to time, but for a long time, I
have abdicated from being r
esponsible for my adult children. It's like, God
has put them on a path. And it's not my place to make them do what path I
want for them. It's we're all on our own mission. Every one of us walk into
planet. We're perfect in our own way. We're all works in progress for ever.
You know, only the good die young. So I'll be around for a minute. There you
go. There you go. I really appreciate you brother and I look forward to
seeing you later Joel Buhr: this afternoon.
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