Month: December 2020

Seth Godin is someone who needs no introduction. His expertise is unparalleled and how he puts it all together is a master class in perfection. He’s one of those names that everyone knows – whether you are a marketer or not. His blog is one of the most popular in the world and he has a top-rated podcast. His books are best-sellers. He’s even a sought-after public speaker and teacher.  

 

Seth is a busy guy, but he was kind enough to spend time with The C-Suite Network during a recent Digital Discussion on all things marketing and business. 

 

I’ve known Seth for years and have admired the confidence he shows. While Seth says he cares more about what other people think than he lets on, he had an epiphany of sorts 20 years ago. 

 

“I don’t like disappointing people, but I find that the best way to be a useful contribution is to be specific about who I’m for,” Seth said. 

 

He continued, “If your motto is, you can pick anyone, and I’m anyone, you’re in big trouble because the number of anyones out there is going up, and they’re easier to find.” Adding, “Too often, we are pushed by outside forces to be anyone. Our mother-in-law or friends or people (who) care about us push us to be normal to be in the middle to be replaceable. The second thing …(you) can’t be specific and be for everyone. At the same time, you got to figure out who you are for. I am here to solve this problem. If you have something else, I will eagerly send you to other people who need what you have, but I’m here for this.” 

 

But, there’s more to getting the public interested in your product than a splashy advertising campaign. Seth says that’s what marketing was 15 years ago, and those days are gone. 

 

“Marketing is what we make, how we make it, who we make it with, how diverse the organization is, what the side effects are — all of those things are marketing choices,” Seth said. “So, by my definition, marketers are always ready with a resilient approach because they understand that the future is going to be upside down.” 

 

My definition of marketing is the inception of the idea, all the way through customer satisfaction. Seth says you should add one step to that, which is “what the satisfied customer tells their boss or their friends.” 

 

With that in mind, we got into the three steps all marketers should consider with their product.  

 

“The first step I’ve been talking about for a really long time. You don’t show up in the chat room, have a Zoom call, and post the link over and over again, hoping that someone will accidentally click on it and buy something from you. That’s spam,” Seth asserted. “You don’t burn trust to get attention. That’s a waste. You have to treasure the fact that someone has a moment to engage with you and if it’s not for them in this moment, it’s not for them. You earn permission.” 

 

“The second one is getting your arms around the idea that you are doing something chronic and persistent over time that marketing is not about tactics or emergencies or making this quarter’s numbers. Marketing is what journey are we on.” 

 

“The third thing is that it’s all a story. Money is a story. The products we make are a story. What is the story we are telling? What does the lived experience of our contribution to the world look like and feel like? And would they miss us if we were gone? Because if they’re not going to miss you. If you’re gone, then please don’t show up.” 

 

Another thing you always hear from marketing people are ways to break through the noise. Seth has some harsh advice for those people.

 

“Please don’t break through the noise,” Seth said. “Breaking through the noise just makes more noise. The tactical approach that many marketers take is not only not working. It’s making the problem worse.” 

 

But, what about the internet?

 

 “The internet is not a mass medium. TV is the last mass medium there will ever be. It’s a micro-medium. There is no homepage of the internet. You can’t reach everybody on the internet. It was so easy to reach 30 million people in 1985. You can’t reach 30 million people today. Stop trying.” 

 

With that in mind, you have to be creative with your approach. If you think being creative is a skill reserved for artists and musicians, Seth believes you need to change your definition. Creativity is the ability to solve interesting problems and that’s part of every c-suite executive’s job. 

 

“What do CEOs, playwrights, and filmmakers and musicians have in common?” Seth asked. “They don’t wait for the muse to show up and whisper the answer to them. They have a practice. They do it on the regular. They’re able to put things into the world. When they don’t work, they learn from it, and they do it again.” 

 

He continued, “Mostly, they aren’t hooked on manipulating the outcome. They are instead focused on the process because if you get the process right, you’re on your way to the best possible path to the outcome.” 

 

I always talk about “failing faster.” You know you’re going to fail eventually, get over it, figure out what you’ve learned, and move on. That will help you “win faster” next time; which according to Seth, is what we need to focus on. To do this, he offers up Simon Sinek’s definition of two types of games — infinite games with a definite winner and loser or infinite games where you’re not trying to win.   

 

“We have to figure out what game are we playing when we bring our ideas to the world when we hire someone when we do a partnership when we seek to build our institution,” Seth says. “I’m way more interested in playing an infinite game than winning a finite game because the problem with winning a finite game is, they don’t get to play anymore. In a world where they’re trusting, connections are so important if we keep weaving those together. We get to keep playing.” 

 

In business, I like to keep playing and winning. 

 

This post barely touches on my conversation with Seth and the Q&A with our members. If you want to hear more about Seth’s new book, “The Practice: Shipping Creative Work,” how his writing career led to becoming a better speaker, and the difference between skillset and talent. This episode of All Business with Jeffrey Hayzlett, is a must-listen. 

Forget Goose and Maverick. I recently had the privilege of talking with an actual former Navy TOPGUN instructor, Commander Guy Snodgrass, on All Business with Jeffrey Hayzlett. 

 

Guy’s military background is impressive in itself, but becoming the best of the best wasn’t easy. Moving up in the military is like any other internal promotion in the business world.

 

“Whenever you join any of these elite teams within the U.S. military, there’s kind of a rush process that goes along with it,” Guy said. “You have to not only apply. But once you’ve made that application, if you kind of get into that final cut.” 

 

He continued, “Typically, those staffs are going to bring in, and they want to see you perform. They want to see how you handle yourself, how you’re going to be if you’re accepted to be part of those elite teams. TOPGUN is no different.” 

 

TOPGUN training courses only run three times a year for about 12 weeks, and class sizes are 15 to 20 students. From there, only a select few make it to the instructor level. When Guy first arrived at TOPGUN school in Fallon, NV, he thought he had failed his tryout.  

 

“I had gone up against one of the most senior Top Gun instructors — we’re dogfighting. It’s a very dynamic, challenging type of flight. He beat me every single flight.” Guy recalled. “I found myself slouched down in the cockpit thinking ‘Man, I just got destroyed, and there’s no way they’re going to take a guy like me, who just got beat three times and make me part of the staff.’” 

 

Instead of sulking, Guy fell back on his training. During the post-flight debrief, he professionally walked through the part of the flight that caused him problems and talked about what he could learn from the experience. 

 

“I’ll never forget after the debrief, (the instructor) looked at me and said, ‘Yeah, I’m going to recommend you for the TOPGUN staff because the reality is I’ve been a TOPGUN instructor for years. I’ve got a lot of these skills you haven’t developed yet, but you’ve got a lot of passion. You got a lot of talent. You got a lot of personality. That will make you a very good instructor. We can teach you to be a top-notch fighter pilot. That’s something that can be trained, but you have those other innate characteristics that matter,’” Guy recalled. “It was kind of a big surprise that it wasn’t just about performance on every single mission. It was the fact that consistently, over time, you’re always seeing to improve yourself.” 

 

Guy had an innate quality — he was teachable. This is something every employer should look for, and have, within their teams. No one wants a hard-headed worker, at any level, who has a bad attitude. I always say “Adapt, change or die,” and the ability to adapt is an excellent quality for leaders and businesses to have. Skills are teachable, attitude isn’t.

 

“When I work with c-suites, you’ve got people who are dedicated to lifelong learning. They’re incredibly humble,” Guy said. “They realize that there’s a lot of experts on their teams who want to continue to make the organization better, and it’s about harnessing those skills and directing those talents. As opposed to always being the sole resource within an organization. Typically, senior leaders like that, don’t succeed.” 

 

Another critical trait Guy and I agree leaders should have: values. I like to call them ‘walk away values,’ but Guy keys into one crucial piece that makes up those values. 

 

“The currency that tends to underpin your success is trust,” Guy says. “When you deal with someone, you learn pretty quick, are they a person of their word, are they someone who might be excessively transactional. They’ll tell you one thing to your face and do something different behind your back. The reality is, whether you’re in uniform flying combat mission or handling these major multi-million or multi-billion-dollar deals, people have to be able to trust you.” 

 

Wise words for sure. 

 

He recently released his second book, TOPGUN’S top 10 which highlights key lessons he acquired as an elite fighter pilot that can easily be applied to business and life.  I asked what the most important lesson from his book was. He says it’s hard because every situation is different, but he did tell me what he thinks is the most evergreen for people at all stages of your life or career. 

 

“Never wait to make a difference,” Guy said. “It’s about being proactive.” 

 

“We’re all pretty optimized to recognize shortcomings to see the problems to see the friction points within our organization. But there’s truly a very slim number of individuals. Usually, around 10-15% of any organization that will recognize those problems and then kind of look around say ‘Why isn’t anybody fixing this?’ and ‘If not me, then who?’. So, they jump right in, and they not only help become part of the solution to either solve a problem or take advantage of an opportunity that exists. Those (people) typically wind up being those leading individuals that will continue to rise and be very successful, because every business leader wants people like that on their team.” 

 

Another lesson from the book is not to confuse activity with progress. Guy says it’s something everyone finds themselves fighting against, from the military to corporate America. 

 

“You find that it’s very easy to step into a routine,” Guy says. “We’ve all seen this with companies that have meetings that are just regularly scheduled, and they’re just there. People will walk in with the expectation that ‘I’ll learn everything I need at this meeting. I don’t have to come prepared.’” 

 

That couldn’t be further from the truth. While everyone should be prepared, the reality is meetings have changed. In fact, tech giant Google recently made headlines for its new policy “no meetings week.” The way we work has forever changed.

 

Besides meetings, Guy says many get caught up in daily tasks, making us forget to work on the more strategic goals that will move the needle forward. I call this working in the business and not on the business. It happens to all of us entrepreneurial CEOs at some point.   

 

I want to thank Guy for his insights and advice. I especially appreciate his leadership advice. If you would like to learn more about what it’s like to Pull G’s, his work at the Pentagon, and how Guy earned his call sign “Bus,” listen to the complete interview here.   

 

There’s nothing more New York than a bagel and schmear (cream cheese for you non-New Yorkers). Many would argue, a bagel is a food that is good as-is. Don’t mess with it. Others would disagree, including Elyse Oleksak. 

 

Recently I had Elyse as my guest, she’s the co-founder of Bantam Bagels on All Business with Jeffrey Hayzlett. Elyse and her husband, Nick, took a New York style bagel, turned it into a donut-hole type ball, stuffed it with cream cheese, and put it in freezer cases across America.  

 

While Elyse and Nick sold the company in 2018, they still run Bantam Bagels. During our conversation, Elyse and I talked about Bantam’s beginnings and its continued rise. 

 

“Who doesn’t love a bagel?” Elyse asked. “It’s iconic. It’s something that everybody loves and fits literally within everybody’s life. What we were doing was just creating a little bit of a twist on it and making it a solution to a problem. (A bagel) is too big. It’s too messy on the go. It’s too big of a commitment.” 

 

They even took their idea to “Shark Tank” and got an investment from Lori Greiner.  

 

“(Lori) was the best fit for us,” Elyse said. “She’s known for having solutions for what seems like everyday problems, and that’s what we were doing.” 

 

First, we addressed the Bantam’s origin story – which is remarkable in itself.  

 

During the 2008 recession, the Oleksaks worked in the financial industry, not the food business, when they decided to get into the bagel biz. 

 

“Nick and I were working on Wall Street when the stock market, the economy, blew up. Half of our friends lost their jobs overnight,” Elyse recalls. “We were young and unafraid. We had ideas. We had hustle. We knew we had more to give. We had watched the professional infrastructure in front of our eyes dissolve, and we said if there’s ever a chance to take a risk. Just to get on the end-line and sprint and try something out, it’s now. Let’s try and own our own destiny. We have this crazy idea that is so good it makes people jump up and down.”  

 

“Just because we weren’t cooks, it didn’t mean we weren’t eaters,” Elyse said. “We were foodies. We lived in Brooklyn for 12 years. Bagels just become a part of who you are in New York.” 

 

Using their Brooklyn apartment as a test kitchen, Elyse and Nick began baking batches of mini-bagels perfecting the recipe that would later become Bantam Bagels. 

 

“In the morning before work, in the afternoon up until midnight after work (we made) hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of batches,” Elyse said. “Seeds everywhere. Flour everywhere. Different strands of yeast. We would take the dough and put it in our laundry room in our studio apartment, close the door because it was dark and moist enough to let the dough rise. We tried all kinds of stuff out.” 

 

She added, “We used to walk around the park and be like ‘You know, it would be really good to get some cheddar and Dijon inside of a bagel.’ It was one of those creative things.” 

 

All that creativity paid off. Nick and Elyse finally had their ‘a-ha’ moment.  

 

“We absolutely nailed it,” Elyse said. “I remember Nick sort of boil-baked one filled bagel for me before he left for his Wall Street job one morning. He’s like, ‘It’s on the counter. Try it.’ One bite, and I did the whole jump up and down. We were off to the races.” 

 

Elyse and Nick shared their new product with anyone in their network and pitched as many people as they could. From there, they started working on their flagship Bantam Bagel shop on Bleecker Street in Greenwich Village. Before opening, Bantam got a full-page write up in The Wall Street Journal. That exposure lead to two segments on NBC’s Today Show in two weeks!  

 

“The New York scene exploded nationally. They were talking about us, and we hadn’t even opened our doors yet,” Elyse remembered. “We’re like ‘now it’s just up to us. Now we have to deliver the product.'” 

 

Early on, Bantam found the media to be major allies.  

 

“We got a lot of really, really good buzz from the press that we capitalized on,” Elyse said. “The press is the most amazing vehicle because they’re genuine, and people listen because they’re not getting paid to write about you. They’re writing about you because they like it.” 

 

To start, Elyse was working 18-hour shifts to keep up with demand. Nick would work his day job on Wall Street, then spend his evenings at the store. Elyse says what they learned early on was the unpredictability of foot traffic, even in a place as busy as New York. Bantam used its positive press coverage, including being named one of Oprah’s Favorite Things in 2014, to start cold e-mailing potential places to sell their product. 

 

“We sent (an e-mail) to someone at Starbucks, who said ‘I freakin’ love your bagels. I bring people to your shop. Come on in!'” Elyse said. “We showed up to their office, and it was like we were on “Candid Camera.” Everyone was coming in saying, ‘Can I take selfies with you guys? I’ve read about you. I’ve seen your story. I love your shop.’ That turned into momentum where (Starbucks) allowed us to launch at three stores. Those three stores very quickly turned into 30, turned into 50. We were personally delivering every bagel. We were personally going on the ground and sampling them to customers, like spreading the love from the ground up.” 

 

Elyse and Nick used that personal approach at grocery stores, trade shows, and anywhere else, they could make a connection. All those connections and media coverage lead to an unlikely relationship with the home shopping network QVC. In fact, Bantam Bagels were on QVC before “Shark Tank.” 

 

One day a QVC buyer cold called because she saw a story about Bantam in a magazine. The buyer was upfront about the difficulties of providing product to the cable shopping giant. QVC wanted 30,000 bagels ready in two weeks. Elyse and Nick looked around at their small store and staff and got to work. They shut down the shop and began baking in 24-hour shifts, all while Elyse was six months pregnant. They even had to research details like Nutrition Facts for the box during that time.  

 

It all paid off. QVC booked Elyse and Nick for a seven-minute segment. Bantam Bagels sold out in five minutes. Then QVC ordered more.  

 

“We were like, ‘we’re going to need a bigger boat,’ Elyse said.  

 

That’s when they reached out to the New York bagel community. From there, they got a crash course on the bagel industry and found a copacker, a company that would help make the product at scale.  

 

Next up for Elyse and Nick was “Shark Tank.” Before they went before the sharks, the Oleksaks crammed for the exam.  

 

“Nick and I went to Columbia, and I studied harder for the “Shark Tank” pitch than I did for my SAT,” Elyse said. “We had study guides. We had numbers. We would walk around and quiz each other. We watched every single episode ever aired, wrote down any questions that they asked, good, bad, you know, poking hole questions and we would prep our answers. I’ve never been so prepared for anything in my life.” 

 

From the Today Show, Shark Tank, Starbucks, and QVC, Bantam Bagels found bigger distribution deals with retailers like Target, Safeway, and other grocers.   

 

“If you look at the grocery store right now, it’s Eggo, Jimmy Dean, Toaster Strudel, Bantam,” Elyse said. “We’re like these little guys, and they’ve been established. We need to stand out.” 

 

How does Bantam stand out?  

 

“People want more. They want to connect. They want to hear a story. They want to be inspired,” Elyse said. “If we can connect personally with people and give that reason that they trust us a little bit more. They know whatever they buy is going to be the best thing ever because they know Nick and I have been up ’till midnight for months on end developing the recipe. That makes a difference.” 

 

I love talking to Entrepreneurial CEOs like Elyse. Her story is an inspiration and proves that hustle and grit can pay off.  

 

If you’d like to hear my complete interview, including the story about how Bantam got into major retailers, click here.