EXPERIENCE 13 | Rina Jean Bindi with Tipping Point Digital

Welcome to the LOCO Experience Podcast with LOCO Think Tank Founder Kurt Bear. Listen in as Kurt digs deep into the business and life stories of business owners and thought leaders at different stages of growth from all walks of life. Launching and growing anything can be a crazy experience, so expand your thinking and level up your understanding of what it takes to find success in the world of free enterprise. Thank you. All right, welcome back to the LOCO Experience Podcast. My guest today is RJ or Rina Jean Bindi. Rina Jean Bindi sold RJ's amazing events in 2020 and events business and has a couple of business pursuits that are at various stages right now. She is the SEO ninja strategic master at tipping point digital and founder, as well as has a real estate investments business and a direct sales and e-commerce company as well. And so the grass never grows underneath RJ's feet and I've known RJ for probably about two years now or maybe not even. Yeah, about two years now and have always wanted her to be a breadth of fresh air and a very enjoyable conversation. So welcome RJ. Thanks, Kurt. I'm happy to be here. I appreciate you inviting me on with everyone and well, I mean, it is just you and me. Yeah, for everyone who gets to listen and hang with us. It's a community. It's community, the LOCO community. So I like to set the stage by just saying, what are you doing right now? What does your day, your week look like? Kind of describe some of your different pursuits, the customers you serve? However helps people understand like who RJ is right now and then we'll delve into some of the story of who made you who you are today. Cool. Well, right now I'm focused on my digital marketing business and we specialize in SEO strategies, which is why I am an SEO ninja because in order to execute SEO properly, you have to have an intelligent plan put behind it. Hence ninja strategy, right? Are ninjas particularly intelligent? Well, they're intelligent. They strategize and then they execute the plan. Oh, so it's a whole it's not like you just go out and like just not just the ninja skills like right from the start. It's a big planning session first and then the ninja attack. Exactly. Okay. Hence where I'm at today. Yeah. Awesome. Okay. So I just help people rank higher, get reviews from past and current clients. Like I'll have a few Zoom meetings every day. I have team meetings every morning with my VAs and we discuss like three things that we're grateful for, three things that we accomplished and three things that we're going to be working on. I like that. It is. It's nice because we all just check in with each other and it helps build community. And who is that one or two virtual team players are more than that? I have two VAs that are full timers and two that are independent contractors. I see. Okay. So the two that are ICs don't join us on our like inner circle team meetings. Yeah. But the two who've been with me, one's been with me for three years, over three years now, Terry. And we just we just like to talk. Yeah. Well, you like to connect, but I'm sure you're doing useful talk, right? Well, and probably another useful stuff once more because that those connections are part of the thing, right? Like making a strong team. Yeah, it has to be about team community. I mean, I want to know how his family is doing, how he's been affected because sometimes we can't do the work that we need to do on a daily basis when we have this other stuff stuck in our head. And so that's a daily thing for you guys. Four times a week. Four times a week. Is it like a 20, 30 minute meeting? We try to keep it under 30 minutes. Yeah. Sometimes it ends up lasting like an hour and a half when we have a lot to discuss, right? Whether it's client and or personal and or strategizing. Yeah, we can get into that work needs to get done sometimes. Like if you're trying to unfold the ending of how to find the right SEO strategy for this particular client and you're looking at it from different angles, I imagine as a team. Yeah, well, that's the easy part, though. Like to to actually map out what needs to be done for the client, I usually have that done prior to us even onboarding them. Oh, I see. So you're the strategist and then you have ninja teammates that do a lot of execution in their their experts in whether it's the video for getting the videos to start ranking organically or Google my business, Google maps, getting the content, the right kind of graphics, getting the right message out and then spider webbing it through all of the different publisher listings, all of the different sites that that a business will have or places that they're found, whether it's their blog, their website. Right. If they're known on Instagram and that kind of stuff, whatever. Yeah. So let's talk a little bit more. So who are these clients that that are hiring you? And what's that engagement look like with your from the client side? So I have one client who's a general contractor that I don't really care what I do. Just do us some marketing and get us some more customers. Yeah, there's just like get it done. And I took them from six figures to seven. So they were they were sitting at three quarters of a million dollars, like, you know, $750,000 the year prior in this last year, I took them up to 1.5 million. Okay. And they attest most of that to the reviews that I was able to get in the targeted neighborhoods. It's just your dog vomiting on my carpet. Yeah, I was like, what did Zugo just cough up there? They attest that to the reviews that I was able to help them to get and then just the overall digital footprint. Okay. Because they're sending people to their social to their social media site. And they're saying, yeah, you know, you could check out what it is that we're doing. You could look at some of our articles or whatever it is that you're interested in. And then they build trust with the perspective of clients. So you help them understand how to build credibility and trust with their clients. Absolutely. Is that what you do for your clients? Absolutely. You can use that if you want to. Yes. You probably have it on there already. I read your website. So how did you get good at this? Like, I remember actually when we first met, this was a relatively new venture and you were kind of downsizing your role at RJ's amazing events, which is what everybody knows you for because you're the best darn face painter in town and then some. So tell me about like, is that was that how you built those skillset of knowing how to get that stuff going? Was for that other business? Oh, yeah. Well, I'm from San Jose, California originally and all of the boys do finite math and their spare time because they think it's fun. You're saying people are smarter than us? They're geeky. Okay, dirty. And I don't know what finite math is. So I guess I'm not. I don't either. It just sounds funny. So I say it all the time when people say, when people ask me about being from San Jose, the no, it really is. It's just where I came from in San Jose. I learned a lot about the tech world. And I didn't really have any experience in it. And when I moved out here, I looked everywhere. I asked I Googled entertainment companies in Northern Colorado because all I wanted to do was face paint and twist balloons, bring joy to children. Okay. I had learned how to do it in California. Oh, my gosh. I could do that out here. That'd be so much fun. Right. What did I can work for? Exactly. I was looking for a job. And then no one would give me one because it was in the middle of winter. They didn't have any work. Their team was full. And I was only able to find a couple of businesses online anyway. Yeah. And then someone was like, well, well, my mentor actually dune over in San Diego. He said, why don't you, you know, start your own business, get your website up and start building your digital presence and take it from there. So I'm like, okay. And I didn't, I knew that writing articles was important. But from there, I went ahead and took classes at the Lovelin Business Development Center. Oh, cool. Shout out to, well, catch the boss down there, boss lady down there now. But who was? Oh, gosh. I can see her face. And I just can't pull her name out of my hand. I was meeting with this guy. Robin from the counseling session. Yeah. I remember seeing Dixie daily down there all the time. For sure. Love. She gives the best hugs. Is that right? Uh-huh. You know, with COVID nation, I don't get to find out. But I'll know that I'll actually see if I can get one next time. I'm down there. I would just be driving by and stop in to get a hug. Really? Uh-huh. See, that's creepy if you're a boy and you do that. I don't think I don't think I can do that. Like, if I have a meeting there or something like that, then maybe I can see if a hug's in the offering. But I don't think it's a good idea for me to just pop in for a hug. I took all their classes, Kurt. I took every class that I got into. So they got to know me. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Laura Gamma, uh, who's with DeGama, uh, digital marketing. She does website, SEO, a lot of the similar things that I do. She does websites though. I don't do websites. Uh, she, she actually, I owe her, so I have so much gratitude for her. She taught a class about SEO and I had gotten my side up and I had gotten everything going. And I didn't understand how, how to get the SEO in there to be effective. Right. And she knows time writing stuff. And is it actually going to make any difference? I didn't, I didn't know. I didn't know. It couldn't find any information. So Lori went in for like 200 bucks, which is stupid, stupid, inexpensive. And she let me know. She's like, I'm, I see your drive. I see your hunger. I see your motivation. And I want to help you. Yeah. And next time this will be 500 bucks. Right. I'm sure it would have been a lot more. That, that was all I needed. Yeah. I needed her to go in and kind of show me. And she went through, just did the key words, optimize some of my stuff. And from there I took off running. I found books on SEO. I attended whatever seminars I could on SEO. And I was like, oh, this way easier than I thought. So you are, I would say almost an SEO and digital marketing expert that happened to have an event's business, but really had an event's business because you got good at becoming found based on search ranking and some things like that. There was a hole. Yeah. There was a big gap in this community for that. And I just went in and hit it like a title wave. One of my biggest competitors like, I'd say for digital marketing space, her digital marketing footprint is Allison with Marymaker. She's a really good friend of mine. She had the Marymaker's website up. And after not even two years, not even two years, she said, RJ, my phone is not ringing half as much as it used to. And I was working 104 hours every single week. I was, I had, I had a team of 20 entertainers. Oh, you mean you were building that many hours of service. So you weren't working 104 hours. No, I had 20 entertainers. Yeah. That I was sending out on the weekend. So you weren't working working two, 40 hour work weeks plus some others. You were saying that those many teams. I was working 104. Oh, you were humping it too. Yeah. I had to do the bookings. I had to answer the phones. I had to get the systems, the operations. I was a technician. I was doing setup. I was doing the marketing. So let's talk about that more. Well, since we drifted into the start of your business story, let's just kind of go there and let's go along your journey. So when was this circa me and just and you moved to Fort Collins? Like why? In 2012, divine, divine guidance. I, I knew that I was called to move. My parents had moved here. Okay. You need to move. You need to move. No, I don't. I'm happy in San Diego where the sun shines and I can sunbathe on Christmas day. And my parents said, well, you should really consider it. And I just flat out said, if God wants me out here, God will make it happen. And the next day, I got a phone call. And it was God. It was not God. It was the, it was the Gal and San Diego who owned the estate that I was staying in. And I was a property manager for. Hey, Zuko, you want to come in here, Bobby? Come here, dude. I think he's thinking of the other dogs. Right. They walk by pretty regular. Yeah. That'll, that'll just background. It's probably it's urban, urban clutter. All right. So Dustin said they were short selling the estate where I lived. And I was like, well, then I got to move. And since I'm moving and I don't know where to go and I just put it out there, I suppose I'm moving Colorado. Yeah. So I did. Okay. Like four or five, six months later, I got offered multiple jobs in California and San Diego and LA. And I just knew I had to come out here. So I don't have to get that dog didn't care if I'm going to cause it. And we're back. So you moved to Fort Collins. Is that where your parents were? Loveland. Okay. I am in Southwest loveland area. Okay. Sorry. I didn't mean to be Fort Collins forcing that upon you. It's just for here. That's all good. I acknowledge that Fort Collins is an amazing amazing brother. Well, I got small business of the year from the Chamber out there. You did in Loveland or Fort Collins? No, in Fort Collins Chamber. In Fort Collins, right? Yeah. I remember. That was the first year I was a member of the Chamber. I'm like, what? It was my first year as a member too. Well, you were obviously far more involved and way more networks than I am. So you know everybody. And that didn't take that long for you. Like it took me 20 years to get to know half as many everybody as you in only what at that time, it was only like five years, I suppose. So you moved to Loveland in with your folks. Yep. And because they were like, hey, we want to be here with us anyway. And once you're, well, we're going to talk actually, I don't know if I'd mentioned to you. Probably not. It's not in the application, but we always finish every podcast with Faith Family Politics. And so we'll expand the family element and where you came from and stuff more later in the podcast. But this is mostly about the business journey. So so you get here. It's 2012. You're in with mom and dad. You'd have this kush gig and some estate in San Diego before. But that kind of got took it away from you. And you're like, all right, God, what do we got going on now? Yeah. When I came out here, I just knew that I wanted to be a face painter. Okay. And I moved into my parents' basement. And they wanted me there. And where did that come from? We touched on that before. But you came out with that toolkit already. And you said where you got that. The which toolkit? The face painter. Oh, well, in San Diego from Looney Duney. He's been an entertainer for over 35 years. He was Ronald McDonald at one point in his career. Okay. He traveled the world entertaining children. And he basically said, I was sitting down, have a lunch one day with his wife. And he had hopped in. And I just come back from a retreat. And I said, man, I wish I could get paid to play with kids. And Dune looks over at me and goes, okay, that's easy. I was like, what? He's like, I'll pay you to play with kids. And then he gave me a game master bag. And I was hooked. It was so much fun. I didn't know how to communicate with children either. Did not come easier naturally to me. I just, I don't know. It was just really difficult in the beginning. But when we were playing games, and I was just in charge of getting everybody to play the games, that was really, really easy. Then I was like, how can I do more? I want to do more, Dune. So he's like, all right, here's an airbrush. Can't go airbrush. I was like, oh my gosh, I want to do more. I want a face paint. And he was like, I can't teach you how to face paint. But, you know, this is what you need and this is what you can do. And so I learned that. That was not easy. So we had a tie balloons, dude. I did not ask him the time. I did, okay, I did not ask to learn how to tie balloons. All right. Did you just do it? I didn't even just do it. Dune, Dune was like, how could I say no? Okay. I was moving out here. And he said, all right, RJ, you were like a daughter to me. And every single one of my children must learn to tie balloons before leaving the nest. Oh my gosh, it was horrible. You were forced into it. God, I didn't want to do it. They squeak and they break and they pop and they scream. It's just like a dead turtle or whatever. That blue snake. They're minor all snakes. That's my skill level. It took me like three minutes to tie a dog. And I had my hands all the way out in front of me and my eyes closed. And I was trying to twist it. And he's like, could you open your eyes? Is it maybe twisted his head off? I twisted his head off. Popped his tail, deflated him. Then he made me pop them all after. You kidding? Oh, destroy your own creation. I didn't even want anything to do with them. So you didn't really specialize in the blue and animals part of RJ's amazing events. Actually, I got really, really good at it. You just, after a while, you really liked the experience of twisting these poor, dimensional animals. Yeah. Well, the kids would get so much joy out of it. I just learned it was worth the suffering of the rubber animals. Yeah. And then I found out I have a latex allergy. And a balloon animal career. Yeah. Or work gloves, I suppose. Non latex. It's so hard. All right. Look at those little things tied and stuff with gloves on. Well, that was a fun segue. So you come out here with a suitcase full of dreams from Dune and skills as well. And so was that almost like your first job of sorts was doing this stuff with him or your daughter almost. Yes. Yes. But you described that. Well, is that part of the family section? When we get to the end of the post podcast, because you described you that way. No. No. Do you don't want to tell anymore about dude? No, I can't. I can't talk more about it. But was it a boss? Was it a neighborhood guy or was it like a guy that know his wife? I knew his wife really well. Okay. His wife and I would have tea. So we'd meet up and we'd have tea once a week and we'd hang out in the same circles and excuse me and I would just sit. And when he, he had been, he'd been watching me like he had seen me over the last couple of years. And he knew who I was and he'd always heard positive things about me. I was like, oh, it should be a great entertainer. But I wasn't ready to hear the message. I was doing maintenance. Oh, I remember that. Yeah, you were a property manager. Well, that's property management is different than maintenance manager. Facilities operation and plant engineer and actually being a handy girl and going into homes and fixing people's stuff. Yes, I do remember that from our very first coffee. Completely different. Yes. You were like, tool belt Annie. Yep. For this company, I assumed that owns some owns a big, a complex thing. And you were like, I was at Kaiser Hospital for six years. And then I ended up going to Hawaii, working for a solar business and I traveled to all the islands. It was amazing. They sent me to all of the islands. This is all prior to coming to for college or to Leveland. Yep. And then from there, it started maintenance business and went to a bunch of festivals and at the time of life, then I ended up going down to San Diego. Is the maintenance business and the festivals related or just the maintenance business did well so you could afford to buy tickets to all these festivals? I am. Yeah. Something like that. It was very easy. I just scheduled all of my work days on Tuesday, Wednesday, maybe Thursday. Right. And make a couple hundred, a couple hundred dollars or whatever it was that I needed and go to the festival. Sure. Yeah. I like it. And party. So you were a party girl in California. I used to be. Did that change when you came to Leveland? Oh, prior to that. It changed in 2008. 2008. That's a long time ago now. 12 years ago, almost 13, I guess, it's been anything time in here. Yeah, I just couldn't hang anymore. Yeah. As well as girls that like, drink way too much and you're like, oh, she's drunk again. No, surprise. Hmm. I was like, I need to stop. Yeah. Yeah. You're two, you're probably an achiever in the any gram, aren't you? Three or a seventh promoter. I think. I'm surprised you don't know. Well, three, I remember being a three and something about leader or achiever or something like that. I do the 16 personalities profile test though. Okay. The ENFJ. Oh, the Myers-Briggs. ENFJ. P. Extrovert. Oh, P. There's, I only know the first four. P, I think. I don't know. Something like that. Nobody's going to get anything out of this part of the podcast. So, so let's just get back to when you came to Leveland, Colorado and you're with Mom and Dad. You've been on your own for some years at that point. Is that fair? And was it, was it led by God thing and a joy thing? Or was it a, oh, I got to move in with Mom and Dad and. If it doesn't make you happy, remove it. Oh, I leave each moment better than when I arrive, shifting my reality as a physicist considers it. That is my affirmation. That is my step one process. That is how I live my life. As a physicist considers it. So it's like a from objective perspective, not just this swinging with the breeze on my emotions. You got it, Kurt. Yeah. You got it. Yes. I was trying to figure my shelf out too a little bit here and there. So I like it. So, so you get here with a with a pocket full of skills, a passion for hanging out with children, which would be weird if you were me, I suppose, but I'd love children as well. And then you kind of stumble into this business because you wanted to paint kids as faces and you couldn't do that because nobody had any proper digital marketing and get those kind of things going. Yeah. So R.J.'s amazing events, amazing events, amazing entertainment. Came to fruition. And that was when? 2013 is when we started actually booking gigs and going to festivals and I started needing help the very first year. I brought in on three to five independent contractors in my first year. Okay. Second year more than tripled and I had 20 entertainers that I was either working with as independent contractors or they weren't quite employees yet because I didn't understand how to make someone an employee. But I figured that out a couple years after that. Okay. So talking about those first few hires, like at first, like before you had the first contractors at all, it was just you and you're doing, if they wanted balloon animals, you'd do that. If they wanted face painting, you'd do that. If they wanted a princess bride, you would bring a bunch of little girl princess bride outfits. I don't know. I had to dress up as a princess. That was my second year here when everyone called said, you're blonde. Do you have a blue dress? Like, why do I need a blue dress? I'm like, well, you're, you, you look just like this Disney character Elsa. Could you, could you just show up wearing a blue dress? Please and say your name's Elsa. I was like, what are these people talking about? I watched that movie. Elsa's pretty cool. Yeah. Well, I like Anna. Oh, she's the cooler sister. Anna's the happy one. Happy and lucky. Elsa's like sad. She's all morose and yeah. Okay. Yeah. Ice powers. Right. It makes you cold cold-hearted. So yeah, you're definitely more of an Anna. So, so you're doing all these gigs solo style and then like was there a specific thing that was like, I need more than just me because people want more than just me. That that was within my first two or three months of just painting for tips out in the parks. People were asking for more than one entertainer. I had to figure out really quickly how to hire talent and how to start systematizing. So wait, wait, wait. So first, so how you started your business was like hanging out at the park with your little face painter's palette kit and being like, hey, I'll paint your kids face for whatever tip you want. And I hung out near the water park because the kids would run through the water. Sure. And it would all wipe off. I think I got to get their face painted fixed back up. They need their face painted fixed. Or they need me to do it all over again. Is it a free fix? So you don't know. They're just giving me tip money. Yeah. They held the moms were really kind and giving. Yeah. And I also set up in our neighborhood prior to that because I was so horrible at it. Like so bad. All the neighborhood kids had run up and I say, okay, everybody, today we're doing kissy fish. And the boy said, I don't want kissy fish. I'm like, you're getting kissy fish or you're not getting painted. And I'd paint 10 faces or 15 faces in a row. All is kissy fish. Just so I could get the practice of doing it over and over again. What's a kissy fish? It's just like two fish and they're kissing in the middle of the mouth right here. So when you go, like that, it looks like they're kissing. Yeah. That's pretty cute. So you just wanted to get really good at do. Imagine it's different. Like here's a little behind the curtain at face painting, right? Like different facial features will make things move differently depending on. Just like the dinosaur. You have the dinosaur right here. It was a lot of fun. It took me four years to actually develop my line control and get the face painting skills down that I required to do advanced techniques. Allison with Mary makers helped me with that as well as advancing my balloon techniques out here. And Dune was like my business guide and mentor through most of it. It was it was a lot of showing up and failing, not knowing what to do, making mistakes, but being accountable, making adjustments proactive, learning from my mistakes and just moving on from there. It was a lot of that. Yeah. Yeah. I wonder sometimes when people start a passion driven business like this, like they failed to charge enough to their customers. Was that case with you? No. That was not the case with me. You're banging right for the start. I knew that I was setting up a business. Yeah. This was not just a hobby. This was a business. I would have to pay myself for my systems, my entertainers, the the merchant processing fees, all of the little items. And I knew that I had to create a stable environment financially as well as with the operations and the sales and marketing and the technician training. I put all of that together. I made it all up. Emeth for visited was an excellent book to help me. Yeah. Chuck Blakeman's how making money is killing your business. I listened to that thing and treated it like the Bible. And that really helped me structure my business. Took some classes from Chuck as well. And once I had all of that, it was like, boom, I am able to do eight events with four, five, six entertainers on a Saturday. Hmm. That sounds pretty hard. We I did a food truck. I'm surprised we didn't run into each other more in the food truck circles. You probably were there going to a lot of the events. Yeah. I do a private party that had requested me for two hours and just go face paint. My husband was upset and wanted me to spend a lot more time with him than I had been. Right. So I kind of took the back. He's he loves spending quality time with me. Is that his love language? Acts of service and quality time. He'll say it's touch, but it's not. Yeah. Yeah. I like it. So circa me were 2013, 14 year building your business. Are you married already? No. No, I met my husband out here. He was smart and locked me in within the first year. Right. He's like, boom, got a lot to this lady up. So when was that? Like you you met him shortly after you moved here and it was just like I've run into. I'd actually run into him right before you right before I moved here. And he just branded me on Facebook. Okay. He did not inspire me to move. He wasn't part of the reason why I moved. As soon as he found out I moved here, he's like, will you come over for barbecue? Barbecue. And why did he follow you on Facebook when you were in San Diego? Because I was interesting. He thought I was interesting. I was traveling. I was going to read your Facebook star before he just he wanted to stay in touch with me. But how did you know about you? We ran into each other through a group of mutual friends. Down the town of Loveland. Okay. And you were coming out to see your parents or something like that before. Yep. And he's like, hey, that girl. It was it was kind of like that. Yeah. Well, it is. If it's a lot of times, you know, it's just kind of like the vibe is there right from the start. And you figure out what to do with that vibe because usually both people have never really had that vibe before, right? It was it was pretty easy and effortless with us. Yeah. We we've been attached to each other's hips from the get go. Love it. We were spending almost every day with each other. And he was like, oh my gosh, I don't know what to do. Like this girl's around me all the time. I'm like, well, either you want me to be around you or you don't. You can actually like make up your mind. Right. And he's like probably like myself before I started dating my wife like mostly single most of the time before that. He he actually was single. Sell a bit and looking for a wife. You're like, I'm your lady. Yeah. I was a party girl back in Cali, but if you're cool, I'm cool. Sorry, I'm teasing. That's fun. Okay, we don't I joke all the time. He used to party like I used to Oh, okay. So he was celibate, but not a yeah, he had joined. He had joined the LDS church. And they had told him basically like, you know, to practice celibacy and you know, look for your wife, not just someone to temporarily be with. And he had told me right from the get go. I'm looking for a wife, not for a girlfriend. I was like, maybe I'm not the one for you. But you sure are cute. Right. Yeah. So we we were stuck at the hip. I love it. How long before you were convinced? I knew fairly quickly. Yeah. So I knew I knew that he I I was able to talk with him. I was able to hike with him. Do activities with him. Speak with him on a spiritual level, intellectual level. He was doing functional art later did handyman work and then became a general contractor. I speak that language as well, which is wonderful. And I just I just I just knew like I years ago I went through a meditation process and I had visions psychic visions, whatever you want to call mushrooms with it too. No, I was meditation only meditation, a little bit of fasting. Okay. And I knew things about my husband before I met him. And when I met him, all of these little pieces snapped into place. Here he is. Uh huh. Yeah. I was like, I need to pay attention. This guy, I've meditated and seen visions of this before. And then once I got to know him even better, I was like, oh my gosh, like he could really be what it was that I sensed coming four years ago. Interesting. Well, we'll get more into the family stuff, but it's neat that he was supportive of of of your ventures, but then ultimately said you can't work 104 hours a week anymore, RJ. Yeah. And that's why I you didn't see me at a lot of parties towards towards the last couple of years. And I just chilled the most part. Yeah. So talk about that that business journey a little bit of of RJ's amazing events. You're you're building your digital footprint. You're getting more and more events. You're able to do eight events with five different subcontractor groups in a day. And things like that. And is it kind of stay stable from there? Did you kind of come to own that space or did you just keep growing and growing along the years? I feel what what eventually happened is I got to know all of the event planners in this area and the the people who wanted to really bring the community in wanted Loveland to thrive. And that's when the city city of Fort Collins or visit Loveland started approaching me saying, Hey, we want to do this event. We'll pay you guys to show up and do whatever it is that you do help us promote this event. And once once that had happened I was like, Wow, this is really cool. Like I have made an impact in the community through worth at work ethic, accountability, just having a quality product to the best of our ability every time. And now like the city wants us to help with the sweetheart festival with winter wonder lights with visit Loveland. They even gave us an ice sculpture for the sweetheart festival that was last year. Right, you know, right, COVID was happening. And I took that ice, I was like, Hey, can I take this home? They're like, Yeah, it's yours, RJ. And I said, RJ is amazing entertainment. And my husband and our buddy Mike put it in the back of my husband's truck and we dropped it off at mom's house and put it right on top of her mailbox. So my mom could see this cool ice sculpture that the city had given to us for participating and helping sponsor and donating part of part of our activities to, you know, just to the event. So it that's that's what's been happening. Yeah. But it started out with sucking, being really horrible. Oh, man. So talk about that. Like what do you mean? Like early days of the business was just to disorganize and stuff like that. I didn't have anything in place. Kurt, I didn't have, I didn't have the operation system. I didn't have someone to answer phones. I didn't have a way to send the parties out with all of the entertainers. Brian, how he's awesome. Him is wife, Christie. Brian came in as a consultant and set up my DJ dashboard and got all of that flowing for me. So that was Christie. How in Windsor? No, I think they're in love, Lynn. Christie and Brian, I think I used to work with her and did you work at Bank of Colorado? I don't know. If this is your Christie, you're awesome. RJ thinks she's doing like, she's doing knitting stuff right now. And then her husband, Brian is a DJ. I don't think he's he's DJing occasionally now. But he's he got another job somewhere else. So doing something else. It doesn't matter. So you don't have any of these systems in place. But nobody does. You know, you can't really you build things to fix things that screw up, right? Because people don't have these things in place, which is why you can't break being 50 or $60,000. We'll just say a five figure children's entertainment business to go from that point up to six figures with with a thing that's basically one day a week. You have to have all of these things in place. And that's where the the everything from the collecting the reviews to having a big digital footprint. All of that stuff comes into play kind of the difference between creating a job that doesn't pay that great and creating a business that can actually create profit even when you're in Hawaii. Yeah. Yeah. Well, good. And it was like I saw you make a lot of progress. Even in the last couple of years, especially that's probably why in the middle of COVID nation, you could sell a business for six figures that was probably had its worst year ever. I assume. Yeah, our I just pretty much gave it to one of my competitors who is a national business. They've been wanting to tap in a Northern Colorado and get the market space and share out there. Oh, really? Yeah. And when I when I had a discussion with them, they're like, yeah, we're interested. And I was like, okay, so I showed them the numbers, had the discussion, they gave me a full price offer. Not a bang, but a boom. Yeah. So tell me about that. Like what had you been thinking about like focusing more on just the specific specifically the digital marketing? Yeah. Yeah. I knew in 2018. I knew in 2018 that I was going to have an exit strategy already had it in place, but I knew in 2018 that I needed to do something else because I knew I'd always have to work in RJ. Like it always have to work and be there because it's a local business. Yeah. And I will still go out and entertain. I'll still go out to face paint and the business that merged with mine and then purchased us ended up they would they will be sending me out still because I still want to do that. Oh, okay. I just don't I don't want to be stuck to a location only business because I love to travel and scuba dive. I want to spend time with my niece who's only two years old in Austin, Texas. I don't want to have to be here. I want to be here by choice. And was that fit? We didn't even share your husband's name. Joe. Joe. Yes, he did say that. So that fits Joe's lifestyle and desires and ability as well. Yeah. He's got a general contracting business, local map construction. They're out here eventually that will be positioned to do whatever he wants with. Our e-commerce business is what's really going to end up taking off between that and the digital marketing business with SEO strategy. So you guys want to have the foot loosen fancy free kind of lifestyle where you can work from wherever and yeah. And if you're in Hawaii and you've got to work two days a week but you can vacation three days or five days a week. That's cool too. Yeah, I take it. I take it. So so take me through that through that transition like where you freaked out like that somebody came along that quickly and stuff and wanted to know you were like ready and now I waited until I was ready. Yeah. I waited until I was ready, waited until I knew and waited until I had not only our e-commerce business up and running yet are my SEO digital marketing business as well. Sure. I had income coming in from both of those. I could see that in a very short period of time. I'd be able to break six figures with definitely with my with tipping point digital. And I was just like this this doesn't make sense to hold on to our jays will be the lowest income producing item. Yeah. So it's time to let go of my baby. Yeah. Yeah. I mean unfortunately there's only so much that people can and are willing to pay for those kind of circuit you know events and stuff like that and it's always labor. It's tied to your physical efforts right somebody's not just yours but somebody's out there twisting balloons or their whatever whereas if digital marketing you can figure out a really great strategy that works for this if you can duplicate without it with other customers it doesn't have the same turning wrenches for money kind of an impact. Even with Zugo. So my baby boy. Zugo. We have Zugo Pat Zugo Bike. That's my sister and her husband's businesses. Okay. Zugo is the mascot. My sister figured out how to do a pet product right on my sister and I created the most viral pet video on the internet to date though we're a billion views. Zugo was on in the reporter Harold the Coloradan and Texas his he really is he was on Shark Tank. I'm sorry I yelled at you for barking earlier Zugo. I didn't realize your fame allowed you to bark whenever he was on Shark Tank and miss we got an epic shot of Mr. Wonderful with him in the rock tear pack. So with Zugo my sister figured out how to do a product she just keeps the bags in an Amazon warehouse and they ship them out for her. She does travel to find the manufacturers and get everything done but being a part of that and seeing how that is built as well and then Zugo Bike which is our electric bike business. Oh well. Building that we went from oh gosh we went from six figures the first year with only six months in business to seven figures this last year. Nice. Just with the snap of fingers and putting all of those systems operations VAs manufacturing we had rideshare businesses approach us and want like multi-million dollar contracts for the bikes that we were building. Well why do you think? Because they're awesome and because first off we have a good quality. Secondly we've already tested them we know they're going to last for a very long time. Third I can't say the names because of NDAs. The other guys ride share stuff is crap ride the ride share not share but like the scooters the bikes everything yeah they are they're experts in the technology to get the bikes out there yeah with the systems they wanted someone who had the bikes already in play so they could just buy the bikes and push them out and give us like share in the business and things like that and we didn't do any of those contracts we decided to go out on our own instead and we are crushing it and we're about to push out an awesome so is this so excited is this your sister's company that you're someone involved in I've always been involved in my sister and her husband's businesses and helping them I step in and out as needed wanted desired or when I can see that they have a gap and they need me to fill it okay it's impressive from an SEO strategy especially in different kind of marketing tactics and product development and obviously they need to go if we're going to do pictures with Mr. Wonderful yeah so you've got a lot going on and you mentioned a real estate investments as well is that something that you and and Joe have been involved with for a while just you is that your thing it's ours we we did rich dad poor dad cash flow quadrant he's like oh my gosh you mean what do you mean you'll never pay for a house that you live in I was like we get rentals honey we get rentals and investments we can we find a good house we can flip it I was like that's investing in real estate and our friend Corey Calvin I love Corey he's brilliant he he teaches people how to invest in real estate with very little money down as well brilliant man absolutely brilliant been following and following him and asking him questions for a few years so it's it's just a smaller thing that we do and it's more of a passive item yeah when we can actively look for properties help people out of foreclosures or find a fix and flip house will jump on it oh okay so you haven't acquired your first investment property and we have oh okay okay cool gotcha gotcha but you're kind of at the ready and that's part of the longer term strategy is looking for those opportunities it's not it's not a fast pace thing for us I I will quantify that of the of the wealthiest people that I worked with in the banking realm and things like that a lot of them used real estate as part of that thing and but I will also share that highly leveraged rental real estate bankrupt many of you have a client of mine back in the 2003-04 period back in the 2000 or maybe for whatever and back again in the eight nine period and so be mindful yeah don't get over your skis too far on too many properties I've heard of people over leveraging themselves but I think it's a rate that Uncle Sam appears to be printing money now and probably for the foreseeable future inflation of real estate values is probably like as measured in dollars the real estate is gonna go way up yeah so I wouldn't worry too much just don't pay any high interest rates no we're good on that all right so um let's get into the the journey of of RJ's like life story and and where you came from a little bit we'll talk more about your specific family later but you were born raised in southern california child of like what what did your folks do were they from california do they immigrants themselves from somewhere well my parents have lived lived in california their whole lives pretty much okay I have one sister Joel I have two step sisters which I never lived with because it was much later okay my dad oh my dad sorry he passed like a year ago so it's really hard talk about him still I don't talk about him too often well but he he was awesome he did sales and it was just an all-around good human who was compassionate and kind my mom did corporate at Kaiser and human resources for 30 years okay so yeah yeah San Jose california born and raised and and hadn't really experienced much else did you go to high school also did you go to college down there too I didn't I didn't know to college yeah I have no judgment that makes you smarter and less debt than most people these days I think couldn't couldn't hang curd oh whatever you're smart as anybody I've met I wanted to compliment you earlier by the way you have an intriguing kind of balance of really logical like you were when you were talking about how focused you were on charging the right amount and having a profitable business and all the systems building efforts that you've done and things but you're also highly tuned emotional person as well and those don't always live in the same house and so you've always been a little bit intriguing to me because of that characteristic thank you so you're you're how old were you when you came to loveland like you said you could equip me I'm party girl in 2012 okay okay you're not telling your age okay well I think I know you're younger than I am but I don't know how much if it's five years or 10 years or what I look like I'm 20 or 20 or 20 years under the 28 no you don't look 28 you're too well you moved here after quitting party in 2008 in 2012 so assuming you were at least 16 when you quit party because you've been doing it too hard for too long yeah so that would be yeah that would have been 12 years ago that would make you 28 so that must have been it anyway we don't need to know your age that's a rude to ask a lady I'm sure it'll come out anyway perhaps so so but like did you have like some years after high school and stuff and then what took your family because you said your family came out here to call about a first and that was the draw we my parents ended up selling their property in California my mom and stepdad ended up selling it and decided they looked at the area they prayed about it where they should go and they were drawn to leveling Colorado okay then we had the schools nearby art so it was cultured there it was more conservative which is nice than you know living in California in serious yeah we're gonna hold out a homeless people running around well there didn't used to be that in California either when I went there but well there are a lot of gangsters right in high school right um so you mentioned already well gosh I don't hate to get into the church element but you mentioned your parents face and praying about it and things are are they also LDS churches no my my stepdad actually has traveled the world studying consciousness he has a PhD in physics he was a nuclear worked as a nuclear physicist many many years a physicist sales guy my my biological dad oh I'm sorry was the sales my stepdad is is the one who like super excelled in college and he's more cerebral cerebral intellectual and highly spiritual my my dad Mike he he was sales he he didn't know how to apologize other than saying sorry he didn't have the coping skills or the way to to formulate his experience that he was having and a negative was like it was good or bad and he's always okay he he was seriously abused by his grandfather who was very violent growing up and so it's a miracle that my dad was just mildly abusive to my sister and myself growing up and an alcoholic but despite that my dad he had after I quit drinking and everything he quit too but yeah it was just it was really they're so very different my dad Michael was so nice and giving to everyone and he wanted to be a better person but he didn't understand how to work on himself right almost strictly outwardly focused yeah stepdad always worked on himself yeah gem he his own continuous improvement project yeah and he he helped me wake up like I was sleep I didn't think anyone was paying attention or watching what I was doing didn't know that I was like a drug addict an alcoholic and selling drugs back then when I was younger I didn't think anybody cared right and when I had a conversation with gem we talked about Einstein's theory of relativity and all of these things he's like you're a very intelligent young woman and I was like you really think so he's like absolutely you're talking about Einstein's theory of relativity I mean you you understand all of these concepts and he's like I'd like to teach you a couple of processes okay I'll learn them I I was a meth addict for over a decade at that point meth uppers anything to help keep me really thin oh so I had image problems self-worth problems I was was unable to say why I was unhappy and I felt if I would ever speak about what I really really wanted so sad so sad Kurt if I would never say what I truly wanted even if it was a piece of chocolate candy right and I'd liar embellish about everything was I never felt that I was good enough and I thought if I told someone what I really wanted they would take it away from me or use it as a means of control over me and my dad did do that to me growing up so I learned not to say what I wanted not to ask for what I really wanted in life and not to really go for too much right so gem sat me down one day and I had been spun out and now you're you're you're actually like 28 or 26 or 24 or something like that right at that point I was I was I was 26 years old when gem sat me down and gave me process the the process which is step one which is I leave each moment better than when I arrive shifting my life as a physicist considers it they said you do this every single day and will give you another process and I was like okay I'll do it so I started leaving each moment better than when I arrived a month later he gave me affirmations in these affirmations I sat down and I had to write out who I wanted to be and what I wanted to do all of these things in I am present tense and I believed him I was like you say this will work I believe you I will do this and one of them was I live a drug free life and I'm smoke free I have no desire to drink or use alcohol and drugs yeah and I would say those to myself every morning and every night until I believed myself until I believe were you using during this time yeah heck yeah okay but you kept saying it until you believed until I believed it yeah and eventually that helped me to stop prior to that though I had a spiritual awakening okay it was two months after I started doing the process with the affirmations I I woke up one day and I was sitting in the mirror saying I love you to myself I love you and I could hear that voice saying no I don't love you I trust you no I don't trust you and it was it was just so sad I was I was very sad inside and finally I broke through to myself and I realized that God is all around God is in everything and it's not like that I'm watching you kind of God it's the the energy or the consciousness of the world and it is all here surrounding me and my the only way that I can describe this is that my third eye opened yeah and I cried for like weak least I stopped talking because I realized the words I was using didn't make any sense and I had been lying to myself and everyone around me but yes I still drank and I still use some drugs I got off meth first then quit smoking cigarettes then partied for like a year and a half more and after that I partied meaning mostly focused on alcohol and we hot derivatives right so still parties but it's not there's partying ish but then there's like heroin is like sure to get you I've never done heroin I've never done heroin that was the one scared me because the needles right can I can I go back so it seems to me that you were like maybe mid teens almost when your kind of habituation toward 16 drugs started 16 to 26 yeah so sometimes they they like try to attribute that like if you were going to say this is why like were things too hard you mentioned that your dad wasn't doing things were things too easy and you don't know no I know I it was acceptable right that was kind of the expectation drinking I didn't I didn't realize that people didn't drink like my dad all the time my dad as an alcoholic would drink in the morning put vodka in his orange juice well in the morning he would go to the golf course he's in sales play golf drink there take us to the elks lodge the vf w sit out my sister and I'd sit on the playground and I thought you know everything we did revolved around alcohol everything we did I didn't know that there was a life that could be without drugs and alcohol yeah I didn't know I didn't know my dad wasn't like the coolest person on the planet right that he was an alcoholic yeah I didn't know it's really challenging and so that just became kind of I guess I can do but but meth is different right even back in those days I I was at a party not even a party it was hanging out with some boys from school they had coconut math didn't both like I'll do that again yeah I just did it again and cooked better but it cost way more so I just wanted to be thin oh I just wanted to be thin what a shame like so I was then I'm sure I'm sure you're thin now and I'm sure you're gorgeous and thin when you were 16 for God's sake yeah interesting it was fun yeah that doubt it I said it was a lot I'm sure there was a time when it was fun and then there was a lot of times when there was pain and well I mean I mean it was it was like fun when I look back and I'm like yeah I had a lot of fun good times had a lot of hangovers a lot of regrets a lot of people I still need to make amends to I don't even know how I pissed off some people I just black out and talk snack this this why don't drink right you're like hey let's have some wine I'm like nope yeah no I think that's great I'm honored and I'm thanks for not judging that I have my poor whiskey here while we're having this because I I learned how to do podcasting whilst having a small drink beside me but but I never have been in in that place where you know a morning drink was ever something I I have had a hangover where I was like you know a bloody Mary is the right thing right now but but otherwise I've never really been in that place where I wanted to drink again before five o'clock the next day but that's for you and I differ friend yeah yeah but I but I definitely have to say that when five o'clock comes I generally want something with ice in the bottom of my glass you know and so I acknowledge that there's certain dependencies that probably I should reflect on myself so life reset in some respects right when you moved out here totally and starting hanging out with kids all the time and had that journey of of RJ's amazing entertainment yeah I have all set events and I need a mistake so so talk to me about like the future of RJ Bendy and particularly the ninja selling is that like a lifestyle business for you you mentioned already that you're kind of crafting your enterprises in a way that can allow a lot of travel and flexibility I'll probably only have about 20 clients that I end up working with in total okay just because I'll be able to a lot enough time to each of those clients the strategy the execution there's like a do it yourself package kind of thing which anyone can do and that's just for collecting reviews responding to reviews getting your optimized listings and a social media scheduler like that anyone can do but I'm talking about clients who really really want to own up that digital real estate expanding their footprint yeah so I figure 20 clients is where I'll be good and then you'd have a few more subcontractors or employees by that time or maybe not even you've got about the right number yeah I think I feel like I feel my team's good we'll end up adding maybe one or two people like other team members depending on what it is that we decide to stick with to execute because they're there are a lot of similarities when it comes to articles news release articles the the spider webbing of all of the different like from YouTube to Google the website the embedding of the videos to the articles the pulling of the GMB yeah the native content and different things like that I wrote about yeah there's a lot of similarities with that and that can cross over into to anything pretty much as long as they're a local business effort with Zucopike and they're national business with these e-bikes and it is so different working with a national brand than a local business well you have a bit of a niche too if I remember right right it was a medical or dentist or animal chiropractors yes yes and I happen to know a couple of animal chiropractors which I guess means it's a lot more common than I thought or maybe just in love and I don't know they're they're a lot it's a really good business um how do you know if your dog needs a chiropractic session have you learned enough yet well I have a video where Zucopike has first chiropractic adjustments okay and that talks about things to look for in your animal and it's pretty much the same as if you or I were to go in to get an adjustment I just got one earlier today oh nice Zucopike goes in every month to get an adjustment if a dog is or a horse is having issues whether it's walking a paralyzed dr. Paige Mott she she helped the dog that couldn't even walk with its back legs and adjusted it and it was able to walk out like that yes interesting yes yes she's got some kind of a special sauce going on there for sure yes could be anything really having chewing problems right just just like if it was you look at your dog if it doesn't seem to be feeling good take it in for adjustment nobody spends money on their cats for that kind of cats have to have a veterinarian overseeing them really it's it's I don't know because they got a weird little spine or something like that they just put your cat down if it needs a chiropractic just I'm sorry for cat lovers out there we have two cats that my wife loves and I tolerate um anyway sorry I'd like to say things once in a while to get people to smile so that's an area of some specialty sounds like you've got some um local clients in that realm already is there like if you were thinking about local think tank because I've actually and when I first kind of learned about this area of emphasis I was like that's probably an area where I could really use some help yeah um because a nobody really knows what local think tank is we don't have a ton of credibility I think we've got 13 reviews or 15 we had to push sometime back it's been kind of a while since we've pushed on getting more reviews and stuff um and that's part of it right that's only part of it because we don't even know what people are searching for so we haven't really done our analytics that much we create a lot of content but is it the right stuff are you putting it in the right place right yeah so yeah so think about that I want free advice for local think tank and I'm gonna go self implement all this but like how would you approach that if I'm ring ring ring ring hey I want to talk about engaging ninja strategies uh I'm sorry tipping tipping point uh to help local think tank grow where's that go well data gather first I imagine the first thing we do is a snapshot audit and I pull all of the information that I can digitally and I put that into what's known as a power hour the power hour is when I look at the six areas of your business and I look at how you stack up versus your competitors if you have competitors that it is that you want me to look for and basically we're looking at your website your reviews your social SEO current ad spend and I'll look at the popular words that are being researched and I'll give you a strategy like a complete SEO strategy and if I found that you're lacking in a few other areas I can recommend someone who can do paper click or even redo the website where there aren't as many errors on it but it's it's like a full blown power hour strategy audit and that's where I have to start with all of my clients because I can't give anyone information without seeing what they've already done and knowing the direction that they're looking to head so you guys have a couple of different locations but I would start with the fork columns area and spread your footprint out as far as I can in fork columns and then move on to the next area that you're looking to do it or if you were looking to start ones they in Denver area start spreading your footprint out in Denver prior to you even having a market there okay and that is the case actually we'd love to have some chapters in Denver by the end of this year so the time is now the time is now and so what's that look like like how do you build a footprint what you're not even at it's it's location keywords so the words Denver it wouldn't be think tank it would be mastermind groups business consulting or those kind of things okay consulting coaching type stuff group sessions because that's what you guys do is you have a team of people sure and we'd figure out which terms are actually being researched right the ones that are most common we will do one-minute videos on actually YouTube is competing with TikTok with those one-minute videos they're like we want people to stay on YouTube and watch YouTube so they're making one minute they have to be less than a minute you guys for anyone who's listening 59 seconds and it's a different type of YouTube video now or it's just a 59 second video that's all it is it could be about anything we're going in this is this is a secret sauce we're going in and I'm adding the question that people are looking for and then heavily inundating it with the SEO keywords and the targeted area or location where we want to do business as well and those are starting to rank in those areas through the 59 second videos wow we also link those to the website on a different page would be like a Denver page specifically with articles about it to increase your organic footprint we'd work on getting a Google like location verified location down there and if not that then we do a secondary location right from your main site which works like we have facilitators like each chapter has this business veteran and we've got a gentleman and little time and one a long month particularly that we're going to try to get launched this year and they've been through our training and they know what we're going to try to set up for them and we've met some prospects but we're building it one piece at a time like can if we find more and more of those if we find one link in Nebraska could we can give them a secondary location of some sort and kind of support it and whatever absolutely and that's how I would have satellite at RJ's my entertainment business I would have done that exact same strategy for the entertainment business sure it's it's just thinking about what people are looking for and wanting and needing as long as that item is adding value yeah and your your program with the local thing think is wonderful Kurt you help business owners entrepreneurs take it to the next level the having someone go up and discuss their business where they're at and get feedback from other people who are in the same like wheelhouse as business owners and the different perspective is just brilliant I really enjoyed attending the local think tank class that I was in in Loveland think right around the time we first met yeah yeah and we actually we actually have chapters now for solopreneurs I don't know if you knew that yeah so we went to talk about that after the show very cool um but we got a place for you because you could add a lot to value to a chapter um so it's all about kind of the local Google local stuff especially right like Google's the boss of the world a little bit at least that that main hub but then the other elements to this the Instagrams the other LinkedIn's the the organic web traffic through newsletters or email campaigns and stuff that's all part of the service offerings that you would you would do that too okay no email marketing the social platforms those are super simple to work with because that's just top of mind brand awareness if somebody needs a specialist for that I have recommendations if someone needs a specialist for either pin creation or ppc type stuff I do not do that I don't want to delve into that world because it's just so different than what I specialize in yeah and it's local service providers local businesses local service providers that are looking to get more foot traffic more clients in our patients in the door and they have a local service because I can work you know you should get uh you should go get the bloom flower shop down here just a couple of locks south I forget her name I walked in there for the first time actually in her new location on the front of the building and when I first met her I was still in that building a couple years ago and it was the terribless darkest windowless office that you'd ever seen for a flower shop but she was determined and she brought in some cool stuff and probably four five six of the plants in this office are from there and now she's got a nice front window environment four times as much square footage it looks amazing and I think she's gonna make it and do pretty good with that uh concept there which is it's really it's really neat to see somebody go from that oh my god I don't know how next month's rent is really gonna be paid because I know how I'm gonna keep all these flowers alive in this cold dark space and anyway I digress but when I think about local things I think about those kind of places flower shops the the dog treats restaurants and yeah it's probably those are probably especially I love working with groomers right yeah is that kind of stuff right because there's specific words that people are gonna use if they're looking to get a haircut for their dog right yeah and depending on where they're located for groomers like every groomer has a favorite type of dog to work with so dogs in loveland they've worked with Zugo since he was a puppy they're responsible for all of his haircuts all of his feathers all of his awesome grooms what kind of a critter is he by the way he's a Yorkie he's a okay he's almost a teacup I rescue him in his hair yeah he's got a little Zugo colored yeah that's beautiful yeah they did they did him up for shark tank and everything too sure he gets an Asian fusion haircut they've taken pictures of all of his haircuts and put it into a book well those guys are amazing with Yorkies right they know how to do a Yorkie cut yeah and they'll do Yorkies all day long they're great with every single type of dog sure but like they need to be branding the fact that they're wonderful with Yorkies so if you're like searching if you're in love when you're searching Yorkie haircut or Yorkie groomer yep they should actually come up on top of that exactly because why not they're so good at exactly so it just depends and I that's what I like to work with groomers and people in the pet industry is really bringing out whatever it is that they they love like whatever kind of animal they would love to do we can do a lot of footage around that yeah and just have them rank for that and is it a more of a slow roll kind of thing because sometimes there's like I our float survey we you know how good is your sales and marketing team our systems at filling the pipeline back up if it gets a little low but the the reviews and SEO stuff is more of a slow roll right you can't just like hit the accelerate button and get more sales I love that you asked me that current people SEO is a six month out plus strategy yeah it is it is not like ppc which is you click and their phone starts ringing right this is something that is the foundation of a digital business this these are the items that will keep bringing in business years to come it does not go away it is stable it's just like the foundation for a house that's how I talk about it we're building upon that layer by layer and and if I remember right oh I guess it's words cost different amounts but that's on the paper click kind of thing right ppc yeah that's google facebook and paid search to right like the the paid search finds those SEO words but it's more of a paid engagement but you got to have the words there to get found anyway I don't I don't like ppc stuff some people really need it and they're good at it I've got a few friends who are wizards at it and I just say hey talk to Brian Heather whatever they'll help you with this I trust them I know their work and I know their results that's not your stuff wait yeah well and I have an attorney friend that that really loves his paper click because if he if him and his team got a little slow he could be like throw an extra ten thousand dollars on the paper click so we can fill the team back up you know when it wasn't a big deal in his industry to go find some of those cases and stuff just with a little cash but but on the same token if they were full they wouldn't need it in the first place they would need it and so it's nice that you can kind of push the gas pedal up and down whereas SEO and and the reviews and the credibility stuff is just all about building for the long term building a foundation strong yeah over over 92% of the people who go online and find information about a business they trust the reviews that they're finding and if your business doesn't have a 4.1 star rating or higher they're going to go to someone we've got a 5.0 maybe heck yeah 13 5 star reviews so that's great if we got one 4 star we'd be knocked down quite a bit but we'll talk more I hope you guys build that up that's so simple to do yeah we should so simple to get reviews from past and current clients when you have a system right yeah no system we've had an effort a few times along the path of of loco but never consistent for sure and I was thinking that like it should be part of our six-month check-in hey if you've liked your loco experience so far it might be cool if you gave us a review give us a review or we're not going to let you back in right you're locked out yeah no I don't think that's kind of our style necessarily but so where where do you want to you said you wanted to take this into kind of a mobile friendly business and kind of what's your do you want to are anything else that people need to know about SEO digital marketing are you ready to go into the the faith family politics segment of this podcast I'm good segueing whenever you want there's there's not really much to it with digital marketing it's it's just SEO it's a well laid out strategic plan executing it sticking to it consistency frequency content and and getting the deep links what kind of contracts do your customers sign up with you is it anywhere from like 500 to a couple thousand dollars a month of stuff that you're gonna do for them baby it's around 2500 per month consistently month to month with the one-time onboarding well it's actually two two sessions that'll give them for the onboarding if they need the second one could be less if they just needed social media like 500 600 bucks a month depending on if they need other platforms it depends it just right like an animal chiropractor I don't know it's 2500 dollars a month seems like quite a bit for a smaller business like that no because they make it dozens of I only work with businesses that are at least two years in bringing in six figures and have a marketing budget and they don't have time to do it themselves okay and they know that they want to be able to push this to the next level I do not work with people who are just starting up I do not work with the people who aren't bringing in at least a hundred thousand dollars I do not work with a lot of independent dog groomer might not be a good fit because they might only be a hundred thousand dollar business with that staff or whatever but if they got three or four staffers or cutting hairs and whatever that's a good fit yes nobody knows they got four people or six people but nobody knows nothing about social media or cares exactly they want to trim the puppies yes and the more full and busy they can stay trimming the puppies the better for everybody a general contractor the same way they don't care and they're doing million dollar houses sometimes one contract is an eighty thousand dollar contract yeah just like you just you just do this reverse spending six spending twenty thousand dollars getting a bunch of good reviews from all of your best clients and stuff like that as well worth it because just one contract makes it worth it yes you got it it's higher tickets at not higher tickets but yeah higher price point plus also a good margin kind of operations like counterpractors if you're smart you're like oh ten minutes boop boop boop hundred bucks two hundred bucks whatever kind of thing I'd probably different with dogs and horses and whatever I suppose horses are probably more expensive than dogs because there's risk of being kicked or there's a strategy to equines as well yeah yeah well I'll have Dr. Mott on here for talking about animal cutter practice more and she does people too yes she does yeah so um yeah let's jump into it which do you prefer as an entree the the faith the family or the politics faith faith so you didn't really fully answer that faith question earlier you're kind of like I got a little bit of this a little bit that God's kind of woven through all the things um he's he's and honestly that's kind of part of how I feel I do claim Christ as my savior but I can see like that God is in everything kind of an element and it's chaos and lot chaos and logos and whatever his power right controlled so talk to me about that for you like if it's my family has a bunch of different beliefs and my mom has been to India multiple times with my stepdad studying under Swami Kalashwar they are spiritual healers and they help people with energy work and in healing and my stepdad it's like raki stuff and not raki raki it's more like I'm from North Dakota so you know okay my husband's from Iowa right we're basically yeah with my husband is is Mormon and he goes he's committed and goes to the the church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints I go with him I was baptized and I just I know I was baptized Mormon and it's nice because my husband and I have that common thread there are a lot of things about the religion aspect that I do not agree with the community aspect of it of that community it's amazing wonderful yeah kid friendly really into providing being of service acts of service totally kind some of the kindest proactive like the 10% of the population who are the doers those are the people that I'm finding in that community I have so much admiration and respect for them yeah I I identify a lot with you want to share the butt because there's so many of the things that you find value and identification also in me yes so it's been difficult and interesting for me to necessarily I don't really label myself I follow my intuition I follow my the psychic aspect of my life where things aren't coincidence they happen with purpose I need to take each moment and identify what's happening in that moment and whether I am here to receive karma from a person or give karma to a person whether I'm supposed to be a listener observer active listener if I'm supposed to help them with a life lesson or maybe even wake them up spiritually by showing them that there is a different path I am the example the leader the the unsung the unsung hero and some things I have I found out a few years later that I just by leaving each moment better than when I arrive yeah from a physics point of view yeah I ran into a few people who who had experienced me when I was at the height of that and they just let me know how I changed their life absolutely changed their life by showing them how to be a different way and that we can change our lives and change our futures and we do not need to be stuck within within this childhood download that we were received and we can go and become so much more than we ever believed or ever wanted or ever desired all we have to do is write it down and do it I for some reason the phrase bend it like Beckham was ringing to you which you might know what that means you know what that means no I don't David Beckham was a soccer player that was like the killer best player forever in some English club paid a good billion dollars to steal him away from some but he would be able to kick these shots where it was like turning and you bend it you know you bend that life that trajectory that you're on and yes guys got a plan for you and and he does have this in that but you can bend it too a little bit and it's partly about maybe those intentions and those affirmations things that you talked about and things like that to try to bend maybe not bend the universe to your will but bend you to the universe as well yeah let that will be done god let that will be done not that own yeah that's that's my it's more of a philosophy on life and wave being that is what I subscribe to do you want to get like real direct with a question go ahead like what do you do with Jesus you know it's like that right well I believe in Jesus I I believe Jesus was here I believed he walked the earth I believe he's wonderful as part three is my wing up as Buddha there with him in heaven actually it's there there are a few spiritual beings who it's okay to go you go come here he's a star so if you believe in Kali of Ganesh there's there's Jesus Christ they're all sorts of goddesses and gods and I'm not saying they like trump god so the creator has them has ambassadors of sorts that he's sent to this in a way yes they're all channels or conduits to be able to tap in to a way of being and it all they're here for all these figureheads are here for is to help people identify with the fact that there is something greater than us out there that is all there therefore that's interesting concept and that's one of the things I think that people are struggling with so much in our society today is thinking that they're the bosses of their world and at least when there was a godhead of some sword there's and then that person was the god of the boss of the world right okay it's a it's a busy beaver award I got that from the rotary club last year um and obviously Zugo is a big fan because running around with the squeaky toy we're just gonna squeak it up if we have squeaks in this episode they'll be part of the fun Lucy's happy yeah yeah like he's cool and if he steals Tucker's squeaky toy um so did we explore that enough oh actually I was gonna share something with you sometimes I share with people that like I also have a fair bit of respect for some of the other major face and minors I suppose that I haven't researched enough but I say it's kind of like everybody's got a dirty lens and for me the Christians and especially the New Testament and old is compared provide the cleanest lens that I can really trust in is that like way off-kilter from you no no my no that's that's that is true in many ways the the issue that I have is when people take the word and try to contort it or bend it to their way or interpret it in a way that's not like the point is to be a good human and to do what's right for ourselves and for others and to live a good life in the pursuit of happiness right leave be a giver be a goal giver that's a great book you know do what's best for the community and for everyone involved not at harm to yourself sure or to your family just be a good person the golden rule and and all that stuff and that's that's what I hear often because I am a self-confessed Christian it goes to church and all that stuff and people like I've been all these terrible Christians I'm like yeah you know yeah that that happens you know there's hypocrites in the church and outside of the church and in themselves and outside of themselves and it just is I've met many many people who have different perspectives and I respect and I enjoy and I enjoy listening to different people's perspectives on religion and their experiences and their testimonies and I say faith instead of religion because I think for me religion is kind of a dirty word too like religion is something you're supposed to do faith is something that you can can have I can feel it like faith is something that's joyous for me to grab onto and and be attracted to religion is something that I shrink from kind of and like avoid if I can yes so I think that's where we resonate to family or politics we're not gonna talk about politics not all you're too scared there's it's not we don't have to it's not a ration day though it's not being scared it's just it's just it's just my desire to not discuss I have to talk about them with my mom my husband right we don't have to hear my my husband plus your business clients could listen to this and some of them will never hire you again if if you know anybody anybody that I work with that thinks that way should just not yeah good because I only work with people that I know like and trust and have a great quality product there's no way I'm going to take someone to the top if they don't have a great product and if they're not a good human like it so I only will work for you if I really want to love to work for you would work for me I would love to work with local well I'm not promising anything at 2500 is a little more than I was hoping but we'll we'll talk um so on that no before we leave the politics thing just lay there on the ground like that um is that like how do I want to say this I don't quite know how there's so much big news right big fat liar what's it called big fat liar big liar there's a book called big fat liar listen to that book I think that is the thing that was on report of this election season like there was claims of fraud and this and that and and Trump's whatever um and all but are we okay with basically Facebook Google Amazon everybody being blatantly side picking in presidential elections in our country is that hard that is not cool they've they've they've messed with the election they've been by as being social the internet the people right 200 people who are in control in the office in Facebook of what we see and what they moderate from us they they have the power they have the power to move the masses and it is just a machine and it is just a computer and it is just an algorithm and I love talking to that computer right I can talk to that computer right right it's just when it comes to politics that is just such a whole whole different level Kurt and well and that's the difference like when politics is like I shared this with my rotary club a little while back that politics you know where that word comes from I've I've never thought about that before it's uh it's the Greek basically it's city something something in in whatever and the Greek city states like Troy and Athens and stuff like that used to all kick each other's assets right and eventually they figured out like hey if we just talk to each other instead of burning each other cities down we could be a unified country and be Greece instead of being like a bunch of half brunt cities and having wars and so politics is basically the act of not killing each other over our disagreements but talking it through instead that is something new yeah I didn't know that and that's kind of part of the principle of why I like to bring this up it's like we don't I don't have to say if I voted for Kanye West I'm just gonna say a 451 other 450 other people in Liberia County did I love you all um but it was a protest vote of sorts because I just don't like the disgusting yuckiness in the national stage especially um but I've always been interested in local politics and always appreciate um people's willingness to just say how they think it could be better world do you know Brock he ran Brock my girlfriend does his uh social and whatnot she's phenomenal my girlfriend Erica and he ran like independent and he got put on the ballot for president yeah how many votes do you get I have no idea I didn't vote for him I know you didn't kind he didn't pop up on a thing right he he had to get written in on a bunch of different state ballots but he ran and I think he's gonna run again in 2024 as well I might I probably won't but the bar isn't that high so you'd be a great president you're for the people you're trustworthy you're you're always you know curious about people I'm doing what's best for the community as a whole like you're already milestones ahead of everybody else who's been I'm not sure I'm smart enough to try to figure out what is best for the community as a whole and stuff like that people would just tell you what to do anyway and then you have to decide right which is the lesser of all those evils this is kind of on the fringe of politics uh on the like the mass conversation you know we're we're pro we're technically we're we're sitting only six feet away from each other not wearing masks having this podcast right now you know like it's kind of a rule uh-huh but like and I struggle with that you know because I but if I was the insider like and I do I think that probably masks reduce the transmission probably probably of this stuff and whatever but still can I require people to strap it on whatever like if I was a insider I I'm not sure what what I would decide I'm glad I'm not the insider as the decided upon I bristle angrily every time I have to put my stupid mask on to do some business with people or feel guilty about being in a room I had to borrow a mask to get over here I bought my mom's mask so you're not a super masker I have a really pretty princess mask really yes got the Disney princesses on it and it makes kids an adult smile so you feel better about wearing that one mm-hmm just because people have to smile at me when they see it right I've got one with a clear window over there so they can see my face my smile up until the point that it fogs over which is like 14 seconds after I put it on so there you just got into some politics discussion there inadvertently yeah that's fine that that's totally fine we didn't dive deep so I'm good on that okay uh let's talk more about your family um your husband is Joe you guys children no no kiddos no children of our own hence for us the uh travel lifestyle kind of dream yeah my wife and I are the same by the way we should hang out sometime we have we need more childless friends come to grease with us in August maybe uh maybe somebody owes me airplane tickets for a good deed done actually and so maybe I can pull it off oh I'll I'll email you the info stories we're done with this we've already booked our travel plans and everything okay it's gonna be we should probably hang out together like oh so yeah it'll it'll be like my mom and her best friend I'm not gonna tag a lot with your mom okay keep going my sister and her husband or Dave what was this name Duke your mentor dude dude no no no him and Susie Susie don't really travel like that too much anyway we're gonna have we're gonna have a few couples so who are these people because this is the family section of this segment here and these are most important people oh yeah and Matthew Fugay really yeah oh he came in his mom they traveled with us too I didn't know you were close with him um his girlfriend if they're still together I hope they are because I know oh oh so he hasn't been around anyway his his girlfriend's dad live right down the block from me uh Fugay it's single oh back on the marketplace Matthew yeah I'm sorry I know you were in love um but uh RJ gave me the anyway uh I love you Matthew and uh when you're listening to this here like that crazy guy um what I'm glad to do I have a I've had appreciation for him as well yeah I love Fugay he's so much fun to take on vacations with us he's he's like a brother to me and and my my mom calls him her second son my sister is an instigator Fugay Julia Jules Jules she's an instigator he's an instigator watching the two of them so much fun you've traveled together before uh huh we have we have we were in uh Mexico this last year and we're back so um we were talking about vacation plans fun travel families things like that talk to me about you said you said you took a trip recently with us some of this crowd yeah uh Fugay and his mom my family we all went to Mexico when scuba diving to did excursions won a cruise boat and it was we came back and then the next cruise boat that left it wasn't on Norwegian but what whichever one left that next week was one that got stuck out to see or whatever right yeah we just missed the code the COVID crisis oh my gosh we felt so blessed that the sweetheart festival was the second week of February and not the first right that was great Fugay was so much fun my okay check this out there's how much fun we are to travel with so Fugay likes to go on the cruise and he was hanging out in the gambling tournaments playing blackjack sure right and he was doing good he was winning and my sister my sister she's got her baby in me and we're walking through and she goes Fugay Fugay where are you your mom says stop spending all her money in this whole casino I like hundreds of people probably like returning to look at this I'm over here I'm winning right you're spending your mom's life savings Fugay knock it off does his mom live up here or she in Texas uh no she's somewhere in Alabama they moved from Houston over to Alabama okay they have a really nice property out there I love mom a Fugate we're we're just fun we're just like a fun group to hang out with we don't take each other too seriously some of us want to hang out and look at art or architecture their activities I like to be underwater most of the time when I travel diving with my husband like scuba diving scuba diving okay so that's not snorkeling that's the tanks and all this stuff yeah we're diverse what's the craziest experience you've had in that capacity have you seen any like sharks up close or baby sharks we're visiting a mama shark like a she was seven feet long she's probably one of the biggest white tip Hawaiian white tip reef sharks that have been seen I hope I said what it is right and she was in this like big pukachelle thing she seven feet and then one day she wasn't there it was the scariest feeling when I saw her swimming toward me I thought I was gonna puke right there I thought I was gonna throw up with the regulator everything because there's nothing more intimidating than seeing a shark but she dove down into the pukachelle thing and the next is she was gone but there were three baby sharks just right across a little way she just you know gave birth to her babies and then let them be huh yeah that's how sharks are right a shark is a shark normally yeah like they still bite yeah if they had nipples they bite them and that's not the way you are a shark they start eating yeah well they're not mammals right although they are somewhat warm blooded right like great whites or have some kind of a blood warming system going on I don't know they're like a weird thing they're not like quite fully a fish I will not I could be foolish it I wouldn't I wouldn't call me out on that yeah so um talk to me more about the family your your sister's obviously very important in your life she's your only sibling is that right she's she's only blood sibling I have a step sister named Anne whose absolutely incredible she is super smart we have another step sister Susan she's never really around much she doesn't really want to belong to our family unit and that's okay she's smart too but not as nice as Anne obviously she's not that smart she doesn't want to hang out with us so yeah but Anne is she's she's similar in the sense that she did facility engineering at the Monterey Bay Aquarium she's wicked smart she can build ever any and everything she puts her mind to she's doing a run-out on her property in Williams Arizona which is turning out so so awesome like Anne is just I can talk to her about anything yeah and I rely on her and I count on her she's she's she's um she's an amazing addition yeah to our family as I you know vice versa yeah yeah I love that my sister jules is my best friend we do everything together love each other unconditionally we co-parent my niece sage so I have to stop myself from saying I'm sage's mom a lot of times wow so you go down there or sage comes up here sometimes it's time interesting every a couple of months either I'm down there or they're up here we face time sage calls me re re so re re and I just buy her beautiful dresses I got our unicorns for her birthday last weekend yeah yeah my wife's uh brother and his family all live in Windsor and there's four nephews and so Jill has that opportunity to really be pretty engaged in their lives and fact she's staying over there in a couple nights they her her brother is they're taking their oldest son to see colleges he's gonna go see another college tour and so was there any reason why you two didn't decide to have kids um we had a miscarriage and we just didn't get pregnant again and then I was like entrepreneuring and trying to like have a solvent lifestyle and stuff like that and we just decided you know um and and in a way there so there was a there there's family medical challenge in Greg's family and there was a chance that Noelle was gonna have a cancer concern a good taker and so there was a time when we wondered if we would like have to really be able to put the shoulder to supporting their family it was kind of about that same time and that isn't a reason not to have our own kids but it was a reason maybe not to get too worried about it yeah because we might have plenty but uh yeah sometimes I think about and sometimes Jill does but more me I think sometimes in that you know could should we grab a a seven and a nine year old set of foster kids and and make them are so that we have somebody to take care of us when we're old you know when we get done with our travel lifestyle right I don't want to start from scratch because I'm too old and somewhere you know I guess Jill feels like I don't want kids I just want to dive traveling dive I'm like okay you're like saying you want it kids right off the gate but yeah you know we're at peace with it we are too yeah it was the reason for you guys I just never happened it wasn't from lack of trying everything's good on both sides just no babies ever were created for some reason and I'm like that's okay yeah a hundred percent and I think that's you know it's thankfully it's not the old days where if you didn't have kids it was evidence that God was frowning on you right and nothing that you touched would ever be successful Baron woman yeah you just nothing worse than a Baron woman right you can still get a divorce nowadays if you have a spouse that didn't uh reveal that they were sterile or something I think that still grounds really really interesting yeah or a nulment there was a a king and a queen in I I was just listening to a history podcast of some sort but she had 18 children including like seven that died before they were two years old of which to her boys everybody else was a girl just about before she produced a male heir for her king wow it's a lot of babies she was pregnant for half her life she was kicking it out yeah maybe two thirds yeah yeah she probably died before she was 50 because she panged out 18 kids and saw most of them die before her you know what a sad thing anyway our families are the opposite of that so talk to me about Joe a little bit like you guys obviously it seems like you have a really strong love for one another that only gets stronger it's kind of one of those things what is it like six years now or something like that we've been married seven years together eight okay yeah and uh what would you tell me about him like what is it about him that made you just like you mentioned something about him and kind of accepting you or this that but but about him and his character not about how his relationship with you was he's nurturing caring kind he's listening he's a giver he gives through acts of service he holds a high we hold a high level of respect for our relationship and we spend time to communicate when we have missed communications which most people don't understand that because we were brought up so differently right when I here's an example when I go to the refrigerator to get myself a glass of water okay if I don't he would expect me to go get him a glass of milk the same time I went to get a glass of water and to ask if he wanted anything right yeah well in my family you just get what you want and if somebody wants something while you're up they ask for it right in his family they ask like oh would you like uh you know would you like anything well I'm up yeah so I wasn't used to that and so my actions seemed selfish right to him and when we figured out that it was just the way that we were raised and how we could communicate effectively with each other it's like oh she wasn't being selfish she just didn't she wasn't I was uneducated right and now I'm educated yeah yeah there's well we're all like as much as we would hope that that unity from our marriage ceremony would be full and complete like right off the bat or whatever we still got all these these gray cells between our heads that are like not really always connected and so there's times when we don't communicate well Joe Joe told me early on that he would never put himself in a position that would jeopardize the sanctity of our marriage and he his his brother was getting married this is just one small example of his character yeah he went to to Iowa or South Dakota wherever they're at and the guys went into the strip club and he waited with another guy in the car well the other guys were in the strip club and he's like I don't need to be in there nothing good is gonna happen in there yeah I am engaged to be married I have no desire to you know look at other women in that way yeah like my wife is gorgeous whatever I'm not gonna jeopardize that and he when he talks with other women or even meant any anyone he always ensures that he's honoring our relationship and I know no matter where he goes or what he does he will I can trust him yeah and that's that's something that's very important I don't need to think about oh he's he's not home yet it's three o'clock in the morning he he goes to bed way before three but right but I don't need to think about that and even he was out camping for the weekend with a group of people I know that he's with men that he respects and who respect him not in the strip club exactly they're out fly fishing or camping or hiking 16 miles which I have no desire to do your mountain biking and well that's probably an interesting thing that we have in common in some ways is that because Jill has that same well but first she's got that same conviction but also she has to trust that you know here here I am in my office alone with a with a beautiful woman and she's gonna trust that I don't have any ill intentions about that and I know everybody and she's kind of an introvert and trust that despite these times that I am in these circumstances that I've got the best interests at heart of our relationship yeah joe had to learn that too with me right because everybody loves you right and you're a hugger I'm a big hugger I love to right right and I have lunch lunch with men women meetings we talk about business family I don't I don't really emotionally attach like I will with my friendships with men we usually talk business strategy we can we can talk about yeah when it comes to my husbands and my relationship or like sex life or anything right right that's in the topic no that that is something that's like that is between that is my husbands and my relationship yeah and I have so much admiration for him and just his desire to learn to grow to provide to be the absolute best version of himself for me and my family when we he came over from my birthday dinner just got in a town he met my mom and stepped out and my mom said Jim almost fell in the garage the the step that goes in is just a little bit too small instead of being a full step from the the kitchen area down into the garage yeah he's just a little stuff smaller step and she's like he almost fell you know like we we got to get that picture figure out what to do about that within 48 hours okay I'm I'm barely not even never even kissed the man right known him for a couple of days right he was talking on Facebook for a while before that he was he was so it's just fine many people do right uh they he came over and built an oversized step from my dad who's six foot four right and and I was just like wow and then your dad just about fell over because your new boyfriend was so freaking awesome yeah they love him very much they have a lot of respect for him they he were equals we all stand confidently and talk with to each other with love and admiration and respect and add value to each other's lives to the best of our ability I love that even when we're upset with each other right right and there might be just little gaps for you're not doing it full force but you'll always have that intention to be your your relationship yeah um we we share a commonality also in that uh you you mentioned your father that died about a year ago and I remember when you were traveling um and I don't I think I shared with you that that Jill's mom my wife's mother just passed a few months ago and yeah and she was you know certainly in my top three of most important women in my life and and uh in Jill's best friend and all that and I remember I don't know what we were how we were connected at that time but out we like we're in the same room not too long after you learned of this situation somehow was a chamber thing I can't remember even how or I called you out of the random we had a talk you called me and you checked in to see I was doing you wanted to know about like VA's or something some conversation yeah I was like oh it's so good to talk to you and somehow my dad came up I'd probably just got back from Cambodia and all that drama do you want to share that story it's a local experience or you don't really want to uh loco if I loco you mean crazy crazy yeah like holy cow I thought I already want to let Zugo have his leave of this place is at time uh when I was in Cambodia my sister and I went to Cambodia to get my dad's ashes all right they said that I owed additional money at the hotel where he had died owed additional money I had already paid the bill all right and when the embassy said it's probably no good idea to come to Cambodia I didn't know they meant like don't come to Cambodia because these guys are going to detain you try to extort money from you they chased us down the street what they chased us like you're running with your dad's ashes I ran ran my sister and I ran we jumped from tuk-tuk to tuk-tuk which are the taxis the chain broke oh my gosh it was the craziest it was like a movie I don't know anything about this so so you go to Cambodia your dad passed on I know hotel in Cambodia he's on vacation or whatever and and somebody's got to go figure this out and that's you yeah we got him we got him cremated out there we're like let's just go and have this experience and like say goodbye and spread his ashes and the Philippines after we get him in Cambodia and pick up a stuff so we went to the hotel over in Siam Reep and checked out all of the beautiful temples and sanctuaries that they had and it was incredible and then then it wasn't when it came time to leave and we're screaming in the streets we were trying to get away they were they were they would not let us go they would not let the driver take us anywhere we we went to the cafe from the cafe they cut us off they told the driver not to leave and then the hotel staff showed up and said you guys owe $700 and I was like what I already paid for as ambulance bill I paid for I paid for everything that was on there already and then they put extra fees on there saying that my dad he had an all-inclusive paid trip so they they put all of these bogus charges right they were trying to hold you up exactly and they they were thinking we're just gonna give them the money I guess but my sister went into beast mode and she's got a good two inches on this guy if you guys were like nope I'm we're out of here and you're jumping we jumped into another tuk tuk and they chased us down and stopped us then okay then we're in the streets screaming there's like some military guy and we're just like call the embassy call the embassy and finally like I was like just walk jules just walk through the papers everywhere she had gotten in this guy's face and we were yelling at the GM on the phone trying to get the police involved and all this stuff and they they just would not let us go so we jumped in an open air tuk tuk and then he said he wouldn't take us anywhere so we walked a little bit further and then we jumped into another tuk tuk we got around the corner and then I like covered my sister up with my sarang to cover her blonde hair and we just hunkered down and there was the security security mo pad that crews passed us and then there was another police officer that crews passes because now we're like head into the siam reed airport right and I was like oh my gosh we we've got to keep going just like look back look back to see if they're there look back and I was like I'm not looking back that's how everybody gets caught you look ahead you look back and I'm going to kick your butt just look ahead jules and I'm like shaking I'm about to bomb it because of the adrenaline rush and two more cops drove past us on their little mo pads and then they turn right and they didn't see us and I was like oh thank god thank god and then as soon as we get to the sign that says siam reed airport our tuk tuk the driver's chain breaks on the tuk tuk and it joltz to a stop right and I can see the sign for siam reed airport we hop out and I'm just go just go and he's like more money more money that's only two dollars for the trip I threw like six it was so rude of me I was so scared I threw six dollars at him ran into the airport with my sister sat there I called up my husband and I started crying I was like honey honey honey and I told him what happened and then jules was like Texner husband yam badass you should see what went down she's like cool as a cucumber to top it off we land in fom fenn and our taxi cab driver the little icon on his whatsapp this is this is in Cambodia still in fom fenn we land in fom fenn and the guy who he had met a couple of days prior picked us up and the icon on his whatsapp turned from him with his family to him with an assault rifle oh and we are stuffing into his petty cab his his his car and I was like holy crap we're about to get kidnapped he was on the same team this guy was freaking a he was a liar he was this guy he was he was manipulative he was driving us around he complained the whole time so he tried to he was he was trying to get more money from us he didn't want to take us to the airport he actually drove so this isn't going to be this podcast isn't going to go to the Cambodia visitor's bureau god and be used probably what can they do nothing no that's what this is not advertising go to Cambodia it's going to be great don't don't so go to Philippines instead or he actually dropped us off at we wanted to get massages before we oh my gosh before we got on the plane he dropped us off finally at this place and it was like a happy ending massage parlor apparently they didn't want to give us massages because we were girls that was the most awkward massage my sister and I have ever been in closed room we don't actually know how to get massages here no they didn't the girls like this too hard and I was like what are you talking to my shoulders just rub my shoulders rub my feet I need a foot rub I've been running you know horrible I don't want it and just on that it's okay I ended up we ended up we went to the Philippines I could buy to my dad we ended up going to Tokyo and there was a super typhoon is about to hit and that was another stressful thing because we couldn't get off and we had six thousand dollars and standby tickets and from there I ended up going to Rome and party like a sober rock star in Rome for four or five days how did sober people party you just go see everything oh you go see everything all of the tours you walk until your feet are bruised and I did it all in Rome and it was epic and I love wrong you get picked pocketed no I don't have any money on me anyway are you kidding oh I had it was the clothes I was wearing at that point no better pick pockets than in Rome in my experience um let's wrap it up um what would you say to people that are that are maybe have a skill set have a fresh start to do they're wondering can they turn their talent into a business oh yeah what would you say oh yeah so if you if you have a hobby or a passion you can absolutely turn into business the first thing you got to do is your research research and see and find someone who is successful in what it is that you're currently doing and after you find someone who can mentor you guide you tell you the mistakes that they have made go for it but just just I mean if you're going to do something that hasn't been done before that's a whole different uh skill set but I I have made sure that the things that I wanted to do I knew why I was doing it what's my why what is my purpose what life where am I going to end up and that is why I'm going to do all of these things and how is it going to get done and then what is it is actually at least important but it's what everybody thinks of first normally yeah yeah well thank you RJ yeah it's been a pleasure to get mmm not a fragment though I love hanging out with you Kurt it's it's always a pleasure spending time with you whether it's on the phone in person whatever you're just an all-around good human and I have a lot of respect and admiration for what you're doing in our community well thank you I'll uh do you want to say it closes off here because I got a frog um thanks for listening to the local experience thanks for listening to the local experience all right here we go thank you for listening to today's episode of the local experience podcast this is Kurt Bear founder of the local think tank and host of the local experience and I'm here with Rory Sharer local business developer and host of the local shorts episodes we hope you heard some new ideas and business perspectives in this episode our mission and all that we do including this podcast is to share a collaborative business ideas and solutions that uplift the business community subscribe and follow us for you listen to podcasts to get new episodes as they are released curious about logo you can learn more about us at localthinktakes.com where you'll find more information about our chapters business resources and events for business owners and if you're looking for perspective accountability and encouragement along your business journey why not apply for a chapter near you today why not why not we'll catch you next time on in-depth local experience podcast with me Kurt and with me Rory for bite-sized business lessons in the local shorts bye