How To Run Successful JV Partnerships

Transcript of EPISODE 15:

Hello and welcome to the Fiit edition of podcast, the number one podcast for Fiit Professionals looking to build their fitness business. If you’re after more clients, more income and more free time then you’ve come to the right place. Visit podcast.fiitprofessionals.com.au today.

Intro: Hello and welcome to the Fiit Professional Podcast. The number one podcast for fitness professionals looking to build their fitness business. If you are after more clients, more income and more free time, then you have come to the right place. Visit podcast.fiitprofessional.com.au today.

Brett: Hello and welcome to another Episode of the Fiit Professional podcast, the podcast for fitness professionals looking to grow their fitness business. I am your host Brett Campbell back again with another fantastic expert within the fitness industry. His name is Rana. Rana and I, met. We probably crossed paths a couple of years ago on Facebook to start with and then we both seen each other now with what we are doing and then things led to another and we ended up having a coffee date and chatting and now here is Rana right now ready to reveal to us all his top secret strategies on how to change your life. No pressure at all Rana, but…”

Rana: “Yeah, yeah! How about that.”

Brett: I’ll give you a brief run down, a little bit about Rana’s history then he can fill you in. So, Rana has been involved in the fitness industry for over 10 years. So, he is an early bird in that aspect. He set up his own personal training studio back in Brisbane which performs now, it performs over 380 stations a week. Through proper chain of 8 personal trainers and it’s virtually touched lives of thousands of people since becoming a personal trainer.

He is also the founder of PT Mastery which consults personal trainers, small business facilities since years. And he is now the co-owner and co-founder of WFBOS which is the World Fitness Business Owners Summit. You may have heard about that, if you have been out there in the inter-webs. If you haven’t, you definitely want to check that out next year. But basically, WFBOS brings together the world’s best in the fitness industry and connects them to thousands of personal trainers just like yourself there and they teach strategy and education with obviously the main goal of adding to you and improving the global fitness industry as a whole.

So, “Rana, what did I miss out there?” “Tell us a little bit more about yourself buddy”

Rana: I like long walks on the beach and listen to classical music, “No!” I, to be honest, that is pretty much like me in a nutshell. I guess; you know; I started off in the fitness industry as a personal; you know; guy looking, just getting into personal training because I thought; you know. To be honest at the start I thought I am going to make good money doing it and obviously same things; you know; you hear with a lot of people. “I was interested in fitness and I like going to the gym and obviously I like helping people and see them get results.”

So; you know; for me it seemed like a bit of a lifestyle job too, so obviously started the course. Started off as a pretty green personal trainer and; you know; I enjoyed doing my Cert 3 and Cert 4 here. Actually I did it in Sydney and; you know; it was just like after, after I graduated it was kind of a little bit of a black hole. I didn’t know, “Ok, what’s next? What do I do? Get a job? Start yourself?” So long story short; you know; it was just fumbling around and I mean I wish I had resources like these and also I knew of other people who were specialists in helping fitness business owners because; you know; it would have definitely fast tracked my growth, for sure.

So, but; you know; obviously long story short we; you know; start as a… I started working at a studio and one of my philosophies to everybody is like, “If you ever going to work for someone else, just work to learn and once you feel like you have learned what you need to, like in terms of running a business or learning how to handle stuff or; you know; you should rise to the top of that business as if it was your own. And when you feel you have outgrown it or you have learned what you need to, you can either step out on your own or go work for a bigger business and bite off more than you can chew.”
Like I started off like a Fitness First sale consultant when I got out. And; you know; I don’t know any of you guys who have been out there or have the experience with it. As much as like Fitness First goes back; you know; I feel like that was an integral part of me learning how to sell. And I, and as a personal trainer; you know; that’s one thing that I sucked at for a long time. Asking people for money and actually knowing what I was worth because it was hard for me to communicate the value that I could give to people. I didn’t really know what my assets were and standing out of the crowd and all that sort of stuff.

So working for someone else was a good, good thing to build my confidence up. And then shortly after that, I stepped out and I thought, “Well, it’s time for me to do this on my own. I feel like am ready and I just started my own studio here in Brisbane and yeah, the rest is kind of history until I; you know; I again found that I had an opportunity to sell part of my business. Which so I did and that makes me some ongoing income, now monthly and I am able to go and do the things I consult and run these great events like WFBOS.

Which means that I can connect with some of the best fitness business owners in the world that are earning; you know; six or seven figures and actually talk to them about; you know; their journeys’ and kind of, “How are you, you know; “actually making money and,” you know; “cutting through the hype of the industry?” And am sure people are listening now and; you know; there’s so much that goes on about six figure blueprints and stuff like that but hopefully that answers your question. “Brett.”

Brett: “Yeah mate! That’s fantastic. Thanks for sharing that.” I guess a couple of things; you know; we always went over and you want to speak about…I always try and take some valuable points out of it and there is a couple of really key things that I really want to touch on and just for everyone to listen up and hopefully they can get that message that I got from it was, the first thing was your honesty. Like your honesty in regards to…. Whenever I ask most people, most personal trainers, I would say 80% of the time the reply I would get to the question, “Why are you in the fitness industry?” 80% of the time people would say, “To help people.” That’s their first initial response.

Rana: “Yeah, yeah”

Brett: Where; you know; I like to pull out the word ‘bullshit’ sometimes and what can the case be to still want to help people. That’s not the core reason. Cause if you wanted to help, you could go down to the local Salvation Army and stand there and give out food and look after people that way. Now the real reason why a lot of people get into the industry and I guess I could probably relate to it a lot more as well because; you know; this is the main reason why I got into the fitness industry was for the lost gold and the opportunity to earn a lot of money.

That’s what; you know; back in the day I was like working in a donut factory myself earning 20 dollars and hour and I was managing the place on 20 dollars an hour for those 20… you know;

Rana: “Yeah, yeah”

Brett: There is a concept of how you can earn 60, 80; you know; 100 dollars an hour; you know; doing fitness. I was like, “Holy shit. I’ve got to get me a piece of that. You know…

Rana: “Yeah, yeah”

Brett: Your honesty there is amazing and; you know; that’s the question that I always task to everyone listening to this is. Actually ask yourself, write down on a piece of paper. Say, “Why did I get into the fitness industry?” Write your answer down and write out the question again. Keep going until you find the real reason because if you keep putting up that blank wall; you know; that could be something that’s hindering you from actually earning the money that you really want to earn because you are not being open to it. “Right?”

Rana: You know; like it’s a funny thing; you know; like people feel really guilty about asking… to say that am doing it for money. They feel like, “Ooh; you know; that’s a really selfish thing to do.” And; you know; I’ve learned really clearly our business in fitness is not about actually fitness. It’s about service and it’s serving people and it’s like you are a servant to; you know; your client. You need to serve them. But, in order to service you have to be selfish. And I know people go on about it and not agree with the word ‘selfish’. Let me explain.

You know; if I have to feed a bunch of hungry people but am starving, am I going to be able to do the best I can at feeding those people? Will I have the strength to; you know; to continue to help feed them or would I burn out before I can actually feed more people? So with fitness, for example, with our industry if am poor I don’t have the resources to grow my business, to expand my business, to improve my business. Then am capped at how many people I can serve. So I think people need really to look at… and the best thing to do is that… money is just energy that allows you to do more things. So rather than attach it to; you know; greed or feeling guilty about it, it’s just fuel.

You know. Like I look at money as fuel. If I need to drive or go a long distance in my business or I ambitious to get to this new peak, I am going to need more fuel. Like if you are going to drive to; you know; a 100 Km you just need to fuel. You don’t feel guilty when you go to the petrol station and go, “Jeez,” you know; “I have to put more petrol in my car. So I want to drive further.” Like you need to just understand that when you have a vision for what your business is, there is going to be a level of fuel required to get there. And that means that you just got to be selfish in doing it.

That means saying no to some opportunities as we were taking before this podcast. It means sometimes saying no to people who might need your help because if your mission is to; you know; help people lose weight and that’s what you are passionate about. Sometimes you have to say no to other at certain times because the priority of reaching that vision requires certain amount of resources and energy. And that’s what I feel like when we do things; you know; we really have to plan out.

Like if I know we are going to do a worldwide event, I know we are going to need a lot of money and that means in order to get that money we need to be really clear about how we are going to earn money from the event, leading up to the event and after the event. And if we are providing enough value and serving people in a way that has integrity, gets results, it’s honest and people will get enough to; you know; alter or improve their lives then I don’t feel guilty about that at all. I think I have a responsibility to do that and charge for it because it allows me to do it even better next year and the year after.

So that’s how I look at it anyway. Long ended way of saying, “Don’t feel guilty about earning money. “Go and make money.”

Brett: We can do a future podcast and we can just talk about the concept of; you know; is money good or evil. I think there’s some a really, really good things out of that. So let’s go back to, you made a nice sleek way into what we are talking about prior to this podcast. Is; you know; it’s that thing; you know; “What have you been up to lately?” “I have been doing a lot. I’ve got this, I’ve got that, I’ve got this…” And being in the positions that we are in the industry, like it’s, we get faced with opportunities on a daily basis from other people and; you know; sometimes it’s that whole thing of the greed button wants to go off and go, “Yeah, that’s a great idea. I’ll take you up on that.”

So let’s just quickly touch on the topic of how you deal with, I guess you would say, overwhelming and not taking on too much at a time. And then after we cover that, I want to get into marketing because I know you love the art of marketing and I could talk about marketing for weeks and I want to…, I have got some really cool things to share with that. So let’s firstly, first question, “How do you deal with overwhelm and having so much to do?”

Rana: I guess with overwhelm; you know; you can relate to stress. Like I think stress is just something that you focus on, that; you know; you feel you can’t control. So it’s really easy to go back and I still find the best way to do it is, write down on a piece of paper everything, everything that you’ve got to do when it’s on your mind. Just like a bit of a brain dump. I just dump everything on to a piece of paper. That will make you feel a lot less overwhelmed automatically and then you just go through and rate them from one to three; you know. One being the number one priority and two being the second runner up and three being the ones that aren’t as important. And then I just start working on the ones.

And; you know; often overwhelm is just procrastination or some sort of resistance that comes in because; you know; we don’t feel like confident enough or we don’t feel we have enough resources or enough time or enough money. So then you just look at how, “How can I make that happen?” If you come up against that and just start working on those things. So for me, like overwhelm and managing what I have to do on a daily basis. It just comes back to what am I out to create? What’s the number one priority of my business right now? What do I need to do and as long as everything that I do adds and links back to adding value to that purpose or that priority, then I don’t feel; you know; I feel like I need to do it.

So; you know; a good example would be like with WFBOS leading up to our event. Everything had to do with; you know; networking and we are going to get into marketing and joint ventures and; you know; connecting with people. And if I was doing those things like; you know; the five key things that I need to do. If I was doing one of those five things which is; you know; Communicating, Networking, Talking; you know; reaching out. Doing like working on the website, working on the copy. Then I felt like, “Ok. Well, I am productive and I am busy.” But it’s still helping move forward.

Whereas if I just started thinking, “Ok. Well, I just got to read this book and then I have got to just go out and go shopping and just get enough food for the house and make sure I’ve got all that or I might actually go out to see a friend, to talk to him; you know; about something that’s not to do with WFBOS. It might be to do with; you know; his business or I might just go out and watch a movie or; you know; there are points where I am like, “Not now.” you know; People get what I call busyness; you know; like I’m sure we’ve all heard this before right; you know. It has to do with am I busy or am I just going through, you know, busyness.
So, busy is actually getting shit done. Busyness is just feeling like you are busy by doing things and a lot of the biggest ones that I find is like Facebook or researching stuff that is just irrelevant. Like there is a point where research has to stop, learning has to stop and action has to happen. And I think that when you go beyond that point, that’s when; you know; you just really just busyness for the sake of it.

“Do you have enough right now in your head and in your wallet to get shit done?” That’s the big [over talk]. If it’s ‘Yes’, go and do it. Put the books down. When you hit a road block and you go, “Shit; you know; actually I am going to need more money or I need to learn more about it,” then go and research enough to go, “Ok, I now know what to do and implement.” And implementation is busy and I feel like sometimes busyness is everything else.

Brett: It’s funny that you say that too because everything you pretty much talked about there, it’s am going through I guess a bit of a patch of that at the moment and it starts from that I had this feeling of overwhelm. So we are actually creating a product, a online Fiit’s product that we are bring out in December and; you know; the last four or five products it was created. It’s been; you know; if each one just gets easier and easier enough to do it with my eyes closed now. But…

Rana: “Yeah”

Brett: This particular product is, I decided to change tactic with delivering it in a different way and it’s a totally different product to what we have done in the past. Now, this product has taken longer than any other product has for the reason being is I have faced a few roadblocks of overwhelming regards to, and this is where I think overwhelm starts, it’s due lack of education. Because I didn’t know how to actually tackle this particular project that I put it to the back burner or always got something else to cover it up and the funny thing is, is once I actually sat down and the only way I actually sat down was the last three days and this will tie into joking about Facebook.

Actually the last four days, I have been into hibernation and I haven’t been active on Facebook and I have been checking my emails once a day and I have been so productive it’s un-bloody-believable and I have been getting up at, you know, 4:00 am and in the office at 4:30, 5:00 am in the morning. I get four hours done  before anyone else gets in here and this morning I basically whipped up a whole sales page for the product and you know, I get a massive sense of achievement when that happens.

But if I rewind to only five days ago, I was feeling massive overwhelm, you know, and it’s just that thing that just, your education up here. If you don’t have your education on it then you are not going to move forward. And what I had to do was, I sat there and literally watched some videos and played around with some things and then I learnt it, you know.

Rana: “Yeah”

Brett: If you are there and you are sitting there and go, “Oh, I don’t know how to do marketing or I don’t know how to get joint ventures, I hear everyone taking about getting joint ventures but they don’t even know the first way to go and approach someone to get one. What…

Rana: “Yeah”

Brett: you are got to do, is just going to remain standing idle and you are not going to be moving forward.

Rana: “Yeah”

Brett: So on that let’s talk about, I know you talk about Joint Ventures and joint ventures is; you know; it’s one of your major strengths and you definitely made it that to get the events that you run. Let’s go through some of your top tips in regards to creating joint ventures for our listeners out there and how they can use that and how it can help their fitness business.

Rana: Yeah, like ok. For me; you know; a joint venture is identifying a mutual win, win, Right? So that’s what, that’s the first thing right. So, with the joint venture essentially guys; you know; for those of you who are familiar you will know but for those who aren’t, it is basically setting up a relationship where you can offer as much value to that person as they can offer to you. And it’s agreeing on some; you know; I guess some next steps and just doing that for each other. And that’s great to build relationships, trust and rapport as well.
So, from an online stand point it’s a little bit different from an offline stand point. So but I guess the underlying philosophy is the same; you know. So you; to grow your fitness business the easiest way and I just, I have not known a quicker, cheaper, more rewarding marketing technique than joint ventures. And basically that just means building relationships. So you find somebody out there, offline/ online, that has something that will benefit your business. So whether it is; you know; an email list, a product, a service or something that will benefit you, your business or your customers.

And then you look at their business and you think, well how can what you do and your product and your service and your emails can that benefit their customers. Because at the end of the day, we all need to add value to our customers, to make them brave and dashing/smart. So, a great example was I went to a really popular day spa here in Brisbane and they had been around like for 5 or so years. And I know they had a doubt about it. So when I started building relationships with the owner. So you know, you invite him for a coffee and just chat about business and it’s very innocent.

There is no hidden agenda. You just tell him, “I would like to just do some ongoing work and share some of our clients with you and see if we can do something together.” Turns out, she had a list of nearly 6,000people on her email list. And the good thing is they were all local. So I knew that they could make it to her business therefore am only down the road they could make it to my business. And I would set up a, the thing is she had been around a lot longer than me so this is the big thing.

And I said to her like, “What I would like to do is set up something where I can send all my clients who join up to your day spa, so I just give you leads. I will put an advert of yours into every single new client pack and then come use them. I’d have a free 30 dollars, free half an hour session or something.” She was really wrapped because no one had actually even approached her for that before and I didn’t ask her for anything at that point. So, what you do

Brett: “Just, just on that Rana. Rana can you repeat that just so everyone really gets that message right there what you just did because that’s invaluable.”

Rana: Yeah, I didn’t ask her.“You meant I didn’t ask for anything at that point?”

Brett: “Yeah, that’s right.”

Rana: “Yeah, no. I don’t.” In a joint venture everyone is used to being asked for something and if you as a person are just hell bent on adding value the law of reciprocity states that, “if you give enough, you will get back.” And you know what, there was a point where you might just be putting energy into a black hole and you go, “Ok. Well at least I tried and something good will come out of it.” So think about that law of reciprocity just give, give, give but I guess there’s a strategy to it. Not an agenda but a strategy because obviously in order to keep giving you do need to get energy from somewhere else as we said before; you know.

You need to obviously, you need to have fuel yourself to keep going. So I sent her five of these clients and then I caught up with her and said, “Hey.” And she goes like, “I just want to say thank you so much for sending me clients, sending me Julia.” She mentioned them by name at that point. I said, “She loved it. She had a great session,” and then we were just talking and then I said look, “I was wondering if maybe you could do me a favor.” And she was more than happy at that point to help. So, I just said to her, “Can I write up an email to send to your database and say that it comes from you.”

So this is critical with a joint venture. Don’t make it ever make it about you. So I said, “Just make it out to your customers that you have arranged for them a 250 dollar voucher to come up and try this new personal training studio that you really highly recommend.” And I said to her, “Look, I will train you for nine weeks. I’ll make it as part of it too; you know; I want to get you results. You know how good we are and so it really backed what I did. And which she obviously should do. And so, she was wrapped so she sent out this email and for the next like three months I would get a steady flow of traffic.

In fact I think she just was so wrapped she might have sent out the email again. Now I, it didn’t cost me anything but a couple of cups of coffee and I was able to generate, I think it was like 70 new clients over three months. And…

Brett: “Wow”

Rana: especially because my pricing point was a minimum of 100 dollar a week, 100 dollars a week per personal training; you know; you do the math and over three months my business grew. So now it was about scaling that model and going and building relationships with people and the local community. Now online; you know when you look at it, you know I don’t know if anyone out there has fitness business mentors. Obviously Brett you are one of them. This podcast is something you guys should follow.

There are other people too that you might look up to, respect, I think it’s really important that everyone does have good mentors and does learn from people in their niche, in the area of business. And the cool thing about this is I went to do WFBOS, I had to call some people that I’d never, they had never heard of me, I had never spoken to them but obviously heard of them by reputation. These guys were killing it, they were big names, they were kind of, right. Ok. They had that status of being almost famous in the industry and to approach them and to get them to be part of my venture, was just something that I was absolutely like, “Will I be able to get this?” I was so scared because; you know; I was asking them for something.

So for me it was about how can I offer them enough value, that they would be more than happy to do this event, be part of this event. And then it’s about delivering that value and reciprocating that to them; you know; over and over again. So I used the same strategy Brett to be honest; you know. I just, I rang them up and I spoke to them. Not everyone said yes, which is fine, but the second year round it just gets better and better.

So you find that the more success you have and the more people that you approach and the more you bring on, you could start referring to those brands, those people, ‘X X’is part of this event or these local business, whose a big business, is part of the… Coffee Club is on board. And you know…

Brett: “Yeap”

Rana: what you start doing, is you build up reputation. “Oh my God! They are sponsored by the Coffee Club. Alright. Jesus!” you know; like they have got Todd Durkin part of the event or ElliotHulse is part of the event and from that point it just becomes a cascading flow. Like you start talking to people and then you can reference. You say, “Ooh. By the way, such and such is part of the event or by the way we are working with a couple of local businesses,” you know; you name drop. And that person obviously feels then like, “Oh, well if they are a part of it, then I should be part of it too.”

And so it is almost like crack the first one, add value, get a rating from someone in your community or someone on line that; you know; obviously has more of a reputation, more of a profile than you at that point and align with them and add value to them and that in itself will push your business up past your competition quicker and earn you more, sort of more respect and long term it will earn you more income and more leads than anything else that I have ever come across.

Brett: Yeah mate, thanks.  Thanks for sharing all of that. It’s like a, I mean, it’s a heap of great take-always in there and; you know; I think the big one to me is that thing with JVs is probably a couple of key points I took from it. One is; you know; you were willing to give away free trainings for nine weeks to this particular lady. You were offering her 250 dollar vouchers with nothing asked in return initially to end up having 70 new sessions a week at a minimum of 100 bucks. So if you do the maths; you know; that’s like an extra 7,000 dollars into your business per week.

Providing they are all there at the same time. Whether they were or they weren’t that is still a substantial amount of return on investment for building a relationship and if we look at that I think the biggest in, and if someone’s there going “Wow”; you know; “What’s the number one key to building JVs?” What I take away is, and I will get your number. But I think that, you just need to ask. You simply just need to ask.

Rana: “Man, yeah.”

Brett: “You agree?”

Rana: “100%.” Like people are so scared to ask and it is why everyone is scared of sales. Everyone is scared of… I know. But you know the thing about that too, I didn’t even say this, but that lady that joined the day spa she actually said to me that when she sent out that email, alright this will blow you away. I didn’t even think it of this at the time. But, she sent out that email and the fact that she just sent that email out to her list saying, “I arranged a 250 dollar gift for you for being my loyal customer and I know we haven’t touched base; I wrote a really good email out for them; she actually got business from old clients.

They came back. So out of that alone, she actually got people who said, “Oh, I’ve been mean to come back.” And that comes back to her business. They might have not even have come to my business but they came to her business. And I thought that was massive. So she saw value from that perspective as well. So she was really grateful that I had even made her email her database. This is something that she hadn’t done for a while.

Brett: “Yeah”

Rana: Like, it’s crazy.

Brett: That’s a perfect example of reciprocity right there in action; you know.

Rana: “Yeah”

Brett: I guess; you know; if we co-relate… Let’s stick to the JV thing for a moment. If we stick to… Most people think when there is a JV that there needs to be something exchanged in regards to monetary. So I just want to talk to the point that, and definitely in my opinion and I’ll get you view on this. But I believe that there is different types of joint ventures. So there is joint ventures that you would have where; you know; I work for this person. You will get a 50 dollar or a 100 dollar referral fee or you bring someone into my business and I’ll give XYZ for that. Where there is the, I guess if we want to call it the law of reciprocity JV where you actually go out there and just do something for free for someone; you know.

So for an example, I am not paying you to be on this podcast. Yes I am not paying anyone to be on this podcast because I don’t get paid to be on this podcast. So at the end of the day, we are doing this here for free. I do it, one: because I absolutely love it and I have said in past episodes; you know; if the greatest people on podcasts learned to sit here and talk to people because; you know; the amount of wisdom you get and every session I do, I jump up and I am pumped to my ear and “That’s right. I took that out of today. Yeah.” Because I am learning; you know; and so are our guests.

I think if we look at it down the track; you know. So I got an email the other day from someone. Now we are up to Episode 15, I think. So that’s close to 15hours worth of solid content that’s been shared by; you know; over probably a dozen people and these people have made literally millions in this fitness industry; you know. And the information is virtually gold. And; you know; I feel like the particular podcast; you know; and put dollar value on it. 15 hours’ worth of information, I could easily ask 500 dollars, 1000 dollars for it right. But this is where that whole reciprocity comes in.

And one day down the track, whether someone listens to this episode, whether it’s year 2013 or 2014. What can happen is they may find out about you and they may jump on the next WFBOS next year when it’s coming around. They may hear about something that I offer or a product or service that we may offer them; you know. It’s that thing about, “Don’t be afraid to do something for free to possibly capitalize down the end; you know; down the track.” So, I went a bit on a rant there. So, “Did I ask a question or was…?”

Rana: “No, no. I mean you were just” Look, I think the other thing is to; you know; when you look at it guys everything is about creating; you know; a channel for what you’re out to create. Like so, some channels you get paid straight away and some channels you get paid down the track and some of it is long term investment.

Like right now, I have no idea but this for me again, like, but this is free. But I have a relationship with Brett and I’m happy to help and he is happy to help me and that, you just build onto that. And then down the track I might say, “Hey Brett, can you help me with, I am doing something; you know; I am doing WFBOS would you mind letting some people know about it?”  He says yeah and then he has a product in December. He says, “Hey Rana, would you mind letting some people know about it?” I say yeah and then you build a relationship.

But where joint ventures go wrong, this is the big, this is the thing that you need to know. Where joint ventures go wrong is that one person does more than the other person. And actually the worst thing you can do at that point is call it a joint venture because what it is, it’s a hidden agenda. And I know a lot of people… you know I have learnt the hard way with WFBOS you put in the effort on marketing materials and putting things together for a particular presenter and you have made an agreement and then one person doesn’t hold up their end of the bargain and then you feel like, it’s kind of like you’re being ripped off.

It’s like saying if I give you a 100 dollars’ worth of value and you give me 100 dollars’ worth of value, we are both happy. But what tends to happen is one person doesn’t give the 100 dollars’ worth of value back and then you can actually burn bridges and kill relationships really quickly. So; you know; I’m a big believer in making sure when you set up a joint venture you are very clear about what each person has to do. Don’t make any assumptions and ask. And sometimes if they say “look, I’m not willing to do it”, no worries at all, look its fine, it’s great just to catch up.

Because I think you both need to know that what you’re giving and what you’re getting back you’re happy with. And that’s ok. So like, to go back to today the podcast, for me it’s great because one the things I love to do is to educate and learn and so this sits in with my values. So I’m happy to do it. Where you say, “But, Oh, Rana, you want to come and talk about speed fishing for half an hour on a podcast, I would be like “mate I’m just totally not interested at all.” It’s not part of my values, it doesn’t add value to my core business. I’m not doing it.  And that’s the big difference I guess.

So with your businesses guys, treat your businesses like the number one priority. If you’re not making a call or sending an email or replying to an email or talking to a client or talking to a new customer or talking to a new prospect about growing your business or improving your business, then what’s the point of why you’re in business? So that’s the big thing, everything you can do if you can link it back to your business in an active way.  So probably go back to one point, a good distinction to make is, in your business there are active ways to grow it and there passive ways to grow it. An active way is asking for a ‘yes or no sale’ or ‘yes or a no action’.

So, how many yes or no’s did you ask for this week will determine how quickly your business grows. The passive stuff is all great. It’s the stuff we all love to do because it’s non-confrontational. Its putting a Facebook post out there, putting a flier out there, stuff you put money into and time into but you don’t necessarily get paid for quite a while and if you can afford to do that, that’s great otherwise get out there and get into action and make it active, so for another good point to add in.

Brett: Well, I guess on that whole active side of it, you’re talking about the active and the passive side. The active is obviously; you know; taking that action right and making something happen and something that pops up to me is that; you know;  personal trainers they genuinely; you know; you got your busy period from 5 to 9am or 10am and then you go back and you got clients at 4 till 9pm; you know. And what happens is, this is where I see trainers fall into the trap. That they haven’t allowed enough time to build their business.

Now, if you are a personal trainer and you’re listening to this and you’re like, “It’s all good. I have got 30 sessions a week. Am happy with that” That’s fantastic. This message is not meant for you. This message is meant for the person who really wants to grow a business and not just be a solo personal trainer. And what you need to do is you need to allocate the time throughout the day to sit down and just book in the time as if you’re booking a client, call your client ‘joint venture.’ So, you’ve got to train joint venture at; you know; midday to 2pm.

And put it down as an appointment. And if you don’t turn up for the appointment, well you are going to have to pay a cancellation fee yourself. You know; the unfortunate thing is that with the cancellation fee your business is not going to move forward.

Rana: “Yeah.”

Brett: It’s about taking action, but making sure that you’ve allowed time to take the action but don’t just go. Finish at 9 o’clock and get home and go, “Oh shoot. When am I going to get some time to do my sales strategy.” Or “I’ll do my joint venture today.”  You need to book in this stuff guys; you need to book it in.

Rana: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, so like the big thing here is, for me it is how active are you. Here is the best marketing strategy you can ever have, right. The best tool for marketing is your telephone. So; you know; I know there’s all these ninja strategies and all these stuff that people would just bog you down with and it’s all great but it’s all passive stuff unless you do it. And if, Ok. Here’s the big thing, let me know. Write back to Brett and tell me the results you get because I bet you probably won’t do it because it’s scary.

Make anywhere from 5 to 10 phone calls to existing or current clients every day, and ask for either a referral or ask for an invitation to come into your business to show them around the studio or your gym. Do that. If you do that, for 30 days, call it a 30 day challenge and I’m talking about 30 days, 6 days a week not 7 you can have a day off on Sunday, and you don’t grow your business by 50%, then I’ll give you a 100 dollar voucher on PayPal or something.

You show me the stats of what you do because I swear to God, I have not coached, mentored, been around, done myself that strategy and not grown my business or doubled my business for the month. You know; it is such an underutilized and it’s something that no one is doing and that’s why the strategy is going to work. Because everyone is hell bent on, “Oh, just talk to people on Facebook.” So it’s not as confrontational. Get on the phone and talk to people about…

Brett: “Yeah”

Rana: Don’t sell to them, just invite them to come in and talk to you at the studio. And with referrals ask clients, “How are your results going?” Just touch base with your customers. “It’s great seeing you in the studio today Rob. I really enjoyed; you know; our session and look, I just had a favor to ask if you don’t mind. Do you have anyone else I could show the studio to and just introduce them to what we are doing here?” That’s it. And like my business, like when I did those things, it grew really quickly. When my team was doing those things, it grew really quickly. When we stopped you could see the difference. 5 to 10 calls per day; you know; so if you do the math on that or put down in your list. You could say it’s almost 300 calls, 30 days say about 250 calls a month. So; you know; tell me.

Brett: And that’s the thing though really and the issue with that is that, I guarantee you maybe one person; two people listening to this will actually act upon it. Probably there will be dozens, maybe a couple of dozens who will listen to this out of the thousands listening to it; you know; start it, they’ll do the course for the first day, second day. Maybe they might not get the results they want and they’ll stop.

Rana: “Let’s do that thing. No Brett, let me know mate. Like email Brett.” If you have done it guys and talk about the results so we can tell other trainers about it. Seriously, like don’t just listen to this and go, “Yeah; you know; I’m good”. If you do, do it we want to hear from you so I can give you a virtual hi five because that is the thing. People who take action are leaders. People who don’t, are followers so if you’re one of the people taking action and doing this stuff, then you’re going to lead and inspire the people who are thinking about doing or not doing it. And that’s the difference between a leader and a follower.

So like; you know; I am a massive advocate for action; you know. If I don’t make phone calls like internationally at 2am in the morning, to presenters on the other side of the world, I’m not going to have an event. So it is such pretty black and white for me, either make the call or I’m ok with not having an event, or just being mediocre like everyone else and just; you know; wishing that I had a big ass better business. You know;

Brett: I think that’s what it is. I think it is that, the thing of being ok and because we are in Australia we will always be ok; you know. You will never going to be into the streets, begging for food. If you; you know; if you adapt any of these parts of; you know; strategy that we talk about; you know; I think the big thing if I look at, I have got a philosophy now. I guess something I made up and it is cool. The EF Principle and it is actually ‘E’, ‘F’. So, put the silent ‘E’. Anyhow, EF stands for The Emotion and The Fact.

Now, if we take the emotion out of this current situation which is someone sitting here, if even hearing you talk about, “Get on your phone, ring people.” They are already starting to have butterflies in their stomach. Now, if you take the emotion out of it or rather actually address the emotion first and go, “Why am I starting to feel like this?”

Rana: “Yeah”

Brett: What you generally find is people don’t want to get on the phone for fear of rejection or fear of feeling needy. Because; you know; many… dozens and dozens of people that I have coached on this, that strategy. It is like, “Why don’t you want to ring them up.” “I don’t want to look like am begging or I am not doing well.” you know; And I said, “Well, you are not going to do well if you don’t do this.” It is a double edged sword. You know; and if you just look at the fact of it, alright.

If you had a friend who had a friend who is in business and they said; you know; “I am doing personal training now. I am just trying to build up my client base. Do you know anyone, any friends, any past people that you know that may be interested in training?” What would you say to them? “Fuck. You are a loser; you know; why do you want my help? You should be doing alright.” You are not going to say that are you?

Rana: Yeah, no.

Brett: You are going to help them. And listen, that’s the fact of the matter; you know. People are… It is you putting these preconceived ideas into your own head that it is stopping you from taking action in the first place.

Rana: Yeah mate. That’s it. That’s the thing. There’s worst things that will happen if some would say no to you and; you know; that’s ok. Like I had a sales coach because I was so scared of sales when I first started my business. Like I went and got sales coaching and one thing; you know; they always… everyone has their own saying to help you through it or whatever. He used to say to me; you know; “What is a client worth to you.” And I said, “Oh well for me, a client spends around about 2000 bucks. He says, “Great. So basically for every; you know; say your conversion rate is really bad Rana.” And I go, “Ok. Probably it is.”

“You can say one in ten people you talk to is going to say ‘yes’.” I said, “Ok.” He goes, “Every time you make a call you can put 200 bucks in your pocket.” And when I thought about it and I was like, “Oh. That’s a good point. Right?” Because am actually, that is making me money. Like, ok I said, “It doesn’t matter. I have just earned 200 bucks because I know on the tenth one, alright, even if it’s the twentieth one; one in twenty you go, “Well do you want to earn 100 dollars right now? Well pick up the phone. Do you not want to earn 100 dollars? That’s cool. Don’t pick up the phone. It is a choice.” There is no judgment. It’s just you either want to grow and you want to earn money or you don’t and you want to talk about why business is going bad.

And so; you know; although that was a nice way to put it, it gave me a good reference point but I still had resistance. And I often find there’s that hold, what do they call it? The one minute rule. Like if ever you procrastinating about doing something, do it for one minute and then stop. And what you find is that procrastination goes away because it’s just really this getting started. It’s like saying to someone in the morning; you know; “You want to get up and you want to exercise.” “No. Am too tired,” excuse, excuse, story, story, story. Now we just do it for a minute, literally, do it for 60 seconds. Go get joggers on, get outside and go for a one minute run.

Bet you they don’t do it just for a minute. I bet you they go for 10 minutes. It’s just starting…

Brett: It is the momentum.

Rana: Yeah. And that’s the thing alright just pick up the phone and make the first phone call. You know; worst case scenario you make one phone call a day which is; you know; six phone calls a week. Six phone calls a week is 24 phone calls a month. You are still going to get amazing results. It’s; you know; marketing is just creativity and mathematics. Guys that’s really what it is. It’s just how creative are you to present and position what you do and who you are. And then scaling it and getting it out to a many people as possible and understanding what the numbers are on it. That’s it.

I know it really sounds unsexy and boring. So; you know; sorry that I bamboozled you with; you know; like a bunch of; you know; ninja tactics. I mean, I can definitely give you those tactics too but if your business isn’t earning you the money that you need just to be happy, why would you even want to go to those tactics.

Brett: That’s right.

Rana: Because getting a lead from some I-friend, dark post-social media strategy. You still got to meet the person. You know what I mean; you still can generate a lead but you still got to meet the person. You still going to talk to them. So, some point you have to be comfortable with taking the action to call a human being and talking to him. We are in the people business for Christ’s sake. We are personal trainers; you know. We are not Facebook trainers like we just don’t get them in and talk to them and then all of a sudden they jump of Facebook and they are like, “Here is my credit card.” It’s just a bunch of crap. Just get on the phone and talk to people.

Be proud of what you do, be proud of your business, be proud of who you are and your message and your mission and just be proud and it’s actually your mission to let people know about it because you are the best at being you and what you doing. The more people you can expose to you and how good you are. You know Jeffrey Gitomer. I met Jeffrey Gitomer, he was on 55G. He said, he put it really straight. Everyone should listen to Jeffrey Gitomer if you are talking about sales. He’s best in the world. He’s phenomenal. So funny as well. And he said to me, “Rana, you know why people don’t like sales and they don’t…

Brett: “Can you do it in the accent for us?”

Rana: Laughs

Brett: You said it was funny. So let’s

Rana: No… I mean, I don’t even know… “New York!” “You know Rana, you know what it is,” you know; I don’t know. I can’t even do it properly.  But he is just so funny. He goes, “Because people don’t believe in their business or their product enough to want to tell people about it.” And he goes, “You know what?” He goes, “Tell me you haven’t seen an amazing film and not told everyone about it. Tell me you haven’t done that.” I said, “No, no. I do it all the time.” If I love something or I am passionate about it, I’ll tell everyone about it. I’ll tell everyone.

He goes, “Yeap! And the reason people don’t do it, is because they think what they do is average and they don’t like it enough.” And I go, “You know what, it’s so true. “Tell me Brett, right now. Between you and me and everyone else listening, between you and me; if I was to give you right now a strategy that would earn you 2000 dollars, right, 2000 dollars in the next, let’s say 30 days. Just 2000 bucks. I guarantee I will give you 2000 dollars if you do this. Would you do it?” Just an extra two grand.

Brett: “Yeah. Sure. Why not?”

Rana: “Of course you would. So pick up the phone.” You know and…

Brett: It freaks me out; you know. People are going to judge me if I picked up the phone.

Rana: But the other thing is, is like, if I gave you something that enhanced your life and you came back to me and you said, “Rana, mate. You helped me, like I am so happy. Thank you so much.” Tell me that you wouldn’t tell people about it and I mean I would have the confidence then to tell more people about it that I was helping people like you and that’s how the ball starts. So marketing really, just love your business and love who you are and what you do and tell many people as possible because you should; you know; The world’s best kept secret. You are the world’s best kept secret. I mean, you deserve to tell everyone about it.

Brett: I think that the major point that you brought there is and… “So what was that German’s name again? The New York?”

Rana: “Jeffrey Gitomer.”

Brett: “Jeffrey.” So Jeffrey how he said, “You think your product is average,” you know; I cannot agree with that more because when I was producing work and I literally thought; you know; “This is a bit average. I don’t know if someone will like it.” you know; I even started to feel, for about two seconds and then I got over it quickly. But…

Rana: Laugh and overtalk

Brett: Even though this is still a free podcast and I don’t feel the pressure of having to deliver this amazing ninja; you know; episode with all these sound effects and all that type of stuff. And originally at the start, before I started this podcast I was like, “Mmmh, I don’t really know because I don’t know if anyone would really want to listen and I don’t know if I’ll have enough stuff to talk about,” you know; All those roadblocks that pop up and like I said though after a few seconds, and I just pulled the trigger and I did it. And now, it is my mission to get this podcast into every personal trainer’s ears if possible; you know. And we even go to the extent we approach fitness colleges, we approach personal trainers and we say, “Hey look! Would you like a free podcast? It’s free.”

Rana: Yeah. Yeah.

Brett: You know, and the reason being is because conversations like this; you know. We are having this conversation; someone’s going to be listening to it. They are going to go, “Shit, that’s going to get me pumped. I am going to go and do XYZ now.”You know; because what I learned was I was listening to audios and I was reading books and what I found was the same thing every time and now I listen to it, “Have you heard of a guy Eric Thomas, ET? Hip Hop Preacher.”

Rana: “Yeah, I’ve heard of that dude.”

Brett: Get onto his podcast. You know his youtube video. It’s the one where he, the black guy, he is talking to a group of students and he is talking about how you go the extra mile to achieve your goals and he has got that, the American football player in it and when he talks he almost yells at you but you…

Rana: Laughs

Brett: You listen to this guy and you cannot, like anyone who listens to it, I’ll give you a 100 bucks if you can’t listen, if you listen to him bloody three minutes and he does not inspire you in some way then; you know. It’s that thing again of learning. He knows his message, he’s not…, he’s articulate as a lot of speakers. He talks gangster [Laughs]; you know.

Rana: “Yeah”

Brett: But he gets his message across and for me, the last; you know; I would say week. Every single morning I’ve been getting up, listen to two minutes of that dude and I am pumped for the day; you know. He’s got me up every morning this week; you know; 4 am every morning to come and talk to on this project.

Rana: “Is that Eric Thomas, right?”

Brett: “Yeap. Yeap. ET the Hip Hop Preacher.” If you Google him you’ll see his youtube video. It literally went viral and this is a guy who literally, and this is an example right now, I’ve just sent; you know; probably a couple of thousands listeners to ET’s website or podcast or what he has got out there. People are going to purchase his stuff because they are going to go, “Wow! This dude is awesome.” And am going to buy the audio book as well and I guarantee someone like yourself, you’ll go and buy his audio book. Because you’ll listen and go, “I’ve got to get this.” And that is a perfect example of, I guess you’ll put it to tie into JVs. That’s almost like a hidden JV. Alright. So, if people out there who will be promoting it who you don’t even know; you know;

Rana:  “Yeah”

Brett: So think about it like that because what it could mean is someone on your personal, like your training someone right. They go out that weekend, they sit down with their friends over coffee saying that, “Rana is a amazing personal trainer. Gets great results.” Their friend then goes and talks to someone else and their friend goes, “I am looking for a personal trainer.” Next thing, “Oh. My friend, Zoe is using Rana. You should go and use him.” It’s a hidden JV and it works by delivering great content and being true to yourself. That’s what I think.

Rana: “Yeah, yeah. “ Yeah. Spot on.” You know. So yeah; you know; like marketing, all this stuff; you know; you just got to love what you do and find creative ways to get that message out there. But I honestly feel like Joint ventures is one of those easy ways to just start building relationships, getting out there. Because it’s kind of like, rather than selling one to one you actually selling one to like a hundred or one to a thousand and that’s a really powerful way to grow a business.

So; you know; I am not saying one to one is not a good strategy, it is. Like you can definitely talk to 10 people a week and that will build your business and make 10 phone calls but imagine just visiting two business owners every week and talking to them and keeping in touch, putting them on the calendar every month, you touch base with them and invite them for coffee, invite them to your studio. Don’t ask them for anything, just build the relationship.

Guarantee you over six months; you know; two or three of those business owners will be fans and be sending people to you because people will go into their business and say, “Oh; you know; I am looking for a trainer,” as Brett said and they go, “Yeah; you know; the guy down the road, Rana, he is an absolute legend. Just check him out.” You know; because… and that’s the beauty of it. That’s the beauty of marketing so, yeah!

Brett: I love it. I love it, I love it, I love it, I love it a lot. So Rana, I guess… I am just checking time here and we are coming up to the end of our time and no doubt you’ve got a heap of stuff to go onto today like you said earlier but look, we didn’t even really get to specifically talk about marketing as a whole but in saying that JVs is definitely a marketing strategy and look we are going to get you on a future meet  and we are going to talk specifically about; you know; you pick a couple of marketing strategies and we will really go deep on those.

But look,“I guess Rana,” but before we go what I am going to do as well is that I want to put a link on our website here under the show notes; you know; to your WFBOS and so forth but look, “where can someone find us or find out any more information about yourself mate?”

Rana: Yeah. What I’ll do is like I’ve got a page, I don’t… like I said to someone the other day when we did an interview, I don’t… there is no ‘opt-in’ there is no nothing it is just a total resource that I’ve kept. I just keep hidden and; you know; give value to people. It’s a…

Brett: “.com page is it?”

Rana: “Actually that’s another thing I was going to add to this but, for now…”

Bret: Laughs

Rana: “Just keep that one under wraps thanks. Now everyone knows about it. Unbelievable!”

Brett: “Sorry mate. Oops.”

Rana: I’ll give the Jeffrey Gitomer link to the Jeffrey Gitomer video, for sure. So you guys should need to watch that. That is phenomenal. That’s worth like, I’d pay like 500 bucks for that video alone cause Jeffrey Gitomer, “Go and check out his product Thursday. Pretty expensive world number one sale’s guy.” So, “I’ll give you that to just give to everyone.”

Brett: “Alright.”

Rana: WFBOS is a page of like four pre-summit sessions that are free. No opt-in required so just check it out. And also there is a 30 day challenge that I put together when I was doing PT Mastery multiple times. No opt-ins required. Just go over, check it out. Learn, grow and just get massive value guys and at the end of the day if you have found any value just hit me up on Facebook and say, “Thanks.” That’s all I need. That’s fine.

Brett: It is so easy.

Rana: “Excellent.”

Brett: “That’s easy. Thanks man.”

Rana: “No worries.”

Brett: So, I will get those and I will put them on the site and I guess I will leave you with the last words and mate, “What’s one of your favorite quotes and why?” “Put you on the spot there.”

Rana: “Favorite quotes and why?” You know, “Oh mate, I can’t…” “This is crazy.”

Brett: “Got you on the spot, didn’t I?”

Rana: But; you know; I think it’s not so much a quote. It is just more of a strategy. It’s; you know; ‘Take massive action’ you know; I think it’s a Tony Robbins’ thing. It is ‘Take massive action’ and; you know; if you want an extraordinary business and an extraordinary life, you need to take extraordinary action. And bottom line is, that’s what I tell myself everyday. “If I want extraordinary result today, what are the things I have to do that are extraordinary?”I guarantee, if you just follow those things, take massive action. I don’t see how you can’t kick ass. So, go and have a crack and if you need anything, yeah, hit Brett up or definitely reach out to me and am happy to; you know; to chat. But yeah, that’s great. “Thanks for listening guys”

Brett: “Mate look, Thanks again for jumping on board and we will be talking to you very soon and till then mate, “you go and have a fantastic and reaping and have an extraordinary day.”

Rana: “Will do mate. You too! Cheers Brett.”

Brett: “See you Rana. Bye”

Rana: “See you mate.”