Go For Launch — Grow Your Business & Your Life

The COVID-19 pandemic accelerated the need for company leaders and their employees to accept the reality that hybrid work is not only possible but desirable for many reasons. While no one is certain what the “new normal” ultimately looks like, hybrid work is clearly here to stay. But the big question is how will companies be able to design a powerful hybrid workplace culture, regardless of where people are working. Many traditional companies are still struggling with the idea of hybrid or remote work. Gustavo Razzetti is the CEO and founder of Fearless Culture, a culture design consultancy that helps teams do the best work of their lives. For more than 20 years, Razzetti has helped leaders from Fortune 500s, startups, nonprofits, and everything in between on every continent but Antartica. Gustavo is also the creator of the Culture Design Canvas, a framework used by thousands of teams and organizations across the world to map, assess and design their culture. In addition to his consulting work with clients, Gustavo regularly speaks with leaders and teams about culture change, teamwork, and hybrid workplaces. His coaching and tools have helped countless executives and teams develop work environments where people collaborate to accelerate individual and collective performance. Gustavo is a prolific writer and author of four books on culture change. His newest book is Remote, Not Distant: Design a Company Culture That Will Help You Thrive in a Hybrid Workplace. His insights also have been featured in The New York Times, Psychology Today, Forbes, Fortune, and other media outlets.

Why is it that every single person in the world has stories and can easily tell them to their friends and family, but in the business context many people are afraid of storytelling—or they think it is only for creatives…or that it is less effective than data and facts? Jamie Dixon joined me on the Go For Launch podcast to talk about how to become a better storyteller. Jamie is a coach, trainer, and author who has worked with ambitious leaders in over 160 multinational companies over the last 10 years through his company, Shaping Paths. He coaches and trains in both English and Mandarin. He is also conversational in Japanese. Jamie is an IAC-accredited coach and a certified Tiny Habits coach. He is also certified in Everything DISC. In addition, Jamie is the author of several books, including his most recent title, The Story Habit: How Leaders Shape Stories That Drive Action. He also wrote the books Overcome and Get It Done and Shaping Paths. Show Sponsor: Accessibe Chances are your website has issues that not only frustrate many of your users, but could lead to significant fines. For example, if your site is found to violate the Americans with Disabilities Act, your first violation could result in a penalty of $55,000 to $75,000. And additional violations can result in a $150,000 fine. Go to Accessibe (affiliate link) to get a free site scan and to learn more about their compliance products.

One of the sweetest sounds in the world is a ringing cash register. And one of the best ways to hear it more often is to improve your word-of-mouth and personal referrals. My guest in this episode of the Go For Launch podcast is Raúl Galera. He’s the Chief Advocate at ReferralCandy, an app that ecommerce brands use to set up and run customer referral programs. Founded more than 10 years ago, ReferralCandy has helped over 30,000 brands leverage the power of word-of-mouth and turn their customer base into their marketing team. Referral marketing is a blend of organic content, community marketing and influencer marketing. Word-of-mouth is a powerful channel for both successful global names as well as new, niche brands. Referral marketing blends perfectly with brands that have a clear customer-centric approach, making it affordable for companies of any size to attract new customers while retaining existing ones. Raúl has been leading ReferralCandy’s partnership efforts for the past five years, working alongside marketing agencies, media and tech companies. Show Sponsor—Accessibe Did you know that 98% of websites cannot be accessed properly by people with disabilities? Chances are your site has issues that not only frustrate many of your users but could lead to significant fines. For example, if your site is found to violate the Americans with Disabilities Act, your first violation could result in a penalty of $55,000 to $75,000. And additional violations can result in a $150,000 fine. The ADA applies to all businesses—and there are many other accessibility-related laws to consider—so it’s not something you should ignore. Several years ago, Target paid a $6 million settlement on a lawsuit brought by the National Federation of the Blind. Domino’s Pizza also lost a lengthy lawsuit by a blind man who sued the chain when he was unable to order pizza off Domino’s website or mobile app—even with screen reading technology. The good news is that it’s easy to check your site for any compliance issues, fix them quickly and make your site user-friendly for everyone. AccessiBe is the first and only AI-powered solution that makes it easy and affordable to add ADA,  Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1, Section 508 and other compliance legislation to your website. All you have to do is get your web developer to install a single line of JavaScript code to your site. Within 48 hours of installing AccessiBe, your site will be compliance. And their pricing starts at just $49/month. Get Accessibe’s free site scan and learn more about their compliance products.

Valerie Hayes is on a mission to help small businesses beat the odds and push through the roadblocks to become an industry leader. She helps overburdened entrepreneurs, small business owners, and CEOs run their companies like a high-performance sports car. As a fractional COO, Valerie helps untangle everything that’s not working smoothly, sorts it all out, and puts it back together. Valerie’s background as a business owner, a human resources professional in Fortune 500 companies, and coach/mentor for high achievers enables her to bring a multi-faceted, collaborative approach to every aspect of business. She’s passionate about sharing her actionable insights with audiences around the world. Valerie is convinced that fewer businesses would fail if people knew more about how to run their business well and how easy it can be. Her direct, down-to-earth approach takes the mystery out of running a business. Show Sponsor: Accessibe Did you know that 98% of websites cannot be accessed properly by people with disabilities? Chances are your site has issues that not only frustrate many of your users, but could lead to significant fines. For example, if your site is found to violate the Americans with Disabilities Act, your first violation could result in a penalty of $55,000 to $75,000. And additional violations can result in a $150,000 fine. The ADA applies to all businesses—and there are many other accessibility-related laws to consider—so it’s not something you should ignore. Several years ago, Target paid a $6 million settlement on a lawsuit brought by the National Federation of the Blind. Domino’s Pizza also lost a lengthy lawsuit by a blind man who sued the chain when he was unable to order pizza off the Domino’s website or mobile app—even with screen reading technology. The good news is that it’s easy to check your site for any compliance issues, fix them quickly and make your site user friendly for everyone. AccessiBe is the first and only AI-powered solution that makes it easy and affordable to add ADA, Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.1, Section 508 and other compliance legislation to your website. All you have to do is get your web developer to add install a single line of JavaScript code to your site. Within 48 hours of installing AccessiBe, your site will be compliance. And their pricing starts at just $49/month. Just go to Accessibe for a free site scan and to learn more about their compliance products. That’s goforlaunch.io/accessibility.

In 2013, Luke Charlton decided to quit a comfortable 6-figure government job, move halfway around the world, and start an online business as a coach. Thinking he knew enough about marketing to survive in one of the most expensive cities in the world—London—he quickly realized it wasn't as easy as it looked. But after years of struggling and nearly going bankrupt, Luke finally discovered the formula for online success that has helped more than 4,000 coaches grow their businesses online. Along the way, Luke has spent more than $16 million on advertising, earned $50M+ in sales for his clients, and been hired by top ad agencies to write copy for experts such as Bob Proctor, Mike Dillard, Neil Patel, Grace Lever, Ryan Moran and many more. He has been featured in 6-Figure Coach magazine. Now, Luke spends his days living somewhere near Byron Bay in Australia, teaching other coaches how to get a lot of clients by sending just one 15-minute email per day. Learn more about Luke by downloading a free copy of his 9 Email Offers That Get Coaching Clients Free.

The pandemic upended a lot of norms, especially when it comes to traditional work models. Challenging the way work is done has accelerated to lightspeed, as people and companies are being forced to reckon with work “standards” in terms of hours per week vs. productivity and work-life balance. My guest on this episode of the Go For Launch podcast is Joe Sanok, author of the new book, Thursday is the New Friday: How to work fewer hours, make more money, and spend time doing what you want. The book examines how the 4-day work week boosts creativity and productivity. Joe doesn’t just write about a 4-day work week, he lives it. He went from working 60-hour weeks to traveling with his family full-time in an RV while being even more productive at work. Joe believes working for yourself in your own business shouldn’t have to feel like a job. And working smarter and limiting the time you spend on things that don’t matter can help. Joe is also the host of the popular The Practice of the Practice Podcast, which is recognized as one of the Top 50 Podcasts worldwide with over 100,000 downloads each month. Bestselling authors, experts, scholars, and business leaders and innovators are featured and interviewed in the 750 plus podcasts he has done over the last six years. Learn more about Joe Sanok and also get a free Internal Inclination Assessment at https://joesanok.com/#assessment with promo code titnf.

Most of the “best” salespeople are happy earning six figures. But the Top 1% of sellers consistently make 7-figures.  If you’re ready to double or triple your sales and break past the comfort zone of 6-figures, you’ll need to learn ways to persuade your prospects that are more emotionally-based and less driven by logic-oriented sales models from the 1980s-early 2000s. Jeremy Miner, chairman of 7th Level, says that, “The single most effective way to sell anything to anyone in 2022, is to be a problem finder and a problem solver... NOT a product pusher.” 7th Level is a global sales training company that was ranked #1,232 of the fastest growing companies in the United States by Inc. magazine’s list of the top 5,000 companies in 2021. In addition to serving as company chairman, Jeremy is also a contributor for Inc. magazine and has been featured in the Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Entrepreneur, and many more publications. Jeremy’s philosophy has made him one of the wealthiest sales professionals. During his 17-year sales career, Jeremy was recognized by the Direct Selling Association as the 45th highest earning producer out of more than 100 million salespeople—selling anything, worldwide! His earnings as a commission-only salesperson were in the multiple 7-figures every year. Jeremy’s unique brand of sales training pioneers the use of behavioral science and human psychology, reflective of his deep studies in the subject from Utah Valley University. Jeremy is the host of the podcast, Closers are Losers, and his new book, The New Model of Selling—Selling to an Unsellable Generation—co-authored by Jerry Acuff, CEO of Delta Point—is scheduled to be published in Fall 2022. Learn more by joining 7th Level’s Facebook Group, Sales Revolution. Show sponsor: Starting a podcast? Get up to two months free at Libsyn, using the promo code LAUNCH at checkout.

Joining me for this episode of the Go For Launch podcast is Dean Inniss, Managing Partner at Your Best Life Now, an organization that helps people elevate their finance, family, fitness and faith through coaching, community, and exclusive once-in-a-lifetime experiences. His unique background of business experience, law enforcement, martial arts training and economic analysis gives him a rare perspective that enables him to successfully guide entrepreneurs, CEOS, and other top executives to new heights. In 2019, Dean decided to leave corporate America, where he honed his leadership, partnership, and business skills on a national, regional and local level. Most recently, Dean was the president and COO of a large regional mortgage bank that doubled its size under his leadership.

Vertical Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) platforms may seem like smaller markets because they are often measured by the size of the existing software market in the industry—for example, it is relatively small in youth sports. However, this ignores the many opportunities for vertical SaaS platforms to expand the addressable market—for example, to raise prices, upsell new features, own payments/banking relationships, and embed commerce. My guest today knows a lot about starting a vertical SaaS platform, attracting customers and gaining market share. Brian Litvack is the CEO and co-founder of LeagueApps, which he describes as the most comprehensive youth sports management platform available. ​​ LeagueApps is the operating system and community for youth and local sports leaders—providing them with the technology and professional network they need to succeed. The company is also building a movement behind its mission—creating amazing sports experiences for all. Through their FundPlay program, they donate a percentage of every dollar spent on the platform back to the communities and families that need it. Their goal is to impact 500,000 underserved kids by the end of 2022.

If you’re ready to host your own event and anxious to get started but feel overwhelmed by all the things you need to do—from negotiating with hotels to coordinating with A/V providers, managing a volunteer team and figuring out what you are going to say and do while you’re hosting—you’re not alone! My guest today helps companies, coaches and celebrities create Powerful and Profitable events. Shay Wheat is CEO of Grace & Ease Productions, Inc. Shay is a Certified Event Producer™ and the creator of popular programs such as “The Powerful Event Process” and “The Ultimate Event Planner Certification Program.” Grace & Ease Productions produces in-person and live virtual events ranging from 200 to 4,000+ attendees. They have collaborated with many well-known celebrities including Lisa Nichols, Dr. Claire Zammit, Bill Baren, Alison J. Prince, Josh Turner and many others. Shay’s clients have made over $24 million in revenue, gaining over 3,500 new clients and changing the lives of more than 16,000+ attendees.

This podcast episode is a little different than the rest. It’s a personal conversation with my good friend Jim Mitchem about some serious topics, ranging from battling cancer to remembering a dear mutual friend, Nathan Richie, who passed away June 16, 2018. Jim is a branding consultant and award-winning senior copywriter who has convinced people to think differently about things for more than two decades. Since 2002, Jim’s company Smash Communications has helped drive revenue for his clients via consistent messaging that elicits action across a range of media. As Jim says, “Copywriting is my superpower.” He’s the author of several fictional books, including Minor King and Mongoose, as well as a non-fiction tribute to man’s best friend, Gone Dogs: Tales of Dogs We've Loved. Jim is one of the most honest and kind people I know. I hope you’ll enjoy our conversation. Find out more about Jim at Quick Like Mongoose. RIP, Nathan Richie.

There’s a tendency to discount your price in order to get ‘quick wins, land more customers or keep existing customers happy. But there’s a better strategy to win more clients—using value-added incentives. Marco Torres believes that value-added incentives such as complimentary travel packages beat price discounts. He joined me on the latest episode of the Go For Launch podcast. Marco is the founder of Marketing Boost, which has helped thousands of business owners worldwide boost sales and scale their businesses by as much as 5-fold through the use of incentive-based marketing. And his Facebook group is home to more than 28,000 active business owners who are raking in sales with his advice and amazingly affordable subscription program. During our interview, my brain was spinning with effective ways to use Marketing Boost. I hope you’ll get a lot of value out of our conversation and check it out.

Today’s podcast is all about learning how to create meaningful and inspiring online events. My guests are Daniel Moss and Michelle Garrison, the Co-Founders of We & Goliath. We & Goliath helps companies host more meaningful and inspiring events online. Their full-service formula combines smart strategy, platform savvy and innovative video that captivates, awes and inspires. Whether you want just live stream production or full-service virtual event management including event planning, technology, and marketing strategy for a multi-day event ... they can help tackle your Goliath. Michelle Garrison is a serial entrepreneur, digital strategist, and creative director, who’s started companies and campaigns on the edge of sustainability and community-building trends for the last 20 years. She’s helped companies reach triple-digit growth, and her projects have been featured in The Boston Globe, Washington Post, HGTV, Dwell Magazine, ABC, NBC and CBS. Daniel Moss is a senior event strategist with more than 20 years of experience leading and training agency and nonprofit teams. He’s designed digital campaigns for large online and in-person events supported by lead nurturing automation, omnichannel retargeting and conversion rate optimization. His clients have experienced 7X attendance online vs. in-person, 5X monthly email signups, hundreds of #1 search engine rankings and 53% conversion rate boosts that increased revenue by $43,000/mo.

Most people think growing older and losing their edge is inevitable. But the truth is, the way in which you grow older is entirely malleable. Just because your chronological age is rising doesn't mean your biological age has to as well. It's time for a new paradigm. You can turn the clock back and stay at the top of your game at 40, 50, 60, and well beyond through precision performance longevity. My guest is Julian Hayes II, an executive health consultant & epigenetic atelier, and the host of Optimal Health for Busy Entrepreneurs. His journey began in his pursuit of becoming a doctor. However, he left school after one year to pursue a bigger dream. Now, he's the founder of The Art of Fitness & Life. This bespoke concierge health & performance advisory firm helps entrepreneurs, and executives live longer, richer, and healthier lives. This is accomplished through leveraging their unique DNA, data-driven health metrics, personalized bio-specific programming, a "performance team," and high-tech toys. On an organizational level, the firm helps companies elevate their bottom line through precision performance longevity. Julian has also written nearly 200 columns at Inc, along with frequently being published over at Entrepreneur, SUCCESS, Chief Executive, CEO World, Business Insider, Bodybuilding.com, and many more of the world's largest publications. He also is the author of the book Body Architect: A Real-World Guide to Ignite Your Fitness, Look Awesome Naked, Quiet the Inner Voices of Self-Doubt, & Design a Lifestyle on Your Own Terms.

If you ask many entrepreneurs how their life is going…and you’ll hear a lot of lies. “It’s great! I’m in control! I’m my own boss! I can do whatever I want, whenever I want!” The reality is, entrepreneurship is often miserable, as you become chained to endless days of working, tedious tasks and time away from family and friends. So how can you get control of your business, family and life as an entrepreneur? That’s a topic my guest is very familiar with. For more than 20 years, Fabienne Fredrickson has powerfully mentored thousands of women business owners to grow, then scale their businesses, earning them tens of millions collectively each year while increasing their time off to enjoy lives they love. Her Leveraged Business methodology is based on her nearly 15 years of experience in generating multiple 7 figures annually with three children at home, while taking 14 weeks of unplugged vacations each year. It is proven to work. Fabienne’s revolutionary book, The Leveraged Business: How You Can Go From Overwhelmed at 6-Figures to 7 Figures (and Get Your Life Back), is a definitive roadmap on how she’s done it with heart and how you can too, without sacrificing your life.

If you’re like many people, still trying to ‘e-blast’ your prospect manually without a great way to track the results—it’s time to make your inbox more sales focused. My latest guest on the Go For Launch podcast is Joel Stevenson, the CEO of Yesware. Yesware is a leader in sales productivity software. It helps both individuals and large companies scale their email marketing efforts, with templates and campaign tools; integrations with Salesforce and other software; phone tracking, a meeting scheduler; and more. Prior to joining Yesware, Joel was the general manager and founder of Wayfair’s B2B division, which he grew to several hundred million in revenue. Before joining Wayfair, he held a variety of sales and marketing roles at Ariba, Innovus and Verizon. He earned an M.B.A. from the Yale School of Management, a B.S. in Business Administration from the University of Illinois, and studied Chinese at Harvard-Beijing Academy. He lives in Massachusetts with his wife and their four children.

Julie Broad is the founder of self-publishing services firm Book Launchers and an Amazon Overall #1 Best Selling Author who knows what it takes to be a successful self-published author. Through Book Launchers and her popular YouTube channel, BookLaunchers.TV, she helps subject matter experts write, publish, and promote nonfiction books that will boost their business. Julie’s titles include More than Cashflow, which topped Amazon, and The New Brand You, winner of the Beverly Hills Book Award for Best Sales book. Her latest book, Self-Publish & Succeed, captures her leading tactics to write, publish and market a nonfiction book. An expert on writing a book with marketing in mind, Julie teaches the best approaches to write a book that builds your business and allows you to have more impact and influence with your brand. Her advice for authors and investors has been featured in Forbes, Entrepreneur.com, Yahoo! Business, CTV, the Toronto Sun, and many local and national TV shows. Born and raised in Canada, Julie currently resides in Los Angeles with her husband and son.

Webinars are one of the most powerful marketing and sales tools available. But many people avoid doing them due to the concerns over how much time and effort they take. Fortunately, there are ways to take full advantage of webinars while avoiding the hassles. The secret is to learn how to automate webinars the right way. Melissa Kwan is the Cofounder and CEO of eWebinar, an automated webinar solution that combines pre-recorded video with real-time interactions and live chat to deliver an engaging experience for attendees. She joined me on the Go For Launch podcast to discuss the journey of starting eWebinar, and their mission to make it the best software for automated webinars. Melissa has spent more than a dozen years in startups and has built three successful companies without venture capital backing. Her previous startup, a real estate tech company, was acquired in 2019. Melissa and her team at eWebinar believe that by automating the repetitive and tedious task of giving the same onboarding, training, and sales presentations over and over, they free people up to focus their time on something else they value more.

Making sales one-by-one is a noble undertaking. But to exponentially grow your business, affiliate sales can be a game-changer. To learn more about the ins-and-outs of affiliate sales, I asked Dominick Keenan to join me on the Go For Launch podcast. Dominick is VP of Sales at ClickBank, a global affiliate marketplace and e-commerce platform. He has had several roles within the ClickBank sales organization including affiliate manager and business development before taking the role of VP of Sales. He focuses on supporting ClickBank’s current vendors and affiliates as well as growing ClickBank’s business. Prior to joining ClickBank, Dominick worked in business aviation and commercial lending. He holds a Bachelor's Degree in Aviation Management from Rocky Mountain College, and an MBA from the University of Montana. If you've ever thought about adding affiliate sales to boost sales of your company's products or services, you will get a lot of valuable tips from Dominick.

Ignition is revolutionizing product launches and go-to-market planning, strategy and project management. Joining me to discuss Ignition's recent beta launch and features is Derek Osgood, Ignition's founder and CEO. Ignition is a collaborative, go-to-market platform that assists product and marketing teams in bringing new goods to market quickly and efficiently. Prior to his current role, Derek spent over a decade leading and scaling marketing teams at brands like Playstation, BBVA and Rippling. He has launched over 100 products working as a Product Marketer that have collectively generated over $1B in revenue.