Brittany Anderson On Finding Your Financial Dream Architect Today So You Can Prosper Tomorrow (#141)

[00:00:00] Jeffrey Feldberg: Welcome to the Sell My Business Podcast. I'm your host Jeffrey Feldberg.

This podcast is brought to you by Deep Wealth and the 90-day Deep Wealth Experience.

Your liquidity event is the largest and most important financial transaction of your life.

But unfortunately, up to 90% of liquidity events fail. Think about all that time, money and effort wasted. Of the "successful" liquidity events, most business owners leave anywhere from 50% to over 100% of their deal value in the buyer's pocket and don't even know it.

I should know. I said no to a seven-figure offer and yes, to mastering the art and science of a liquidity event. Two years later, I said yes to a different buyer with a nine-figure offer.

Are you thinking about an exit or liquidity event?

If you believe that you either don't have the time or you'll prepare closer to your liquidity event, think again.

Don't become a statistic and make the fatal mistake of believing that the skills that built your business are the same ones for your liquidity event.

After all, how can you master something you've never done before?

Let the 90-day Deep Wealth Experience and our nine-step roadmap of preparation help you capture the maximum value for your liquidity event.

At the end of this episode, take a moment to hear from business owners, just like you, who went through the Deep Wealth Experience.

Brittany Anderson is the President and Shareholder of a top-ranked financial services firm Sweet Financial Partners. Having more than a decade's worth of experience in her field she has taken her business building and team engaging insights and has worked with CEOs, entrepreneurs, business owners, and authors. Brittany is the co-creator of the Ultimate Advisor Coaching and Ultimate Advisor Mastermind Platforms.

Her insights have been featured in national media outlets, such as the Huffington Post, Women, Inc., Barron's, Private Wealth, and Forbes magazine. She has shared her expertise through her contribution to three published books and will continue on with her love for writing as she is set to publish two additional books in 2022.

As an influential speaker and author, Brittany Anderson has spoken at Million Dollar Round Table, Raymond James National Conference, and others, on showing up each day to be more than a title more than a label and pursuing a life that fulfills their purpose

Welcome to The Sell My Business Podcast and stop the presses. If you're a financial advisor, if you're a business owner, stop what you're doing. You're going to want to listen to what we're talking about today.

Our guest walks on water with what we're going to be talking about. We're talking about different kinds of wealth and what you can do, both monetary, non-monetary. And I know what you're going to hear is going to thrill you. So Brittany, welcome to The Sell My Business Podcast.

Absolutely delighted to have you here. There's always a story behind the story, Brittany. What's your story? What got you to where you are today?

[00:03:20] Brittany Anderson: Yeah, first of all, thank you. The walking on water, I feel like I have really big shoes to fill all of a sudden, so let's see how this goes. So my story, I went to college and at the time I was actually working full-time. I was in a corporate environment and I was managing a jewelry store.

This job ad pops up and I, at the time did not know exactly what it was, but I was so darn drawn to it. I felt like I had to work at this place. So the place was called Sweet Financial Services. It's now a Sweet Financial Partners. But almost 14 years ago, I ended up applying for this client service-type role.

It wasn't necessarily the duties or the job itself that was the big attractor. It was something about the company. In hindsight, having a little bit of experience now, it was absolutely the culture and the entrepreneurial nature that pulled me in. So I got the job, landed the job, and ended up realizing quickly that I missed the leadership component.

I missed being in that type of a role, that type of a position. So I ended up moving into the director of operations role, then moved into the COO and now I'm the president and one of four partners in the firm itself. So that's been a really fun journey. And through that, the founder and I found a commonality where we both had this massive passion for helping people not reinvent the wheel.

So we ended up creating a company that coaches other advisors. So helping advisors from across the nation to really build their business, not just focused on growth, but scalability. Hone in on their culture, hone in on their team engagement, and help them build a practice that is really one of their dreams that allows them to, have a life at the same time and not be all consumed. So that's in a nutshell and a tight nutshell where my journey really has come from.

[00:05:06] Jeffrey Feldberg: Wow. Well, firstly, congratulations. I mean talk about just coming there and you're just starting out and now fast forward, here you are. You're president. You're a partner. So at tremendous congratulations to you. And I'm sure we'll get to this a little bit later, but you're quite modest because you're also a thought leader.

You're an author of two books and you're just doing some amazing things, but let's do a deep dive on, culture because culture, whether you're a financial advisor, whether you're a business owner, culture is everything.

In fact, it's one of our X-Factors that can insanely increase the value of your business. So talk to us about culture, Brittany, why don't we start with the glass half full? What are companies doing right when you walk into a business and you're looking at the culture, what should we be doing? What are you looking for?

[00:05:56] Brittany Anderson: Yeah. So I want to preface this by saying, when people think about culture, sometimes that's not the fun, sexy strategy that business owners, regardless of what industry you're in, that they want to focus on, marketing, for example, is really fun and it's sexy and it's exciting and there's new things.

You have this whole attract and repel strategy that you really dive into and get excited about. What I would say is culture is absolutely it's the same thing. So when you think about the culture in your company, you're looking at who you want to attract and who you want to be on your team, and who you maybe want to repel.

Because indirectly what happens is if you're attracting the right kind of people doing the right things, all of a sudden your clients are being served at a completely different level because you have people coming to work, not just for a job. But for something that is fulfilling to them. So back to your question, when you think about the things that people are doing it's the whole concept of slow to hire quick to fire.

They are taking their time and they're finding the right person for the company, not the right person for the role. To go along with that, the people who you see that great success when you walk into a business and your body can literally feel the positive energy in the environment. Something that happens at our core business at Sweet Financial brick and mortar people walks in and they will literally get caught in conversation with our Director of First Impressions because she makes you feel like you have been family.

You are this long-lost friend. She wants to serve you. She's getting up and not just sitting behind the desk, she's walking around, she's closing that gap or closing that space, getting rid of the divide. And she's truly leaning into who they are as people what's got them excited and she's striking that conversation.

So again, the people that are doing things right. They're creating that atmosphere, they're encouraging their team members to have autonomy to make decisions. So instead of having to go up this hierarchal chain of command, which is actually why I personally got out of the corporate world, it wasn't for me you're giving autonomy to your people and saying, hey, I trust you.

I'm giving you the tools that you need to make decisions for our clients, for our customers. And I trust that if something goes wrong, You're going to do something to make it right and make sure it doesn't happen again. And if it goes right, then that's a win for the customer, the client, and that's a win for the company as a whole.

So those are a couple of things in general that you know when you really see those companies that stand out, they're taking their time. They're finding the right people for the culture, for the company as a whole. And they're giving that autonomy to people to make decisions.

[00:08:31] Jeffrey Feldberg: Wow. And for listeners out there, I hope you pick this up and we're listening because Brittany is walking the talk. I just love the title of that you came up with. You could have chosen anything, but you chose the Director of First Impressions. Wow. And it just goes back to the culture piece of how important that is.

And Brittany, I know offline, we were talking a little bit about this, and in the Deep Wealth Experience, this is our 90-day system with a 9-step roadmap. One of the things that we talk a lot about is how a future buyer will look at a company culture. And depending on the culture, if it's a toxic culture, one of two things is going to happen either there's no deal or the enterprise value. It's going to have a penalty. It's going to take a hit and go in the wrong direction. So let's talk a little bit about that. I know you and I are both the glass is half full at the same time though, we have to take a look around and know what to look for and what not to do. So in terms of a culture that's either toxic or it's not just right.

What are you seeing out there? And I would imagine the best practices that you're about to share, whether I'm a business owner, regardless of industry, what are the telltale signs of, hey, maybe something's not right here. Perhaps we need to focus on this and really make a difference.

[00:09:46] Brittany Anderson: Yeah. That's such a great question and you know, I wanna come in the whole, the glass is half full versus half empty, you know, optimist by nature. You can sense that in a person very quickly. However, I would argue that it doesn't matter if the glass is half full or half empty, it matters that it can be filled up again.

So I liken this to and back this into the whole culture aspect. When you think about. Some of the toxic traits. A lot of times it really boils down to a couple, maybe two, three core things. Number one, being micromanagement. If people feel stifled if they feel like they have to answer to multiple industries.

Like they cannot take action or they cannot make a decision or they cannot come up with a new idea without having to get permission per se from maybe one, maybe two, maybe even three layers deep. That is a culture killer because then all of a sudden people are feeling more robotic in nature versus like they are contributing to something.

The other thing too is if there is an atmosphere of fear. I'll say this first is that you definitely don't want to have a lackadaisical culture where it's yeah, you make a mistake, you fix it, you move on whatever. You want it to be a learning experience. So the ones that tend to have that more toxic nature is there might be a blow-up or the shame when somebody makes a mistake and the opportunity there is to say, okay something happened.

How can we walk through this to say this isn't going to happen again? How do we learn from it? Because odds are, if somebody makes that mistake, if somebody falls short, somebody else on the team absolutely could too. So that's a big component as well as making sure that every opportunity that could invoke fear is actually one that invokes excitement because it's a learning opportunity.

And then finally, it's this big C-word that every single business has an issue with at some point, I don't care how, you know, buttoned-up, you are with your culture, you know how optimistic you are in nature, how streamlined and process-oriented you are. If you have a let's just call it a lack in communication, that can be a culture killer.

And I've seen this even with organizations that have amazing culture, people still struggle with communication. You want to feel in the loop, but you don't want to be over-communicated to, as the owner, you want to make sure that you are communicating that vision, but you're not shoving it down their throat.

There's so many different layers of that, but that word, in particular, tends to come up. So making sure that you have a really good streamlined process for how you communicate. What gets communicated to your team, what's deemed important and what's deemed as just minutiae. So those are a few key things that can absolutely damper or damp in culture of the team.

And like you've said, Jeffrey, the ability to set up for sale that can be a big deal because the person coming into it's going to look at it as one massive headache and something that just can't be fixed. So make it easy for the end-user.

[00:12:45] Jeffrey Feldberg: And for the members of the Deep Wealth community. I know you're nodding with me because Brittany, you are preaching to the choir. And what's interesting is does your business run with you?

That's going to be key to number one, having some kind of liquidity event and even having a better-than-usual enterprise value. If you can go on vacation for six months as an example, and the businesses, even better, every buyer, every investor is going to want to see that. And then on the communication side that you're talking about, we call that the four points of clarity, and in the four points of clarity, another X-Factor increases enterprise value.

Communication is certainly top of the list and other things that you mentioned do I know what my role in the company is and why I'm doing it and why that's important and all those other things that go along with it, but for the business owners out there, what's interesting here is wouldn't you want to work with someone like Sweet Financial with Brittany and company before your liquidity event and know that you're getting some insights into the business of what you can do post-exit, that's going to take your new-found wealth and take it to the next level, but help you get there perhaps a little bit more worry-free. And let's speak about that, Brittany, let's talk a little bit about the post-exit life that could be a whole episode in and of itself. And I know you're in the very fortunate position of working with business owners after they've had a very successful liquidity event.

So what insights do you have? I'm a business owner. I'm having a liquidity event may be in a year from now or five years from now, or whatever the case may be. What can you tell us about the post-exit life that if I should be doing this today, I'll be better off tomorrow and the next day, and beyond?

[00:14:21] Brittany Anderson: That's such a great question and it's interesting because every liquidity event or every time a person decides to make some form of exit out of their business, regardless of what that means. If it just means you go from being majority to vast minority, or it goes from a complete exit where you're completely stepping away or it's a multi-generational transfer, whatever the case is, there's a couple of things that come into play here.

If you're leading up to that exit, the number one thing that we would say is making sure you have the right people in your court to help you make decisions. And it's people like Jeffrey you and your company that have helped business owners. How many times over, over the years to create a successful exit, they don't try to do this yourself.

You've never done this before. So have somebody in your corner that can absolutely help you. You know, get aligned with a CPA that actually has experience in these types of transfers align with an estate planning attorney, align with a wealth advisor. I think about on our team here, if we're able to connect with a business owner before they make some of the biggest decisions of their lives, that's when these types of events tend to become even more successful because they are leaning on the advice of others who have helped others time and time again.

So that's really, I think aside from any sort of strategy that you could put in place, that's more high level is just aligning the right people to get them in your court. A lot of times selling a business can create an invoke, a lot of emotion and for a business owner.

And this kind of leads me into my second part is oftentimes their entire identity has been tied to their business. So all of a sudden, you're not going to have that thing anymore, or it's at a much lesser capacity. So you're waking up in the morning going what now? I've had this purpose, I've had this you know, identity and I think that's why as a Testament, not to talk in a circle here, but Jeffrey, what you said too when people, it can sometimes be a little bit of a struggle to set yourself up, to be able to walk away for six months and take a vacation because they feel like they're needed and that's their purpose and that's where they need to be.

And that's what makes them feel important and fulfilled. When in reality, you're setting yourself up for much greater success by being able to become indispensable or not so indispensable to your business. So that really leads into the next part is aside from the creative tax planning strategies or tax savings strategies, aside from making sure that you're partnered with people that can help you come up with great legacy plans philanthropic by nature, you're looking at how you can contribute more and more down the line.

The number one thing that we hear is really helping them redefine their. What is next for me? Because if you are like a lot of the high-achieving high profile, you're an entrepreneurial by nature. You've been a business owner for a really long time. You're not one that's going to be okay with just going and golfing for the rest of your life, or just going off and sitting on a beach.

It might sound really fun because you've been busy and you've been running for how many years? But it's not sustainable and you're going to go crazy. And you're going to get that itch to get back into something. So we actually at Sweet Financial, we have a trademark process called the dream architect.

And to really put it in simple terms, it's a process of mapping out your future, creating the vision for what you want. Helping you find that purpose, putting you in touch with people who can help you dig into that, and then putting your wealth to work for you. You know, making sure that you're actually using the money in a way that's going to help you feel fulfilled and help you feel like you're putting some sort of contribution back into the world.

[00:17:54] Jeffrey Feldberg: Wow, Brittany, that is so powerful and full disclosure here. And I'll share this with you and the audience. My biggest mistakes came after the liquidity event, both on the personal side, also on the business side not before.

And the simple reason is lack of preparation. And for our listeners out there, I have to tell you if I had spoken to Brittany and company before my liquidity event, I can say with full confidence that it would have been some very different outcomes, less heavy lifting, less mistakes. And it's the one area that as business owners we never really think about.

Okay after the exit. Whatever that looks like for you. Maybe you've kept part of the company you brought in investors, or you took some chips off the table or a full exit, but you no longer have those responsibilities. The now what question? And Brittany, to your point, you travel the world? First-class, you buy your toys. Maybe you're sitting on some beach, which looks the same as all the other beaches. You walk back to that luxury hotel, which looks the same as all those other luxury hotels. And you ask yourself now what I'm bored out of my mind now what? And the process that you're talking about of just walking business owners through of preparing for that, then asking the right questions well In advance, that's worth the price of admission right there.

And then the confidence, which I didn't really have any of. Okay. Who can I trust to manage the funds, the capital, the wealth? What does that look like? And you know, to do that ahead of time with your process, with your system, you're really a one-stop-shop.

And that's very unique because you don't really see that a lot out there. So let me ask the question. How did you get into really this umbrella, if you will really from start of even before your liquidity event, all the way through, during the liquidity event, after the liquidity event, how did that come about I'm really curious?

[00:19:46] Brittany Anderson: Yeah. It's interesting. We have been so fortunate in our business to work with some amazing business owners. A lot of times we end up working with people that have less than 50 employees. A lot of times it does end up being some sort of a multi-generational facet to it. It honestly came from watching too many people's struggle in the earlier years.

And we took a look and said, we don't necessarily within Sweet Financial need to be the experts in all of these different areas of that pre, during, and post liquidity. But what we can do to be of service to our clients is align different professionals from different walks of life. That absolutely are experts in these different areas.

So for us, we tend to take a really collaborative approach in anything that we do. So we're looking at it going, okay there's a gap here. Maybe it is in again, I'm, talking about what you do to Jeffrey. Maybe it's just making sure you're making the right decisions leading up to it.

So you can maximize the opportunity in your sale. That may not be something that we have somebody physically on team or onsite to do, but we absolutely know people that can help and get you what you need there. Same thing with different estate planning attorneys and creative tax strategies. We absolutely try to tap into some of the brightest minds, some of the best professionals, for lack of better terms that we've encountered to be able to fill those gaps, fill those needs.

And we don't ever look at it as a competition situation. Our whole end goal is to make sure that the client, that this business owner has an incredibly successful liquidity event. And obviously, there's benefit to us on the other side because we ended up managing the wealth post-sale. But our whole goal is to make sure that they have an incredible experience, that they are taken care of, that they have a trusted network of advisors because what you said before is absolutely something that happens where you can know who to.

Are they telling me this because there's some advantage in it for them or, are they telling me this because they're going to get some great commission off of whatever you just don't know? And for us being able to provide that network of trusted individuals that we feel confident putting in front of our clients, putting in front of prospective clients, That's really what matters.

And that's what our whole end focus is. Give you the right people, put the professionals in your corner. You then focus on deciding what it is that you want out of life. Put your energy there rather than being sick every day, waking up with a pit in your stomach, because you don't know if you're making the right decision for your business, for the sale, for your tax proficiency, for your future, for the next generation, for your legacy.

All of those things, let other people who have helped others do that for you, so you can free your mind up to focus on the stuff, that's exciting. The good stuff.

[00:22:28] Jeffrey Feldberg: Yes, the F-word Brittany fun. Get some fun back into your life and business. And let me ask you this. And I'm going to put myself in this group as well. There's a lot of business owners who have this notion, particularly after a liquidity event that it's really his or her responsibility to manage that wealth. There are business owners that are really good at that, and God bless them and more to them for that. The majority of business owners, that's not the case. So what can you share with our listeners who do have this belief of why that's a myth and why you can actually let go in a responsible way and get back to that F-word fun in your life and whatever else you're doing in your next chapter after liquidity events. So what are you and your team doing Brittany to help with that?

[00:23:17] Brittany Anderson: Yeah. It really boils down to its value alignment. So when you look at it and the other term that comes to mind is opportunity cost. Yes, most of the time, or, almost all the time you get a business owners, they're incredibly smart individuals who are perfectly capable of managing their own wealth.

But you have to take a step back and say, is that really where my time is best spent? There are so many brilliant people out there who again, make decisions on people's finances, on their wealth, on their plans every single day. You're now having to navigate and learn all the things that all these people have spent a lifetime learning.

When you could be in turn, maybe creating a new business opportunity or you know, fulfilling your entrepreneurial nature or doing something, that really feeds your soul in a charitable fashion. Be it time, be it money, be it energy, be it, whatever. So it really boils down to opportunity cost it's you know, what is truly fulfilling to you? Because most of the time, what we have seen is you might have somebody that does have this type of liquidity event. We also deal a lot with sudden inheritance through that multi-generational factor and they go, okay well, I think I can do this on my own. Then they end up having to lean on us anyway, to ask a million questions, to make sure they're understanding it.

And then at some point, they're like, forget this. This is horrible. Why do you guys do this for a living? Just go ahead and take it over because I'm realizing this is a lot more time and energy. And the thing to think about too is for a business, be it suite financial, be it another wealth planning firm deals in a similar capacity.

We have processes in place to help take the pain away. We have teams of individuals to help make decisions for your future, for your finances, for your wealth plan. If you go it alone, you're alone. Like you can read different resources, you can join different masterminds. You can maybe make some informed decisions there, but again, it's how much brain capacity do you want to spend on that?

When there's so much creative energy and so many opportunities for people to do really good things in this world and still have your wealth managed in an amazing capacity in an amazing way. So really focusing on what do you value where's your time spent and is it really worth it for you to take it on alone.

[00:25:26] Jeffrey Feldberg: I'm wondering if you can share with our audience what happened in the early days of the pandemic for your clients that you're able to give them some peace of mind, protect their capital preservation, of course. And how did all that work out?

[00:25:40] Brittany Anderson: You know, It's interesting because, you know, think back to 2008, 2009, massive market downturn, time of recession. And at that point in time, a lot of the clients that we worked with, maybe hadn't been through such a tragic event, such an emotional roller coaster when it comes to their money.

Fast forward to the pandemic and it was interesting. We had very few people that had that same exhibited those same nerves and that same scarcity mindset that maybe happened during the '08, '09 downturn. For us, we have been preaching for years and years and years. Basically, pivoted from the 2008, 2009 happenings is helping people stay focused on the long game.

So when you really look at the charts, yes, the market's over the past, they have gone down, they have gone down exponentially, but if you look at the trends, guess what else has happened? They have come back up. So if history repeats itself, having the strength of mind to be able to stay true to your course, to be able to look at your goals, your objectives.

It's one of those things where people might watch some singular component of the markets or some singular part of the financial industry in general, and it will make them nervous and they're going, oh my gosh, this is going down. This is so horrible. And they come into their review and you're like actually, you have a very balanced and we tend to take you know, I don't know how else to say it, but it's the boring approach.

It's the long game, we're not trying to catch the next best investment. It's looking at how we can align what you've said you want your money to do for you. What you've identified, what you've said is your goal. Let's then measure against that versus some proverbial component of the markets. So really when you look at the pandemic, those were the conversations that we were having is, hey, let's take a look at what you've said is important to you.

Let's make sure that you're still on track with your goals. Let's look at what might happen, should the worst case scenario happen, how that might affect you. And it was interesting, the majority of those conversations were actually really positive in nature because we've been doing this and talking about this through other difficult times.

So I feel like we have a little bit of an advantage there actually if you want to look at what went on in the past as a positive. The people that stayed steadfast and held on they get it. And that's what they're doing right now. And that's what they've been doing for the past couple of years.

[00:27:52] Jeffrey Feldberg: And for our listeners out there as you're hearing what Brittany is sharing, I know for myself, I'm just feeling this wave of peace of mind that's coming over because it really, you have the professionals that are there. This is all they do day in day out. Do you really want to gamble with your future wealth or do you want to have it managed professionally? Have the capital preserved first and foremost, and then to grow that part of it.

And Brittany, I'm curious because you're really involved in the community. I know that you're also doing some coaching with financial advisors as well and I'm wondering what's that all about? And why are you doing that? What's that looking like?

[00:28:29] Brittany Anderson: Yeah. It's interesting. I mentioned before that the founder, Bryan Sweet, and I, founder of Sweet Financial Partners we were talking about how it's so hard watching businesses in particular reinvent the wheel. So you deal and you work with business owners over the years in our core business. Bryan has an amazing network of advisor friends that he has different study groups he's part of. In turn, I've been able to meet a ton of advisors from all across the nation.

And we kept seeing the same issues, time and time again. Through a couple of different events, we decided, you know what, let's create something that helps financial advisors because this is the industry that we're in that we eat, sleep and breathe that we're actually practicing day by day.

Let's help people to not have to reinvent the wheel. When it comes to building their business, let's help them to create killer cultures and to create sustainability for their business, and to give them freedom. So they don't feel like they have the golden handcuffs that they have to sit and stick to their desk.

A huge attraction point, I guess you could say is Bryan, he takes at least at a minimum of 16 weeks off, totally disconnected from the business and it doesn't just do Okay.

It grows. So it goes back to Jeffrey what you said before about being able to create a business that you can actually step away from and it's fine. That's a really great thing for your team, for the future, for your own potential liquidity. And so that's really what we started looking at is saying, how can we bring all the things that we have learned and put them in front of advisors, but not just any advisor. Advisors that are hungry for growth, that want to learn, that will actually implement the things that we talk about.

We've really created a few different legs. We brought in another great partner of ours. We had actually had him as a consultant still do to this day brought in Draye Redfern of Redfern Media and he brings some of the marketing, the automation, that brilliance into it. Bryan having over 40 years and experience in this industry.

So he brings some of those best practices, that practice management component, the growth, the scalability. And then for me, I brought in what I have been doing for how many years is helping build cultures and helping build teams and helping you free up your brain to be able to focus on the things that you love and you enjoy.

And putting the right people in the right seats to drive the bus for you. So you be the vision, you create that path and then you get people behind you that are hungry to get you towards it. So that's really what the coaching is it's all capacities of the business, all facets of the business.

And it's bringing in again, brilliant people that can come and share their genius and help you grow. And the way that they've helped us.

[00:31:04] Jeffrey Feldberg: Wow, Brittany, that's truly magnanimous. So here you are, you're successful and you're taking your secret sauce and you're sharing it with what some on the outside could say, would be potential competitors. So what's going on with that? Why is that happening?

[00:31:19] Brittany Anderson: It's like my favorite question. So, you know, one thing I would say is that there are absolutely people out there that they want to steal your ideas. They come into the programs because they're like, oh, we like, how Sweet does it, are we like how the network does it and we're going to get all these ideas and we're going to run.

The bottom line is the implementation quotient is so slim to none. You know what, if we put our best ideas out there, the odds are is that the people who are coming to steal per se they're not going to implement it like we did. They're not going to take the same path.

They're not going to have the same people. So you run that risk anytime you put your expertise or your genius out into the world. But if we can on the other side of things, help some really great, brilliant advisers to avoid some pain, to implement some things into their business that help them in a multitude of different capacities.

I'll just use this as an example. We have a podcast, Ultimate Advisor Podcast, and Bryan was hosting a conference that he hosts every single year, Elite Wealth Advisor Symposium. This adviser, gentlemen, who had gotten onto the list. Somehow he comes up to Bryan and he's like, I got to tell you something.

He's like, I have been listening to your podcast. You guys share so many things on there, but I have to tell you underlying I have been battling cancer for years, and I was very sick there for a while. And the only thing that really got me through and kept me motivated was listening to your guys' podcast.

It's huge. And we're sitting there going, I think every business owner, every entrepreneur at some point in your life goes, what the heck am I doing? What am I doing this for? This is a lot of work. This is hard. This is exhausting. And then things like that happen.

And you step back and go okay, this is something, this is for purpose. And again, if we're putting our best practices out there and talking about mindset and making sure that you make informed decisions and you're doing good things for your business and you're helping your team and you're creating possibility for your clients and for the future of others.

And for yourself. If we can put that out there and it can help somebody, that's worth it. The people who want to steal it. And there's a few of them out there. Unfortunately, we've battled that before. But the good side far outweighs the bad.

[00:33:32] Jeffrey Feldberg: So congratulations on being able to really take the high road, do the right thing, pay it forward and make a difference. You don't hear that all the time. And it is really wonderful to hear.

And it's always great coming out of an episode that there's some immediate takeaways, whether I'm a business owner or a financial advisor that we're just speaking about, and maybe it's the same for both, or maybe you're going to have some pearls of wisdom that we can segment out coming out of here if there was, I don't know, maybe one or two or three pearls of wisdom that I should be thinking about or doing, I can start taking some immediate action. What would that be?

[00:34:10] Brittany Anderson: That's such a great question. The number one thing that I would say is right down something that you are fearful of right now. When it comes to actually taking action, write down what you're afraid of and then do something intentional to move past that. So it might be a tough conversation you need to have in your business, maybe with a business partner, maybe with a team member you know, it might be taking a chance on a new business.

But I think one thing that we do is we can let fear get in the way of leaning into our full potential and What we were put on this great earth to do. So I would say that is the number one. Another side nugget to is align the people I know I've talked about this a couple times, but get the right people in your corner and create a network that is full of people who have actually done the things that you're trying to do.

There is no sense in like I've said before, reinventing the wheel. There is no sense in trying to feel like you have to be this Lone Ranger and go it alone. It's not worth it. It's not worth the stress. So making sure that you have the right people in your corner for all different reasons. I mentioned briefly, but if you're listening to this and you are a business owner who is approaching some big liquidity event, or you've maybe already gone through the transition.

Sometimes the emotional impact is even bigger than the financial impact and making sure that you have people that you can truly talk to that have that same entrepreneurial drive or that have gone through it. And they can actually meet you where you're at versus getting advice from people that they have good intentions and they're good-willed, but they just don't know what it feels like.

So I think having the right people in your corner and then overcoming fear, those are the two, I think, biggest nuggets that I would offer up.

[00:35:56] Jeffrey Feldberg: Words to the wise and so true and everything that you said. So Brittany, let's begin to wrap up the episode, and let's do a thought experiment. This is one of my favorite questions that I have the privilege of asking every guest.

[00:36:08] Brittany Anderson: Love it.

[00:36:09] Jeffrey Feldberg: So Brittany, think of the movie Back to the Future and in the movie, you have that magical DeLorean car and it can take you to any point in time of your choosing.

So imagine now it's tomorrow morning, you look outside your window and there it is. The DeLorean car is there. The door is open. It's waiting for you to hop on in and you can now go to any point in your life Brittany, as a child or a teenager, a young adult, whatever the case would be. What would you be telling your younger self in terms of, hey, Brittany, here's some life wisdom or some life lessons or don't do this, or do that?

What would you be telling yourself?

[00:36:46] Brittany Anderson: Ooh, that is such a good question. I think I would go back to my early teenage self and I think I would tell her that the stuff that you think matters. It really doesn't. And what feels really big and really real right now in a couple of short years is going to feel like a distant memory that either has maybe a little emotion attached, but probably a lot of humor.

And with that to just not take yourself so darn seriously. I think that's one thing where, and I think this carries forward into our adult lives is that we feel like when we're in the moment and things are overwhelming and frustrating and draining that it is the end of the free world. We feel like our problems are bigger than anything else around us.

And I think if we really slowed down to ask ourselves, is this gonna matter in a week, a year, or five years from now? Is it really going to matter? Is it really gonna make a difference? I think a majority of the time, the stuff that we are telling ourselves in our own brain, the six inches between our ears, that it's really not as heavy as what we make it out to be.

So that's where I would go.

[00:37:56] Jeffrey Feldberg: Don't take yourself so seriously. I think some great advice there for us and some wonderful life wisdom. And Brittany, we're going to put this in the show notes, including your books and everything else, but if somebody would like to reach you online, where would be the best place to do that?

[00:38:10] Brittany Anderson: Yeah, so you can very easily go to sweetfinancial.com. There's contact forms there that you can put in otherwise I answer every email that gets sent my way brittany [at]sweetfinancial[dot]com.

[00:38:23] Jeffrey Feldberg: Brittany, a special heartfelt thank you to you for taking part of your day and spending it with us on the Deep Wealth, Sell My Business Podcast. And as always, please stay healthy and safe.

[00:38:33] Brittany Anderson: Thank you so much.

[00:38:34] Sharon S.: The Deep Wealth Experience was definitely a game-changer for me.

[00:38:38] Lyn M.: This course is one of the best investments you will ever make because you will get an ROI of a hundred times that. Anybody who doesn't go through it will lose millions.

[00:38:48] Kam H.: If you don't have time for this program, you'll never have time for a successful liquidity

[00:38:52] Sharon S.: It was the best value of any business course I've ever taken. The money was very well spent.

[00:38:59] Lyn M.: Compared to when we first began, today I feel better prepared, but in some respects, may be less prepared, not because of the course, but because the course brought to light so many things that I thought we were on top of that we need to fix.

[00:39:14] Kam H.: I 100% believe there's never a great time for a business owner to allocate extra hours into his or her week or day. So it's an investment that will yield results today. I thought I will reap the benefit of this program in three to five years down the road. But as soon as I stepped forward into the program, my mind changed immediately.

[00:39:37] Sharon S.: There was so much value in the experience that the time I invested paid back so much for the energy that was expended.

[00:39:47] Lyn M.: The Deep Wealth Experience compared to other programs is the top. What we learned is very practical. Sometimes you learn stuff that it's great to learn, but you never use it. The stuff we learned from Deep Wealth Experience, I believe it's going to benefit us a boatload.

[00:40:00] Kam H.: I've done an executive MBA. I've worked for billion-dollar companies before. I've worked for smaller companies before I started my business. I've been running my business successfully now for getting close to a decade. We're on a growth trajectory. Reflecting back on the Deep Wealth, I knew less than 10% what I know now, maybe close to 1% even.

[00:40:19] Sharon S.: Hands down the best program in which I've ever participated. And we've done a lot of different things over the years. We've been in other mastermind groups, gone to many seminars, workshops, conferences, retreats, read books. This was so different. I haven't had an experience that's anything close to this in all the years that we've been at this.

It's five-star, A-plus.

[00:40:45] Kam H.: I would highly recommend it to any super busy business owner out there.

Deep Wealth is an accurate name for it. This program leads to deeper wealth and happier wealth, not just deeper wealth. I don't think there's a dollar value that could be associated with such an experience and knowledge that could be applied today and forever.

[00:41:04] Jeffrey Feldberg: Are you leaving millions on the table?

Please visit www.deepwealth.com/success to learn more.

If you're not on my email list, you'll want to be. Sign up at www.deepwealth.com/podcast. And if you enjoyed this episode of the Sell My Business podcast, please leave a review on Apple Podcasts. Reviews help me reach new listeners, grow the show and continue to create content that you'll enjoy.

As we close out this episode, a heartfelt thank you for your time. And as always, please stay healthy and safe.

This podcast is brought to you by Deep Wealth. 

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Your liquidity event is the most important financial transaction of your life. You have one chance to get it right, and you better make it count. 

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Enjoy the interview!