Tonya Eberhart & Michael Carr On How To Create And Leverage Your Brand To Win (#153)

[00:00:00] Jeffrey Feldberg: Welcome to the Deep Wealth podcast where you learn how to extract your business and personal Deep Wealth.

I'm your host Jeffrey Feldberg.

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 Tonya Eberhart and Michael Carr are international bestselling authors, hosts of the Be Bold Branding Podcast, and partners in BrandFace.

They have helped and inspired authors, podcasters coaches, real estate agents, and sales professionals in five countries and 44 States to stand out and become an authority in their markets through the power of personal branding.

BrandFace started as a project when Tonya was selling vacuum cleaners door to door to pay her way through college. Her approach was discovered by someone in the radio industry, which began a career-long journey of helping serious professionals become recognizable business stars through the power of personal branding.

As Tonya and Michael say, people don't do business with a logo. They do business with a person.

Welcome to the Deep Wealth podcast. And as usual, I not only have a terrific episode lined up, but we have a dynamic do all that is just gonna rock your world. When you think of your brand and what you're gonna do with your business and not just see, how others are doing, but actually learn step by step some of the things that you probably don't know, but you should, but I'm gonna stop right there. No spoiler alerts here. So Tonya, Michael, welcome to the Deep Wealth podcast, such a delight to have you with us. And there's always a story behind this story. What's your story? What got you to where you are today?

[00:03:07] Tony Eberhart and Michael Carr: Jeffrey, first of all, thank you so much for having us. Absolutely. Thank you. We are excited to be here. And so my story begins back in college. I ended up in the radio industry. I ended up in sales. I got there actually through selling vacuum cleaners door to door. And I realized that that's where my own personal story came in.

I couldn't just walk up to somebody's house and expect them to pull out their wallet and buy a vacuum cleaner for me. I had to kind of position myself and say, hey, this is my story. Poor pitiful me, let me in the door. I'm in college. And then I was discovered actually selling vacuum cleaners by somebody on radio.

And I was invited into the radio industry on the sales side of things. And that's where I understood very quickly, how personal branding has such an impact on a business. I noticed that there were lots of business owners who were almost like rock stars in their industry. And the one thing they had in common, most of them is that they were the face and the voice of their own business. So they were in their radio commercials, their newspaper ads, their TV ads back then there was no internet. I'm gonna date myself here. Jeffrey, there was no internet. So that's really where it went from how do I tell my own story and position myself to, okay.

Now, how do I tell my client's stories and position them for success? And that led me through a lot of years in the media world. And then I opened up my own small agency for a little while, but it was when I really focused in and thought, okay, I'm gonna center in on something that I'm very passionate about.

Something that I'm very good at. And I looked through back at my life and thought, the common thread through everything has been personal branding. That was almost a decade ago. And BrandFace became a book first. And in short, order became a business right after that. And that's about the same time that I met Michael.

[00:05:04] Jeffrey Feldberg: And Michael, why don't we pick up the story from there, but, just before we do, wow. Tonya door to door, I mean, that's probably the toughest kind of sales that you can do. I mean, you really earn your stripes with that. And pre-internet, I mean, for some of our listeners, it's like, what? there was a world before the internet,

[00:05:20] Tony Eberhart and Michael Carr: Yeah. And cell phones and the fax machine for that matter, let's go even deeper into this Jeffrey.

[00:05:26] Jeffrey Feldberg: There we go. There we go. And Michael, what about yourself? What's the story behind the story there?

[00:05:32] Tony Eberhart and Michael Carr: Well, Small town guy, north of Atlanta, and grew up in the suburbs. And my dad was in the car business. I didn't wanna be in the car business, but we bought cars at auction. I loved the auction business. So my first passion right outta high school was to be an auctioneer. And I was a circuit auctioneer.

So cars in the South Carolina, North Carolina, Tennessee, Alabama, Northern Florida, Georgia area. My mentor told me to get my real estate license. He said I could make a little extra money selling farm sales on the weekends, something like that. I did it in 2000 I opened up my own brokerage, but still just to have the autonomy, to build my own real estate portfolio and help my family and friends to buy the house or a piece of property or something that no serious thought of being a broker.

But in 2006, when right at the edge of the mortgage debacle because of my experience level in selling real estate and being an auctioneer and having multiple licenses, I partnered with a company out of Irvine, California, and we went after the bear Stern's residential portfolio and got it. Most of it probably I would say 90% of it that led me on a seven-year trek.

Starting in 2007, I ended up licensed in 31 states. I had an office in Atlanta, office in Irvine, office in Seattle, office in Manhattan. I spent a lot of time in all the major cities sold property in 31 states ended up being involved in over 65,000 transactions at the time, but good auction years are always working themselves out of a job.

So I came back to my small town and bought a piece of property. The other agent on the other side of the property sale. Said that we work good together. Let's open up a brokerage. And I said if you'll run it help me. I'll do it. I never had the plan to do it, but I gotta do something. Wanna do something I'm young and vibrant.

And that's when she's about two weeks in, she said your marketing stinks and you need help and you need to meet my niece, Tonya. And I was still going across the country, trying to close down the offices. We didn't, need anymore, and, cleaning up, sweeping up the floors, cleaning up the messes that we left in blazing a trail, and I was like, whatever. And I never called her. And one day I get I'm in San Bernardino, California to get a call from a lovely lady with a lovely voice. And she says, I don't know if I'm supposed to call you or you're supposed to call me, but I'm Tonya. And Carolyn says you need help with your marketing.

And I literally said I've had five others just like you. I don't need another one. And she said, you've never had anybody like me, and I know what I'm talking about and I'll show you. And she did. And so I hired her and there in San Bernardino, California, and we made an agreement. She came into our brokerage and immediately transformed it through the power of the personal branding that she had been working on through several decades and transformed our company.

Like literally overnight. We discovered so many mistakes on the branding that we can get into. I was a marketer and a promoter, but I had no idea about what a brand was or how it really makes the difference in companies. And she taught me all of that. And so now I get to say to people like you, that secret of my success is just listening to her. I love that part. Of course.

[00:08:30] Jeffrey Feldberg: What a great story on both friends you really cover off a lot of points. So now that we got the story behind the story and it's it's just amazing how it all fits together, but at the time it probably didn't seem that way, but it is just working beautifully. So let's talk about that.

So for most business owners listening in who haven't had the benefit of going through your system, the book, hearing what you guys have to say, getting your insights on wisdom. Where do most business owners get it wrong? What's happening or in this case what's not happening out there?

[00:09:00] Tony Eberhart and Michael Carr: The number one mistake they make is trying to market themselves without a clear brand without a clearly defined brand. And I think that the biggest reason for that is there is confusion about the difference between branding and marketing and we in a very simplistic way, Jeffrey kind of give the answer to that. So marketing is simply utilizing different marketing vehicles or channels to get a message and image out there. It could be billboards, it could be radio commercials. It could be YouTube ads. Doesn't matter what it is. Your brand is the message and image that you put on those marketing vehicles to get them out to the world.

And so a lot of people think I'm just gonna do YouTube ads or I'm going to run television commercials or whatever it is. But they don't really think about, okay, why are you doing what you're doing? They don't think about the five critical questions that every great brand must answer.

And those are exactly who do you serve? How do you serve them? What qualifies you to serve them? How does it make their life better? And what makes you different from everybody else? Also trying to serve that same customer. So that's where it all begins.

[00:10:18] Jeffrey Feldberg: Wow. Tonya, what are you saying? I just can't show up for these marketing things that I'm doing and just throw some kind of logo out there. And somehow magically customers are just gonna show up at my door. You're saying I gotta think about this and do a little bit of work ahead of time?

[00:10:30] Tony Eberhart and Michael Carr: If it hurts your feelings. I apologize then. Yes. That's what I'm saying. You absolutely do.

[00:10:35] Jeffrey Feldberg: And as you talk about that, and I love the five questions that you put out there, how has marketing changed, particularly with social media? And the reason that I ask that I suspect some of our listeners are. I'll call it maybe old-school marketing, not so much on the social media. Yeah. I don't really need that.

That's not who our customer base is and they're not really on that kind of stuff. What's going on out there in the marketing world?

[00:10:58] Tony Eberhart and Michael Carr: I believe it's brought more of the personal into play because in the business world before social media came along, you didn't really see the person. You didn't see them on video. You didn't see photos of their family. You didn't see the things that they were doing on a personal basis. And now with social media, which, the first intention of social was just to be social.

It really was not intended for business at all in the beginning. And that has that's toed line, now it's utilized for both, of course, but that's what has happened is it's brought, it's forced us to showcase more of our personal side, which I believe is a truly a strong point because it allows people to see what kind of person you're doing business with, what are their values or morals even outside of the business world.

And it really allows us to see a little bit deeper and make a more educated choice about the person we're doing business with.

[00:11:54] Jeffrey Feldberg: And with that, for the business owners that are saying, oh, okay, geez, I gotta be vulnerable. Now I gotta put myself out there. You just used to put the business out there. And that was that. But on the flip side, they're saying, yeah, Tonya, Michael I hear you on that. But, you know what, I'm just not one of those multi-gazillion dollar companies, a fortune 10 or fortune 100, they have these big budgets and yeah, they do all these branding kinds of things.

Why would that apply to me as a small business or mid-level size business? Why should I care about that?

[00:12:25] Tony Eberhart and Michael Carr: I'm living proof of that hybrid, you know, I was that guy 30 years in business. I started in 1992. And they didn't have the internet was around a little bit, but we didn't really have the internet. Like we know it now of course barely had cell phones back then they were bag phones.

You if y'all remember and that sort of thing, but you know, and then to come into this era that now is a more open society like back then there was no way you would get a personal cell phone number of a CEO of any size company, you had to get through his gatekeeper.

You had no idea where he lived. You had no idea what his family was like. Unless you were lucky enough to live close enough. And now it's a click away. And I remember 10 years into my career. I bought a website from a charity auction that I actually did nobody bid on it. So I did, I think I paid 125 bucks for this full website. And I remember getting it built out. I didn't even know what to put on it. I didn't know anything about it really. And she couldn't help me. She was just a web designer. She wasn't a marketer. She went, but then one time I went to get the insurance about three years after that. And the insurance agent looked up my website.

And literally, while I was on the phone with him, told me how I needed the insurance for every division, not just one of what the website was. And it was a stark reality to me at that time. I'm like, what? So why would she go? Why would she, why is this becoming a part of our identity now? And that was back in 1997, 98, something like that.

It's definitely a part of our identity now. And people know like in the real estate business, especially, which is what I'm in NAR did a study on it 94% of people are going to look you up online, your social media, what you're doing, what you're about, what your message, who you are, what type of person you are, what kind of pictures you're showing on your website and what kinda message you're putting out there before they ever call you.

Before they even think about doing business with you. And we say in BrandFace we deal with clients in 45 states, five different countries. We've got an international staff of people that help us to do that. So we have all these different cultures and colloquialism, if you will, that is infused in what we do.

And all of them agree that it's exactly the same, no matter what industry you're in. So it's never been more important now for people to say, I'm not used to that, but I need to be a part of that because that's where your customers are going. And it doesn't matter if you're an attorney. It doesn't matter if you're a, if you're in a service forward-facing business of any kind, then it is very important that people know who they're dealing with.

[00:14:46] Jeffrey Feldberg: Wow. So there's a lot to unpack there, but let me ask you this. And I'm probably gonna oversimplify things. So just bear with me on that. So let's imagine a business owner comes to you and, you know, I know you could probably say Jeffrey, what kind of business? Where are they at? What's their industry?

What are they doing? How large are they? You know, all those kinds of things, but work with me on this for a little bit. So they come to BrandFace and they say, okay, here I am. I've been in business for however many number of years. I've done well, I've been successful, but I wanna grow the company.

And I just want to take it to the next level. Maybe even have some kind of liquidity event, maybe three to five years down the road, but I don't know where to start or what to do. The whole marketing game has changed BrandFace. You have this system you've changed businesses. You've changed lives heard about you through the books, your podcast, everything else that, that you've done, please help me.

So what does that look like when someone starts to work with BrandFace with the system, can you walk us through what we could expect and what we're gonna be doing?

[00:15:43] Tony Eberhart and Michael Carr: Yeah, Absolutely. I'll simplify it back for you. Jeffrey. We do a simple process called the 3D process three, we call it our 3d freedom formula because it allows you as a professional to attain the freedom that you want to attain to grow your business the way you want and attract the people you wanna attract.

But that 3d, it stands for define, develop and display. And it's just a simple process. We start with defining by asking those five questions. Who are you trying to attract? How do you serve them? What makes you different from everybody else in your space? You know, what are you known for, or what do you wanna be known for?

So that's all kind of wrapped up in the define stage of things. That's what we look at. Because if you think about it, this all goes back to why marketing is such a problem. How do you even know where to market or what to put in your marketing? Unless first of all, you know who it is you're trying to attract and then you know how to attract them.

So you gotta figure that out first and that's all part of the brand. So that's what we do in the defined phase. The development phase is where we take after that definition, then we take everything that goes along with explaining what it is that made you that valuable to that person, to that ideal customer.

And then we start develop things like your bio, your signature soundbites which are your branded to glance your elevator pitch. And then we go further of course you gotta get into imagery. We know that a picture's worth a thousand words, it's gotta be the right thousand words. It's gotta match what you're telling everybody, and that's gotta match what you're trying to portray in your messaging to the ideal customer you're trying to do business with.

Background colors, logos, this is where logos come in. Everybody gets hung up on a logo for a brand first and foremost, but it's really, it's not the first thing that we look at because it's not personal. It's not, we wanna know about the person. You know, we have a huge questionnaire that we go through with our clients.

We look at 77 different criteria and when we're building out that brand. And so after the development phase, you gotta develop all of those parts and pieces out to where they have one seamless message. And then the final piece is pretty easy. It displays you wanna put those puzzle pieces together and display those correctly and consistently across every place that you market. Every place you put yourself out there, whether it's social media organically, whether it's in your advertising, whatever that is, you infuse that brand and those branding elements into everything you do.

So the message image is consistent.

[00:18:15] Jeffrey Feldberg: And so let's take what you just shared with us and let's take a few steps back. Let's actually look back so we can look forward and you know what we've had, if you look back the past two or three years have really been interesting across a whole number of friends. And so coming out of that, as we look to the future now, how has the past two or three years with the pandemic coming outta the pandemic, all these new social rules that are being written and some of them still being written every day it seems like what's changed out there from a marketing side? And what should we know about as business owners and looking to get out there marketing-wise that we need to think about and change?

[00:18:51] Tony Eberhart and Michael Carr: That's easy and simplified right off the back COVID did nothing but pushed the internet even further into a necessity of doing business. No matter what you do. Because we went through a timeframe where human connectivity was impossible. And if not just from our, all of our concern about what that would do and passing that on and continuing that pandemic, but also, the how we're gonna continue our businesses.

If we can't do that, especially like me being in real estate business. It was really for a second, we were like, you know, how you gonna show a house? How you gonna put people in cars, how you gonna ride around into going into people's houses that they don't want you in their yard much that's their house. Nobody knows how to deal with this thing. It pushed the internet to the forefront. So then now it becomes to people who had, that's why zoom went crazy on the stock price. I wish I'd been smart enough to buy some, we had been using zoom for 10 years in that sort of platform.

And then all of a sudden everybody was using it out of a necessity. So I would dare say that the internet now is even more important, no matter what your industry is and how you build that out. And how do you display yourself is more important than it's ever been.

[00:20:00] Jeffrey Feldberg: Wow. So certainly some game changers there and really what it sounds like with what you're saying, Michael, is perhaps those business owners that were a little bit reluctant to get onto the internet. Now would be the time, not tomorrow, not next month, it would be now. And so let me ask you this.

I love how you walked us through the different questions, the different phases, how you're doing that whole needs analysis. You're finding the gaps of what's there, what's not there when we go through the brand phase system and things are starting to click, let's share with our listeners, what can we expect from that?

Because the reason I'm asking is when you speak to business owners, one of the things, particularly when it comes to marketing it's such a black box. And this is where you tend to hear the horror stories. Yeah. Jeffrey, I lost, I can't tell you how much money I lost. And it was such a waste of time.

And I tried all these different agencies and went to the next and I was promised the sun, the moon, the stars, and I got nothing. And so let's start to change that narrative. So when you're with the right group, you have the right system. What can we start to expect? Can you walk us through that life cycle of what starts to happen in one?

[00:21:05] Tony Eberhart and Michael Carr: Yeah, absolutely. First, they panic a little. Okay. and that's because they're not really used to telling their story, especially sharing anything personal. And of course, we don't go deeply personal. But you have to share a little bit of yourself because people don't do business with a logo. They do business with a person.

So it starts there. There's a little bit of an uncomfortable part of what they're going through. They're just not used to it. The second thing is confidence, a huge amount of confidence because as this brand starts to come to life, they become so proud of what they've created. Oh, wow. My photos. I can't believe they turned out that great, this brand.

Wow. It's coming together. Now, I can finally tell my story. It makes sense. It's clear my materials look fantastic. Can you imagine the pride and the confidence that comes from something like that? When all you've known in the past is all these failed marketing attempts. So, and then that goes into the next phase would be just like giddiness because of recognition.

 You're out and about people rec, oh, aren't you, the guy who aren't you, the lady who, and then next thing you know, it's yeah, this thing's working. This is awesome because they're recognizing you, not only by your face, your BrandFace, but they're recognizing you also for what you stand for.

What do you wanna be known for? And that's really truly what we focus on. What is your story? Why are you doing what you're doing and what are you known for?

[00:22:32] Jeffrey Feldberg: That's terrific. And but let's talk about, okay, so we're starting from here. We wanna get to there. So with BrandFace, just so we can get a sense of what's going on. Behind the scenes is this where you have all the people who, if I choose to, I can have you do the copy, do the graphics.

If there's gonna be some kind of filming involved, you're gonna do the filming, the editing, all of that. So where do you start? Where do you stop?

[00:22:56] Tony Eberhart and Michael Carr: Okay. Yeah. You want me to take that one? Yeah, those are good nuts and bolts questions. Let's get into it. Okay. So the very first thing we do is we tackle the brand messaging. So there's seven things that we do together with our clients. Seven things we do in order that's really important to know too Jeffrey is order is hugely important.

A lot of people go straight for the logo or the, for the photo shoot. Okay. So what we do first is the brand messaging, simply because that's the story. That's what all the rest of it is built upon. That's what everything else adds fullness to, so we wanna know who are you, where did you come from. What, or who might have influenced you in your life to do what you're do doing today and why are you doing it for the people you're doing it for and how are you impacting their lives?

It all starts right there. So once we do that, then we take a look at, okay what does the logo look like? What is that one symbolic representation of the beginning of a brand? Now one element of the brand, right? Everybody looks at a logo and says, that's my brand. Or they think their business name is their brand and that's not it, their brand is really more their reputation, what they're known for.

 It can be defined many different ways, but I look at it as what are you known for? What are you known for? So we look at the logo then, and then we take a look at their background imagery, of course, brand colors come with the logo. We wanna solidify the brand colors because that's really important that comes along with the logo phase.

We look at background imagery. So for instance, Michael on his he's got billboards up and down the 85 corridors in the Atlanta area. And one of the, in the background image that we use behind the photo of him on all his billboards is the north Georgia mountains. We chose that as one of his signature branding images several years back because it's one of the reasons people move to this area, the beauty of the landscape in the north Georgia mountains.

It's absolutely gorgeous. So when you see those mountains, first thing you think is, oh, that's Michael again, that's Michael again. So there's that familiarity that comes from utilizing the branded images. And then we take a look at a photo shoot for you. We look at making sure your website's customized with all of the new branding elements, all your new photos, photos of you.

Your logo, your brand messaging, we customize all of your social media platforms. We customize all your collateral materials, things like your business card, personalized note cards, things like that. So that's pretty much the order that we go in. As we're moving forward, we build the brand.

We kind of stop at the marketing phase of it. We don't market for you. We give you every single thing that you need to market yourself on any platform, period.

[00:25:43] Jeffrey Feldberg: And, you know what's really interesting with that Tonya and for our listeners out there, let's now tie this together. So I've been doing lots of nuts and bolts questions, Michael, as you refer to. And that was very deliberately because here's the big picture with this. So, You know what, as a business owner, I'm thinking of having a liquidity event and that's not done in isolation.

So when you put your business out there and you do it right, you're gonna go through the Deep Wealth nine-step roadmap, of course, nudge, wink, wink. And at the same time, you're gonna be bringing on your whole advisory team. You're getting a competitive process, going all these buyers are gonna be coming to the table.

What's the first thing that's gonna happen? Your future buyer or your future buyers. Are gonna be looking, they're gonna be researching you. Do you have a website? What does a website say? What's the picture like of you is a picture of you from 20 years ago that when they come to meet you, they're looking around the room and they can't find you because you haven't updated things.

Are you current? Are you updated with all those things? And so when you get the brand because the brand to me, and please correct me if I'm off base the brand and the origin story and the brand promise is everything. If you don't get that right well for a liquidity event, you're gonna have some issues, but even before the liquidity event, you're probably gonna have some business challenges that come along with that.

Because like you said earlier a little bit of a different spin on it. In my experience, we don't do business with strangers. We prefer to do business with friends. And when you got the story, when you got the branding, when you got all that out there and it's consistent, and it's just doing all the right things that should.

We didn't have a comfort level. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Michael, I, yeah, I remember Michael, and I've seen his billboards and I've heard his message a gazillion times. I, you know what I think he's a great guy. I can trust, let me give him a call because I think he can help me with this particular issue that I'm having.

And so from that perspective, this is where we can all tie that together. So I would love your thoughts on that little commentary there.

[00:27:33] Tony Eberhart and Michael Carr: Yeah, I would agree with a 100% the Napoleon Hill said in think and grow rich, it's the company, it's the personalities back of a company that makes it successful. The personalities matter. Tell me that Jack Welch, wouldn't the face of GE through the nineties, number one on a fortune 500 beat the US tax code two years, didn't pay a diamond tax? Tell me today he wasn't the face of that company. Even though it had what, 50, some thousand products that it made, like unbelievable.

You had everybody knew who he was, it's very important. It even goes B2B. Because even in business, big business where people are turning on they're doing business with somebody they trust. They're not calling a robot. They're not calling a computer. They're doing business with other people.

They know that can fill those orders or provide that service or build that, whatever it doesn't really matter. People do business with people. And it's very important that you have that dialed in not just, I say, not just for your clientele, but also for the people that work for you because you are the head of that.

And at an organization, it is your blood, sweat, and tears. Many times that started at the kitchen table, but grew into an 8-figure, 9-figure, 10-figure company. It still it is you and that acumen then bleeds down into every facet of that business. And so even if you think I'm in a business where I'm not, you know, we're selling ball bearings or something like that.

And I don't need to be the first face of my business. I dare say that's wrong. A lot of times, if you're gonna buy stock on a serious level, you, what do you look at? You look at the board. What do you read about the board members you read about their careers? You read about where they came from, what they did, how they did it, what they learned, where they learned it from.

I do it in marketing now. As I follow, I would rather follow Andy Florence than Rich Burton because I just think Andy's got it figured out. I think Rich is still trying to figure it out. They're both billionaires. They both have billion-dollar companies, but they, to me, one of 'em is better than the other, cause I know their history and they went to college together.

 I think that it permeates every facet of the business that you're going to do. And then to your point, and when it comes time for that liquidity event. That's what the purchasers are gonna be buying. They want to know okay if you can run a tight ship, your image and your brand, your personal brand, isn't tight.

There's a juxtaposition there that somebody says why is that? What's why would that be? And I, we say that it is just as important as any as your accounting is. It needs to be dialed in. And in case of a business selling of selling a business and, merges and acquisitions, they're buying your legacy as much as they're buying what they trust right now today.

[00:30:06] Jeffrey Feldberg: Absolutely. And let me throw something else your way in, again at Deep Wealth. This is not only your thesis, but we've seen this time and time again, but you're the branding experts and would love to get your thoughts on this and from our perspective, and, Tonya, you being in sales from vacuum cleaners all the way through.

You've had the whole thing going there and you know what we see just time and time again, people do not make decisions to buy anything. It could be a billion-dollar company, or it could be a hundred dollars, whatever they make it on emotion first, and then they justify it with logic later.

And part of that emotion, a large part of that emotion is the brand story. Of what you've done. Where you're going and why tomorrow is bright and even better than it has been today and yesterday. So as the branding experts at BrandFace here and with your systems, I would love to hear, you know, your thoughts on that and how our listeners can really do a deep dive on that as they think about their branding and their story and how they can get people just excited and on the emotion side.

Wow. I just get the warm and fuzzy. I know it doesn't show up in a spreadsheet, but boy, boy, does it show up in why I'm gonna do business with this company over that company?

[00:31:20] Tony Eberhart and Michael Carr: I'll tell you one great example that I can think of is think about how you feel about the charities you support. Why do you support them? Because they do a very good job at sharing their story. So brand like a charity, share your story because you are doing it because, you know, someone who's been affected by maybe a disease, maybe lung disease or heart disease or diabetes or something like that, or, someone.

Or you have someone in your family with special needs. There are many different things that make your emotions want to support that charity. And so you've gotta think about those things. It goes beyond just selling products and services. Why are you doing it? So dig deep into that.

Why starting with those five questions that we talked about, but, yeah? I think, just looking at how charities do it and why you are drawn to charities. And of course, why you're drawn to different brands. Why do you drink Coca-Cola over Pepsi? You know, why do you look at those things, but more so on a human-to-human level?

I think probably charities are the best example.

[00:32:25] Jeffrey Feldberg: Love that absolutely love that. And what just a great analogy and everyone can relate to that because we have that in their lives and we can see, okay, how are they positioning themselves? What kind of messaging are they putting out there? What's their story? And how can I take that, make that my own, and then put that into our business and take things to the next level?

So let me ask you this. Let's look big picture wise and I'll put you guys on the spot here a little bit when it comes to branding and let's look at both sides of it, what would be the top things to do and the top things to not do?

[00:32:55] Tony Eberhart and Michael Carr: The first thing you do is really understand your why. Like, why are you doing not just why your company exists? Why are you doing what you're doing? Are you passionate enough about it to see it through?

Because if you are not, you need to stop now. Because you will never be as successful as you could be if you're not truly passionate about what you're doing. And then the second thing is make sure that your story is articulated very clearly when because I think anybody can eventually state your why. So if I come up to somebody and I say, okay, Jeffrey, tell me why you started your business. Why do you do what you do? For most people, it will take them a minimum of 60 seconds to three minutes to tell me why they do what they do. You need to be able to state that in one sentence.

So at least the start of the story in one sentence, and as Paul Harvey says, the rest of the story follows, but that's, you know, you really need to be very concise. Mark Twain once said I'd have written you a shorter letter if I'd had more time.

[00:33:55] Jeffrey Feldberg: One of my favorite quotes. Love that one.

[00:33:57] Tony Eberhart and Michael Carr: I do too. I might have gotten it a little backward but it's either that, or if I'd had more time, I'd have written you a shorter letter, but, it was all the same.

I could have shortened that one too. We contended that. Why is the driver for everything and then you, the second thing that we see a lot of entrepreneurs do in especially startups and we have been guilty of the same thing? Is a fear of focus and the inability to dial in on something and say, I need to be very good at this.

And I'm a big fan of the good to great book. You remember? I don't know if y'all remember that book or whatnot, but he talked about that so much about how like what's the big drug company Walgreens was in everything. They were in all kind of different things when the dad started it.

But when the son took it over, he is like, we only need to be good at being the greatest drug store in the history of the world. And we make more money doing that. Then we will trying to hold on all of these other distractions and it totally turned the company upside down and to make it go forward.

And so we talk about that a lot, even down to a one-person shop working out of their kitchen table, doing something that could grow into something big. If it's more than they can handle, they're distracted in a hundred different ways then they're not speaking to their ideal customer.

They haven't created a brand that separates them from their competition. They haven't shared with their clients, why they haven't shared with their future employees, why this is important. And the acumen itself is like confusing. And so they have confusion in their life. And it's scary to a lot of people, you tell a real estate agent, you need to focus on a certain genre of business, a niche if you will, then they're like, ah, I wanna sell, I wanna make a commission on everything. But the reality of it is you can't. I'd like to sell every house that's ever been known to man. I've sold more houses than anybody in the United States, but that doesn't mean that I can just go out here and just say, hey, I'm gonna sell a house to everybody.

I need to focus in what I'm doing. And I think that business owners tend to mess that, especially in the branding and we tell 'em you look brand first market second, so you can have ROI on your marketing so you can know where your dollars are going. So you can track those dollars. The biggest complaint we hear is marketing doesn't work.

When we talk to people on our discovery sessions, they're like, ah, marketing doesn't work, but I thought marketing didn't work either. I just thought you just, I asked a guy worth like $500,000,00 one time. I'm like how much money should my company be spending on marketing? And he said, all of it. I still don't know what he meant by that, except for the fact that he didn't know what marketing worked either.

I, you know, I mean, But then when I got Tonya and she's like, look, you're not focused. Like you're all over the place, hey, you got six construction trucks on the road. And two of them have a different number than the other four. You know, You don't have this thing. You're not in a linear direction and it's causing a lot of confusion, not only to you but to everybody else.

So focus is a big deal.

[00:36:36] Jeffrey Feldberg: Some terrific takeaways there of both what to do and not to do. And you know, one of the takeaways coming outta that. This could be a whole other episode in and of itself, but we'll keep a briefer starting to bump up again sometime here. But when you do the branding, the branding leads into the culture.

And when you have a rich and thriving culture, it really goes beyond the owner at that point. And to both of your points, when you have that branding, that's embedded in the culture, everyone is saying the same story, the same narrative, the same origin story. You. What does this company do? What do you do?

And whether it's from the frontline person, all the way up to the CEO, you're hearing the same thing. And it all goes back to branding. And like we say, in Deep Wealth with culture, it's an X-Factor that's step number two is one of the things that can insanely increase the value of your business and your competition with all of its capital.

They can copy many things. Heck, they can even hire away your employees. But not necessarily, if you have a terrific culture and they can't copy your culture, money cannot buy culture. It's that unique and branding is really at the heart of that. Well, listen, you know, we could just go on and go down these different rabbit holes of branding, how it's behind all these different things.

We're starting to bump up against some time. So I'm gonna ask both of you a question and one of you is gonna have an unfair advantage because one of you is gonna be listening while the other answers but, be that as it may, this is a thought experiment and I have the privilege and it really is a privilege to ask every single guest on the Deep Wealth podcast.

And here's the thought experiment. Here's the question, think of the movie Back to the Future, and in the movie, you have that magical DeLorean car that will take you back to any point in time. So imagine now it's tomorrow morning, you look outside your window, and not only is the DeLorean car there, but the door is open and it's waiting for you to hop on in.

So now you're gonna go back to any point in your life. Maybe when you're a young child, a teenager, whatever the point would be. And what are you telling your younger self in terms of life, wisdom or lessons learned or, hey, do this, but don't do that. What would that sound like? So I don't know who wants to throw their hat in the ring first, but there's the question and who would like to go first?

[00:38:40] Tony Eberhart and Michael Carr: Go ahead, Michael? No, I get to go first. Yes. All right. It's easy for me. It's easy for me. I was blessed enough to know early on what I wanted to do for a living. I wanted to be an auctioneer. I was very passionate about that. Had a chance to be an engineer. I didn't wanna be an engineer. I wanted to be an auctioneer.

My mother cried all night. So I'd starve to death. We laugh about that now. But I would go back to that person that 17 year old, 18-year-old person. And I would say be bolder than you could have ever imagined. You could have been bold like literally, no matter what you like, like I told a guy one time when he was hiring me and he's like, how much is it gonna cost me?

And I said I need you to come up with a number that is really going to hurt you to write on that check. And then I need you to quadruple it. And so that's what I would do to that person back when I was 18, be bold than you could ever imagine. cause they'll work out fine.

[00:39:29] Jeffrey Feldberg: That is terrific. And Michael, just tell us what you really think. hey, write down a painful number, quadruple it.

[00:39:34] Tony Eberhart and Michael Carr: Right.

That's a great one. I would probably say realize the impact that you that I, me every one of us as a human being has on helping people, everyone realize their inner star because I think that's really what we're all about today is helping people unveil their inner star.

There are so many people who don't realize what's unique and special about them because I've never been taught to think that way. So if I had the opportunity all along the way, I'm doing it now, but think of all the years that I have missed and all of us may have missed in letting people know how special and unique they are in this world.

Because to me, sometimes it can make the difference between a young person waiting on the next drug deal and a young person going off to college with a bright future is their self-worth. And so I would say impact that wherever I could, along the way.

[00:40:32] Jeffrey Feldberg: Wow. You know what? Both terrific perspectives, wonderful wisdom in something that you just can't go wrong with, with both of your narratives are on that. I absolutely love that. Listen, we're gonna put this in the show notes with all of the other links that are already there. And for our listeners, it'll be an easy point and click.

If someone would like to either contact you or find you online, where would be the best place?

[00:40:52] Tony Eberhart and Michael Carr: Brandfacestar.com That's the best place you'll have the ability to do all.

[00:40:57] Jeffrey Feldberg: Wonderful. And again, for listeners, we'll put that in there. It'll be a point and click and off you go. Tonya, Michael, thank you so much for taking part of your day and spending it with us on the Deep Wealth podcast. And as always, as we look to wrap things up, please stay healthy and safe.

[00:41:10] Tony Eberhart and Michael Carr: Thank you, Jeffrey.

Thank you. It's been an honor, Jeffrey.

[00:41:12] Sharon S.: The Deep Wealth Experience was definitely a game-changer for me.

[00:41:15] 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.

[00:41:25] Kam H.: If you don't have time for this program, you'll never have time for a successful liquidity

[00:41:30] Sharon S.: It was the best value of any business course I've ever taken. The money was very well spent.

[00:41:36] 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.

[00:41:52] 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.

[00:42:14] 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.

[00:42:25] 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.

[00:42:38] 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.

[00:42:56] 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.

[00:43:23] 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.

[00:43:42] Jeffrey Feldberg: Are you leaving millions on the table?

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

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

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