0:07

Welcome to another episode of the L3 Leadership

0:09

Podcast , where we are obsessed with helping you grow

0:12

to your maximum potential and to maximize

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the impact of your leadership . My name

0:16

is Doug Smith and I am your host , and today's episode

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is brought to you by my friends at Beratung Advisors

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. We also recorded this episode live

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from the new Birgo Realty Studio . If

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you're new to the podcast , welcome . I'm so glad that you're

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here and I hope that you enjoy our content and become

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of our episodes over on our YouTube channel . So make sure

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Podcasts or Spotify or whatever app you listen

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to podcasts through . That really does help us to

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grow our audience and reach more leaders , so thank you

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in advance for that . Well , leader , in today's episode

0:50

, you are in for a treat . You're going to hear my conversation

0:52

with one of the top literary agents in the

0:54

world , Esther Fedorkevich . If you're

0:56

unfamiliar with Esther , let me just tell you a little bit

0:59

about her , because she's amazing . She is the founder

1:01

of the Fedd Agency and she actually

1:03

launched her career in 1997 as a salesperson

1:05

for a major book publisher and within six

1:08

months she sold over a million dollars in products

1:10

. From there she went to work for Dave Ramsey

1:12

and eventually founded the Fedd Agency in 2003

1:15

. Esther firmly believes that she doesn't

1:17

just represent authors . She represents and

1:19

builds futures . Using her natural

1:21

entrepreneurial sensibilities , esther

1:23

also negotiates deals for film , television

1:26

and other derivative products . Additionally

1:28

, the Fed Agency offers agency guided publishing

1:30

and audio book production services

1:32

. In our conversation , you're going to hear her talk

1:35

about so much . You'll hear her talk about her upbringing

1:37

and how her family , way before Shark

1:39

Tank was the thing , actually played a

1:41

version of Shark Tank together and they all started

1:43

businesses when they were very , very young

1:45

and were very successful , and you're going to love hearing about

1:47

that . You'll hear her talk about her strategy

1:50

for getting a meeting with anyone , including

1:52

Elon Musk , her best advice for

1:54

aspiring authors and so much more

1:56

. I just think you're going to love this conversation

1:58

. But before we dive in , just a few announcements

2:00

. This episode of the L3 Leadership Podcast is

2:02

sponsored by Beratung Advisors . The

2:04

financial advisors at Beratung Advisors help

2:06

educate and empower clients to make informed

2:09

financial decisions . You can find out

2:11

how Beratung Advisors can help you develop a

2:13

customized financial plan for your financial future

2:15

by visiting their website at beratungadvisors . com

2:18

that's B-E-R-A-T-U-N-G-Advisorscom

2:23

. These investment products

2:25

and services offered through LPL Financial

2:27

, member of FINRA and SIPC , Beratung

2:29

Advisors , LPL Financial and L3 Leadership

2:31

are separate entities . I

2:33

also want to thank our sponsor , heni Jewelers . They were jewelry

2:35

earned by my friend and mentor , John Henne , and

2:38

my wife Laura and I got our engagement and wedding

2:40

rings through Henne Jewelers and had an incredible experience

2:42

. And not only do they have great jewelry

2:44

, but they also invest in people . In fact , for every

2:46

couple that comes in and gays , they give them a book

2:48

to help them prepare for marriage , and we just love that . So

2:51

if you're in need of a good jeweler , check out HenneJewelers

2:53

. com . And with

2:55

all that being said , let's dive right in . Here's my conversation

2:57

with Esther Fedorkevich . Well

3:01

, esther Fedorkevich , it is an honor to have you on

3:03

the podcast . You've been named the top literary

3:06

agent in the world , at least as I was researching

3:08

you . But I thought an interesting

3:10

place to start as I was preparing for this is

3:12

. You have a really , really unique upbringing and

3:15

I believe you're one of seven children and

3:18

when I think I heard you say that your family

3:20

before they were a shark tank . You guys had

3:22

a version of shark tank in your family . Can you talk

3:25

a little bit about your upbringing and what that looked

3:27

like shark tank in your family ?

3:29

Okay , so my parents

3:31

had seven kids in nine years . So

3:34

we're pretty much here apart , right , and

3:38

they were entrepreneurs . So my dad

3:40

came . They were , we were

3:42

first generation Ukrainians

3:44

born in the US , but

3:46

my dad Ukrainian parents came

3:49

to Argentina . So my dad was born in Argentina

3:51

. My mom was born in China from missionary family

3:53

. Anyway , they band up

3:55

. My dad drops

3:57

out of eighth grade , out of middle

4:00

school , and comes

4:02

to America on a visa to

4:04

make money and

4:07

send it back to his family in Argentina . So

4:09

that's what these kids . Can you imagine our kids doing

4:11

that ? Now ? Think about it . Hey

4:13

, we need money . Will you go and work full

4:15

time and send the money back to your parents

4:17

? Well , so that's what they did . And my

4:20

dad started , like , in construction

4:22

from the bottom and grew

4:24

to the one of the biggest builders in New Jersey

4:26

and developers and he literally

4:29

taught himself so as an entrepreneur

4:31

. And he , he , when you

4:33

, when you grow up poor and you grow up um missionary

4:36

family , they say , America

4:38

, money grows on trees . Right , Everyone's

4:40

like , oh , money grows on trees , you can do , you can make

4:42

whatever you want , you can do anything . And

4:45

so we grew up with dreaming big and

4:47

believing we could do anything and accomplish anything

4:49

. So as a young

4:52

kids , my dad instilled entrepreneurship

4:54

and all of us starting businesses , no matter what

4:56

they were it could be from selling bubblegum

4:59

to chicken eggs to whatever

5:01

right we would

5:03

start businesses . And the board

5:05

our board of advisors was our family

5:08

. So when we had an idea

5:10

, he taught us how to do a business plan . He

5:12

was our financier , so he

5:14

would finance our business plans if we

5:16

got all the votes , but then we would have

5:19

to do all the work . So that

5:21

part is we would have to do all the work , but he would

5:23

give us the money . And

5:25

the board was all of my siblings

5:27

who would be like that's the dumbest idea

5:29

or that's awesome

5:31

. Right , yeah , let's do it . Or I want to get in with you

5:33

on this idea . How about we go 50 , 50 ? We

5:36

would do deals all the time , give

5:38

people what jobs they would do what we would do , and

5:41

that's how we grew up . It was literally our

5:43

own before Shark Tank . It was our own

5:45

Ukrainian Shark Tank and

5:47

we literally started businesses

5:49

and fell in love with business from

5:52

a young age .

5:53

When you say a young age . So I have four kids under seven

5:56

. Things like this interest me greatly . How

5:59

young were you guys starting ?

6:01

So my oldest brother was

6:03

10 . And so think of it like

6:05

the youngest , youngest two weren't doing

6:07

anything . But he had an idea . We lived

6:09

in this big house . We lived on my dad . It

6:12

was a developer , so the house I grew up my whole life

6:14

was on Esther court . My name is Esther .

6:16

He named it Come on .

6:18

A whole life . I lived on Esther court , so we

6:21

they have a date . My brother was 10

6:23

. Any idea to do a carnival in our backyard

6:25

? And we set up high

6:27

jumps . We brought out mattresses on

6:30

the high jumps . We a carnival games with my

6:32

mom's dishes where you throw pennies in everything

6:34

we should . He charged that tickets

6:36

from Walmart and

6:39

people would buy tickets to play

6:41

our really ghetto New

6:43

Jersey home games and

6:46

we went into our attic and found all of our

6:48

old toys and that's where the prizes

6:50

that they would win if they hit something big . You'd

6:53

have to ask my brother , josh , but I think he was like

6:55

at 10 years old he was right

6:57

racking in like 510 grand

7:00

on our carnival and everyone from the school

7:02

and we were all his worker bees

7:04

getting paid nothing . Literally it

7:07

was super fun but we all worked the carnival but

7:09

they like we would any kind

7:11

of crazy idea we would do .

7:14

And you started . I don't know what age you were , but your

7:16

first successful launch of that

7:18

was selling bubblegum . Is that correct ?

7:20

Yeah Well , my first was I sold chicken eggs , right

7:23

, so we had chicken , we lived on the farm , so

7:25

we had chicken , and we would box up the eggs and

7:27

go door to door and since I was good at sales

7:29

and talking and cute , my brothers would

7:31

make me be the one that asked to buy the

7:33

eggs and they would be

7:35

right around the corner , right , I would sell it

7:37

, get the money , give them the eggs and then give

7:40

the money to my three older brothers . So it was

7:42

kind of funny . It's like I would be the face

7:44

of their company , their chicken egg company

7:46

, and we did that literally

7:48

every Saturday . So that was like

7:51

some people did newspaper route , we did chicken

7:53

egg route . So I was fine . But

7:55

when I was 13 , my dad was

7:57

teaching us about ROI

8:00

, right , and

8:02

he was like you guys

8:04

, you can't think , because we kept thinking of ideas like

8:06

let's make a T-shirt for five

8:08

bucks and we'll sell it for 10 bucks , right

8:11

, and he's like that's not a big enough markup . So

8:13

I thought of the idea of a gumball

8:16

, which was one penny it cost to buy a gumball

8:18

and you sell it for 25 cents , and

8:21

so that's the think about any product you can think

8:23

of now that has a 25 X

8:25

. Wow , yeah , that's kind of

8:27

crazy right . I wish I

8:29

could think of an idea like that now . And

8:32

so we started a gumball machine business and it

8:36

just grew and grew and grew and grew . And

8:39

then I sold it to my brother and he

8:41

scaled it and just grew it even bigger

8:43

than what I could do at 13 , 14 years old

8:45

.

8:46

That's incredible and , if I believe correctly

8:48

and when I was researching you , all of your siblings

8:50

have become entrepreneurs as a result of this correct .

8:53

They're all entrepreneurs . Everyone has their

8:55

own companies or starting their own companies . Or

8:57

, like one of my brothers helped

9:00

start Disney Plus , right . So he actually

9:02

worked for big companies , started Disney Plus , then

9:04

he left and worked for another big company , but he has his own

9:06

businesses too and his own patents and inventions

9:08

. So even if you look

9:10

across the board of our whole family , we're

9:12

all entrepreneurs . We

9:15

still , to this day , do business ideas together

9:17

.

9:17

Yeah , talk to me about that . I think you say how often

9:20

does your family meet and what does that look like today

9:22

?

9:22

Okay , so , as

9:24

of today now , all nine of us kids

9:26

are in our 40s . So all nine of us

9:28

are in our 40s , which is kind of cool , right

9:31

, and we've all lived . We say we live some life

9:33

, we've made some mistakes , we've had some failures

9:35

, and we do five

9:38

of them , seven of us kids plus

9:40

my mom and dad , but we do this with just the

9:42

seven siblings now . Sometimes

9:45

we involve mom and dad , but

9:47

it's mostly just the seven of us kids and

9:50

we five of us are here in Austin of

9:52

my seven siblings , and we

9:54

meet once a month for breakfast or tacos

9:56

at one of our offices and

9:58

we talk about business , of , as we also have

10:01

a group text thread of

10:03

all of us , so it's not just getting together . We're like

10:05

, hey , this business opportunity came . Do

10:07

you want to invest ? I'm going in for

10:09

10 grand . Do you want to go in ? I'm

10:11

going to . I have a thousand to give , I have a hundred

10:14

thousand to give , whatever it is . And we all go in

10:16

and invest in the same kind of companies If

10:18

we like it . And sometimes I'll like an

10:20

idea . My brothers or my sister will

10:22

hate it Because I don't get anybody

10:24

liking it , but then it's interesting

10:26

because I get their opinions , every idea

10:29

. We get opinion of seven of us deciding

10:31

what's good , what's wrong , what are we missing

10:34

? So it's it's kind of cool .

10:36

Wow . Well , clearly it seems like your parents

10:38

did a lot of things right , and obviously they

10:40

gave you the spark to be entrepreneurs . But

10:43

I'm curious too , you know , as a father for I

10:45

know your mom as well you know I'm

10:47

always interested in how I can raise great families . Is there

10:49

anything else Life lessons

10:51

, leadership , or anything that your parents taught you that you

10:53

think would be worth sharing ?

10:56

Okay , so that's a really good question . I

10:59

heard Warren Buffett say this . I was listening

11:01

to him in an interview and I'm probably gonna mess it

11:04

up , but he said something like I wanna

11:06

give my kids enough right , but

11:08

not too much . That they don't have

11:11

to work . Wow , and

11:13

I think with our kids , what

11:16

so many parents make the mistake , it doesn't even matter

11:18

. We don't have to be as rich as a billionaire , right

11:20

, but we give our kids too much . And

11:23

where's the balance ? Where ? Why

11:26

don't take that drive away from your

11:28

kids ? Let them want that drive , that

11:30

spirit of entrepreneurship

11:33

, that they wanna start something or build something and

11:35

see the excitement , because if you give them everything

11:37

, they don't have to work for it . And

11:40

I think one of the big values our

11:42

parents taught all seven of us is work

11:44

right and so and believe in yourself

11:47

and dream . And even if our dreams are crazy

11:49

out there , that's probably never gonna happen , it's

11:51

still that thing of hope and dream

11:53

and building and trying . So I think

11:55

with kids we're always

11:58

talking about business ideas . We don't do half

12:00

of them because we find out they're bad ideas

12:02

. Right , they start off with a good idea and then we're

12:04

like actually this won't make any money , it'll

12:07

be a bad idea . But then we

12:09

have the good ideas and that's

12:11

what's fun , because the whole family gets to share in

12:13

the wealth .

12:15

Yeah , do you do anything specific with your kids

12:18

? Like , do you do the same thing your parents did with you as far

12:20

as them coming up with business ideas ? Did you carry that

12:22

tradition down or how ?

12:23

So my kids are the oldest because I got married

12:26

really young . So my kids have

12:28

a daughter who's a junior in college

12:30

and a son who's a senior in high

12:32

school . So I have a 20-year-old and an 18-year-old

12:34

and then the next is a 13-year-old

12:37

, so by the time

12:39

they had kids . So there's a gap there

12:41

, right .

12:42

Yeah .

12:42

But every time we get together , we're always talking

12:44

about businesses and all of us are investing , even

12:47

the little kids , the five-year-old , six-year-old

12:49

. They're putting $150 of their own money

12:51

into a startup that we're investing

12:53

in as adults . So they'll put $150

12:56

or $100 . They literally

12:58

will put their own money , their birthday money , into

13:00

startup investing and we tell them you might not

13:03

get this back for seven to 10 years and

13:05

they're good with it .

13:06

Wow , do you ?

13:08

Bitcoin came around , all of us did

13:10

Like I'm telling you , like

13:13

all the kids did it , and so

13:15

it's fun , and they're not seeing

13:18

a reward immediately . And what a cool

13:20

lesson to teach your kids that you're

13:22

not investing right now for tomorrow

13:24

to get the money back . You're investing

13:26

and you're saying bye-bye to it for a while .

13:29

Do you pay your kids an allowance ? Do you make them work for their

13:31

money ? I'm just curious how did you guys handle

13:33

that ?

13:35

Do not pay the kids allowance I

13:38

, so their

13:40

lives are really full . So I have a son who's

13:43

going to be a D1 athlete , so with

13:45

school . They go to a classical Christian school

13:47

, so with school work , and there's no

13:49

time for a job . But he does work

13:52

Like he'll have jobs to do

13:54

that he'll get paid . But it's

13:56

different because when they were younger , yes , they worked

13:58

, but now , as they're older , with

14:00

school work and like different goals that

14:02

they have , it's hard to get jobs . My daughter makes

14:04

money . They be sitting for any of her extra

14:07

needs , but like their needs

14:09

that they have on a regular , like

14:12

their food and their gas and their insurance

14:14

we pay for right now , but when they graduate

14:16

it's done .

14:18

Yeah .

14:18

They're gonna be on their own

14:21

.

14:21

Speaking of money , I heard you saying in another

14:23

podcast and we'll get more into your career and what you're doing

14:25

today that money's kind of always just followed you

14:27

. It's not really been something that you've had to pursue

14:29

, et cetera . But we live in a culture

14:32

where everyone's chasing money . Everyone wants

14:34

to be a multi-billionaire by 25

14:36

. What have you learned about money

14:39

and your life and career ? What can money

14:41

do for you and what can it do ?

14:45

Okay . So the Bible verse the love

14:47

of money is the root of all things evil

14:49

, right , and I think it's the love of money

14:51

. When people are working just to make

14:53

money , I'm a strong

14:56

believer where the proverb

14:58

that says all hard work brings a profit

15:00

, but

15:02

when people just talk about ideas , mere

15:04

talk leads to poverty . And

15:07

I think what happens in our world is so many

15:09

people talk about ideas or talk about

15:11

starting a business or talk about how bad

15:13

their job is or how bad

15:16

their boss is , but they don't even

15:18

put the hard work in . The

15:20

profit's gonna come to you just

15:22

by working hard , and I think

15:24

people forget about that . They think things are gonna come

15:26

easy or they think , oh , this is just

15:28

gonna come in this world of influencers that get

15:30

paid crazy money to oppose or this Like

15:33

. Honestly , I'm still a big believer . It's hard

15:35

work and I know that sounds really boring

15:37

and really old school , but

15:39

I've worked really hard my whole

15:42

life and I just no matter what that profit

15:44

is . I don't do it for a certain amount of money

15:46

, I do it because I know God's gonna honor it and

15:49

I will turn a profit . Now

15:51

, people who are lazy , or

15:53

people who just talk about things . And

15:55

then they wonder why they're like living paycheck

15:58

to paycheck . You know , I worked for Dave Ramsey

16:00

for a while . You wonder why these people are living

16:02

like that . It's because they don't have the mentality

16:04

of get up and work

16:06

hard and give like my motto

16:08

every day as I wake up every day and

16:11

I'm gonna give God 100% of my time

16:13

, whatever that is .

16:16

I love that you mentioned you work for Dave Ramsey

16:18

. So you know , grew up entrepreneurial . I'm

16:20

sure had a thousand business ideas that you could have done

16:22

, but something drew you to working for them

16:24

. I'm just curious , you know , how did you get on staff

16:27

there ? What drew you to working for a company versus doing

16:29

your own thing initially ?

16:30

Okay , so I was . I'm not gonna

16:33

give you the names of these companies , but I worked for huge

16:35

, huge Christian company at 19 years old , got

16:37

married at 19 , moved to Nashville

16:39

, worked for a huge company and

16:42

I was really naive . I've been like they're Christians

16:44

, they're gonna be awesome , right

16:46

. And I did telemarketing

16:48

sales where I was in a cubicle making phone calls

16:51

every second , selling curriculum

16:54

and books

16:56

and they

16:58

had a campaign going that if you

17:00

could sell to a new person

17:03

no , it's first time customer they were gonna pay 30%

17:05

commission on whatever you sold . So

17:08

I got remember my motto of how I

17:10

grew up to work hard . Right , like God honors

17:12

hard work . So I would

17:14

get up and be in the office at 7 am , cold

17:17

calling , telemarketing , like literally call up

17:19

to call , and I would leave at 7 pm , like get

17:21

the East Coast and the West Coast in here

17:23

. At 19 year old I did a million dollars in five

17:25

months . They only 300

17:28

, a little over 300,000 , and

17:30

they said I couldn't make more than the president of

17:32

the company . And then my

17:34

sales manager boss said you're 19

17:36

, you don't need to make this much and you have to also

17:39

remember I'm 19 and I looked like I

17:41

was 13, . Right , I was like

17:43

so young and so they

17:45

weren't they . And then I went to my pastor

17:48

was the pastor of a big mega church in Nashville

17:50

and I said what do I do

17:52

Like ? Is there age discrimination

17:54

? Cause I'm young , but I did everything

17:56

. They said I worked harder

17:58

than all the other telemarketers , which is like letting

18:01

things slide and we're making

18:03

a phone call and going to get a snack and going

18:05

to like a break room and talking to I mean I literally

18:07

didn't talk to anyone . I focused and I was like on

18:09

a mission to get as many calls and cause I knew it was a numbers

18:12

game , the more calls , the more sales , right . So

18:16

my pastor said Esther

18:19

, you can't sue this company . It's a huge company

18:21

. It's not right to sue

18:23

this company . God doesn't love that . So

18:26

I want you to talk to . My Sunday

18:28

school teacher at that time was Dave Ramsey . He

18:31

was the finance teacher . They brought Dave Ramsey to

18:33

this private meeting and

18:35

Dave told me come work for me , I'll

18:37

never cap your commission . And

18:40

he goes I'm starting something called financial peace university

18:43

and I want to know what you did to sell

18:45

that much . Come work for me and I'll

18:47

never cap it . And he took . He kept his word , never

18:49

kept his commission . I

18:51

had an amazing experience working for Dave

18:54

and I

18:56

never sued this company and my

18:58

Dave and this our

19:00

pastor said God will just bless you , don't

19:02

worry , what goes around comes around . God's gonna bless

19:05

you , you'll be fine . And I wouldn't in that that

19:07

, yes , I was hurt and yes , it kind of

19:09

I'm like , wow , people can like really

19:11

like not be true to their word , but

19:14

what was cool about it was then I let it go

19:16

, I didn't think about it anymore , I like moved on

19:18

and now I'm selling the next thing you know , working

19:20

for the next company . It

19:22

was really cool , cause I kind of see how God

19:25

now , looking back 25 years later

19:27

, it's like oh God , really God was fine

19:29

with it . You know , like I had a plan , a bigger plan

19:31

, but it was tough thinking

19:33

that you're gonna have $300,000 in

19:35

commission and then not getting it .

19:39

So you went to work for Ramsey and you know Dave's

19:41

made such an impact on so many lives . I'm

19:43

sure you made a huge impact while you're there as well . Anyone

19:46

I know who's worked for Ramsey . I always just ask you know

19:48

, being under that leadership culture , are there

19:50

one or two lessons that you learned from your time at Ramsey that

19:52

are worth sharing ?

19:54

Well , dave's driven . He honors

19:56

hard work , right . He's like . He teaches

19:59

you how to your own PNLs . And

20:01

the biggest thing , which I didn't know , cause I didn't know

20:03

I was gonna start another big company like my agency

20:05

four years later after

20:07

I started working for Dave , but he

20:10

taught me how to live , to start

20:12

a company debt free , with no debt , telling

20:14

me myself how to get out of debt . That's

20:17

one thing that our parents never taught

20:20

us . They never taught us about debt . They taught us

20:22

about how to make money . They taught us about how to dream

20:24

big . They taught us how to be entrepreneurs . They

20:26

never taught us about debt . And so

20:28

that's the biggest thing I

20:30

learned from Dave and I will always like

20:33

. When people with COVID hit or

20:35

the recession in 2008 hit , I

20:37

was debt free . It was unbelievable

20:40

. So I can make it through these times where other

20:42

businesses or other literary agencies or

20:44

entertainment agencies were closing their door . I

20:48

was able to be fine , and I really

20:50

do owe that to Dave Ramsey .

20:53

That's such a cool story . I'll

20:55

come back to Dave and the transition to your new agency

20:58

, but I do wanna ask you've been in your

21:00

career , got to spend time with , you know , some of the most influential

21:02

people on the planet , dave being one of them Steve

21:04

Furter , tim Tebow , you know Tim McGraw

21:06

, et cetera . And I heard you say on a podcast

21:08

which I love this , I'm a big believer

21:10

in this you said , if you gave me two or three weeks

21:12

, I could get in touch with anyone

21:15

on the planet and have a meeting with

21:17

them . I

21:19

guess first I would just ask is there anyone

21:21

that intimidates you or that you would

21:23

like to get to that you haven't gone after yet ? And

21:25

then , how do you ? What is your actual process

21:27

if you were going to start today to try to get a hold of someone

21:29

that most people think you couldn't ?

21:32

Well , I'm a big believer that you can get

21:34

to anybody . You can't quit , right

21:36

, remember , you have to keep going and you have

21:38

to be smart about how you get to them . But

21:41

yeah , there's nobody that I think

21:43

that's somebody I couldn't

21:45

get to and

21:48

you got to be aggressive about it . You got to work hard and you have

21:50

to have a system about it . My system usually is

21:52

I find out if there's any

21:54

connections , anybody that I know , even if it's

21:56

a six degrees of like this person knows

21:58

this person , that knows this person . We

22:00

have LinkedIn today , so there's a lot of ways

22:02

through connections on LinkedIn . We

22:05

have social

22:08

media , which is so much easier . Like I

22:10

can DM somebody that they don't

22:12

know who I am and mention a couple of names in the

22:14

DM and I could be

22:16

lucky that they DM me back . Wow

22:18

, so we I'll

22:21

tell you one that I'm right now I

22:23

think I'm one degree away is you know ? I'm in Austin

22:25

and one of me with Elon Musk read his

22:27

biography , super impressed , had a couple

22:29

things , and I went down that

22:31

trail and I think

22:34

I'm one person away from meeting with him . So

22:36

it's like and people be like that's

22:38

so hard to get Not really Like

22:40

I'm now talking to one of his best friends who's

22:42

making the connection and ? But it took me

22:44

eight different people , wow

22:47

, connecting me to eight other different

22:49

people , and then you're testing that one , that one

22:51

, that one , that one to get to him . So there's nobody you

22:53

can't if you really want it

22:55

, but there's got to be a reason . I'm not trying

22:57

to get to Elon Musk , to just get to

22:59

Elon Musk , right ? What's the reason

23:01

? So that when he there's a reason that

23:04

he would say yes to meeting with me and

23:06

I think that's the kind of thing as you're looking at , who

23:08

do you want to meet with ? What's , what's

23:10

the reason for it ? I

23:13

don't ever have a reason . Just because I'm a fan , right

23:15

, like I don't want to go meet

23:17

I don't know Justin Bieber

23:19

, because I'm a fan of Justin Bieber . It's like it would be a reason for me

23:21

to meet with Justin Bieber . So I'm saying , as you think about those things

23:24

is like , what's the reason and why do you really want

23:26

to meet with them ? And

23:29

if it's a good reason , they'll probably want to meet with you too

23:31

.

23:32

So that's phenomenal . So you get the meeting . I'm

23:36

curious and I'm sure a ton of people try to get to you as

23:38

well , just with your background and what you do . When

23:42

you get a meeting with someone , how do you make

23:44

the most out of it to make sure that you you honor

23:46

, respect their time but also accomplish what you are accomplished ? You

23:49

may only get 10 , 15 minutes , maybe more . I'm

23:51

just curious how do you handle the meeting ?

23:55

Okay . So when I was younger

23:57

, in high school

23:59

, there was like there

24:01

used to be these big , it was cassette

24:04

tapes back there I'm really aging myself now that I don't really like telling

24:06

the story so

24:08

we would listen to cassette tapes , right . There was no podcast

24:10

, there was no internet , there was no social media , there was no cell

24:12

phones , right , but we would like

24:15

there was these like convention

24:17

conferences , and I

24:20

went at 16 years old and

24:22

heard this guy , zig Ziglar . Have you ever

24:24

heard of him ? Oh , huge fan .

24:25

Yeah , of course I was so .

24:26

Inspired , I

24:29

bought . I bought Spades $700

24:31

. I remember exactly

24:34

how much it was . And bought his whole cassette series and

24:36

I was just single night and I think that's

24:38

kind of what people are doing now with podcasts , right

24:40

, we have so much , but back then

24:42

it was cassette tapes and it was this

24:45

guy inspired me and he was amazing

24:47

and anyway

24:50

, he has this one thing that he says he's like

24:52

you can get everything

24:55

in life you want , right , if you , if

24:57

you just help enough people get

24:59

what they want , do you remember that you get

25:02

?

25:02

help yeah .

25:03

And that is that

25:06

is how you connect with people is you get anything

25:08

you want ? You got to help people get what they

25:10

want . So usually our calls is I'm helping

25:12

someone get what they want and then figuring

25:15

out the right time for me to ask for what , what

25:17

I want .

25:19

Love it . Thank you for sharing that First what

25:21

I want .

25:22

Usually . Usually it's it's me

25:24

getting them what they want , then they'll give me something

25:26

.

25:28

So I don't know if you want to share this on the podcast now because you

25:30

haven't had the media . But Elon , like

25:33

how would you ? You know I'm going into a meeting with Elon ? How

25:35

will I know what Elon wants so I can

25:38

serve him prior to him ?

25:39

you know , whatever my objective is , Well

25:42

, I'm in with Elon on a total separate

25:45

company . We have an invention that

25:47

we think Tesla's going to buy from us for

25:49

about three , four billion dollars

25:52

, and it's a patent . We signed it . We

25:54

took some years to do it . He never thought

25:56

of it . He's missing it in his cars

25:58

and it's me and my

26:01

brother and we feel like it's so

26:03

huge . So my going

26:06

to him is I've invented this , going to change his life

26:08

and make him tons of money , and

26:10

that's why he wants to meet with me . I'm

26:13

solving a problem for him . That's why he wants to

26:15

meet with me .

26:16

Amazing . Thank you for sharing that . I'm fired

26:18

up and I yeah .

26:18

It sounds like you'll get the meeting I can't wait to see

26:21

, I don't want anyone to steal it , but it's a real . I'll

26:23

tell you later , but it's a really good invention

26:25

.

26:26

I look forward to it changing the world . So kudos

26:29

to you and your brother . That's awesome . I

26:31

want to dive in . I'm sure everyone wants to hear about

26:33

the publishing world , but before

26:35

we dive into that , just briefly . You're at

26:37

Ramsey and at some point you decided

26:40

to jump out on your own and start the Fed agency

26:42

, which is your agency that you

26:44

do now . Can you talk about that transition and the launch

26:46

and what that was like ?

26:47

Yes , I was doing for Dave

26:49

, we were . We started self publishing before people

26:52

were self publishing . So I have a love for

26:54

books . I love her story . We're doing all financials

26:56

type of products and

26:58

I got I was 25 . I

27:00

was pregnant with my daughter and I

27:03

said I don't want to just do financial

27:05

books anymore and we did this book called

27:07

total money makeover which and

27:09

we did a huge campaign . It was so fun it

27:11

was , and learning from the best , like Dave

27:14

, was really great for me because then when I had to

27:16

go and start my agency and find

27:18

clients , like I saw how it's done on the highest

27:20

level to know that that is , that

27:23

is a possibility for my authors at some

27:25

point in their life . You know , even if their first time . You

27:27

know when I'm starting as a young agent , and

27:29

so I gave birth to my daughter

27:31

in August of 2003 , formed

27:34

my company the next day and

27:36

literally the next day and

27:38

it was . There

27:40

was no turning back from there . And then what

27:43

has it been ? 20 ? This past

27:45

August was 20 years and we've had over

27:47

a hundred New York Times bestsellers , represented

27:50

over 2000 books , and

27:52

it's been really it's been a fun ride .

27:55

Yeah , well , let's just talk about this . Just

27:57

in general . Do you believe that

27:59

everyone in the planet has a book in them and should

28:02

publish a book before they die ?

28:04

Yes .

28:07

Okay . So if that's true , if

28:09

someone feels like they publish it now

28:11

.

28:12

do I believe every book's a bestseller ? No , but

28:14

do I believe everybody has

28:17

a story to tell and should publish a book and

28:19

put it down and writing 100%

28:21

?

28:22

Yeah , and I feel like I read some stat that you

28:24

know 95% of people want to write a book

28:26

before they die , but I'm sure

28:28

the statistic for many people actually do is way lower

28:30

than that . If people feel like they have a message

28:33

in their heart to write , what should they do to

28:35

start ?

28:36

Okay . So there's . You

28:38

gotta be be honest with yourself , right ? When

28:40

someone says I'm going to sell a million copies

28:42

and they have 10 friends on Facebook and Instagram

28:45

, right , I have no clue how they're going to sell a million

28:47

copies because they haven't built any transactional

28:49

audience . But there

28:52

are books that you're supposed to just write and tell your

28:54

story for your kids , your grandkids , your

28:56

great grandkids , your great great grandkids to

28:59

know about you . And I mean , I wish , don't

29:01

you wish , doug , you could have your

29:03

great , great great grandfather's journal

29:05

or writing of what he was going

29:07

through , what was happening in the country at that time

29:10

. Anything like that would be amazing . So that's

29:13

why I think everyone should write a book , what they've been through

29:15

, because , as the generations

29:17

happen and go past and past

29:19

, books will stay around forever

29:21

and audio , like now , we can put on

29:23

audio and you can listen to their voice to

29:26

take the time and do it . But it's not everyone's

29:28

not supposed to sell a million copies . It's very

29:30

hard to sell a million copies . I

29:33

believe in the power of books . I don't look

29:35

at a book sold as a book sold . I look

29:37

at a book sold as a prior answered

29:39

and I

29:42

think if we can put great content out there

29:44

and change a lot of lives and

29:46

my authors write great books

29:49

and I'm able to help them on the marketing and branding

29:51

side and scaling that

29:53

, we can do a lot of good and reach a lot

29:55

of people . I always say my favorite thing it'll

29:57

never change is when I get a letter

30:00

in that your , my books , my author's book

30:02

, is translated into a different language . Then I know

30:04

we've arrived right , because that's something

30:06

we couldn't

30:08

have done on our own . That was just God .

30:10

Wow , you talked about

30:13

writing a book for your kids or your family

30:15

, which is one thing . And then obviously , some people

30:17

do want to have huge platforms and write the

30:19

million dollar or the million copy sellers , but

30:22

people can also write a book just for credibility , right ? Can

30:24

you talk to people who maybe their goal

30:26

is to sell a million copies , but

30:28

they can use a book to increase their business

30:31

in other ways .

30:32

Okay . So I had a financial

30:34

planner come to me . She was taking

30:36

investments of a million dollars or more

30:39

right , that was where her size of her business was

30:41

, and we did a book for the

30:43

purpose of growing her business and building

30:45

credibility for her . She ended

30:47

up moving 10,000 books , but the best

30:49

part is her agency grew and now

30:51

she's taking minimum of two and a half million

30:53

, had seven more employees and has , you know

30:55

, did 10X in business

30:58

. So a lot of times a

31:00

book is , first of all , it builds credibility for you . Do

31:02

it right , Don't do it the cheap way . There's

31:05

so many people online that sell you self

31:07

publishing . That's a joke . That is not

31:09

going to . It's just not going to help you

31:11

. Call my office . I know the good , other

31:13

good people that do it . If we can't do it , we'll have

31:15

other people you know that we trust to do

31:17

it . But publish right

31:19

, you know , and then , as you get it out , use

31:23

it to grow your business , use it to grow your following

31:25

, use it to just grow your legacy

31:27

. However you're looking at it , it doesn't necessarily

31:30

have to be a book that

31:32

gets in Target

31:34

or Wal-Mart , you know , or on shelves where

31:36

you're in the airports it would be nice , but

31:38

to do that you have to be one of the top

31:40

30 titles that everybody wants and

31:42

is everyone looking for . So

31:45

we do a lot on Amazon . We're where Amazon

31:47

Ninja's over here , so we really

31:49

know how their algorithms work and how

31:52

to move books and have people find books

31:54

on Amazon . So that's a big strategy for us here

31:56

.

31:57

Yeah , so talking about different routes people

31:59

can go so they can self publish on their own or find

32:01

you know various people who will say they can do a good

32:03

job . I believe your agency

32:06

also offers an agency assisted publishing

32:08

and then traditional . Can you talk about if someone's

32:10

processing , hey , I have my book

32:12

, or I want to write a book and want to , you know how ? Do

32:14

I even know what path I should go down ?

32:16

Okay , so traditional is all about platform

32:19

. So you have to have a big enough platform that a traditional

32:21

publisher will pay you to publish , to

32:23

publish your book

32:25

. It used to be different

32:27

back . You know , even five , 10 years

32:30

ago , before social media was what it was , you

32:32

could get a book just because you were a great

32:34

writer . Now , even great writers

32:36

need to have a platform and have to show

32:38

a publisher how they're going to sell . The

32:41

problem with traditional publishing is it takes long

32:43

. So right now I'm selling books

32:45

that are coming out in fall of 2025

32:47

.

32:48

Wow .

32:48

That's a long wait . And so what's

32:51

happening ? And we have a another

32:53

side , called agent managed publishing

32:55

, which is a hybrid model where the author

32:57

owns 100% of their book and

33:00

we service it and create a great book , but

33:02

they own it

33:04

. We're having huge influencers with

33:06

millions and millions and millions

33:08

of followers not wanting to go traditional

33:11

because they want their book out in six months

33:13

. They don't want to wait two years . They

33:15

don't know what they're going to say in two years . They

33:17

know what they want to say now , and

33:19

so they rather own it . All

33:22

. That's what a lot of people are doing now is

33:24

they want to own all their own content so they

33:26

can do e-courses and master classes and

33:28

they can do movie deals

33:31

or documentaries or I mean

33:33

it just goes . The list goes on and on

33:35

. So traditional is not for everyone , and

33:37

traditional is not like it used to be in traditional

33:39

publishing , where you needed them more because of

33:41

how you buy books today

33:43

and you can get your book on Amazon and

33:45

look if you , 90%

33:47

of all books are sold online . What are we talking

33:50

about here ? You know , and that's including when you include

33:52

audio sales in there , because audio is all

33:54

digital Audio is . It went up 347%

33:57

in the last two years Wow . So

34:00

think about that when you're really looking

34:02

at books . It's like you can do it yourself . The

34:04

problem is you're going to have to have some money . You're going to have to invest it . It's

34:06

going to be a business for you , or you

34:09

can wait and do it traditionally and help have

34:11

a publisher , help you scale it , but at

34:13

the end of the day , it's up to you . You're still going to have

34:15

to work that book .

34:17

Yeah , on the agent , assistant or I

34:19

forget the word you used for it Like if

34:21

people are looking to make that investment , what does that typically

34:24

cost ? Range rise for them to

34:26

do that and get a book out in six months ?

34:28

It depends fiction , nonfiction , children's

34:30

book but it could be anywhere from 20,000

34:33

to 100,000 . So it really

34:35

depends on where they're at and also

34:37

know if they're writing themselves or

34:39

do they have a ghostwriter . So when you have a ghostwriter

34:41

, there's ghostwriters that are 10,000 and there's ghostwriters

34:44

that are 10 million . So

34:47

, like , like

34:49

the guy who just wrote Steve Jobs and Elon

34:51

Musk's book , you know he's , he's probably

34:54

the one of the most successful ghostwriters and

34:56

I think he starts at 5 million .

34:59

Wow .

35:00

It gives me an idea of like ghostwriting

35:02

is a whole nother side . And then it's like who's going

35:04

to tell your story ? And a pastor

35:06

can't just take a book , sermon

35:08

series and transcribe it and think it's going to be

35:11

a good book . It doesn't work that way , so it's

35:13

got to get a writer involved and make it right

35:15

. But that's where it's just

35:17

like buying a car . I always say you

35:19

know , you buy a car , you want leather

35:21

seats in it right , going to cost you a little more

35:24

. You want , like the heated steering wheel

35:26

is going to cost you more , right , you want . So

35:28

all that is kind of in a book

35:30

is the same way . You got to look it in and say , look

35:32

, what's your budget . And then what can you do ? What's the best you can

35:34

do for that budget ? And we really help authors

35:36

work in a budget and say this

35:39

is where I would spend it if that's what I have .

35:42

Got it and you talked about the importance of platform

35:44

and I'm sure whether , whatever route you go

35:46

, platform is important . Can you just talk

35:48

about , like , when you guys are looking for someone with quote

35:51

unquote a legit platform , that it's

35:53

like , hey , this is someone we should consider

35:55

? What kind of numbers are you looking for typically

35:57

?

35:59

Half a million on Instagram . It

36:05

could be the same on TikTok or Facebook

36:08

, but we're looking at they showed . It really actually is

36:10

even better if they show that they sold their

36:12

people something before

36:14

they have a transactional audience . They talk

36:16

about that if they sold stuff

36:18

, if they sold products , if they they're

36:20

getting them already buying from them . That actually

36:22

is great for us for a book . A lot of these

36:25

influencers can have videos that went

36:27

viral and have 20 million views

36:29

on a video , but they've never sold

36:31

anything . That's very different than clicking and

36:33

watching a funny video versus

36:35

actually going to that person and buying

36:37

. So we look at subscribers , we look at people

36:39

that are invested in them and

36:42

, of course , we have authors that have smaller platforms

36:44

. A lot of them have

36:46

. They have shown that something is transactional

36:49

in their line . So even if they don't have that

36:51

many followers , they're selling something

36:53

to their audience . Does that make sense ?

36:55

Yeah , no , absolutely so . If someone

36:57

just starting from zero , which sounds

36:59

like they'll have a long way to go . But where would you encourage

37:01

people to spend their time building

37:03

their platform if they don't know where to start ?

37:05

Well , a book helps them . So books a great way

37:07

. When you have a book out , they won't get a traditional

37:10

deal we'd have to publish it for them and

37:12

use the book to grow their business or grow their

37:15

brand and to start their brand and

37:17

the book's going to be really great for them . And if

37:19

that means they , it causes them to have

37:21

chances to go out and speak , that's awesome

37:24

. That's what a book does for a lot of people . They get speaking opportunities

37:26

they wouldn't get before . I also

37:29

would just think , when you're looking at a book is a

37:32

book is a part of a bigger

37:34

thing you're trying to grow . When we do a book for

37:36

a client , that's one thing , but a lot of times we have a movie

37:39

or documentary or something , a

37:41

core , something else that we're building , and

37:43

that book is just a catalyst for us to

37:45

do the other stuff that we want to do .

37:48

I've also heard that that you love when authors

37:50

have vision of writing multiple books

37:52

and seeing each book as a business . Anything

37:55

you want to say there that would be helpful for people aspiring

37:58

to write ?

37:59

The reason I love that is we

38:01

work for you , right , so we have

38:03

to scale something . It's hard to scale

38:05

one book , and so when an author has

38:07

multiple books , doug , we're able to scale

38:09

it . You're giving us something to scale . When

38:11

the first book does OK , the

38:13

second book does better . We can sell more of the first

38:16

book and , as our jobs

38:18

as agents is , we want to grow your

38:20

business and help you grow and help you scale . So

38:23

the more products you can give us , the more

38:25

chances we have to scale .

38:28

I want to dive into sales and marketing , which is on the other side

38:30

of publishing , but anything else

38:32

that I'm not asking that I should be

38:35

when it comes to writing and or

38:37

getting into publishing .

38:38

No , you did a good job

38:40

.

38:41

OK , great Well , sales and marketing . I was

38:43

really excited to dive into this because it sounds like

38:45

you could sell straight out of the womb

38:47

, so

38:49

I'll just leave this really really open ended . What

38:52

advice do you have for people , but

38:54

specifically authors , when it comes to selling

38:56

and marketing in their book ?

38:59

So I mean you've heard me say this before

39:01

but really think about a book like a business . So

39:03

if you were starting a I

39:05

don't know a laundromat or cleaners

39:08

or a Chick-fil-A , you'd want to do

39:10

marketing to people know that it's there , right ? You'd

39:12

want you have to spend money in marketing

39:14

. And so many times authors spend everything in

39:16

getting the book done and

39:19

then it's time to market and

39:21

they spend nothing and

39:23

then nobody gets to hear about it . And

39:25

so I say , whatever you spend on the book is

39:27

what you should be spending on marketing . Really realistically

39:30

is you need to put money in marketing and you've

39:32

got to have a team around you . That's why a lot of these

39:34

authors do launch teams and

39:37

they have a bunch of people around them

39:39

supporting them . They do Instagram lives

39:41

and ask their influencer friends If

39:44

you believe in the message , help get it out . And

39:47

so marketing is really crucial to a book

39:49

and even at like , you

39:51

create great ads and

39:53

great reels and great , you can

39:55

spend some money on that . It's

39:57

just how do you get your message out and

39:59

don't just spend all this time doing a book and then it comes

40:01

to market it and release it and then you're

40:04

out of money and you can't grow it .

40:07

Yeah , you mentioned a lot of different things

40:09

that people can do . Where do you see the greatest ROI as

40:11

far as spend comes when it comes to marketing

40:13

? Is it social , is it ads , is

40:15

it trying to get media ?

40:19

It's all above , but it's social media , right . So

40:21

everything , and it depends who your demographics

40:24

are , right . So there's a demographic for Facebook

40:26

and there's one for Instagram and TikTok

40:28

, right , and LinkedIn is a different demographic

40:31

. So it really depends on what your number

40:33

one demographic is , and then that's where

40:35

I would encourage them to spend the money .

40:38

OK and OK . If I

40:40

gave you 5 to 15 hours a week

40:43

, because I'm guessing a lot of authors aren't

40:45

full time to market and sell your book

40:47

, how would you spend that time ?

40:50

I would do ads and

40:52

I would do a lot on Amazon . I would spend

40:54

a lot on Amazon Instagram

40:56

, probably LinkedIn for you Facebook

41:00

and we don't have to spend

41:03

a ton but start with 500 a month

41:05

in AdBuy's and see

41:07

what's turning right . The other side

41:09

is I would ask you if you can speak

41:11

, what places you can locally speak at and get out

41:13

there and talk and then have books to sell

41:16

. I would , and

41:18

then I would do a lot on Amazon .

41:21

And I would love to hear you specifically talk

41:23

about selling . When you get in front of someone that you want to sell

41:25

product to , like you're meeting with Elon

41:27

, what are you thinking and how

41:29

do you kind of , what's your process for getting

41:32

the sale ?

41:33

OK , so

41:35

have you ever bought in from an infomercial ?

41:39

I don't think so .

41:41

Nothing you've ever bought in a product from an infomercial

41:43

.

41:44

Oh , I'm a big Beachbody workout fan . I

41:46

didn't get him from the workout but from

41:48

infomercials , but that would be the closest probably

41:50

I've come . Yeah , I'm boring .

41:53

OK , so don't they do the shakes , don't they have

41:55

Shakeology ?

41:55

Yeah , Shakeology , yeah yeah .

41:57

You call Shakeology .

41:58

Yeah .

41:59

OK , so a real Instagram

42:02

post , any of that ? That's

42:04

new infomercial right You're buying

42:07

from clicking Back . In my

42:09

days we'd watch it on TV and QDC

42:11

or home shopping network . So

42:13

I remember , like any infomercial

42:15

I watched , I would be sold . So one

42:18

thing about me is I'm super easy

42:20

, like I'm like an egg cracker that cracks

42:22

the egg for you and , with no mess

42:24

, buy it Right . Most

42:26

probably inventions that never worked

42:28

. I would love it because they did such a

42:30

good job selling about ease of life or

42:32

they were solving a problem , like

42:35

the ab roller right or the like

42:38

the George Forman Grill

42:40

, like think of the my Pillow guy who's

42:42

super nerdy but I bought it because it was World's

42:44

Comfiest Pillow Right and by the time you get it

42:46

. It is comfy . This is a comfy

42:48

pillow , so I

42:50

bought . I get sold really easily

42:53

. So that also is

42:55

why I think I can sell anything really

42:57

easily . And so when you listen to enough people

43:00

selling and you listen to enough sales pitches

43:02

, you kind of know that you've got to

43:04

solve . What's the problem you're solving ? So

43:06

when you go in and talk to someone , what are

43:08

you offering them ? Is it ease of something

43:10

? Is it , is it wealth

43:13

? Is it ? Is

43:15

it making their life ? You know , their

43:18

workflow of their workday easier

43:20

. I mean you just got to think what's the problem ? You know

43:22

that yourself . Is it helping them cook

43:24

meals for dinner for in 30 minutes

43:26

or less ? All of this stuff matters

43:29

. And so when you know that and you go in to

43:31

a meeting , you're sell , you're solving a

43:33

problem for them . Then their ears you know

43:35

they listen , they're like what do you

43:37

have to say ? Like this is interesting . So

43:40

you have to know what problem you're solving and what they need

43:42

solved . If you're solving a problem that they don't

43:44

have , you're out the door . So

43:47

you better do your research and figure

43:49

out what you're solving for

43:51

them or what they need . And

43:53

when you sell you have to be confident . So

43:55

I always say this like I walk in , I don't even know what I'm selling

43:57

sometimes , I'm just super confident and I'm

44:00

like , yeah , and then they believe

44:02

me that it's the best idea , because if you're confident

44:04

and you have good energy , they want your

44:06

energy . But if you go in there and

44:08

you are boring , what , what

44:11

are they going to ? Why do they want to have you in there ? But if

44:13

you show excitement and change your voice and get super

44:15

excited and like , do

44:17

crazy stuff , they kind of like it because

44:19

, listen , they have enough boring people around them every

44:21

day .

44:25

Several follow up questions there . My first one is how

44:27

does your ability to be

44:29

sold so easily impact

44:31

your marriage , Like what I'm

44:33

just trying to like ? Does your husband just see like 100

44:35

boxes show up from Amazon every day ?

44:38

No , but there was a time that he , like

44:40

when I was pregnant and you're like kind of crazy

44:42

, when you're like at

44:44

two in the morning I was like buying everything

44:46

off the infomercial . So he like took

44:48

away my debit card and is like you are not

44:50

buying anything anymore , like this is done

44:53

, but I was getting these . But I

44:55

right now we do have another company

44:57

that we do inventions for , right . So

44:59

it's interesting that I'm part of invention

45:01

business because I love

45:03

things in inventions that people

45:05

are coming up with their ideas that are new . That's

45:07

why I love shark tank , right . I love seeing

45:10

new things that people are creating and

45:13

it's fun seeing if it works

45:15

or if you could actually make it work . But

45:17

anyway , that's like a whole different side . But yes , I'm

45:19

sold easily , but the people

45:21

on them , they actually sell really

45:23

well , like the oxy clean guy

45:26

. He makes it look , anything

45:28

can be white and clean , and amazing

45:30

that . Why wouldn't you try

45:32

it ?

45:34

Right .

45:35

But he's exciting . Is he boring ? Would he

45:37

sell it if he was like bioxyclinic

45:39

clean ? It could make your thing . No , he's dynamic

45:42

. So that's where I think a lot of people

45:44

go in to sell something and they're not

45:46

dynamic and they're not excited about what they're

45:48

selling because they don't care about it . So

45:50

find something you care about , and if you're

45:53

writing a book , you should be selling

45:55

something you really care about and believe in , and

45:57

so make it exciting for the person .

46:00

Yeah , you also mentioned confidence . Walking

46:02

in with confidence , you

46:04

clearly are very confident . I think I heard

46:06

you say that , like you're not really intimidated , you don't get nervous

46:08

around people . I'm just curious , like is

46:11

confidence something that you feel like you

46:13

have as a result of being raised in a great home

46:15

where your parents gave you the value , dignity

46:17

and worth that you needed to be confident ? Is it some of the way

46:19

you were naturally wired Like ? I

46:21

feel so many people deal with insecurities

46:24

and desire to have confidence . They just don't

46:26

know how .

46:28

OK , Doug , how many brothers and sisters do you have ?

46:31

I have a sister and a stepbrother , so two yeah

46:33

.

46:33

OK . So when you grow up in a big family

46:35

and there's seven of us a year

46:37

apart , you go crazy for any

46:39

kind of like airtime right , any

46:41

kind of any parents time to actually

46:43

get your voice in for one second

46:45

they can hear you , right ? But

46:47

think , we all grew up confident . We

46:49

all . We were also our own sports team , we all played

46:52

sports , so we all were super competitive , but we

46:54

all grew up confident . We weren't a very confident

46:56

home and very positive home , but

46:58

we had to really work to get our voice heard . So

47:01

now when we talk with someone , we don't have to work

47:03

as hard when you have seven , you know , seven

47:06

of us trying to scramble over each other to get our voice heard . So

47:09

confidence , I think and I and I look across all of

47:11

my siblings Everyone's confident . No

47:14

one's scared to talk up in public , no one's

47:16

scared to share their ideas . We're also

47:18

from Jersey , so Jersey , but

47:21

I will like confidence wasn't

47:23

or speaking our ideas , and even if we

47:25

were turned down or made fun of or people laughed , it didn't

47:28

matter . We were made fun of every day at home with

47:30

seven kids all making fun of each other . So

47:33

you kind of get you let things roll off of

47:35

you easier , and you're not afraid to speak up

47:37

, and you're not afraid to be wrong either . You just go

47:39

for it .

47:41

Yeah , thank you for sharing that . I

47:43

guess anything else on sales and marketing . I

47:45

just want to ask a leadership question and dive in the lightning round

47:47

.

47:47

No , that's good All right , I'm

47:50

just curious .

47:51

overall , you know you've been leading an organization that

47:53

you started 20 years 20 plus years ago now Any

47:56

leadership lesson . Stick out that you were like , wow , when I made this shift

47:59

in my leadership , everything

48:01

changed for us .

48:03

Okay , when I learned to delegate

48:06

, everything changed for me . Really

48:08

, delegation was hard for me because have

48:11

you ever heard this saying Jack

48:14

of all trades , master of none ? Yeah , so it

48:16

was like okay , I was a jack of

48:18

all trades . I was good at everything . I

48:21

could learn how to do stuff . Because when you , when you're

48:23

green and you're learning and

48:25

you're doing it all yourself , you just learn , right , you teach

48:27

it . It's like it's called street smarts right , you're

48:29

learning it , you're figuring it out . But

48:33

when you can bring someone in that actually is really good at

48:35

this , one thing that you don't like

48:37

you're learning or doing like I'm doing accounting and

48:40

I took accounting classes just to learn

48:42

how to do accounting . But it wasn't my number

48:44

one strength and I hated

48:46

it , but I did it because I had to do quick books . I had to do the books

48:49

and as the business was growing , it was

48:51

getting more and more complicated . And then

48:53

I was , and then I'm like , wow , when I hired a CPA

48:56

and accounting and a bookkeeper here

48:58

and a CFO , it was amazing

49:00

how much relief came off of me so

49:02

that I could focus doing sales and

49:04

marketing what I want to do and what I was good

49:06

at , and let someone else do the financials

49:08

part , what they're really good at . And so

49:10

delegation was a big thing , but really finding

49:13

people in their own individual strengths

49:15

A lot of people hire people

49:17

that are like them , like we , like people that are like

49:19

us , and that's great to have

49:21

some of those around , but you really should hire

49:24

people that have

49:26

a skill that you don't have and

49:28

then that actually allows you to keep doing what you're

49:30

good at and leading the way you need to lead , and have

49:32

these other people building other parts of your company

49:34

. So that was a big learning lesson for me .

49:37

So good , with a few minutes we have left , I

49:39

want to dive into the lightning round bunch of fun questions

49:41

I ask in every interview , and the first one is what is the best

49:43

advice you've ever received and who gave it

49:45

to you ?

49:47

Oh I

49:49

well , like I said , I have this motto

49:51

that is , work like it depends on you and pray like

49:53

it depends on God , From

49:56

Mark Batterson . Wrote it in the circle maker

49:58

, one of my favorite books , and

50:01

so that is my motto . And , like

50:03

it's funny , I got that right when I started

50:05

, like five years after starting my agency

50:07

, and I really have made

50:09

this my motto .

50:11

It may be the same answer , but if you could put a quote on a billboard

50:14

for everyone to read , what would it say ?

50:16

Yeah , I would do that , work , work , like it's

50:19

good , I like that .

50:20

Yeah , I already know the answer to this , but what's one

50:22

book that's made a huge impact on your life that you find yourself

50:24

giving away most often , or , you

50:26

know , telling people to buy ?

50:28

so the circle maker . It's

50:30

when I started really dreaming big for my company

50:33

and I was 29

50:35

years old and I believe that I could have

50:37

the biggest faith-based

50:39

literary and entertainment agency in

50:41

the world , and that was my dream and that's

50:43

what I'm trying to build . And the

50:46

circle maker I started praying circles

50:48

around everything my every office , every employee

50:50

, our conference table , every call

50:52

. I had and Been

50:55

pretty cool . So if you haven't read the circle

50:57

maker , pick it up . And then he has a devotional called draw

50:59

the circle . That's a 40-day prayer challenge

51:01

that will change your life . Everybody needs to read that

51:04

.

51:05

You may have answered this , but I am curious . You've gotten

51:07

to work with so many people , especially in the Christian

51:09

side of things , that people would love to spend time

51:11

with . Are there any of other authors

51:14

that you've worked with that have significantly

51:16

impacted your life the way maybe mark in the circle

51:18

maker have ?

51:19

oh , pretty much all my Seriously

51:23

all my authors in some way . I get to hear amazing story

51:26

, get to hear about their life , get

51:28

to see God using them in big ways . Everyone

51:31

knows Tim Tebow story , I mean obviously was pretty

51:33

remarkable when he put John 316 under

51:36

his eyes and over 90

51:38

, you know , million people googled

51:40

John 316 in 24 hours

51:42

. Pretty amazing to see

51:44

like how God uses that and we were able to do a

51:46

book from that . I mean , I have stories

51:49

. I've got a NBA player

51:51

, jonathan Isaac , who in the bubble

51:53

stood when everyone was kneeling

51:55

and Stood for

51:57

Jesus and it was unbelievable to see

51:59

like Tens of thousands of

52:01

people get saved from him being that

52:03

bold . And what people don't know about Jonathan

52:05

Isaac is Just a year ago

52:08

from before that he was in Florida

52:10

State and struggled with anxiety

52:12

taking anti-xay e-messon because

52:14

he was so scared to talk up or speak up or raise

52:16

His hand in class . And here's

52:18

God , tell him to stand In

52:20

front of all these reporters you know for Jesus . So

52:22

like that kind of stuff I hear all the

52:24

time every author has amazing stories

52:27

and it's really just really

52:29

. I tell you've heard this , doug , but we

52:31

get thousands of letters in of suicides not

52:33

committed , of people coming to Christ , marriage is saved

52:36

, of fathers and sons Reunited

52:38

. And I tell my a business is growing

52:41

. I mean we just got an awesome one , say , of somebody

52:43

who's I encourage them to start a business , and

52:45

then it's like now their business is ten

52:47

million dollars . I'm like in two years . I'm like can

52:49

you teach me what you just did ? That's impressive

52:52

, right , I think . And

52:54

I tell my authors and I tell my staff

52:56

this , but it's all because of their

52:58

books , right , and and I

53:00

feel really honored and humbled to get be

53:02

a part of getting their story out .

53:05

Yeah , well , thank you for for being obedient to

53:08

the call and the plan God has for your life and

53:10

the impact that it's making . Just thank you for being faithful

53:12

. I'm sure there's times Well , I don't know

53:14

if there are times you've wanted to throw in the town , but

53:16

I'm sure glad that you haven't stopped and you've continued

53:18

to go , and I'm just so grateful for the impact .

53:20

Okay , I'll tell you this one thing so yeah like

53:22

every . I believe

53:24

too many people Quit

53:27

before their miracle , they quit before

53:29

their success . They give up too easily and

53:31

in our culture today too many people don't

53:34

realize like just work hard and keep going , because

53:36

when you quit you , I mean you

53:38

could have been successful six months later or a year

53:40

later . And I , just because I'm

53:42

a literary agent CS Lewis , I

53:45

was reading about him that a lot of people don't know this . But back

53:48

then , okay , when CS Lewis was pitching Narnia

53:50

, you would have to hand write

53:52

. There was no internet , there was no phone

53:54

calls , right . You would hand write your

53:56

letters , your submissions to Harper Collins

53:59

or to Penguin Random

54:01

House , right , and you would say here's my submission

54:03

, please take it . He went 600

54:06

rounds . And

54:09

I always think about this because I'm like if I was

54:11

CS Lewis's agent , I would not quit him . I'm

54:14

like , do you ? And I think I would go 600

54:16

rounds with one of the best you know writers

54:19

? And and I don't know

54:21

, 600 rounds . Working for free is a lot

54:23

of work , right , a lot of rejections

54:26

. But what if he stopped

54:28

at 599 , you know

54:30

, none of our kids would know Narnia

54:32

. We wouldn't read the grace great divorce

54:34

. You wouldn't have like . Think about book after

54:36

book after book of CS Lewis . So if

54:38

, if he

54:40

quit , we would have lost right

54:42

, and I and I wonder

54:45

if how many people have

54:47

really lost in life because they

54:49

just quit too early and they didn't stick it out . So

54:51

I , if I can encourage anyone here , is do

54:54

the work and just don't quit . If you're feeling like

54:56

you're gonna give up , keep going , because

54:59

you never know when your day is gonna be so

55:01

good .

55:02

Thank you for sharing that . You

55:04

get to spend time with a lot of great people . I'm just curious when you meet

55:06

someone that you look up to , I want to

55:08

learn from , do you have a go-to question that you always ask ?

55:11

Oh , that's a no , I don't . I

55:13

just whatever I feel like wanting to ask .

55:16

Okay , what's your greatest leadership pet peeve ?

55:20

Okay , my greatest leadership pet peeve

55:22

are You're

55:24

gonna . When people talk too much all

55:27

day long and not work , it like drives

55:29

me crazy . When they're just talking

55:31

for hours and hours at the coffee thing

55:33

or talking to this person , I'm like good to work

55:35

, right , so I like I don't mind you

55:37

talking for a little bit , but my pet peeve is like all

55:40

day long just talking and fooling around

55:42

and not working . It drives me crazy . I .

55:46

Don't know if you have an actual bucket list or not

55:48

, but if you do , and even if you

55:50

don't , want something that you've done in your life that you think

55:52

everyone should experience before they die , oh , Okay

55:55

, I don't have .

55:56

Everyone answers this question goes skydiving

55:58

. Do this ? Everyone needs

56:01

to cold call someone , oh . Oh

56:03

, that's a good somebody that they want

56:06

to talk to or interview or meet Cold

56:09

call . I cold call people every

56:11

week that are the craziest cold

56:13

calls ever , right , and I'll find their agent

56:15

or fan , find their manager , and I literally just

56:17

call and introduce myself and they have no clue who

56:19

I am . Wow . So if you haven't done that , I would

56:21

encourage you to cold call and practice that

56:23

, because it's really good for yourself , it's really good

56:26

and it's kind of exciting when you do get

56:28

the answer that you get a call with the person You've

56:30

always wanted to talk to .

56:32

It's good stuff if you could go back and have coffee

56:34

with Esther at any age and you would

56:36

have actually listened to yourself . What age would

56:38

you have coffee with yourself and what would you tell that version

56:40

of Esther ? Oh ?

56:42

I probably would have told . Just because I'm going through

56:45

this with my son , he's a senior . I probably

56:47

told my senior self to go play basketball in college

56:49

you know and go do it . Sometimes

56:52

I look back and say I wish I played sports in college

56:54

. But I Don't

56:56

really care , like I wouldn't have got to where

56:58

I am today if I did that . So it's

57:01

just one part of like I would have told myself

57:03

to play sports in college .

57:05

And last question you've you've talked about the impact that

57:07

you've made through your work , but you know , one day , at

57:09

the end of your life , looking back , what do you want to be remembered

57:12

for ?

57:15

Encouraging , inspiring people to tell their stories

57:17

, so I want to be known for .

57:20

Anything else you want to leave leaders with today .

57:24

Don't quit , go for it , keep

57:27

keep on keeping on right like I honestly

57:29

I just I would if I could inspire everyone . Just just

57:32

believe in yourself and keep working and

57:34

Keep dreaming and keep creating

57:37

and keep developing new ideas

57:39

.

57:40

Well , esther , I've loved this . It was everything I thought would be and more

57:43

. Just again , thank you for the impact you're making and everything

57:45

you do . Hopefully we can do this again sometime .

57:47

Thanks , Ted .

57:49

Well , leader , thank you so much for listening to my conversation

57:52

with Esther . I hope that you enjoyed it as much as I did

57:54

. You can find ways to connect with her and links

57:56

to everything that we discussed in the show go to

57:58

l3leadership . org/ 404

58:01

. And , as always , I liked into every episode

58:03

with a quote , and today I'll quote Joyce Meyer , who said

58:05

this . She said God chooses to use

58:08

and promote those who know they are nothing without

58:10

him and who give him glory and credit

58:12

For all of their accomplishments . Every time you

58:14

have success in your life , remember to

58:16

give the glory to God , and I just

58:18

love that . Well , I hope you enjoyed this

58:20

episode . Know that my wife Lauren , I love you . We believe

58:23

in you and I say it every episode . But don't quit , keep

58:25

leading . The world desperately needs your

58:28

leadership . We'll talk to you next episode .