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Intro…
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Lives Sarasota, FL
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Kids: 16, 8, 5 – 2 girls & a boy
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Current Work
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Agency — SEO, PPC, Web Design
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Story
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Introverted…doesn’t get out of his house often
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Big family…9 of them…moved around a lot…military family
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His brother was his best friend — he’s the extrovert
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Freshman in college
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core curriculum he wanted to learn was not in there
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In the Navy 95-99…
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joined to use as a stepping stone
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machinist…
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Seal training cut short…
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Got out of the Navy…
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wanted to be in business for himself after he got out
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got into a really bad car accident ==> left Navy
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got run over by a semi
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His job is to figure out where to go…
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…and hire the right people
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1st job as a model…?!?
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2nd job out of the Navy…
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sales @ car dealership
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had to learn how to do small talk
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worked from 9am to 9pm for a month and made $1.42
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his manager was his roommate…mad at him for not paying rent
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5 other Michael’s that work there…
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==> change his name to Mical
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if they don’t remember you, it doesn’t matter
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==> top 3 sales
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~1.5 years doing this job
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started learning internet marketing at dealership
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SEO, Email Marketing
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~1999/2000 — Google wasn’t super big yet
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Then, wanted to keep growing his skills
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last real job @ mortgage broker ~2003
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“how much biz have I delivered to them?”
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~$100 million
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daughter born…holding her in hospital
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can’t do this working 80 hours a week at a job
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==> courage to go out there
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Started his business ~2003
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small office in old cigar factory
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agency — getting clients
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educating people
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doing this for customers outside the USA first 2-3 years
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1st clients by going to conferences…
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personal development conferences
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then getting referrals
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Next phase of business
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branded as him…
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ranking for Tampa SEO
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Asked himself, “what happens if he wants to sell his business?”
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changed to a business positioning vs personal positioning
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~2007-2008 started this…took about a year
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==> starting to pull himself out of the company’s roles
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take his face and name out of it
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Then…realized he needed to focus on systems and documentation
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“What if something happens to me?”
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no one could fulfill on what he did…
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brought on a lot of people to try to fulfill
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~up to $50k/m
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was working up to 18 hours a day
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brought on someone, taught him the business…
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he walks away and took away half his biz
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Recovery from getting ripped off…
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defining roles…
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To start: 1 person can do multiple roles
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Eventually: 1 person-1 role
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built a system to create a system
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empowered people who worked for him to build system
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==> system innovations he didn’t expect
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hiring contractors…
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on as an needed
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but, if entire biz is outsourced, it has reduced value
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employee base is an asset
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Moved to Georgia
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Met now wife…
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Facebook brought him back to her
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Get back to Florida
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start to scale up biz
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next kid born…wife sick…juggling lots of things
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started speaking at local events
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gives you a lot of authority
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unconference, meetup
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doesn’t like networking events…
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…unless speaker or sponsor
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Person at one of his events he was speaking at
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Mical was wanting out of his business
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Approached him…saw documentation he had…
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Made him “absurd” offer: $2 million & he took it
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paid out over time…
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small % paid upfront with monthly installments
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thinks he structured the deal poorly
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didn’t listen to knowledgeable people on this
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$2 million supposed to be paid out over 2 years
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Took him about 1 year to transition out of the business after sale
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he wasn’t systemized out of the sales yet…
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he could have done it faster if his systems/documentation were better
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Year: 2012
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If he were to do it again…
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get a business broker
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Then tried to figure out what he wanted to do next
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working in this biz for 15 years…
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considered doing a course…
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started looking at legacy
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do something that is going to last longer
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leaving his kids taken care of
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partnered with a mentor…
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looked for companies in this area to invest in
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& use his marketing expertise can be leveraged
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never invested $$ into companies because they couldn’t find the right companies
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did take ownership in a few companies via advisory roles
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started another agency…
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with intent to build and sell
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crashed and burned with web design partner
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Then started Cyberize Group
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More web design vs SEO
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scaling up…
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started using a call center for outbound sales
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predictable 1-2/week new clients
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paid hourly…
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in the Philippines
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Started outbound sales in Dec 2018
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started call center in Feb 2019
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makes the business worth
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Inhouse vs contractor
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critical positions need to be in house
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strategy — in house
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execution — contractor
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Next 2-5 years
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Agency —
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scaling and removing himself from working in his business
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wants to be the chairman of the board
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Digital Domination Dojo
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Operation SEO Agency Empire
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Putting the documentation from his agency into here
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need a vision for the business…
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to spread to your team…
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vision needs to be able to fit team member’s dreams inside of it
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set out from beginning trying to learn “critical skills”
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wanted to build a business…
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knew he needed to learn how to sell…
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…because businesses always need sales
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skill vs talent
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talent is starting point…doesn’t translate into high performance
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skills develop on top of the talent
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break things down into smaller pieces
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Outro
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Thank you!
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Agency — SEO, PPC, Web Design
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