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Build Your Own Referral Engine: The Power of Centers of Influence with Mike Snively · The Ambitious Coach Lab

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_02: Welcome to the ambitious coaching lab, Powered by Nine Game.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_02: I'm your host, Dr.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_02: Pam Lumley.
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_02: Each week we explore the real-time big tough conversation and breakthrough moments to drive coaching things.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_02: Let's jump into today's episode.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_02: Well, hello, friends.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_02: I am so excited to welcome Mike Snively with us today.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_02: Mike and I both live in Greenville.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_02: Uh and so we connected actually by happenstance.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_02: I think we had run in circles and we're just happening to playing golf at the same time and then ended up having lunch with a couple of our mutual friends, which is so much fun.
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_02: But Mike is an all-around business development expert.
• 0:39
  SPEAKER_02: He helps leaders.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_02: He's also sitting in many different leadership roles and has led companies and sat in lots of different seats.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_02: But one of the unique things that he has is this unbelievable ability to connect with other people and in a deep, meaningful way.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_02: So we're going to jump into that.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_02: But Mike, welcome to the show.
• 0:57
  SPEAKER_02: I'm excited to have you, man.
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you, Cam.
• 1:00
  SPEAKER_00: I appreciate the opportunity to have a chat.
• 1:03
  SPEAKER_02: It's such a unique thing that you do.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_02: But before we jump into all that, why don't you kick it off and just tell us a little bit about your journey to kind of where you're at to today?
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_00: Well, it it's been a long journey, but I've held uh many leadership roles in sales and marketing.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_00: I've helped run a couple of companies along the way.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_00: Uh the role I'm in now, I'm a solo uh B D guy uh working for a managed service provider that's focused on cybersecurity.
• 1:40
  SPEAKER_00: But uh out of all of this uh multiple decades, I'm not gonna say how many, but it's a lot, Cam.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_02: I won't ask you.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_00: I've worked my way from the Midwest down to beautiful South Carolina and here to Greenville for the last almost eight years, and uh built uh some soft skills that a lot of people I've learned don't have down pat.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_00: And I help them with that, which I think is what we're gonna talk about today.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_02: I cannot wait to jump in.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_02: Um so let's see, we go back, you know, about eight years because it's 2020, it's hard to believe it's 2026, but I think 2019 is when you said you first kind of moved down to Greenville.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_02: And one of the things that when we were talking initially that you said you had said, I want to make sure I get this right, is you were six laps behind in a four-lap race, which I thought was really interesting because you essentially had no network when you moved down here.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_02: And so can you take us back to that season?
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_02: When did you realize you needed to stop networking casually and really start actually building relationships intentionally?
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_00: So it was very early in 2019.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_00: I actually got here in December of 2018.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_00: And early in 2019, I was at an event with someone uh here in Greenville who's become one of my best friends.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_00: And I was taking note mentally of the words that were coming my way.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: Um I'm a fraternity brother with, I sit on a board with, I uh hunt with, I've gone fishing with, they've come to my house with, and the there was a sense of intentionality.
• 3:47
  SPEAKER_00: And or I went to I graduated from Greenville High with, and and it was much like being uh blasted, sandblasted by these very that that if you weren't paying attention, you wouldn't hear it.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_00: But it was I'm nowhere near this, and like I told you, I moved to Greenville and I knew nobody.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_00: Nobody.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_00: I knew my wife, my son, and my daughter-in-law, and I had no business connections.
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_00: And so maybe my antenna was up, but I picked up on I've got uh I I can't just go to these uh what I call business card collection events.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_00: And it and there's really no uh connectivity that's going on, right?
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_00: You're just collecting business cards and it it's a bunch of hey howdy kind of stuff.
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_02: So yeah, that is uh so accurate, you know, it it and there's a lot of those around.
• 4:57
  SPEAKER_02: It's not hard to find those types of events, right?
• 5:02
  SPEAKER_02: And I think especially with um business coaches or advisors, we can kind of, you know, just where wherever you fall in that type of relationship.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_02: But um, I think it can be a little bit of a trap sometimes where we think we're filling time with going to these networking events and we're gonna be able to network with people, but it doesn't necessarily lead to something, right?
• 5:24
  SPEAKER_00: No.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_00: Activity does not equal productivity.
• 5:28
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_00: I can't tell you over the time that I've been here where people will go to events just so their boss can look at their calendar and it looks like they're actually doing something.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_00: And honestly, they're not moving the needle.
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_00: You know, where if they would slow down and be intentional, and we'll get into this here, I'm sure, in the conversation, uh there's a way to get this done and actually have close intentional uh centers of influence, and we'll talk about that in a little bit.
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_00: That that actually help you um move the needle in their business and your business and help you be a trusted advisor.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_00: That word's well overused, but it it's true in a lot of cases.
• 6:21
  SPEAKER_02: So let's I mean, on that note, let's jump into that.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, so you went from essentially zero connections to uh almost, I think 1300, I think is what you had said, in a very short amount of time.
• 6:34
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, basically just a couple years.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, what did you start doing that accelerated that at that rate?
• 6:41
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, most people would take decades to get that many solid connections in an area.
• 6:47
  SPEAKER_00: So it it I dusted off the this process didn't just come to me in a dream.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_00: It it's one that I've used over a few decades.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_00: And so I dusted it off because I knew I had to not be six laps behind on a four-lap race.
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_00: And I intentionally looked at uh how do I get jumpstarted in this and look for groups where there are business leaders that are part of these groups.
• 7:17
  SPEAKER_00: And in my case, I looked in Greenville at two that I found.
• 7:22
  SPEAKER_00: One was the South Carolina Upstate Alliance.
• 7:26
  SPEAKER_00: They had 210 uh investors at that point, and the other was Greenville Rotary downtown.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_00: They had, this was pre-COVID, so it was 260 members, most of them business leaders, partners, you know, leadership level folks.
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_00: So I convinced my owner.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_00: We're a company of about 45 to 50 people, and we looked at the price.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_00: It's more than what we usually spend on groups, but I made a business case, jumped into those groups, and what I the the intentionality was I looked at who they were and the types of companies that they worked for, and they were all well above me in the orgs organizations that they worked for, and they were the type of people that I needed to be associated with to jumpstart this.
• 8:27
  SPEAKER_00: So fast forward, for instance, the Upstate Alliance, in the first year I was there, I got fifty-eight first we call them first-time appointments out of that group, which if I had just done this by myself, though first off, those people would never have taken my call because they wouldn't have known who Mike was.
• 8:54
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_00: But I came to them as a new investor in the Upstate Alliance, which is a great organization.
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_00: Um I played the new guy in town role, and I also used um the CEO's name and said, John Lemmis told me to give you a call.
• 9:11
  SPEAKER_00: They sat down with coffee.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_00: And while none of them did any business with me, which was not the intent, they did introduce me to someone who introduced me to someone who introduced me to someone who so they started this chain reaction, and I I tell people when I uh when they bring me in to talk to their teams, it's like the Oppenheimer effect.
• 9:37
  SPEAKER_00: When you're splitting the atom, you go from two to four to sixteen to sixty-four to two fifty-six, and then I can't multiply past that in my big numbers.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_00: Big numbers.
• 9:48
  SPEAKER_00: So so I jump started with that.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_00: And and from that I started having individual meetings.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_00: Usually they were coffee meetings because I get a hold of people before their day gets out of control.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_00: And uh and I started I'm very intentional about setting those, and I'm looking for very intentional people.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_00: I wear that word out, Cam.
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_00: Intenal.
• 10:18
  SPEAKER_00: So that's how I got that's got to.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_00: I went from zero to 1350 in three years, and it's way above that now.
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_02: That's amazing.
• 10:30
  SPEAKER_02: The um you talked a lot about uh just centers of influence, right?
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_02: Can you dive a little bit into that?
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_02: Because maybe, I mean, again, we're you know, the ambitious coach lab, we're talking to coaches and consultants and those.
• 10:45
  SPEAKER_02: And so a business development is a lifeblood of a coach, right?
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_02: You get into coaching to do coaching, right?
• 10:52
  SPEAKER_02: You don't get into coaching to do business development sales, but you have to do that before.
• 10:57
  SPEAKER_02: And so, can you just outline your understanding and definition of a center of influence and how you leverage that in the context of how a business coach could leverage that for their own practice?
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_00: So uh I look at it it's other service providers.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_00: In my case, we've talked about if you think of it as a pie, and and every pie has pieces to it.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_00: My pie has 10 pieces, other coaches, their pies may have six or five.
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_00: It's not it doesn't matter.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_00: But each piece represents a profession.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_00: And I intentionally looked at what service providers uh are at the leadership level in those professions and know their clients at both wide and deep.
• 11:59
  SPEAKER_00: So for instance, a CPA, they they talk to the owners, the uh presidents, whoever inside their companies, and they know what's going on wide and deep inside the company.
• 12:12
  SPEAKER_00: So a CPA would be a service provider, they would be a center of influence, they would know when something is amiss and when there's risk, because that's what my company does, is we mitigate risk and find blind spots so that they don't get surprised on a Monday morning because someone bad from a foreign company country came in and did something wrong.
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_00: So I identified 10 pieces of the pie, ten professions, and started intentionally reaching out to those people or having people introduce me to those folks, like CPAs, fractional CFOs, um commercial bankers, business coaches, peer advisory groups, private equity people, merger and acquisition people, all of those.
• 13:09
  SPEAKER_00: I'm leaving people out there intentionally.
• 13:12
  SPEAKER_00: But I looked at who's my ideal referral partner that gets me to my ideal client profile.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_00: So it's it it all again, intentional.
• 13:27
  SPEAKER_00: And and behind it, that center of influence, that group in that pie helps me, they're out thinking about if I if I do a good job of uh telling my story to them and they're doing a good job of actively listening.
• 13:46
  SPEAKER_00: In some cases I have to tell the story five or six times, maybe just once if they're really good.
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_00: I'm I have a team of unpaid salespeople that are out in Greenville right now thinking about is this a good company to introduce Mike to?
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_00: And more importantly, vice versa.
• 14:07
  SPEAKER_00: And we'll get into that.
• 14:09
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_00: Because that's we're all a center of influence for each other.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_00: And it's i it's based on giving more than you get.
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_00: That's the whole premise on what I do, and it's a habit.
• 14:26
  SPEAKER_00: It's like brushing my teeth every morning or taking a shower and washing my hair.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_00: I don't do this when the funnel gets shallow.
• 14:36
  SPEAKER_00: I do it every day or at least two or three times a week so that it's a consistent habit.
• 14:46
  SPEAKER_00: It's not when things get you know weak in the funnel, as we call it.
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 14:53
  SPEAKER_00: And then you scramble.
• 14:55
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 14:55
  SPEAKER_00: You consistently just do this because it it's the same thing as if you work out and you ask someone which workout made you fit.
• 15:04
  SPEAKER_00: You can't call that one workout.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_00: It's it's over time, right?
• 15:11
  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_00: Same thing with this.
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_00: And so it it you know, James Cleary wrote the book Atomic Habits, and it's same thing, same principle.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_00: If you do the little things consistently over time, it it bears amazing fruit.
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_00: So I I do a lot of the hard work that a lot of colleagues that I hang around with do not want to do, right?
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_00: They're like, oh, I get plenty of referrals, you know.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_00: I I grew up here and went to Greenville High and blah, blah, blah.
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_00: And then all of a sudden the referrals that start to diminish, and then they're scrambling.
• 15:50
  SPEAKER_02: That I see that so much in in the coaching world where it's it's this reactive, oh man, I gotta I gotta fill my pipeline again, and then then I take my foot off the gas, and then, you know, and it's just this whiplash, and there's never no consistency.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_02: And I one of the things that I distinct, yes, one of the things that I distinctly remember, because I want to go back, you had mentioned this in the when you were talking just a second ago, but of how you have little mini salespeople that are outside of your organization.
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_02: I distinctly remember when we sat down for lunch at Threes Greenville after we had played golf, that I think I asked you, hey, oh Mike, what do you do?
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_02: And you looked over at David Benner and you said, take it, David, and he introduced you and it blew my mind.
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_02: And that's an actually an intentional thing that you do, is that correct?
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_02: It it is.
• 16:46
  SPEAKER_00: So it in the I've got I don't know how many now, but it's well over 2,000, 3,000, whatever the number is, uh in the group that I've curated over eight years.
• 17:02
  SPEAKER_00: Um in the middle of that pie, if you will, at the center with all of those professions, I've got 18 I call them purple pelicans, because they're they're different in that they are incredibly intentional and we have a regular cadence that we meet and they know my business as well as I know theirs.
• 17:30
  SPEAKER_00: And they can we can all give each other's pitch, if you will.
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_00: So I tell people I have 18 people right now in Greenville or the upstate out there talking to people thinking, is this a a good company to introduce Mike to?
• 17:51
  SPEAKER_00: And how will I introduce them?
• 17:53
  SPEAKER_00: And they know how to introduce me because I've helped them do that with a process system that I've given them so that it's not just Cam meet Mike, Mike meet Cam, and we'll talk about that.
• 18:07
  SPEAKER_00: But it the importance of these purple pelican uh crowd is cadence and intentionality.
• 18:17
  SPEAKER_00: And the cadence part we we meet monthly, if not that.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_00: We meet uh every six weeks.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_00: We talk about what they're trying to achieve, what uh accounts they're trying to get into, uh where they're struggling.
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_00: It might even be, hey, I ran into this situation, how will you how would you handle that?
• 18:41
  SPEAKER_00: So coaching each other in in those kind of circumstances.
• 18:46
  SPEAKER_00: And so I bring my target list, they bring theirs, we talk about all that.
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_00: And and there's also we we know what's going on in each other's personal lives, too.
• 18:57
  SPEAKER_00: So that we if we need to back off on introducing because they're gonna be moving or they're gone to Europe for a month or whatever it is, we we know all of that stuff.
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_00: So the more I know, the more I can help.
• 19:13
  SPEAKER_00: And Oh, go ahead.
• 19:15
  SPEAKER_00: Sorry.
• 19:17
  SPEAKER_00: So so that cadence, you think about it as a family, right?
• 19:21
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_00: You have cousins you don't know anything about because you haven't stayed in touch.
• 19:27
  SPEAKER_00: Yet you have a five-year-old son, right, Kant?
• 19:30
  SPEAKER_00: I do.
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_00: You know everything about him because he's all uh all in your world and you've got a regular cadence with him.
• 19:40
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 19:41
  SPEAKER_00: And so you know everything that's going on.
• 19:44
  SPEAKER_00: I try to have a regular cadence, I not try, I do have a regular cadence with them.
• 19:49
  SPEAKER_00: And so when I go into meetings like the one you saw with David Benner, yeah.
• 19:55
  SPEAKER_00: I've been in meetings where some of these purple pelicans have sat at the table, and when it comes around and they say, What do I do?
• 20:03
  SPEAKER_00: I look at them and say, Do you want to tell them what I do?
• 20:07
  SPEAKER_00: And they can give my non-technical pitch in less than 30 seconds, and people are blown away by the fact that that's happening.
• 20:21
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 20:22
  SPEAKER_00: And and it doesn't happen just overnight.
• 20:24
  SPEAKER_00: It this has taken time to do this, but it's it it it bears amazing fruit because we will together, we will look and say, who can we introduce so-and-so to, right?
• 20:38
  SPEAKER_00: It's not just uh quid pro quo thing between each uh each other.
• 20:43
  SPEAKER_00: So it's amazing.
• 20:44
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, that's that really is.
• 20:47
  SPEAKER_02: I want to jump into something because I see a lot of coaches, I I would say most of our listeners would say, yes, I understand the value of that.
• 20:59
  SPEAKER_02: But to dive a little deeper, how would you know?
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_02: I love Purple Pelican, by the way, that's awesome.
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_02: But um what how would you how can you identify that an individual, uh a center of influence or a referral partner is getting to that level of say you're 18 center of the pie kind of place?
• 21:22
  SPEAKER_02: How do you instinctively know that?
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_00: Well, it instinctively is a good word, but it you'll start, you'll know they're not when they're sitting across the breakfast table or the coffee table or the lunch table, and uh it feels like a river of narcissism coming back at you where it's I, I, I, I, I, I, as opposed to, well, can tell me about your ideal client profile.
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_00: Tell me about your ideal referral part.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_00: Cam, tell me how you how do you find your ideal clients?
• 22:08
  SPEAKER_00: Which markets are you strongest in?
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 22:12
  SPEAKER_00: What are you trying to do over the next six or nine months?
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_00: If if it's trying to learn more about you rather than all about the, you know, the me train, if you will.
• 22:28
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 22:29
  SPEAKER_00: I I I joked one time that I sat across the table from somebody who had the best chiropractor in Greenville because all he could he could pat himself on the back the whole time and not have it older.
• 22:41
  SPEAKER_00: That's great.
• 22:43
  SPEAKER_00: And and it was, you know, a nice individual, very accomplished, but not intentional.
• 22:50
  SPEAKER_00: He was not he was never gonna get it because it was all about he was all about taking.
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 23:00
  SPEAKER_00: And it was funny because we had an hour-long conversation, and as we took our coffee cups to the trash can, he goes, Oh, by the way, are you married?
• 23:11
  SPEAKER_00: And it that was the perfect, you know, it it was like, yeah.
• 23:18
  SPEAKER_00: You know.
• 23:19
  SPEAKER_00: That was that was one of the frogs that I had coffee with, not a prince.
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm looking for princes.
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm I'm looking for people that ask those intentional questions that come back.
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_00: Tell me how you do, how you find the people that you find.
• 23:36
  SPEAKER_00: Tell me why people come under your tent, Mike.
• 23:40
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 23:41
  SPEAKER_00: Those kinds of things.
• 23:42
  SPEAKER_00: Uh and as business coaches, you know, the the good business coaches are asking really, really, really meaty questions.
• 23:51
  SPEAKER_00: If you're getting somebody on the other side of the table that asks the same kind of questions, I'm I would bet a lot of money that that's an intentional person.
• 24:01
  SPEAKER_02: That's really good.
• 24:03
  SPEAKER_02: Because that totally checks out.
• 24:04
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, if if they're that that genuine interest and all right, hey, I'm looking, looking into understanding your worldview and what you are doing.
• 24:15
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and and intentionality is the word that I keep coming back to because I know you've said it a lot.
• 24:22
  SPEAKER_02: But I mean, when a lot of coaches, I mean, they they hear networking and uh, you know, they they probably think, you know, coffee meetings, events, collecting LinkedIn connections.
• 24:33
  SPEAKER_02: I feel like every coach on the planet's on LinkedIn all the time.
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_02: You know, but you've turned relationships or relationship building into the the habit and system of consistency.
• 24:47
  SPEAKER_02: So what does your your weekly and monthly rhythm look like in a regular cadence like that to continue that relational development?
• 24:57
  SPEAKER_00: So good question.
• 24:59
  SPEAKER_00: Um I I track all of this in my CRM and uh and I share numbers when I do when people bring me in to coach or teach, whatever.
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_00: I mean, Michelin hired me.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_00: I I've done this about, I don't know, 30 times, something like that.
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_00: Anyway, um I keep track of all these n numbers, but I'll have a about 10, 10 to 12 COI meetings a week.
• 25:33
  SPEAKER_00: And uh I do this year I'll do about 195 introductions.
• 25:42
  SPEAKER_00: Wow.
• 25:43
  SPEAKER_00: And and and I'll pause because it's not Cam meet Mike, Mike meet Cam.
• 25:51
  SPEAKER_00: There's it there's more meat to it because the one asset we have that we can't reproduce is time.
• 25:59
  SPEAKER_00: So I want to make sure that it's a very compelling introduction, and there's a Cam gives me an intro paragraph that it tells me why Cam is different than every other person in Cam space.
• 26:16
  SPEAKER_00: And I include the LinkedIn link and explain why uh Sue needs to meet Cam.
• 26:25
  SPEAKER_00: And this is why I think the two of you need to get together.
• 26:29
  SPEAKER_00: It looks like the Magna Carta compared to the lazy man's version of introductions.
• 26:37
  SPEAKER_00: But I've tracked it and I did 220 and 22, 191 and 23, 178 and uh 24, uh I did 192 and 9 uh 25, I'll do about 195 this year.
• 27:00
  SPEAKER_00: And it because it it's giving more than you get mentality, which I read the book, The Go Giver, about I found it about two years into this, and it's like this is what's behind what I give, what I do here in the system.
• 27:18
  SPEAKER_00: And so the the good part is all of those introductions met within three weeks of me making the introduction.
• 27:29
  unknown: Wow.
• 27:29
  SPEAKER_00: So what it t what it tells me is that I'm uh doing a good job of listening when somebody says the that this would be a good referral for me or a good introduction, or I'm looking for X.
• 27:45
  SPEAKER_00: Um a back pocket introduction where about a year from now we're gonna look for a new CPA, and I've got five CPAs in my network, and uh two of them I think would be a good fit, so I make an introduction or I host a lunch and bring them together.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_00: And that uh I keep track of that.
• 28:13
  SPEAKER_00: I had you you said coffees.
• 28:16
  SPEAKER_00: I had 371 coffees at Methodical last year downtown.
• 28:22
  SPEAKER_00: That doesn't count the other coffee shops, doesn't count lunch, doesn't count taking people out for other things.
• 28:30
  SPEAKER_00: Um and it's not it it it's methodical downtown for a very specific reason.
• 28:38
  SPEAKER_00: It's centr it's centrally located.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_00: I don't have to move around, and I can have four coffee meetings without moving out of one place, and it's very efficient for me.
• 28:53
  SPEAKER_00: So the people won't do the the numbers that I do, and I don't want them to get confused with that.
• 29:01
  SPEAKER_00: Sure.
• 29:02
  SPEAKER_00: But but the habit, building a habit into it, because everybody has work product they have to produce, and so do I.
• 29:10
  SPEAKER_00: But the habit of scheduling that business development or COI meeting habit into your week is the key to anything.
• 29:21
  SPEAKER_00: Just like meeting with a client.
• 29:24
  SPEAKER_00: You know, two hours on Tuesday, two hours on Thursday.
• 29:28
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm gonna, that's how I'm gonna keep my funnel full over the course of the year.
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_00: And you'd be amazed at what will happen come the end of the year when you've had those coffees or lunches or whatever whatever works for you.
• 29:48
  SPEAKER_00: And if you've done a really good job of knowing who your ideal referral partner is, who you really need to get connected to, how you do the outreach.
• 29:59
  SPEAKER_00: And if you give more than you get, which I can't reinforce enough, I'd I probably give, and I don't track it because it would be disingenuous, I'd probably give 10 to 15x versus get.
• 30:16
  SPEAKER_00: And I don't care, right?
• 30:18
  SPEAKER_00: Because if it comes back, great.
• 30:20
  SPEAKER_00: If not, I'm doing some I'm helping a lot of other people get what they need, right?
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_00: And and my give is introductions, my give is books.
• 30:34
  SPEAKER_00: I think we've talked about I've given hundreds of copies of uh Unreasonable Hospitality, uh The Psychology of Money, Great Go Giver.
• 30:47
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 30:47
  SPEAKER_00: Um I'm into uh this one, Transformational Leadership by Randy Dobbs.
• 30:56
  SPEAKER_00: I think I'm up to 50 copies.
• 30:58
  SPEAKER_00: Randy's actually a uh lives in Greenville and has an incredible story of entry level to officer suite and GE and the incredible book.
• 31:12
  SPEAKER_00: I heard him speak.
• 31:13
  SPEAKER_00: I read it, I've given 50 signed copies out.
• 31:17
  SPEAKER_00: Randy's been generous enough to do that.
• 31:20
  SPEAKER_00: I read the book in three nights.
• 31:22
  SPEAKER_00: It's un unbelievable for for the next generation of leaders in Greenville, you know, because we need to uh train those folks up.
• 31:33
  SPEAKER_00: So uh you know, introductions, books, articles, tips and trends, I feed my CPAs during tax season, all sorts of ways to give and stay front of mind with people.
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_00: Whenever, you know, whenever the time's right, and they they're like, I think I need to talk to Mike because whoever I have as a partner for my technology, now I need to have a conversation with Mike.
• 32:07
  SPEAKER_00: So it's not selling, it's just staying there, being a uh a thought leader.
• 32:14
  SPEAKER_00: That's a term that's been overused too.
• 32:16
  SPEAKER_00: But just letting them know that there are some resources out here.
• 32:23
  SPEAKER_00: Here's some information providing value, whatever you want to call it.
• 32:27
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm I'm constantly doing that.
• 32:30
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, I love that.
• 32:32
  SPEAKER_02: I love how you've outlined that because it if you know, the way that I the takeaway that I get from that is staying top of mind, right?
• 32:43
  SPEAKER_02: Through whatever way that we can, right?
• 32:46
  SPEAKER_02: That's people always ask me, like, hey, why do you post on LinkedIn so much?
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_02: And to me, that's just I number one, I love it.
• 32:55
  SPEAKER_02: It's fun for me.
• 32:57
  SPEAKER_02: And I'm staying top of mind for my network on a regular basis.
• 33:02
  SPEAKER_02: And then for this specifically, so this podcast is actually a center of influence, you know, relationship starter for me specifically, of talking to people, coaches, advisors, fractional executives that are great centers of influence for me.
• 33:21
  SPEAKER_02: And out of this is a little sneak preview, but for every single guest that comes on here, I get them a little custom mini Lego figure of themselves because they're building a practice and it's it's stupid, but it's one of those things that it's so intentional and thoughtful.
• 33:39
  SPEAKER_02: Like I had to sit down and make the Lego and get it shipped to my house.
• 33:42
  SPEAKER_02: You know what I mean?
• 33:43
  SPEAKER_02: And I cannot tell you how many people have messaged me and they're like, Man, I was looking at my Lego earlier today, thought about you.
• 33:51
  SPEAKER_02: Hope you're doing well.
• 33:52
  SPEAKER_02: Just those simple things that you stay top of mind.
• 33:57
  SPEAKER_02: And it is amazing to me of how much that influences how the relationship gets deeper, right?
• 34:06
  SPEAKER_02: And so I think that's something that hearing you talk about that, whether it's giving a book or hey, I found this article, I thought about you, those little moments, then when they're thinking about or they need what you're offering, who are they gonna call?
• 34:23
  SPEAKER_02: It's you because you've been top of mind for them the entire time.
• 34:27
  SPEAKER_02: And so you just compounded that in centers of influence relationships.
• 34:31
  SPEAKER_02: So it's just having a massive impact.
• 34:34
  SPEAKER_02: So thank you for unpacking that.
• 34:36
  SPEAKER_02: I love that so much.
• 34:38
  SPEAKER_00: So uh I you saw me reach over.
• 34:41
  SPEAKER_00: Um you probably I don't know if you can see that.
• 34:45
  SPEAKER_02: I can, you just got your name.
• 34:47
  SPEAKER_00: So I got people don't get regular mail.
• 34:51
  SPEAKER_00: I dropped some of these books off uh with a handwritten note, nothing fancy, does not have my company name on it, and it says, Cam, thought you would enjoy this.
• 35:06
  SPEAKER_00: Uh several leaders in my orbit have enjoyed it.
• 35:11
  SPEAKER_00: Um hope you get a chance to read it.
• 35:13
  SPEAKER_00: And I can't I can't tell you how many people either call, text, email, whatever, because they know by my horrible handwriting that it took me forever to do this.
• 35:27
  SPEAKER_00: But again, doing the things that other people are not willing to do.
• 35:33
  SPEAKER_00: Right.
• 35:34
  SPEAKER_00: I do LinkedIn stuff too.
• 35:37
  SPEAKER_00: But nobody, nobody sends handwritten notes anymore.
• 35:42
  SPEAKER_00: Nope.
• 35:42
  SPEAKER_00: Right?
• 35:43
  SPEAKER_00: And so I try to do that on a I've gone through boxes of that stuff and sending that kind of thing out so that people remember that.
• 35:56
  SPEAKER_02: How do you intentionally, that's the word we're going back to a lot here.
• 36:01
  SPEAKER_02: Um, how do you balance the um I'm trying to think how to frame this?
• 36:10
  SPEAKER_02: How do you balance the just relationship building and trying to grow that, trying to grow connections?
• 36:19
  SPEAKER_02: I don't want to say the transactional side of it, but you know, you your goal is to connect with as many people, right?
• 36:26
  SPEAKER_02: So how do you balance that, the growth aspect, with the genuineness that it takes to build trust and a real relationship?
• 36:37
  SPEAKER_02: How does that work for you?
• 36:39
  SPEAKER_00: So the inner circle or the purple pelican uh group, we talk about this all the time.
• 36:48
  SPEAKER_00: It's uh I would rather have a small number of new referral folks than a large number of bad ones.
• 36:59
  SPEAKER_00: I want and we talk about who would be good, who wouldn't.
• 37:04
  SPEAKER_00: And we bounce names off one another all the time.
• 37:08
  SPEAKER_00: And uh frankly, the older I get, the easier it is to say no, right?
• 37:15
  SPEAKER_00: Um I wish that I knew that.
• 37:18
  SPEAKER_00: I wish I used that when I was younger, right?
• 37:20
  SPEAKER_00: May maybe I would uh have have gone a different path.
• 37:25
  SPEAKER_00: But the the ability to look and say this this fills a gap, or it strengthens a spot that's a little soft in in the COI world that I've got.
• 37:43
  SPEAKER_00: And uh I need I need a couple more private equity people, or I need uh another mA guy or gal.
• 37:54
  SPEAKER_00: And so we talk about that all the time uh amongst ourselves.
• 38:00
  SPEAKER_00: Who you you know, who who do we need to add to the group?
• 38:03
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, one of my Purple Pelicans and I started a group networking thing that's by invitation, and we look out and look at who's intentional, and it's once a month, it's there's no financial commitment, and it's service providers because he's got he has a lot of work product.
• 38:27
  SPEAKER_00: He's a solopreneur.
• 38:29
  SPEAKER_02: Okay.
• 38:30
  SPEAKER_00: And he didn't have time to do a lot of the things that I do, but he wanted to build this network.
• 38:39
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, uh I met him when he worked for a small firm and he had no idea what a target account list was.
• 38:46
  SPEAKER_00: I can still remember the look on his face.
• 38:48
  SPEAKER_00: He goes, I suppose I should have one of those.
• 38:51
  SPEAKER_00: And then he ended up leaving that company and starting his own firm, and we had some long talks, and he's uh he goes, I think I need to learn how to do business development now.
• 39:03
  SPEAKER_00: Yes, you do.
• 39:04
  SPEAKER_00: And he goes, Can I buy you lunch?
• 39:06
  SPEAKER_00: I said, Yes, you may.
• 39:08
  SPEAKER_00: And so we started down that path.
• 39:10
  SPEAKER_00: And so we meet monthly, invite certain people.
• 39:15
  SPEAKER_00: Nobody overlaps each other in what they're providing.
• 39:20
  SPEAKER_00: And then we've been doing this for about a year now, and five to seven people in a private room here in Greenville, and it's four o'clock on a Monday to 530 once a month, and it's been incredibly well received.
• 39:38
  SPEAKER_00: And we talk about intentionality, we're respectful of their time, we talk about ideal client profile, ideal referral partner profile, how do you find your customers?
• 39:52
  SPEAKER_00: Why do customers come to you versus your clients, all of that?
• 39:56
  SPEAKER_00: And then there's an encouragement for them to do one-on-ones outside, and then we will shuffle the deck.
• 40:04
  SPEAKER_00: So some people from last October are coming to this next one, plus some new people, so we can introduce those folks, and we've built a it's pretty strong community of people within that that you know know each other that didn't, and they can build their own networks from that.
• 40:29
  SPEAKER_02: So yeah.
• 40:31
  SPEAKER_02: Man, how cool.
• 40:33
  SPEAKER_02: So I want to ask one more question before we conclude.
• 40:36
  SPEAKER_02: Um the let's say there is a a coach that's listening to this, maybe they're in a new market like you were.
• 40:46
  SPEAKER_02: Um, there's actually someone that I'm thinking of specifically as I'm asking this question, just moved from Salt Lake City to uh down in Florida, um kind of outside of like the um like Western Florida.
• 40:58
  SPEAKER_02: And so um, but he is in a brand new market.
• 41:02
  SPEAKER_02: He's gotta obviously grow his opportunities.
• 41:07
  SPEAKER_02: So, what would you tell him over the next 90 days to start beginning those relationships in a new area just like you did?
• 41:16
  SPEAKER_02: What would be the roadmap you would kind of put in place over the next 90 days?
• 41:21
  SPEAKER_00: So one, I would I'd draw my pie and figure out what who are the ideal referral partners that if people sent me leads, where would they come from and what professions are those?
• 41:40
  SPEAKER_00: So it might be for him, it might be four or five pieces in his pie.
• 41:47
  SPEAKER_00: Figure out who those are.
• 41:50
  SPEAKER_00: He can either go do some research on LinkedIn or go to the local chamber and see if some of those folks are in that chamber.
• 42:02
  SPEAKER_00: But he needs to be intentional rather than just machine gunning or shotgunning uh his approach and hoping to get one good shrimp in the net with a bunch of junk that's on the bottom of the ocean floor, right?
• 42:21
  SPEAKER_00: And and then start go to look at organizations that have those people in them and see if he won, find out if you can go for free, you know, for a uh the the initial meeting, or uh have somebody invite you as a guest and start to introduce yourself, make sure you you know you're not babbling when you go in there, right, and and start to have very specific targets, just like uh any networking group.
• 43:00
  SPEAKER_00: My my methodology, I have a very age-proven uh point about networking groups is I'm looking to find sort of like the cheetah on the Serengeti, I'm looking for the two wildebeests that I'm gonna cull from the herd that are intentional.
• 43:18
  SPEAKER_00: Because out of ten people, only about 20% of them are really intentional.
• 43:24
  SPEAKER_00: The rest of them are professional coffee suckers.
• 43:27
  SPEAKER_00: So that person in Florida needs to develop that skill set of figuring out who's intentional, but more importantly, who who do I need to surround myself with that it it likes to give more than get, that understands how to be a good partner and can understand what I do, and is will wants to be in a network, if you will, of my Mine and other people like me, and then figure out which groups where do they hang out, right?
• 44:08
  SPEAKER_00: Is it the chamber?
• 44:09
  SPEAKER_00: Is it um uh a CFO gathering that they may all get together for lunch once a month, or is it you know a a a networking crowd that they've put together in Western Florida or whatever?
• 44:25
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 44:25
  SPEAKER_00: But but that intentionality, I identifying your target, your end target first, and then working back from that.
• 44:34
  SPEAKER_00: And then saying, okay, I've found them, I see who's all connected to them, and then finding groups where they possibly would you know congregate on some regular basis and then find a way to get in and go in and say, Hey, I'm Cam.
• 44:53
  SPEAKER_00: I'd like to buy you a cup of coffee and learn about your business.
• 44:56
  SPEAKER_00: And it every one of my meetings with somebody at the end, I always say, So how can I help you?
• 45:04
  SPEAKER_00: And always without fail, people are, well, actually, and then they give me something for me to do, right?
• 45:16
  SPEAKER_02: That's good.
• 45:17
  SPEAKER_02: That's really good.
• 45:19
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, that is such an unlock for for anybody that's in a coach consultant type relationship, um, looking to grow.
• 45:27
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, this is a I wouldn't say cheap mode, but I think it's it's very much a long game, but this is such a compounding impact on your practice as you're trying to connect.
• 45:41
  SPEAKER_02: So um, Mike, this has been incredible.
• 45:44
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you for for coming on and opening up and sharing your wisdom.
• 45:48
  SPEAKER_02: I always like to ask guests on the tail end here two questions.
• 45:52
  SPEAKER_02: First one, if you could go back to let's call it rookie mic, with all the knowledge and experience you have now, what advice would you give yourself?
• 46:05
  SPEAKER_00: Great question.
• 46:06
  SPEAKER_00: Um, probably two things slow down before you answer and think instead of filling the sp the that pause with words that mean nothing.
• 46:23
  SPEAKER_00: The other is I would have been better at actively listening.
• 46:30
  SPEAKER_00: We're humans are built to listen to respond rather than listen to understand.
• 46:38
  SPEAKER_00: And the uh if I had been better at that as a rookie mic, uh it it would have been a b big benefit.
• 46:48
  SPEAKER_02: That's a good word.
• 46:49
  SPEAKER_02: I needed to hear that because that's a lesson that I'm learning right now.
• 46:53
  SPEAKER_02: It's easy to fill that, and I think you can wherever it comes from, you know, good, bad place, irrelevant, but it is there's a lot of wisdom to that.
• 47:04
  SPEAKER_02: So I appreciate you sharing that.
• 47:06
  SPEAKER_02: That's that's a good word.
• 47:07
  SPEAKER_02: And then the second question that I always like to ask is what is a lesson that you're in the middle of learning in this current moment?
• 47:14
  SPEAKER_00: So I picked up a book, it's called The Checklist Manifesto.
• 47:21
  SPEAKER_00: And it came from uh um I happen to be on the uh board of the Greenville Tech Foundation and uh Larry Miller, the new president at Greenville Tech, is uh incredible uh new leader over there.
• 47:39
  SPEAKER_00: And I uh have been given the title of Larry Miller's Librarian because I keep giving him books, uh, such as The Unreasonable Hospitality.
• 47:51
  SPEAKER_00: Well, he has given uh his direct reports a library of books to read, and uh I got a uh picture of the slide that shows his library and unreasonable hospitalities on there, but more importantly, there's a book called The Checklist Manifesto, and it's about getting things done via checklists, and in and I'm just getting into it, but uh uh airline pilots use it, uh military and commercial hospitals have saved lives because they follow a checklist to do certain things.
• 48:32
  SPEAKER_00: And it has application across everything we do in terms of doing a checklist.
• 48:40
  SPEAKER_00: And so I'm reading that.
• 48:42
  SPEAKER_00: And in fact, the joke is uh from all of his direct reports when we have our board meetings, is Mike stopped giving him books to read because then he turns around and gives us all of this reading material.
• 48:57
  SPEAKER_00: So so they they want to make sure I I'm not feeding the beast over there.
• 49:03
  SPEAKER_02: So hey, hey, what do they say?
• 49:05
  SPEAKER_02: Uh leaders are readers, right?
• 49:07
  SPEAKER_02: Isn't that what they say?
• 49:08
  SPEAKER_02: So that's good.
• 49:10
  SPEAKER_02: Um I love that.
• 49:11
  SPEAKER_02: Well, Mike, this has been great.
• 49:13
  SPEAKER_02: Thank you for for sharing.
• 49:14
  SPEAKER_02: I have learned a tremendous amount in just this single conversation.
• 49:18
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and so if somebody wants to say sit down and methodical with you, or maybe get pick your brain on something, uh, you know, what is the best place to get in touch with you?
• 49:31
  SPEAKER_00: So two ways.
• 49:33
  SPEAKER_00: Um cell phone would be the first one, uh, it's 843-364-6575.
• 49:44
  SPEAKER_00: And uh email is M Snively, S N I V E L Y 56 at gmail.com.
• 49:57
  SPEAKER_02: Easy enough.
• 49:58
  SPEAKER_02: And I guess third one, if you just happen to show up at methodical, he'll probably be there.
• 50:04
  SPEAKER_02: So uh no, Mike, this has been great.
• 50:06
  SPEAKER_00: I exactly.
• 50:08
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 50:09
  SPEAKER_02: I I appreciate you um you coming on and and sharing sharing your wisdom.
• 50:14
  SPEAKER_02: Um and I'm glad our paths crossed.
• 50:16
  SPEAKER_02: I look forward to keeping the relationship going.
• 50:19
  SPEAKER_02: Um I you know it's fun how it's how worlds collide.
• 50:23
  SPEAKER_02: So I'm I'm glad the that we we ended up being in the same same realm.
• 50:28
  SPEAKER_02: So um and thank you for for tuning in.
• 50:32
  SPEAKER_02: Um, I trust this was incredibly valuable for you.
• 50:34
  SPEAKER_02: I know it was for me.
• 50:36
  SPEAKER_02: So thanks to Mike for coming on, and we'll catch you on the next one.
• 50:39
  SPEAKER_02: Take care.
• 50:41
  SPEAKER_02: That's it for today's episode of the ambitious coach lab.
• 50:44
  SPEAKER_02: My hope is that something here helps you sharpen your craft and keep building a coaching practice you're proud of.
• 50:49
  SPEAKER_02: Before we wrap, a quick thank you to our sponsor, 90.
• 50:52
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• 50:58
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• 51:03
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• 51:09
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• 51:17
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• 51:21
  SPEAKER_02: Again, that's AC20 for 20% off.
• 51:24
  SPEAKER_02: Thanks for hanging out with me today.
• 51:26
  SPEAKER_02: I'm Cam.
• 51:26
  SPEAKER_02: Cheering on as you grow your ambitious coaching practice.
• 51:29
  SPEAKER_02: We'll see you next time.