Transforming Challenges into Opportunities: The Yuloff Creative Approach to Business Coaching

Intro: Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studios in Atlanta, Georgia. It’s time for High Velocity Radio.

Lee Kantor: Lee Kantor here. Another episode of High Velocity Radio, and this is going to be a good one. Today on the show, we have the co-owners of Yuloff Creative, Sharon and Hank Yuloff. Welcome.

Sharyn Yuloff: Thanks, Lee.

Hank Yuloff: Hey, Lee, how are you, man?

Lee Kantor: I am doing well. So excited to learn what you’re up to. Tell us about Ulvwf creative. How you serving folks?

Hank Yuloff: Uh, we’re our clients. Call us their easy button. You know, we hold them accountable, hold their hands when they have questions about marketing or sales or HR or systems or. Heck, one of our clients the other day needed a new housekeeper. So we went on social media and got her a bunch of leads. You know, we’re kind of the, the, the help they needed. It.

Lee Kantor: So what’s your backstory? How’d you get involved in this line of work?

Hank Yuloff: Uh, you want to go first?

Sharyn Yuloff: No, no. You started the company.

Hank Yuloff: Yeah.

Sharyn Yuloff: You have to go first.

Hank Yuloff: I 29 years ago at Thanksgiving or. Gosh, we’re almost at dinner. 30th anniversary. We are. Uh, we were one of those families that went around the table. And, you know, what are you thankful for? And when it got to my turn, you know, mom’s running. I said, well, mom, you know, Sharon, me married. Awesome. And I’m passing it on to my sister. And she said, well, wait a second, Henry. You know what? She uses the full name. That’s like, oh dear, this is how’s work? And I had just had I was a regional manager for a national company and the national sales manager just quit. And the owner was putting his son in as the new national sales manager. His son had no sales experience, was like three months out of college. So my life was about to become hell. And my mom said, well, what would it take for you to start your own company? And I kind of flippantly said, well, I need a new fax machine because the one I own, you know, the one I have, belongs to the company. She looked at my dad, said, write him a check, which was her way of saying, you know, it’s time to jump in, kid. And two weeks later, uh, my, you know, my business started. Uh, then you fast forward 12 years. I begged and begged Sharon.

Sharyn Yuloff: Sure.

Hank Yuloff: To to leave entertainment industry and, uh, join me in what had turned into a coaching business, uh, instead of a commercial product business. And it’s gone from there. The last the last 12 years, I’ve gotten to work with my best friend, uh, and my my life partner. And we no longer have to have the. How is your day, dear? Conversation.

Lee Kantor: So, Sharon, what was your, uh, you know, what were you doing before you got involved with Hank.

Sharyn Yuloff: I was, uh, HR director for, uh, comics to film company that also did 3D conversion.

Hank Yuloff: Um.

Sharyn Yuloff: Yeah, it was it was quite intense. Uh, and before that, I was doing something similar in financial and then entertainment before that. So mostly office and HR management. So I kind of brought that same thought process to the coaching. So not only now do we get well our clients get Hank’s marketing and sales brain, but now they also get HR and office systems.

Lee Kantor: So is that where people are beginning their relationship with you? They come in with some sort of a marketing or sales challenge usually.

Hank Yuloff: Yeah. Or they’re stuck. They’re either they’re they’re a new business getting started in their stock or they’ve been in business a while and they’re really good with what they do. But, you know, maybe sales are stuck or, you know, don’t know what to do with this AI stuff or my website, you know, kind of sucks or social media, something is off and they want to fix it and we’re there to help them fix it.

Lee Kantor: So let’s start giving some advice for the folks listening. What are your kind of go to marketing moves when you meet a stuck company?

Hank Yuloff: Well, first we want we want to see what you’re doing and and are you are you do you have the right message? Do you know who your audience is? You know, if that isn’t dialed in, you know, you ask some people, well, let’s use chiropractors as an example. You know, chiropractors say, well, yeah, I can work with anyone with a spine or a dermatologist, anyone that’s got skin or and not always the case. You know, they that that, um, you know, they have a specialty in working with sports injuries, you know. Okay. Well, let’s let’s dial into your, your audience. It’s going to be a lower age range most likely. Or maybe you’re working with seniors that that still want to stay active. So who’s your target audience. And let’s get that dialed in then. All right. We’re going to need to put your message out. Where are those people hanging out. You know, you continuing that example, um, seniors that are active in sports are not generally on Pinterest, you know, so we’re not putting your messages there. Uh, but where are they playing? So our goal is to find out, you know, what they want their life to look like. Who are they awesome with? And let’s find let’s find the right place to put your message. And then are they being consistent? You know, we hear all the time. Well, I blogged once or I was on I was on one podcast.

Sharyn Yuloff: I joined the chamber, but I never attended anything.

Hank Yuloff: Yeah, we hear that all the time. Hear that all the time.

Sharyn Yuloff: Yeah. That does.

Hank Yuloff: Yeah. I read an ad once. It didn’t work. Well. Okay. Was there an offer? What did the ad look like? I mean, where did you put it? I mean, there’s so many different factors. Your marketing can go askew in a lot of different ways. Uh, we know that from from marketing our own company. We’re still in the game, uh, promoting ourselves. So every day we’re we’re in there working on ourselves. So we’re, we’re used to playing with our clients and saying, okay, this is what we’re doing, and let’s look at what you’re doing and let’s, you know, let’s, let’s chart a path. It’s not really a marketing plan, but it’s more of a path because things can change.

Lee Kantor: Now when your clients are working with you or are having a hard time understanding, is it as a coach where you’re kind of asking questions and giving them ideas, or are you a marketing agency that’s kind of rolling up their sleeves and then, you know, okay, let’s here’s some creative for for the ad you should run.

Sharyn Yuloff: It’s kind of a combination. Most of the time we’re coaching, if especially if they’re part of our group coaching program, if they’re a private coaching client, then there’s a lot more deliverables on us, and that could include us giving them ad content. For example, if you’re part of the group coaching program and you want to run an ad, we’d say, give us your best shot. What would you put in the ad? What do you want there? And let’s talk about how is that the best use or do we need to make a change? If we’re a private coaching client, then we design the ad. We already know who your ideal client is. We already know what the headline should be. We already know all those things, so we’ll just assign it and let’s cut to the chase.

Lee Kantor: So how do you run the group coaching? Is it like a mastermind or is it, you know, kind of more of a coaching session?

Sharyn Yuloff: It is mastermind. It is mastermind style. I mean, they certainly get our opinion, but we do ask the hive, so to speak, um, you know, their thoughts, especially if there’s someone in the hive that is their ideal client customer referral partner. Then we try to get that specific opinion.

Lee Kantor: So do you run multiple groups?

Hank Yuloff: No, we do it. It’s it’s Monday afternoons. Uh, we we block out Monday afternoons. Uh, we start at 3:00 eastern and we go until they’re done. Uh, most of the time it’s about an hour, hour and a half. But we’ve had a couple sessions that went even longer, uh, and a couple of sessions that go shorter. But we block out the entire afternoon if clients show up and they they want to work on things. Well, that’s what we’re there for. Uh, and and it Monday afternoon is like one of our most fun times of the week.

Sharyn Yuloff: So until they’re until they’re all still complete.

Lee Kantor: And so this is this could be for businesses. They might be competitors. It could be just anybody who drops in that’s a coaching client.

Sharyn Yuloff: Yeah. As long as they’re a client.

Hank Yuloff: Yeah I mean it’s like we have a couple of different, uh, promotional product companies that are clients and we have investment advisors that are competitors. Yeah, we do, but we approach it. If there are competitors in the room, you know, one of the things we’re training customers, in fact, any business owner, um, you couldn’t no matter what business you’re in, you couldn’t, uh, what. Right. All the insurance possible, uh, in the promo world, you.

Sharyn Yuloff: Couldn’t.

Hank Yuloff: Sell everyone. So you might as well understand and be friendly competitors with those people. Look, we couldn’t coach every small business owner that needs and wants coaching. And that’s why we’re glad that there’s a whole lot of great coaches out there, because, look, we’ve we’ve had conversations with some people and we’ve been able to say, you know, we’re not the right ones, but we have we we know somebody that might work better for you. And it’s learning to approach things from a, not from a scarcity point of view, but from an abundance, an abundance point of view. There’s plenty of business out there, folks.

Hank Yuloff: And collaboration.

Hank Yuloff: Yeah.

Lee Kantor: So you mentioned private coaching. You know, one on one and group coaching. Are there any other kind of coaching, uh, deliverables that you offer?

Hank Yuloff: Uh, okay. Can can you keep a secret, Lee, and not tell anyone?

Lee Kantor: Absolutely.

Hank Yuloff: Okay, everyone, stop listening for a minute. I’m just going to tell Lee something. Um, we’re we’re working on a marketing course. Um, it’s it’s going. The deliverables will come in different modules where they, they watch the video, have an action guide and send it to us, and we coach them through email and an occasional phone call. We’ll look at their answers and say, all right, this person’s way off track. We need to just call them and work on it. Um, we’re we’ve decided we want to do that a little bit because, frankly, there are some businesses that can’t afford coaching. You know, even our group coaching, which is only a few thousand dollars a year. Uh, they can’t afford it. And we wanted to come up with something that new businesses or businesses that are truly struggling need some help. So we’re putting that together. Okay. You can you can let everybody back in the room now.

Lee Kantor: Okay, I, I pressed record.

Hank Yuloff: Okay. Awesome.

Lee Kantor: Um, so now as part of your marketing and the way you position yourself, you, uh, invest a lot of time in writing books. Can you talk about how that came about?

Hank Yuloff: Wow. Okay. Um, well, I’ll try and leave all the swear words out. We had a coach, um, and he’s and and God love him. He was absolutely right. He said you need a booking, and I’m one of those coaching clients. I am not the best client. Let me tell you, if you’re trying to coach me, honest to God, I’m not the best. And I kept saying, no, no, no, no, I don’t want to need a book. I don’t want to write a book. And he finally said, look, I will put you on stage at one of my events in front of 300 people to sell your book and sell your coaching if you have a book done by. They gave me a date, so I was one of those people that you see in the movies. I’m sitting in front of my computer, cursor blinking, you know, white screen. Okay, what am I going to write about? And to shorten that story, the first book was 49 Stupid Things People Do With Business Cards and How to Fix Them. Uh, finish the book. Book goes bestseller on Amazon. I handed it to my coach. I said, here, and he looks at it like, well, that’s nice, he’s going through it. He said, so where’s the, uh, where’s the workbook that goes with this? I’m like, what the hell do you mean? He goes, well, you just spent 160 pages telling me my business card sucks. Why don’t you tell me how to do it right, genius? Okay, fine. So then, you know, back to the blinking cursor. And next book, 80 Simple Ways to Master Your marketing. Still, haven’t I? Still. We’re eight books in I still haven’t written a workbook on how to write a business card, create a business card, but we now have a book up for overwhelmed and overthinking entrepreneurs. Uh, one for people that are partners in business, uh, a sales book. It really comes down to we like creating content, and we needed a place to put it other than on our blog.

Lee Kantor: So you recommend your clients take that same strategy?

Sharyn Yuloff: We do.

Hank Yuloff: All the time.

Lee Kantor: So? So a book in a small business, you think a book is a must have? Not a nice to have.

Hank Yuloff: Um, I could make that argument. Um, look, people, when you watch all the all talk shows and quite often they will have. Hey, our next guest is the author of the new book, you know, and people want to learn from the person that wrote the book on the subject. They want to hire the person that wrote the book on the subject. And we we are not saying you’re ever going to get rich from your book. Your name is not Stephen King. You’re not you know, this is a sales tool, and we show our clients how to use their book and leverage their book to get on podcasts. And, you know, all the different things that a book can do for you.

Lee Kantor: So what are some other tactics that you recommend clients take if they want to stop being that best kept secret?

Hank Yuloff: Um, number one, be consistent. Definitely, uh, you know, put in your calendar time to market, you know? Okay, I’m going to block out X amount of time to write a blog. I’m going to block out this amount of time. I’m going to either a virtual or an in-person networking group. Um I’m going to block out time to follow up. Wow, that doesn’t happen a lot. Follow up with prospects. Um, I’m going to block out time to make referrals for people. Now you can go through your social media and connect to people that might want to know each other. You know, hey x and hey y, I see you two do this and this. You might be great trading partners. Why don’t you have a conversation? And the first thing that they’re going to be able to talk about because they don’t know each other really is you. So why not again, come from that, that point of view of not scarcity but abundance and connect people that might be able to do business together, you know, and, and you create your plan and block it out in your calendar. This is time to market my business. It’s time to work on my business. And we don’t see that very often. Uh, it’s one of the things we we frankly have to train our clients quite often on how to do it.

Lee Kantor: Is there a story you can share that maybe illustrates how working with you helps somebody get to a new level? Like maybe share the challenge they came when they started working with you and how you were able to help them kind of get to a better place.

Hank Yuloff: Sure. Um, do you want to tell?

Sharyn Yuloff: I was thinking of Angie. Yeah. She’s the first one that came.

Hank Yuloff: Yeah. That’s a great story.

Hank Yuloff: I like that, um, so, Angie, it was a nonprofit. Came to us. She was kind of stagnant. Uh, she runs, uh, halfway houses for folks that especially seniors that are struggling in northern Arizona. Um, and she had, like I said, she was kind of stagnant. So we made a recommendation that.

Hank Yuloff: In fact, this was this was she was a client for a couple of years, and we kept making the same recommendation. And in the third year, she finally said, okay, I’m gonna do it. And yeah, and it added $60,000 of profit to her bottom line. In the first year, it was just from doing one little thing.

Sharyn Yuloff: When she was afraid her clients would push back on. She was. That was her hesitancy, and it turned out there was no pushback. It was totally welcomed and super easy.

Hank Yuloff: And and sometimes it’s just we see for our clients what they don’t see for themselves. Uh, we’ve got two clients right now. In fact, three that. Their their business to business type sales. And not none of them had been members of their local chamber of commerce. And we said, all right, this is you should join your local chamber. And we laid out, here are the steps, and here is how you dominate in a chamber. And here’s what it’s going. You know what the investment is going to be. And we’ve led them each down a path. Um, none of them saw themselves as being a chamber member, being active because they were all all three of them are are tremendous introverts. Um, and fast forward two and then three years for each of them. And they’re all on the board of directors of their chambers. And now it’s a. A regular gold mine for them to generate revenue. It’s something we saw for them and we took them at their. Their pace, you know. But if you go back to the beginning, none of them, you know, all three of them pushed back on. It’s like I could never.

Sharyn Yuloff: I’m never gonna do that.

Hank Yuloff: I could never do that. Like, okay, that’s fine. I’ll tell you what. We’re just going to take this one little step, you know, go to this one little meeting, do this one little thing, and we’re their cheerleader and and holding their hand and, you know, sometimes virtually, sometimes really in person and some it’s got to be honest, y’all need to believe in yourself a lot. You know, uh, and a lot of people just don’t. And that’s sad. But, you know, if you give yourself some grace, Um. And understand, sometimes you’re gonna stub your toe and it’ll hurt for a minute, and you’ll feel better, but you can do it.

Lee Kantor: So any advice for those people? Like, is a chamber, um, kind of a must join in your opinion? You talk a lot about chambers, like your first book was chamber kind of adjacent. And and this example is a chamber centric is like, well.

Sharyn Yuloff: We’ve built our businesses on chambers and many of our clients, not all, but many have. It depends on who your audience is, right? Our audience is small business owners. So where are those small business owners hanging out? Many of them are hanging out in chambers of commerce.

Hank Yuloff: If you’re let’s say you’re let’s say you’re a manufacturer, uh, chances are, you know, with national distribution, chances are you’re only a member of your local chamber of commerce because, you know, politically, uh, you want to know all the people that are making decisions in your neighborhood and in your city and your town and your county that could affect you. So from that point of view, it’s great, but you may not generate a lot of revenue from it. It’s protecting your tax dollars. Um, so you have to have a very specific reason or reasons for joining. Um, you know, but but no, it’s not for everybody.

Lee Kantor: But it’s for a lot of people. A lot of people. I mean, because I have a bias. I’m very pro chamber. My the studio we’re talking in right now is in the Chamber of Commerce, actually. So I work very closely with my Chamber of Commerce.

Hank Yuloff: So Lee, let’s talk chambers for a second. Um, I am of the opinion that most chambers are are dead and don’t know it. Um, they’re not doing what they need to do to get Gen Z and younger millennials involved. And, you know, we’re we’re in one here in Maryland. Salisbury. That’s incredible. But there are others in our area. It’s like, why do you exist? So the chamber has to stay relevant, you know? They have to be active politically. Um, you know, promoting the the business point of view. Uh, heck, there’s one there’s one in northern Arizona. The Flagstaff chamber is incredible at what they do. Um, but again, other chambers in northern Arizona we see are just flailing. So it does it does make a difference. And before you join, uh, you know, take a look at what they’re doing. Uh, take a look at their membership. What? How often are they meeting? What other activities? Uh, who’s on their board? How big is their board? You know, so not all chambers are alike. What do you think on that?

Lee Kantor: Yeah, I agree and and where I live in Atlanta, in the metro Atlanta area, there was a lot of smaller chambers that were very kind of, I don’t want to say almost neighborhoody. And there’s recently the chamber that I’m in has been part of this consolidation of kind of joining them all together. So it’s more efficient and, and it’s, it’s serving more people better. Uh, because it was hard for them to get kind of corporate support when there’s so many little ones and these big there’s, you know, there’s billion dollar corporations near where I live. And they it’s hard for them to participate, uh, in these even though it’s in their neighborhood because they’re too small. But if they kind of join together, which they have, and they’re kind of continuing to expand and they change the name to reflect this kind of more of a region than a, you know, a town.

Hank Yuloff: Very smart. Did you notice that in the smaller chambers that, uh, within each board there was a little bit of ego going on?

Lee Kantor: Oh, that was the that was holding them all back. It was the same, you know, the one old guy that’s been there for a hundred years that this is how it is until I’m done here, basically.

Hank Yuloff: Yeah, that’s we’ve always done it this way.

Lee Kantor: Right.

Hank Yuloff: Yeah. See you Atlanta Los Angeles. I mean, you’re gonna see the same sort of thing, I think, in a lot of different places. I totally, yeah, totally understand.

Lee Kantor: Yeah. So I’m a big proponent of the chamber, but it is, you know, it’s a bureaucracy. So whenever you have a bureaucracy, you have politics and you have challenges in that area.

Hank Yuloff: Yeah. Uh.

Sharyn Yuloff: Well, and they have to they have to attend. It’s not enough to just join the chamber. And then at the end of the year.

Lee Kantor: Right. And where’s my. Yeah, that. Yeah. That’s what I mean. That’s true for any business organization. It’s not an ATM machine where you put money in and expect money to come out. Just because you put money in like it doesn’t work like that.

Sharyn Yuloff: I mean, many of our, our clients before before we started working with them, they have that same feeling. Right. Well, I didn’t get any business in the chamber or I didn’t get any business from social media. Well, were you there? Did you do something other than just post? Were you involved in groups? Were you actually active? Because if you’re not active, people aren’t going to they’re not going to buy from you if you’re not actively there.

Lee Kantor: Yeah. It’s the work part that scares people, I think.

Hank Yuloff: Well, yeah. Goes back to my answer. You are you are you putting in your calendar to market you and and doing the work, you know, all of the different things it takes to market you. Um, and we see a lot of clients before, you know, a lot of clients have stayed with us for years because it’s, you know, I know I’m going to have to face you on Monday or whatever day their coaching call is. I know I’m going to have to answer to myself, you know, through you as to what I did this week. And, you know, yeah, we’re we’re not taskmasters, but we are.

Lee Kantor: Well, you’re accountability partners and and that’s an important component because people lie to themselves all the time, but they also keep appointments. So, you know, you got to leverage that to your advantage.

Hank Yuloff: We’ll text a client. We’ll text different clients all the time. Hey, how’s this going? Looking forward to our call on Thursday. How’s this going? Just just look, I’m not there to to to get them out of bed in the morning, but I sure am going to remind them that they they they owe it to themselves and their families. Um, that’s why they started their business. They want a better life. All right, let’s let’s make it happen.

Lee Kantor: Well, if somebody wants to learn more about your practice and get into one of your groups or read one of your books, what is the website? What’s the best way to connect?

Hank Yuloff: You know.

Hank Yuloff: Um, best way is for us to give you a half hour for free. Uh, our calendar is how to get there faster. Com. Uh, it’s not a sales call, you know? Here’s our sales pitch. Ready? Um, our our program is. You can find it at, uh, company Marketing plan there. That’s like 5 or 6 seconds. The other 29 minutes, 50 something seconds this year. Um. When you go to how to get there faster, it’ll ask you a few questions so that we can, like, look at your website and what are you doing online. And we know you a little bit so that our time together will will be the highest and best use for you. Uh, but we love giving half hours of time to to small business owners. Uh, we learn about different industries that way, and it’s kind of fun for us.

Lee Kantor: Well, thank you both for sharing your story. You’re doing such important work, and we appreciate you.

Sharyn Yuloff: Thank you Lee.

Hank Yuloff: Absolutely. Thank you man.

Lee Kantor: All right. This is Lee Kantor. We’ll see you all next time on High Velocity Radio.