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Search Results for: marketing matters

Thor Legvold on Nordic Leadership, Purpose, and Pricing

August 6, 2025 by John Ray

Thor Legvold on Nordic Leadership, Purpose, and Pricing, on The Price and Value Journey podcast with John Ray
North Fulton Studio
Thor Legvold on Nordic Leadership, Purpose, and Pricing
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Thor Legvold on Nordic Leadership, Purpose, and Pricing, on The Price and Value Journey podcast with John Ray

Thor Legvold on Nordic Leadership, Purpose, and Pricing (The Price and Value Journey, Episode 141)

In this episode of The Price and Value Journey, Thor Legvold joins host John Ray to talk about how the way we lead ourselves, our clients, and our firms shapes how others understand our value. Drawing from the Nordic leadership model, Thor explains how values like trust, purpose, and shared responsibility are not soft concepts. They’re strategic levers that affect how we build businesses, lead people, and price our services.

The conversation underscores the close connection between pricing and values. When your firm is clear on its purpose and leads with integrity, pricing becomes less about what the market will bear and more about what your work is worth.

Topics covered include:

  • The core ideas behind Nordic leadership
  • Why purpose and values must inform business decisions
  • How solo and small-firm professionals can reset when they’ve burned out or hit a wall
  • Why empowerment matters, both internally and in client work
  • How to price with purpose, not apology

This episode is particularly aimed at professionals who struggle to balance their values with the need to charge appropriately for their work. It’s not a tradeoff; on the contrary, it’s a path forward.

The Price and Value Journey is presented by John Ray and produced by North Fulton Business Radio, LLC, an affiliate of the Business RadioX® podcast network.

Key Takeaways You Can Use from This Episode

  • Nordic leadership works. Values like empowerment and purpose drive real business results.
  • Purpose guides everything. It shapes decisions, culture, and how others perceive your value.
  • Feeling lost? Return to your values. Burnout or transition is a cue to recenter on what truly matters.
  • Empowerment means ownership. Don’t just assign tasks; delegate real responsibility.
  • Co-create with clients. Better outcomes come from collaboration, not prescriptions.
  • Purpose supports premium pricing. Clients pay more when they believe in your “why.”
  • Culture is your leadership in action. Your behavior sets the tone more than your policies.
  • Your legacy extends beyond visibility. Trust that your impact reaches further than you can see.

Topics Discussed in this Episode

00:00 Introduction and Welcome to The Price and Value Journey
00:09 Exploring Leadership and Value Perception
00:25 Guest Introduction: Tor Legvold
00:32 Understanding Nordic Leadership
03:08 Nordic Leadership Principles
07:33 Applying Nordic Leadership in the US
10:48 Purpose and Values in Professional Services
14:50 Recalculating: Navigating Career Transitions
19:41 Balancing Purpose and Practicality
23:07 Purpose-Driven Organizations and Integrity
29:36 The Power of Integrity in Business
30:29 Empowerment and Delegation in Nordic Leadership
34:53 Collaborative Client Relationships
37:14 Building Strong Company Culture
44:11 Values and Purpose-Driven Business
52:01 Balancing Premium Pricing with Purpose
55:09 Conclusion and Contact Information

Thor Legvold, Legvold Consulting

Thor Legvold, Legvold Consulting
Thor Legvold, Legvold Consulting

Thor Legvold empowers organizations to navigate leadership challenges, cross-cultural collaboration, and post-merger integration through proven Nordic leadership principles. With global expertise in organizational psychology, Thor ensures leadership alignment, cultural synergy, and long-term growth. Whether serving as an executive coach or leading full-scale integrations, he helps clients build resilient teams and drive effective outcomes in dynamic environments.

Legvold leads with integrity, collaboration, sustainability, and a global mindset. Thor’s work is grounded in trust, honesty, and respect for human dignity, empowering people and teams to achieve lasting impact. By embracing a systems-oriented approach, he designs solutions that honor interconnected ecosystems and prioritize balance and inclusivity. With a passion for cross-cultural engagement, Thor helps leaders and organizations innovate and thrive in a connected world.

In over twenty years of consulting for businesses and organizations, he’s had the opportunity to work across a wide range of industries, including tech, finance, entertainment, industrial/manufacturing, and retail, as well as the public sector. Thor has extensive experience successfully working with entrepreneurs and startups, family businesses, AI organizations and companies ranging from midsize to Fortune 500. Wherever people are involved, Thor has a proven track record of delivering value.

Website | LinkedIn

John Ray, Host of The Price and Value Journey

John Ray, Author of The Generosity Mindset and Host of The Price and Value Journey
John Ray, Author of The Generosity Mindset and Host of The Price and Value Journey

John Ray is the host of The Price and Value Journey.

John owns Ray Business Advisors, a business advisory practice. John’s services include business coaching and advisory work, as well as advising solopreneurs and small professional services firms on their pricing. John is passionate about the power of pricing for business owners, as changing pricing is the fastest way to change the profitability of a business. His clients are professionals who are selling their expertise, such as attorneys, CPAs, accountants and bookkeepers, consultants, coaches, marketing professionals, and other professional services practitioners.

In his other business, John is a podcast show host, strategist, and the owner of North Fulton Business Radio, LLC, an affiliate of Business RadioX®. John and his team work with B2B professionals to create and conduct their podcast using The Generosity Mindset® Method: building and deepening relationships in a non-salesy way that translates into revenue for their business.

John is also the host of North Fulton Business Radio. With over 880 shows and having featured over 1,300 guests, North Fulton Business Radio is the longest-running podcast in the North Fulton area, covering business in its region like no one else.

John’s book, The Generosity Mindset: A Journey to Business Success by Raising Your Confidence, Value, and Prices

The Generosity Mindset, by John RayJohn is the #1 national best-selling author of The Generosity Mindset: A Journey to Business Success by Raising Your Confidence, Value, and Prices.

If you are a professional services provider, your goal is to do transformative work for clients you love working with and get paid commensurate with the value you deliver to them. While negative mindsets can inhibit your growth, adopting a different mindset, The Generosity Mindset®, can replace those self-limiting beliefs. The Generosity Mindset enables you to diagnose and communicate the value you deliver to clients and, in turn, more effectively price to receive a portion of that value.

Whether you’re a consultant, coach, marketing or branding professional, business advisor, attorney, CPA, or work in virtually any other professional services discipline, your content and technical expertise are not proprietary. What’s unique, though, is your experience and how you synthesize and deliver your knowledge. What’s special is your demeanor or the way you deal with your best-fit clients. What’s invaluable is how you deliver outstanding value by guiding people through massive changes in their personal lives and in their businesses that bring them to a place they never thought possible.

Your combination of these elements is unique in your industry. There lies your value, but it’s not the value you see. It’s the value your best-fit customers see in you.

If pricing your value feels uncomfortable or unfamiliar to you, this book will teach you why putting a price on the value your clients perceive and identify serves both them and you, and you’ll learn the factors involved in getting your price right.

The book is available at all major physical and online book retailers worldwide. Follow this link for further details.

Connect with John Ray:

Website | LinkedIn | Twitter

Business RadioX®:  LinkedIn | Twitter | Facebook | Instagram

Tagged With: Culture, Delegation, empowerment, John Ray, Leadership, Legvold Consulting, Nordic leadership, premium pricing, pricing, professional services, purpose, purpose-driven, The Price and Value Journey, Thor Legvold, values

SEO vs AIO: Why Your Content Isn’t Hitting and the New Truths About Digital Visibility

August 4, 2025 by angishields

Women in Motion
Women in Motion
SEO vs AIO: Why Your Content Isn’t Hitting and the New Truths About Digital Visibility
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In this episode of Women in Motion, Lee Kantor and Renita Manley, joined by SEO experts Mindy Weinstein and Heather Schallert, explore how artificial intelligence is transforming search engine optimization. The discussion offers actionable strategies for businesses to adapt their digital marketing, optimize content for AI-driven platforms, and boost LinkedIn engagement. They give practical tips on structuring content, leveraging schema markup, and repurposing material to stay visible and competitive in an evolving digital landscape.

Mindy-Weinstein-HeadshotMindy Weinstein, PhD, is a leading expert in marketing and has been named as one of the top women in the industry globally. Founder of the firm Market MindShift, she has trained thousands of professionals from organizations of all sizes, including Facebook, The Weather Channel, and World Fuel Services.

Mindy is the author of the book, “The Power of Scarcity: Leveraging Urgency and Demand to Influence Customer Decisions” (McGraw Hill 2022). She is a TEDx speaker and has been quoted in The Washington Post, NASDAQ, Yahoo News, Bloomberg and more.

Mindy is a marketing instructor at University of Denver, as well as a program leader for The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and Columbia Business School.

Connect with Mindy on LinkedIn.

Heather-SchallertHeather Schallert is the co-owner of a boutique digital marketing agency – Digital Nova – www.TheDigitalNova.com –  specializing in B2B, SaaS, fintech, education, communications, and emerging niche markets. With expertise across SEO, GEO (Generative Engine Optimization), UX, and digital communications, Heather helps brands thrive where search visibility, AI fluency, and audience experience intersect.

As a seasoned CMO with over 25 years of experience, Heather has driven transformational growth strategies for startups and enterprise brands alike: particularly in high-stakes, high-complexity sectors such as finance, education, AI, and technology. Her work bridges the technical and the human: search engines, machines, and decision-makers all understand her clients better because of the ecosystems she builds.

A recognized UX and communications expert, Heather doesn’t just optimize for algorithms—she architects digital experiences that engage users, earn trust, and inspire action. She’s known for turning websites into high-performance environments where content strategy, design, and search optimization work in unison.

From structured data and schema markup to semantic architecture and AI-first content frameworks, Heather fuses creative clarity with technical precision to build digital platforms that rank, resonate, and convert: both in search engines and in AI-powered discovery environments.

Often described as an “execution assassin” by long-time clients, Heather delivers the impact of a multi-person growth team: bringing unmatched focus, tactical fluency, and measurable ROI.

Her core capabilities include:

  • Growth hacking
  • AI Overview & LLM visibility strategy
  • Semantic SEO and topical authority systems
  • UX-led content and conversion frameworks
  • Structured markup and schema optimization for AI discovery
  • Brand voice and communications strategy aligned with search intent

A proud Colorado native with a love for the outdoors (and dogs), Heather brings energy, precision, and bold thinking to every partnership. She works with brands ready to lead, not just rank: those seeking to claim visibility, build trust in AI interfaces, and win the next generation of digital attention.

Connect with Heather on LinkedIn.

Episode Highlights

  • The impact of artificial intelligence (AI) on search engine optimization (SEO) strategies.
  • Changes in consumer behavior regarding online research and content visibility.
  • The decline in traffic from traditional search engines due to AI-generated content.
  • The importance of adapting SEO strategies to include AI optimization (AIO).
  • The role of content structure and machine readability in SEO effectiveness.
  • The significance of schema markup and structured data for AI interpretation.
  • Diversification of content formats to enhance digital visibility across platforms.
  • Strategies for improving engagement and visibility on LinkedIn.
  • The importance of early engagement with posts to maximize reach on social media.
  • The evolving terminology and concepts in the SEO and AI landscape, including generative engine optimization (GEO).

Music Provided by M PATH MUSIC

Transcript-iconThis transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix

 

TRANSCRIPT

Intro: Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studios, it’s time for Women in Motion. Brought to you by WBEC-West to join Forces Succeed Together. Now here’s your host.

Lee Kantor: Lee Kantor here with Renita Manley. Another episode of Women in Motion. And this is going to be a good one. But before we get started, it’s important to recognize our sponsor, WEBEC-West. Without them, we couldn’t be sharing these important conversations. And today’s show is especially interesting for folks who have a business or are involved in business, because we’re going to be talking about search engine optimization in the age of artificial intelligence. Renita, what a show you’ve put together today. This is going to be a good one.

Renita Manley: Thanks, Lee. Thanks, Lee. It’s something that I’ve been thinking about working, so I’ll just jump right into it. In today’s episode, it is all about digital visibility, and our guests are going to be breaking down why your content might not be hitting like you’re used to. So what’s changed behind the scenes and new tips on how to get seen? They’ll cover what still works, what’s not working as much as you’re used to, and what everybody what everybody needs to know about SEO, AIO, and suppressed algorithms.

Lee Kantor: All right, so today on the show we have Heather Schallert with Digital Nova and Mindy Weinstein with Market Mineshift. Welcome.

Mindy Weinstein: Yeah. Thank you.

Heather Schallert: Thank you. Excited to be here.

Lee Kantor: Renee? Will you have a kick off question to get this conversation started?

Renita Manley: I do, I want to I want to know why does it seem like nobody’s content is being seen anymore? No matter how much SEO you’re using is just not being seen. What’s going on?

Mindy Weinstein: I can start with.

Mindy Weinstein: Yeah. Heather. Go ahead.

Heather Schallert: Oh. Go ahead. Mindy. You’re good.

Mindy Weinstein: I was going to say it’s interesting because I have had a lot of these conversations with clients, too. Even one today, because that is a pain point for people. And so the game has changed. So what’s happening now is people are going to basically all the different eyes to research before they even get to your website, or even start to go on a search engine to look for something. In the past, our behavior was we need a product, we need a service. We’re going to go to Google. I mean, we say Google it. We’re going to Google it, but not so much anymore. And so now we have to look at the AI engines and how can we show up in those, which I know is what today is all about. But Heather, I’ll kick it to you because I’m sure you’re going to have some great things.

Heather Schallert: Yeah, I agree with that. Uh, it’s really AI agents are just intercepting audience attention before they click now, and they’re also participating in the discussion from an omnichannel perspective. So people will go using AI agents to do their initial research. They’ll bounce on over to Google. They’ll enter via a paid ad, look at a few things that go back, do more research on AI. And so it’s becoming a very complex partner in the way that you scope out your pain points and figure out the solutions you need for your business. And we really need to, you know, make sure as marketers that we are talking and involving a genetic AI as much as we can in our client solution sets, and presenting it in a way where it really resonates and becomes top of mind.

Lee Kantor: Now, is there a behavior shift that’s actually you can see kind of numbers associated with it because it feels that way from a, you know, a business owner who sees traffic where you’re not getting as much traffic or I’m not or people in general aren’t getting as much traffic from the usual suspects that they were getting previously. Has the behavior changed to the amount where people are going on to AI to answer questions, rather than going on Google to look for websites that might have the answers.

Heather Schallert: Definitely. We’ve seen anywhere between a 30 to 34% decline, and most of it’s caused by Google’s own AI engine. And that’s the AI generated answers, and they’re just appearing above the search results now. Um, so, you know, whereas you used to be really top of mind organically, if you’re on the first page of Google Now, you’re really only top of mind organically if you’re in the first four results, because the first top three are those generative AI results. Uh, if you’re in an actual LLM agent too, and not using Google directly or synergistically, uh, you know, you’re kind of bypassing Google altogether. And so you need to really dig into, um, you know, how people are searching nowadays as well as their overall attention spans. I mean, in March in 2024, to put it in perspective, only had a 2.6% decline in March of 2025. People are seeing between 30 to 34%.

Renita Manley: That’s a lot. Yeah, I wonder that. Mindy, that’s so much what I was going to ask. Sorry. Seems like I might have cut you off just right now. But what is what’s what’s the value now in SEO? Or is when I think about the first three results, they’re always paid sponsored results. So what? Where is this? How is this blending together? The the page sponsored results. Seo and then, um, I know, but before you answer that, just please finish what you’re about to say.

Mindy Weinstein: Oh my goodness. But it actually aligns with what you just asked me. So it’s a twofer. I’ll give you two for this one. Now, I was just going to tack on what Heather was saying, because a lot of the stats that we’re seeing, like in terms of let’s talk about Google specifically, is the Google search page. I mean, 70% of people aren’t going past the top third of the page, which goes to what Heather was saying with the AIO or the AI overviews is what Google is calling it. And then with what you’re asking, Renita, with the paid search. And so what has really changed, and the conversations I’m now having with clients is one, I mean, it’s no longer like, oh, we got to be in the top page of Google or the top ten of a particular keyword. It’s you got to at least be in the top three. Otherwise, no one’s going to really look down and scroll and see you. But even more so than that, and this is I’m going to say something I know that’s probably driving me nuts is like, well, what if I do show up in the AI overview? But then Google gave my answer and then no one’s going to go to my site, because that’s been an issue too.

Mindy Weinstein: And so to your point, what we’re doing and really looking at it is that it’s frustrating. It’s changed. But things do change, especially in our world. I feel like it changes all the time is that we focus on like, okay, well, how do we get into the top position for the ads that we’re running? So we want to be in the top three for the the keywords that we’re bidding on. How do we get in the top three organically? And then how do we snag that position where we’re a source in the AI overview? So you’re stacking all these different things, but I know we’re going to get into a little bit more like, how do you show up and all of that. But I do want to at least give some reassurance is that if you’ve already been doing SEO and optimizing and following all the right things, you’re not starting from scratch. So don’t think you’re starting from scratch with like, now I’ve got to do something completely different. It’s just you’re going to have to tweak some of the things you are doing, just like minor changes. So just to give some hope right away. So listeners aren’t like, I’m done, I’m out. They know just stick around.

Lee Kantor: So content is still important. Creating original content is not going away just because the answers are being given to the user in a slightly different manner.

Heather Schallert: That’s correct. I’d say it’s probably more important than ever. Not only that, you’re creating content on your own website, but then you’re spreading your content throughout any kind of viable website and sourcing. In addition to that, it’s really how you create content now and how you position it for AI agents. Um, it’s interesting to me. I completely agree with you. I don’t think it’s taking away from SEO. I think AIO really piggybacks on traditional SEO. You still need crawl pages, you still need data. You still need a ton of links. Um, but I platforms rely on really structured executable content with clear semantics and source attribution. That’s where it changes a little bit and where AI optimization really steps in. So it’s not so much about keyword density as it used to be. Now it’s more about being machine usable. Uh, the way that I agents parse and look at data is different than traditional Googlebot. And so we really need to make sure that we’re positioning your brand as a subject matter expert. And that spans all of your marketing channels. That’s, you know, uh, having the integrations between your paid search and your SEO, SEO and your AI optimization is really front and standard now in the way that you’re going to register with those agents at the end of the day.

Mindy Weinstein: Yeah, no. And I, I love that because here’s the thing with it too. The question about content is that we so you have to understand to like think about I, I was like, you know because we call them I bot. So think of them in your head as little robots. So there’s all these little robots out there getting all this information. And so they’re getting your information to you. So you want to be able to control some of that narrative, which means you really got to be like mindful of the content you’re creating. And as Heather just mentioned, it’s the way you structure it. So for me, I feel like with AI, AI optimization, it’s very content driven and it’s actually very PR driven, which goes to what Heather was saying. You have to have your content other places, because if you stop and look at some of the sources that are cited in I search results, a lot of times they are like news publications or these other things. And so you have to show up in multiple places. But if you are able to understand who you’re trying to target your customer, you know what questions they’re asking. And you set up your content in a way like conversational. You have your question, you answer it. You don’t do the old school SEO, or you’re going to answer it in like 3000 words, when you could have really said it and just, you know, a paragraph. And so it’s a lot of that is what we’re looking at, but it’s still very much content driven because that’s what the AI bots are going out there to get. They need content.

Renita Manley: Pretty cool. So I think we we did kind of jump right into this. So if there is any VB or small business owner out there listening, can you kind of break down the difference between SEO and AIO and how each of them are working differently.

Mindy Weinstein: Yeah. So I can start with that. Um, so with SEO, I mean, just in basic terms, I mean, you’re optimizing for search engines, you know, so you’re thinking of Google and being and there’s and there are other ones too, besides besides Google. I mean, there’s a lot out there, but you’re optimizing it. So you show up in those traditional search results for IO, which it does have a lot of different acronyms. So we’re using IO, which is artificial intelligence optimization, which actually can be even more encompassing because a lot of times it even encompasses like how you go about doing your tasks in marketing to or in our world. There’s also geo. So if you hear geo, someone say that they’re not talking about location, they’re talking about generative engine optimization. So just understand that the the big difference between, um, between them is you still are creating content. But as Heather alluded, there’s something that it does. It’s going to sound very technical, but it’s actually not that hard. But there’s markup that you do when you’re code for, like if you have an article you put on your page or on your website or in the back end, you’re like being very particular on like marking what the title is, marking that it is an article marking who the author is.

Mindy Weinstein: And so what that does is that just helps those AI bots even more understand what’s on your page. And that’s been important for SEO too. But the other thing that’s a little bit different for IO, and I think Heather even mentioned this too, is you have to be very intentional to on your sources you’re citing, you need to be authoritative. You also need to be more concise in terms of do address. Either the phrase someone might search on either one. So if it’s a prompt on ChatGPT, let’s say, and then you would need to have a very concise and direct answer. So it could be bullet points, it could be a little it could be a little paragraph. But you have to get to the point. So think of it opposite. If you were in school doing a research paper where you’re like building it up, you know, getting to your main point, your main point goes to the top now. So that’s just a little bit. But there is so much crossover, which I know I’m sure Heather has a lot to. There’s just there’s a lot.

Heather Schallert: Definitely. And I think you you need to have a really profound SEO strategy to do well in Chennai. Results. Uh, and just as you were talking about Mindy, it’s really that schema markup, that structured data markup. And that’s simply because the way LLM engines read things, they don’t prefer HTML as a markup source. Um, they can read what’s called a Json-ld language in two x to ten x. The amount of time, um, from a crawl budget perspective is they can traditional HTML or markup. So what that really means is, you know, you need to look at the different AI engines that your audiences are using to different audiences, different B2B markets in particular really rely on ChatGPT versus like cloud. Um, and those platforms citations, they prefer different areas to. So for instance, ChatGPT really relies heavily on sources that are similar to like Wikipedia, not Wikipedia specifically, but really sources that define things that really like lean into. This is what this is. This is what it does for you. Here’s the outcome. Whereas perplexity and things like that really lean into like Reddit and really modern time sourcing, like crowdsourcing, so to speak. Um, Google over reviews also really site and lean into YouTube, LinkedIn and Quora. So it’s kind of like where is your audience? Where do they want to be found, and where do their ideal demographics stand and what tools are they using? And then how do you link that all together and speak to the engines in a way that’s really profoundly easy for them to understand. It’s like making a cliff note version of all of your customer information and putting it forth quickly.

Lee Kantor: Mindy.

Mindy Weinstein: I love the cliff note part. Just to add on that too. Um, because I’m actually a 100% agreement because, I mean, that’s. Yeah. Right on. But I wanted to just say to that as you’re thinking about content, because a lot of, you know, what we’re talking about is text, you know, like written or typed content, but you want to have different formats because one, I mean, we know that users and learners, we we learn in different ways. Some of us love videos, some of us love more visuals, but some of the different platforms that are out there prefer different ones. Like, Claude really likes images, so you want to make sure that if you’re putting content out there on your website, like have a nice image that goes with it, maybe it’s a nice graphic that explains the concept that you’re trying to discuss on that blog, and then also do videos, because we know perplexity really leans into videos too. And so I mean with everything Heather saying with the, the sources and what they prefer 100%. And then just think about how can you take something you’ve already created. So if it’s an article landing page to spin it into. Now a great video and also great graphic because that’s just going to help you too.

Lee Kantor: And then how do you how do you put this on the page. Like what is your website now becoming. It sounds like it has to be so much more robust than maybe it had to be before. I.

Heather Schallert: I don’t think it’s necessarily more robust. I think you just in the actual code itself, you are defining everything to the LMS. Um, and so in addition to just writing really good content and now making sure that it is in, in LMS format that LMS really like. So those questions, those answers, those how to step one through five, um, you know, very concise questions and answers that uh, that you can see diversified through multiple platforms. The next step to that is just making sure that you’re writing the correct code on your website, and putting that in the header of your website for every single page. Um, you write it differently and you optimize it differently depending on the engines that you’re trying to speak to, and you track it differently. So that’s where you kind of need, you know, an SEO partner to help break the house down to, to do that. But it’s not that difficult at all. Um, and I think the main takeaway is really in addition to putting that special code on your site and really talking to your audience as well as you can, it’s that diversification, like Mindy was saying. So you wanted to diversify your presence across all platforms, and you want to diversify your content across all content pieces and then really lean into what works, because you’ll see that you’ll start generating AI results with a certain platform a lot more. You’ll resonate with ChatGPT or perplexity more, um, it really lean into what you do. Well, after you’ve realized, you know what the perfect platform is for your audience.

Mindy Weinstein: Yeah.

Renita Manley: And just so, like, uh. Oh. I’m sorry. Me.

Mindy Weinstein: Sorry. No. Go. Go ahead.

Renita Manley: Okay. Because I have, like, a thousand questions going through my head. So, Heather, while you were talking, I was thinking, so should I be building out a frequently asked questions portion on my website? Um, but I don’t know if I understood what you were saying. And then. And then when you said build your content across various platforms, it made me go on to like, um, my follow up question, which was going to be about LinkedIn. I know a lot of our small business owners and VBS are on LinkedIn, and I know for sure if they’re listening to this, they’re like, how can I get more people to see my content on LinkedIn? But then I just read something that said, LinkedIn is about to shift their algorithms so that we now see old content first. I’m all over the place. I’m sorry. Let’s go.

Mindy Weinstein: I mean, I can I can take some of those questions and then, Heather, if you want to take it from there. Um, but I’ll answer your FAQ question. So with that, the way that we handle that is instead of having like a dedicated FAQ section of your website, we prefer that if it’s a landing page. So let’s say it’s a service page. You have your service oriented company. Or if you sell products on that particular product page or the service page to have frequently asked questions there. And that actually is really, really important. That is one of the things that we do when we’re going through our client’s websites and setting it up. Even better for I is we do the frequently asked questions. That’s one of the biggest things. But I also wanted to just add to like when we’re talking about, you know, the code and the back end, I know that can get really overwhelming. But if you’re using, let’s say so, it’s a CMS, a content management system. So if you’re using one of those and it’s WordPress or Wix is another common one, or Shopify. A lot of them have built in features where you can add that code very easily.

Mindy Weinstein: But to Heather’s point, you still always should have a professional like just kind of help you at least get going. But it doesn’t have to be as scary or overwhelming. I actually feel like with this approach now with what we’re talking about with AI, to me it’s a little I know it’s going to sound really weird. It’s it’s easier because now in the past with SEO, you’re like trying to come up with all these different topics to put on your website because you got this keyword and that keyword and oh my gosh, how many times can I possibly talk about, you know, fill in the blank, right? Well, at least with this approach, it’s like, okay, I’m going to hunker down on this particular topic because this is what my business is about. I’m going to write a really great article that shows my expertise, that gives that answer. But then I’m also going to take this topic and I’m going to make this video about it. So to me it’s better because now I’m not trying to think of all these different things, um, that I have to to write about. Because after a while you run out of ideas sometimes.

Heather Schallert: Totally. I agree with that. And it’s it’s more than just FAQs. There’s about 19 different segments and different types of content that you can put on a single piece of content. So FAQs at the bottom of a resource is always great. Um, how you get those FAQs, just go look at what people are googling. Really. Um, those that’s what Google’s pulling it in, because that’s what people are asking. Uh, in terms of, you know, any kind of product and service, the natural inclination is to just semantically go through what your brain would go through, because that’s what the LLM agents are thinking. They’re thinking, I’m solving this problem for the person that’s utilizing my service. When I give them the answer, what is the next relevant question that they’re probably going to ask? Answer that in your content. So it’s probably is how does this work for you? Okay I’m going to get it. How do you onboard it. How do you set this up? What’s the best way to X, y, z? And whether that’s a bullet point list or one, two, three or a diagram or a video, just think naturally what your client would want to see to have all their questions answered. That’s what llms want to. And then you just put really good markup on it.

Lee Kantor: Now, when it comes to some of the like, you mentioned the trickier things, or at least it feels intimidating from a layperson. I mean, you guys deal with this all the time, so this seems second nature to you, but can you lean on AI to help you in this area? Can you say, hey, I, uh can you, you know, go through my website and tell me what would I should what more content should I put on here so that it makes me more visible in the world of AI? Or can you tell me what types of markups or codes I should be doing in the back end in order for you to, you know, make my site more visible?

Mindy Weinstein: That’s a good question. Um, and I can tell you. Oh, I hate this answer, even though I’m going to tell you it anyway. It depends what you’re doing. So if you’re trying to use it to get that code, which is the markup code we’re talking about, um, I’m not sure whether your experience, but our experience is using, let’s say, ChatGPT for that or even Gemini. It’s a lot of times not accurate. So it just it doesn’t do it correctly. So I wouldn’t use it for that. What you can use the different AI platforms for. Let’s say that you wanted some help because of all the things we’re talking about like okay, well what what do I need to include on my website that’s not there? That’s a great topic. I mean, you can use it for that and even give it some competitors to look at, to put you down the right path and even help you create an outline of something you might put on your site. But I would still, at the end of the day, recommend, like writing it yourself, doing the video yourself. Um, well, I mean, there are some cool video programs though. That’s a whole side note, so I’m not going to go off on that right the second, but I would just be careful on the the schema or the code part we’re talking about, because that doesn’t always work the best.

Lee Kantor: So what would you do to recommend for the biz out there listening to kind of get a sense of where they’re at like to. Is there a way to audit a website or a way to kind of know what needs what work needs to be done? Like, where should I be spending more of my time when it comes to content creation? Because creating content, you know, that can be a rabbit hole just unto itself. Like all of a sudden now all I’m doing is creating content. I’m not, you know, doing my work and selling things. I it seems like it never ends.

Heather Schallert: I think it’s helpful if you’re going to do your own legwork to go into the top three AI engines and ask them about your brand and what they know about it, and ask them about your competitors. From there, you’ll be able to see kind of where you stand right now from a digital footprint perspective, whether they’re able to really go into detail about your brand versus your competitors, and you’ll almost be able to stack your brand versus your competitors in just an order of how much attention the AI bots give them. Um, from that point on, there are a ton of tools you can use from the markup perspective. Schema.org is a free tool. It has schema data on it. It shows you how to build it. They have schema data for everything from office to FAQs to little call out statistical sections. Um, that’ll help you write the code itself. If you if you can’t, you know, work with an agency that can help you do that. Um, and it also has an AI testing tool, a schema markup testing tool in it, where you can go in and utilize that to make sure that you’re writing it correctly. Um, if you want to branch out from that, there’s a ton of amazing tools to look at your brand and the questions that are going into your brand of where you stand with eyes. Um, scrunch eye is one of them. Peck eye. Semrush has its own version of this. Uh, Ahrefs is coming out with a new version of how it tracks AI bots. Um, really, it’s just, I think leaning into, you know, looking at what what is kind of your, your budget and your resources for utilizing AI. And then, um, just working backwards. You can even ask the tools, what they prefer, what they lean into. Um, and if they don’t understand a concept, ask them why. Ask them how they’re built. They’ll tell you it’s really interesting.

Mindy Weinstein: And they’re so polite to I don’t know why. They’ll just keep in my head, like, if you like. I feel like when you use the different like I was on ChatGPT like it compliments you like, oh, that’s really good. Like you feel affirmed after going on there. Um, yes. To what Heather said. And then, um, some other things, because that is actually usually what I recommend is to check what is being said about your brand, and it’s also a good opportunity for you to make sure the narrative is correct. If you’re like, well, that’s not right, you can see where the source is coming from. Maybe it is something on your website you didn’t realize it was still there, and it’s older and that needs to be updated, or it’s something you were quoted in a long time ago that may need to be updated. You could reach out to that source. And so it’s a good idea for sure to do that. And then also and this is because we talked about questions earlier. So there are really good tools for that. So you can use a tool called also Asked.

Mindy Weinstein: It actually pulls from Google’s people also ask section. But a lot of times those questions are very similar to what would show up in the chat prompt. So that’s a really great one. And same with answer the public. That one pulls from a lot of different resources as well, but it’s a good one. So those would just help you really come up with more of the topical matter. So when we’re talking about the questions and things, but just know if you’re listening to this like, and you’re overwhelmed, like, there are so many things you can do, but just start with what would actually generate business for you. Because I even sometimes get all excited and want to put everything out there. But really, what’s going to make sense to bring in customers and clients like that’s what you’re going to focus on first. You know, also what people ask you when they call, like, I mean, all of us being business owners, you know, we’re in sales too. We know what people are asking us. And so, you know, start looking for that and see what’s coming up in the prompts.

Renita Manley: This is this is so much information. I know for sure that I’ll be going back and listening to this again. I want to I want to get clarification about one thought, and then I want to go back to that LinkedIn question, because still are we listening? Probably are going to click on this link from LinkedIn. Uh, so clarification what I’m hearing you all say is and please correct me if I’m wrong, we bees or small business owners can now, um, focus on specific content, but you just kind of want to regurgitate that content in different ways for different platforms. Uh, like top ten and an image top ten and a blog post top ten in a video format. That was just my example. Um, is that is that what I’m hearing? And then once. Yeah.

Mindy Weinstein: Oh, sorry. As I say, I don’t use regurgitate. I use repurpose, but repurpose.

Renita Manley: Repurpose.

Mindy Weinstein: Regurgitate works well too. All right. Continue on.

Renita Manley: Okay. And then, um, well, you can address that part first, and then I’ll get to the LinkedIn question next. That’ll be my final question because we’re we’re in deep right now.

Mindy Weinstein: Yeah. So I mean I do like I do recommend um, repurposing content because again, that is to me like just going back and being like in the marketing brain again, going back to like, how do people want content? Well, we consume content different ways. So yeah, if you come up with something and it’s, you know, list of ten tips on x, y, z. And that’s your nice blog that you wrote with this great authoritative direct information. So not fluff like you are. You’re giving your expertise. Yes, create a video that talks about it and maybe it doesn’t get into all ten topics. Maybe you do a one that’s like the top ones. You know, the top two of those or however you want to do it, but it just allows you to take the concept or the topic and put it into those different formats that people like, and also the AI bots like. And actually still Google likes because we do still have that. I know we’re not talking about Google in terms of it still being a search engine, but there’s still a lot of people just going there as well. So we’re we’re checking all our boxes.

Heather Schallert: Absolutely. Um, the other thing too, I think that it feels really overwhelming. You’re like, what content do I work with? What do I start with? Start with your top performers. Start with the ones that have always done the best for you and take another lens with them and say, how do I take these five pages, these five landing pages, these five articles, whatever that content is for you? And how do I make it outshine all the articles that compete with it directly? Just focus on those five. Go into the AI bots themselves. Ask them about those five and ask them how they can create them. You know, make them better. Look at your competitors. And the other thing to do a lot of testing, it’s it’s really like a brave new world. It reminds me so much of SEO in like 2000, 2002. Um, you know, it’s a pioneering time. They don’t have complex algorithms. You’re not trying to beat them. You can really experiment with formatting and schema and answer design, and you’ll be able to gain an early edge if you embrace it. Uh, they follow clear patterns. You’ll be able to see what works and just duplicate that against your next highest performing content piece.

Renita Manley: He’s got it, got it. And then, um, a couple of tips on how can our ribs get their content more visible on LinkedIn, which I think that’s our favorite platform to use. Like, what can they do to make sure a post is being seen? Um, you know, week one, not week four.

Mindy Weinstein: Um, I can talk to that first. So we’ve been playing because again, you even mentioned, like it’s an algorithm, all these different algorithms that you have to put up with. And so LinkedIn, um, they are regularly updating their algorithm to. But one of the things and this is very tactical, um, but we’ve been experimenting with this is before you post on LinkedIn, spend about 5 to 10 minutes interacting with other people, commenting, liking, but spend 5 to 10 minutes doing that. So you’re almost like warming up your presence and then post. And we’ve actually seen an increase with that. And, um, there’s some I mean, it’s, you know, some of these things are just like, how is that a thing? But it works. And so that’s one of the like little tidbits that we have. And I’m sure Heather has more to.

Heather Schallert: Yeah. And I think always using LinkedIn and synergy with your website. So if your website’s talking about your LinkedIn, post to it. If your LinkedIn is talking to your website, think back to it. I would say the three takeaways from LinkedIn is start with a really bold statement, a statistic, or an open ended question that will link that’ll link in LMS right away. It’s synergistic with Google. It’s great for audiences, use a lot of like line breaks. Make it pretty, make it easy to scan the content and have a really strong call to action and delineation of why this matters. Rather, get to the meat and potatoes of it, site your benefits, site your pain points. Um, and then think about publishing when your audience scrolls, you know, Tuesday to Thursday between 8 to 10 a.m., make sure that you’re looking at your time zones. Avoid weekends, um, and boost your comments in addition to what Mindy was saying. The warmup we’ve tested that as well. It’s incredibly useful. Boost your comments, not just your likes. Uh, LinkedIn heavily rewards comment activity, especially within the first 90 minutes. So, you know, get your team involved, get people really generating that buzz around what you’re posting so that it can saturate and get farther in the algorithm.

Mindy Weinstein: I love what you just said, because that is one of the things we say to like, get. Yeah, get your team. Or even if you don’t have a team, get your sister and your your neighbor. Just like, hey, I just posted, can you go on there? Um, because yeah, that does make a difference. You need that immediate lift.

Heather Schallert: And you can tag in other people. Ask other people in the industry, ask subject matter experts what they think. They might not reply to you, but it’ll definitely, you know, get more eyes on what you’re talking about.

Lee Kantor: Now, what is kind of the. Maybe this is the dirty little secret when it comes to these third party platforms like LinkedIn or Facebook or Instagram. If you have, you know, x number of followers in any one of these platforms, if you just do a post, just a generic post, what percent are actually seeing that without you boosting or doing any of these little magic tricks that you’re talking about here? Like what? What what’s the reality behind that? Because, um, I think a lot of people are going to be shocked that that number is extremely low. But, Mindy, why don’t you kind of chime in on this?

Mindy Weinstein: Yeah, it’s it’s low. Yeah it is. Well it depends. Okay. Again. No, I give you another answer that it depends, but it’s okay because I’m gonna give you more information. But because this is something that like we have different clients and it’s that some of them, you know, they might have tens of thousands of followers. Why? Another one has a couple thousand for their business, but the couple thousand gets more engagement because it really does matter. Um, to Heather’s point, we’re talking about LinkedIn is are people engaging? And it has to be, let’s say, even for Instagram, it’s more than just liking something. It has to be that people are saving your content, even LinkedIn, to that. They’re saving it because it had really great stuff. So they’re going to save it for later. And so the more that that starts to happen, then those different platforms. So whether it’s Instagram or LinkedIn, they start to put you in front of more people. But if you’re posting content and you’re just not getting any kind of interactions, even if you have 100,000 followers, you’re not going to be in front of all of those people, because those algorithms recognize what you’re putting out there just must not be overly engaging. So you have to take those steps. And with that, just to make it more tangible, if you’re like, how do I create something that someone would save? Well, let’s say that I’m just going to go something really random, but let’s say you have this great, um, business where you create custom cookies that people use for their businesses. So it’s like branded and all of that. Well, you could put some really nice layout and example of what a client did and something that’s really creative and even put in the post. You know, save this for future inspiration. And so you’re almost telling the person like you are supposed to say this. And so you’ll get more people doing things like that, but all of those things, and they’re all the little things that make your reach bigger for your followers.

Heather Schallert: Definitely. It’s really low. Um, I would say on a LinkedIn personal profile, 5% of people on average would see it. A company page is almost like a half percent to 2%. Um, but it’s all about engagement. It is that first 30 minutes to 90 minutes, uh, because LinkedIn works with what’s called throttle distribution to test engagement. So be unique. Be funny. Be strong. Stand out. When you do that post. Be devoted to staying on LinkedIn for 30 minutes to an hour, interacting with that post, interacting with questions, interacting with people. You can also tag in additional information into your post. So maybe 20 minutes in, you know. Put a checklist that’ll help people solve that problem. Put a link to a video that will help people understand the questions that they’re asking about what you proposed for. You know, get it going and get it and nurturing the audience.

Lee Kantor: Or is it good mojo to just post on your feed and then take that same post and then post it into maybe specific groups within you know, that your members of. Or is that like something not to do?

Heather Schallert: Um, I don’t think it’s it’s a not to do it. I think you want to speak specifically to the groups more tactfully. In fact, I would almost say reverse that. I would get the buzz going on the groups first. Um, just kind of tiny little snippets about what you’re going to post on your personal or on your company profile, and then really bring the whole conversation together on your main profile, whether that’s your personal or your your company, and then boost it, you know, tag other people and use all those engagement tactics that we were talking about.

Lee Kantor: Now, Renita, we were talking at the very start of this. We were kind of throwing out some of the jargon in the in the space. Do you want to get into having a conversation and defining some of those words?

Renita Manley: Well, I guess I will say she brought up. Well, we got into SEO, we got into AIO. Before we start recording, I brought up, um, another acronym. Not sure if it’s related to this. Um, but it’s maybe one of the new hobbies acronyms AGI, AGI or something like that. Can you elaborate on that?

Mindy Weinstein: Heather had a good one. I don’t use that one I use. I’ve been going back and forth between IO and Geo. So Geo is again, that’s generative engine optimization. I feel like we can’t like right now it’s. There hasn’t been a consensus on like, what are we going to call this? But it’ll be interesting. But Heather had a really good explanation of I remember of the other.

Heather Schallert: Yeah, I think it’s just all keywords. People are just trying to name the same thing. Agi technically stands for artificial general intelligence, and it’s a type of AI that can perform any intellectual task, uh, any human can do. So it’s not limited to Llms in particular, but, um, you know, I just call it SEO for LLM engines. Obviously.

Mindy Weinstein: That’s a good way to put it to.

Lee Kantor: Um, so if somebody wants to learn more about each of your businesses. Heather. Uh, digital Nova. What? What is the website? What’s the best way to connect?

Heather Schallert: Yeah. So our website is the Digital nova.com. Um, you can also check out my LinkedIn. I’m sure it’ll be in the show notes. Um, and we have a lot of information both on our LinkedIn’s, uh, my co-owner and myself, uh, Caitlin Garcia, and on our website, too. So, uh, we also do a lot of free audits and kind of initial consultations for free. So if you have interest in any of this or any follow up questions, we’d love to help you guys grow.

Lee Kantor: Now, what’s your ideal client profile like? Who is the ideal client for your firm?

Heather Schallert: You know, honestly, we just like clients that are really excited about growth. It’s not so much a size, um, we like smaller to medium size clients. We do have some really strong, amazing enterprise clients that we love. Uh, but people that are really going to lean into it, honestly. At the end of the day, it’s just working with a team that that believes in rapid growth, uh, and supports those visions with you together. So it’s really about, you know, people that are going to collaborate more than size for us.

Lee Kantor: And, Mindy, what’s the best way to connect with you and and learn about you and Mark Minecraft.

Mindy Weinstein: Yeah. So well, two things. Um, our website is market mind shift. Com so that’s market mind shift.com. I have a background in psychology. So that’s why you got the mind part in there. But I also did um because I talk a lot about the subject that we were discussing today at conferences. And so I have a lot of resources available and that you can download for free. So um, some just like how to’s, some checklists, like helpful tools and, um, really easy way to get it. Just go to my resources dot I so my resources I and that’ll take you right there. And so that would be the best way. And then of course, I’m on. I’m on LinkedIn as well. I think LinkedIn is my favorite platform. So you can always find me there.

Lee Kantor: And your ideal client, what’s the ideal client for you?

Mindy Weinstein: Yeah, yeah. So, um, it’s interesting, Heather, because when I was wondering, like, what’s your answer? Because we do have certain industries that we have a lot of clients like we have a lot of e-commerce and retail clients. We actually have a lot in the education space. Um, we have a lot of software related clients. But really, when it comes down to it, it’s we look at it as a good match. Like, do you have a team that’s excited about this, that we’re going to be able to be part of your team, but we tend to work more with like midsize companies and some enterprise clients. Those are the main focus that we have. But I also personally just do a ton of training. So that’s also just another thing. And for that it’s any any anyone who wants to learn. Um, I’ve been a professor for a while too, so you can see I’m a talker, so I will teach you things.

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

Mindy Weinstein: Thank you for having you.

Heather Schallert: It’s been a great conversation.

Mindy Weinstein: Yeah, it’s been fun.

Lee Kantor: Renita, any last words before we wrap?

Renita Manley: Yeah. Mindy. Heather, thank you so much. I really did learn a lot. I learned a lot. Every time I had these, um, I’m hosting a new podcast episode, but this episode, I learned a lot. So thank you both so much for sharing all that information. Um, to all our listeners out there, we do have a couple of events coming up. Um, I want to encourage everybody to check our feedback vest events calendar for our Colorado VBS. We have on August 14th a forum event, so check that out. Mastering Mergers and Acquisitions, I believe, is the name for that August 14th Colorado Forum event. And then on August 22nd, we have before Summer slips away. That’s going to be hosted by our Orange County Forum. So go check that one out. I believe our CEO and president, Doctor Pam, might be attending that event just to kind of meet with some on the ground and see what’s going on with all out there in California. So just go check our website. Um, Rebecca Hyphen west.com for more information and go up to the events tab. So I hope that all was accurate.

Lee Kantor: All right Renita. Well thank you everybody for doing this. This was so important for everybody listening. This thing’s changing so fast, and we all need all the help we can get. Uh, this is Lee Kantor for Renita Manley. We will see you all next time on Women in Motion.

Speaker7: Come on down. Hey!

 

Justin Abrams with Aryo Consulting Group

July 30, 2025 by angishields

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Houston Business Radio
Justin Abrams with Aryo Consulting Group
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Justin-AbramsJustin Abrams is the founder and CEO of Aryo Consulting Group, a strategic consulting firm that serves as the unbiased growth engine for small and mid-sized businesses.

Specializing in increasing total enterprise value, Justin helps clients cut unnecessary marketing spend while implementing smart, scalable acquisition models—all without sacrificing EBITDA margins.

In his conversation with Trisha Stetzel, Justin shared his philosophy on building sustainable, long-term growth rooted in strategy, automation, and efficiency. Influenced by his father’s military background, Justin brings a structured, mission-driven approach to business problem-solving.

He discussed how AI and automation can be used to eliminate routine tasks, improve profitability, and empower small business owners to focus on what matters most. His commitment to organic growth and operational excellence makes him a trusted advisor to companies aiming to scale with purpose.

Connect with Justin on LinkedIn.

Transcript-iconThis transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix

 

TRANSCRIPT

Intro: Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studios in Houston, Texas. It’s time for Houston Business Radio. Now, here’s your host.

Trisha Stetzel: Hello, Houston. Trisha Stetzel here bringing you another episode of Houston Business Radio. My guest today is a game changer in the world of small business consulting. Justin Abrams is the founder and CEO of Aryo Consulting Group, known as the McKinsey for Small Business based in Boston. ACG delivers strategy, growth and optimization without the corporate price tag. Justin’s firm helps has helped over 300 businesses, including Pfizer, Sony and Bayer. Grow smarter, often without spending a dime on ads. Instead, they leverage organic strategies like Reddit, local SEO, and community driven content to generate leads that stick. Also, Justin I know don’t get read yet because I’m not finished. Recognized as a top consulting firm by clutch and among other works, top 1% expert vetted teams Justin and ACG bring clarity, innovation and results to founders who are ready to scale with purpose. He’s here today to talk business leadership and why small businesses deserve world class strategy, and he’s got the playbook to back it up. Justin, welcome to the show.

Justin Abrams: Trisha, that was amazing. That was the nicest intro I’ve ever heard about myself. I really appreciate it.

Trisha Stetzel: Yeah, absolutely. I’m so excited to have you on the show. We were just, uh, riffing before we started recording, and it’s been a few months since we’ve gotten together, so I’m really excited that we have this opportunity today together. So first, I’d like to start with tell us more a little bit about Justin and how you got into the consulting business in the first place.

Justin Abrams: Yeah, so Aria was really started out of necessity during the pandemic. A lot of my friends and family, uh, needed advice. They had small businesses and things had changed so drastically, um, that it really just became more of a how do I help my friends and family rather than how do I build a business? As this started to grow and I realized, like, these solutions, uh, were practical takes just about everyone in this space. Uh, it was really it started to kind of fester my mind. Like, maybe I should start a business out of this, like, I. I thought it was at the right time. There was a lot of need for for kind of an updating in your systems and kind of going, as we’ve always done, started to change. So, uh, tried to get a few clients, got really lucky and started getting some of the larger clients as well. Sony was one of our first clients and it just kind of grew from there. Uh, really again, organically. Like, I was not expecting to start a business. Uh, and then, you know, five years later, I’m extremely thrilled to be here with this business.

Trisha Stetzel: Wow. That’s amazing. You know, I think that happens often. We get we start doing something that we love for others who need the skill or the service that we can provide, and then we decide to open a business. So let’s talk about that. Let’s talk about these small businesses and um, how you’re able to take this, these big business ideas and apply it to smaller businesses through, um, different strategies and things that people may not have top of mind.

Justin Abrams: Yeah. Well, I think the biggest thing with the small businesses is that they start to get really content based on their revenue as that business owner sees for their lifestyle. So if they’re making around $1 million a year, they look at their their annual salary and their take home pay and they start to say, this is great. I don’t need to really work any harder. I don’t I don’t want to work 80 hours a week anymore. And they take their foot off the gas a bit. Um, which is totally understandable. There’s nothing wrong with that. Um, but the thing that I start to get worried about is like a there’s a exit plan that’s going to happen. So if you’re a 40 to 50 year old business owner and you’re, you know, you have the lifestyle that you want, your kids are starting to grow up. So you want to spend more time with them. That’s excellent. But someone’s going to have to take this over. And so you need to think kind of a longer term approach of what is this look like in 15 years when I want to go sell it is it’s still going to be a 1 to $1.2 million business. Like that’s great. But that’s not maybe a nest egg that people are comfortable with. I mean, $1 million today is not the same as it was ten years ago.

Justin Abrams: Uh, so so it’s really a question of like looking almost to the future, like a financial advisor and saying, where do we really need to get to? And what does that take? Um, that’s the first thing. Uh, and then the other thing is just so, so many businesses, all they know is their business. So they’re experts that they’re one thing. But because we’ve had 300 plus clients, I can tell you I have this case study experience over so many various examples and saying like, because so many people come to me, they’re like, all right, let’s start doing TikTok ads. I see those are going off. I’m like, all right, we run the test. Like, I can tell you exactly how much you should spend. Or I think it’s a bad idea to run TikTok ads for, you know, x, y, z business. So it’s a really good way for them to bounce ideas off of me. And I can tell them, real world, this is working or not working. Um, and just really, I try to think of us as like a primary care physician. They come to us consistently, they ask us their other, they tell us their problems, and I help diagnose it and then get them on their way to to growth.

Trisha Stetzel: Yeah, I love that. So I want to go back to the first thing that you talked about, which is exit strategy. And, you know, beginning with the end in mind is so important. But yet, as you do, I see a lot of businesses out there that aren’t thinking about the end. They’re only thinking about where they’re at right now, and it feels they get to a position where they feel good and they’re like, well, I’m just going to stay here for a little while, not thinking about someday. You don’t want to just let your business go. You want you either want to leave a legacy and pass it down. If you have a family business, right, or you want it to be bankable and something that you can actually sell for a profit, I think that’s so important. And then to your second point around, we’re all experts in one space as we should be, right? As small business owners, we should focus on the thing that we’re really good at and then ask Justin for advice on the things that we’re not very good at, so that you can help us with that direction. Can you talk about. I’d love to talk a little bit about marketing because you you brought up TikTok, and I think this is really important. And we see a lot of business owners buying ads on LinkedIn or Facebook or TikTok or wherever they’re spending their money. Um, how much should a small business be spending on marketing, generally speaking? And why should they be spending money on marketing?

Justin Abrams: Great question. And okay, the first answer is that they should be spending as much as they can. That will actually work, because if I am making $1 million a year in my business and I’m spending $50,000 on ads, if they’re if that’s what’s getting me to that million dollars. Then by all means, do that. What I find most small businesses is they’re spending 50,000. There may be only making 100,000 off of that. And then if they’re actually thinking about what’s their actual margin, they’re oftentimes net negative. I come into at least half of my companies that I come into. I realize they’re really not making a profit on their marketing. So I really try to dial it down to start maybe a few percentage. And then once we see where we’re actually getting the profit from, and maybe we funnel some of that money into a different strategy, um, then we can really grow if it’s working. If you’re getting A5X return on your investments, let’s keep spending more. That’s great. But most people are not even getting a 1 to 1. Or maybe they’re getting a 2 to 1 and that isn’t really reproducible.

Trisha Stetzel: Mhm. Okay. So they need to come talk to Justin. Uh. All right. Um, when we’re talking about growth in these businesses and, you know, whether it’s through marketing or other things that we’re doing, um, you know, we we talk about double digits in growth every year or annually. You’re saying we should grow by 20% annually. Let’s talk more about that.

Justin Abrams: Yeah. So this is a really hard thing for people to wrap their mind around. Um, I would say it’s really a question of inflation. Number one, so if you’re not growing at least by maybe 5 or 6% a year, you’re actually losing money due to inflation, especially some industries. It’s even worse. Um, a lot of the, the employer based where you have high costs on employees benefits are going up five, 6% a year. Salaries are maybe going up 7 or 8% depending on this face. Or maybe you can’t hire. And so now you have to really struggle and pay more. So it’s easily a 6 or 7% growth that you need to have. But then you need to look at your business and realize there’s a lot of consolidation on all of these businesses. I think 100,000 baby boomers a day retire. Those people that are retiring are selling their business, and those people that are buying them are young, hungry, scrappy. They’re trying to combine all of these businesses, cut costs, maybe consolidate the CRM, consolidate the back end. And so they’re looking when I speak to them, they’re always looking at 20%. So if you’re not going at at least 15 to 20%, it’s going to be very difficult for you to compete with them because they’re coming in hard and fast and and consolidating where you can actually see that growth. So definitely want that 15 to 20%.

Trisha Stetzel: Yeah. That’s awesome Justin. So, uh, I know that there are some folks out there who are already interested in having a conversation with you. So what is the best way to get in contact with you, Justin?

Justin Abrams: Yeah. So our websites are wired for consulting group. Com. You can find us online. You can follow us on LinkedIn. My name is Justin Abrams on LinkedIn. I’m based in Boston. Uh, they can definitely reach out. And I love to talk to every small business owner I can. Even if we’re not going to work with them. I love to bounce ideas off of them and vice versa.

Trisha Stetzel: Fantastic. Thanks, Justin. Let’s talk about you. Talk about financial engineering to grow your business. Tell me more about that.

Justin Abrams: Yeah. So I think it’s a misunderstood part of business, uh, that you can actually put very little amount of money down, similar to buying a home but actually buying a similar business. So if you’re an HVAC company in Houston and, you know, and I’ll just take a step back and say a lot of the private equity guys, they’re already doing this. But if you’re a HVAC guy in Houston, you might already know the best guy near you and have a good relationship and a good rapport. And he’d much rather sell his business to you than to sell to some New York private equity. Guy’s just not even going to care. So you have this relationship, you have this knowledge, you know, his business inside and out. And, yeah, maybe 65. He wants to retire. So what you can do is if they’re if they’re growing and you want to look at their books, you can then buy their business. Put about 5 to 10% down. You’ve now potentially doubled your revenue. And you just have a small monthly fee that you have to pay off every year. But not only do you now have a great situation where you just have like basically a loan because you’re a larger business. The larger the business, the higher value you you have. So if it’s a $1 million business, you might have a lower multiple than a two or a $3 million business. So you’ve basically it’s like a two, a one plus one equals three. In a lot of ways it’s a great way to grow your business.

Trisha Stetzel: Wow. That’s a fantastic idea. And I know in the Houston area, there are a lot of small business owners that are ready to retire. I heard you say that there’s a very large number of baby boomers that are retiring on a daily basis, and I know a lot of those must be part of the millions of people who are here in the Houston area. So, Justin, as a as a consultant and in that space, it you’re open to work to not working with anybody but having a conversation with anybody. And I think that’s fantastic that you’re open to just let’s have a conversation and see where it goes. Why? What is the biggest reason why people engage with you to help them with their business.

Justin Abrams: I would say the largest one is really people are stuck. They’ve hit a plateau on their sales and they are realizing that they need to do something. Something needs to change.

Trisha Stetzel: So how do they what’s the first step with the folks that who. So you’re going to have a conversation with them. And I think that’s fantastic. What’s usually the first step that you take with your brand new clients?

Justin Abrams: Yeah, I like to just look under the hood, see what’s going on. Where’s the marketing? Where’s the spending? Tell me a little bit about the organization, the employees. Why have you felt it’s slowing down? It’s slowing down because a new competitor is in town. Is it slowing down because, uh, maybe maybe just sales have not been so great in that area. Maybe there’s, uh, people leaving that area. Is it macro related? Is it something that you did? Um. You know what? What is the. I want to hear what you think, and then I can do my own research, but which will not cloud it. But I just want to understand what is your reason for for coming to me. And what are your thoughts? Um.

Trisha Stetzel: I love that. And no judgment. Right. It’s just kind of where you are. And why are you stuck? And then you’re going to go do your homework so that you can bring back some really great information for them. Um, I happen to know that your dad was a veteran. So can we talk about can we talk about that just a little bit?

Justin Abrams: Sure. Yeah. My dad was a major in the Army. He was in there for 15 years. He just missed out on Vietnam. But, um, you know, definitely kind of the just. He was obsessed with the Army. He was stationed all over the world, Germany for a number of years. Um, and he had that kind of Cold War, Uh, Easter, eastern Germany. Kind of stationing. Um, he never literally thought he was going to be in the military his whole life. Um, like, was ready to be a general, like in his mind. Um, he hit 39 or 40, maybe. And he ended up getting set up with, uh, at the time, a woman turned out to be my mom. Uh, you know, so he he ended up leaving. But 15 amazing years and, uh, you know, he’s he’s the kind of person that I look, just I just look at him like he’s lived a life far better than anything I’m doing. I wish I could give back as much as him, but, uh, this is maybe a small percentage of what I can do.

Trisha Stetzel: Yeah, I, I love that. And, you know, we all have a little bit of space to give back, and we’re going to do it in our own way. And I can see that kindness through even our conversation today. So the I want to ask how his story has really impacted you. And I hear part of it where you want to be able to give back. But what is the impact that your father’s story has on you as a grown person today?

Justin Abrams: You know, I think part of it is really strategically thinking, you know, he when he was working and, and leading hundreds of of people or thousands of people, it’s really a question of like, how do I strategically make everyone in this battalion better? And what’s the what’s the long term plan? He’s still to this day, as you know, strategy games and stuff that he’s always I mean, he beats me in chess every time I play and it’s very frustrating. So I think it’s it’s just a way to think through the, the way that I think through businesses. A lot of the way that he thinks through through military strategy, um, and using that kind of knowledge has been really helpful. Um, so yeah, that’s certainly one way. And I think just his idea of giving back. Like, I could go to the large conglomerates and try to sell our services. But to me, it’s not something I enjoy. And personally, I don’t think, uh, you get to reward as much.

Trisha Stetzel: Yeah. Well, and, you know, being able to take this big business idea and bring it to smaller businesses, I think is so important. And that’s a huge give back to the community to be able to provide that type of knowledge, innovation and strategy to provide back to these smaller businesses. So as we get to the back end of our conversation, I’d love to hear more about some of these tools that you’re utilizing with your smaller businesses so that you can help with cost savings, um, and how you’re able to help utilize those with your clients.

Justin Abrams: Yeah. I mean, we use a ton of different tools, um, that really are. It really depends on the type of clients, but a lot of them are utilizing just modern AI workflows. So things like inbound, um, text and messages, we can automate a lot of that stuff. You know, I have a client right now. They’re getting about 30 or 40 inbound requests a day. It’s just too much for one human to manage. Um, and a lot of them are very basic questions. Can you give me an idea? Can you tell me the pricing? What are, you know, what are your thoughts on x, Y, and Z? So it’s it’s something that a human could do, but it’s almost a waste of that humanness because they’re behind their desk now answering questions. It’s not it’s not right. So I try to really push what can be basically like not human work, like robotic type of monotonous work that we’ve had to use humans. But now we can put your humans onto the things that make you money, which is sales, customer relationships, outreach, uh, conferences. Like, I talked to a sales guy the other day. I said, take the number of conferences that you’re going to and triple it. We can automate all the nonsense and the proposals and all that stuff. Let’s get you in front of the right people. That’s what matters.

Trisha Stetzel: I saw you light up when you started talking about AI and automation, so I’d like to dig around in there for just a minute, because I know there are a lot of people listening today that may still be a little afraid of A.I. and when we’re talking about AI, we’re not just talking about chat bots, we’re talking about other ways of automation, like what Justin was talking about being able to answer questions to your audience, having an automated FAQ. Basically, if we want to bring it down to a lower level. So talk to me about AI and why our small business owners should be embracing it instead of running away from it.

Justin Abrams: So the beautiful thing about small businesses in comparison to the large businesses is large businesses cannot afford to make a mistake at all. They do not. Pfizer cannot have a chatbot on their site that accidentally gives you the wrong dosage. Something, God forbid, happens. And there’s a, you know, something horrible happens, right? That is something that by nature, AI is going to make that mistake at scale with millions of patients. It’s going to do that. So they can’t really embrace it in the same way that small business that maybe gets 20 or 30 messages a month, you know, that’s not a big deal. If you if you say, uh, yeah, that was our chatbot. I’m sorry we gave you the wrong quote for plumbing. You know, plumbing contract. It’s no big deal. So that’s the beautiful thing that I see AI being able to bridge that gap and also really cutting some of the costs. So now you don’t have a person responding to every message. You can have them doing other more valuable things. I don’t see it as cutting employment at all. I see it as being able to move like humans into the right part of the business to grow it. And that’s again, that’s just something that if you’re at JP Morgan, you can’t have a chat bot doing it all or it’s just too much, too many mistakes. So it’s a huge benefit and I think you can be shy of it. You can be afraid. Um, but why not embrace it and start slow?

Trisha Stetzel: Yeah. And go learn a little bit, even if it’s helping you with your calendar or maybe an FAQ forward facing or something that answers your phones. It’s such a time saver. And then you can put the right people in the right places doing the right things that they’re good at, right? Uh, instead of the things that they’re not so good at. All right. So here’s my last question for you. Well, it’s not really a question, but a statement. Tell me your favorite story. It can be a client story or your favorite Justin story.

Justin Abrams: Oh, this is a great question. So I think, uh, I think my favorite story is really on. Um, I have a local landscaper. He is in a similar position to a lot of your, uh, your listeners, um, they’re doing a little under $1 million a year. Um, in similar fashion to what we were talking about before. His father had a their rival, but they were really rival landscaping company as well. And he passed away. And that is a big catalyst of these of the the best small businesses is just an untimely death. So he had to take over. Now he has two companies and he has to take it over, Figure out all the systems, how to grow it. For a year he did that, and he then looked at his annual profit and loss. That. All right, I’m spending way too much. So what? All we did, we came in, spent about a month looking at everything, testing a few things, and we realized he was spending about $40,000 a year on marketing and making -$10,000. It was actually losing him. Customers. I don’t know how, but he was losing him money. So the first thing we did, I just said, let’s let’s just cut it all.

Justin Abrams: You’re not making any money from it. Let’s just cut it all. His profit has doubled this year. Just by just just cutting those things off. We’re running some SEO. We’re running some local community groups. Yes, but there’s no cost to that other than some some minor ongoing maintenance. And it’s totally changed now. I say this is like some great thing I did. The trust that he has to do to just turn off the faucet. That’s something that’s very hard to do. I say most most of my clients wouldn’t have the faith in me. So I think it’s when I say, like, what’s the most impressive? I always say having that faith, believing that I know what’s best. That’s I mean, I don’t trust anyone. I understand. It’s like it’s a hard it’s a dog eat dog world, and I understand, but that’s one of the things where I found a customer really believes in me. Even though, you know, I don’t know anything about landscaping, but I can look at the books and kind of tell him how to do it.

Trisha Stetzel: Because you have the experience and expertise in business, and that’s what’s most important. Thank you for sharing that. I, uh, what a great story about a family owned business by accident. Yeah. And, you know, unfortunate situation, but we find ourselves in those kinds of positions quite often, where we have aging parents or grandparents that own businesses, and the person who’s receiving that business just doesn’t know anything about them. So thank you for being there right along and helping this gentleman grow his profit by twice. Uh, just from cutting off something that he’s spending too much money on. Right. And not getting a return. Fantastic. This has been a wonderful, absolute amazing, uh, discussion today. Justin, I really appreciate you joining me.

Justin Abrams: Oh, thank you for having me. Trish, this is great.

Trisha Stetzel: All right. One more time. Justin, how can people connect with you?

Justin Abrams: Uh, yeah. So the website is ro r y o.com. Mario, by the way, stands for Safe Travels in Japanese. So if you have any issues, you need some safe traveling expertise. I’m your guy and we’re on LinkedIn. You can find me on Twitter, Instagram, all the socials.

Trisha Stetzel: Awesome. And I think I found Justin on LinkedIn. I think we’re connected. So if you can’t find him, come, come find me and I’ll connect you with Justin. Thank you again for being with me today. This has been amazing and, uh, can’t wait to have our next conversation together.

Justin Abrams: Excited to do it. Thanks, Trisha.

Trisha Stetzel: That’s all the time we have for today. If you found value in this conversation and I had with Justin, share it with a fellow entrepreneur, veteran or a Houston leader ready to grow. Be sure to follow, rate, and review the show. It helps us reach more bold business minds just like yours and your business. Your leadership and your legacy are built one intentional step at a time. So stay inspired, stay focused, and keep building the business and the life you deserve.

 

Tagged With: Aryo Consulting Group

Donald Farrey on Eliminating Debt and Budgeting

July 21, 2025 by John Ray

Donald Farrey, Don the Money Man, LLC, on North Fulton Business Radio with host John Ray
North Fulton Business Radio
Donald Farrey on Eliminating Debt and Budgeting
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Donald Farrey, Don the Money Man, LLC, on North Fulton Business Radio with host John Ray

Donald Farrey on Eliminating Debt and Budgeting (North Fulton Business Radio, Episode 887)

Donald Farrey, a CPA and a Dave Ramsey Preferred Financial Coach, joins North Fulton Business Radio host John Ray to share how he helps high-income individuals and couples get out of debt, stay on top of their money, and stop living paycheck to paycheck, even when that paycheck is a big one.

After a long career in finance and real estate, a cancer diagnosis led Don to rethink his path. He now focuses on helping others avoid the stress and confusion that often come with money. In this episode, he explains how practical tools like the EveryDollar app and proven methods like the debt snowball can make a real difference.

Don also talks about common financial blind spots, how money can create tension in relationships, and why budgeting doesn’t mean giving up fun. If you’ve ever wondered why your income doesn’t seem to stretch as far as it should, this episode is for you.

John Ray is the host of North Fulton Business Radio. The show is produced by John Ray and North Fulton Business Radio, LLC, an affiliate of Business RadioX®, and is recorded inside Renasant Bank in Alpharetta.

Key Takeaways from this Episode

  • Don Farrey works primarily with high-income individuals and couples to eliminate financial stress, reduce debt, and build a better future.
  • As a Dave Ramsey Preferred Financial Coach, Don uses proven tools like the debt snowball and EveryDollar budgeting app to help clients gain control.
  • Budgeting isn’t about depriving yourself; it’s about spending intentionally on what matters most.
  • Don emphasizes communication between couples as the foundation for financial success in marriage.
  • He helps clients identify and plan for “total cost of ownership” and avoid the cultural trap of keeping up with the Joneses.
  • Emergency funds and intentional planning protect against inevitable disruptions like job loss or illness.
  • Accountability is critical. Most people don’t need more information; they need a partner to help them follow through.

Topics Discussed in this Episode

00:00 Introduction and Welcome to North Fulton Business Radio
00:35 Meet “Don the Money Man”
00:57 The Benefits of Renasant Bank
02:21 Don’s Financial Coaching Philosophy
05:00 Dave Ramsey’s Financial Principles
11:00 Budgeting Tips and Tools
13:01 Prioritizing Meaningful Experiences
14:09 Personal Stories and Financial Wisdom
16:14 The Problem with Excessive Spending
16:36 Marriage and Money: Navigating Financial Stress
17:24 Effective Budgeting and Communication
20:31 Planning for the Unexpected
23:01 When to Seek Financial Coaching
26:16 Success Stories and Practical Tips
29:42 Contacting Don the Money Man
31:10 Closing Remarks and Additional Resources

Donald Farrey, Don the Money Man, LLC

Donald Farrey is a CPA and Dave Ramsey Preferred Financial Coach who, after a distinguished career in real estate finance, transitioned to his true calling following his retirement in 2024 due to illness. Motivated by a lifelong passion for financial empowerment, he now dedicates his expertise to guiding individuals and families out of financial distress, equipping them with tools for lasting financial health.

With decades of hands-on experience in cost reduction, mortgages, purchasing vehicles, insurance decisions, and navigating special needs situations, Donald brings a wealth of practical knowledge to his coaching. His deep understanding of the unique challenges clients face allows him to offer tailored, compassionate guidance that supports confident financial decision-making and long-term security.

Website | LinkedIn

Renasant Bank supports North Fulton Business Radio

Renasant BankRenasant Bank has humble roots, starting in 1904 as a $100,000 bank in a Lee County, Mississippi, bakery. Since then, Renasant has become one of the Southeast’s strongest financial institutions, with over $17 billion in assets and more than 180 banking, lending, wealth management, and financial services offices throughout the region. All of Renasant’s success stems from each banker’s commitment to investing in their communities as a way to better understand the people they serve. At Renasant Bank, they understand you because they work and live alongside you every day.

Website | LinkedIn | Facebook | Instagram | X (Twitter) | YouTube

Beyond Computer Solutions supports North Fulton Business Radio

If you’re a law firm, medical practice, or manufacturer, there’s one headline you don’t want to make: “Local Business Pays Thousands in Ransom After Cyberattack.” That’s where Beyond Computer Solutions comes in. They help organizations like yours stay out of the news and in business with managed IT and cybersecurity services designed for industries where compliance and reputation matter most.

Whether they serve as your complete IT department or simply support your internal team, they are well-versed in HIPAA, secure document access, written security policies, and other essential aspects that ensure your safety and well-being. Best of all, it starts with a complimentary security assessment.

Website | LinkedIn | Facebook | YouTube

About North Fulton Business Radio and host John Ray

With over 880 episodes and having featured over 1,300 guests, North Fulton Business Radio is the longest-running podcast in the North Fulton area, covering business in our community like no one else. We are the undisputed “Voice of Business” in North Fulton!

The show invites a diverse range of business, non-profit, and community leaders to share their significant contributions to their market, community, and profession. There’s no discrimination based on company size, and there’s never any “pay to play.” North Fulton Business Radio supports and celebrates businesses by sharing positive stories that traditional media ignore. Some media lean left. Some media lean right. We lean business.

John Ray, host of  North Fulton Business Radio, and Owner, Ray Business Advisors
John Ray, host of North Fulton Business Radio and Owner, Ray Business Advisors

John Ray is the host of North Fulton Business Radio. John and the team at North Fulton Business Radio, LLC, an affiliate of Business RadioX®, produce the show, and it is recorded inside Renasant Bank in Alpharetta.

The studio address is 275 South Main Street, Alpharetta, GA 30009.

You can find the full archive of shows by following this link. The show is available on all the major podcast apps, including Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google, Amazon, iHeart Radio, and many others.

John Ray, The Generosity MindsetJohn Ray also operates his own business advisory practice. John’s services include advising solopreneurs and small professional services firms on their value, their positioning and business development, and their pricing. His clients are professionals who are selling their expertise, such as consultants, coaches, attorneys, CPAs, accountants, bookkeepers, marketing professionals, and other professional services practitioners.

John is the national bestselling author of The Generosity Mindset: A Journey to Business Success by Raising Your Confidence, Value, and Prices.

Tagged With: budgeting, dave ramsey, Dave Ramsey coach, Donald Farrey, financial coaching, financial stress, John Ray, North Fulton Business Radio, personal finance

How to Fix a Broken Sales Process with Dean Nolley

July 21, 2025 by John Ray

How to Fix a Broken Sales Process with Dean Nolley, on North Fulton Business Radio with host John Ray
North Fulton Business Radio
How to Fix a Broken Sales Process with Dean Nolley
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How to Fix a Broken Sales Process with Dean Nolley, on North Fulton Business Radio with host John Ray

How to Fix a Broken Sales Process with Dean Nolley (North Fulton Business Radio, Episode 886)

Many business owners know something is off in their sales, but they wait until growth stalls or declines before seeking help. By then, the problems have usually deepened. In this episode of North Fulton Business Radio, host John Ray sits down with Dean Nolley, founder of Sales Growth Imagination, to explore how companies can rebuild their sales process before it’s too late.

Dean shares the patterns he sees across B2B companies of all sizes: missing sales structure, underused CRMs, founder bottlenecks, and a lack of meaningful sales activity tracking. He explains why a solid sales process is not just a set of steps but a system that connects strategy, people, and technology in a way that supports long-term growth.

Dean also breaks down what makes a sales process repeatable, how to make CRM dashboards actually useful, and how to shift from reactive fixes to proactive leadership. Whether you’re doing all the selling yourself or struggling to scale a sales team, Dean offers a roadmap grounded in experience, not theory.

John Ray is the host of North Fulton Business Radio. The show is produced by John Ray and North Fulton Business Radio, LLC, an affiliate of Business RadioX®, and is recorded inside Renasant Bank in Alpharetta.

Key Takeaways from this Episode

  • Most companies wait too long to address sales issues, often after growth has already stalled or reversed.
  • A missing or undocumented sales process is one of the most common and costly problems.
  • Founders who stay in the sales role too long become a bottleneck for growth and scalability.
  • Many businesses have CRMs in place but fail to use them effectively, especially for forecasting and accountability.
  • The right sales process connects strategy, people, and tools in a way that drives consistent results.
  • A repeatable sales system makes onboarding new reps faster and reduces dependency on individual talent.
  • Tracking lead indicators—early-stage activities—is essential for long-term revenue health.
  • A working CRM should reflect what matters most to owners, whether that’s gross margin, deal velocity, or pipeline strength.
  • Dean’s approach involves hands-on implementation, not just advice—he builds systems that last beyond his engagement.
  • Fixing sales is not about chasing quick wins. It’s about laying the groundwork for sustainable, confident growth.

Topics Discussed in this Episode

00:00 Introduction and Welcome
01:47 Meet Dean Nolley: Sales Growth Expert
02:48 Dean’s Journey: From Kodak to Sales Consulting
06:27 Common Sales Challenges and Solutions
11:03 The Importance of CRM and Sales Processes
19:53 Hiring and Managing Sales Teams
26:18 Success Stories and Client Testimonials
31:19 Closing Remarks and Additional Resources

Dean Nolley, Sales Growth Imagination

Dean Nolley, Sales Growth Imagination
Dean Nolley, Sales Growth Imagination

Dean Nolley is a senior sales leader with more than 30 years of experience driving business growth and profitability. He has an impressive record of scaling up sales teams and improving revenue for organizations of all sizes.

With his collaborative approach, Dean structures partnerships for mutual success and a shared sense of accomplishment. His experience includes corporate leadership, a Silicon Valley start-up, and multiple VC/PE-backed portfolio companies, while starting and successfully selling his own company, Digital Imagination.

Thus, Dean is walking down memory lane with supporting small businesses, as he has successfully walked the walk as a small business founder and owner. Dean has certifications in OMG (Objective Management Group), CSL (Certified Sales Leader), and AI Certified (Business Transformation, AI in the Sales Process, and AI Sales Tools).

Website | LinkedIn

Renasant Bank supports North Fulton Business Radio

Renasant BankRenasant Bank has humble roots, starting in 1904 as a $100,000 bank in a Lee County, Mississippi, bakery. Since then, Renasant has become one of the Southeast’s strongest financial institutions, with over $17 billion in assets and more than 180 banking, lending, wealth management, and financial services offices throughout the region. All of Renasant’s success stems from each banker’s commitment to investing in their communities as a way to better understand the people they serve. At Renasant Bank, they understand you because they work and live alongside you every day.

Website | LinkedIn | Facebook | Instagram | X (Twitter) | YouTube

Beyond Computer Solutions supports North Fulton Business Radio

If you’re a law firm, medical practice, or manufacturer, there’s one headline you don’t want to make: “Local Business Pays Thousands in Ransom After Cyberattack.” That’s where Beyond Computer Solutions comes in. They help organizations like yours stay out of the news and in business with managed IT and cybersecurity services designed for industries where compliance and reputation matter most.

Whether they serve as your complete IT department or simply support your internal team, they are well-versed in HIPAA, secure document access, written security policies, and other essential aspects that ensure your safety and well-being. Best of all, it starts with a complimentary security assessment.

Website | LinkedIn | Facebook | YouTube

About North Fulton Business Radio and host John Ray

With over 880 episodes and having featured over 1,300 guests, North Fulton Business Radio is the longest-running podcast in the North Fulton area, covering business in our community like no one else. We are the undisputed “Voice of Business” in North Fulton!

The show invites a diverse range of business, non-profit, and community leaders to share their significant contributions to their market, community, and profession. There’s no discrimination based on company size, and there’s never any “pay to play.” North Fulton Business Radio supports and celebrates businesses by sharing positive stories that traditional media ignore. Some media lean left. Some media lean right. We lean business.

John Ray, host of  North Fulton Business Radio, and Owner, Ray Business Advisors
John Ray, host of North Fulton Business Radio and Owner, Ray Business Advisors

John Ray is the host of North Fulton Business Radio. John and the team at North Fulton Business Radio, LLC, an affiliate of Business RadioX®, produce the show, and it is recorded inside Renasant Bank in Alpharetta.

The studio address is 275 South Main Street, Alpharetta, GA 30009.

You can find the full archive of shows by following this link. The show is available on all the major podcast apps, including Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google, Amazon, iHeart Radio, and many others.

John Ray, The Generosity MindsetJohn Ray also operates his own business advisory practice. John’s services include advising solopreneurs and small professional services firms on their value, their positioning and business development, and their pricing. His clients are professionals who are selling their expertise, such as consultants, coaches, attorneys, CPAs, accountants, bookkeepers, marketing professionals, and other professional services practitioners.

John is the national bestselling author of The Generosity Mindset: A Journey to Business Success by Raising Your Confidence, Value, and Prices.

Tagged With: crm, CRM system, Dean Nolley, John Ray, North Fulton Business Radio, Sales, sales consulting, sales process, Sales Process Engineering, sales processes, sales teams

From Insurance to Karaoke: Chuck Burge’s Journey to Fundraising Success

July 17, 2025 by angishields

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In this episode of Cherokee Business Radio, Joshua Kornitsky is joined by Chuck Burge, creator of the Airaoke karaoke fundraiser benefiting the 9/11 Fallen Hero Project in Metro Atlanta. Chuck shares his journey from insurance to entertainment, his experiences as a karaoke host and corporate DJ, and the growth of Airaoke from a small airport hangar event to a major annual fundraiser. The episode highlights Chuck’s dedication to community causes, details about the upcoming event, and the positive impact of supporting local firefighters and honoring 9/11 heroes.

Brought to you by Diesel David and Main Street Warriors

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Chuck-Burge-bwChuck Burge has been in the marketing industry for over 30 years. He became one of the hosts/emcees for the Diet Pepsi “You Got The Right One, Baby” Uh-Huh Girls…. transitioned into a corporate DJ.

He was invited back into the marketing world to create marketing campaigns for Fortune 500 companies…GM, Dunkin Donuts, Pepsi and many others. After the downfall in economy in ’08, he started doing everything locally that he was doing nationally… helping companies with branding and sales.

Today, he still creates events for non-profits selling sponsorship for and producing them. Airaoke.org is the website for his biggest event. He hosts two sports podcasts to raise money for a cancer support group and NIL money for the 2nd largest college in GA, Kennesaw State University.

He is very involved in his community through Chamber of Commerce, business associations and volunteering for MUST Ministries.

Connect with Chuck on LinkedIn and follow Airaoke on Facebook

Transcript-iconThis transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix.

 

TRANSCRIPT

Intro: Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studios in Woodstock, Georgia. It’s time for Cherokee Business Radio. Now, here’s your host.

Joshua Kornitsky: Hey, welcome back to another episode of Cherokee Business Radio. I’m Joshua Kornitsky, professional EOS implementer and your host today. And today’s episode is brought to you in part by the Community Partner program, the Business RadioX Main Street Warriors defending capitalism, promoting small business and supporting our local community. For more information, go to Main Street Warriors and a special note of thanks to our title sponsor for the Cherokee chapter of Main Street Warriors Diesel David, Inc.. Please go check them out at diesel. Com. Well, in the studio with me today is is really an incredible guy. I’d like to introduce Chuck Burge, the creator of Airaoke. Hey, Chuck, how are you?

Chuck Burge: I’m very well. Josh, how are you doing?

Joshua Kornitsky: Oh, it’s, uh. It’s been an exciting day today. If not a little bit too warm.

Chuck Burge: It’s a long day already. Yeah.

Joshua Kornitsky: But, uh, tell us a little bit about yourself before we talk about karaoke.

Chuck Burge: Well, uh, native of Marietta, uh, went to McEachern High School back when schools were the same first through 12th grade. So I went 11 years to the same school, but grew up, never lived further than five miles from the Marietta Square. Uh, very endeared to the city of Marietta. I love it very much. Um, went to Kennesaw Junior College, which was a two year school then.

Joshua Kornitsky: Now for Kennesaw.

Chuck Burge: State before Kennesaw State now it’s the second largest school in the state and got my associate degree, uh, business degree there, and then went to Georgia Southern and got my marketing degree at Georgia Southern. Uh, got married, got divorced, got two fabulous sons, uh, 36 and 28. Chip and Kevin and Boston and Nashville. And love them like they’re here every day. But they’re not. Yeah.

Joshua Kornitsky: Sure, sure. Well, thank you for giving us a little bit about your background. And before we get into air hockey, I feel like it gives a lot of perspective. Do you explain what you spent your career doing before area hockey, so that we can then talk more about that?

Chuck Burge: Well, my career was really kind of odd. Um, my first job out of college was working at Life Insurance Company of Georgia as a claims examiner and got promoted to internal audit, which I just still can’t believe I did that job. But it was great company, great benefits. We got off at noon on Friday and, uh, floated down the river every Friday afternoon during the summer. So it was a great job for a single guy. And then I got married and, uh, and in 89, when my oldest son was born, I said, well, I need to do something different to make some money because I know I got a kid to raise. And, uh, so I went to work for Mass Mutual Insurance Company and was rookie of the year agent in 1990, sold more Fisher policies than any agent ever had nationwide for MassMutual. Wow. And, uh, they put me into management, going out, recruiting and hiring and training new agents. Um, and then from that, I was having dinner one night at the Marriott Marquis Downtown Champion Sports bar with a guy named David Ponzio. And I’ll never forget that name, because that night literally changed my life. And, uh, we were sitting there having dinner with this guy Chuck Lorre. And what’s the guy’s name? Comes around and throws this book on the table and said, what is that? He said, it’s karaoke. I said, what is a karaoke? Because it was brand new to the States. Nobody knew what it was. He said, it’s this music system where we play the background music.

Chuck Burge: You get to provide the lead vocals. I said, no kidding. I start flipping through the book. I said, well, I got to do this. He said, we’ll pick out a song. I said, no, I gotta do what you’re doing. I said, how much fun would that be, right? And he said, well, as a matter of fact, we’re looking for someone. If you’d like to meet the owner, I’ll introduce you to him. So the next day I went met Greg Smith, and, uh, Greg said, yeah, as long as you don’t try to sell insurance, everybody comes up and sings, we’ll give you a shot. So he did. And 3 or 4 years later, Greg calls me and says, hey, Chuck, there’s this new karaoke company coming to town Thursday for a group interview, and I’m going to be in Vegas at the electronic show. Would you be willing to go for me and see what it’s all about? I said, yeah, I’d be glad to, uh, might meet somebody I can hire as an agent. This is what I basically said. Sure, absolutely. So I got out there, and what it was was Rent-A-Center, the Rent to own company, had started an entertainment division called Race Entertainment and had signed a $3 million contract with Diet Pepsi to put. You got the right one, baby. Uh huh. On karaoke and go all over the country and have people come up and sing it and get a cassette promotional gift of them singing you got the right one, baby, huh? And they hadn’t hired a soul.

Chuck Burge: I said, well, that’s pretty cool. I think you think about it. Yeah. So I went home that night and they called me back and said, hey, Chuck, we’ve got this narrowed down to ten people. Could you come back tomorrow? And I said, yeah, why not? So I went back and then the next night’s phone call was, hey, Chuck, are you working in here this weekend where you can watch you perform? I said, yeah, as a matter of fact, write it down at Marriott. Um, northwest at Interstate North Parkway. So a guy came from Manchester, England, Indianapolis and Wichita, Kansas, and introduced themselves. They said, hey, you know, we’re looking forward to seeing you. I said, great. And I had got a regular crowd by then, and I had friends coming in and saying, and I knew it was going to be a good show. So about halfway through the show, one of them walks up and says, hey, Chuck, he’s I said, what do you want to sing? And he said, no, flip it over. And yeah, it sounds like they said, we want you. That’s great. And that changed my whole life. Double my salary for when I was at the insurance company. And for the next two and a half years, I was number two karaoke office in the country. And, uh, was singing you got the right one, maybe Uh-Uh with the Uh-Uh girls for two and a half years.

Joshua Kornitsky: Listen, there’s got to be something special about a myriad of boy that can make a living off of Pepsi.

Chuck Burge: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. So it was a very, very fun contract. And when the contract ended, I had take. I took all my, uh, marketing material or my, uh, karaoke equipment and sold it to a guy that owned a company called Monte Carlo Productions is a private casino company. And he said, I’ve always wanted my own DJ. He said, I’ve always subcontracted out. Would you be interested in coming in and running my DJ business? I said, sure, yeah. So I went in there and sold parties and I mean, I had such a great time. I, um, I did Evander Holyfield, 4th of July party three years in a row. Wow. Saying Under the boardwalk with Lenny Wilkins at the opening of Philips Arena. Uh, did Braves opening night parties in the parking lot at O. Atlanta-fulton County Stadium. I mean, I had a really pretty good name in the in the DJ industry for six years as a corporate disc jockey. Not on the air? Sure. And then, um, in 2000, January of 2000, the guy calls me from Boston who was the number one karaoke company in the country when we were doing the, uh. You got the right one, baby on promotion. He said, hey, Chuck, I’ve taken this Pepsi business and turned it into a national mobile marketing company and I need somebody to run Atlanta. Coincidentally enough for the All-Star game that summer and to 2000. And I said, you know, Mike, I really want to come home and spend more time with my kids. If you’ll promise me X and tell me this is the last job I’ll ever have. I’m all yours. So I did that, and I ran the All-Star game for Pepsi down in the Turner Field, then for 2000, and then got into creating grassroots marketing campaigns for large companies general Motors, Cingular Wireless, um, ran the Mall of America for five days for Diet Mountain Dew, hung out with Dick Vitale and John Wooden for five days. Wow. Wasn’t a bad day. Wasn’t a bad.

Joshua Kornitsky: Week. No no no no.

Chuck Burge: So and in 2008, when the economy kind of started tanking, I just started doing everything locally that I was doing nationally and, um, kind of once a fun time, I became my own boss and I wasn’t I was on the plane every week for 6 or 7 years and, uh, meeting somebody.

Joshua Kornitsky: I think you’d be hard pressed to find somebody who has more experience in a field that you wouldn’t think experience matters. Karaoke where it clearly does matter.

Chuck Burge: I learned a lot.

Joshua Kornitsky: Yeah, and the marketing aspect that served you well coming from, uh, from the the time in college ended up becoming your whole life. So. So what how did we get to ROI from all of that? Thank you for giving us the background, because that helps us understand why and who you are.

Chuck Burge: Well, karaoke came about, uh, I had not DJ or MC or anything other than like, friends, birthday parties or their wedding receptions or stuff since 2000. And then, um, in 20. Well, when in 2001. When, um, when the towers fell on nine over 11. Um, my best friend was supposed to be in the towers, but he missed his flight out of Atlanta the night before he would have been killed, thank goodness. So, uh, God thing know that he knows that. And, uh, and then when 2020, when Covid hit and they couldn’t do the stair climb anymore to raise money for the firefighters.

Joshua Kornitsky: Oh, from okay from the Fallen Hero project.

Chuck Burge: Yeah, from the non Heroes project. Uh, I, I went to, uh, the chief of Cop County fire. Who was Mr. Kreider, who I’d known since he was 4 or 5 years old and said, hey, I want to do something to help raise money. And that’s where I came up with the area. Okay. I was out at the aviation museum in Marietta, and I looked at the big C-130 out there and said, how cool would it be to wrap a stage around the nose of that plane? Sure. And do aerial in front of an airplane.

Joshua Kornitsky: And that’s where it was born.

Chuck Burge: That’s where the idea was born. Okay. We couldn’t do it there because right across the street from the Aviation museum is a railroad track that has 72 tracks, 72 trains a day coming by.

Joshua Kornitsky: Yeah. So let’s see how that gets in the way.

Chuck Burge: So it didn’t make sense. So we moved up to Cobb International Airport. Uh, and Jim Cook with Atlanta Air Charter was nice enough to give us the hangar for a couple of years. And all we did was have an airplane face the hangar, wrap the stage around the nose of the plane, and people would come up and sing Airy Okie. It was really cool. Had the planes taken taking off in the background and all that. Very, very neat venue. But unfortunately, we outgrew the hangar in a couple of years. Uh, I mean, 250 was a max that would hold, and we were we were getting ready to bust out. Yeah. So we took it to the Strand Theater, and we’ll be having it there for the third year and our fifth year overall on August 30th of this year.

Joshua Kornitsky: Oh, fantastic. All right. So if people want to want to see the event, do they go to the strand website. Do they go to your website.

Chuck Burge: They go to Eric. That’s I a okay. Dot org. You can buy tickets. You can buy. You can sign up saying we still have six singer spots left, which is very unusual at this time because usually we have a lot more. So the word’s getting out about this event and we’ve been running it well, and now we’re getting where people have been signed up since February to sing. And now we’ve got, we’ve got six slots left and it’s 25 people saying, uh, and somebody wants $1,500 in cash.

Joshua Kornitsky: Does it all happen that night?

Chuck Burge: Everything happens that night.

Joshua Kornitsky: That sounds like a lot of fun, too.

Chuck Burge: It is a.

Joshua Kornitsky: Lot of fun. So if somebody can’t attend. Is there a way they can still show support?

Chuck Burge: Uh, you can always support by sponsoring. Also, if you’ll go to archive.org and hit sponsorships up at the top, it’ll give you a list. It’s basically $250 an up. And, you know, the most important thing. I mean, it’s a really, really fun event, but it is for a nonprofit called the nine over 11 Fallen Aero Project. A guy named Mike Kirsch and Susan Kirsch and their kids, Wesley and Lauren, uh, are the ones that run this event. I run it for them. Sure. And I raised all the funds. But Mike was actually a, um, uh, captain detective, New York City captain and detective. And, uh, he was not on site when it happened, but he spent nine months there after it happened, recovering the bodies of his friends and identifying them and all. And now Mike is riddled with cancer. And from all the asbestos and stuff he got. So it’s a lot of me and Susan putting this together. But all the funds go to metro Atlanta. It’s not tunnels to towers. It’s a nine over 11 fallen hero project. So all the all the proceeds go to metro Atlanta.

Joshua Kornitsky: That’s I’m glad you shared that because that makes it much more personal, much closer to home. Yeah. And it’s not that there aren’t people that need help everywhere. With regards to nine over 11, but it’s nice that we’re able to help the folks that are here. Yeah. That’s fantastic. So now how many years have you been doing here?

Chuck Burge: Here. This will be the fifth year.

Joshua Kornitsky: This will be the fifth.

Chuck Burge: Year, and next year will be the 25th anniversary of nine over 11. So hopefully we’re going to do something grander. Uh, it’s just hard to believe that it’s been 25 years. And we every year we have artifacts from ground zero at the event where people can come have their pictures made with it, which is really, really cool. And obviously.

Joshua Kornitsky: It’s cool and it’s somber too, but it’s.

Chuck Burge: Cool and somber. That’s a good way to put it. Yeah.

Joshua Kornitsky: Um, so over the the preceding years, have you had any really exciting or interesting events happen, you know, with the singers, with the crowd?

Chuck Burge: Oh yeah, Some of both. Uh, uh, the singers have been really good, and the whole premise is, like I said, we we look for singers, we look for sponsors, and we look for items that are donated to raise money. Because if you sign up to sing, there are five live judges there. And I want to thank Sarah for getting them from the Atlanta Orchestra this year. So our judges are going to be coming from Atlanta Orchestra. But the whole premise is bring all your friends to vote for you. It’s half audience vote and half judge vote, because we have about $25,000 worth of raffle items that we’ll raffle off. So the girl that won last year, Little Girl and Elise Lightner from Kennesaw State, sang Jolene, but she brought her family, she brought her track team, she brought everybody from KSU. And she was like, I think second in the judging, but she was first in the audience. So the whole.

Joshua Kornitsky: Premise, folks with her.

Chuck Burge: Whole premise, whole premise is come sing, bring your friends to vote for you and to buy raffle tickets to support the firefighters.

Joshua Kornitsky: That’s amazing. And what does the ticket cost?

Chuck Burge: 25 bucks.

Joshua Kornitsky: Okay, So it’s pretty reasonable really, particularly these days. Yeah. And for that much entertainment, it seems like it’s something that’ll keep you alive.

Chuck Burge: It’s a lot of fun. And I’ll give a little credit to Joe Turner, who is our emcee. And Joe is an international magician. And he fell in love with the event. I think you said, you know Joe, right?

Joshua Kornitsky: I’ve met Joe a number of times, and he’s also a great speaker.

Chuck Burge: Oh, very, very good speaker. So, Joe, I connected with him last week. I said, hey, I know you’re in, but I, I just need confirmation that you’re still in. And he said, I’m looking forward to coming back. So he he’s recently moved to Tennessee, but I appreciate him making the trip down to come to the show.

Joshua Kornitsky: Joe’s a good man. I’m glad he is coming down, too. He’s awesome. He’ll he’ll absolutely make.

Chuck Burge: The good singer too. I don’t know if you ever heard.

Joshua Kornitsky: Him sing, not know that. And I’m a terrible singer, so I’m going to do my best.

Chuck Burge: He can’t. He can’t compete. But he is. He is good. But the people that have won. And you asked earlier. Uh, Josh, uh, the guy that won the first year was invited to sing with the Trans-Siberian orchestra. Uh, the girl that won the second year is now singing opera in New York. Uh, the girl that won the third year is just some rock n roll singer around town here. Like I said, the girl that won last year just sang Jolene, and I said she was telling her about it at Kennesaw State, a show that I do a podcast. And she said, oh, I’d love to sing. I said, well, come on and sing. And so you just never know who’s going to win. Uh, we I don’t think we’ve ever had a really bad act. I’ve been doing this five years, from the time that I’ve been doing karaoke since 1992. I’ve seen a lot of bad acts.

Joshua Kornitsky: I, I, I have to pray for your ears. I can’t imagine what you’ve heard.

Chuck Burge: Most of the people that come to this really can’t sing or really think they can sing well.

Joshua Kornitsky: And the strand holds a.

Chuck Burge: 530.

Joshua Kornitsky: People. Yeah. So that’s a lot of people say if if you’re going to get up there and try to be funny, that’s a lot of people that try to be in front of you, in front of when you’re if you’re a terrible singer. So, yeah. Uh, I can’t thank you enough, Chuck. This is really great stuff that you’re doing. Such a wonderful, wonderful tribute to the nine over 11. Follow here Fallen Heroes Project. And to make it local and to make it resonate, that’s really incredible stuff.

Chuck Burge: Yeah, I’ve been given so much by this community and this is just what I can give back. It’s not much, but it’s what I can give. So as long as we do our all. Everybody does our own part. Everybody’s got their own charities. I mean, I also work for Mushroom Ministries. I volunteer at There Gobble Jog every year. I drove the Pink Pig at the at the, uh, Festival of Trees last year to help bring awareness for, uh, the sex trafficking in Atlanta. I want to give back as much as I can, but this is my heart. This is. This is where my passion is.

Joshua Kornitsky: Well, I can’t thank you enough for sharing it with us, Chuck. Remind us again when? Where they buy the tickets. What is the date and the time?

Chuck Burge: The man is 6:00 on August 30th. Doors open at six. Singing starts at seven. But come and enjoy all the raffle items. And like I said, the artifacts from Ground Zero have your picture made. But it is Saturday, August the 30th. Um, and we just can’t wait to see who’s going to show up. An area key Karaoke. Karaoke? If, like I said, if you want tickets, if you want to sponsor or if you want to sing, or you can call me directly at (770) 428-9930. I’ll take phone calls. I’ll take text. Anybody want to reach out to me? Feel free to do so.

Joshua Kornitsky: Perfect. Well, uh, you know, Chuck Birch, honestly, the creator of karaoke. What an exciting event this is going to be. Uh, I will do my very best to be there. And I will absolutely not be singing. So that should 100% make more people come. As long as I’m not.

Chuck Burge: Well, if you fill up a seat, that’s all I can ask. There you go. There you.

Joshua Kornitsky: Go. Well, thank you again. And please make sure next year you come back when we’re talking about the 25th, we’ll we’ll do everything we can to help promote that.

Chuck Burge: Well, I appreciate you, Josh. All right, well, thanks for the invitation.

Joshua Kornitsky: Thanks, everybody, for joining. Thank you again, Chuck, for coming. This is Joshua Kornitsky, professional iOS implementer and host of Cherokee Business Radio.

 

Tagged With: Airaoke

Empowering Communities: The Role of Investigative Services and Global Talent in Local Business Growth

July 17, 2025 by angishields

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Empowering Communities: The Role of Investigative Services and Global Talent in Local Business Growth
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Brought to you by Diesel David and Main Street Warriors

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In this episode of Cherokee Business Radio, Joshua Kornistsky interviews Sheila McPhilamy, owner of Complete Investigations and Security, and Pablo Gonzalez of Global Talent Direct. Sheila discusses her experience running a private detective agency, the challenges of being a woman in her field, and her nonprofit supporting missing children cases. Pablo shares how Global Talent Direct connects businesses with skilled remote professionals and highlights his involvement with veteran support and local organizations. Both guests offer insights into their industries and community impact, providing listeners with valuable perspectives on business and service.

Complete-Investigations-and-Security-logo

Sheila-bwSheila McPhilamy started her journey as a private investigator 16 years ago.

She worked domestic, insurance fraud and criminal cases before obtaining her company license and then her classroom instructor license after that.

Complete Investigations and Security has been featured in the media. Several of Sheila’s children work with her.

Their main focus is criminal cases for both attorneys and individuals. They also run a non-profit.

Follow Complete Investigations and Security on Facebook.

Pablo-Gonzalez-bwPablo Gonzalez, Head of Broker Relations, Global Talent Direct

Global Talent Direct (GTD) was born from a mission to help American businesses thrive, not struggle. Founded by Air Force veteran and former dog handler who traveled the world in service, GTD emerged from years of business consulting where one challenge surfaced repeatedly: “I need help but can’t afford it.”

Our Foundation: Service-Driven Solutions After transitioning from military service—where global perspective was essential—I recognized that businesses were trapped by geographical hiring limitations.

The constant payroll pressure was preventing growth, stifling innovation, and keeping entrepreneurs from achieving their dreams. This insight sparked Global Talent Direct’s core mission: leverage global talent for local impact.

The GTD Philosophy We’re not about taking American jobs—we’re about creating them and helping those who have them. By helping businesses access world-class talent at sustainable costs, we enable companies to reach profitability faster, extend their runway, and reinvest in local growth.

When a startup saves 65% on payroll costs or reclaims twelve months of runway, they’re not just surviving—they’re positioned to hire locally, contribute to their communities, and build the next generation of American innovation. Global-Talent-Direct-logo

Proven Impact Our clients consistently report transformative results: controllers in Colombia identifying $80K in first-month savings, customer success teams achieving 4.9/5 satisfaction ratings, and support operations running 24/5 while U.S. teams focus on strategic growth. These aren’t just cost savings—they’re competitive advantages that fuel local job creation.

Our Commitment Global Talent Direct believes in profitable businesses that give back to their communities. When companies thrive through strategic global hiring, they create local opportunities, support local causes, and strengthen the American economy.

We’re helping businesses get profitable faster so they can make a meaningful impact at home while also helping create jobs all over the world.

Follow Global Talent Direct on LinkedIn.

Transcript-iconThis transcript is machine transcribed by Sonix.

 

TRANSCRIPT

Intro: Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studios in Woodstock, Georgia. It’s time for Cherokee Business Radio. Now, here’s your host.

Joshua Kornitsky: Welcome back to Cherokee Business Radio. This is Joshua Kornitsky professional EOS implementer and your host on today’s exciting episode. Today’s episode is brought to you in part by the Community Partner program, the Business RadioX Main Street Warriors defending capitalism, promoting small business, and supporting our local community. For more information, go to Main Street Warriors and a special note of thanks to our title sponsor for the Cherokee chapter of Main Street Warriors Diesel David, Inc.. Please go to Diesel Com to learn more. Well, welcome back. We’ve got some great guests in the studio with us today and I’m really excited to get started. So my first guest is Sheila McPhilamy with Complete Investigations and Security. Good morning Sheila. How are you?

Sheila McPhilamy: Good morning. Doing great.

Joshua Kornitsky: I’m so happy to have you here. I appreciate you being patient with me. I’ve got a little bit of a sore throat, so I’m sipping on some tea today, so I’ll try not to to stress my voice too much. Well, tell us a little bit about Complete Investigations and Security. What is it you do and who do you help?

Sheila McPhilamy: So we are a private detective and security agency. We’re located up on the Marietta Square. We’ve been in business for 13 years now. We do criminal insurance fraud and domestic cases.

Joshua Kornitsky: Wow. That’s a crazy avenue for you to find yourselves in. How did you get here?

Sheila McPhilamy: I had people ask me that all the time. It. There’s nothing in particular, to be honest with you. Um, I worked for a company doing some video editing. And, uh, it actually was a lot of undercover. Audio files.

Joshua Kornitsky: Okay.

Sheila McPhilamy: Um, in in reviewing those files, um, there were a lot of comments made about, you know, hey, you’d make a great investigator. It wasn’t something I’d ever thought about doing, uh, before, but that kind of, I guess if I was going to say something sparked it, then that’s what sparked it and started going down the path and getting all of my training and, uh, opened my company, uh, 13 years ago.

Joshua Kornitsky: Wow. And you’ve actually, from what you shared with me, you’ve had some pretty interesting experiences as far as, as a company, you’ve not exactly been out of the spotlight.

Sheila McPhilamy: Uh, we’ve done, uh, we’ve been in a book. We’ve done, uh, some TV shows and documentaries and things like that where we’ve worked on cases.

Joshua Kornitsky: That’s, that’s going to, of what I promise. I won’t ask any of the details about any of the cases, but certainly having that that opportunity and that exposure must have been kind of a departure from the day to day for you.

Sheila McPhilamy: It is, but it made it fun. Sure. Yeah.

Joshua Kornitsky: So let’s dive in a little bit and talk more about it. So you had said that you’re doing all types of normal, all types of investigations. And, and I know from our discussion with it how unusual is it to be a woman in this space.

Sheila McPhilamy: Very unusual. There there are a few out there, but they usually don’t last very long. Um, it it truly is pretty much a man’s world. Um, so it’s having to navigate that and people automatically, you know, assuming when you answer the phone that you’re the receptionist and not not the actual owner and investigator.

Joshua Kornitsky: So there’s a lot you have to overcome with that. But I gather from 13 years in business, you’ve you’ve more than proven that, that it’s a space that you are excelling in. Hope so. Must be so. So what are some of the common things people assume you spend your time on that may or may not be correct?

Sheila McPhilamy: Hmm. Well, people automatically make an assumption because TV shows, you know, they kind of portray. If you’re a private investigator, you investigate cheating spouses. And, uh, you know that we do do that. Uh, but that’s not the main part of our business. We handle a lot of criminal cases. So, um, we deal with some pretty heavy stuff.

Joshua Kornitsky: So let’s talk about that a little bit, because obviously you’re doing investigations, you say into criminal matters. Who are you? Who are you investigating for?

Sheila McPhilamy: It can be an attorney’s office or it can be an individual. So a lot of times families will come to us. Um, maybe there’s there’s been a something criminal that has occurred, and they come to us because they feel like they’re not getting answers. And it’s not because police aren’t doing their job, it’s just that sometimes agencies are overwhelmed. Um, and, uh, families, you know, they need closure. And so they’ll come to us. Uh, we have attorneys that come to us as well. Um, so. Yeah.

Joshua Kornitsky: Okay, so so you’re doing that type of work for families, for attorneys, and, and when you’re doing that type of work, you’re functioning in a capacity where you’ve got to learn as much information as you can. I gather right. So when it comes to things like questioning people, and this is of particular interest to me. What are some of the things? And again, not looking for any secrets out of your universe. What are some of the things that you have to do when you engage with people in order to get them to open up?

Sheila McPhilamy: So it really depends on the case. Um, you know, it’s not a, um, one, one tool is going to work for everyone and every, every situation that you’re in. It may be that we just go directly to them for an interview, you know, as a witness or something like that, or it may be something where we have to come to them, you know, pretending to be someone else. And of course, there are guidelines that we have to follow, just like, you know, police have got investigators have guidelines they have to follow. Right. Um, but, uh, we just really have to base it on the case and what what we’re trying to retrieve. And it’s not always the same type of person that is, is going out to talk to them or calling them on the phone. We may base whoever’s going out based on who we think is going to be able to get more information.

Joshua Kornitsky: Okay.

Sheila McPhilamy: So depending depending on the case.

Joshua Kornitsky: So you’re going to find the right, uh, individual to, to slot in the right tool for the job as it were. Okay. And and again not I, I I’ll stop saying I’m not trying to ask anything confidential. Do you have a fairly good number of tools to choose from in that regard, that you’re able to find different folks to come in. Okay. Um, so when it comes to your your team and your staff, are you in the lead of everything or do you have other folks that are able to go out and lead investigations as well?

Sheila McPhilamy: So I oversee everything. Okay. Um, it’s, you know, it’s my company. So I want to make sure that everything’s done correctly. So, um, I do oversee it. They do have some flexibility in what they do because, you know, they are trained as well. Uh, sure. But, yeah. So I oversee the end product, and then they’ll come to me if they have any questions.

Joshua Kornitsky: Okay. And I assume they check in along the way. Make sure everything stays on track. Correct. Okay. So with the types of investigations, we talked a little bit about the criminal stuff. Um, we don’t need to talk about the spousal stuff because everybody’s got a TV. And most of that I’m sure is wrong, in any event. But let’s talk a little bit about the accident stuff. And I feel like if a defense attorney is asking for you to investigate, there’s a reason, right? And in what? Again, no one’s maligning the police. What might that reason be? Why do the defense attorneys reach out to get a third party?

Sheila McPhilamy: Yeah. So they there. They may come out because, um, where there’s a case where there may possibly be video footage that was not retrieved or couldn’t have been retrieved at the time. So we’ll go out and try to do that. Um, we will try to come up with more witnesses, because it may be that someone talked to the next door neighbor when the event occurred, but they didn’t talk to someone who was two doors down. And that person, two doors down, had video. Their child was outside playing when it happened, so they were outside. So you never know. Um, we do a lot of we’ll take measurements, uh, photographs, uh, document anything that is still there from the incident that occurred. Uh, so it’s we can retrieve a lot of information that the attorney may not have had prior.

Joshua Kornitsky: And just out of curiosity, because I’ve got a technical background to to a small degree. How much have things like home cameras and doorbell cameras and things like that? Has that been a factor in as as you’ve grown as an organization? Do those factor in?

Sheila McPhilamy: Oh, yes. It’s huge. Uh, you do have to get the video pretty quickly. So, um, you know, you can’t you can’t call an attorney, can’t call me two months down the road and say, hey, you know, we had this incident occurred that we need the video for because most of the time it’s gone by then. Um, sometimes you get lucky. Somebody, you know took a video on their cell phone, and and you can retrieve it there, but, uh, yeah. So it’s the advancement with with phones, with ring cameras and things like that. Those are huge.

Joshua Kornitsky: Yeah. It’s funny, I read somewhere that if Bigfoot or the aliens were around half a billion or, billion. Excuse me? 4 billion people walk around with a cell phone. Somebody would have captured it by now. Yes. And I can’t imagine how many things that you see that get captured by those types of cameras. Um, you also had shared with me that you do missing persons. We do. And hopefully there’s, uh, there’s some happy stories there. In addition, what I assume are some less than happy stories. Uh, without giving away anybody’s information, or are there any happy stories you can share with us?

Sheila McPhilamy: We we work a lot with helping locate, uh, missing teenagers. If, uh, a child is met someone online. Um, sometimes they end up in a different state. Um, and we will have to go out and retrieve them. Bring them back. Those. Those are good stories. When we’re able to get a happy ending from that. Sure. Um, I had a situation where a woman, her mom, had been missing for 40 years. Wow. She went missing in California, and we ended up locating her in Florida. And so that was a feel good moment. So you do have those and those are great.

Joshua Kornitsky: That’s awesome. And I imagine that, uh, with some of the other things you see, it probably is a little bit of, of a lightning to your mood. Yes.

Sheila McPhilamy: Definitely.

Joshua Kornitsky: Okay. Well, I mean, it’s really incredible to me the, the, the breadth and the depth of, of what you’re able to do, who you’re able to help. And it’s not just the attorneys, it’s also the individuals. And when it comes to individuals, they can reach out to you. What’s the best way for them to get Ahold of you?

Sheila McPhilamy: They can give me a call on my cell, which is actually the office number. I don’t have an office number. It’s just call me on my cell. Send me a text. Uh, that number is (404) 379-1125. And then they can also locate us on the web at Complete Investigations net. And then we’re also on all the social media platforms under complete investigation.

Joshua Kornitsky: That’s wonderful. And we’ll also have all of that information shared on our site. And I appreciate you sharing with us what you’ve shared. But I want to ask you about one more thing that you had told me about, which was your nonprofit.

Sheila McPhilamy: Yes, I have a nonprofit. It’s called Serving to Protect. And a lot of the times where children go missing. It’s there’s a lot involved as far as getting them back to the parent. Um, they there may be costs for hotel rooms, for air travel, for travel to the location. Uh, so, um, the nonprofit helps cover some of those costs. Uh.

Joshua Kornitsky: Yeah. Okay. So is that something that that anybody can reach out and make a donation for?

Sheila McPhilamy: They can. If you go to complete investigations and go to the page for serving to protect, uh, there should be a link there where they can make a payment.

Joshua Kornitsky: That’s fantastic. Well, Sheila, I can’t thank you enough for coming on and sharing your experience. And and, uh, the incredibly real true life as opposed to, as seen on TV version of of what you do with your investigation and with your investigators. And thank you so much for being here. I hope you have time to stick around. But once again, this has been Sheila McPhilamy with Complete Investigations and Security. Thank you.

Sheila McPhilamy: Thank you so much.

Joshua Kornitsky: Thank you. And my next guest is Pablo Gonzalez. Pablo is one of the founders of a company called Global Talent Direct. Good morning. Pablo, how are you?

Pablo Gonzalez : Hey, Josh. I’m good. Thank you so much for having me.

Joshua Kornitsky: Thank you so much for being here today. We really appreciate it. So let me start by asking you what do you do?

Pablo Gonzalez : Yeah. So Global Talent Direct is a company, uh, that was founded, um, with the goal of helping business owners, uh, use global talent for local impact. Uh, and that’s our mission statement. Um, Essentially, we’re not just, you know, people always going into the. People are always going into thinking, oh, you’re taking American jobs this and what have you. Um, when in reality, you’re you’re not only giving someone. A job, uh, overseas, but you’re helping a business owner stateside become profitable faster, um, by being able to find someone who has their masters ten years of experience asking 1300 bucks a month.

Joshua Kornitsky: Wow. So what types of roles do you help fill?

Pablo Gonzalez : Yeah. So we we, uh, right now have a solid baseline of customer service reps. Uh, executive assistants, those I, I would say are our most popular offerings. Um, but then we also have marketing, uh, any accounting and finance, um, operations salespeople. It’s it’s really we’re also working on finding a legal assistance and paralegals as well. Um, but it’s really anything that can be done remote where the founder did not get into their business, their nonprofit, their the organization to be doing these things? Sure. And be able to actually remove one of those hats.

Joshua Kornitsky: Okay, well, that sounds like it makes a pretty big impact in in in more than one place, right? Yeah. So so let’s back up a little bit. Tell me a little bit about your background. How did where did you start that you ended up here.

Pablo Gonzalez : Yeah. So, uh, I’ll keep it short because it can be I can’t take that detour, but, uh, I’m a Air Force veteran as an explosive detection dog handler. Uh, for six years. Um, and when I separated, my wife asked me to do something where she could get some sleep at night.

Joshua Kornitsky: Well, first, thank you for your service.

Pablo Gonzalez : Thank you, thank you. So, uh, I still wanted to, uh, you know, make an impact on on my community, uh, wherever it is, and society as a whole. So I went into, uh, into business consulting. I found that a small.

Joshua Kornitsky: Business.

Pablo Gonzalez : Profession. Yeah, I found that small business owners and just business owners in general always have a really amazing story as to what got them there. And they’re they’re the ones helping the economy. Uh, get back to where it needs to be. Um, and I, I found during those years of business consulting that the main problem was always, I wish I could afford more help. You know, I need it. I can’t, I can’t get it. Um. That would be great. And payroll. And, you know, nowadays you’re having some college kids coming out expecting $95,000 salaries with no experience. Um, so it’s it’s it’s really helpful to to the business owner that thinks there are several years away. Sure. And even the serial entrepreneurs that, uh, want to scale and sell, scale and sell.

Joshua Kornitsky: So it really helps them sort of be able to do things that they otherwise wouldn’t be able to touch.

Pablo Gonzalez : Precisely.

Joshua Kornitsky: Okay. And where do you make the connections with folks? Uh, obviously we’ll talk about where you find your customers, but where do you find the talent?

Pablo Gonzalez : Yeah. So we have them really all over the world. Uh, specifically where the cost of living is going to make the most sense for the business owner. Uh, in the sense of ROI. So it depends. We have most of Latin America, Asia, um, uh, Middle East. Uh, Trinidad and Tobago. I mean, really any with Jamaica, even anywhere where the cost of living is going to just make that the most sense.

Joshua Kornitsky: Okay. And do you specifically bring, uh, bring to market talent that may be multilingual and not that that’s a focus, but.

Pablo Gonzalez : Yeah, no, absolutely. All of the candidates speak, uh, speak English are very fluent in it, not just in English, but we also test for fluency in their specific field. Oh that’s great. Obviously, you know, I speak fluent Spanish. I’m Colombian. Um, but I couldn’t tell you how to take a computer apart and put it together. Okay. Um, so we test specifically, like bookkeepers, knowing those financial terms and such things.

Joshua Kornitsky: Okay. And. And how would you say that you’ve got a specific vertical that you’re helping, or as far as the clients that you’re looking for, what? What’s a good fit other than somebody who’s too busy?

Pablo Gonzalez : Yeah. No. So that’s the cool part about this is, is when I was in business, consulting was almost a little restrictive. Um, where the medical came into play. And, uh, you have to get all of this information to their first born, and even then, they might still get denied. Um, whereas now it can be an individual that thinks they’re too busy. It can be a business owner that needs to, that wants to spend a few more hours with their family a week. Um, and it can be serial entrepreneurs that are, uh, just buying, scaling and selling, um, and wanting to help the, the local community.

Joshua Kornitsky: So can I ask you a tough question?

Pablo Gonzalez : I would hope so.

Joshua Kornitsky: Tough question. Aren’t these taking American jobs?

Pablo Gonzalez : Yeah. Um, that’s that’s really that comes in a lot. Uh, I think I mentioned a little bit earlier and it’s it’s tough because you can’t find an American with ten years of experience. Uh, and their degree and looking for 1300 bucks a month. Um. That’s true. And, you know, these aren’t just cost savings. They’re competitive. Competitive advantages that fuel, uh, local job creation. So that’s where our mission statement comes in. Um, it’s it’s when you have that money you’re able to donate to your causes. You’re able to hire more stateside. Um, one of our niches that we’ve actually found is blue collar. Um, which might sound ironic because obviously there’s a lot of hands on. Sure, sure. Um, but they where they find the most ROI in filling their back office with these remote roles so that they can focus on the big picture and strategy.

Joshua Kornitsky: So they’re not just temporary roles. It’s not just I need somebody to help me out for the week. They’ll they’ll actually permanently take the position.

Pablo Gonzalez : Yes. So we actually prefer that, uh, it’s we’re direct hires. Um, so we were able to place them and integrate them with your team. We have, uh, standard operating procedures that we’re able to provide for people who, uh, might have. Well, are going to have. The question is, how do I integrate a remote person with my physical team? Um, and we found ways to do it that make it have the least friction possible, uh, with having the business owners not really have to worry about, uh, several other things other than I just made an amazing hire for a fraction of the cost.

Joshua Kornitsky: Wow. So that really does make a pretty strong impact. Now, I know you are also involved in a number of other organizations. Uh, first, can you tell me a little bit about the Cobb chamber?

Pablo Gonzalez : Yeah, I love the Cobb chamber. So ever since I separated from the Air Force, uh, and moved back here, uh, to Georgia, I’ve been involved with them. Only this last year on the steering committee, uh, for the young professionals. Um, but it’s a an amazing Cobb County, as you guys are aware, is an amazing county. Um, and the chamber specifically does a lot of good, uh, for, for the local community. Um, one of my favorite events is the top golf tournament. Uh, it’s a fundraiser for, uh, Children’s of Atlanta.

Joshua Kornitsky: Sure. Yeah. The children’s healthcare is is, uh. If I ever have the money, it’s where it’s going to go, for sure. But you also are involved with savvy. Would you tell us tell us what it stands for?

Pablo Gonzalez : Yeah, absolutely. Uh, so as a veteran myself, it’s it stands for a strategic alliance for veteran integration, and it’s a nonprofit that helps veterans reintegrate into society, um, through a specific course. So it’s resources for all veterans, but specifically, it builds out a track for someone who’s either a year from separation or post separation, um, if they want to go entrepreneurship route, if they want to go into corporate, if they want to go back to school, get their benefits squared away. I mean, free Coursera membership, it’s um, it’s a lot of resources. And, uh, Taps does a lot for us, which is the transition assistance program that is mandated in the military. But, uh, there’s just so much that it misses.

Joshua Kornitsky: So do you function as an advisor for some of the men and women that are in that window of getting ready to transition out or having just transitioned.

Pablo Gonzalez : Out, not to them directly? Uh, I help with the programs. Um, so, uh, outreach, um, resource gathering, uh, just being able to get the organization, uh, as, as successful as possible and be able to reach as many veterans as we can.

Joshua Kornitsky: And I assume that’s a nonprofit as well. Yes, yes. If people wanted to make a donation there, how would they go about doing that?

Pablo Gonzalez : Yeah, absolutely. So just on the website and you can look up Strategic Alliance for Veteran Integration or Savvy. And it actually has at the very top make a donation.

Joshua Kornitsky: Oh fantastic. Okay. So let me circle back to to Global Talent Direct because I want to make sure that we give due diligence and the amount of time there. So what, if anything, uh, should I have asked that? I haven’t asked that. That you want to communicate about how you help your clients and how you help the people that you employ? What if someone’s listening right now and and forwards this, uh, when we publish out to somebody in a different country, how do they reach you? What are the types of things that you’re looking for?

Pablo Gonzalez : Yeah. So if it’s if it’s talent, uh, what we’re looking for is meant to senior level experience. It makes the transition a lot easier for actually placing these individuals with having their own setup already and proven experience working remotely. Um, if it’s companies and organizations and nonprofits, then we’re actually able to, uh, we have social global talent direct on all socials. Um, and you can actually, uh, send me a text or a phone call at six seven 8 or 8 00542. And then there’s also the admin email on our website, Global Direct. Com.

Joshua Kornitsky: Oh, fantastic. And we’ll have all of that shared on our site as we will for for Sheela and complete investigations and security as well. Um, I can’t thank you enough, Pablo Sheila, for for sharing your experience and your stories and your knowledge with us. Um, it’s been great to have you here in the studio. We try to make it interesting. We try to make sure we ask the right questions. Thank you both for being here. This is Joshua Kornitsky professional iOS implementer and your host today on Cherokee Business Radio.

 

Tagged With: Complete Investigations and Security, Global Talent Direct

The Transformational Work of the STAR House Foundation

July 10, 2025 by John Ray

The Transformational Work of the STAR House Foundation, on North Fulton Business Radio with host John Ray
North Fulton Business Radio
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The Transformational Work of the STAR House Foundation, on North Fulton Business Radio with host John Ray

The Transformational Work of the STAR House Foundation (North Fulton Business Radio, Episode 883)

In Roswell, Georgia, hundreds of children face steep challenges outside the classroom. Those challenges don’t stop when the school day ends. That’s where the STAR House Foundation comes in.

In this episode of North Fulton Business Radio, host John Ray speaks with Windy Nicholson, Maureen Curtis, and Alejandra Torchia of the STAR House Foundation, a nonprofit that provides free, on-site afterschool programs for underserved children at Title I elementary schools. These programs offer more than academic help. They provide character development, emotional support, healthy snacks, and consistent encouragement from trusted adults.

A $1,000 donation funds a full year of support for one child. Many former students are now returning as volunteers, educators, and even board members. Their “32 STARS for 32 Years” campaign aims to raise $32,000 to expand the mission and reach even more children.

If you believe every child deserves a strong start and a real chance to thrive, this conversation will show you what that looks like in action.

John Ray is the host of North Fulton Business Radio. The show is produced by John Ray and North Fulton Business Radio, LLC, an affiliate of Business RadioX®, and is recorded inside Renasant Bank in Alpharetta.

Key Takeaways from this Episode

  • Early intervention matters: Reading proficiency by third grade is a strong predictor of long-term academic success. STAR House helps students build that foundation.
  • On-campus access: STAR House operates after school in Title I schools at no cost to families, with a six-to-one student-to-coach ratio.
  • A full-circle model: Former students are now volunteers, educators, and board members—proof of long-term transformation.
  • High-impact giving: Just $1,000 supports a child for an entire year of afterschool care, tutoring, and personal development.
  • Community powered: STAR House depends on individual donors, sponsors, volunteers, and corporate partners to fulfill its mission.
  • Current campaign: “32 STARS for 32 Years” seeks to raise $32,000 to fund the upcoming school year for underserved students in Roswell.

Topics Discussed in this Episode

00:00 Introduction to North Fulton Business Radio
00:24 Highlighting the STAR House Foundation
00:46 Renasant Bank Sponsorship
01:49 Welcoming Guests from STAR House Foundation
02:14 Overview of STAR House Foundation
03:23 Challenges Faced by Underserved Children
04:35 Maureen’s Role and Experience
06:00 Details About the Schools Served
09:41 Importance of Food and Nutrition
10:16 Growth and Impact of STAR House Foundation
12:50 Partnership with Schools
15:09 The Stakes and Long-term Impact
19:05 Heartwarming Success Stories
22:09 Back to School Campaign
25:17 Volunteer Opportunities
28:40 Corporate Sponsorships and Donations
29:45 Final Thoughts and Gratitude
33:12 Closing Remarks and Sponsor Message from Beyond Computer Solutions

STAR House Foundation

STAR House Foundation is a non-profit organization based in Roswell, Georgia, dedicated to supporting at-risk children in North Fulton County through after-school tutoring, mentoring, and enrichment programs. Serving over 200 students in three Title I schools, STAR House provides a safe and nurturing environment where children can improve their academic performance, develop positive study habits, and build essential life skills. The foundation also offers a summer camp that bridges the academic gap during school breaks, focusing on retention and continued growth for elementary students.

Founded in 1993 by local volunteers who recognized the need for after-school supervision and academic support among economically disadvantaged youth, STAR House has grown to become a vital resource in the community. Its mission is to equip students with the tools and encouragement needed for personal and educational success, working closely with schools, families, and community partners. STAR House is committed to fostering diversity, inclusion, and equity, ensuring all children have the opportunity to reach their full potential and envisioning a future where every student can improve their life’s trajectory through education and mentorship.

Website | LinkedIn | Instagram

Renasant Bank supports North Fulton Business Radio

Renasant BankRenasant Bank has humble roots, starting in 1904 as a $100,000 bank in a Lee County, Mississippi, bakery. Since then, Renasant has become one of the Southeast’s strongest financial institutions, with over $17 billion in assets and more than 180 banking, lending, wealth management, and financial services offices throughout the region. All of Renasant’s success stems from each banker’s commitment to investing in their communities as a way to better understand the people they serve. At Renasant Bank, they understand you because they work and live alongside you every day.

Website | LinkedIn | Facebook | Instagram | X (Twitter) | YouTube

Beyond Computer Solutions supports North Fulton Business Radio

If you’re a law firm, medical practice, or manufacturer, there’s one headline you don’t want to make: “Local Business Pays Thousands in Ransom After Cyberattack.” That’s where Beyond Computer Solutions comes in. They help organizations like yours stay out of the news and in business with managed IT and cybersecurity services designed for industries where compliance and reputation matter most.

Whether they serve as your complete IT department or simply support your internal team, they are well-versed in HIPAA, secure document access, written security policies, and other essential aspects that ensure your safety and well-being. Best of all, it starts with a complimentary security assessment.

Website | LinkedIn | Facebook | YouTube

About North Fulton Business Radio and host John Ray

With over 880 episodes and having featured over 1,300 guests, North Fulton Business Radio is the longest-running podcast in the North Fulton area, covering business in our community like no one else. We are the undisputed “Voice of Business” in North Fulton!

The show invites a diverse range of business, non-profit, and community leaders to share their significant contributions to their market, community, and profession. There’s no discrimination based on company size, and there’s never any “pay to play.” North Fulton Business Radio supports and celebrates businesses by sharing positive stories that traditional media ignore. Some media lean left. Some media lean right. We lean business.

John Ray, host of  North Fulton Business Radio, and Owner, Ray Business Advisors
John Ray, host of North Fulton Business Radio and Owner, Ray Business Advisors

John Ray is the host of North Fulton Business Radio. John and the team at North Fulton Business Radio, LLC, an affiliate of Business RadioX®, produce the show, and it is recorded inside Renasant Bank in Alpharetta.

The studio address is 275 South Main Street, Alpharetta, GA 30009.

You can find the full archive of shows by following this link. The show is available on all the major podcast apps, including Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google, Amazon, iHeart Radio, and many others.

John Ray, The Generosity MindsetJohn Ray also operates his own business advisory practice. John’s services include advising solopreneurs and small professional services firms on their value, their positioning and business development, and their pricing. His clients are professionals who are selling their expertise, such as consultants, coaches, attorneys, CPAs, accountants, bookkeepers, marketing professionals, and other professional services practitioners.

John is the national bestselling author of The Generosity Mindset: A Journey to Business Success by Raising Your Confidence, Value, and Prices.

Tagged With: after school care, Alejandra Torchia, Beyond Computer Solutions, early childhood education, John Ray, Maureen Curtis, mentorship, North Fulton Business Radio, renasant bank, Roswell, Roswell Georgia, Star House Foundation, Title I schools, underserved children, underserved communities, why early childhood matters, Windy Nicholson

Why Charging Premium Fees is Actually a Service to Your Clients, with Criminal Attorney Joshua Baron

July 9, 2025 by John Ray

Why Charging Premium Fees Is Actually Service to Your Clients, with Criminal Attorney Joshua Baron, on The Price and Value Journey podcast with host John Ray
North Fulton Studio
Why Charging Premium Fees is Actually a Service to Your Clients, with Criminal Attorney Joshua Baron
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Why Charging Premium Fees Is Actually Service to Your Clients, with Criminal Attorney Joshua Baron, on The Price and Value Journey podcast with host John Ray

Why Charging Premium Fees is Actually a Service to Your Clients, with Criminal Attorney Joshua Baron (The Price and Value Journey, Episode 138)

In this second part of a compelling conversation, host John Ray continues his deep dive with criminal defense attorney Joshua Baron, exploring the life-changing effects of charging premium fees and the philosophy behind building a service-based practice.

Josh reveals how a single 45-minute conversation with a business consultant led him to triple his prices and why most of his clients said yes. This episode unpacks the psychology behind pricing decisions, the importance of aligning your client experience with your fees, and how premium pricing actually serves both attorney and client better.

Beyond pricing strategy, Josh shares his unique approach to client access (including giving out his personal cell phone number), his philosophy on when to work for free versus when to charge premium rates, and how his deeply held beliefs about service and purpose drive his business decisions.

Whether you’re struggling with pricing confidence, wondering how to justify premium fees, or seeking to understand the relationship between pricing and client treatment, this episode provides both tactical strategies and a philosophical framework for building a sustainable, values-driven practice.

If you haven’t heard the first part of John’s interview with Josh, please follow this link

The Price and Value Journey is presented by John Ray and produced by North Fulton Business Radio, LLC, an affiliate of the Business RadioX® podcast network.

Key Takeaways from this Episode

  • Test pricing changes with pilot programs – Don’t overhaul everything at once; experiment with a subset of cases to build confidence and gather data.
  • Focus on what you’re uniquely good at – Narrow your offerings dramatically rather than trying to serve everyone; Josh went from thirty practice areas to essentially two.
  • Have honest value conversations with clients – Help clients articulate whether the case is truly important to them rather than trying to convince them it should be.
  • Premium pricing requires premium experience alignment – You can’t charge high fees while delivering a discount experience; everything must align.
  • If clients don’t treat you well, examine your pricing – Low prices communicate that you see yourself as low-value, which affects how clients interact with you.
  • Personal accessibility can reduce overall contact – Giving clients his cell phone number actually decreased calls because they felt secure knowing they could reach him.
  • Your day job enables your mission, it doesn’t have to be your mission – Charging sustainable rates allows you to pursue your deeper purpose without financial stress.

Topics Discussed in this Episode

00:00 Introduction and Guest Overview
01:34 Recap of Part One
02:00 Joshua Baron’s Pricing Journey Begins
04:04 The Impact of Pricing Changes
08:08 Client Value and Case Selection
10:30 Understanding Client Value
16:53 Creative Solutions in Legal Practice
20:37 Premium Legal Fees: A Service to All
22:45 Balancing Work and Life as a Lawyer
23:35 The Importance of Pricing and Client Treatment
25:13 Setting Boundaries with Clients
26:09 The Value of Accessibility and Client Communication
30:16 Philosophy Behind Legal Practice
34:41 Pricing and the Mindset of Service
42:42 The Importance of Networking and Relationships
46:15 Final Thoughts and Contact Information

Joshua Baron

Joshua Baron
Joshua Baron

Joshua Baron is a criminal defense attorney and the founder of SB Legal, based in Utah. He graduated summa cum laude with a Bachelor of Arts in History from Cal Poly, Pomona, at age 18, then served an LDS mission in Viña del Mar, Chile, where he became fluent in Spanish. In 2007, he earned his J.D. cum laude from Brigham Young University’s J. Reuben Clark Law School, serving as Executive Editor of the Journal of Public Law and Associate Editor of the Education Law Journal. After law school, Baron began his career as a civil litigator in Park City, representing developers and real estate companies. Seeking more trial experience, he joined the Salt Lake City Prosecutor’s Office in 2008, handling over 1,500 criminal cases per year and leading more than thirty jury trials.

In 2009, Baron co-founded Sharifi & Baron, PLLC, which later became SB Legal. He has since represented hundreds of clients in nearly every court in Utah, covering a wide range of criminal and immigration matters. Baron is licensed to practice before both federal and state courts in Utah. His practice areas include criminal defense—such as violent crimes, drug offenses, white-collar crimes, domestic violence, and sex crimes—and immigration law, including deportation defense and appeals. He has achieved not guilty verdicts and dismissals in serious criminal cases, including aggravated burglary, sexual assault, and drug distribution.

Baron is recognized for his professionalism, client-focused approach, and responsiveness. He has been selected as a Super Lawyer by Mountain States Super Lawyers from 2020 to 2025 and previously as a Rising Star. He has also been named a Top Lawyer by the Global Directory of Who’s Who and included in Utah Business Magazine’s Utah Legal Elite.

In addition to his legal practice, Baron is an author and educator, having written books such as Criminal Defense Referrals and The Business of Criminal Law, and taught criminal law and procedure as adjunct faculty at Ensign College.

Website | LinkedIn

About The Price and Value Journey Podcast

The Price and Value Journey is a show for expert-service professionals who want more than formulas and quick fixes. If you’re a solo or small-firm provider—consultant, coach, attorney, CPA, or fractional executive—you know the real work of building a practice goes far beyond pricing. It’s about finding clarity, showing up with confidence, and learning how to express the full value of what you do in ways that clients understand and appreciate.

The Price and Value Journey Podcast with host John RayHosted by John Ray, business advisor and author of The Generosity Mindset, this podcast explores the deeper journey behind running a services business: how you think about your work, how you relate to clients, and how you sustain a business that’s not only profitable but deeply fulfilling. Yes, we talk pricing, but we also talk mindset, business development, trust, empathy, positioning, and all the intangible ingredients that make a practice thrive.

With solo episodes and conversations featuring thoughtful guests, The Price and Value Journey is a companion for professionals who are building something meaningful. Produced in partnership with North Fulton Business Radio, LLC, an affiliate of Business RadioX®, the podcast is accessible on all major podcast platforms. The complete show archive is here.

John Ray, Host of The Price and Value Journey

John Ray, Author of The Generosity Mindset and Host of The Price and Value Journey
John Ray, Author of The Generosity Mindset and Host of The Price and Value Journey

John Ray is the host of The Price and Value Journey.

John owns Ray Business Advisors, a business advisory practice. John’s services include business coaching and advisory work, as well as advising solopreneurs and small professional services firms on their pricing. John is passionate about the power of pricing for business owners, as changing pricing is the fastest way to change the profitability of a business. His clients are professionals who are selling their expertise, such as attorneys, CPAs, accountants and bookkeepers, consultants, coaches, marketing professionals, and other professional services practitioners.

In his other business, John is a podcast show host, strategist, and the owner of North Fulton Business Radio, LLC, an affiliate of Business RadioX®. John and his team work with B2B professionals to create and conduct their podcast using The Generosity Mindset® Method: building and deepening relationships in a non-salesy way that translates into revenue for their business.

John is also the host of North Fulton Business Radio. With over 880 shows and having featured over 1,300 guests, North Fulton Business Radio is the longest-running podcast in the North Fulton area, covering business in its region like no one else.

John’s book, The Generosity Mindset: A Journey to Business Success by Raising Your Confidence, Value, and Prices

The Generosity Mindset, by John RayJohn is the #1 national best-selling author of The Generosity Mindset: A Journey to Business Success by Raising Your Confidence, Value, and Prices.

If you are a professional services provider, your goal is to do transformative work for clients you love working with and get paid commensurate with the value you deliver to them. While negative mindsets can inhibit your growth, adopting a different mindset, The Generosity Mindset™, can replace those self-limiting beliefs. The Generosity Mindset enables you to diagnose and communicate the value you deliver to clients and, in turn, more effectively price to receive a portion of that value.

Whether you’re a consultant, coach, marketing or branding professional, business advisor, attorney, CPA, or work in virtually any other professional services discipline, your content and technical expertise are not proprietary. What’s unique, though, is your experience and how you synthesize and deliver your knowledge. What’s special is your demeanor or the way you deal with your best-fit clients. What’s invaluable is how you deliver outstanding value by guiding people through massive changes in their personal lives and in their businesses that bring them to a place they never thought possible.

Your combination of these elements is unique in your industry. There lies your value, but it’s not the value you see. It’s the value your best-fit customers see in you.

If pricing your value feels uncomfortable or unfamiliar to you, this book will teach you why putting a price on the value your clients perceive and identify serves both them and you, and you’ll learn the factors involved in getting your price right.

The book is available at all major physical and online book retailers worldwide. Follow this link for further details.

Connect with John Ray:

Website | LinkedIn | Twitter

Business RadioX®:  LinkedIn | Twitter | Facebook | Instagram

Tagged With: charging premium fees, client communication, criminal defense attorney, criminal defense lawyer, John Ray, Joshua Baron, networking, pricing, pricing strategy, purpose, raising prices, relationships, SB Legal, setting boundaries, The Price and Value Journey

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