A fascinating and insightful conversation on business marketing, lead generation, and the purpose of life(!) with Tom Poland, creator of Leadsology® and a #1 best-selling author of numerous books that support people in building sustainable businesses (and successful lives). Tom currently helps entrepreneurs around the world create a flow of high-quality, inbound, new client inquiries into their business almost every week of the year.

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Biggest takeaways (or quotes) you don’t want to miss:

• Systemized lead generation is critical to business.

• “Hugh Jackman Marketing” – What is it and why should you avoid it?

• What is death by power-point?

• Asking yourself – Can I be better than I was yesterday?

Check out these highlights:

5:27 “A lot of the marketing I was buying into was general marketing advice. It wasn’t working.”

6:50 “These things that we think we don’t want- we need.”

13:50 The journey of entrepreneurship is one and the same with your personal development journey. 

15:00 What are some of the most powerful strategies that people often get wrong?

15:57 What is the “first domino”?

23:25 How does the webinar go wrong?

25:27 “If it’s not captivating, it’s not marketing.”

25:44 “Failure to realize that the enemy of motivation is complication.”

26:14 “Confusion between the presentation and the actual client work.”

32:00 “I had friends who were getting law and medical degrees. I decided I would study success.”

40:00 Success and happiness in business.

43:50 “All any of us can do is something with what we’ve got.”

45:30 “Emotion should not be avoided.”

46:00 How do you dissolve dysfunctional emotion?

49:20 Why you should listen to your first thought when you are struggling.

How to get in touch with Tom:

On Social Media: 

https://www.linkedin.com/in/tompoland

https://www.twitter.com/tompoland

FREE GIFTS FOR LISTENERS:

Join Tom’s free 5 Day Lead Generation Challenge here: https://www.leadsology.guru/five-hour-challenge

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About Tom Poland, multiple best-selling author and Leadsology Guru:

Tom Poland is a multiple best-selling author who has been published physically in 27 countries. Over the past 41 years he has started and sold five businesses, taking three of them international and has led teams of over 100 people with annual revenue of more than twenty million dollars. 

Today Tom teaches his unique webinar marketing method that made him so successful and which has helped thousands of clients globally enjoy the prosperity that comes with a weekly flow of high quality, inbound, client inquiries.

Learn more about Tom here: www.leadsology.guru

Imperfect Show Notes

We are happy to offer these imperfect show notes to make this podcast more accessible to those who are hearing impaired or those who prefer reading over listening. While we would love to offer more polished show notes, we are currently offering an automated transcription (which likely includes errors, but hopefully will still deliver great value), below. 

GGGB Intro 0:00
Coming up today on Guts, Grit and Great Business.

Tom Poland 0:04
You asked about happiness. And happiness is what happens when you take the garbage out. It’s what’s left. It’s what was there originally. It’s our state of emptiness. If you want to be more specific, it’s it’s a state of mind, which is devoid of emotion.

GGGB Intro 0:23
The adventure of entrepreneurship and building a life and business you love, preferably at the same time is not for the faint of heart. That’s why Heather Pearce Campbell is bringing you a dose of guts, grit and great business stories that will inspire and motivate you to create what you want in your business and life. Welcome to the Guts, Grit and Great Business podcast where endurance is required. Now, here’s your host, The Legal Website Warrior®, Heather Pearce Campbell.

Heather Pearce Campbell 0:56
All righty, welcome. I am Heather Pearce Campbell, The Legal Website Warrior®. I am an attorney and legal coach based here in Seattle, Washington. Welcome to another episode of Guts, Grit, and Great Business. I am so excited to bring you my new friend Tom Poland today. Tom’s on the other side of the world. So he is starting off his morning with us. I tell him, Tom is a multiple best selling author who has been published physically in 27 countries. Over the past 41 years, he has started and sold five businesses taking three of them international and has led teams of over 100 people with annual revenue of more than $20 million. Today Tom teaches his unique webinar marketing method that made him so successful, and which has helped 1000s of clients globally enjoy the prosperity that comes with a weekly flow of high quality inbound client inquiries. Tom lives in castaways beach Australia. He is the author of leads ology the science of being in demand. He teaches his unique webinar marketing method helping 1000s of clients globally with inbound lead generation. And from LinkedIn, I just had to share this because I love your actually several things that you say, but that you’ve had the privilege of sharing speaking platforms with Michael Gerber of emf who I love. I’m a huge fan of Michael Gerber. And Richard I’m not sure how to say his last name, whether it’s coke or heart Kosh. I’m glad I asked from the 8020 principle, Brian Tracy and many others. And then I love the last part. I’m voluntarily married to a Uber pretty German Frau and because I’m from New Zealand, originally, we’re known locally as the kiwi and the crowd. Does that this year that I love that Tom? Welcome.

Tom Poland 2:45
Man, thanks for having me. Yeah, I mean, folks, you don’t know this. But before the interview, Heather and I spent about 15 minutes fixing the world. We had a lot of values in common. That’s right.

Heather Pearce Campbell 2:58
There’s a lot to be fixed, unfortunately. Well, Tom, I’m so happy to have you. So for people listening, Tom and I just met recently through a group we both participate in. But the funny part is on the last call, I was like, to the whole group, you know, I want to learn this thing and how to do webinars, and bla bla bla, and people are like, Oh, you just need to go pick up Tom’s book, which I’m doing. So Tom, you’re next on my list of books to read? Yeah. So tell me how did you get started? What did your How did you get down this path of becoming the leadzology guru?

Tom Poland 3:36
I actually started decades and decades ago and ended up here. And the origins of it’s pretty simple. And that is I started the business when I was age 24, which is, holy cow 40 years ago, almost 40 years ago, anyhow. But I’d heard this thing about nothing happens to the business until something is sold. You know, you can pay suppliers, you can invest in research or development, you can pay yourself and so on and so on. You can even buy some copy paper and so on. And I thought about that, and I thought, Yeah, but you can’t sell anything until you’ve generated an inquiry. So it seemed to me that the point is to end of by business was going to be lead generation and so you know, I’ve always said the secret of success is not that you have to be smart and that rather you only have to be smart enough to know how dumb you are. Just be smart enough to know that you’re stupid in a certain area or ignorant a certain area you can get help, right so right. You know, I’ve always been an avid reader and consumer of books. Back then the we had, believe it or not, we had records vinyl, love it. Learn from Earl Nightingale and Norman Vincent Peale. And some of the early grades. We got into cassette tapes or listen to cassette tapes and go to seminars, workshops, everything I could do about marketing, about sales, about marketing. I mean, I would literally fly to another country and do a seminar at a workshop and come back and implement I’m pretty good implemented, but to my to my repeated disappointment, nothing made much difference. You know, I could learn copyright and send out 10,000 emails. Yeah, some of it worked, okay, but it didn’t really, it wasn’t quite as good as people told me it was going to be when I bought the course of the program or the workshop or the book or whatever. So basically, I sat down and tried to figure it out myself. And I realized that the reason why a lot of wasn’t working is a lot of the marketing advice I was buying into was actually general marketing advice. So it was meant to work for the dry cleaner versus the consultant versus the manufacturer versus the know the building contractor or the message therapist and was just too broad and too general to work for, for me. So long story short, I figured out that marketing for services advice was different. And that’s what started me on this journey. It was actually a journey of frustration, disappointment that ended up with the science of being demand, which is the holy dodgy thing, what do you have to do? If you’re not offering a physical product? What do you have to do to get people knocking on the door?

Heather Pearce Campbell 6:01
Well, it’s so interesting, you say that it was the journey of frustration and disappointment that resulted in this thing, right, a huge part of the conversations that I have on this podcast, which is titled guts, grit and great businesses about how sometimes being in those hardest places is actually what leads to the next evolution of our business or the next thing or, or making a decision that actually creates the success, right, versus,

Tom Poland 6:26
I would say, it’s the reason we were alive. Yes, the reason for being a human skin is the challenges and the obstacles and the effort and the thinking that required because that involves consciousness. And to me consciousness is the the highest value, because if we get conscious, we become loving and happy and fulfilled, and we present. And we stop being sociopaths, and many narcissists, and we actually start making the world a better place. So those things that we think we don’t want, we need.

Heather Pearce Campbell 6:55
Love that. No, it’s, it’s so true. And I think so often, it’s easy for people to fall into the trap of thinking, this shouldn’t be happening, or it’s not supposed to go this way, or, you know, any of the number of things that we think when we’re in a period of compression or hard times are struggling to make ends meet, and, you know, variety of other things that are happening currently in our current market. And it actually, you know, can be from those moments. I mean, I even look at my sister and I use her as an example frequently. But, you know, she went from being a mom that had very little work history was married, had a couple of small children, both boys that were like, you know, one and three. Anyways, her husband cheated on her and all this horrible stuff happened, and they ended up in a divorce. And she went through a really tough period, like tears every day period, where she was trying to figure out how to make ends meet, you know, how to provide for these little boys how to negotiate her new life without having much work experience at all. And, you know, she’s now three years, you know, passed kind of some of the toughest waters. But, I mean, she is tough as a diamond. Like, it’s really that she was faced with a series of hurdles. I mean, in the midst of her trying to gain employment and learn all these skills, her husband suitor for sole custody of the children and dragged her through a big legal battle. And, you know, she was she had been paid. Yeah, she’d come from a job where she was making like 10 or 11 bucks an hour. And suddenly, she had to be able to pay legal fees to an attorney who charged 350 bucks an hour, you know, to keep her life going and keep her kids. And anyway, she came out the other side of that, and not only did she pay every cent of it, herself, you know, she, she has climbed the workload she is anyway, she’s one of my heroes, but I’ve watched how intense that period of life was for her and how many people are feeling that intensity right now. And I just I have to believe and I have to hope that so much goodness, even for entrepreneurs and business owners and people who are in the space that I serve, like so much will come out of this that that will be apparent to people down the road. Maybe in a couple years, like maybe not immediately that it actually served them.

Tom Poland 9:21
I mean, first of all, she’s gonna have grown and developed enormously because of this and you mentioned you not as tough as the diamond probably shining quite brightly as well. Yes. But think of the inspiration the story would be to her children and her grandchildren.

Heather Pearce Campbell 9:34
And it gives me goosebumps.

Tom Poland 9:36
Exactly yeah. And and it’s also I don’t know what folk believe about an afterlife or multiple afterlife I don’t know. But when you think about what we take with us what what we work hard to achieve in our life. There’s three essential things sorry, three main categories. There’s the health or well being which is your physical, spiritual, mental well being there’s the relationships loving life, which is friends, family and community, etc. And then there’s the money side of things, which includes businesses or career, etc. If you have all those areas, we create goals and we work we strive to improve on those areas. When we die, none of that comes with us. You know, we the health is clearly gone because we’re dying. The relationships probably no one’s going to do a Romeo and Juliet decide to go with you at that point. I’d love you the money. You know, I mean, Howard Hughes was the richest man in the world when he died. And, you know, I said, If I get so much he left behind, like I know, all of it. So you don’t get to take the health you don’t get take relationships, you don’t care for the money. All those things we we worked assiduously towards that created, what we do get is who we become. And you guess that I believe for a tenant is a part of her soul’s evolution. So that’s, that’s the gift. You know, there’s that there’s that little truism I suppose about the butterfly, if you a butterfly has to work very hard to get out of that chrysalis, it has to break the crust of that chrysalis. And if someone were to make it easy for the butterfly, pull that crust away that cocoon away, the butterfly’s wings would never have the fluid in it that they need to form to better could fly, right, the butterfly and it gets to flies through struggle. And that’s very much like our soul, we get to, we get freedom, and we get fulfillment from effort, not from being a jellyfish. So the challenges we have one of us, none of us wish them into our lives, but they’re going to be there. They’re inevitable. They’re an inevitable part of seeking progress and consciousness. And they, the effort is actually the reason we create goals. It’s not, it’s not to stand at the top of the mountain, it’s it’s the development of the journey up the mountain. That’s the gift.

Heather Pearce Campbell 11:50
That’s right. That’s what we learn about ourselves on along the way. It’s about and that’s so true. Like, we have to enjoy the journey because ultimately like that, that is what we have, we have the journey. We don’t you know, when you when you get back, right, but people spend so much time focusing on like, when I get to the top one day, you know, for me, you know, the joke is like, if you climb Mount Everest, how long do you actually stay at the top, you know, five minutes, 10 minutes, 30 minutes, and then you have to go and run like.

Tom Poland 12:23
I mean, like, I climbed Mount Cook, which at the time, it actually killed more climbers than Mount Everest. And it’s not nearly as big, but it’s it’s a very dangerous mountain. And I can tell you as little time as possible at the top, because it’s just sheer ice and cook. It’s about a 45 degree angle, and there’s a over a one mile drop to the rocks below. So you don’t stay on that long. Then it is it’s all about the journey. But it’s I mean, there’s a series of I guess, train stops along the way, you get the milestones, if you like achievements, which we can pause and celebrate. But our minds are such that if we wanting to squeeze the, you know, the last drop of lemon out of you know, juice out of the lemon, then we’re going to find another mountaintop. Right? It keeps us alive and vital is the next big thing. So I don’t think it’s a matter of therefore of going well, there’s no destination. So you know, why bother? It’s it’s a matter of understanding that the journey is the destination.

Heather Pearce Campbell 13:25
That’s right. That’s right. No, and I love that. And I think, you know, these types of conversations are so important right now, because part of my goal, even around creating this podcast is helping remind people that the, and I see the journey of business, or the journey of entrepreneurship much probably in the way that you might if I were to guess, based on our conversation, which is that it is one in the same with your personal development journey. I mean, those journeys are intertwined. And for most entrepreneurs that I serve, you don’t really get to separate out, you know, your personal development or your personal life from the success of your business or your endeavors in business. And so, you know, my, my, one of my big goals for this podcast is to remind people that the, the journey of business and the journey of entrepreneurship is a marathon, not a sprint, it is about the journey. It is about, you know, certainly reaching new milestones and being able to celebrate those but also having people share stories, about their journeys about what it was like along the way, not only in the dark places, the valleys, the hard spots, but you know what, they really learned to move through those and to really bring themselves and their businesses to the next level. So I know you’ve got lots of experience in the world of, you know, trying things, testing things. I mean, even your comment about it was through repeated disappointment and nothing really working that you created what you are doing now. So talk to us about some of what you have learned along the way. What are some of the most powerful strategies that you would like to share that people often get wrong?

Tom Poland 15:06
For personal development or business development?

Heather Pearce Campbell 15:09
Business Development.

Tom Poland 15:11
Okay. Well, I think first of all, in unavoidable, I’ve already touched on it. But the most important thing to understand is that if you don’t have a predictable flow of high quality leads coming in, and you don’t have any security or certainty around your financial future, because as an entrepreneur, you wake up, we all wake up every Monday morning, effectively unemployed, and, is essentially those new client inquiries that are coming in.

Heather Pearce Campbell 15:39
I love that, I haven’t heard that for quite that way before Tom.

Tom Poland 15:43
So, so that you think I caught you know, the first domino the first domino is, is what is the thing that you need to do to generate an inquiry? We need that first thing to be systemized and we need it to be produce predictable results. What so if people if people would agree that they need to devote some care and attention and time to the development of the lead generation system? As opposed to random acts of marketing. Then we started looking at Well, what’s the best way of doing that, and if you look at most people have will go to my go to networking meetings, they might get a business conferences, and kind of, you know, hope to get lucky, quote, unquote, business wise, I mean, meet someone who has an interest hand out business cards, and when you’re marketing services or advice, effectively, what you’re doing, it’s far more like you’re proposing marriage than it is selling a washing machine.

Heather Pearce Campbell 16:40
That’s right.

Tom Poland 16:41
Because we’re actually suggesting someone enters into a relationship with us. Not one that you know, ends at the altar and dead. But still, it’s a commercial relationship. So if we were to want to, you know, if I wanted to marry someone, or I wanted them to marry me, then I would probably not ask them straight off the bat, which is the equivalent of going to business networking at a conference and putting my business card and everyone’s hands going, you know, Pick me Pick me Pick me. It’s, it generates an aversion or at best, it’s.

Heather Pearce Campbell 17:13
Yes, the number of ways this goes wrong, like one of my pet peeves on LinkedIn, I just have to mention this one of my pet peeves on LinkedIn is connecting with somebody and then suddenly being flooded with, here’s what I do, check out this page, this might you know, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, like, here’s all these links about me like, go check. And it’s, I just find it so funny. I’m like,

Tom Poland 17:35
That’s what I call. That’s what I call Hugh Jackman. Marketing.This comes from a show True story. So I’m in the kitchen having coffee with my Uber pretty German Frau. And I said to her, I still don’t know why I said there’s some sort of brain scenes. I said, hey, I’ve got a question for you. Who would you think is the world’s most irresistible man? And she goes quick as a wink. She goes, of course, you are Tom. Of course, all wrinkled and bald. Who couldn’t go for that right? Seriously. Anyway, we had a bit of fun around him, and eventually she goes, it’s like, a no islide object. Ah, it’s like her eyes are popping out of her head. She goes, Hugh Jackman. Yeah, it’s Hugh Jackman. And I’m thinking I’ve got this image of Hugh Jackman from werewolf with this torso, bear chest and six pack and teeth and claws. And this is his big sideboard and I’m thinking I said to a Hugh Jackman, I get that I mean, he can sing he can dance he can act he is is a hunk I love and I mean, he’s got a buddy of Donald’s would die for apparently he’s also philanthropist and environmentally friendly. All the things right. We have a winner. So then I had my second Brayden sees. I said okay, so Hugh Jackman. So let me ask you this. What if there was a knock on the front door right now? And you put your coffee down, you walk to the front door, you opened it and was Hugh Jackman. And he dropped to one knee and he held up this little red velvet box and he flipped it open and was a diamond ring sparkling in the sunshine. He said to me, You don’t know me, but would you make me the happiest man on earth? Would you run away with me and marry me and live with me for the rest of your life? I said to my wife, what would you say to Hugh Jackman, if you propose to like that? She puts a coffee down. She says, you know, you told me you know I love you. Right? Yeah, and I think I know what you’re gonna say next. She says, lol I’m sorry. I’d run away with him. It’s cute, frickin Jackman. And so I’m like wiping a tear out of the corner of my eye. And I’m thinking about this. Well, that was a stupid question to ask. And I said do it. You know? I don’t think you need to apologize. She said Why is that? I said well, if there was a knock at the front door right now and I went there and I opened it and Hugh Jackman proposed to me I think I’d run away as well and I’m not even gay. But you frickin Jackman you know. And, you know, I could maybe you know, change teams or something. I didn’t Hugh Jackman. And anyhow, the reason I tell that story is that a lot of people when our business gets aldens got software as a service to trainers, whatever, the practicing Hugh Jackman marketing. It’s like, it’s not even a first date yet. And you’re saying, you know, here’s my business card or on LinkedIn going, would you like SEO Services today? We haven’t had a first date yet. It’s too soon. I don’t know, I don’t know you. And you’re really suggesting we get into relationship together because any long term commitment that a client is making to us as a provider of ideas or services or programs or software, whatever it is neat to first date. And that’s if we accept that lead generation, systemized, predictable lead generation is critical to the security and prosperity of any business. And the next step is to understand that we need to give people the opportunity that first date, and that’s why I run webinars, is because it’s like a one hour date with my perspective of the people I might propose to and I don’t propose them till the end of the webinar. And I use webinars because basically, I’m anti social. And, you know, I’ve done hundreds and hundreds of speaking gigs, you know, on stages around the world. And I kind of enjoy it, but I got over it. So I just want to sit here at home and our beautiful place on the sand next to the blue eyes, little Castaway beach and run webinars, which is what I do. So I regard webinars as being the most efficient combination of the most efficient and effective first date. Mm hmm. And Funny thing is, I mean, I’ve been writing up since 2008. And a lot of the colleagues that you and I know, have been saying for years. Now you’ve really got to run physical workshops and seminars, you know, and, and I’ll be going okay, and I’m still making some money doing webinars now. COVID-19. Guess what they’ve all decided, actually, the virtual idea is that works pretty well, too. And it does.

Heather Pearce Campbell 21:51
That’s right, you were way ahead of the curve on that one.

Tom Poland 21:54
Well, not because I was smart just because I was lazy, actually. But it worked out. Okay. Either way.

Heather Pearce Campbell 22:01
I know and I don’t believe that you’re antisocial. But I do hear you on the exhausting part of the in person. You know, running live workshops or teaching speaking, speaking speaking.

Tom Poland 22:12
Yeah, I can I can tell you I’m definitely anti social at our wedding and second marriage for my pretty German frown. I know how you have the groom side and the bride side. I had one person on the groom’s side she had like 100, on the bride side of my one lonely friend sitting at the front Pew going, where is everyone on my side? You’re at we had bushfires. Here we were overseas. And we had these wildfires that were coming close to our house. My wife I counted there she had 23 offers of accommodation. I had none. And you know what the sick part about this is I was really happy with that.

Heather Pearce Campbell 22:52
And that’s funny. I was I was about to say I bet you could have reached out to some of your webinar peeps, and they probably would have put you up over here in the States. Maybe, no, but I hear you and i think you know, learning webinars I mean, it’s on a lot of people’s lists right now. It’s a huge focus, whether you call it a webinar, or you call it something else. I mean, I hear a lot of hubbub about even using the word webinar. Yeah, tell me though, you know, digging into and for people who are listening who are thinking like okay, I really need to lean lean into this and do it right. How does it How does it go wrong? Talk to me about the webinar itself and what you’ve learned over the years.

Tom Poland 23:32
Yeah, yeah, there’s a lot to it and and i think you’re right webinars, we’ve got a bad rap and but for good reason is because everyone’s offering free training webinars. And it turns out at some frickin sales ambush, where there’s countdown timers, and scarcity and bonuses and bullshit like that. Which works in a market which is young, gullible, naive or desperate. But it’s not, it’s not good karma. For the presenters, I have to think. So other than if we take all the hype and the BS and the the, you know, the bait and switch, which is the free free training, but it turns out to be So take all that out, because that most of us would agree that’s not something we want to emulate, right? So let’s assume that someone wants to give real value and give some actionable ideas during the webinar. Let’s let’s take that as a starting point. Two mistakes that are the most common ones for several actually but and I’ve just released a book on this by the way called marketing with webinars and it came out literally a week ago. So some marketing was webinars.

Heather Pearce Campbell 24:35
And, okay, and for people listening all share that link to your book, Tom in the show notes. And so for folks listening, be sure to go check out legal website warrior.com forward slash podcast specifically for this book, and there’ll be other things.

Tom Poland 24:49
Perfect. Thanks, Heather. Yeah, so in the book, I go through a bunch of mistakes, but here’s some of the highlights. Death by PowerPoint. All people are saying is a PowerPoint in this bullet. point and this bullet point and this bullet point, and then there’s an image and there’s so there’s no, there’s no real captivation. And people talk about interaction, interaction is a subset of captivation. Engagement is the subject of captivation. And if it’s, if it’s not captivating, it’s not marketing. It’s not captivating marketing. That’s the standard for webinars, it’s got to be captivate. It’s got to be interesting. There needs to be there does need to be interaction, there used to be questions need to be answers. And if someone’s not talking, they’re not engaged. Right? when they when they when they’re able to share their thoughts, they become engaged and become invested in the process. So despite PowerPoints a big one, another really big one is a failure to realize that the enemy of motivation is complication. Hmm. Do people newbies to present presentations with webinars or offline online, make the mistake of thinking they have to dazzle people with how much they know. And what happens when you present something, a solution that’s actually complicated. And most of us, if we’re doing what we’re doing for any number of years become specialists. And there are a lot of software’s, and there are a lot of nuances. But it’s this confusion between marketing and value delivery between the presentation and the actual client work the two complete different things. When we have a client, we’ve got an extended period of time, we can take them to a series of steps, a complicated process can be broken down into a series of steps. So there’s easier and simpler for someone to implement, we can present that on a webinar marketing webinar, because it’s too complicated. So the enemy of motivation is complication, when we present, the solution, which should be after about half an hour to the webinar is not in five minutes into the webinar, right? When we present the solution, we got to present in such a way that people, it’s only three parts, that’s my golden rule, only three parts if you have when you present how you work with your clients. Three is the magic number. If you do four, you start to lose people, if you do two, out of three is the magic number, the three parts model, you need an audience, for your webinars, you need an asset, which is your PowerPoint presentation, or your prezi or whatever it is, and you’re the call to action. So audience acid action three part model is a lot more to it. Of course, there’s 51 steps, but a present 51 step. So that’s one of the big mistakes is death by PowerPoint, a failure to captivate and complication.

Heather Pearce Campbell 27:26
Yes. Now, those are huge. And I think anybody listening who has been through any number of webinars or presentations, period, I mean, you know what death by PowerPoint feels like? You know what complication feels like when you’re on the receiving end of it. And it’s, you know, people check out they don’t engage. They don’t Yeah, absolutely. So what are the ways Talk to us a little bit about the work that you do and how you lead clients through this process? Is it strictly through webinars? What are what’s the range of your services,

Tom Poland 27:59
Pretty much just marketing and webinars, that’s, that’s what I do. That’s my specialty. So if something was better, if something was more efficient, and more effective, then I’d be doing that because I love marketing. It’s, it’s not my first love. It’s my second love. My first love is personal development and high levels of consciousness and life purpose and all that stuff. But I do love web marketing, because I’m just intrigued and fascinated with the psychology behind it. I love technical stuff. And I love gadgets and devices. So webinars really suits me and I am an introvert. You know, my wife is the social person. And I find a lot of my clients, like the idea of being able to generate new client inquiries right around the world while they still sit at home. Yes, that’s and i and i, the global reach is another thing because when not only do we reach, you know, have clients in in England, Ireland, Scotland, Germany, Spain, Portugal, Italy, Canada, the USA, South Africa, Hong Kong, China, Australia, New Zealand, I love the diversity of that when we have our support calls every week, we have like half the United Nations is on the call. And there’s a lot of the cross pollination is from cultural styles and Lebanon, kind of Lebanon. So Dubai, and so on. So you get all these people on a call, and they’re all contributing to each other and helping each other and I love the diversity of that the richness of that. So yes, now I forgotten your question.

Heather Pearce Campbell 29:24
No, that’s good. Well, yeah, I was asking how how you work with people, right, if it’s through this webinar training webinar process, and I, I know you have a ton of content out there and we’ll be sharing some gifts with the audience. But there’s two things I want to follow up on because I also love that personal development is your first love. It’s really funny because if you could see in this office, I’m literally surrounded by stacks of books. I’ve got huge bookshelf over here and over here, you know, overflowing and books everywhere and I’m a paper book reader. I do not love being on digital devices. But my husband is always teasing me like, why don’t you read something fun? And I right, and all I read is personal development and business. That’s it. It’s all I ever wanted to read right my entire life. And so I’m like, this is fun, right? Every time he sees me pick up a book, why don’t you read something fun? And I think in his mind, fun is sci fi or fantasy or something, you know, scrape a book?

Tom Poland 30:28
Recreation reading.

Heather Pearce Campbell 30:29
Totally. I like doesn’t matter. Give me a business book. Give me a personal develop book I’m in. So I love that your first love is personal development. How? Talk to me a little bit about that path. How did you get started down the personal development path.

Tom Poland 30:45
It started when I was 16 years old and drunk.

Heather Pearce Campbell 30:50
Well, that’s a good start.

Tom Poland 30:53
We’re getting close to 50 years ago,I left home that at a young age, and I was still going to put myself through through through high school as a 16 year old, but I wasn’t living at home anymore. My parents had divorced. And it was you know, it was it was difficult for them and so on. And for me, it was the dose of freedom. I just, I mean, I felt I was sad, my parents were breaking up I cried about them. But to me, it was like I had I bought myself a little motorbike and I freedom so amazing. And, but I very quickly saw patterns of alcoholism repeating you know that I could see my forefathers if you like, and as a 16 year old, sowing, some wild oats and being too free I suppose. I was I got scared, I still remember was it was an autumn night and I was literally lying on the back lawn of this mixed student flat that I was living in. And I was alone, I was just staring at the night sky. And I just really felt very upset and kind of scared and alone and afraid because I could see these patterns that are 16 you’re starting to repeat. So I decided that I would study you know, and friends doing starting to do law degrees or medical degrees or whatever. And I decided I would study success is it occurred to me that that was the most important subject, success, you know, so so it’s been a it’s been, it really has almost been literally a lifelong journey. And through Christian traditions, through Eastern mysticism, different spiritual paths. My first book I wrote on was called, it’s called your extraordinary life, it’s now in the third edition. And I put together on the basis of that, you know, that was that was a moderately successful book. Introduced the concept of life purpose to people of goal setting of what happiness really is. And it’s a surprise, there’s a lot of people to when they when they understand my my proposition around happiness, fulfillment, how to set goals, how to clear dysfunctional emotions from the mind. So your external life that was that sort of the summation of half a lifetime of learning. And just recently, we created a companion course for that. So people who go through step by step and actually implement the book into their life. So that’s life, planning course calm, it’s completely free, people can go there and figure out the life purpose, figure out how to be happy, set goals.

Heather Pearce Campbell 33:22
I love that that’s amazing. I, it’s, it’s interesting, again, relating back to your story. And what happened out of that period of it sounds like some tough times in your family, you know, personally, still being a kid, I always find it interesting. And I even look at my own family, my mom died young, my siblings were a second oldest at the time. But you know, my youngest siblings were 13 and 14, they still had high school years ahead of them. And, you know, it’s a very different type of loss for them, because they hadn’t been through some of those formative years. And right now, I even look at what’s happening now, in our family and in life generally. And I just find it so fascinating that some people will go through something very, very hard and like you did look for the way out, look for the opportunity look for you know, kind of the meaning and what that means for them in the next phase, versus people who just stay in the very dark places and stay, you know, making choices that really end up just making life harder.

Tom Poland 34:30
I think, you know, some people are not aware that there’s a choice by reasonable programming, whether it’s parental programming, television programming, God knows what but but that is really the point of power when people become aware that they do have a choice that they, yes, this thing has happened and how much they contributed to it. We could debate that but this thing has happened. Now what am I going to do? Some people are conditioned and programmed that they don’t have a choice that it sucks and they just got to wear it. And other people somehow become aware that there’s a choice that they could make an effort and recreate. It might be a long path, there might be low steps involved. But yes, I’m going to start that and have some faith and some confidence that there’s that I can change this. So that’s that, to me is the point of power is that awareness. So little things like the practice of mindfulness, maybe in the shower or brushing my teeth and becoming aware of the sensations. A morning exercise I’ve run for many years is my morning exercise. What am I seeing? What am I hearing? What am I smelling? What am I touching? What am I tasting, then that creates a level of consciousness awareness so we can practice becoming aware, we can practice and that that awareness then gives us, as I said, the opportunity to make a choice. What am I going to do about this?

Heather Pearce Campbell 35:44
No, and it’s interesting I, because I think that for anybody listening, I mean, I know, in my own life, I have definitely seen when somebody is what I call, like remaining a victim, they see themselves as a victim, they repeat, but I’ve never thought about that from the perspective of maybe they actually don’t perceive that they have a choice. Right? Right. I hadn’t thought about it in that framework, that it’s actually like, they’re not even that, you know, foot in the door, thinking that they have a choice at all. Instead, I’ve always seen it as like, they’re just choosing to remain a victim.

Tom Poland 36:20
But, yeah, that’s right. But many times they’re not the, my attitude towards this change. When I did, I did volunteer prison work, I got to prison and teach things like self esteem, personal responsibility, which is interesting, when you’ve got a group of inmates who all swear to God, they didn’t do it. So personal responsibility, being the key to change, you know, if I if I’m responsible, I am able to respond. That’s right. Because if I’m reactive, I just continue to react and experience the same thing. So all that sort of good stuff, which which was absolutely loved. And it was, it was a revelation to many of them. And I did something that I wasn’t aware I wasn’t allowed to do. I actually interviewed every student from that was going to be in my class before the class. And obviously, the prison authorities knew I was interviewing them. But I asked them questions that I didn’t realize till later, I wasn’t meant to last of like, what are you in here for? How long was your sense, but I also ask them things like, tell me about your family, which got some interesting reactions, and 90% of them, were one of the last children and a long line of children that were unwanted by their parents. There might have been 12, or 14 or 16 out of 16 kids and they were passed off from grandparents to Uncles, aunts, to foster parents, their role models were often people that had never worked for money that had gone from generation to generation on welfare. I mean, tragically difficult circumstances, illness, sicknesses disease, the people that have quote, unquote, made it in the circles were dealing drugs or whatever ring and etc. And I walked out of those interviews, though, this is over a series of couple of weeks, stunned at my own ignorance, and my own arrogance, about how I thought we all had the same choice, right? Some people don’t have the advantages that that I had when I was growing up. So how dare I look down my nose at them and say, You, victim, you Why didn’t you step up? You know? Yeah. Like, they weren’t brought up with that programming.

Heather Pearce Campbell 38:25
Right? Right no, and I think that’s a, that’s a powerful shift to make is, I think we can all recognize when we have different levels of privilege, but you forget to apply that to the mind, right? different levels of privilege around mindset, or resilience, or grit or any of the other things that you know, we have opportunities to develop in life. And it’s I think that’s Yeah, it’s a really, really powerful example of that.

Tom Poland 38:54
Always remember the programming of thinking and we we set a goal setting exercise and used to run workshops and out of prison also in person that I mentioned, okay, we’re gonna have a breakout group. And they all stopped, they all looked at each other. I want to put the hand up and said, when you say breakout group, do you mean one? We think you mean? No, no, no, no, no, no, no, I mean, just smaller groups. Anyway, so it was to create a goal and then they’d set a goal and then come back and share their goal and one of them is how they were thinking, one of the guys was in that was in there said, I’ve got a goal. I’ve got a goal. I want to have the biggest marijuana crop in my state. Now, at the time, marijuana was very illegal, certainly growing and commercially. And here he was in prison sending a golf announcer to get back into prison. Okay, let’s go back again to values revisit this. But that was the thinking this was the way you were successful is you have you can’t make mainstream. Because you didn’t have the education, you didn’t have the opportunities didn’t have the connections. So you really to get to get loved and to get money and to get family and to get a wife, you had to do something illegal, right? Interesting.

Heather Pearce Campbell 40:15
It is very, very interesting. I mean, there’s so much in that conversation we can unpack. I’m still wondering, What is your definition of success, both success and happiness?

Tom Poland 40:30
Well, okay, so first of all, let’s go with success. I mentioned before health relationships and money that helps being physical, mental, spiritual, emotional, etc. relationships, being a friend or family, our loved ones, the wider community, the world, really, relationships, and the financial side being business or career money, personal legacy, financial insight. So my definition of success is anyone who’s making progress in all three areas simultaneously. Definition so by that definition, I could think of a certain person who’s in charge of a very large company, country politically, who has lots of real estate developments to me not successful because that that person is not making progress in certain areas of well being clearly.

Heather Pearce Campbell 41:13
Right?

Tom Poland 41:14
Oh, you get the Olympic athlete who, and it’s an extraordinary achievement to win a gold medal. But if the riddle The body was steroids, and Odetta 38, that is not a definite success. So and by the same definitions, one of these prisoners that I was talking about that’s working on their physical and mental health, that’s trying to be kinder to other people, or fellow inmates around them. And that’s perhaps saving, you know, $1 out of the $2 a week, they get paid, that person is successful.

Heather Pearce Campbell 41:40
Uh, that is, so I mean, I love your perspective on that, even as I relate that to my own life. So there’s a program in the states actually has taken it worldwide. Now. It’s run by a man called Howard Glasser named Howard Glasser, and it’s the children’s success Foundation, you can find them online, but he has a program called the nurtured heart program for children, and most of these kids usually are at risk, or, you know, they’ve got some, I mean, generally, diagnosis or something that would be considered as the disability that, you know, interrupts their ability to engage in social manner to be in school and be, you know, a productive happy child or at home. And I’m so in love with his program, because, and I have a child with special needs, and which is how I got introduced to the program. But the the correlation in your definition, and as I like related, even to our children in the world who are struggling, is that we have the opportunity and the shift in mindset, even as adults observing other adults and trying to, you know, measure success or really see, you know, what’s working and what is not is, I think we all have massive opportunity to look at that differently. And just like our children who are struggling, you know, any moment that certain children are not hitting other kids or not swearing or not doing something that is considered, you know, not a pro social behavior is actually a win, like the absence. But that’s right, that’s success. And, and so Howard Glasser, his entire program is really around, rewiring the brain of the parent and rewiring the brain of the support staff in like, let’s say, a juvenile detention center, around actually seeing these kids is successful in every moment that, you know, the absence of a negative behavior is there and acknowledging them for that success and showing them the ways that they are already successful. So that’s what I mean, I’ve just I saw that in even just the way that you described how those inmates are being successful. And I think it’s so powerful.

Tom Poland 43:51
Yeah, we all any of us can do something, what we’ve got, and now the base level that we start from, certainly is relevant to us. But in regards to success and making progress, it’s completely irrelevant. It is what it is. So whatever money we have whatever lack of small gram of patients, I might have somewhere one of the vestige of human kindness or compassion, I might add, can I grow that? It’s like, you know, the concept of PB personal best? No, can I be a little better than I was yesterday? Because if I can do that, and I can do that in the areas of health and relationships and financially, regardless of how small that step might be, of how insignificant that drop, a progress might appear. It’s success, because I’m moving forward, right? You asked about happiness. Happiness is what happens when you take the garbage out. It’s what’s left. It’s what was there originally. It’s our it’s our state of emptiness. If you want to be more specific, it’s it’s a state of mind, which is devoid of emotion. And I’m not saying emotion should be avoided. And I’m not saying saying it’s good, or I’m saying it’s bad, I’m just saying that happiness, happiness is like the color white, you white, why does the result of not being any color, right happiness is the result of the not being an emotion. Black, which we use as a, as the color representing depression is a combination of all colors. So it’s not a bad analogy, if you like for the state of happiness is what happens when you take the garbage out happiness is what happiness is what you experience and the slice of time where you’re devoid you’re empty of emotion. And emotion should not be avoided motion should not be suppressed. And chapter 49 of the book, your extraordinary life, I go into how to how to dissolve dysfunctional emotions so that you, you can assume it’s a practice. It’s like a golf practice or a piano practice or a language practice, we get better at happiness by practicing it, that we need the right technique to practice otherwise, we don’t improve.

Heather Pearce Campbell 45:57
Right. Absolutely. And you said you you have a section on how to dissolve dysfunctional emotion. Talk to me just for a minute about what that means.

Tom Poland 46:06
It’s good. It’s called the four forces model. It’s awareness, acceptance, affirmation and action. So I mentioned before that the point of power is when become aware of something, right, so when we, you know, someone pulls in front of us and the freeway or something. At some point, we become aware that we’re angry, right. And it might be two days later, and you think, oh, man, I really lost my rag, you know, in the car, that might be a minute later. But at some point, become aware that we had this emotional reaction. That’s the point of power. And that’s when we can be we have to we can say, oh, okay, my old friend anger. So we’re accepting of the emotion. And that’s whatever we resist, we make stronger, if you want to make your bicep stronger, you do resistance training with weights, we resist something get stronger. If we beat ourselves up and get home and I’m a bad person, I got angry, I wish I wasn’t out I don’t want to feel anger, do we actually make that response stronger than next time. So we can dissolve. I call it dysfunctional motion. Because I don’t want to say motion is good or bad is just not functional relative to what we want to achieve. We want to achieve happiness. And we’re getting angry, that’s a dysfunctional, it’s not functioning relative to our goal of happiness. So awareness. And then acceptance is where we can sit down. And we can breathe deeply because that releases more chemicals in the brain, which is why we’re feeling the emotion this camera is nothing more than chemicals in the brain. And we sit down and we state the facts around what just happened and we and we add to the end of it and that’s okay, so someone just put in front of me and by the way, and that’s okay. And we neutralize the thought that this was a bad thing. But not by saying it’s a good thing or a bad thing but that it’s okay. And there’s there’s more chapter 49 but it’s a it’s a step by step process which you can very easily and simply dissolve dysfunctional emotion into the nothingness that it always was.

Heather Pearce Campbell 48:04
Oh, I love that. Oh my goodness. Well, I I’m gonna include your free course. First of all, I love that it’s free and that it’s a resource out there living in the world, the life planning course.

Tom Poland 48:17
Like the better place.

Heather Pearce Campbell 48:18
Yeah, no, I love that so much. So I’m going to include that link in our show notes. What else before we sign off? What else would you like folks? And I mean, we’ve covered a lot in this conversation. You know from the business perspective, everybody needs what you’ve got especially right now you know the the opportunity to learn about how to create consistent leads how to do webinars the right way there’s so many ways that they’re done wrong. I will be one of your next students in that regard. But what else would you like people to know about you about how to connect with you anything else before we sign off?

Tom Poland 48:59
Well, I do try to get respond to everyone’s emails. So email addresses Tom at Leeds ology dot guru, and not guru ads and my god is a master but more just authenticity. g you are you. And on that note, my encouragement of people would be to listen to their first thought. And I have a problem and have a challenge when they have a question. Listen carefully to your first thought your first inclination what you first, what comes up first? Because that will always be the answer. That will always be the step that you should take forward. When the doubts come in czar the ones you don’t listen to. So listen to your first thought, because that’s that’s your intuition speaking, before you start feeling the emotions associated with this problem will challenge listen to your first thought, because that’s the key to moving forward.

Heather Pearce Campbell 49:53
Oh, I love that so much. I mean, the power of that before we start running everything through our filter right? Really digesting it and usually the wrong way.

Tom Poland 50:04
Putting it on a spreadsheet and yeah.

Heather Pearce Campbell 50:08
Oh, I love that. I think that’s a great piece of advice. Well, Tom, I’m so grateful. I’m just personally grateful that we have the chance to connect today and I’m super excited to share everything that you have spoken about today with our listeners. I hope everybody will pop in. Definitely check out the resources all include Tom’s contact information, Tom, I hope I hope I get to have you back again. I look forward to Heather I’ve really appreciated the opportunity to, to you know, get out from my little world and my little ivory tower and share some ideas. I love it. Well, I just wish I had a little bit of your beat as I sit here in my gray office in a basement in Seattle.

Tom Poland 50:51
Looks like you made a pretty cozy.

Heather Pearce Campbell 50:53
It is cozy I had to give up because of COVID I had to give up our plays phase upstairs so that you know my two wild little Munchkins actually have some place to run around and it’s got some shine even on the lockdown with two little kids. That’s right, I get to uplevel all my skills at the same time, Tom so that’s what I’m working towards. Alright, so good to know you.

Tom Poland 51:22
Thanks Heather.

Heather Pearce Campbell 51:23
Yep. Thanks for being here.

Tom Poland 51:25
Bye everyone. Cheers.

GGGB Intro 51:30
Thank you for joining us today on the guts, grit and great business podcast. We hope that we’ve added a little fuel to your tank, some coffee to your cup and pep in your step to keep you moving forward in your own great adventures. four key takeaways links to any resources mentioned in today’s show and more. See the show notes which can be found at legal website warrior.com slash podcast, be sure to subscribe to the podcast and if you enjoyed today’s conversation, please give us some stars and a review on Apple podcast Spotify or wherever you get your podcast so others will find us to keep up the great work you are doing in the world and we’ll see you next week.