How Adam Stott Built a Multi-Million Pound Business | Sales, Social Media & Scaling Success

0:01It's just about being confident in yourself, going out and doing what you want to do and being who you are.

0:11Adam Stott:Welcome to Brave Bold Brilliant. I'm here today with Adam Stott. Nice to see you, Adam. Yeah, brilliant to see you too. I can't wait. Oh, fantastic. I'm feeling brave, I'm feeling brilliant and bold. That's what we want. That's what we want. Now, listen, I mean, when we were, I was looking at what you've done in life, and it's pretty impressive from where you started from, Adams, because you are multiple business owner, entrepreneur, public speaker. You've had over 100 ,000 people attend your events. You help businesses of all sectors, sizes, scale up. So we're going to have a lot to talk about, and of course, fellow podcaster.

0:52Yeah, absolutely.

0:54Adam Stott:So there's a huge amount. But let's start at the beginning, because you grew up in very, well, just a normal, humble beginnings in Essex. You're an Essex boy and I'm a Mancunian girl. So, you know, this is an interesting combination we've got going on here. But yeah, where did life start for you? Yeah, I think pretty, pretty normal. As you said, just as a young guy growing up in Essex, depending on how far back we go. So I started kind of getting interested in business and success probably. A lot of people talk about being 10 years old. I mean, I did a paper round at whatever it was and stuff, and they talk about it very early.

1:34But I actually think I got interested in business and success probably in my teenage years after I'd kind of left school. And, you know, I did very badly at school. I didn't succeed there. You know, I was too hyperactive, I think, for my classrooms. I wasn't very good at all that kind of stuff. I worked a lot of menial jobs and I wasn't really finding my way in life. I was a bit lost, actually, in my early teenage years. I kind of had a bit of desire to be more and to do more, to accomplish more, but I had no idea how I was going to do it. And for that reason, I kind of felt a little bit lost.

2:08When I was about 19, I found sales and that was the first thing that I was ever any good at. When I started doing it, I felt like it just fitted. I don't know if you've ever been in that situation or anyone that's listening has. I was just in that situation where I found my thing and I was able to do it and I did it well. And I think that built a lot of my belief and that built a lot of my confidence. And from there, I was able to use that skill set to start opening doors for me, really. And I started to realize that I could achieve more because of that skill set. And that kind of was like the beginning phase of me learning sales, you know.

2:44Adam Stott:And actually, sales is an interesting area because a lot of people just absolutely freeze. they you know they don't like asking for asking for the fee or closing the deal and you know can kind of feel slightly awkward um about selling you know and i think the more the more you progress with your career you realize that selling is serving and if you believe in what you're you are putting forward to someone actually you're providing them an opportunity um but did you think of it in that way when you first started or was it just like you know i just gotta like get out there and do as many pictures i think all the things that i'd been criticized for growing up being too talkative being too hyperactive you know being the loudest person in the room in the classroom or you know all of those kind of things i found that when i found sales that you would get rewarded for those things so it was always like the opposite actually going out there talking to people building relationships and i think as well and it's interesting quite an interesting thing when they talk about adhd i don't know if i've got adhd or not i probably have i've not been diagnosed and talking about any of that but i think that there's a the guy that i met and he started talking about adhd saying that if somebody when they're a child is often very ignored and that their eyes rolled constantly at them or if they're not able to get on in school very well they don't concentrate they said that you know someone that goes through that experience tends to be able to pick up quite a lot of social cues and starts to be able to read people in a better way because they're so used to annoying people as a kid that they can they can read situations better and I felt that I definitely had a good instinct for being able to read people's communication and and it fitted and I just found my thing and and from there that that kind of allowed me to to go and find something I was good at and that defined the early stages of my career I had multiple different sales jobs and I started to succeed them so prior to that I'd not really done anything been successful or anything and then I started making money and and then what it really did is it opened my eyes to opportunity and I think for every there's obviously be lots of different people listening at lots of different stages in their life but I really do feel that my life started to turn around when I found something I was good at so I always say to people like look internally what are you good at what do you enjoy what do you notice about yourself what lights you up sales lit me up that was what I enjoyed doing and then I went and did multiple roles so the first role I had was in a company called powerhouse selling tvs and washing machines and all that and I started to get quite successful there and I met a friend that was selling cars and he was doing really well he's earning double what I was earning so I was like well I better go and sell cars so I went off to Ford and I worked there for a number of years, learned a lot of disciplines.

5:34And from there, I went to BMW because I saw that they were selling more expensive cars. So I just followed this sales route up until with a few different iterations along the way, up until I was about 25. And I've been successful enough to earn good money, you know, be able to buy my own home and my own place. And for me, I just had a yearning to to go and build a business and and that was like it was just it was everything to me I was like it's difficult to explain but it's like a calling and I don't know if yourself you've had that or for anyone listening you've just got a calling like this is what you're meant to go and do and you know it's almost became like an obsession I want to go and start my own business but if we know how to do that I had no skills I didn't understand starting businesses I didn't understand how I was going to do it and because of that I found it difficult but I knew I had to do something and around age 25 I kind of started my first business around that age and that became a bit of a you know the first kind of like journey of going from you know having nothing, not doing very well in school, you know not growing up with any wealth to actually becoming moderately successful in my career to then be able to go and you know start building a business right that was

6:49Adam Stott:my first first phase yeah and i think as you're talking what i think is interesting is very often people jump to the how too quickly you know and they don't stay in that dream state of oh what if you know what if i started a business what if i was successful you know i think people often close down ideas too early because they start thinking they start worrying about the how they're gonna do it yeah too early and therefore that can sometimes like you know put people off actually starting whereas for you it sounds like you just had this calling you had sort of a i don't know a feeling in your gut that this was the right thing to do didn't worry about the how too much at that point just got going i think i had a lot of ideas right and i had all these different ideas and i didn't know what was going to work and i really didn't know what was going to work i remember i remember i had a big list of different ideas about how i was going to make money and how i was going to do something i didn't really know what to do but i had all these ideas I had all these things I wanted to do.

7:46And for me, that was quite a frustrating period. And I think they're probably, obviously, as you said, we've had over 100 ,000 business owners attend our events. I've trained many, many, many people to start, like many, many thousands of businesses now. And I notice the frustrations in people because I think they've had that same calling to do more. And it's not someone whispering to you, you should go and do this. Do you understand what I mean? but I call it it's just a feeling yeah that actually I think I want to do this I want to sort of take control of my own future and I meet people like every week and then when I meet those people you can see the frustration in them because there's usually things that are holding them back and that could be that fear is holding them back maybe they're afraid maybe like you said the what ifs maybe it's the well what if I do it and it doesn't work and what if this happens and people get very in their head and I think you've got to have a stronger reason to do it because you're going to have a thousand reasons not to do it but you just got to have that strong reason and I think my conditions at the time I was 25 I bought my own house I actually sold my house to fund my first business so I really I moved back in my mum I had 50 grand I put that in the bank a bit of extra money from what I'd earned in my career and I said right I'm gonna go and build a business and I'm gonna give and by the way I'm not saying this is the right way to do it I'm just saying this is what I did I'll talk a little bit more about the right way to do it later but and I went and started the business and I didn't really know what I was doing I was like I'm gonna be a business owner I'm gonna sell what I got I'm gonna take my money and I'm gonna go and make something work and and that probably looking back was not the right way to do it but that's what got me going and that's what got the wheels in motion for the first business I did find the first year really hard like I found it really tough I found it super frustrating I had lots of moments of doubt I had lots of moments like what have I done I had frustrations I had lots of ups and downs I often felt like I'd made a mistake I would often say to myself I made a mistake and I wasn't really seeing any fruits of my labour or any results so I found that first year really difficult but I persevered I was resilient and I think again that comes back to I kind of had to make it work and I wasn't going to give up you know like it was one of those um and that that was

10:10Adam Stott:kind of like the starting point you know what's your mum's name Diane Diane what did Diane say when you moved back in with her you had your 50 grand you popped it in the bank and you said mum i'm going to start a business what did diane say well mom's great actually um you know my mom's great and she funnily enough growing up um when my mom and dad my mom and dad split up when they were about 10 and when they split up we had um two transport cafes my dad had an underpinning business and my dad had been pretty successful we lost everything in a really hard recession and we bounced back later but he lost everything and and then what happened is my mom got given a transport cap as the only thing left in the divorce pretty much it was so underwater on the mortgage the bank didn't want it right so it was like the the the thing and my mum basically took that cafe and she used it as a we moved in three boys moved into this cafe and my mum basically worked from you know got up every day at 4am and worked till 4pm every day to go whilst raising three kids to go and drive that business worked her absolute socks off she ended up selling it for a significant amount of money about 15 years later so my mum worked hard understood business and to be fair my mum's always been there um for she's always been there for us um well certainly for me and i think my brothers will say the same and i think that when i said i want to go and start a business she was she was all for it you know she's like that's great that's great i think the only thing i'd say about it is is that my mom and my dad have both been really supportive of of what i do and everything i want to do but their their advice or their guidance was always just work hard like they didn't really understand some some of the strategies and and the things that you learn as you build bigger businesses but what they did have is an incredible work ethic and I think that really rubbed off on me that work ethic um from what I'd seen so yeah I think I obviously frustrated my mum at times you know I think and I paid her rent don't get me wrong she wanted a pound of flesh she weren't doing it for free she saw an income opportunity right so I was paying her a bit of rent um and I think uh yeah it's difficult isn't it because when you ask that it really does take me back um to when i was in that spare bedroom and i and she was doing i think it was fine really it was just i was getting on with it she was supportive and she kind of let me go and do my thing didn't get involved with yeah but the thing is when people look at you now today with you know the incredible success that you've had it's all self-made no one gave you anything here they don't always know what the journey has been right and they don't see the failures the sleepless nights the loneliness the fact that you know you grew up in quite an entrepreneurial family family situation where you saw your dad make it all lose it all bounce back again you saw your mum absolutely working her socks off because she had to survive yeah she had to bring she was bringing the three of you up people don't see that do they and i think you know there's a sense of you get rewarded in in public for what you do in private yeah 100 % um but that that grit and determination that you you've obviously got within you clearly clearly comes from yeah i definitely think i'll give a lot of a lot of credit to um to to my mom and dad for for what i've seen and seen them do and they've been great they're great parents you know i'm very very blessed and very lucky to have amazing parents and yeah and i learned a lot from them but you know for me even though i learned a lot from them when i first started that business you're right it was lonely i didn't really know what i was doing i didn't know what to do next very quickly i got stuck and the 50 000 pounds that i had plus a little bit of extra money that i'd had for my career just started to evaporate because it don't get you very far a few weeks a few months you know a few few little investments here and there trying a few different things and all of a sudden it starts to evaporate quite quickly and you're trying to stay on top of it very quickly the money just started to start to go and as the money was going i think this is something that's quite common with business owners is a lot of the time especially early business owners not necessarily um business owners that are more established but certainly earlier business owners is you your mood is quite linked to your bank account yeah quite early on so if you ain't making any money you've not got a lot of money you're stressed you're stretched you're panicked you make different decisions and you know you struggle in that way and I definitely was like that and I found it super tough I found the first year horrendous I think the I think the loneliness is you're always in your head in the early stages it's not like it's not like you're lonely because you might have some people around you might even start to get your employees around and stuff like that but the loneliness is the pressure when you're in your head on your own and that's when and for everyone that's listening you know when you go and start a business that's when you're kind of those moments where you're phasing out and you're you're looking fear in the face and you're saying how's this actually going to is this going to work out you know am I going to be humiliated here am I going to lose everything here those kind of thoughts start to run through through your head I definitely had that in the beginning what I did to bounce out of that is I did what I've been hesitant to do which was to reach out to people that were already doing what I wanted to do I had a few people I knew that were doing well and I was very much on the outside and I knew I had to build relationships I think that I had totally lacked relationships in the beginning I was trying to figure everything out myself that's why I had a horrendous year I wasn't around the right people didn't have anyone one really encouraging me.

16:23I was dealing with every problem myself. And then I started to look at, well, who's doing well? And I started to get myself in different rooms, go to different places, start to be around different types of conversations where people were doing well. And I started to build some relationships and get some clients. And thankfully, by doing that, things started to turn around. Now, momentum sort of travels in one or two ways, as I'm sure you know. When, i don't know if you've been in a situation when things are not going very well you feel like they're always not going to go well does that make sense absolutely and it's like this one bad thing happens so the next bad thing happens so the next bad thing happens and now you've just got terrible things happening and it's like oh like oh why is life so hard type thing now positive momentum is exactly the same is one good thing happens and that opens the door to another good thing that opens the door to another good thing and then you get this thing and all of a sudden now you're in a positive trajectory you're like this is amazing you know and and i think this happens with business owners all the time you say how are you like oh my god it's terrible you see them a week later they're like oh my god it's amazing you're like are you mad and for me i just needed to turn the momentum and for people that are listening right now if they're in a tough spot they're going for a difficult time you're probably a few conversations away from changing your trajectory you're probably a few conversations away from changing your momentum if you've been having a tough time doesn't mean it's going to stay that way you've just got to get yourself into some different environments do some different things and that's what i did i joined a club like one of the early turning points in that first business was i joined a club called the business lounge and this business lounge basically was full of business owners and we used to go out and we'd go out for dinners in nice places so we go to the gherkin the shard the o2 it's a lot of money to join it but i invested to get around people that were doing bigger and better things than me it had been recommended by a friend of mine that was doing well so i was like okay i'm gonna go and give this a go and i went and started to get in that environment it was just something about getting your suit like getting dressed up yeah going out to these nice places having nice conversations and probably the first three or four months didn't get much out of it like month five month six i started to get a couple of key contacts started to do some good deals um started to get some money back coming in and i was turning the tide and it helped me to establish actually what my business model was because when i started the business which is in 2008 it was a finance company and obviously it's probably not a

19:00Adam Stott:good idea to start a finance company in 2008 like by 2009 i realized that this wasn't a finance company it was an automotive business right really my experience was in cars that's what i knew i was trying to do finance for cars i was wasting my time i need to be in cars so i changed i pivoted and from there things started to change i got to a million pound in 2009 in revenue from there i got to 2.9 million then i got to 4.3 when i did 4.3 million i was starting to get some momentum and i was feeling good about where we were going and i worked i basically was like i got in my head i'm going to do this this is going to be amazing i'm going to crush it and i got really psyched up for the year and i spent the whole year i did 4.3 million revenue with probably about a couple hundred thousand in profit the next year i did 4.4 million in revenue so i went up by 100 grand and my profit went down to about 25 grand so i was like how does this work i couldn't have worked any harder yeah yeah and i just and it's all got worse and that was a weird kind of year for me but then i that was when i realized that there was a problem with the business model that wasn't quite working i needed to build the team in a different way and then we bounced back i've got some good good team i've got a great finance director come and join me at that point and we went up to 6.3 million and then from the next year you know we weren't profitable enough at 200 grand like do you know i mean but this 6.3 million we made a lot more money a lot more profit and we went to 13 million to 24 to 33 to 40 and the business just kept growing and i kept growing as a person as an individual throughout that journey and it was all very very fast and the reason we started to get that rapid trajectory in that first business was because i really started to invest and study social media, like really started spending a lot of money on training, on coaching, on mentoring, and trying to figure out how does social media work?

21:03Like, what do I need to do? And when I did that, it started to unlock a lot of doors, which gave me some rapid growth in that business. But what was really good is, you know, that was my first business, but you know, the business I run now is an eight-figure education business, which all the lessons from the first business I use now as well right you know so it's like been a good journey

21:27Adam Stott:but before we continue I want to speak directly to those of you who are listening and thinking I know I'm capable of more but I need structure I need some help because here's what I've actually learned after gosh more than three decades in business you know ambition without clarity creates frustration. And motivation without structure, it really does fade very, very fast. So that's exactly why we created Rise Academy. And Rise Academy, it's not theory. It isn't fluffy motivation, although you will be motivated. And it certainly isn't another online course that you never finish. It's actually a fully structured growth environment for ambitious entrepreneurs, leaders and founders who absolutely are ready to do all of these things, sharpen their strategy, elevate their leadership, increase revenue with intention and build businesses that actually support the life that they want.

22:33Adam Stott:And inside Rise Academy, we focus on the foundations most people skip, leading yourself, leading your teams and leading the business. It's about clarity, standards decision making commercial intelligence and execution because scaling it really isn't about doing more it's actually about doing the right things and doing the things right consistently so if you're serious about stepping up into your next level of your leadership your business life you know and not just consuming content but actually implementing it then rise Academy was absolutely built for you. So you can find all the details on our website, go to www.brave-bold-brilliant.com.

23:19And now, let's get back to the show.

23:25Adam Stott:Well, I think that's the key, right? Because there's so many people out there that are mentors, coaches, business advisors, and you know, there are some incredible, incredible people. And you know we're in a similar game but from a different angle but what I would say is you know you've got a lived experience I definitely have you know through the ups and downs as well exactly and you know so you can help other people not make the mistake you made you know so you actually fast-track people in a way that allows them to go further faster doesn't mean to say their business won't fail it may well do for a whole bunch of reasons and as we know starting a business is bloody hard you know 50 % have gone within the first three years and not not not survive but it's a lot easier to have someone in your corner that's been there and done it and and you know I know you said at the beginning when you started that first business you know I can't it can't fail it can't fail what was the driver then i.e your purpose when you first started and what's your purpose and driver now because you're at a very different stage of life definitely that with the first business i mean it's 2008 i was 25 years old um the irony is i did have that you know that first business made me um a multi-millionaire bought a property for 2.1 million pound and paid for that when i was before before i was 30 it created a lot of wealth got a great pension out of it very successful but actually i did close it and i didn't sell it so in some ways it did fail do you understand what i mean so you you've got to like but I still got a lot out of it I think the main thing I got out of that first business was well experience yeah to be a 25 year old kid and to come out at 33 um still you know created some wealth also learned some hard lessons that that was that was a huge amount of experience and it's been quite a few people that I'm able to help someone navigate tough situations i'm able to help someone navigate you know situations of rapid growth all of these different things building teams absolutely everything so it is lived experience and you know i've had like five or six businesses now in different sectors that i've been able to to take the principles that work and just install them you know when you say like the difference between that person then and the person now i think a lot of the first i think a lot of the first business i think was a lot of it was driven by ego actually i think that i i think i had a point to prove and and i think that your ego often is not your amigo and and you know when when you look back i probably i could have sold that business three times over right multiple times and made a lot of money but i didn't because i my ego is like hundreds of millions you know I don't, you know, like, so I think that that was the first one.

26:20I think where I'm at now is very different because I love what I do. And because I love what I do, and I sincerely and genuinely just love business. I love solving challenges and problems and building businesses. And because I've got so much experience now, because combined the businesses I've had, I've done 186 million pounds in revenue. I mean, for a UK-based business, it's quite a lot over the period of time since 2008 to 2026. And I think the difference now is I know where people go wrong. It's very obvious to me where people go wrong in building businesses. It's very, very obvious. And the reason it's very obvious is not because I'm a genius.

27:10It's because I made that mistake seven years ago.

27:13Adam Stott:Do you understand what I mean? you know or it might be i made that mistake a year ago yeah because you're always learning yeah and and that's why it's very obvious for me to be able to read through the lines and what i've been able to do well um or i feel pretty well is be able to see the patterns in in running a bit starting a business growing a business scaling a business like exiting a business been able to see the patterns much clearer now where i think in the beginning when i started the first business i didn't have any experience i was a wannabe and i had a lot of determination and drive and and i've got some good results from it but i didn't i didn't get everything right i've got a lot wrong actually does that make sense so i think now it's more i love the challenge i love the patterns i love building businesses i i like helping people not make mistakes that i've made you know like i think it's cool when you you can see someone got the back to like listen the funny thing is still you know it's hard to get through to a very ambitious driven entrepreneur that's young and get them to change course when they're very very determined but often it's exactly what they need right they need strong voices around them to guide them i think most people don't have a good coach most people don't have um a good mentor someone to guide them through those challenges and if they did they get results a lot faster and make a lot less mistakes so i like now being that mentor and that coach to other people yeah i mean it's a different stage of life i mean i'm a lot older than you but it definitely becomes much more about giving back um and yeah of course we you know we're business people we want to you know make financial financial success and reward for ourselves as well as the people that we serve but it definitely becomes much more around that than i think just following the money you know um which i think we're all guilty of when we're younger yeah i think that's that's actually when you say it like that i think the first like the first business i had was driven by money wealth what i don't have and all the lack yeah where now it's not it's now driven by the impact and the enjoyment and the passion for what I do, which actually is quite a different place.

29:32Adam Stott:Yeah. And also, you know, when you're younger, and I think probably I was in a similar position for you, you know, I think I always thought I had something to prove. Yeah. Not only to myself, but I, you know, I was more concerned about other people. What will other people say? What will other people say? Whereas now, it's not that I don't care, but I certainly care a lot less. You know what I mean? I think it's very helpful to care a lot less. Yeah, absolutely. and I think you know you're coming back to your point about mentoring and coaching um I think very often people they want to they want to hear what they want right yeah but they don't want to hear what they actually need yeah what they need to hear and that's that's the difference so if you've got an open mind and having a great mentor or coaching life which by the way anyone that's listening watching this if you haven't you must get yourself a coach or a mentor and there is a difference between the two formally informally but it is the best investment anyone will make in in themselves right 100 percent um but i think that difference that open-mindedness to to hear the uncomfortable stuff the truths that you really do need to hear you might not want to hear them but you need to hear them and that's the difference i think for what you do now isn't it definitely i think there's a big difference between information training coaching and mentoring and when you look at them it's what do you really need because I think there's a lot of people look we we all love podcast systems I run a podcast you run a podcast you want people listening to it yeah but what you want to be making sure that if you're listening um to podcasts is that you are taking something from it and actioning it executing it implementing your business you're trying to find something that you can use because if not it's just information i mean don't get me wrong it's better than watching netflix right it's better than watching something on on youtube or whatever else you know i mean you maybe they're watching the podcast on youtube but you get what i'm saying right so information is one thing training is when you're going to see it and you're going to receive some information which should be more detailed and more step by step but what a lot of people need is somebody to sit down with them look at exactly where they're at, understand where they're at and really not see it better than it is, see it how it is and then look at what is the next point for you, where are you trying to go, what does great look like for you, what is your vision and then really start to look at how we're going to chart our way towards that vision and remove any blocks along the way and I think that people, especially in today's world with podcasts, YouTube, you listen to a thousand YouTube videos, I think there's definitely a lot of the DIY mindset now because you can go and listen to like loads of YouTube videos listen to loads of podcasts you can get on chat GBT Claude whatever it is you can get instant answers but most of it is is not going to challenge you to to be more create more do more in the way good coaching and mentoring can do that I mean I've had amazing coaches in in the business that I run now so I started this business 2016 big business entrepreneurs and for the first from 2016 to say 2018 I was running it it was more kind of part-time because I still had other businesses and I was doing it for fun because I really do love it I love helping people I love helping businesses and I was enjoying it and around 2018 I decided to go full-time in this business and to really go and build something i want to build the the best coaching and education business for small businesses in the country and that was my vision but i had no idea how to do it and i mentioned to you sarah i sat down with sarah who's one of my uh coaches and i started to chart that out with her and when i started working with her and she really is more of a mentor than than a coach because she's you know mentored me through through lots of different parts is when I sat down with her and one of the things that she often asked me which I think is a good question for a lot of people is what does great look like to you what does great look like because a lot of the time we start these businesses we run these businesses and we run them in a way that we end up doing what the business needs us to do or what the business wants us to do or the business starts carrying you in that direction and you kind of lose your vision your control over where you're going.

33:59When you really understand what great looks like to you, you can optimize more to get everything you want out of that business. And really, she helped me to do that. And I learned a lot from her. And one of the things that we created was a model for small businesses and business owners to use to run their businesses. And this is called the simple replicable business model the purpose of it is is that you have to have in order for a successful business you mentioned 50 % of SMEs fail right so if you don't want to be one of those businesses that fail and you genuinely want to take your business make it scalable grow it then these are the five elements the first element is business strategy in order for you to succeed at a high level to make your business simple you need a great business strategy that gets you to market fast so you can start making sales the the concept of this is you've actually before you go and execute you've thought deeply about who the target market is what the offer where you're going to find the clients which sales process you're going to use you understand how to influence the people how many conversations you need to have and you have the blueprint of how am I going to go and actually start to generate revenue from this business that's step one the second step is you need to build a brand that wraps around that strategy like brave brilliant bold like bold brilliant you know you have to take a brand that communicates what you're trying to communicate to the target market and really speaks for you in order to attract the right type of people then you need a consistent marketing funnel to bring new leads new inquiries turn strangers into customers, bring them into your world, a strong sales process for conversion, and then a great operation for delivery.

35:48So what we now do with business owners, and this is the thing, when you go back to 2008, Adam started a business and didn't know what he's doing. I didn't have any strategy. I was weaning it. I didn't have any brand. I think the first, my first iteration of my business was like APS motor finance, right? I mean, I don't think I've ever even said that because it's embarrassing in the podcast before or anything that was like the first iteration and then i changed it to to big financial right and then later on add other iterations i had no branding no branding i didn't understand what i was doing branding for me was do i like that color does it look good and i think that's what most people do without understanding um what branding really is i had no funnel i had no way of getting clients i didn't know how to get clients i had no process i had no marking right i didn't i was my sales process if you give me a lead i could close it because i was good at sales but i didn't have any leads and i didn't have a clue what operations were i knew nothing about business operations at all so 2008 me like if i had been able to sit down and have somebody tell me these things i probably would have saved three years at least in messing around and doing the wrong things so i kind of built the business and the model for the old version of me they didn't know what he's doing right and then the version of me that's running a four million pound business and he's just getting surprises every five minutes i'd have a brown envelope come through from hmrc i'd be like what's all this about i didn't expect this bill you know and i didn't know what i was doing yeah you know that kind of thing or I hire the person and hire the wrong people because they're like yeah I can do that I can do that like no no you absolutely can't because I didn't know what I was doing so if you run a business via trial and error you're going to get a lot of error and and I think that what I do now is to to help businesses to build a business model that is sustainable profitable and commercially grows their businesses and I've been doing that now since 2016 so we're doing it 10 years 24th of june which i think we're pretty much at is our 10 year anniversary so we've been running for 10 years we had 100 000 people attend our events we do 15 million pound revenue business last year and growing and yeah i love it you know i love what we do i love i love the business it's cool

38:13Adam Stott:well you know you've got great energy because you're sitting here you're having a chat and you can just feel it you know you can tell you love what you do yeah absolutely thanks um and you're a no kind of person as well i think you know you you what you see is what you get 100 right which is which i think is great because people know that yes you're going to sell sell to them but it's for their good you know what i mean and and that i think is really key so what i want to talk about is social media yeah adam right because you've built a significant following on social media and like anything social media can do a lot of good yeah it can do a lot of harm as well right so there's always two sides to every to every coin isn't there but what i'm interested in is how do you have a big credible authentic social media presence that isn't just smoke and mirrors you know because there's a lot of noise on social media people put out the best version of themselves right they don't always keep it real and yet your brand and everything that we've been talking about now is very much around say as it is really you know be able to be authentic and in a in sort of a non a non sort of twee way so social media talk about that and how to do it right and keep true to your values without it all being smoke and mirrors and and the nonsense okay cool so so where i see it differently and this will be very different to what you might hear from from other people but this is how i see it and what's helped me right is i really don't care too much about social media i really i really don't have um strong feelings or emotions towards it i look at it in a lot colder more clinical way and the way i look at it is i have objectives that i want for my business and those objectives that i want for my business need distribution and the way i see it is that it's a distribution vehicle for me me to be able to distribute my messaging yeah through social media so i see it quite clinically i don't really personally like social media that much i think like everybody you can all get quite hooked into into you know scrolling on reels and all this kind of stuff and getting a bit to looking too much at what other people are doing and stuff like that and they just bought this social media ban from the six things i think that's a good thing right i don't know what your thoughts are but but that's kind of like the way i the way i see it now why why does that help somebody that's listening okay the reason it helps somebody that's listening is that everybody in their head and by the way we've trained many many tens of thousands of people on this on social media yeah so um but the way that we explain it and the way that we communicate it's a vehicle for you to get your messaging out now there's three ways that you can market any business so within our simple repl business model the businesses that we train one of the sections is called top of funnel right so you've got the foundations which is business strategy you've got the halo effect which is brand and then you've got the top of funnel which is what this segment that we're talking about right which is essentially marketing your business now there's three ways that you can market your business one you can use paid media now that could be paid media in multiple different facets let's talk about ads for social media is one of them yeah you can then use borrowed which is essentially what we're doing here yeah i'm talking to your audience i'm getting to know people you come talk to my audience it's a very viable good thing to do it's great for relationships it's it's awesome right for marketing but you can also have to do that podcast you do that with youtube you do that with speaking on stages you could do that with joint ventures collaborations you mentioned virgin and marks and spencer's to me earlier they're doing a collaboration two businesses there right and then the other way that you can do it is through earned now earned is organic social media repeat business referrals networking all of these standard ways and what i would say to anyone that's listening is there really isn't anything that falls outside those three categories borrowed joint ventures partnerships strategic relationships you know all of those um paid media which is ads it could be paid billboards any type of media now media and social media you have to understand it coldly and clinically so let's talk about it clinically and coldly it is when you are using social media is not what you see so you see the front end which is the front end of instagram the front end of facebook which you're posting and you've got lots of visuals you've got the videos and everything that everyone sees then you have the back end of social media which is your ads manager accounts right and that is where it's much colder it's much more clinical because what they do what facebook what meta do what youtube do what everyone does is they sell you impressions that's all they sell so they sell you impressions now you can buy a bag of impressions which we also call eyeballs a thousand impressions we can get a thousand people to live to watch this video right now and it will cost us about 20 quid to get a thousand people that want it or it makes it quite practical to give it in this example or you can do it organically and then that would fall into your earned category and you might not get as many impressions organically because it depends on the quality of the content the amount you've done etc etc yeah so if i want and i'm a small business owner and i need leads and i need people to know who i am to know what my business is and know what i do i've got to choose do i want to go and post loads and create loads of content and earn people's attention or shall i pay 20 quid and get in front of a thousand people shall i pay 200 quid get in front of 10 000 people you know shall i should i pay two grand in front of a hundred thousand people should i pay 20 grand in front of a million people so when you start to look at it like that it all becomes a lot more simple so as a small business owner i don't even believe that your ambition is to necessarily get depends what you want if you're interested in the fame part of it or the like the ego part of it and stuff like that and you want fans then the earned method is quite good for you to go and build that up i personally don't have any personally i'm not bothered yeah yeah yeah right i'm just not like and the reason i'm not bothered is for every person that loves you you can have someone that hates you as well yeah so it's like i don't need that in my life i'm like if you i hope i help you and if you're listening and you're getting value from this that's amazing and you know you're and great if you want to support me i really appreciate that if you want to tear me down i don't got any time for it yeah do you understand what i mean yeah yeah no and that's hugely helpful because because you're right when you when you've got your business hat on it's very different than when you've got your kind of you know personal friendship you know image etc all of that kind and coming back to ego as well yeah you were talking about earlier i think ego often gets in the way with or it drives a business it's the last thing you need to be bothered about absolutely i think the thing that you need to be bothered about is look when i when i coach businesses is very straightforward you can take any business bar none and make it grow by doing two simple things get them to speak to more people get them to make more offers so this is how simple it is say you say you want to grow your business and you spoke to 10 people last week and you made two offers and one person said yes well if i get you speak to 20 make four offers two people can say yes yeah yeah 10 yeah it's a numbers game right right so if it's that simple then getting our ego in a twist about who's watching liking commenting stuff like that is not great so the argument could be all right well adam what are you doing here then well what i'm doing here is i'm when you look at the three ways is borrowed so i know that you're very credible you've got great people you work with you've got great clients and they might not listen to me or have heard of me before yep therefore i get come and speak to you and then i get the impressions there from you make sense absolutely right and then if i want to get my ads out i'll go and get the impressions there and we'll do the content i'll go and do impressions there now for me you need to look as a small business owner needs to look at their business and say how many lead how many people do we need to be speaking to how many leads do we need how many sales do we need remember i said in the strategy that's number six the how many and then we need to go out and we need to get those eyeballs we need to get those leads we need to get those sales we need to drive the business so i see it as a distribution mechanism yeah now it doesn't quite answer your question so i'm going to circle back to answering your question in just a sec but if there's somebody listening to this right now and they're stuck and their business isn't growing the controversial thing that i'm going to say to them is that's actually your choice it won't feel like it's your choice but it's actually your choice because at your fingertips you can run ads to drive your messaging yeah right it's there it's there for you right now so a little bit of money gets your message out which is what you need to do for your business so i think that's quite important to understand that part um and then to circle all the way back to to what you said um when you're building a brand on social media which i look at slightly different okay so remember i said in your business model you got segments you've got your foundations which is your strategy you've got your halo effect which is your brand you've got your top of funnel which is your lead flow and your inquiries um you you asked about the social media but i think that it relates more to the branding element which is the brand and the way i see branding is um you said how do you make it authentic how do you make it smoke a mirror not smoke a mirror and kind of that was the question you asked the way i i would show it is this is every single person no matter who you are no matter what you go through in your life you're going to have massive ups you can have massive downs you have things that are horrible to happen and then you have things that are positive that are going to happen okay now branding and building a brand I believe in building a culture of success because if you have a culture of success you attract successful people towards you that doesn't mean that you're successful all the time because we all have ups and downs but I'm going to choose to show on my social media I'm going to choose to show the things that I'm doing which are positive it doesn't have to be look at me but if I'm doing something positive if my clients are winning if I'm winning if we're doing good things if we're having fun then they're my things that i want to show the world about who i am and what the business is yeah if something bad happens i don't want to show the world that because i'm busy dealing with that challenge so i'll just not everything needs to go on social media first of all um so the way i i would look at social media from a branding aspect is the client that you want to serve the client that you want to do business with show them the version of you that they would want to do business with and that's that's a bit different right because you do get people that are controversial and they want controversy but they win a lot of time they win as much business as they lose and and they gain as much fans as they don't i just prefer to keep my image clean and if i need leads or i need distribute because let's say now go back to these three methods hopefully it's not too technical right we're good no no okay good i want it to be simple right for people to understand so if you look at these methods i could come out i could say something stupidly controversial and because of that my reel is going to get let's say 200 000 people look at this reel that i made or i could say something that's quite you know educational informational adds value to the audience and I guess 20 ,000 so I could act like a dick and get 10 times the productivity than if I just act like I want to go and help people so my choice would always be give the education over the controversy because if I want to get another if I want to get 200 ,000 people actually to see that I can pay for that anyway well yeah and also you know I think this is this is around what do you want to be known for yeah what do you want to be known for what do you stand for and what do you stand against and and you know social media is incredibly powerful i mean you know for us linkedin is is really important you know in terms of the clients that we have etc anyone's going to go on linkedin they're going to check out who i am what my credentials are am i am i a billy bullshit so have i done what i said i've done you know so actually for a you know a power a power crazed high of x could do so much damage and the other thing i think that's really important as well with this is it's there forever you know so you might be a small business owner right now you might be starting you might be scaling and i mean maybe we touch on this because i think that's quite an interesting phase of the business well but in the future you might have a significant business you might have you know done a done a deal with private equity you might be taking your business global you're in a very different place in 20 years time than when you were when you when you when you sort of you know put whatever you put out on social media but it's there forever to be seen right so i think you have to be conscious about what's the why and what do you want to be known for um and to me that's more important than the vanity metrics i totally agree because you can pay for distribution yeah so just look at it like if you want to get your business out further use ads you don't need to use controversy and you don't need to damage your your overall brand your overall personal brand it's like you said i am who am i'm just a pretty normal guy that loves business likes helping business owners you know the weekends i'm with my little boy playing my little boy having fun you know with my girlfriend i'm not doing it i'm not doing anything you know i'm not bothered about like i think i've the the ferrari or anything like that don't care you know i'm quite chilled so i i don't need to kind of create that controversy i think it's not not for me right how have you changed since becoming a dad then i think that's changed loads yeah it's interesting people don't really ask that but i think that that changed me massively i think that i think that changed everything actually in what way um i think it's just that when when you become a parent i just think you see things differently i don't know do you think well i'm not a parent i'm not a parent but i am a great auntie yeah you know but yeah no you're right i mean because you're in a different stage of life yeah you were you know when you started 20 years ago but yeah how's how's it changed for you i i think that you you know for me um you become a lot less selfish i think i mean obviously we'll have i'm sure there'll be a lot a lot of people that are parents listening and i think you just become less selfish i think that you your motivations change i think you become less materialistic actually as well value the time those moments yeah i think we definitely become less materialistic it's difficult to be materialistic when every weekend you're getting puked on or uh you know or you're you're dressing up in like uh that i i say it's a funny enough right because my um my little boy's 11 right i've just literally dropped him off this morning um at school but my i'm not with my my ex he's not with his mum so with my girlfriend sasha i've been with now for six years we will one weekend we will go out and we do things for us because i have him every other weekend plus tuesdays for school taking to school school that and uh on our weekend we'll go out we'll dress up we'll do nice things we'll go nice places when it comes to his weekend and his tuesdays i just get into dad clothes you know he says dad clothes so you just like the worst t-shirt you got the worst tracksuit bombs or pair of shorts you got worst trainers you got and you just it's all about him you know yeah yeah well i think kids are a great leveler aren't they i think that's probably the way that you'd uh yeah you know it's a good question but yeah i've i don't know if that kind of explains the answer but i think i think some of the people that maybe are parents might might understand where i'm coming from yeah well i guess i guess it's not just about you anymore there's a bigger purpose is that you know there's another human there's another human that you're shaping and growing and and legacy legacy will become will become more important as you know as he continues to grow and who knows where the family will end up yeah so rich house poor house yeah what was that like as an experience yeah that was that was really nice i actually went on that with my dad i i did the first episode in 2021 where we swapped houses with a lady a lovely lady called kip too that she's got three children and her husband had passed away they were living in a very small um two-bedroom property street like you know just over a studio type flat uh we had two bedrooms in london she's lovely and she really struggled she's actually a really nice woman very entrepreneurial got a lot of drive a lot of desire uh to do more but really had very little opportunity and she was having she's doing what a lot of entrepreneurs do actually she was running a cookery business she was running tennis academy business she was running a um a church she was working for a church working for the local school she's doing like five six things whilst bringing up three kids on her own working every hour she possibly could great example to her children but just was spinning her wheels not really getting anywhere and we swapped houses they went over to to my house they had a great time so i had tennis court and they're playing tennis and they just loved it it was really nice and i'm in their house in London and I went with my dad and which was quite nice and then we ended up swapping and when we came together I said to Kip too it's quite emotional um that that you know I'll give you a shot like I'll help you because I think when I've seen these programs before everyone goes oh here's five grand and see you later do you know I mean I'll buy your van and buy but I didn't really think that that was the the play for me I didn't really think that's what I wanted to do I actually She wanted to try and really help her.

57:14I've been quite, her story is quite emotional, really, because she lost her husband and things have been quite difficult. So I said to her, I'll partner with you in a business and I'll help you grow this business, but you've just got to choose one. I'm not doing it if you're going to do four because you won't succeed and you're going to have to let go of everything else. And this is what I believe in, focus. And we'll build a model, a simple record business model. And she did. She got focused. she built her cookery business and we got some great results out of it i mentored her for probably four years after after the show um still it's at 2021 so she still works with our team um i'm not personally mentoring her anymore um we're still really good friends she comes to our offices every week my team now are mentoring her and helping her and i think she's got a lot more so i paid for a lot of stuff i've got her premises and i've got all the stuff invested quite a lot in her business and looked after the interesting thing about that the interesting thing is what what happened was is the only episode of rich house ball house where they've done the episode itself and the success story episode in the same season yes because basically it she succeeded so quickly by episode 12 they were like we need to put on the success story because it's the fastest success story you've ever had in the show and that's because i just got behind her and i got involved and we did everything and she did really really well so it was season seven episode one and season seven episode 12 annoyingly on netflix they've got season one to six i've got season seven so it's not on netflix in here so you can watch her on channel five if you want to watch it it was lovely it was it was nice i enjoyed it and uh yeah she's lovely we're still in touch and um she's doing really good what did you get

59:06Adam Stott:out of that as well as obviously great to see what a big bill how did you apart from the bill no but often when you you know when you actually help someone or you advise someone else you actually learn you think you're you're giving them knowledge advice and support but very often you know what i think it's an experience i think there's a few things that i've got out of it which are quite good um i didn't really look at it like i was trying to get anything out of it no no not intentionally but but it's amazing how you grow through yeah definitely yeah you actually give genuinely for no no reason than just to be a good person ironically you normally very often i find you end up gaining far more than you ever potentially even thought about in unintentionally you know yeah so a few things that happen from that so i don't think we spoke about much this much on podcast either really but it was like so good questions first thing that i got out of it which was really nice it's about to spend a lot of time with my dad so i went i spent a week with my dad there um we did that together um it's definitely an experience that i won't forget the filming and everything that we did so i thought that was really nice and it was good for us to to go and do that to sort of have that which you understand my dad's a bit older i thought that was quite nice um i think that what was interesting is when we started it my dad was like oh my god adam you spend so much money you're gonna struggle you're screwed like my dad was laughing and the irony is i didn't at all and he was like i ain't doing this i need some food i'm doing like he actually like it was the other way and i and i stuck to the budget and i did all the things that we said we were going to do but so i thought that was it was fun it was fun memories it was quite an interesting point in my life actually because i just split up with my other half so my little boy wasn't on the show at that that point because um we just split up she didn't want to be on it so it's quite an interesting point for me and it was just nice and just just enjoyed it i've got a really good relationship with kip too i think that she's a great example to her children i think that was really nice as well and we got publicly quite a lot of exposure from it we've got a lot of um you know i think i became a bit more well known through doing those two episodes and just enjoyed the whole experience really yeah i'll do it again i enjoyed it i liked it it was cool yeah and kind of showed your human side probably more than maybe you have the opportunity to you know in just the everyday business world right yeah definitely you know yeah those special moments you'll never forget that ever will you you know definitely sounds like the timing sometimes things come along at exactly the moment i've been asked to do it quite a few times before but she'd never want to do it my ex so like literally the minute she'd gone i was like i'm doing this but not new doors and all that yeah yeah yeah that's fantastic so i did like it i thought it was good it was fun well i'm so excited for you adam because you've obviously had an incredible you know journey so far the highs the lows you know and i think you've shared so much advice that's really really proper advice to help people that are listening or watching this and you know over the years you'll have had stacks of advice yourself I'm sure and some of it some of it great some of it may be yes great um but can you think of a standout piece of advice that has stood with you through thick and thin or maybe it was pivotal at a point of time when you needed something really important and a bit of advice from someone yeah I think that I've had a lot of a lot of good advice from a lot of different people I think one of the more valuable lessons that I've learned was actually through working with Sarah and Michael who I mentioned have been coaching mentioned me for a long time I remember the first time that I kind of sat down with them they'd built multiple businesses all like nine figure businesses and I started to really try and find the picture of what does a great business look like.

1:03:04And that's when I came up with that model. And I think the advice that's helped me the most is what Sarah Michael said to me, is that when you're building a business, it's got to be simple. The business has to be simple. The functions of the business need to be repeatable. So if you can keep your business model very simple, and you can repeat and just do the same thing over and over again that is what a great business looks like a business that is great where it's simple and replicable now up until that point all the businesses that i've built had been complicated and dependent on me so it was so the reason it was interesting is it was the exact opposite of what i'd been doing i was working as like the hero dependent business owner where everything was in my head and it was all complicated and you know like a tangled web if that makes sense but when i started to get get sit down with them and i really understand that and even as i say it people like is that the best advice you know is that but for me reason that's one of the best bits of advice is because now i look at things through that lens so i'm like is this simple is what we do simple can we do it again and again and again so we can scale it and can we get that model to work like profitably does that model work and can we drive more in the top to just keep the thing happening i'll give a practical example so this makes sense if you walked into what's your favorite restaurant what restaurant do you like oh nobu nobu oh that's nice

1:04:34Adam Stott:i like nobu as well what one do you go to uh the one um oh what's it in there green park that one yeah green park lovely yeah so i was in vegas actually i went to nobu absolutely beautiful best meals i've ever had anyway so imagine we're going to imagine you walked into nobu tomorrow and you walked into Nobu and all the lights were on, it was bright in there, okay, and the person that walked up to you was the business owner and they were like, hi, you know, I'm Nobu, how you doing? Come and take you over to the seat and you went over to the seat and they were like, we're doing salads today. What would you say?

1:05:09Adam Stott:This isn't Nobu. Because it's bright lights, they're doing salad and you just spoke to the owner. Have I walked into the wrong place? Have I walked into the wrong place and that's the key thing, right? because what what nobu and like any great business are doing is they understand their strategy so let's talk about nobu strategy right nobu strategy is high-end experience-driven exquisite food you know um quite dark aren't they you know dark environments you know like that that that prestige type feel which means high prices high price points that's their strategy premium client is their strategy you know biggest cities in the world Vegas London prime locations so they know what their strategy is they know what their brand is right they understand these different things what can they do is is their business simple yes they know that they're Asian type food um is it repeatable yes is it scalable yes um can they do it again and again and again when they do do it again and again and again every night the same table you sit at they get another four people sit at that table and they just turn the table again and again and again and the same person walking in after you left has the same experience and feels warm and fuzzy and then they bring another one in and every single bill on the table bills like five six to a thousand for 500 to a thousand pound a table and it's cha-ching cha-ching cha-ching cha-ching cha-ching they're churning out the same meals again and again and again that's a simple replicable business and why is it reputable well multiple cities around the world making money as they go and brand and brand yeah so that for me is the elements of a business and now as an sme as a small business owner the people that are listening you know where are you on that scale how simple are you how reputable are you and that's why I've chosen to train people on that which I learned from Sarah and Michael and help people to to understand that because in my first business it wasn't simple it wasn't reputable it was founder dependent it was bottlenecked by me and now when I build businesses I don't build them in that way and because of that I'm much more successful my clients are really successful we create amazing results and and that's what it's all about for me so that was a pivotal all piece of advice but now as you say you use that lens yeah i use that i use that as a lens because often i find myself trying to overcomplicate it yeah and and we do yeah i spent hey listen i spent like my life in corporate and corporate businesses overcomplicate things all the time and actually just keep it bloody simple you know because because that's when you're going to cut through and you're going to really get to the nub of what's going on i also like a bag of fish and chips in mind you know or a pie chips peas and gravy yeah that's that's the go-to as an northerner um so this year if you could describe this year in one word and you know this is coming because i i gave you a hint earlier before we press record should i say what i said earlier well you can say you can say what you said earlier but we'll have to hyphenate it if you do so if you could describe this year in one word what would it be and why that's such a difficult question it's such a difficult question because my instinct to answer is against the fiber of my being do you know what i mean like just say what comes to mind don't overthink it i i would say which i i would say it's probably been challenging here has been a challenging year it's challenged me in a lot of different ways um it's challenged my focus at times and i think that's something that i'm always like one of my superpowers is having really great focus but i think it has challenged my focus at times um for sure and i think that we've had a we had a couple of key people that actually left the business people for only eight ten years very recently actually i've just had two people that have both been with me for eight years and i think that that's quite challenging when people move on in different ways because it's not that i didn't necessarily you know i'm gonna say i did or didn't want them to leave or whatever um i didn't let them go they actually left and i think that when that happens you know there can be challenges with that so i we have a lot of challenges but the other the other word that came to mind so it'd be two words was transitioning you know i see i see because of some of the change and the challenges that we're transitioning to a better more structured you know disciplined business which i think is a good thing and that happens sometimes when people have been there for a long time as i'm sure you you know with what you do yeah you sometimes you can have people in the business that have been there forever and because of that there's resistance to change does that make sense yeah And then when those people move on, then what that often does is that allows the change to flow better.

1:09:53And I think that that's kind of what this year has been like for me.

1:09:56Adam Stott:Interesting. So it kind of forces the change in a way because of that catalyst that sort of, you know, made it move in that direction. So, yeah, an interesting year for sure for you. Now, we have a playlist on Spotify, Adam. Oh, yeah. So what favourite song are we going to add to the playlist from you? Oh, wow. Who would it buy? bye people often say this is the hardest question of the actual interview what's the vibe of your playlist complete range from classical to rock to cheesy to i don't know punk to you name it r &b doesn't matter all right not necessarily my favorite song but i'll give you one that was listening to in the gym this morning great so silence by klaus oh silence by klaus yeah I think it was by Klaas or Michael Roman or Klaas.

1:10:46It's like a Tiesto kind of like dance mix, you know, very good sort of vibe. And that might get you super focused in the movement.

1:10:55Adam Stott:Excellent. Well, we've not had it. So there you go. Unique, you see? Good, there you go. Unique differentiator. I love it. So final question, Adam, what does brave, bold, brilliant mean to you? Well, now you've branded it in my mind as you, isn't it, right? brave bold brilliant i think when you say those words which is a it's just about being being confident in yourself going out and doing what you want to do and being who you are without letting other people you know put you off get in your way just having and i think that you you're doing a great job of that i think there's uh yeah wonderful thank you adam what a way to finish yeah i really hope you've enjoyed this episode of brave bold brilliant remember check out our new website www.brave-bold-brilliant.com you're going to find loads of resources on there that's going to help you with your leadership journey and with the businesses that you're trying to scale up and grow so take care everyone and remember there are no limits to your growth but it is by being brave and bold that you're going to unlock your brilliant

1:12:09Thank you.