From Small Startup Business to Success: Dan Kuschell’s Guide to Growing Your Business

0:00Whatever business you're in, what if you became your own media platform? Dan Cushel, marketing extraordinaire. His formula for marketing is phenomenal. You've got to build the boat. Breakthrough, outcome, transformation, experience. Your success in sports, baseball, and life is going to be 90 % mental and the rest will be physical. His philosophy on success came from his career back in baseball. Baseball, you're a major success when you fail 70 % of the time. I take more at-bats than most people, and I don't necessarily get hung up on the fact that I might have broke a bat, I might have soon missed, I might have popped out.

0:35I just get way more at-bats than most people. What is success to you? I would say it's being able to live your fullest potential mentally, physically, socially, spiritually, emotionally, and then financially. Fullest potential. Define that for us, because I think that's kind of a unique way to look at this thing. I think I would define it as, you know, getting clear on values, right? So, you know, the Confucius quote, Brad, it says, you know, know thyself, right? Like, number one is being clear on your own, you know, values of where you stand. So my three core values, which are similar to our company is number one is hype lead with hyper growth mindset.

1:16Number two is collaborative teamwork, you know, coming from my sports, but I'm so grateful, Brad, that my dad introduced me to personal development when I was 10. I went to my very first seminar when I was 10 years old. He was a coach for baseball. And I started hearing about PMA, positive mental attitude. I can picture the page in this manual I got from Eastern Michigan University. And it said, your success in sports, baseball, and life is going to be 90 % mental and the rest will be physical. And then the third core value, Brad, is related to impact, being impact driven, like is leaving people in a better place than before we met them.

1:58How does failure teach success? Like how do you learn from your failures and turn them into successes? Baseball, you're a major success when you fail 70 percent of the time. Coming from this background of baseball where, I mean, failure is like part of the deal, like you're not going to succeed more than you fail. So it gave me a grounded place to connect dots, Brad. And failure is not failure. It's really just learning. And to take more at-bats. And I think people have sometimes asked, well, what do you think is your greatest talent? I take more at-bats than most people. And I don't necessarily get hung up on the fact that I might have broke a bat.

2:36I might have swing and missed. I might have popped out. I just get way more at-bats than most. What is marketing to you? How does it work? Two ways we could look at it. It's like a football field. You know, and imagine that I'm going to catch a kickoff at the goal line. So you kick off or your team kicks off to me. I catch the ball at the goal line. And because I'm in my 50s and I'm old and slow, I go about four yards. I'm giving myself a lot of credit here, Brad. And I absolutely get pummeled by the opposing team. So I've gone four yards, right? Well, what does that mean? Well, in Business Point, my marketing took me four yards.

3:15and now what do I have to do to get a sale? Well, I got to go 96 yards. In other words, I got to sell really, really, really, really hard to, you know, really create a client in this case, if I don't have good marketing. On the other hand, you know, let's say we're kicking the ball to you because you're more athletic, you're more spry, you stay young, all the things you do, we kick off, you catch it, you make a move, go about 10 yards, make a cut to the left, head to the sideline, And you go down the sideline, you go 84 yards and somebody pushes you out of bound from behind. Now, you got 16 yards to go in this example.

3:54So your marketing took you 84 yards. How much selling do you really need? Right. So so good marketing is about field position in your business. And what is that field position? So marketing is what you do to get someone on the phone or face-to-face in a selling situation where they're pre-qualified, pre-motivated, pre-interested, and more ready to do business with you, right? That's what good marketing will do. How do you, Dan, succeed at marketing? Number one, to get your vision and growth plan in place. Number two, to build intentional connection, romance and advanced campaigns to warm people up to speed trust.

4:31Number three is you have a lead machine. Move people from here to here. They're in your platform versus out there. Number four, education-based events to drive more conversions faster. And number five is to go deep, optimize it, and then implement. And here's a little secret. What is the business that Apple is in? They're not really in the technology business. They are in the media business. Disney, they're not really in the entertainment business. They're in the media business. Whatever business you're in, what if you became your own media platform? It opens up so many doors directly and indirectly that allow you to be able to go connect, to be able to convert, and to be able to go deep with your business.

5:15What are some of the keys to making sure I do give enough education online so people can come to me ready to buy? Boat. You got to build the boat. Breakthrough, outcome, transformation, experience. Right? So you're in your client's shoes, you're in their heart. And then the first part of the boat, it's like the sail on top of the boat that makes this boat go. And that word inside their sail, if you can picture that, is their problem. What problem or problems do they want solved? And if you can speak to them in a way related to their problem, an easy way to create content is start with a question.

5:54What is the question related to a problem that your client is suffering from today? Dan, talk to me about leveling up, going from good to great. You teach people to choose massive goals rather than just small goals. How do you do that? How do you get people to choose the big goal rather than just the small or mediocre goal? Number one, it's surrounding ourself with people who are also like-minded. And there's a big difference between being linear in our thinking and transformational in our thinking. If your goal right now is to double your business, let's say, well, what would it look like if you worked to 10X that business?

6:27See, that's just a different way of thinking about things and it'll scare you. And if you start thinking from there, you'll start looking to be from there and do the things that are required. You know, what has to happen to have it happen? Who do you have to become to have that happen? And if you do that work, the results will follow. How did you go from that good to great? What changed your brain to be that thinker? You know, I casted a vision and then also forgiveness, as crazy as that sounds. And so I forgive myself for my guilt, my pain, my mistakes, because I was I've always had a tendency to be very hard on myself.

7:07And he talked about this vision process. And then, you know, I like to engineer things in much simpler ways than most. So I literally now will write a vision every year and then also work with coaches like having a coach who challenges our thinking. right? And leveling up our game. I think those couple of things are probably the biggest reasons, you know, for it. And, you know, none of it's easy, but it's pretty simple when you have the right focus. Number one, the vision that you're committed to and then coach and support to help make it happen. And that's a big success podcast for today. Hopefully you took a lot of notes, learned a whole bunch.

7:44And if you need to go re-listen to it, we dropped a lot of information right there today. Big success is what it's all about. And by the way, if you haven't subscribed, hit that subscribe button so you're here with us every single week on the Big Success Podcast. I'm Brad Sugars. That's BS. Big success is what we're shooting for. Check the show notes for all the links. Make sure you follow through. Keep learning. Keep coming back. Oh, and by the way, share this with any of your friends who you know are up for success. I'll see you next week on the Big Success Podcast. You've been listening to the Big Success Podcast with the number one business coach in the world, Brad Sugars.

8:21To learn more about how to achieve business and personal success, as well as how to level up or listen to past episodes, visit www.bradsugars.com.