Build a Memorable Brand in Any Industry: Insider Tips Revealed w/ Neel Dhingra

Hey everybody what's up on this podcast I'm talking to my buddy Neil dingra who I met many many years ago I think it was pre- pandemic we met in person he did something very unusual and he has a very non-traditional non-conventional way of thinking and I want to tap into his brain how he built his personal brand how he's able to create an event from nothing and build a really engaged and pretty amazing community of people in The real estate mortgage Finance space and it's it's pretty neat to [Music] see Neil welcome to the show

thanks for me Chris appreciate it for people who don't know who you are can you please introduce yourself and tell us a little story about how you got here my name's Neil uh you can you know my main my brand is Neil Hol and so a lot of people think that's my last name my last name is dingra but I started off in the real Estate and mortgage industry just putting out content to build a personal brand grow uh trying to get more clients honestly just get more business and it ended up taking off and

my business quadrupled over four year you know over Over a four-year period I was able to kind of reach the heights of my industry and do really well but along the way a lot of people within the industry and within you know even adjacent industry started reaching out to me and say hey Neil could you come speak at my thing or hey uh uh would you mind um teaching me how you did what you did and I saw a huge opportunity to help people do the same thing that I just did which was build a

personal brand to get more clients kind of escape the rat race of chasing people and doing you know hard SA sales track you know their the people that they actually want to work with and just en re enjoy your life again like you know a lot of people get stuck in This day-to-day grind and I found a way to escape that by doing marketing and that's what made my job of fun again and so uh I've been having a lot of fun over the last few years helping people within the industry and we started a

company called forward Academy and uh we have a annual event that Chris was just talking about the forward event where we have a thousand people come out now it started off as like 70 people in a dark room and now it's kind of grown to thousands of People across the country even worldwide like we had people from Europe Dubai Canada come out this year and it's really cool to see how just me pressing record you know on my phone led to this cool opportunity of me connecting with and doing cool things like this um never

thought that would be possible here's what I think Neil is a classic left brainer which is like he's kind of in the finance mortgage space and it's not one where you typically Think this is the hot B of creativity and it's something that I've had to discover over a period of time that there are a lot of really creative people in industries that aren't traditionally looked at as creative and maybe in in another life Neil you a frustrated designer or a content creator that just happened to fall in to the business that you're in but

it's been amazing to watch your journey and your transformation and the reason why I want To bring this up is because there are a lot more people probably listening to this podcast right now that might fit into your category versus my category category and I think that's why I want to have you on the show because I think your story is going to resonate with a lot more people because if Neil can do it in his vertical by being a little bit different by showing up and press and record as you say and having your

life transformed that's going to give a lot Of people hope and it doesn't need to be this gigantic leap of doing crazy content things but I want to take us back to the beginning there's a period in time when you're doing what you're doing what inspired you what was that spark that told you hey it's time for us to make content to get out of the Shadow and start making what we do more visible yeah so the way I did this was like I was watch I was the last dude to get on social media

just I was Tri doing the Typical you know making cold calls buying leads online to get customers doing all that stuff knocking on doors and then what happened was I saw um my friends you know were like hey man you need to get on social media like what's your Facebook what's your Instagram I don't even have an account Chris like I was I would be the guy who would make fun of other people like hey you guys are giving up all your privacy to Zuckerberg like I'm not playing on Social media I got a real

I got real work to do and uh so I would make fun of everybody but then finally I was like you know what I'm going to set up an account and I was just in the shadow not even a profile pick and just watching other people's content and started to see like people like Gary ve pop up and these other influencers and they would talk about this huge opportunity in content marketing and with social media and I was like oh uh from a Business perspective this sounds pretty cool like I'm a nerd I love data

and it's like he's talking about this uh untapped opportunity within our industry to put out content so I was like you know what um let me go to a conference and learn you know some marketing stuff so there was a marketing conference coming up and um I end up getting a ticket to go to this thing and part of the ticket if you bought the highest level ticket was the guy who's putting On the conference would do like a one-hour coaching call with you so I jumped on this coaching call with this dude who wasn't

anything special but you know he was like the first guy kind of connected with and he was like Neil uh when you come out to the conference get a videographer like start putting out like document your experience here like just talk about what you what you learn you know make a highlight video and plus people will think you're really cool if You walk around the event with the video dude following you like it'll give you some credibility and I was like oh okay cool so literally the coaching call dude's not that bright but that was

one piece of advice that I was like you know what I'm going to try that so I went on to uh Google looked up like videographers in LA got onto this website for like job website for videographers found a guy who just by luck happened to be good and this dude Still works with me today you you probably met him Eric uh we've worked together since 2018 and I randomly found him on a website in LA in 2018 for this event and so anyways uh we make our first video there and he's like Neil uh

you know talk about your experience at the event what' you learn what like what's for what do you want to make the video about and I was just like he hits a record I just freak freeze I can't even say anything and then finally we Get through that video if you saw the uh the outakes or like you know the what we shot that day it would be so embarrassing like it I couldn't even speak on camera and so anyways we got through that posted that video and then from there I just started putting out

cringe content you know videos and uh you know let me let me let me hit pause here there's too much stuff here bro you know it's really bad when you can't even watch your own videos because the team That my team will embarrass me now they'll make a highlight video they pull videos from 2019 it's so bad uh I'm going to call this your PO Dexter years this is when you had the part in the middle right looking a little nerdy and I have to say I love it because the contrast from where you started

to where you are now and I want to stay in this moment tell us like give us the Gory details of how cringe it was back then like when you look back at the clip what Do what do you see so what I see is just no confidence I knew what I was doing I'm the same dude I'm just as smart maybe I'm a little Dumber now because as you get older you know you start to get a little slower but I I was actually smarter then than I am now but anyways I was like

I'm really good I'm really smart but I can't articulate things on cameras I just couldn't be myself so it's just really stiff um really worried about what are people going to say about Me just you know like just in my head and then on top of that I think the main thing was just the lack of confidence on camera you know like you know it's one thing to say something but it's another thing to actually communicate where people believe what you're saying and so I I was not believable I was just talking uh trying to

get through the video and what I found Chris was like even with those bad videos at that time because it was earlier on in the you Know in the content creation World um I still got noticed like still people I still got some clients from it people would still reach out and say hey dude saw your videos I don't know if they're just being nice or what but uh I was still getting some like recognition within my local market from making cringe videos what was the internal selft talk like when that when Eric looked at

you and said hey answer this question what were You saying inside your head uh I'm an idiot what why did I even sign up for this to do this like what was I thinking that I could pull off a video I don't even I'm not that guy um what are people going to say when I actually post this then I was thinking to myself let me just get through it so I can finish this video with this guy pay him and then I don't even have to post the video like I hope he I hope

he never even sends me the finished product because I'll never Thing I just need to I just need to get through the day cuz I had my wife with me with me and she's watching me and I don't want to I was like embarrassed cuz she's like she's supporting me like hey like's let's do this together uh and uh and I was like man I'm I'm probably looking like an idiot here and just I was so main thing was just let me get through that yeah and and then I'll I'll get to the other side

of this thing well thanks for sharing that with us because I think that's what a lot of people are saying I mean you're so self-conscious hyper self-aware you're your wife's there this professional videographers in front of you you're the only person who's like in the spotlight not knowing what they're doing and that saying to yourself like I just need to finish this as a ASAP so I can just end this throw away the file I never want to see this again I'm just going to survive the day and that was just 2018 2019 right Correct

and then so what's funny funny story is while we're shooting that video you know this guy's with a Gimbal and I miked up and we're watching out and then he's getting highlights b-roll of me just walking in and out throughout the day I would walk up to the other thing that the guy told me who the you know the on the coaching call was like hey there's going to be influencers there so at this conference Chris was Patrick Brett David Bradley uh Grant Cardone and So on the I have was in the VIP section so

I would go walk up to them to say hi love your book I'm a big fan you know say whatever I would say and my videographer would capture the b-roll of me just chatting with these people so that we could use it in the highlight video so it would be like really cool footage for me to use in the future and I had no idea that I would need that footage but like the dude told me to do it so I just did it so anyways uh like While we were there a dude comes up

and was like hey Neil could you sign my book my uh my like program book for the conference and some was some younger guy he just he wanted my autograph because he thought I was something special because I had a videographer following me around I was like man dud that that guy was right on the coaching call people think you're cool if you have a videographer with you they thought I was like one of the speakers or something You know so some random kid thought you were some because you had a videographer because of proximity

you're in the VIP section he sees you speaking to other people so you must be someone noteworthy and then of course only noteworthy people have videographers following them around or so yeah so it was like oh like perception is reality like you know you so then it was like okay and then when I finally got that video after it got edited L just I think it's like kind of Like God's work you know like luckily the dude I worked with was really good at video he was super nice we became friends right away and so

it was really cool like he made this dope edit of the thing where I barely spok in it but the video was really good like he cut down the speaking times for me because I was so bad but he was a good video producer so like he made it look really fun and cool and he grabbed all the shots he needed he it was actually like better Than what the event was producing so then I posted that video CU I was like oh this made me look really I'm talking to Grant Cardone in the video

I'm talking to pbd it looks cool so I I got brand lift from this guy who uh luckily made a dope edit okay I I I cuz your your business guy you understand numbers way better than I do I have to do the numbers here what event was this what was the VIP ticket how much did it cost this ticket was $2500 I think the event was called drive or D driven or something like that it was a marketing yeah it was in LA at the Ritz Carlton the regular ticket was like 300 bucks and

then they had an offer for on social for 2500 bucks you could be in the VIP section plus uh he would do a coaching call so I bought that ticket did you have to buy a ticket for Eric too uh before I bought before I went to the event I emailed them and said he have a videographer with me and the guy I got his permission uh on the coaching call to bring a videographer me so they didn't even charge me for it at that time it was like kind of not as common as it

is today okay well that's cool that was really smart of you to do that now I know you pretty well these days because we've spent a lot of time chatting on and off stage and the one thing I noticed about you which I really admire which I don't have and I'm just going to put this out there you are Willing to spend a lot of money to build relationships and to kind of move the the the timeline of your life faster you're willing to pay to go faster and it is just remarkable to me now

I'm just curious from your own upbring in your background is this something that was normal in your family or is this something unique to you so no it is not part of my upbringing my parents immigrant family from India very cheap you know how it is imig coming up and IM Like we would uh share you know like lie to the Disneyland people about how old we are so we could get the child ticket like classic you know no don't order any soft drinks when we go out to dinner it's water only just penny pinching

middle class like I nothing to complain about but just really penny pinching but because my parents were so averse to risk it was always like go to college get the job become a doctor become a lawyer that was the whole plan But anyways like I would get uh so that was not the upgrading but what I found was as I got further along in um business and investing I had experienced some losses along the way so for example like I had put some money in the stock market during 2000 and some real estate Investments during

2008 during that recession I lost it all and um and then but it but so it was kind of a dark time but I quickly came back through business And so it kind of changed my relationship with risk because I realized like money's a tool you know you could use it and then dude what's the worst that happens if you lost all your money so like a lot of us like you know you might be perfect like you might be uh watching or listening to this or you could think back to when this was in

your life when you had no money and you just kind of were paycheck to paycheck I was kind of happy during that time bro Like it wasn't I wasn't like broke like starving I was making good decent money like two three grand a month and I lived with some friends and we had fun and I would make money and spend it and make money spend and it wasn't like a dark time so I was thinking like well what happens if I went back to there but now I have the knowledge that I have in business

now so I feel I what I found was like uh the best investment I've ever made the skill is the skill to make Money you know to get clients to get business and so you know along the way in business I would do different marketing things not on social but just different sales and marketing things to make money and I was always able to do that so even when the worst case happened where I lost everything and came back from it it just changed my whole uh feeling about money it was like okay well I

could spend this there's upside there's also the worst case Scenario where it turns out to be that $2,500 I spent on a ticket could be a complete waste of money but what's the upside and so it just started opening my eyes to that and so as I started to spend money in in personal development my risk tolerance changed and I was like okay I spent $500 and it worked out next time I'm going to spend 5K next time I'm going to spend a 10,000 you know and kind of just leveled up from there along the

way I spent money on things that Were a complete waste of time and money they it was it was a scam but also found things that were not and I got a 10x return or 100x return on the money there's a Common Thread here that I see in Thoroughbred entrepreneurs and I would describe you as one is your propensity to put money at risk knowing that sometimes you're going to lose but in the long run you win and that's how you play the game and if you you make a small bet in it works you're

like let's See how far this bet can go and just make increasingly larger bets and so I want to highlight a few of those moments and then we can talk about whichever ones you want the way that you and I met was very unusual and you did something that no one had done before but has since done you you basically booked a one-hour coaching call with me and then you kind of pulled a a little thing but we'll we'll talk about that like I want you to tell that story and what your Thinking was because

I want people to understand the way your brain works because it's fascinating to me yeah I wanted to connect with Chris I watched your videos on YouTube and loved like the kind of creative way you were approaching business even though your audience was creative I was in business left brain right brain that whole thing you talked about right yeah so um I was like okay I got to connect with this guy I got to do some content with him how Could I do that and I went to your website and you were selling coaching calls

and this was luckily before you raised the price of these right so I got kind of Lucky it was a sweet spot there where you were undervaluing your time I would say yes I think it was 500 bucks right yeah I think it was a thousand um oh thousand okay I think since then it's gone up to 5K maybe more I don't know yeah it's 5K it's 5K now but luckily this was before inflation right so I was Able to I was able to book the call at $1,000 price point and then I DM Chris

and I said hey Chris uh I booked a call with you I've already paid for it booked it I'm actually going to be in La at this time with my media team could we do the call as a one-h hour podcast at at your studio we'll come to you make it easy and to my surprise you messaged back said yeah let's do it I was like oh it worked let's go you know and so we ended up booking it coming to your Studio at the time on in Santa Monica and we shot an hour episode

there live which then I turned into probably 20 pieces of micro content plus an hourong episode on my YouTube channel and um and and then I got a lot of brand lift because hey Neil dude how are you sitting down with Chris doe like you're at this you're at the future in Santa Monica doing video with content with Chris I'm like yeah man you know like you should be following me like you Should be learning from me I'm doing some big things you know so I was using it and then I would leverage that episode

to get the next person and the next person my previous guests included Chris doe then I did it with somebody else and so on and so forth uh and it just lift I just got a lot of uh uh like I got a lot of brand lift from that even though I wasn't necessarily that good on with my own content yet I would leverage other people so if I could just ask you A few questions and I remember watching back that interview my questions are terrible uh even like I was scared because like if you

get a dumb interview sometimes Chris I you'll you'll actually tell them they're kind of dumb in the interview you know you'll be like can you rephrase that question I don't even understand what you said and I was like oh let me re askk the question for clarification I just want everybody to know when I ask somebody to Rephrase it's not me thinking you're dumb it's just I want to make sure I understand the question yeah but my to be fair my questions are terrible you know like I was just I was rambling no confidence on

camera same kind of problem but it's also just like dude just jump in you know what's the worst that's going to happen and so uh how do you get to a good interview well you do some freaking bad ones first you know what I mean so that's how I did it so I Did that I did the same thing Chris with so many other people you know that I uh got to connect with you know there was leaders within my industry I would do the same thing I would somehow buy their product or Serv service

or if they had an event support their business because what I found was there's a hack to connecting with people who are above you they may not um you can't sometimes pay these people because they're already successful in business but what you Could do is you could buy their products or services and I found that like successful entrepreneurs have like a a hierarchy or like a ladder of priorities the top of that is like themselves their family below that is their probably their employees or their team below that is their customers below that is their

followers and then below that is everybody else so how do you move up like from follower become a customer if you become a customer even If you bought something of $500 and and you probably tested this too like somebody buys one of our things for even hundred bucks but they message you and said hey dude I bought your thing and loved it and you you take the time to respond because they're a customer you know so it just moved me up the ladder by saying hey I've already bought your thing can we do X Y

or Z and so I use that same strategy to connect with so many more people yeah that's a Great observation you remind me of another entrepreneur friend of mine who lives in Taiwan what he does is he Brokers deals between really ginormous Brands multi-billion dollar Brands and a-level celebrities and he has to kind of figure out how he can get in touch with the celebrity and it's a game that he plays and he goes through all kinds of uh research and creativity to figure out how he can build that relationship and you remind me of

that kind of that Same problem solving thinking now I'll tell you on the other side here's what happened no reaches out books said okay cool we're going to do thing I don't know who Neil is just at this point and then he sends hey I'm going to be in La can we do this in person and I think there was one more step in here where there was another message so that the relationship kept changing slightly but maybe that's just my faulty memory and then you're like oh by the way can we Film this and

instead of doing this we'll do this podcast the reason why I said yes was no one had asked me this before they' book me for coaching they would ask me to do podcasting but not in this way so I think there's the novelty of something being the first in that just I'm like I don't know who this guy is but let's let's go for it if it doesn't work out I'll never do that again if it works out it'll be fine and I think there's something about you and Let's take it to another level tell

tell the Billy Jean story yeah so Billy Jean uh I was 2020 you know so I'd gotten better at content had some business growth and I was getting a lot of people reaching out to me from within the industry uh to do coaching and do you know my programs and things like this so I saw Billy Jean speak and B if those of you don't know he's called his company's called Billy Jean is marketing bgm and he is kind of like at the time and he Still is today he just doesn't do as much of

it but he's he was the king of like paid ads and media and sales and online sales and uh and digital marketing so emails videos YouTube Instagram whatever so I saw him do one of these talks at one of the events I went to because I would be a sponge I would go to the events and learn I would create content in the hallways I would go to try and grab people uh another side note uh is I would go grab people Who spoke at the event as they were coming off or getting in the

hallways and say hey uh my name's Neil I'm creating I'm creating a highlight video for this event could we grab five minutes really quick and we would shoot a quick interview with that person now they might have thought that I'm making a highlight video for like the people putting on the event I didn't say I was but I would just you know say hey I'm making a highlight video so I would Connect with so many people so I did that with Billy Jean um and I and then I ended up following him and so he

one day he's on social this was maybe six months later and he posts on his story or feed I can't remember he says hey I'm looking to take on a one-on-one client and I'll Mentor you and give you the blueprint and help you blow up your business this year DM me if that's you so I me I just said message him and I was like uh dude I'd be Interested and you know he messages back he had gone through some my content and gone through stuff he like I think it might be a good fit

he asked me some questions about what I wanted to do to make sure that he could help me and then he drops this price on me that made me uh a little sick Chris he says hey um you know it'll be a year and I'll work with you you can use my you'll come out multiple times you'll be working with my team my team will Help you implement this whole strategy we'll do it together uh it's $100,000 and I was like man dude that's like a condo where I live you know like that's a lot

of money man it's a lot of money period it's a lot and um he ended up overd delivering like it went even a longer than a year it was it was I got mult I made at least a million dollars off of that $100,000 investment right and it also sped it compressed time because it would have taken me four Years five years to figure this out on my own and I would literally solve problems that were six months time in like a weekend with him so uh I was like you know what uh yeah I'll

do it but I got I always found this out with people it's another hack I learned along the way whenever somebody quotes you a price for something instead of trying to haggle with them to reduce the price just try to get them to add more things to it because by haggling with them it's Almost like undervaluing what they said like if I said to Billy hey could you do it for 50 he might have just said off you know like he may not have wanted to do it but so what I did was I said

okay I'll do it but I need you to speak at this event for me my event coming up I didn't even have an event but I was like I will have one so will you speak at the event because he has a 20K speaking fee so I'm like I'd throw that in there plus um would you do a at some Point do a podcast with me and you know I just kind of threw in a few things extra because and I said if if that works for you I'll do it right now I'll send the

money I'll wire it tomorrow and he's like done I was like okay so we worked out the deal the next day I'm supposed to wire the money Chris I tped type it all up in Bank of America and I I can't have a problem hitting enter you know it's it's like dude what if this your fingers Frozen yeah it's like what If he screws me like what if you know but the crazy the reason why I actually hit enter and sent the money was I had been following him for over a year um I would

binge he's taken down all this content but he would literally do YouTube videos at the time this is how he blew up his brand he would he would uh dissect your content and your ads on YouTube for like 40-minute videos they would publish two or three of these a week I would watch these at night After I put the kids to bed I would watch these for like two three hours every night for like months and I was learning so much from him and so at that point like I just felt like dude the guy

knows what he's doing um I trust him because I'd seen him seen so much of his content and I just hit send and then uh we I went out to a studio I think two weeks later we did like a one our first session together during that first session he helped me launch my first Product for forward which was called Neil's content day we built the funnel launched it put it out there in one day I knew nothing about funnels email marketing how to sell things on social media I did it in one day Chris

with him and his team so we would sit at a round table with Billy and he had all of his team five people there so we're like brainstorming somebody's literally over here building the funnel somebody's over here like Getting the uh copy ready for the email sequence that comes after somebody comes in somebody's giving me a Google sheet with like uh what to say to the people on the phone phone calls to get them to book with us and we did the whole thing in one day and that was just the first session I had

so literally in the first session I was like on my way to recovering my investment and I was like oh I made the right decision I have to ask you this question Because I I think I met your wife when you came out to our studio in Santa Monica right yeah Whitney was there now Whitney's kind of there always by your side in the background somewhere how does she feel about you throwing money at things like this sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't is she a ride or die or does she like hey honey

can you like slow down on some of this what's your thoughts on this so I'm a little crazy like as we talked about Earlier where I'll find a way to make it work you know what I mean so we've never gone without we've had times where we weren't uh you know as comfortable for sure you know but there I've never not come through in terms of being a on my financial provide being the provider she's never had to worry about that so I think that because of that she gave me a little bit more rope

you know like luckily I didn't hang myself but like she gave me more leeway and she wouldn't Really question uh what I'm doing as long as everything's taken care of we're comfortable uh you can swing for the fence is the is the kind of attitude we have um luckily you know I never had a huge financial loss other than 2008 and at that time we had just gotten married so it wasn't like we were already starting from scratch so it wasn't like she came in and I was rich then I lost everything that wasn't the

way like we started from dirt so we would we were Together when you know we were pinching pennies to go to Olive Garden so it wasn't a big deal you know I think she's and it's kind of like she comes from meager upbringing and and we didn't have money to start so it's kind of like oh well like worst case we go live in an apartment I'm cool with that too like she's not like worried about living on in some million dollar house or anything like that right so she's super Scrappy and and because you

guys had that Baseline it's like we kind of know what this looks like so we can play a little little bit and see where this takes us yeah and I think for anybody who like spouse doubts them or is giving them you know critical uh feedback for what they're doing with money and things and especially when it comes to business and risk-taking it's because maybe you haven't been a person of your word you know like maybe you're the guy who always says you're going to do something And then you don't do it you know and

so I think you can quickly flip that around and get them to fully support you if you just start following through on the things you said you were going to do and could be as simple as like yeah I said I was going to show up at home more I said I was you know hey you know what like you've been kind of letting me down around the house can you do the like you said you would help me with this and you didn't do it like just those little Things they all reduce your wife's

your credit score with your wife you know I think we have a credit score with our spouse I got a really high credit score Chris you know but like that's because I do what I say I'm going to do you know and I've had times where that credit score has dropped and it's got me in trouble and she's check me on it she's like you know what dude you you haven't you you bullshitted me on this you didn't say you said you were going to do This you said you were going to do this and

you didn't do it I'm pissed and I was like you know what I guess you're right man I did I have been dropping the ball can you can you give us an example one of of those moments when you dropped the ball and you had to reconcile the balance there yeah like I I I think a lot of us in Entrepreneur Space have all gone through this some people won't ever tell you but I you know I'm I'm happy to share because I think it helps people I Had a period where I just took my

off my marriage just because I was so excited about what I was doing in business and so you don't really notice but it be it's like death by a Thousand Cuts it's the little things that just start stacking up it's like hey you know what remember when you used to be really pumped to like plan a weekend to take your wife somewhere or go to this concert or do stuff you start you start doing that less because now you're Getting your kicks from this business and the new Facebook ad you're running and the new content

and wow dude that video just blew up on do on YouTube like that was where I was getting all the Rush from and then it stopped being about me and my wife so then if I'm being honest I was just taking my eye off of that uh it wasn't like I was being a bad dad or husband and I was still providing and then you can quickly get into this uh negative mindset which I did for a moment which is hey I'm I'm a really good provider I'm like we're living comfortably my wife drives a

Range Rover we're good like you shouldn't be complaining that you know I didn't do enough date nights or like I wasn't uh fully in attentive at dinner time like I'm providing all the money and so what I found out which is a hard truth I think a lot of said to being a provider is only one slice of the pie coming from Immigrant background Chris my dad it's it's like in India it's the whole pie right you just provide and then nobody bothers you like you could do I remember like we didn't talk to Dad

he just do it his work bro leave dad alone he's doing important stuff right now yeah it's like Dad wasn't at throwing the football with me outside bro like my dad was working on his thesis he has a a PhD and he was working 90% of the time at home once in a while I talked to my dad and it wasn't Like I hate my dad like we're fine it's just the way I was brought up it wasn't so we all have different upbringings especially immigrants I think you relate to that so I thought if

you're a good provider you have a green light to do whatever you want and you're family support you but what happened was it's just a slow erosion of like that and you know hey I'll be there at 700 show up at 8:30 and never called and just when I get home hey you know we got caught up On this video uh me and the guys you know we were just tied up and she's like all right you know I get it do that like 20 times you know see where you're at and you know hey

I can't show up here and there so I don't I think I I was like uh just thinking like hey she's just yelling at me because um just nit nagging but really it was like a lot of it was my fault so I just look at myself and said hey dude get your together man like if you want to if you want to Uh reconcile this and so if if I would have kept doing that bro I think we wouldn't be married today you know but I quickly got corrected I remember calling you one time

and was like man dude I think my wife's Gonna Leave me and you know like really yeah and Chris and you were like dude honestly man you are on the road a lot you are doing a lot of things it was like a hard I had to like hey dude stop trying to blame other people and just Look at your own behavior it doesn't mean that you their other person not to blame too like they could be nagging you a little bit too but it's part it starts with you like what could you do to

fix yourself and so I just uh corrected that and realized like hey once everything's dialed in at home it actually made me better in business because now I don't have this like worry in my mind what's going on you know my wife's mad at me what's Happening at home and you or she's nagging me like and then I also what I found was she actually gives me more room to do what I need to do as long as I'm checking those boxes yeah well I can say as evidence in the last time that I saw

you which was just a couple months ago that the relationship seem really strong and I've seen you in a couple of different ways where it was like is there are they connecting are they on the same wavelength and it's I I think This and I said to uh an audience once that the most underrated thing is to have a a really good partner that cares about you that wants to see you win and supports you because with that you could do anything there's nothing that you can't do and if you're distracted like oh my gosh

is is my home life going to be okay am I going to be sleeping on the couch tonight it can mess you up too so you have to take care of both the the business and the home life otherwise the Two are in competition and it's not a good place to be yeah think about it right now like we've all been there when you're going through like arguments and strife at home how how great are you on your videos and your calls with customers and as a leader at work like you're handicapped bro like you're

probably at 50% or worse what you could your potential could be and so I always tell people the same I was like solve that first and um stop blaming the other Parties like look at what you could do better and then Watch What Happens they'll come around too so all the things that I was mad at her about for for the most part uh were fixed by me just doing what I need to do you know what I mean like uh it's probably doesn't work for everybody but that's what worked for me and we also

went to therapy and all that stuff too yeah I think that helps you to have a Prof Prof guiding you along the way yeah for sure But I noticed nobody talks about this Chris they're just like pretend you know I see some people they're like in pictures with their spouse two three three years later they're divorced you know we we had a conversation backstage at my last event and Gary ve was there and Gary Vee always talks about empathy and love and kindness and and then you were like hey you should ask him about work

life balance cuz the dude just got divorced you know last couple years ago Like what happened you know and so I'm remember askas him he gives you the same blanket answer and nothing against Gary he just probably doesn't want to he doesn't want to go there that's fine but like I think it's something that more entrepreneurs should talk about yeah I agree because we we get to see the LI the Limelight and the the the cars or the success and and everything that comes with that but then we don't understand that it comes at a

cost and It's it's very difficult to manage both things I mean some of the most famous rich people are now divorced and maybe they just screw apart and that's okay Jeff Bezos got divorced Bill Gates got divorced and Steve Jobs got divorced I think I mean they go through a lot of different things because they pursue the business and it's kind of not that easy if no one's telling you this is the price you're going to pay if you continue down this path yeah like how Many times has uh Elon Musk been married I don't

even know at this point a gazillion times yeah but you know he probably is the same way he's obsessed with business that comes first and then the marriage suffers so if if it's like mutual and you guys it just didn't work I get it that happens too I'm not saying like it's the end of the world but if it's like you know if it's something that you wanted to actually have both success in business plus a happy Marriage it can be done like it there and more people should talk about the ways to do that

and I think the main the main takeaway for me is hey what's it like to be uh on the other side of whatever it is you're doing so let's just say like what's it like to be in an interview with you is it good is it bad like put yourself in the other person what's it like to be your wife you know what's it like for that person and really really be honest like what's it Like what's it like to be your employee on your team put yourself in that person's shoes for a day and

see like you're like man you know what if I was that person I would be kind of pissed at that you know that would have probably made me feel like and then you can make adjustments based on that well I appreciate you talking about this and I think there's another half to the story that we're going to do on a different episode with the person in That we're talking about hopefully I don't get rolled on that episode but yeah we'll see we we'll kind of Crosscut the two episodes and see like the differences between how

one person perceives versus the other but I really do appreciate you doing that and I I hope this encourages more entrepreneurs to speak up to talk about their their struggles or challenges openly and so that we can have better templates for how to guide how we want to live our Life with our our partners and I think that's really important okay let's get back to the whole brand building thing and the Neil show here so we see this consistent pattern with you your willingness to spend money to extract whatever positive you can to apply it

immediately to get your very high Roi let's move over into your personal brand and I I just would like for you to take a look back because you've not been doing it for that long to be honest it's Been about sixish years yeah that you've been doing this and you're in an industry that I think there isn't a lot of innovation Maybe by regulation or the way people perceive themselves it could be a limiting belief but here you are looking the way you look saying the things you say and doing things that are pretty atypical

for people in your industry first of all I'm I'm just going to ask you this question how do you think other people in your industry Perceive you um I would say they probably think at this point I'm Innovative maybe um little edgy uh speaks his mind you know does things out of the box so that's probably where where people would see me now it wasn't always like that but now as I've kind of found my Lane MH okay I would add to that Relentless honest and sincere and and it's just like a no BS kind

of guy if something's happen and you're just going To say it and I've heard you drop some f bombs on stage and talk about like an uncomfortable thing I think that's a a a clue for people if you want to really build a strong personal brand just let go of the pretense just show up as you are you'll turn off a few people but you'll gain a lot more in the process now along your journey talk to me about the decisions that you made that started to shape the old Neo into the current Neo yeah

so that was you know I most People don't know this about me but I grew up uh kind of like skateboard culture um and then I got into some trouble with the kids who were skating so then my parents took my skateboard away and then what I replaced that with Chris was uh music so I started playing drums I was in a a metal band if you can imagine that then I got into uh alternative rock bands and so I spent probably from like 15 to 21 in in that culture in band so then It's

at some point right after college I was working in a bank to pay the bills my brother's in this industry mortgage industry and making a lot of money this is right before the 2008 crash he's like hey Neil you got to get in here just it's there's a lot of money in this business you need to do this got into that and then kind of left all the creativity behind and you and I have talked about this before but like uh the business kind of Beats the creativity Out of you and then you just kind

of do the things that work the tried and true things and over time you lose all creativity like you just kind of it goes away and so for a decade of being conditioned in the industry all my crayons all my drumsticks all my guitar it kind of just the guitars in the corners it's got dust on it I the drum set I replaced with the electric drum set so that I could play in the house then the electric drum set we sold Because it was a clothes rck we don't you know I'm I'm making money

now bro you don't need to be doing all this other but so I lost all that stuff then what happened was as I started to get into content I started to get the creativity back and then as I got more as I got more confident with it I really like that's where I think I was getting so much fulfillment from was like creating good stuff finding out why it works and then trying to do more of that Thing you know how do we hack attention how do we get more people to sign up what are

the things we could put in our uh videos or subject lines or whatever it is to get people to take action all these kinds of things I fell into so along the way I just started to be U I think you build a tolerance for just being more real and so in the beginning you might censor yourself but then eventually you just said you know what I'm just going to be me and something Clicks and then you're like okay now the content's actually working better because I'm not worried about offending someone or what they're going

to think if they unfollow me I'm cool with it if they whatever I'll just do it I'll just be me and so from there is I think when it really started working for me but that was like two years into creating videos and then it becomes a process from there same thing with speaking I was super stiff um my mouth would go dry I was really worried about I would really rely on the slides and just be robotic but then along the way I could just I just said forget it man I'm just going to

be myself and then the speaking got better as well and so I got more comfortable with that so I think it's just reps and then you get to be yourself and then along the way I stopped uh carrying about like how I needed to show up so if you look at my older content you said Neil's Point Dexter's got the hair parted and I would wear you know the Banker's shirts and I never liked wearing those clothes but it was just what we had to do at work I said you know what I'm going to

do Chris I'm going to switch out the collar shirt for a polo shirt because I'm more comfortable and I hate wearing this ties and suits and so I stopped wearing the suits and tie and then I started using polar shirts and I went to the meetings and people were were still cool With it and it was fine then I switched the polo shirts for t-shirt cuz I always wanted to just wear a T-shirt and because I had a little bit of brand and people had see my stuff they were cool they didn't treat me any

worse in fact the meetings went even better then I always wanted to wear a hat you know and uh I never could wear my hat cuz I wear my hat backwards if you look at pictures of me when I was like 20 something years old I would always have a backwards cap On but I never could wear it to work then I said it I'm just going to wear the hat to the meeting see what happens nothing that happened it was fine so literally from that point on I've been you you give me about this

I wear a black T-shirt I've got I found the jeans I love there's these gar jeans I love I have 20 pairs of these gar jeans I've got 30 black t-shirts different variations black t-shirts and I got my black cap I wear the same thing Every day and it became my brand so for probably two and a half years I've literally worn what I'm wearing right now every single day okay that explains a lot so there was this whole creative person this Rebel this punk rock person in you that I think business life just crushed

and destroyed for about 10 years and then you went on this journey it's like you know what I'm going to just try this thing and and you did it the right way I Think which is to do it in phases I'm like let me try this and let's see if I get away with that and nothing bad happens and in fact you're like oh we we like this a little bit more relaxed look and I have to say and we'll probably on for the video boys who are doing the research cut the cut the video

and show the before and after of the point Dexter Neil versus The Neil now which person would you like to work with you know the the stiff guy who's trying to like fit In but we can tell we can tell he didn't really want to be there and that's the thing yeah it would be I would be in those suits at the networking event like and I would be dread I wouldn't want to talk to anybody and it was just like you know you're just not comfortable CU you're not being you yeah yeah I I

think that's kind of really interesting um there's this scene from The Ultimate Fighter it was Connor McGregor versus Uriah Faber and Connor's the king of Trash talking and they're about to like walk into the arena and he's just giving him like he's talking trash to UAH he says to yah you know you're just like a like a a 30-year-old skateboarder and that was how he's insulting because he was wearing flipflops loose shirt and shorts and he goes well you know you and your alligator skin or snakes skin shoes and blah blah blah so they were

just Two Worlds Apart one was dressed in a super Tailored suit and the other one would looked like a California kid and he goes you know I work hard in all my life so I get to wear this suit CU from where Connor was growing up you work in the field or you're doing High labor work and you don't get to wear a suit like this and then what was really interesting to me was your says back to him I worked all my life so I don't have to wear a suit and both are true

and both are really interesting right and There's nothing wrong with wearing a suit or a t-shirt but it's like when it's mismatched with who you are we can feel it and we can see it yeah I'll give you example like my brother he's like always loves suits nice suits he gets tailored suits he's like Ryan sirant you know wear a suit and he likes it and that's him so that's cool like if that's you bro like do you but for me it was never me I was always you know kind of the Rebel and I

think you can you can Find your own like style I know we this this leads to a lot of branding in the future but like I would have glasses for example like you might think well ne's just how much style could you incorporate you got black T-shirt and jeans well you know the black t-shirts you can get nice you can you can wear nice t-shirts or you can wear sloppy t-shirts you know there's NICE T-Shirts I've spent 100 bucks on a t-shirt before you know there's some nice quality Fabric and it looks clean glasses you

know I used to have shitty glasses now I got the warie Parker I found the ones I like and they fit and the it's party style little things like you don't wear Rolex and you know like I don't know there's certain accessories you could add that become part of your whole thing and you can you can have like a really polished look it doesn't have I don't mean you have to be sloppy like you can still be polished but and be yourself And then you can you can clean it up from there yeah well now

that you're doing your thing and you you got your following and you're creating content on a regular basis other people are following suit now you're giving people permission which is really cool to kind of explore their personal style to show up on social media what what kind of impact have you seen in your industry by the things you've done and how you've LED so First impact was like there was about a couple hundred people wearing their wearing a backwards cap and all the videos I was like oh that's cool but honestly it just the the

better impact has been people you know if they want to be casual if they want to be whatever they're going to be they started giving them the permission to just do it and be okay with it and not feel judged and so a lot of people have kind of broken out of their shell and become on the same They've gotten on the same path to putting out content and so they're teaching the same kind of topics but they're doing it in their own way and they're doing it in their own style and then that's when

it actually works rather than being all stiff and just trying to be like everybody else is there anybody from the Ford Mastermind someone who's gone through Neil's content day that you think perfectly exemplifies the ideas the Things that you're teaching anybody you want to mention in particular there's there's been multiple people I look at like success stories over the years so many people like uh and I think you know one of these guys Sean Kaplan um he was if you look at his old videos he's all suited up and stuff and he has his own

style it's not like he's kind of gone through different iterations but now he's kind of found his own thing he lives out in Tennessee and he's he's Being himself now and so that's cool to see him just kind of like fall into that thing and so many other people just like this both on uh males females doesn't matter like there's so many people who have just gotten cracked out of the showell we had this gal who came to our event for the first time I think two years ago Lindy and she uh was super like

nervous and didn't know she could build a brand and she's only two years into this and she's being herself and Talking you know how she would normally talk and doing the style in her own way and it's led to her business like doing she's in in our industry right now it's a down year and she's having her best year ever because she's standing out in the marketplace so it's really cool to see people like kind of embrace the strategy because it's not just for like making yourself feel good it actually translates to business results absolutely

well one of the Benefits of building a personal brand I kind of look at like this if you take all of the things that you do the service or products that you provide to people and the the the things you have to do to acquire customer lifetime customer value and all that kind of stuff and if you put the personal brand next to it it becomes a multiplier and it expands everything that you do so instead of chasing leads leads come to you so you get to choose instead of Chase and the opportunities for public

speaking or the kind of network that you can build it all gets Amplified because of the strength of your personal brand so I'm curious how do you define personal brand and what is your personal brand so I would say there's so many definitions but the one I really like Chris is like uh my personal brand is what people say about me when I'm not in the room so what would they say about you Like or would they say anything you know some people don't have a personal brand at all so they'd be like if your

name came up nothing happens there's no association there's no style there's no nothing there versus like the more things they know about you and can associate you with those feelings or things that becomes your brand and so when you said you described me as all these things those are the the words that descriptive words that people say About me if I'm not there and they're having conversations about you and you're getting brought up and then those things create opportunities for you so uh whether it's more referrals for clients whether it's more speaking opportunities all these

cool things like there's so many opportunities I've gotten in the last 2 three years that I never thought were they weren't even on the road map they weren't like it it wasn't on the it wasn't in the game plan A lot of times people will ask hey what's your game plan for the next five years I I have no idea like I don't know I'm just trying to do what I'm doing right now do the best I can and then all of a sudden good things happen as a result of that so I have this

I don't know who said it originally but uh I have this thing where this this this uh saying I follow it says like if you if you do the work the work if you take care of the work the work will take care Of you so I just try to do the best job I can put out as much content as we can do the best event that we can if we're doing a webinar it's going to be the best webinar I can do and by doing that every day every week 52 weeks a year

all of a sudden some other door opens next year that I didn't even think was possible or something happened there so it kind of like be that becomes part of your brand well the brand that you have right Now this person who's known I I think because you've done a really good job of telling your story so people do have an opinion about you and and it feels pretty aligned do you see it evolving in a different way 3 four 5 years from now where Neil continues to change or is Neil like the black T-shirt

backwards cap and gar pants kind of guy who shows up and pushes you to do the best work you can do I don't know man it's it's interesting I I've never thought about It but I'm sure it'll evolve a little bit like even your stuff Chris I look like you've kind of had uh new newer things come out in the last last three years two years you've kind of added things to your style um and so I think I'm at some point there'll be more things but it's it's it's in the manner that we talked

about before like kind of one thing at a time you know like I I think there was a period of time where you were doing certain things in a Certain style but you didn't wear a cap in every video I think somebody then told you that your head was too reflective or something then all of a sudden you had to uh you had to put a capot in every video but then they became part of your brand now so like I'm sure there's something like that that will happen for me along the way too yeah

you know I was in I want to say like uh I was in Amsterdam and I was at this office and I was doing a little Fireside chat as as part of a bigger event and I was just sitting there in the back just chilling for a little bit I had my hat off and then somebody and then I and then it was time for us to do our chat I put my hat back on I go up on stage and they asked me like hey how come you take off your hat what's going on

I said well it's not the most comfortable thing for me to wear but I will show you what it looks like like with and without the cap and it's kind Of like the same reaction that people get like if you take your glasses off they don't recognize you anymore yeah and then you put your glasses back on it's like Clark K Superman Clark can't Superman so I had actually pulled them and I said do you want do you prefer the cap on or off and there no cap on like we can't figure it out so

now it's like it's become attached to your identity one of the things I try to encourage people is really think about the Silhouette like if we all strip naked we're all pretty much the same different you know shapes and sizes but we're all pretty much the same but when you wear the cap or glasses it changes the silhouette and it becomes part of your identity you know I don't know if you do this where do you ever talk to your kids and you take off the glasses and they have a weird reaction like who's that

yeah it's the same thing and so it's becomes part of it so we want to be Pretty intentional because the more you show up a certain thing you kind of get stuck a little bit yeah so you better be comfortable in it you know it better not be it's got to be you because that's it becomes associated with you so I think that the more consistent you have there imagine like you went to Starbucks and every Starbucks you went to had a different color logo and a different thing it'd be like dude you know it

would take it I'm sure the name would Have its own brand Association but the actual colors and feelings need to be simil like it would be weird so I think of the same way with the way we show up and so I introduce new things all the time like for example I was loved wearing the black cap but we have red in our logos and a lot of the stuff for forward so then I just do a little thing where we put the little red thing on the cap and kind of like make a little

like just introduce little things like that Versus me changing out my whole shirt to Red all of a sudden and wearing a red shirt every day it'd be kind of like a pattern interrupt yeah I love that and before before we get out of here I want to talk a little bit more about the forward Community the events that you're able to run and you mentioned before like the first event was like 70 people in a dark room it was a little dingy and maybe it wasn't perfect talk to me about the lessons you've learned

in building This thing so that a thousand people show up fly to Las Vegas in the middle of summer I have to say and are excited to be here and I I want to give you a lot of credit because the kinds of people that I meet at your event they're very different than the kinds of people that I meet at events that I go to first of all they're a little loud they're very warm and friendly and they're they're very effusive in their praise and just their generosity and Appreciation for things when I go

to some events with designers it's like I think that person knows me or wants to talk to me but they don't say anything but at your event people are like chryst from across the escalator I'm like oh hey and they come up to you and they give you this big hug I'm like wh okay personal space but it's all good but it's really genuine I'm like dang these left brainers they're just there's a lot of heart in here or so I think and so I Think uh somebody told me the fish rots from the head

so if things are going well it's from the head and if things are going poorly it's from the head so I think there's something about you your ethos and what you put out in the community that you have assembled talk to me a little bit about any insights that you've learned along the way yeah this is uh been kind of a work in progress but when I first started it was about hey um how do I get people to come To this event what I wanted to do was uh just put out make put put

together a really valuable event in terms of like hey I'm going to help the people with what they need the most so who could I assemble to give them the most value and uh I learned this from kind of Gary ve stuff you know provide the most value so that you can win uh and I didn't know what my product or my offering was going to be I just knew I had to put on a good event so my first events were like Classes um for real estate people in my market before anything I started

doing with forward and these were just small classes locally where I'd provide value help them with marketing ideas to so that they could get more clients and then as a result I would get business from them referrals from them so I would ask for referrals and they would be like oh yeah like you helped me I'll help you and it would work out it was kind of reciprocation then what I decided to do Is like hey why don't we do something a little bit bigger uh this was during covid which was another problem because you

couldn't do Live Events till 2020 I was like I'm going to start my first forward event um how I came up with the name was I just literally started searching domains and found a domain that was available and then that was what I named the event and then I asked my like Fiverr Graphics dude hey could you just throw together a logo for me so We could get this thing published and we did it and then the website's ugly the logos are ugly but what I found for me is like um you know the be

like I've always had this obsession with like getting things to work and just getting them out to the market and getting customers for them before uh before everything's perfect you know like we like I I did so much business Chris with a terrible looking website and logos and things like that and I know other people Who will spend their entire part of that process tweaking the names and doing a a focus group test to see which logo they like and the colors and the design and I get that but like I just went with it

so I put it out kind of ugly started it off and then what I found is really shocking Chris you can put together the best event you can put together the best people and you think that they will come you build it they will come nobody comes like uh it's really strange even with Well-known influencers it was like man I put all this work together I put it out on Instagram and like 13 people bought and four of the 13 are relatives okay so it's like man I've got some work to do here so we

did a small event in 2021 in in uh one of my friends uh he had a training facility so we could do it in his basement because you couldn't do events during Co in the casinos and stuff like that so we did in a small Basement and it was only 75 seats and the way I filled this event was just dming people and calling people Ono one so I said hey Chris I'm doing a really dope event we've got Billy Jean and Tom Ferry and all these great people there they're going to teach you marketing

and it's going to be awesome I think you should be there let me know if you're interested and I'll I'll hold you a spot and then I would try and close them on buying a ticket and I did this I sent Out probably thousand messages to get those 75 people there uh but these were all my followers on Instagram so there was no cold ads it wasn't any um cold audience it was all people who had been following me on Instagram so then the next year we did it we leaped up to like 600 people

and then the next year we did 750 and then we got to a th000 and I like that sweet spot because bigger than that you have to get a much bigger venue and it becomes kind of like Arena type Of versus right now we've got kind of a close-knit Vibe but the reason why when you see all these people at the event who are so warm and friendly and all they're all my friends like it's all my people from Instagram so I haven't yet gotten into running cold ads to fill things it's all been just

my followers from and Friends of those followers so it becomes this kind of close community and what I found was like community building is so underrated but it is it Can be huge for your business because these are the people these are your people and so if really put out stuff and let them know who you are and what you're doing they'll rally behind you and they'll tell their friends to come and they'll start selling tickets for you and it's really cool even in a tough environment like this year where most events I speak at

Chris are like very poorly attended poorly marketed it's becoming more more difficult to get People to do things we were able to sell our event out it wasn't easy but we were able to sell it out because of community okay well I admire you and I understand why people describe you as Relentless because I can't even imagine trying to send an DM to everybody that follows me and the fact that that's what you had to do or you had to literally call people in s ham putting together this really cool event love to see you

there I guess that goes back to your Early days in the mortgage space right where that's how you you did it cold Outreach but this is like warm Outreach but still it's like lukewarm because you'll you know people are your friend until you ask them for to jump on a plane and spend money then you find out who your friends are right but uh but yeah it's like hey if here's the thing there's a hack all of us can do is set a date for what you're going to do I don't care if it's a

free Webinar a mini Meetup a class whatever it is publicly set the date and post it you're now committed because in order for you to back out on that you'd have to like almost be humiliated a little bit you have to say like oh you know what I failed uh we're not doing it anymore due to unforeseen circumstances it's been cancelled I didn't want to do that so once I had put it out there I've already paid the speakers Chris I've already published that I'm doing This now I've got some pressure on my shoulders you

know like you have to come through at that point so like a lot of people like well dude what's the hack to getting some big things done just have a deadline that cannot be missed have a have a Target that you cannot fail and then watch what you're capable of you'll send the DMS man when your ass is on the line like you'll make the calls you know like I think a lot of us are hesitant to put ourselves in that situation to begin With because you don't want the pressure of that situation but I

found that the pressure is actually a privilege like that's what actually gets it done yeah contrary to popular belief creativity loves a deadline because creativity will expand or contract relative to a deadline so if you give somebody three years to do something they'll take three years if you give somebody three hours it'll take three hours so this idea of committing to a date and then see what You're capable of is tying into this other idea of like the social contract we we will let ourselves down but we're less likely to let the other people who

we care about down and so when you say I'm going to do this thing I'm going to lose this weight I'm going to climb this mountain I'm going to put on this event a workshop whatever it is and you commit to it all of a sudden the shame and the guilt that you'll feel for not fulfilling your end of the bargain Having to like tail Tock between legs like uh unforeseen circumstances death in the family you have to make up some crap to be able to get out of this but you know deep inside that

shame that you'll feel will get you past that sticking point and you'll you'll do the work that is necessary yeah it's like man you just just uh raise the stakes you know and so I I like this thing some people might say I'm a little weird or sick with it but Now these are like bets you know so you talked about earlier um you know how you're able to make these take these risks in business and and see the return I kind of equate it CH to like high Stak scambling it kind of gives me

a little bit of a rush of like man man we got to come through man we we got we just did it at a higher level now we spent s 00k on the last event the first event cost me 70k the last event cost me 10 times that you can't fail like I'm not going To my wife to tell her hey honey I lost you know half a million dollars on this dumb idea no that's not happening like we'll figure out a way and then you get really creative like with because there's a like a

deadline coming up that can't be missed so I love that strategy uh it does make you kind of cram things into a short period of time but that's the hack for me to get done and you know and it's also gets your whole team rallied around you people um I think They the the best marketing I've seen is your own customers helping you fulfill you know like a satisfied customer telling all their friends and buddies to do something is is the best marketing uh you could ever have I'll give you a quick example we have

this Mastermind it's a high ticket offer that we offer to people at our event and it's an amazing community and people have great results and I tell them from the stage about all these things and you guys some People even make fun of me because like Neil talks to much about the Mastermind cuz I love it like it's it gets it's just amazing and I want people to know about all these things but by me telling more about it it almost makes it sometimes like feel like salesy and so it was weird I was sitting

at the booth where the Mastermind at the last event and there was a few spots left and the team at the sales team was like Neil next break at the event or on stage Could you please remind people that there's only this many spots left so that we could fill we can finish this up for you and fill this up I was like dude you know what I don't want to I don't want to say it again like it because oh there's only this much spots left time's running out I just feel like a freaking

infom marcial at this point so let me try something else so this gal comes up who's already in the Mastermind her name's Anna I think you met her recently Or she asked you to be at her event oh yes Anna she's in Glendale so I said Anna um I knew she was one of my people who rallied and helped me she brought friends with her to the event and she had a friend named Errol and I met Errol earlier in the day and I was like you know what I said Anna why don't uh why

isn't Errol in The Mastermind because Anna's already in the Mastermind she goes you know what he should be I said would you mind just go talk to him and Tell him to join like go bring like tell him how great it is because I think he would he would love it he's going to get such a great result she goes yeah I got you Neil no problem she leaves the table Chris 15 minutes ler she walks arrol back over to the table and he signs up and buys the product next guy comes over mace I

think you've met mace you would recognize him tall guy with glasses I said mace comes up to me and said Neil bro I'm with you for life these events Have changed my life your community changed my life I just want to thank you so much is there anything that I could ever do for you to repay you I said no bro your success is is payment enough D just keep crushing it one thing one favor I would ask do you know anybody who would love to be in this group who you know would benefit from

it he's like you know what I got you stay here he walks back Chris with another person signs up Immediately so bro I don't need to be selling from the stage so hard just tell the customer like our existing satisfied members hey who do you know that would benefit from this group and maybe there's some incentivizing there that affiliate thing that could be done in the future I don't know I didn't work out all the details yet but all I know is like the the power of an uninterested party not a salesperson telling you their

personal experience about working With someone that's the best Marketing in the world there's no freaking ad that I could ever run that would compete with that marketing yeah 100% agree NE I want to ask you two more questions do you have time yeah yeah okay there's something I mean I'm I'm there's like three questions but I'm like trying to figure out which one I want to ask you there's something I really surprised me about your community and the first time we did an event together it was for your Mastermind it was in San Diego and

you told me hey just talk about personal branding and I told this story on stage where I felt like really weird and awkward cuz I was thinking I don't know Neil knows what I do but this seems like a misalignment but what really shocked me was as I was going through my presentation talking about my thoughts on personal branding and what they can do to build something that's really meaningful that is connected to who they Really were I I almost felt like the audience was like just taking it in like I was seeing it in

my mind like I could see their reaction and how they were leaning into the conversation what is it about this group of people that is so hungry for this kind of creative spark that seems like it seems like not typical for them to want but they they have a voracious appetite for it yeah I think it's because I haven't marketed to the whole Industry I've been just putting out my own content sharing what I'm doing personally sharing the journey so I call this building in public a lot of the people who've been following my stuff

have been following since Point Dexter days you know so like they've kind of seen some of the stuff maybe they came in recently and they love it but a lot of people have been around and so what I found was I'm finding within this huge pool I'm finding my people which are Maybe the creative types maybe the people who lost their crayons or their drumsticks along the way maybe uh they have something in them but they don't know maybe it's just a feeling of like you know what I was meant to do something more than

what I'm doing kind of bored with what I'm doing I make good money but like I don't really feel anything anymore I'm kind of burnt I'm just like numb maybe I'll check out what Neil's doing sounds like that looks cool So like those are the people I attract and then these people are like a like you said like a sponge they really want to take it in and then they want to implement some people are better implementers than others of course but what I found was like they they're just really hungry to do something different

they're tired of being in the box that this industry puts them in and so that's my Niche I just accidentally discovered it by just being myself and I think it Wouldn't have necessarily worked the same if I run a bunch of ads and got random people at the event but because it was my community it really worked and so I think it's not the whole industry I don't paint with the broad brush but there's people probably within every industry in business and in corporate world that are these kinds of people and what are these people

going to do man they got to they got to get an outlet they got to figure out something and so This is kind of that outlet for them these are in my mind business oriented people who have this child inside this creative Misfit that you give them permission to like hey celebrate with us I'm one of you I see you and you see me and they come out and and you know I look forward to to coming out and hanging out with your people whether I'm on stage or not it doesn't really matter because I

just like seeing them there's a warmth and energy that I Really like and the fact that they're all taking positive steps to shape their future to figure out what's next for them to move forward I think that's really cool one one last question I was going to do a not serious question but I want to do a serious question with you people underestimate how hard it is to put an event together first of all you mentioned something like it's a $700,000 gamble you're putting it on on a red chip and you hope it lands on

red Because otherwise you are effed and so you've gone through your roster of people who speak and if somebody's listening to this who thinks I'm a totally in line with Neil's message I want to teach people about marketing or design or whatever it is well we know that there are different calibers of speakers I don't want to mention any names I'm curious if they want to think that they might speak on your stage one day what is it that you found that makes For a really good speaker Who Who Are You actively looking for so

this this is the the big thing I found from speakers over the years because I've paid I've hired a lot of speakers I've had a lot of done a lot of favors where you put somebody on a stage sometimes it works sometimes it doesn't and as an event organizer or the part the host part the the host of the party so to speak when somebody's bombing on stage it's like your skin is crawling you know like it's Like imagine these bugs and you're just trying to get the you just want them off man because you're

like man I can see all the people in the audience looking at their phone I saw a bunch of people go to the bathroom we're somebody's bombing right now and if we've all seen this I remember one time we let our members have a chance at speaking at our event and you were with me in the back of the room and one girl was was bombing and me and you couldn't even watch bro We were like cringing in the back of the room and you looked at me you said it's really hard to watch this

Neil and I was like dude it's so bad so what I found is there's a lot of people who have the knowledge but there's very few people who can teach and there's also very even fewer people who could keep your attention for an hour so first of all don't give people hour time slots if you're not sure because 20 minutes I mean you could Do some damage in 20 minutes but at least it's not an hour right 20 minutes we can all sit tolerable yeah we can get through that so if I was if I

was unsure on somebody in the beginning I would give them a shorter slot you can always expand if necessary if it's going great be like hey man keep going like add some T add some time to the clock cool if they're bombing you can get them off but uh for speakers that I've seen do really well Chris are people who can tell Stories people who can doesn't mean you have to be like super aggressive or loud but people who for some reason there's certain people when they speak the audience listens and there's other people when

they when they speak they don't command that same attention I don't know that's that's that's an intangible I have yet to get the formula because someone like you softspoken but everybody's Eyes Are Open Looking at you on the stage they're not looking at their phone or their notebook or ducking out of the room so what is that cuz you're not yelling maybe it's just they just believe that you know what you're doing I don't know what it is it's some connection that happens so what I've done as I've gotten further along and the stakes are

higher now where I've promised people that this is going to be amazing and I can't afford to have anybody bomb is now I ask I Really go deep on watching previous talks I ask people so I'll ask Chris hey who do you know that can talk on this topic Chris will say I saw this lady I saw this guy he crushed it okay good like so I really do my research it's not just I'm not just shooting blind anymore but in the beginning I was um and and I I got I've had several people bomb

on stage including myself and it's not thing you're like a lot of people bomb I'm on top of that list but I've worked through it but the way you get through it is like you just I hir a speaking coach yeah I had to hire someone and then I had to do a lot of practice and even to this day I'll watch the film back and I did a lot of ums and a and I wasn't myself and what was it that I did beforehand that got me off my game like you know how it

is like you know what are you what are the tweaks you need to make to get better it's like I think It's like uh Sports you know the best athletes watch the film Game film right I watch back my talk and be like dude I could do better next time you know and most of it what I found comes down to is preparation you know like putting the prep in um and the more prepared I am the less nervous I am the less like I'm worried about like someone throwing me off cuz I can roll

with it and then the biggest thing that's helped me and I think a lot of the people who crush it Is just reps man like I know you talked about you don't really like public speaking but at this point I feel like you're more comfortable with it than you were five years ago like for sure you you're not worried as much as you were before yeah you don't have the same nervous energy anymore you're more I'm not in the bathroom as much anymore yeah it's so same with me like I I would have to go

run to the bathroom and then the worst for me was my mouth would go dry On stage yeah then I got jug of water and I'm having to chug all this water 20 minutes into the talk I got to go take a piss what are you going to do now you got a 40-minute talk you know so that's not a good thing uh but so this is the main thing I noticed with when hiring speakers is don't necessarily worry so much about how known they are yeah worry about the what are they going to teach

and are they good at teaching and can they can they keep the people's Attention are they good at storytelling I've had people come through that nobody knew their name and they loved them afterwards you know like you know people like Irwin nobody knew Irwin in my community now they love Irwin because he's a good orator he's a good speaker he tells stories where people listen so like you can learn plus they command your attention um and then I was going to say one other thing about speakers uh I noticed this that there's A lot of

people out there who um will do the same talk and they kind of one trick ponies we've all seen this now you might think that this guy's proven or this G proven and it's true they have an amazing talk and they can and they check all the boxes but they've got one thing that they can do and so if your audience has already seen that one thing then it's kind of like not the best investment because now they're just going to do the same thing and I've had That happen a few times where I thought

this was the world's top speaker in XYZ and they are but they only have one way of presenting and it's just that same signature talk so um the best speakers I found are the ones who can make something custom for your people or even if they have like a standard talk could they adjust it for your group I think there's this thing where when we feel like it's a talk track or a script that you read whether it's real Or not if we feel that then it throws us off a little bit and so the

ability to improvise or to tailor what you're speaking about to Their audience and to update it like that was the same talk you gave seven years ago the world's changed a lot in seven years AI wasn't being talked about you know the rise and fall of crypto or whatever it is a lot has happened like how come the talk is the same I think that's what throws a lot of people off but I'm going to Venture a guess a hypothesis and I'd love to hear your feedback on this yeah I think speakers who have the

intention to serve will always be better speakers some speakers have the intention to self edify to to fulfill or or boost up their own ego like look at me how important am I aren't I so clever uh AR isn't my success amazing and they're not literally saying that but they're behaving in that way and I think some people are fooled by that for a little Bit but if you go to enough events you're like wait a minute this doesn't feel right I don't think they're here for me they're here for themselves and I'm not telling

you I'm the world's best presenter or public speaker but my intentionality is always how do I honor the people that matter number one is you and Trevor I want to make sure Neil made a bet on me and Trevor made bet on me that I don't let them down so I'm always thinking like what can I do better how Do I incorporate like how do I serve them and number two and it's a very close number two here is how do I make sure every single person to the best of my ability gets their money's

worth because that's the responsibility that you entrusted me with right not only did they buy a ticket which is like a th000 bucks they flew out there they're taking away time from work and family they're putting themselves up in a hotel it's a big freaking investment and I take that Investment very ser seriously I want to make sure I deliver so I think it's about this intentionality that then everything else if your slides aren't perfect if you're not the most dynamic speaker if you don't have this booming commanding voice it's all okay because it it's

filtered through what it is that you're trying to do which is to serve what are your thoughts yeah that's a great point I love that because that would explain why some people with who Don't have the most polished talk sometimes get the best reviews afterwards you know it's it's more about and there's people who have that polished perfect talk track thing that can do well too it's it's just that that audience uh you can only do it one time and then it's kind of it decays from there in terms of like how effective it is

um but yeah I think that's that's the case like I really wanted to do the best I can and you can even be Self-deprecating be honest like I've seen I used to do this in the beginning I would come on stage and say guys um you know what I'm actually terrified of public speaking so you'll have to give me a little bit of uh of leeway here because of XYZ I would say it sometime during the talk and the H be no dude you're doing great man thank you so much like and you know just

trying to provide value so I would I even ask the audience at some point during the talk multiple Times hey is this helping you um do do do you guys is this is this I'm on the right track here do you want to go deeper on this and then that way they feel like oh this dude really cares about giving us value it's not just him trying to go from A to B on The Talk track yeah so they give you Grace because of that yeah it is because you're you're also kind of being very

transparent and vulnerable because it's like I'm working through This and I'm doing the best I can versus hey I'm the best thing since sliced bread and I'm going to go out here and do my thing and you're going to love me for it see how great I am it's it's an attitude it's an idea it's a philosophy and I think it translates through lots of things yeah I love that and I think uh one thing that people can do um who are trying to do more of this is like anytime you can incorporate actual things

you've done into the talk the Audience doesn't care so much about how perfect you are as a public speaker because you're teaching something that worked so if I said you know here's a strategy I'm using right now that does XYZ here's the example or the proof then they're like it's more about like tactics and facts rather than am I the best on stage they don't really care anymore because they're getting something from it right smoking like a true instructor there a true teacher Neil there's a lot more I want to talk to you about but

I realized like I'm a little over time here and so I think this is probably a good way for us to close the call I've enjoyed your stories and your vulnerability talking about your marriage talking about how you built this from almost nothing to the what it is today and I think you're doing like of the people that I get to see U you're doing one of the best jobs out there as an event organizer you're Sitting there because we will talk about like oh how can we improve this what can we do better and

you're never taking it for granted and I think the people who show for you understand that and recognize and appreciate and that's why they're willing to go to bat for you each and every single time so I appreciate you for jump JP on the show today Neil thank you man I appreciate it this has been fun yeah and and you know word of warning we'll do the Whitney Episode and it'll be a good like comparison for A to B so thanks for jamming with us and thanks for sharing so openly thank you bro if you

want to equip yourself with the right Community training and resources to take your business to the next level I want to personally invite you to check out the future PR group and our membership specifically created for experienced business owners ready need to scale [Music]