As I bask in the warmth of Punta Cana, I'm joined by Alita, a marketing maven whose resilience shines brighter than the Caribbean sun. Her story is a testament to the relentless spirit required to rebuild from natural disaster and rise through the ranks of real estate and marketing. We don't just talk shop; we delve into the raw, honest trials she faced, from the sting of being fired to the weight of debt, and how these moments sculpted her into an industry titan. Alita's voice echoes the untold stories of women navigating male-dominated spaces, and her insights ring out as a rally cry for camaraderie and support amongst female professionals.
The episode weaves a narrative that highlights the lifeblood of any successful enterprise: relationships and networking. Alita and I unravel the intricate dance of personal connections that have bolstered our careers, sharing how partners like Tom provide an unsung foundation of emotional support. We examine how industry giants like Grant Cardone harness the power of their networks, offering listeners the blueprint for turning every handshake into a step towards triumph. It's a conversation that transcends borders, illustrating the freedom and enlightenment gained from global business adventures.
In our final chapters, we tackle the entrepreneur's greatest adversary – downturns. Alita lays out her strategies like a seasoned general preparing for battle, emphasizing income diversification and the unyielding will to invest in oneself. But it's the primal fight-or-flight instinct, that deep-seated survival drive, which we agree is the ultimate fuel for those determined to turn adversity into opportunity. Our exchange is not just a peek behind the curtain of success; it's a map to finding your own path there, with a promise of more exclusive insights in episodes to come. Tune in for inspiration, strategies, and a celebration of the resilience that defines the entrepreneurial journey.
As I bask in the warmth of Punta Cana, I'm joined by Alita, a marketing maven whose resilience shines brighter than the Caribbean sun. Her story is a testament to the relentless spirit required to rebuild from natural disaster and rise through the ranks of real estate and marketing. We don't just talk shop; we delve into the raw, honest trials she faced, from the sting of being fired to the weight of debt, and how these moments sculpted her into an industry titan. Alita's voice echoes the untold stories of women navigating male-dominated spaces, and her insights ring out as a rally cry for camaraderie and support amongst female professionals.
The episode weaves a narrative that highlights the lifeblood of any successful enterprise: relationships and networking. Alita and I unravel the intricate dance of personal connections that have bolstered our careers, sharing how partners like Tom provide an unsung foundation of emotional support. We examine how industry giants like Grant Cardone harness the power of their networks, offering listeners the blueprint for turning every handshake into a step towards triumph. It's a conversation that transcends borders, illustrating the freedom and enlightenment gained from global business adventures.
In our final chapters, we tackle the entrepreneur's greatest adversary – downturns. Alita lays out her strategies like a seasoned general preparing for battle, emphasizing income diversification and the unyielding will to invest in oneself. But it's the primal fight-or-flight instinct, that deep-seated survival drive, which we agree is the ultimate fuel for those determined to turn adversity into opportunity. Our exchange is not just a peek behind the curtain of success; it's a map to finding your own path there, with a promise of more exclusive insights in episodes to come. Tune in for inspiration, strategies, and a celebration of the resilience that defines the entrepreneurial journey.
Welcome to another episode of the LFG let's Fucking Go show. Today we have a very special guest and we're in a special place. We're in Punta Cana, dominican Republic, right now, drinking ice matcha. No apple on this shit, because we got to control ourselves a little bit here. But, with that being said, we're in Punta Cana and, like I said, this is a show where we talk to the baddest men and women in the industry and, believe it or not, I have my first female guest in the industry. She's a killer. Everyone loves her. I've just been all around. We've been in multiple continents with each other running the police show. Now we're in the Caribbean. It's great to have you and Charlotte, so let her lines. She's with the wisdom companies. She's been in the industry for a long time, A real vet, and it's fucking great to have you on our show. Let's fucking go. Let's fucking go, control this matcha. So, first and foremost, let her How'd you get it?
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's a leader.
Speaker 1:A leader Shit.
Speaker 2:No, but no it's okay. Let's get this out there. You know, you asked me like what message I want to get out there. The word led, isn't it? It should be fair.
Speaker 1:I love that.
Speaker 2:You're right, the word led, isn't it?
Speaker 1:but it's a leader, beautiful A leader. Let's talk about it. How'd you get into the industry?
Speaker 2:Um randomly lost everything in a hurricane. You've lost Um had to move to Tampa, always doing real estate. Before that, you know, 20, 20 years ago, I was like I have a lot of big networks right, so I had a client house about that age a person in a city. Um, yeah, I started in real estate and I just started going into marketing jobs because I was in my three-liters like open house was in Blackhack and I work in Tampa and I knew I was in the right space for the wrong company.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Then, like a year later, I started dabbling into everything being your buyer, myself being copyrighted a whole load, just trying to get my feed wet, and just started networking hard. I mean, had it looked that sense that was back in 20 years, Wow. So you've been in the industry five years after like well, six years.
Speaker 1:Supplies buys. Oh my gosh. I think our industry each year was like dog years, literally. I've been in call centers for most of my life, right, and I got into lead job like late 2015, or like I feel like I've been doing this shift for 50 years.
Speaker 2:I know, but it's incredible, the shape shift. You know you have to be a little bit, you have to adapt very quickly, but that's also a good thing to apply to anything in life, absolutely. So, industry forces you to do that Cool.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I didn't know. Then I think it's a good story of how you dealt with you know a fucked up situation, right? You lose everything, yeah, and then you got to make ends meet and then you go on to listen, you start somewhere and you learn from that and then you get to. It takes like another step that gets you to the next spot, right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I remember like I actually got fired in my first job and I was, you know, I wanted to, but you know like I'm wilder when I was severely in credit card debt just being like being myself, you know, trying to make me work and family, and feeling again, and feeling again, and so you get it to crack, and then what it does is most beautiful thing in there, yeah, and I think that's the best power being persistent, even in yourself, right?
Speaker 1:I mean, were there times when you lost the networking app and you were, like you know, broke and then credit card, that were like there are times you want to give up or like, oh, fuck it, I'm not going to do that, like, let's talk about that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean, I think it's more or less in the space to really really have tactics here and drive, and you know, like we're all talking about here at the show, like you know, things aren't moving at the speed that we needed to, but it's all because we're so used to hustling, so much to be. You know, having an instant right, the future versus everything in general, and I think that if you can apply it to your work ethic which you know all of us here really do that you can get far If you can embrace earlier you can't lose You're always going to win because you learn something to shine.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. So let's talk about something. I didn't realize this till right before we sat down here. I think this is at some five do about fifth podcast that I'm shooting, right, they'll show them shooting. But we interviewed also a lot of people at shows like randomly right.
Speaker 1:I think we're going to put one else, like maybe 10 or 12. You're the first female on the show. Yeah, I'm honored. Yeah, but you're welcome and I'm happy to have you on here. But I love it. I think that. But one thing that shows that 12, 12 shows 13 of them you're the first one. I think that's. That's a ratio of females to males in the industry. Do you think that's right?
Speaker 2:That's a great actually yeah.
Speaker 1:Somewhere around that, I think.
Speaker 2:Somewhere around that I mean a lot better. But you know, yeah, it's definitely different all the time. So, still, like us women now aren't and we definitely stick together, it's not. You know, I feel like before him maybe we were, as women, just straight male dominated industry or both, to kind of compete against one another. But different now, Like we're all working together collectively to help put another out because we all share the same family and city sense at all.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I think that's a little bit more about that, if you don't mind, because obviously it's male dominated. There's a lot of alpha males, very competitive men, people who are just like fucking sharks, right, In a good way, in a bad way, right, and you know how, how. What kind of difficulties can you talk about? The difficulties you had navigating a male dominated environment like this?
Speaker 2:To be fair, I think I always was more than masculine. Okay, well, I said masculine. I just don't want to be, I don't really care about things, I just want to get to the point. I feel like a lot of the women in this industry are also kind of like that. You have to be like that, though, if you want to make it a you know, dominated industry.
Speaker 2:You know there are a lot of struggles. I'd say, you know working with clients when I want to not be complicated buying contract. There's a lot of weird things out there. A lot of these conferences and stuff are pretty loose. They're pretty fine, but also you can get yourself into some sticky situations when you're not looking out. You know dealing with some things you know inappropriate touching texting messages. That is a real thing. That happens for us in this space, and I think being able to have the stomach to either say something about it and call people out and be firm with, like, what your situation is, or just being able to identify whether it's worth really acting on it or not, can be the biggest struggle.
Speaker 2:So I think we're trained to take something think about where our career is at where we want it to be and just shut up and move on. Now, especially with the whole Me Too movement happening in the world, it's gotten a lot better. But guys in their space, once they get behind a keyboard, once they make their first mill, they start to get ahead of you. They just don't look at you as a person always. So I mean that's something that if I could get out there, it's just you guys in the space. Treat your AMs with respect. Treat your business developments, your team, any woman really, or anyone in general, you should always be doing it.
Speaker 2:But like, even in the space especially, you go through some shit and you know we talk about it kind of privately, not as in the open. But yeah guys, you guys can be firm. I'd say there's a lot more to it. That has happened. But in the beginning, when you're not as established, you pretty much do anything. You want to excel in your career. So you just take what you got to take to the forward.
Speaker 1:Yeah, man, I appreciate you bringing that out, especially at the events to get loose. I just shot a video at Shangri-La for it right, talking about how that place is great for making money and business. I feel like a lot of that lucid culture is drinking alcohol or consumption of, you know, illegal drugs or whatever. You can make a lot of business. But a lot of times I've seen guys that they get crazy and they're like they get that ego and then they're like texting girls and saying crazy shit and gotta be careful, you'll lose your career over that. This is gonna be based on reputation.
Speaker 2:They're getting reputation like that. They're famous for everything. Absolutely, I think that you've gotta be aggressive. I don't go a single female in the space that isn't real aggressive, like we have to be. We were talking about alphas and sharps. While, like I'm an alpha female, my friends in the space are also alpha females. So I think that's important to be able to handle that with a personal relationship, with a business relationship, but really really happy to be protected. Okay, whether you're not being knocked down or you know little side comments here and there, you just gotta be able to like take it or hold your ground and move forward without making a scene. You know we're supposed to be kind but not too strong, and then you know when we wanna be too strong we can complain, like it's just a double standard.
Speaker 2:But we get through it and there's a lot more benefits. Like I said, it's difficult.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and I think if you can get through that and get through it, I'm a man. So for me to say, if I easier said than done I mean you've been on the shoot, correct me or wrong I would think that if you would get to that initial bullshit, eventually you become so vague and you have a reputation People aren't gonna do that shit. If they know the words you're gonna get out Like you're a name in the industry, so they're not gonna risk that shit.
Speaker 2:I think in the past three years, four years ago it's about three years ago it was a proper, but now you know the message to me and I think I'm proud of my boyfriend too that he comes around to all these as well helps me out this great first support every way possible. That's kind of helped me establish, like this firm position where I'm not it's so touchy, I mean I'm kind of untouchable. I like to respect that that I have a boyfriend and I'm working on my business and all this stuff. Or like when you first get in you're desperate to make wines, you're desperate to network, you just let things go.
Speaker 1:Yeah, bye, I think it was important, right, because I didn't realize the extent of this. I had a solo retired on my team. We went to a show in the solar industry, I don't know it was. She got like a rash of these messages from guys, like saying stupid stuff like at three o'clock in the morning and obviously they were drunk, and then next day they apologized. It's just, it's fucked up.
Speaker 2:I didn't know this would happen, but yeah, sometimes watch it. Most of the time they don't even call the guys See it's gotten better, especially US partners. Obviously they know better. Like you want to protect your name too, you just don't do that stuff. Some were born foreigners. Two were still just very touchy-peely at the show, very loose-lived, they don't really care as much. It's unfortunate. But yeah, I mean I really commend current co-workers and some of my best clients that are really like looking after you for an excellent, important day.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's awesome. You've got to pick a good time to move along. Fuck, we're gonna keep going, man, that's what we do, but check it out. So a couple of things, right. You said, which is interesting, I love the fact that Tom Tom right. Yeah, tom, I love that.
Speaker 1:Tom, your boyfriend, love of your life, is with you. You guys make a great couple. I mean you guys travel the world together. Yeah, we do. I probably made him at three or four shows. He's very smart, I think he works at Hedge Fund, right. So, and I love that, because my wife is very inshubetal and helping me go up the business, she would go to the shows. I mean, she helped me get clients. She came to lead the general world. Let them all be good people. Like they recognize it for my stories. I think I'm a picture. It's a great thing. So I think how has that benefited you? I feel there's a lot of benefits, and so that people are scared to bring their spouse or their boyfriend girlfriend. I think it's good for them to know what kind of world we're in, what do you think?
Speaker 2:Oh, absolutely I think one day, when I started dating him, I think that's why things worked out, because from my perspective, from the outside, looking into the mail, we didn't know what was going on and how we're actually doing business. People would have thought I'm an S-hunter.
Speaker 1:I mean, to be fair, like we're in Toronto we're by the Sort of left, but it's like we're on yachts.
Speaker 2:You know we're driving fast cars with clients. Sometimes we're about age too, and they're like you know, that can be a little daunting, but I brought him like as soon as we started dating and said I don't understand why it's boring in the hotel room. It's me and 10 other guys Like you know. We're actually getting stuff done or having good conversations, but it's been great. He's devised a lot of emotional support For me. He's so strong and independent. A lot of guys cannot handle that.
Speaker 2:They don't want to be the dominant one. I can tell you right now that's the I like to be dominant. I like to sit at the tone and he's very supportive of that Like, let me do my thing. It helps me push forward and see other perspectives.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think a great support system especially you know you're growing your business too is really really key to get to the failures, get to the difficulties, have someone fresh giving you advice all the time. It's been really great you know the travel. I think the best part about this job is the travel. Absolutely, yeah, you know and then you make friends and you're like, oh, let's go to.
Speaker 1:Japan early. Let's go do this together, yeah.
Speaker 2:We all can. That's the best part.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I mean I'm sure you have. You had a nine to five before and you're like sitting behind us.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I have, but I'm also into you very early on that I never was built in the nine to five, like you know. You have energy, I have energy, everyone here, we all are like all over the place all the time, but we thrive in that. I think I knew that I was never gonna work for someone to be able to work for myself and I'm not micromanaged at all and that's really important for us to be able to succeed and do what is best for us.
Speaker 2:You know, I'm sure you can say that. You know, if someone tells you you have to do something a certain way at a certain time, you can't do it a different way, like it might not work for you.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's health.
Speaker 2:Yeah, exactly that's what it is yeah. But this space is great for that. It's great for entrepreneurs. Always doing something new, 10 different things, like 10 different times, you can't complain.
Speaker 1:No, I love it and that's one of the perks of our industry, right? I mean, we're in Dominican Republic and it's supposed to be invite all the national money right now. Right, yeah, I was just in Columbia the other day. I have a call center over there and now I'm here and you know, it's just great. Everyone who wants to be stuck between nine to five, I mean some people, they don't want to travel, but for us, I mean, you grow tremendously right. What's the biggest benefit you got from personal intervention, from all this travel?
Speaker 2:I've always liked to travel before I was in the streets, that was just great. For me, I think the biggest benefit is going to a city and always knowing somebody, or knowing someone that knows somebody. That's been the biggest benefit.
Speaker 1:You feel?
Speaker 2:so interconnected. Even going to you know remote parts of maybe I have someone to see and I'm like, oh, I live here in Turkey, let me take you around, but okay, great, that's. A huge benefit is building all these international relationships and being able to have freedom outside of the US, outside of an office.
Speaker 1:Yeah, remember you, but for me it's just every time I travel I learn something. Oh yeah. And the beautiful things. I always you don't see some of the economic rewards, so later on you might make a connection. You met two years ago and three years later, like Dave, I'm doing that.
Speaker 2:That happened recently actually Now with these are yeah, we were recently connected a few months ago. I was filming a year prior to it and then we all started just scaling up on the HG7 ACA. That was really nice, but that's how it goes. You made the first five times. You need someone if you want to do business with you may not get them until the 10th time. Grant Cardone always talks about it takes 18 points of contact. Wow, you can close or something Pretty applicable, pretty true, that is absolutely, I've done a lot of business like that.
Speaker 1:My business partner at Payne. We met in 2017 at a silly summer. My first job was a sportsman in New York City. We didn't do business for like a year. I mean like one deal for $1,000. Then after a year a year and a half later I saw this guy was real Like shit didn't work. He made it right. Then we started doing a lot of business together. We went from 1,000 a week to 5,000 a week, 10,000 a week, whatever it was. And then we're like yo, we should just merge. Man, I like working with you, we merge. And then now we have a great business, like 60 people on our team or whatever. But that's one of those stories where we've probably had 18 to 30 made contacts before we started making some money and then boom, it just fucking exploded, right yeah.
Speaker 2:And I really live off the whole one intro.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:One intro how do you find out business partner? And that's the whole other thing. It's helping grow my business. I can actually be like now that I'm starting to do stuff. I do it in return because there is value for everyone and the connections that opening those doors I mean. You think about it. You've all the financial guys that have joined the space. People have some serious, serious background before they came in here to gain their capital and build wealth elsewhere. This industry is very well connected and the guy who I met on Google on TikTok commercial real estate- right.
Speaker 2:Everyone's dabbled into multiple things and I just said right now they've been like OK, how can we help one another out? How can we grow our business? How can we just spend more money? I'd be friends with them.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and that's what it comes down to, right? You said, you know, I think you talked about networking before, right, and I think people think typical networking, they're like you're trying to get something from somebody, right, but it's more about adding value. You can add value for someone and we talked about yesterday well, offline, we're talking about when you first got into the industry, change you would do to add value. Let's talk about that. That's the key.
Speaker 2:Right there, you'll have a dime to your name how I brought value OK, so I took it in literal situation. You know everyone's around drinking OK, what's something that I can do that's going to help somebody that doesn't cost a lot. Or how can I bring guy? Ok, bring liquid IDs, bring a lead, like. I always try to be almost like a mother of a situation, because people remember that and they appreciate it and it's actually genuine, because I'm like I want to work with someone tomorrow and I'm like, oh hey, you know, let's have a meeting tomorrow. I don't want them to be hungover the week before and I don't want them to feel bad or cancel on me, so it goes full circle. But just being able to make the right connection or, you know, hail a cab for a giant group or organize shit, like people appreciate that because it takes time, it takes energy and it's not always about how much money you have to play. It's something like you can weasel your way into situations and bring value besides.
Speaker 2:Just you know, a chance to win a campaign or already having money. You know there's so many different ways that you can bring value to that. I think early on for AMs that are starting to offer you know just people in general starting out in this space Find that, find how you can bring value. Even if you don't have a guy here, you can make that happen.
Speaker 1:I love that and that's what it comes down to. And sometimes you have to hear a sounding board. I was talking to someone about that recently. One of the best clients would call him when he had issues with his wife. Right, and they'd do. He would listen to him. He became like a therapist but then he helped him. He was like a sounding board, right. The guy felt like he could find him and, at the end of the day, this is a trust piece. Yeah, you're trusting people. The clients are trusting you with their budgets, or the publisher that trusts you to pay them on time, right. There's so much shit that goes wrong in our industry.
Speaker 2:You're not talking big, small dollar money.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we're talking big money yeah.
Speaker 2:Back there they're like oh, I just got burned for $200k. That's a very real thing. Trust is everything. Your name is everything, the nutrition, your quality of work that's red. If you can be consistent and your quality of work, that will go one way.
Speaker 1:Yeah, be able to provide value like that. I think that's the key to consistency, right? So if you're somebody like again, you start off the industry, maybe you don't have much economic means. I'll tell you actually later on what your advice is on starting brand new in the industry, no experience, like you did like six years ago, right, meet everybody.
Speaker 2:Find out what everyone's doing, where they're working at, how they're doing it, when they're doing it. I mean, that's 99.9% of my job is just knowing everyone and being able to remember. Engaging in a conversation with someone and talking about your personal life together can help you remember that person and then the next time you see them, they like that. We're talking about how we talk on Instagram quite a bit. Sometimes I want to shut it off during the week, to like keep my head down and not my legs to school.
Speaker 2:But the reality of this is, I love seeing what's going on. You're like I love seeing your kids fall out. So I love seeing all the travels people are taking, so that time you see them next. It's not all transactional, it's not, it's actually genuine. That goes so far. People forget about that. If I ask you how your kids are and I know their names you're going to be like whoa remember their names and remember their names.
Speaker 1:So you get that warm and fuzzy feel Like this person cared. They care about me Exactly. I'm not just a client, I'm not just someone that they're making money off leads. They care about me at the first and they're going to be willing to do more business with me Exactly.
Speaker 2:And I think actually caring about people and figuring out how they live their life and how they have succeeded. It's very educational. I'm just listening to them Gaging in more conversations with literally anyone. I don't care if it's a tracking platform or you've been in the street for two months and you're doing business after whatever network. You never know who's going to remember you or refer business to you. You never know.
Speaker 1:Yeah, especially when it's genuine and I feel like you're a genuine person. I'm a genuine. I think everyone has been successful. They're genuine. You don't have to be extremely outgoing first Like you're outgoing. I'm outborn. I know people that are introverted, but they remember. They'll say hey, happy birthday. It's not a that simple thing. Like, we see this as a birthday. Send him a DM on Instagram. That actually goes a long way. It dies it goes so far.
Speaker 2:I even say that in reverse too, because usually it's AOMs or reps having to do that to be caught on the client side, but now I have clients doing that for me or taking care of me. I get once in a while I'll get an email. It says oh, you've been sent a $25 Starbucks gift card, so when so, and I'm just like you know what that thought went so far and it means so much to me. It goes a long way. They'll be like thank you for working late with me, or something like that. I don't even think of, but they do. That feels a long way, because now I'm more inclined to pick up the phone literally whenever and go out of my way for that person. And that's this beauty of it Just being genuine, pulling on and finding the right partners that you actually work well with and can grow with. It's pretty amazing.
Speaker 1:So let's talk about finding the right partners, Because in the partnerships are the key to this business and, like in my partner, we were doing business again and now we're a partner like economic partners, we're equity partners. So let's talk about that. And how do you? What I'm trying to say is that when I first got into this industry I do a lot of Apple and I was like kind of like you feel most of them meant that you willing to deal with some shit just to make some money, Like when let's talk about some difficult situations, how you handled it and how you know, what did you learn from that?
Speaker 2:I think receiving explicit photos out of nowhere, receiving hate messages out of nowhere, can be a lot. I think something I've learned from it is to at the beginning I would just ignore it or I'd brush it off, or you tell another fellow woman just to like vent about it, but in the process, definitely being loud in the right time to stand up for yourself and being confident with everything that you do. That was definitely a learning experience for me, and you know making mistakes like big mistakes. You know, years ago I dated an affiliate Not that I ever did business with them, but I was. I don't know the company. There's just like things that you don't think of that can happen, that are very important to watch. As you're building your career, as you're building your reputation, especially as a woman, you do one thing. One thing you're done.
Speaker 1:You know, the guys.
Speaker 2:You can do whatever you want, what you want. No one's gonna say anything. So realizing that and really taking the heart that you're named and everything, was something that I learned the hard way in some certain situations before.
Speaker 1:Well, I love that you're not afraid to talk about it, because I think more people, more women, need to hear that right and understand that they can talk about this stuff, and because it's hard you know it's not always.
Speaker 2:You know you're afraid if you said what, what will happen to your company, or you know, to be fair, you call the wrong person. It couldn't affect how much you make or you don't want that. But I think this is really especially everyone that is in Pichotana. Everyone has each other's back.
Speaker 1:Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 2:I remember like last year, the last year, year before there was some stuff that happened in Bangkok and some guys was randomly making comments about it myself and other hands- I think I heard about this and you know, I had Walker messaging me on the side, you know you okay, and they carded out in there and started, you know, really taking control on things, which is which is nice to see, but you have to be ready for that. It's just kind of annoying Like what did I?
Speaker 1:do, yeah, but you know, what's beautiful is that they had your back. I heard about this. I didn't see the whole thing, but I heard. No, I can't believe. I'm glad you brought it up and that's a beauty. When you're, I feel like the circle gets tighter and the cream rises to the top. The longer you're in this industry or any industry, right, and people like this are one they got your back.
Speaker 1:Some shit goes wrong. Like listen, I had an issue, weird issue, on LinkedIn, something similar to that word, so I'm closing out. They didn't know who I was, they didn't know the situation. They pulled me on blast and kind of leads up. So and then, like, all these people came to my defense. So, like you know, all those folks came to my defense Like, bro, I love you man. Like I'm like whatever you want, man, I mean the first one to be raised like Dave. I didn't realize, I didn't understand what I did. It was just nice, kind of like what happened to you. Mine was a different situation, but you know, they know that you're a good person, they know that you know, and like, someone's come back like fuck this person. They get kicked out and guess what? That's an economic bad decision by them.
Speaker 1:Yeah, these are some power players here.
Speaker 2:You know he's a day and a half, so now they're like Ben. You know the net worth of this, like this conference, is probably what would you say? The net worth, the combined net worth of the people at the show is.
Speaker 1:There's a million, I don't even know, maybe more.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and that's that's the thing is. But everyone's human, everyone makes mistakes. But yeah, you just watch out, you know I could cry behind. Yeah, sure, well, I love that and I think that it just goes to show you. I mean, you got to be prepared. You know, I say this kind of, I got kind of laughing now, but I remember why I was here.
Speaker 1:Like you know, the man letters and whatever I go oh my God, what the fuck I'm going to lose my business. You have the good attorney to handle that for you. Right, Absolutely Right, Any business. I think that's the thing. I think that's the thing. I think that's the thing, I think that's the thing.
Speaker 2:I think that's the thing. I think that's the thing, Especially in this space. You got to get a good lawyer.
Speaker 1:You got to be ready for those bugs and bruises, right, and they make you stronger. I went to a mastermind Eric's barber. Like listen, people are. I don't want problems. You want problems like the full problems. You got to be here, navigate the public, handle. You want more problems?
Speaker 2:Yes, I mean you're doing something. I had a good friend who lives in Atlanta with me in the space and he wants to be, so I was. Someone was trying to sue me at the time. He was to me. He goes congratulations. Yeah, you know I was like what. He's like no, that this is good because you know you're not somebody and so you can sue that means you're doing something. It's a threat to somebody else.
Speaker 2:Like you know, that's a really good point, having the right perspective. Going into all of this. You can't lose as long as your mindset's right.
Speaker 1:Absolutely. We just talked about some like tough situations. Let's let's talk about some good situations. Let's talk about, like, maybe a client or a foreigner that you scaled the shed of like wow, what were the keys to making that, that that work out for everybody Like a good success story yeah, Client or a truly anything, whatever it is pops in your mind.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'd say like my biggest success story is building her magazine marketing out. You know, you know wisdom during the day, quote unquote as an advertiser, but being allowed to build my own company out on the side and actually doing something good with it.
Speaker 2:That helps everything go back into wisdom was a huge win for me Because, if you think about it, I started doing the accounts, the profiles. You know all the agencies, the BMS. Really, my main idea behind it was oh my gosh, you know the guys that are running to me. Their stuff goes down. Your problem, like their problem, is now my problem, and once I figured that out like oh my gosh, I can make something off of it Things just started on me like rolling, rolling through it, you know.
Speaker 2:I was able to make a lot of money doing that just as a side hustle.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:It really helped me be a better and a better like rep overall, I kind of like really realized if I can be a one stop shopper, people they can't lose. If I can provide someone like you know to do creatives for you especially just with the accounts and all these forces or introduce someone else, you're going to work with me and someone else that can only just provide you one thing.
Speaker 1:Absolutely.
Speaker 2:And that's you know. That will back into the network. I think the success directly from your network is your network. It may say yeah, straight up.
Speaker 1:You remind me when I started the industry you know I was. I just looked for ways to create value right and you don't have to make money off the right away. You don't. If you just they don't come back in.
Speaker 2:Oh, my first year, I think I saw it. Who's at the poverty, literally the poverty line, after talking to you about everything. To change is beautiful, but it was a journey and you got to be a pay, to take all the bones to get there.
Speaker 1:So let's talk about the right. I call this an LLG show. Let's fucking go to them yeah.
Speaker 2:It's funny you say that because I'm always saying that with this symbol. I'm like let's LLG like let's fucking go.
Speaker 1:You know it's everyone's life.
Speaker 2:Everyone's happy to hear it and it's, you know, yeah.
Speaker 1:So, with that being said, that your reason, I call it. I'd say that you know, for me, motion creates emotion, right You're? I think we're very similar. You're high energy, I'm high energy. I think you can. You're having a bad day? Just start fucking moving. Go for one. Why don't we change your?
Speaker 2:mindset. Change your mindset, try something new.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And being being proactive and trying different things simultaneously. Yeah, I mean, I was like, focus on this one thing and become a master at it. Yeah, focus on main thing, but don't stop trying to learn on the thing on the side. You got to keep evolving and keep keep learning. Honestly, keep learning. The moment you stop learning or you have a desire to learn something new, you're going to hit it, You're going to hit it.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I love that. I love that. Obviously, you know you talk about your history when you got in the industry, how you were credit cards and all this up, what was like the LNG. Let's fucking go a moment like, listen, I gotta get moving, I gotta make some shit happen. Can you walk us through that?
Speaker 2:How about my first Audrey?
Speaker 1:Yes, wow, can you?
Speaker 2:make your first, audrey, I mean any more yeah. I mean, I went from clearly trope broke. Hitting wasn't a sub-benefit. You could just roll it all in for you.
Speaker 1:Oh wow, I don't know. Unemployment Unemployment.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I was getting unemployment even back in after COVID. You know that wasn't that long ago, but now I'm on a poor worry, You're making someone's salary once. That's not so. I think that first hundred came once was like. I mean, even the first time I made 10,000, that was like oh my god, this is legit, this is real.
Speaker 2:You know, especially in this space. The making money in your sleep is so true and having residual income that you don't have to manage. That was the real life. Double go and being able to start doing a profile set, the servicing you know, some of my partners in different ways than what I normally would. Once that clicked, it was just game over and now I'm just like building all these things you know, same for you. You can start off in one vertical, do really well, but then, like once you have your structure set up, you're kind of like like what's fucking going? What's the next vertical?
Speaker 1:What's the next rule? Absolutely yeah. It's rinse and repeat.
Speaker 2:Yeah, rinse and repeat, like what else can we keep doing? How can I keep growing, how can I keep building this out? I was really after the first hundred came. I was like this is legit, I can do this, I can be an entrepreneur, I can be successful. Like just you know, it's still learning. I still feel like I don't know what to do yeah same way.
Speaker 1:I mean, I come a place like this, sometimes I feel like an 80 on it. How the fuck did I get to where I'm at? I want you to score and we're trying to get my son in Miami. There's just three-year-old kids who want to AI robotics. I'm like what the hell the fuck did I get to where I'm at? I mean, these kids are like geniuses, man, but it is what it is.
Speaker 2:It's good, don't put yourself short, though I'm a great computer here.
Speaker 1:That's true. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah yeah, people forget that. Yeah, that's a three-smart aspect of it, right? Yes, you can blend it too, and then you're on top of it, right yeah?
Speaker 2:no, that's my time.
Speaker 1:He's like the analytical half of me, I would say that's how you compliment each other right it's like my wife too.
Speaker 1:We compliment each other and that's what makes the world go up. It does, yeah, yeah, cool. So we talked about someone new getting into the industry. What will be your advice on that? Let's talk about, because this happens a lot, especially last year. Last year was a really crazy year for people. Some people crushed it. I feel like our industry. In the last few years, everybody was crushing things like this right. Last year was the first year where shit started going the other way for a lot of people, right, including myself. Our revenue went backwards for the first time like forever man. Thank God we made some adjustments to some. But what would you? What's your advice? Someone's been doing this for a while and maybe their plateaued is going a little backward. What would you say is the shit they need to do?
Speaker 2:It's got to provide for downing more cool right? Same for me. I didn't just want to be an ammo. But that's good, you make money from doing that. But what if that goes away? What do I have what? Do you gotta increase your streams of income.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:How do you do that? I don't know. I really just say take a step back, right down the spine, things that are that you're good at and buy things that you want to work on for yourself. And you know, taking those, buy things that you aren't good at and really, really using that and the weapon to build more businesses and build relationships can keep you going, even if time's at the top. You know like you're just starting up in the space again. Meet everyone, figure out what everyone does, study the language, talk to everyone doesn't matter who they are, because you will learn something and you never know when a door is going to be open for you.
Speaker 2:And when times get tough, people get desperate. You know you have good partners. You say, you know I also know someone for this. They're going to trust you to do that for them or figure that out for them, and that can be, you know, your other door open when times are tough With the current path that you're on. So I would just say it's pretty tough to say one specific thing, You're just starting out take classes.
Speaker 2:Oh, one thing I did too. What I did was in 2020, I started dropping on Facebook. That was where I learned Facebook ads. I really wanted to understand fully the problems that my clients were facing firsthand.
Speaker 1:So you know like oh.
Speaker 2:I've run a campaign and run into this issue. Now I did it. I did it. While you're freaked out by this, knowing that and really empathizing with people and partners helped a lot in figuring out the problems together and also learning new things.
Speaker 1:And I love that. What would? You say yeah, I'd say that I think networking school, these events go like this again, this is an invite-only event, right? And then, and this is the minute group, oh yeah, you got to travel. You guys have some money but don't pay for it. People that are cheap, they don't want to spend money. You guys spend money to make them, to invest in them yourself.
Speaker 2:I see it all the time like this cost me 10 grand. I would have paid 10 grand, absolutely. No problem because of the people that's in the room and the information that. I've learned and taken. I can make that happen.
Speaker 1:That's how you turn into seven figures, eight figures, whatever Exactly exactly.
Speaker 2:I think that can take you to other places. A lot of people are not willing to invest the money and time early on. If you can like, I went into debt to drive one, but it's honestly no, really really risky, really risky kind of no joke. But you know, obviously it paid off and you know I'm sure it did pretty too.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's what it is. You got to take the risk. I got stories like that one. I first saw it. It was like I had a baby on the way. My ankle went down dramatically Because I went off and started the business. You know, I don't know what the fuck am I going to do?
Speaker 2:But that's survival instinct. I'm telling a lot of people, especially when they're coming up, they don't have that survival instinct. When you're forced to take money or forced to do something, you can give them all their choice. You can get a lot of stuff.
Speaker 1:You're backs against the wall. You're going to ship. You've got to make this shit happen. You have to, you have to you have to give them all their choice. I fucking love it. That's a great way to end this. You know what I think? I think we've got to do another behind the scenes later on. There's a lot more stuff I want to touch upon. We'll touch bonus footage behind the scenes, okay, but, alita, thank you so much. This was fucking amazing. Great to have you on the show.
Speaker 2:I'm working with you too. Yeah, it's going to be a big year. It is going to be a big year. It already is and they'll turn it back now.
Speaker 1:They'll turn it back.
Speaker 2:They can throw whatever they wanted us, but we're ready, let's go, let's fucking go baby.