426: Get Stuff Done, Develop Your Team, Get Out More, and Scale with Advertising Professional Mike Arce

Robert Plank 0:00 marketer of the day number 426. get stuff done, develop your team get out more and scale with advertising professional, Mike RC. Hey, everyone, and thanks for listening. And we're talking right now with Mike RC. And Mike is the host of the top fitness business video podcast, which is called the GSD show. And he's also the founder and CEO of loud rumor, which is a seven figure advertising agency for small businesses in the fitness and wellness space. And Mike has helped over 25 major brands like orangetheory fitness, and his agency has worked with over 457, fitness and wellness companies throughout the world. And as a husband and father of four, Mike has created the time to do all of this while traveling to speak at many events across the country over the last two years. So Mr. Mike, glad to be talking to you. Thanks, man. Glad to be here. glad that you're here. So what is on your mind these days? What has you fired up?

Mike Arce 0:58 Well, first, let me just say that the BIOS since we sent it to you, which is like two weeks ago, we are actually over 500 clients now, which is pretty cool. But no, we I'm excited about the agency, we're getting to work with some amazing brands and franchisees and our team is excited, because you know, they're they're great customers for us. And every day seems to be a very fun day here right now.

Robert Plank 1:21 Awesome. So moving super quick paced, the buyer was already out of date, all kinds of fun things happen. And then yes, exactly. So do you think that there's something that that you in particular, or that your company does that's unique? That kind of gives you more of an advantage over everyone else?

Mike Arce 1:39 No, but a lot of people ask me that a lot of you'll see like, What's that one thing? What's the one thing that you do? And tell you the truth, man, you know, I answered it incorrectly the first few times. And I didn't know it was incorrect until people weren't successful with that one thing that I told them to do, which I was telling everybody, you got a niche, you got to pick a focus, which for me, it was fitness, and we just strictly focused on it. However, that wasn't the only thing. What I what I realized is before the six years prior to that, I was a part of a lot of entrepreneurial programs. And I really needed to make sure that I knew all the different facets of business. So sales, marketing, lead, you know, leadership, communication, all that stuff. I didn't really, I didn't really like learn that later, I learned that first The problem is I wasn't able to exercise it because the niching, which allowed me to get in front of a lot of people that would that didn't exist. So once I niched that got my brand in front of a lot of the right people, and then all the things I learned allowed me to scale that so you know, hiring people, developing people, selling people retaining people delivering great results, all those things are able to be exercised. So it's not just one thing, it's really having a great business. And also, that's why you take people like Shark Tank, all the people the cast on Shark Tank, Marcus lemonis, those guys are able to jump in businesses and industries that they've never been in, have no experience in, but they're able to be successful, because 90% of business is the same. It's just that 10% so I think a lot of people, they look for that 10% when they should be focusing on that 90%. And then that allows him to do more with that. 10% I think does it make sense at all, Robert? Yeah,

Robert Plank 3:32 it does. And I like that way of thinking a lot. And unfortunately, that's I don't know, it seems, it seems like I can only speak for myself. But it feels like that's that right? There is a lesson that I wish I had known years and years ago that that all businesses are kind of the same. And for for and I'm only kind of starting to get out of it now. But for a longest time, it was like, I thought that my business was unique and that I had to be all hands on. I couldn't delegate and I couldn't systematize and that just seemed like a real recipe to be like a glorified employee. Like I thought I was going from being an employee to being an entrepreneur. And I made a little bit more money from that. But I felt like I was putting in way more hours I was doing everything myself. And then all this time was passing and I was only making a little bit of progress. And if only I had looked at like you said more like a shark tank or more like a Marcus monus. Like, let me be the the chess masters so to speak. And let me see that if this if this is missing anything and has these things in place, and that if there is work to be done, how do I do that quickly, instead of trying to do it all myself. So I can relate to that in a ton of ways?

Mike Arce 4:37 Yeah, yeah, it's, you know, I think I think a lot of businesses fail. In fact, many businesses fail. But I think the reason they fail is because they you know, the massage therapists. She wants to get the coupons to become the best massage therapist so she figures if she gets certified in more things than anyone else. Oh, I do hot stone and I do Asian and I do you know all All these different types of massage, she figures, she gets more certifications, she knows more than any other massage therapist, she's going to be the most desired. But there's people out there that know maybe one type of massage. But they really understand how to define what their product is who their ideal customer is, how to get in front of that customer how to stand down and present what she does better than the competitors, and then how to build systems and processes around scaling and getting more clients than the average massage therapists can handle the same on a timeframe, that person will be more successful. But you know, the personal trainer wants to get all the certifications, the massage therapist wants to get all that the the advertising company wants to learn about all the different things they can do. When in reality, those things can't even be exercise if you don't have a business mentality behind it.

Robert Plank 5:45 So why do you think that so many people fall into that trap? Is it just a matter of like, going through the day to day and not having a real plan or not having that outside coach looking in? I mean, why does so many people fall into that trap? Like you just said, where they think they have to learn more or be smarter, when maybe they just need to be better business people and market themselves better? I mean, why do people kind of not take that leap they need to make?

Mike Arce 6:08 They just don't know it? Yeah, the coaching is a big part of it. So just yesterday, a couple days ago, I was at my son's basketball game. And he went through his legs like two or three times and didn't move an inch. And the coach yelled at him and said, Julian, why are you going through your legs so much? You're not even moving forward? You're just in the same spot. And that's what a lot of businesses do. They start doing all these new things, these fancy things, but it doesn't move them forward. So but that's because they don't know that you take people like Tim Duncan, who is a Hall of Famer, the guy I don't even know if he went through his legs, his entire career. 20 years in the NBA. He was Mr. fundamentals. That was actually his nickname. And so he had one of the best coaches of all time, and Popovich but yes, I think a lot of people you just don't know if you're ignorant to things and ignorant isn't a bad word, it's just ignorant means I just don't know, you're ignorant to it, you don't know. So I think more people need to be reading books like e myth and scaling up and the Rockefeller habits and just things that understand the principles of this business. And then whatever they do, it doesn't really matter. They're gonna be able to be born successful at that thing. I just don't think people even know they should do that, or they don't value it.

Robert Plank 7:19 Well, it's great that they're listening to you right now. So now maybe they're kind of waking up a little bit. And so was there was there like a moment or like some kind of event or something that that pushed you into this new way of thinking like, it's something happened where you had to make a change?

Mike Arce 7:33 I got lucky. So no. So I really, really lucky I, I became an entrepreneur because of, you know, a lot of bad stuff that happened. So I like a lot of entrepreneurs hit a rock bottom point, and then I hit that I thought that was rock bottom, but then it was more rock bottom that kept falling. So that's why I started a business. But for the first couple years, I was like everybody else where I was just wanting to keep develop, delivering a better product, the product was good already. I just didn't have a business mentality. And then I got real lucky. And I, I went to this one place, I just bumped into the CFO, the former CFO of Cold Stone Creamery. He was there when they had like 40 stores. And he was in there until they had over 1000. And we just hit it off. And he said, Let's go to lunch, we went to lunch. And he asked me what I was reading, and I didn't know what he was talking about. And then he started telling me what I'm talking to you guys about. And that opened me up to realize that, you know, it's not just about being a great advertiser, it's about being a great business person. And I'm a business owner advertising the service I deliver. But at the end of the day, I'm a business person at this point. So that he made me start reading and then I got hooked every book recommended other books. And so then I started getting coaching, as I saw on books, that was reading a lot of the best, most successful people have coaches, their coaches have coaches. And so, you know, I've spent over $150,000, in coaching, I've read over 250 business books, I spend, you know, a couple couple of grand, every quarter, just going to conferences, learning more about this stuff. I listen to podcasts, there's, you know, every day you have to dedicate to education on business, not advertising, or whatever you do business. And then, you know, you spend a little bit of time developing the product every day as well. But business has to be part of it.

Robert Plank 9:20 I like that a lot. And just like always be being curious enough to me, even if there's only time to read a page in the morning. I mean, imagine what that would add up to or if there's only time to, to open up the audible app in your phone and listen to 10 minutes on a run. I mean, again, that adds up to a lot. So yeah, you lucked out. You ran into the this guy who was high up in Cold Stone Creamery, and he kind of turned you on to you know, getting out more and reading and stuff like that. So after I mean, it's one thing to hear advice, right, but it's another thing to take action. So do you think that there was anything in particular that that kind of motivated you into doing having those better habits like I mean, Going out there to conferences and having lunch with people. It's a scary thing for a lot of people. So how the heck did you do it?

Mike Arce 10:06 I had a son. And then I had a daughter that was, you know, just born as well. And what I learned was, I saw my son who was at that point four years old, five years old, I realized that I never taught him how to walk. But neither did my wife. And you did anybody. nobody teaches anybody how to walk. Kids just learn how to walk, you encourage them, you put your arms out and you say, you know, come on, you can do it. That's it. You don't say, Okay, now the left foot now the right foot, even if you did say they wouldn't know what you're talking about. They just walk. And the reason they know how to walk is because they've been watching you do it for the last 10 to 13 months. And people can say, well, it's instinct. Okay, well, then how do you explain that same kid same age, picking up a toy phone and going Hello. That's not instinct. So they watch you, and then they do. And you can tell them all this stuff, but they don't do what you tell them. They do what they see you do. And I realized that I can tell my kid what every parent tells her kids, you know, do your best honey, just do your best. That's all I care, I don't care. If you mess up, just do your best. It's okay. If you mess up. Don't care what anybody thinks. You need to go out there and do it anyway. It's okay to fail failures part of it baby Just do it. They would say all this stuff, but how many adults are actually doing it. And so you could tell your kid do your best. But if you're not doing your best he's watching that. Or at least that's what he thinks best really is defined as he can you can tell him, don't worry if you mess up. But how many times z watching you mess up and keep moving forward. He can tell you not to care what everybody else thinks. But how many times he wants you care what everybody else thinks doesn't matter what you say it's what you do. So I realized that if I wanted to really get my son to get the most out of his life, I needed to do whatever I would want him to do. So whatever advice I would tell my son, that I need to follow that myself.

Robert Plank 11:50 I love it. That's That's great. So be a good example. And, and I think about I mean, I'm sure you think too about your childhood, I think more about moments of ways my parents acted, especially if like my parents, like, did something that was kind of kind of like I didn't like like if if one of my parents got angry or something, I remember that more compared to what they said. And I mean, I don't have kids. I don't know anything about raising kids. But I mean, wait till those kids are teenagers, they're really not going to listen to you. But they're sure as heck gonna get to see what what you're doing there. So, so that's great. So you kind of like looked for something else outside yourself, and then looked at Okay, well, it's not just about me, it affects other people, if I'm not kind of being my best self, but I'm not living the life that I'm supposed to be living.

Mike Arce 12:34 And, you know, I didn't even the thing is, you don't think about it until later. So, you know, my, I forgot all about a lot of stuff that went on with my dad. But then later on what started happening to me, and then I, I realized that I behaved a lot like him. So when I was in fourth grade, my dad entered a business deal, and he lost everything. He lost his entire life savings he worked so hard for, I saw my dad almost have a heart attack while I was in fourth grade. He was in his early 30s. And so but then I saw him work 18 hours a day, for like the next five to 10 years. I don't know where it was, you know, go by gut feeling whatever it felt like. But I remember watching the knick game with him. We were both Nick fans, he and I never missed the Knicks game. Never. But my dad worked at home. He was a jeweler. That's what he did. He fixed jewelry, pair jewelry. That's what he does. He had a bench in the basement. And in the other room of that same basement was the family room where the TV was. So we would be watching the game. And my job was to tell him every time the game was about to start, because whenever there was a timeout, my dad would run to the other side of the basement, and he'd do whatever work he could do in two minutes. And then once the game was on, I would go Dad, it's on. And he'd run back and he'd sit next to me you watch a game together. And then at halftime, you get a good 1520 minutes to work. And that's what he did. That's how much he worked. There was not one minute wasted. But he still spent time with me. And so I have four kids, I've coached 13 seasons of basketball. I've coached two seasons of baseball, two seasons of football, two seasons of soccer, I go to all the practices I go to all pretty much all the games I've missed maybe six out of like 280 or whatever it is. And so I go to all this stuff no matter what but at the same time, you know GSD that's the name of the show it stands for get shit done. I'm still moving forward and working my ass off to make sure that the company and everything that we're doing here is working together but the two are married together you know the the family time the business. And I didn't realize until I hit rock bottom until I started working that way naturally. No one taught me to work that way verbally. No one said might hit rock bottom. Here's what you got to do. You gotta work 18 hours a day, but somehow you got to find time for the family. No one verbally told me that. I just did it. And then I went back later on after I got myself out of the hole and realized that's what my dad did. And I could only I could only put my finger on the fact that I just I absorbed that, you know,

Robert Plank 15:04 yeah, that's, that's great. You absorbed it as a kid and it kind of stuck in there for when you needed later on. So and you mentioned your, your GSD show and your agency. And so can you kind of go into a little bit of detail about what your agency is exactly, and what the GSD show is, and, and like all the cool stuff you do,

Mike Arce 15:21 yeah, sorry, agency helps fitness studios and independent gyms. With their advertising, we get more leads for these people than anybody else period like we are in right now. And we do it through Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube. And that's what we do. The GSD show is a video podcast that we created form, it's really cool. It's like a sports center theme and everything that helps people in that industry succeeds. We bring in a lot of influencers, and they share their business knowledge, not just fitness knowledge, but business knowledge on how they can better grow their business. Now since then, that shows actually going to be going on a hiatus as I was asked to be the host of a show for a huge organization called mind body. And so it's duplicate content doesn't need to happen. So I'm actually now it's going to be the bold show. But I started a new show, Robert, and it's called the goat show. Do you know what goat stands for? No idea. No. So if I tell you Michael Jordan's ago, Tom Brady's ago, Muhammad Ali's to go You still don't know what it stands for if the first word is greatest, greatest of a time maybe of all time. So basically, every episode I interview somebody that's arguably the greatest of all time and whatever it is, they do so we are we are launching in January, we're interviewing 15 people before the end of the year. So we're gonna have 15 episode headstart. We've already interviewed john Lee Dumas Dennis you, Ryan deiss. Why not to interview Lewis Howes on Friday daymond John's coming on Russell Brunson Grant Cardone, all these guys are coming on arguable, goats and what they do. And the reason is, because what I told you, I get to sit down with these guys for you know, whatever time I'm on asking them questions, and I get to ask them whatever I want, learn from them, develop relationships with them. And to me, that's been the most valuable part of my business is not learning how to run an ad to get myself more customers, it's learning how to look at everything, the big picture, because I'm hanging out and learning from people that are far more successful for longer than I am. You know, and they've been doing it for longer. And sometimes, even if you're more successful than people in in general, they may be better than you at one thing. So you take like that average five year old kid that can destroy you in a video game. It's not that he's smarter than you, it's just that he's played it 1000 times. So he already knows what's going to happen, where the guy is going to come from, where the bullets going to come from. So he already knows cuz he's memorize things. And he could predict, whereas you are reacting to like what's coming at you. So I like to just learn from people in the dojo allows me to learn from the best

Robert Plank 17:56 I love. And I can relate to something similar with, you know, interviewing all these different people on the podcast, like some some little less than stuck. And then sometimes if I just keep hearing the same lesson over and over from, like, 1020 different guests, I think, Okay, well, all these people who have these like deep skills in other areas, if they all have this kind of common ground, and that's something that I really need to listen to. And so I'm curious, like, how do you reconcile the sort of the, I guess, like, grinding it out, versus the more the more like intangible stuff because like, on one hand, like, you know, networking and getting yourself out there, and all that's really important, but then there's also the time to kind of be back in the office and do the things that need work. And you can't have one without the other. Any, if you have too much without the other, like there's problems there. But how do you how do you view that? How do you know, if you're spending too much time in the office with just your team or too much time networking? I mean, what are your thoughts on that?

Mike Arce 18:50 Well, it depends on where you're at in your business. So if you're just starting right now, then you have to, you're building everything. So you've got to be in the office, because you're you're you're doing the sales, you're doing the marketing, you're doing the customer service, you're creating the processes and systems, as if you have employees so that when you do have employees, those things are already, you know, set up and ready to go and be trained on. So but you still got to make time to learn every day. But eventually, as you start developing your team, which should be a goal for you, is to be able to hire people that can start taking these hats off for you, then the majority of your time should be spent on that right right now, I probably spent a total of five to 10 hours a week in the office. And majority of it's really just developing the people here and spending time with them, and listening to their ideas. You know, optimizing some of the strategies we have in place, and just making sure everyone's got a really good place to work. That's all I really do. Outside of that the majority of my time is education, you know, reading a lot, listening to other podcasts, interviewing other people get and then keeping those relationships so I can find ways to continue meeting up with me After the podcast is over, so I, that should be a goal. But it's like kids, you know, when you first, when you first have a kid all your time is devoted to that kid because the kid can't do anything without you. The kid can't sit, the kid can't feed itself, the kid can't change its own diaper. But then over time, then you could start focusing on other things, because the kid becomes more can start running himself, you know?

Robert Plank 20:25 Yeah, yeah, I like that a lot. So basically, like, and it kind of any situation, when it's first going, and you're trying to, you know, work the bugs out, or whatever system you're building, and maybe you're doing some of it yourself, it's like you're doing maybe more work than then you can sustain more work than you think you had to. But then if you now that you're getting the kinks out, now that you're making this system yourself, then you know that at some point, you can hand it off to someone else, or refine your system better or do it easier. So it's kind of like, you know, like, if you're, if you're pedaling a bike at first, like, you have to work a lot. But once you get up to a certain speed, it's pretty easy to maintain that speed.

Mike Arce 21:00 Right? And developing people is extremely important. So like, you know, you say you take your kids, you can either be that kid that has to help your kid with home or that parent, you could either be that parent that helps your kid with homework until he's in high school. Or you could be that parent that really teaches your kid how to get ahead of the game early, so that he's ahead without you even having to help them. So then little by little, that means instead of you being involved in the homework stuff until high school, you don't have to be you can get out of that earlier. And that allows you to work on other things with him, which means you're able to develop them faster, you keep doing the same thing. Same thing with your people, you can be the person that's micro managing all your people and making sure they are running ads the way you tell them to do it. Or you could be teaching them where they can continuously learn how to run this, basically, where you would go to learn, teach them where to go, and then teach them the value of learning it so that they can start doing that on their own. And they're creating without you having to be there.

Robert Plank 21:59 Right, so that so that way you can keep on ramping up. And it's like if you're micromanaging too much. It's almost like if you raise a kid to shelter, then you're you're hurting them by doing more work for them. It's better if you can get them to learn this and do it themselves. If you're always

Mike Arce 22:15 micromanaging your kid you never have time to spend you never have time with your wife. Because you're constantly chasing the kid around Next, you know, it's 10 o'clock, and you're both like, I'm going to kill that kid. He just can't wait to go to bed versus you know, kid does his homework, I was on his own while he's doing his homework, you and your wife can have like a conversation.

Robert Plank 22:33 Have 30 seconds to yourselves, right?

Mike Arce 22:35 Yeah. And you're you could work on yourself, which helps you work on the household, you know, just in general. So work on the things in the house, you know, things that you have to do for your own financial. So the more you can get the people in your tribe to be self sufficient and be self thriving, the easier it is for you to work on the things that allows I tried to grow.

Robert Plank 22:58 So did you experience any sort of those hiccups when it when it came to growing your tribe when it came to getting these clients or building your team, anything that you wish you'd known going in?

Mike Arce 23:09 I wish I knew everything I knew now going in, there's not one thing. But you can't learn it all at once. So I would say you know, if you're just starting out, and you haven't read, read the book e myth revisited first by Michael Gerber. Because that really just helps you understand what the small business owners need to understand. And then outside of that, I mean, just just read like books like tools of Titans to find out what the highest performers are doing and how they're doing it. And you got it, you want to be great. You want to study great people. That's as simple as that, you know, you, you want to learn how to how to do anything you want to you want to study from people that are already doing that thing better. And I think a lot of people just work hard on trying to figure it out themselves. And they waste a ton of time and and straining on not just on you, but on your family. They have to wait longer for you to figure it out, too. Right. I

Robert Plank 24:02 mean, time you'll never get back. And then the other downside of that. And I mean, I think you know, I can relate to this in a lot of other people can I think too is like, if if you make things too hard on yourself, then you kind of have that that limiting belief in your head that like, Oh, yeah, building a business was real hard. Well, yeah. Because you made a way to harden yourself that it had to be making a website or building a business, all that stuff. And it's like maybe that that act itself of building a business doesn't have to be hard, but maybe the way that you yourself did it is hard. And I haven't read tools of Titans yet but even if that's one of those books, like I mean, I completely agree with you. I can't recommend that one enough. I think I read it five years ago only read at once. So I should probably read it again. But I read it five years ago and I still think about that like a couple of times a week. I was even thinking about this morning. I love that one and that just really helped to get out of my headspace in that. Oh yeah, this whole time I thought that like I was I was the boss and well no it seemed at this whole time I was my own work. And what need to do is hire workers. And then if that becomes too much, then have the managers take care of the workers and kind of build this beast so that way, that way, I can kind of multiply time and get everyone else to doing all these things that I wasn't able to do myself. So kind of a hard lesson to learn, and you kind of have to get over the ego a little bit and let go a little bit and take a little bit of those risks. But I mean, great reminders, and I definitely need to hop on tools of Titans. Is there any like one kind of tip in particular from that from tools of Titans that stands out to you so that I have like a motivation to get into that book?

Mike Arce 25:36 No, there's no one tip. Because it's gonna there's every two pages is like another person, there's hundreds of people that this guy interviewed. So the thing is, you got to find what works well for you. But for for the audience, I want to actually summarize the most valuable thing in E myth, because I think, if you can just think about this at all times, you're solid, you want to build your business, like you're going to sell it, whether you're going to sell it or not, you want to build it like you're going to sell it. So have you ever sold a house, when you're about to sell your house, the very first thing you do before you list it is you fix it, you go in it the sinks not working you pay, you get a fix, if the yard looks like crap, you go fix the yard, if the tiles got dirty grout, you clean the grout like the P fix of the paint, you do all these things, you invest maybe five to 10 grand into the house, knowing that that will allow the perceived value to go in the 40 to 50 grand and also move the sale faster. You do that for that reason. Now, the cool thing is, we did that. And as soon as we spent like 6500 bucks, we spent it we fix the house up, we looked at the house we were excited to sell and now we go, man, I kind of like this place. Now I don't want to leave, you know. And I think when you're building your business, you should always build it as if and constantly do things as if you're going to sell it. So the girl that the massage therapist that once you get all those certifications, that's great. Well, if you're selling the business and you don't come along with it doesn't matter how many certifications you have no one wants your business. Because it depends on you that personal trainers get all the certificate, that's awesome. But if you're selling and you're leaving, well, then what's the guy going to do with your business, it means nothing without you. So you want to build your business as if you're going to sell to someone else, and you're not going to be a part of it. And it's going to be just as valuable without you. And if you can do is that? Two great things. One, if you want to sell it, it's got more value to if you don't want to sell it, it's yours. How awesome is that? So it's that's the best thing I got from E myth. And that's the way I look at the business at all times.

Robert Plank 27:39 I love it. So it's it's a win win if you want to stay in or you want to sell it either way you win as long as you do these right things and you do these right steps. And so I mean, it's so great stuff. So how can people find the GSD show? And how can people find loud rumor along with anything else you got going on?

Mike Arce 27:56 So for me you can go to Mike RC dot live. That's MIT e Mike and an AR c e RC dot live. The GSD show.com will take you to the podcast for the GSD show. A loud rumor calm loud rumor woba that'll take you to our agency site.

Robert Plank 28:15 super great. So three easy things to remember Mike RC dot live the GSD show calm and then loud rumor calm if you want to check out the agency. So thanks so much, Mike for stopping by and Kevin, that blend of really good advice and really great stories and really great examples. And for kind of reminding us that, you know, it's not all about one thing. I mean, like it's really tempting to say like, out of all the things like here's the one thing that made all the difference, but like you said, you got to always be curious, always be kind of moving in that next direction. Always be talking to people, you need to talk to reading what you need to read. So if we were just to say like, it's just one thing, well, then that would kind of cheap to everyone else. Because it's like, well, here's like maybe number one on the priority list. But now we're missing out on items two through 20. So so great. So and also that also that reminder that everyone is unique. Everyone's on our own path. So again, if we were to kind of overgeneralize and say, Well, this one thing everyone everyone needs to take away from will ever all of us are on our own journey. All of us are at different parts in our business depending on what we want. So great reminders all across the board and best of luck to you and building your agency to maybe to 1000 clients or 5000 clients wherever it ends up at can't wait to see what you end up creating. And thanks so much for stopping by. Thanks a lot, Robert. Appreciate it. Go right now to marketer of the day.com slash iTunes to subscribe to the show. Listen to other episodes and rate and review the show