Mastering Chaos with Automation, Strategy, Leadership with Clate Mask

and those three transformative habits are wake up early plan your weeks and do quarterly retreats to evaluate the past quarter and plan the next quarter welcome to the let's talk business podcast a project of the PEX group gain valuable actionable ideas from the world's top Business Leaders to help you take the next step in your business journey and now here is your host Manny Hoffman comic to you from the PX headquarters in Brooklyn New York this is the podcast for No Nonsense advice to help you learn grow and lead today I'm so excited to Welcome Back Our Guest clay mask Clay is the co-founder of keep formerly infusion soft and in our conversation we uncover valuable insights from Clay's journey and revolutionizing small business operations through Automation and his latest book conquer the chaos 2.0 clay shares is inspiring Journey from developing a CRM tool for direct response marketers to creating a comprehensive automation platform that empowers small business owners he emphasizes the importance of achieving not just growth but also profitability and freedom providing key takeaways that can help entrepreneurs Elevate their operations to new heights in this episode we also explore the roller coaster of Entrepreneurship focusing on the critical aspects of mindset personal vision and the rhythm of execution Clayton and I delve into personal stories and research back strategies to help you navigate the height and lows of running a business learn how setting personal goals separate from business objectives can assure a fulfilling life beyond the dream of your Enterprise without further Ado here is my interview with clay [Music] mask clay mask thank you so much for joining me on the Le business podcast Manny great to be with you it's been a while yeah absolutely so for our listeners uh is this is not the first episode I'm doing with Clay very early on and this is going back probably two two and a half years we had you on the show um and for our listeners that did not listen to that episode I encourage you to go back and listen we'll also put this in the show notes um so we'll just do a brief introduction as far as the past and how you got started and then ultimately um now where keep is um you know the company keep is is up to but I really want to focus a lot on the recent book you just published which is 2.0 of conquer to ks awesome that sounds great I look forward to it okay so our listeners that never heard clay MK never heard about you never heard me speaking about keep or anything like that tell us a little bit about what you know how you got started to this space of Automation and ultimately what's keep all about yeah maybe just to cut right to the chase then I'll give a little background so keep is small business automation we help small businesses grow by automating their entire business from marketing to sales service internal operations and helping them not just grow the business but do it Prof profitably get the freedom that they want because so often small businesses even if they're growing they're not getting the The Profit the freedom and it you know it causes causes frustration because we we don't achieve what we were after in the first place so that's what we do it's all about automating small businesses and the way we got started was many years ago we began working with some people in marketing they're direct response marketers and they needed to automate the followup in their in their um direct response marketing campaigns so we worked with them created a CRM product started helping them to automate these campaigns and at the time there was no such thing as marketing automation it didn't even exist was it called manage Pro CRM or something yes wow that's a blast from the past that's right yeah it was it was like a CRM product that that was kind of marketing flavored and then more and more direct response marketers began using it because they realized that they could automate their campaigns and make sure that the followup was happening that the right message was going to the right person at the right time whether it was by email or direct mail or a phone call or or what have you and so that's how it got started it got started as a CRM product that was sort of geared toward direct response marketers and I I remember if we go back the you know in the memory lane I remember the the term that I've used when I searched for a product until I got to the product I think at that point I don't remember what the name was I think maybe it was already called infusion s just had the black and red logo at the time yeah and I was actually frustrated because I I we had different Services we offered everybody was in a different date that we need to reach out we need to collect payment different things and I said it got to be a better way of having multiple Excel files at the time and that's when I reached out to um um um and and I found I found the software and and I've been connected ever since and I think for our listeners I just have to do this this disclaimer because we've had many episodes on the concept of Automation in general and I think I think um just to let our audience know now we're talking about keep which is an actual product it's not just automating and and connecting one app to the other which obviously it is one of those apps that you would connect to but we're talking about the concept of automating you part of your sales and marketing even for internal use within the CRM within the software itself as well so and obviously I think uh people that don't know more about keep um don't know that obviously I think the term automation wasn't even a thing when you started right that's right in fact um I remember you know marketing automation was not a category people you know there people didn't really understand it and I remember us talking about it saying well what do we call this thing because you know we're we're doing this automated followup to to to you know in these marketing campaigns and and we decided to call it marketing Automation and I remember it sounded so strange like that like as the words came out it felt like saying purple zebra or something it's like it was just such a it it wasn't a thing nobody understood it but marketing automation came you know for small businesses came to be what we do and it you know it just started to take off and and what hap what's happened over the years is that once people start automating their marketing they start to see oh wait I I want to automate automate the sales process and then I want to automate everything I can after the sales process and the customer you know the customer service experience and then where the where the magic really happens is people start to automate everything internally and when they begin to automate their internal workflows their internal Sops um that's that's when I think people really get hooked on Automation and just just a a really fun way obviously we'll we'll we'll get back to some of the Automation and some of it how it actually applies to Everyday businesses but obviously I owe you a lot of gratitude and I think we have discussed it in the for in the the in in the past um episode and we spoke about it a lot and it's because two things I think you're leading your company from the heart um obviously it's been something that I've been able to mimic and work alongside when we the way we have built PEX throughout the years when we spoke when we speak about culture leadership and so so on and so forth I'll never forget those moments um sitting in the headquarters of of keep and having those I think it was called the um um the leaders for Elite Form Elite for elite Forum yes yeah and having those aha moments as far as leadership and understanding really how how leaders need to react and how leaders need to be able to drive their business forward and their people and so on and so forth and also leads me to the conversation is that as much as you built a product you had the heart for the small business owner and and I think it comes from you know speaking about your book conquer the chaos you had the first version and now you came out with the second version which is ultimately it's not just a product and and here's a product that you could offer and it's a better solution than anybody else um as you said before you opened up a new category because you saw the chaos in small business and you saw where the bottlenecks are that's Lally that's not allowing them to grow so I guess what was the what was the premise of the first book and what have you seen you know in the process last couple of years where you decided you know what it's time for an upgrade yeah the first book was really about marketing Automation and what's possible for small businesses when they do that and over the last decade plus since the book came out what's happened is automation has spread all across the business and what's happened is the technology that's available to people has improved dramatically and and what's happened is the world has changed and now there's Ai and there you know there's so many different components to what small businesses can do the world has changed a lot and our product has changed a lot to enable customer small business customers to automate and so I started to feel about a year ago I said to Scott my my co-founder and co-author I said you know I think that we need to do a new version of the book I think we need update it because if you look at our product now what you know what it is now versus what it was back then and if you look at what's happening in the in the world and in the market I just think it's time for an update so Manny I thought I was going to update about 20% of the content and it it turned into about 90% new it was it was so there was so much that changed and I'm so excited about the book I I love the book it truly is the book I wish I could have read 20 years ago as a entrepreneur and so it is conquer the chaos the six keys to success for entrepreneurs and it's the three personal keys and the three business Keys that's really what it's all about is helping helping entrepreneurs be successful but not just in their business in their personal lives because you know I define success in the book as balanced growth in your business and personal life yeah you know it's a it's a line that I've used many times in Dave Ramsey which is a business will never outgrow as leader yeah yeah and which means in every given a time like if if you are not growing yourself on the same parallel with your business ultimately one of them will out you know um at one one of them will will actually stay flat yeah let's dive into some of those those the six um the six um pillars of of the book and then maybe uh we'll dive into one of them or two just to to give our audience a little bit of a taste okay that sounds great so um I'm happy to take it however you want I can I can explain the three personal keys three business keys if you'd like is that would that be most useful yeah absolutely okay so what you know you kind of have to start with the fact that entrepreneurship is really fun and exciting and challenging you know there's trials and triumphs but amidst all of that there is a tendency for the Dark Side of Entrepreneurship to emerge and I've you know I didn't really talk about this in the first book but over time I've been able to see this and i' I've I've watched it in entrepreneurs and customers all across the the Spectrum in small business and what I see is that whether we are dealing with a ma major trials and challenges or whether we are dealing with great triumphs in our business there is a dark side to entrepreneurship that pulls the small business owner into it and it it's like you almost become enveloped by the business you know wrapped up up in the business and it it consumes so much more of you than you thought you were going to need to give to the business when you started it and so this Quest For Freedom kind of gets you know it kind of gets Stamped Out and and even people will say yeah but when the business is really successful it actually happens almost more when the business is successful because we kind of become addicted to it we get so enamored with the business that it crowds out everything else in our lives and so you know I one of the reasons I wrote the book B is because I had become personally acquainted with the dark side and coming very close to seeing what that looks like and and I had seen it with so many friends and family members and customers and partners and so to me this book is a a labor of love as much as it is what I've learned over 20 years you know more than two decades now in serving small business and so you have to start with that premise I think on that note is um and I've I speak to so many business owners myself as well the the exactly for the reason they started the business all of a sudden they get sucked in and ultimately say at one point I wake up why why am I doing this you know I thought I'm doing it for a totally different reason and a a matter of fact it's taking more of my time more of everything right no you're you're exactly right and um and and so they they feel you know sort of disenchanted with the business sometimes they get really frustrated with it or their family gets frustrated with it so when you start with with that you go okay well how do then how do we achieve success how do we get balanced growth in our business and our personal life and you know this these three personal Keys come from lots of research um literally millions of dollars spent with consultants and coaches I mean this is not just something I came up with one one day and it's it's it came by the way in the in the first edition I didn't write nearly much nearly as much about the personal side I did talk about the mindset but but I hadn't I didn't have the the perspective yet of having done this for Two Plus decades and seen it with hundreds of thousands of entrepreneurs and so I'm so grateful for that opportunity and what I've had the the ability to to do and and see over the past couple of decades but so here are the three the three keys to to success from the business side for the or from the personal side for the entrepreneur the first one as I mentioned is mindset it all starts with the mindset and you know and people say 99% of success is between the ears it's absolutely true because we take actions based on what we think and we and so when we get our thoughts right it it actually drives the actions that um that lead to success so we've got to we've got to cultivate a mindset of success that's number one number two it's not just a mindset that is you know propelling us in any particular direction it's we've got to get a vision that of Our Lives it's a personal Vision so I'm not talking about the business Vision I'm talking about the personal vision and when we get that personal Vision now we can start to channel our mindset and our energy in the in the right direction and then the last one is what I call the rhythm of execution so it's one thing to have a personal Vision with a plan but how we execute that on a daily weekly monthly quarterly annual you know there's a rhythm to it and by the way I I I call it a rhythm not a routine I call it a rhythm not a rut I call it a rhythm because entrepreneurs we can do amazing things with rhythm but if we get stuck in ruts uh we we lose our creativity we lose the we lose the ability to to produce amazing outcomes and so the three personal keys are mindset vision and Rhythm and those are on the personal side and in the book I lay out how to achieve that how to put together how to get your mind mindset right how to get your how to set your vision personally most most entrepreneurs haven't done this they set the vision for their business but they don't set and you know we we go through this Vision setting in Elite as you might recall on the business side but it was so fun to go back and write the V the you know the second uh edition of the book and put time into the vision creation for our lives and then the rhythm of how we execute to that hey listeners are you struggling to create beautiful looking proposals is it a hassle every time you need to prepare a quote or proposal for your clients is collecting signatur still a manual process well it's time to upgrade to pandadoc at PX we use pandadoc for all our proposals employee documentation and so much more it saves us time keeps everything organized and our documents look incredibly professional with customizable templates real-time collaboration and E signatures padoc turns creating documents into quick and easy steps plus it integrates with so many other tools streamlining your workflow and boosting productivity try pandadoc today by visiting px. c/ pandadoc and start your free trial trust me it's going to be a game changer for your business that's pte x.p da do yeah I you know I I love this I have this P peeve where I would St you know speak to a business owner I would say do you have any any personal goals he says yes and he starts rambling off everything ask for the business and I said no no I'm talking about your personal life I said what do you mean this is H and and you know people that listen to me for a while no I have a very similar process on on creating your you know the four tires of of a car which is the spiritual health financial and family goals and and on the personal side and for our listeners that don't know about it they can download it from PEX group.com gos and I've gone through this exercise with hundreds of entrepreneurs and and it's such a eye openening um exercise as you mentioned your own personal vision and the reason for that is because you are disconnected from your business you also have a business you could see phenomenal successful entrepreneurs that might have they would have phenomenal personal lives and they might have multiple businesses in their career so you can't give away your whole life for that one division of the business yeah you have to have your own vision of what's important to you yeah that that is so well said and it's very very common when you look at the uh all the programs out there for entrepreneurs they are about building the business you know and and and they should be I mean the business is you know what we think about as entrepreneurs but if the entrepreneur hasn't take time taken time to get clear on their personal vision and how the business fits into it then then the business takes over and and so when you get you know people might hear this and go okay yeah sure sure well that's that's great but how you actually do it is what I go through in the book I you know I lay out your life Vision which is the Life vision is made up of your identity your purpose your values your mission and your goals and and once you get your identity right you know all of the all of the science around habit set about setting habits and establishing those it's all very clear that when our mind is set to the right identity then habits take of you know to take over very naturally and so you know I go from Key you know the number one key is mindset and then I go right into Vision that starts with well take that mindset and get it get your identity right because once you're clear on your identity then the rest of your vision can start to fall into place and that vision is a purpose this you know should sound familiar on what we talked about in Elite because on it's the same thing on the personal side once you get your identity then it's your purpose why you exist your values how you go about living your life and your mission what you're up to in your life and and that's a it's not an easy thing to just Discover it one day it takes a little time to work at but when when you put your time your your your mind to it you can really establish that purpose that values your values your mission and then you create the goals and you know I I explain how you set the goals in five areas of life and this is where the balance really comes into play and it's the of the Crux of the whole thing the five areas of life for an entrepreneur that I recommend and that I take them through in the book are um physical spiritual social business and financial and sometimes people will say well aren't business and financial the same thing and I say no no no you can have your business goals and your you know your life Vision does have to have some drive towards your business goals but a lot of times the business goals can be happening but it's not coming translating into the financial goals that you have for saving or investing or creating the wealth that you want for your family and so you have to have business goals and financial goals and the social goals you know those can incorporate your hobbies your leadership your you know the different um different areas that bring some balance to your life some fun and enjoyment and then of course your physical is taking care of your body and your spiritual is making sure that you are tuned spiritually to what matters most and that's really critical because a lot of times the business will start to play games with us and we lose sight of what matters most so when you think about the vision it's identity purpose values Mission goals and those goals broken into five areas once you've got those goals laid out then it like it goes right into the rhythm of execution of how you work on those five goals breaking them down from Lifetime to 10 year threee one year quarterly monthly weekly and where the magic happens which is in the daily morning Mastery as I call it yeah so what I loved about the book is the part um on the Rhythm part because there's a lot of people that will hear a good podcast will listen to um to a good audio book or or actually read a good book or even a lecture and they'll speak about the importance of setting goals and they'll might do the exercise of actually setting goals but if they don't F figure out how they're going to execute it it stays a piece of paper yes and and it's okay to start slowly if you have that mindset you have to go but if you find that Rhythm what works for you and and you get that you know almost that H hold holding your hand as far as what comes first what comes second you it becomes bite-sized pieces that you can start executing if you start executing you start seeing results if you see your results it builds momentum to do more and more and more yes yep that's exactly right and and um you know I I talk about this in the book and I I tell people as I lay it all out I say look this might be a lot for you you know you this you're you're going to say whoa this is a whole bunch of stuff and and saying well here are the principles of success and instead of getting overwhelmed by all that it is break it down to the most critical aspects and I in the book I call it the three transformative habits they will they will transform a life if if people will do these three things and it's where it's where the Life vision and the rhythm of execution comes together and those three transformative habits are wake up early plan your weeks and do quarterly retreats to evaluate the past quarter and plan the next quarter I am confident that when people do those three things they will shape an extraordinary life wow so let's let's turn to the business side of things so the three uh the three parts of uh that goes into the business planning yeah so the three uh the three keys to business uh on this business success are strategy Automation and Leadership and strategy actually breaks into two parts it's the customer strategy and the company strategy and so the company the customer strategy is all about who we are for our customers what we do you know what's the what do we deliver for them and and and and how do we systematically deliver for our customers to produce great customer success great you know customer satisfaction and happiness that's the customer strategy and we we talk about that all the time as executing a a customer life cycle you know you get your your customer strategy in place your customer life cycle in place and then it's all about effectively moving the customer through your life cycle through a process of followup and as you know most small businesses don't grow effectively because the follow-up breaks down they don't have a good customer strategy and and good customer followup so we help them get clear on that in this the customer aspect of strategy then we go to company strategy and this is where it's about your purpose your values your mission as a company now not not as the individual but as the company and so that's that strategy then automation is really about automating that customer life cycle so that instead of having a lead come is come in you know a lead comes in and you've got to kind of work that lead through a manual process you want to automate it as much as possible and have the manual intervention apply when necessary and and then it should be that way all the way through the customer experience and you can do that that through the marketing the sales the service even your internal operations can be driven through that kind of automation M yeah people confuse automation with okay I'm I'm taking away the Personal Touch automation is totally not that automation is actually just to create that process automate those steps sometimes that might be getting you sending you an email who you need to follow up with one1 yes and then creating that Personal Touch through the through the follow-up because you can do that through automated followup that's very personal and and um especially with AI that takes into account all of the you know the interactions that you've had with them key pieces of information um you know it's just it's really fun to create personalized automated followup especially with AI I want to speak about the the final key which is leadership and I think this is something so important and and something that obviously I've seen you demonstrate with the the the full leadership team at uh at keep all these years I have a fundamental question when it comes to leadership in general which is something that I've heard a lot of other business owners um wrestle with is let's say they starting a company small business they have two or three or four employees already in the company how much of the vision of the company is based on the leader founder versus how much do they need to bring in their team in in creating that strategy of where the company's going as a whole yeah this is such a great question Manny because the answer is neither a dictatorship nor a democracy it's in between and there's a co-creation that needs to occur because if you if if it's if you just come down and say well here the you know here's the way it is you know um it doesn't work so well you know I think we all know what happens when you just put something in stone come down from the mountain and say here it is everybody you know they tend not to follow too well so so on the other hand if you as the leader just say okay well we're just gonna all create this together you you lose some of the direction and understanding and inherent wisdom that the founder has and and so that's not a good outcome either and the way that I describe it is the smaller your organization the higher the percentage of the entrepreneurs you know fingerprints are on the plan obviously if it's just you then it's going to be not all you by the way it'll be mostly you and then you'll go get some perspective from some advisers some friends some other people because if it's just you living in an echo chamber that doesn't work either so now what if you have five people well then it should have you know maybe it starts to look like it's about half you and about half the others that have you know kind of have their perspective and if it's about 10 people maybe it's about 30% you and it starts to you know and and it's like well people go okay well I hear that but how do you actually do it and here's how you do that we teach this in Elite as we teach leaders how to set their vision and get everybody in alignment to it and it's an iterative process and the more people you have the the more the more people that are in the company the more the more employees you have in the company the the more iterations you have in the process so if it's if it's uh you know you and a handful of people you kind of come up with a very rough draft and and this is really really important if you bake it too much then your team can't really shape it with you so you come up with kind of a very rough draft and then you spend time together working on it and then you might set it on the shelf and come back a week later and spend a little more time working on it and you spend a little time strengthen it getting to the point where it's like 90% of the way there that you can say okay this is our working draft let's work at it this way for the next you know maybe two to three months and then we'll revisit it and kind of finalize it now if you've got 25 people in your business you need to add an extra an extra an extra iteration to that where the leader does a very rough draft and then the team kind of puts together a draft and then the the the leadership team and then they start to bring in some of the employees and get them on board with it and and then only once you've kind of got everybody noding their heads you don't need perfect unanimity but you need people like yeah this is it like this is you know we're going in the right direction here then you publish it with the word draft in big word big letters on it so people know that it's a working draft and you spend two or three months and invariably there'll be some a few words here a few things that'll change and you can tighten it down now you've got you know in a period of 90 days or so you've got your go forward plan of how you are running the business with your purpose your values your mission um and that's that's what then everything begins to execute to and that leads to the the third the third key to success which is leadership and frankly it's taking that strategy that we just talked about and then hiring coaching and firing to it and that leadership is the is the key yeah so so I want to ask you um another question because um we were speaking about company culture I know that throughout the years um you have been a a huge advocate of creating a a culture of Excellence H you know it's not just about perks it's not just about cereal it's not about babysitting service it's about a culture of excellence in a company we've seen a lot companies spend a lot of money on culture and then sometimes they'll have private Equity VCS come in destroy the culture so to speak but it's all about the bottom line and and the one of the reasons sometimes they're disconnected from the business but a lot will depend will because on the p&l they don't see Roi on company culture we need to set the record straight how do you justify spending money on company culture um as a good Roi for the company um that is such a great question and let me just double down on your point that so often when we just you know count the beans and look at the numbers we miss how important the people are that make it all work and so you know I think you've got to subscribe to a theory that says people before prophets and the prophets will follow and that's very important if you just say people before profits you might lose sight of the fact that we we are in business to create profit we need to do that um but if you just say hey you know we're all about prophets and the prophets will follow you miss the key point that it it the profits follow because you have great people that are doing great things and are aligned to the vision the purpose values and mission of the company so I appreciate your point and I would say we we have to understand that profits happen in a business because of great products and great people and great process that we put in place this is you know automation is what what drives this right so people you you know Pro people products and process are what produce the profit and if we don't subscribe to that theory then we end up going and you know wagging the you know wagging the dog by the tail because we think we've got a hold of profits but we don't realize that it's it's people and pro products and and process that actually produce that so I appreciate your point and I and maybe the you know it's easy to say these things in in concept but this is where putting your purpose values mission in place and truly hiring and coaching and firing to it is so crucial and it's what I would say is probably the the most um misunderstood aspect of leadership that it's really about establishing that culture you know PE people see leadership and they think it's standing up in front of people and you know let's go take the hill and speaking and and but you know that's a that sometimes leadership manifests itself that way but it's really about being clear on the core being clear on the purpose of the company why we exist the values of how we go about doing what we're doing and the mission that we're up to and when you do that and you do that in a in a very intentional way then all of the manifestations of leadership sort of happen naturally they you know the the standing up and speaking it and the you know um getting on getting getting out in in you know in in media and being able to uh rally the troops when there's a challenge or you know all those things those come out of of a Clarity around our purpose our values our mission and getting those Rock Solid and hiring to it coaching to it and F coaching to it and firing to it got it um you have built a company from the ground up and obviously with technology you've been uh throughout the years you've been pivoting the product and iter like different iteration of the products in order to adapt to what the market needs and ultimately what small businesses um um need you've always had like as I mentioned before a soft spot to small businesses and the book um title is is um you know Conquering the chaos yeah let me ask you point in blank is there a way is there a possibility to tell business owners that yes you could conquer the chaos or businesses there's always going to be a chaotic moment in a business life it is possible to conquer the chaos um and it is it is not something that you just have to accept as part of growing pains in small business some people just say oh I you know just I just accept it and those are the same people that say oh there's you know balance is a is not something you can actually achieve um now having said that it doesn't mean that there's never any chaos chaos and there's never any imbalance so let me let me talk about chaos the way I talk about balance in the book at the beginning when I say we should strive for balance in our business and personal life and I say success is balanced growth in our business and personal life I fully acknowledge that there are times of imbalance and so if we're going to be so rigid and literal to say well you know I'm not living a balanced life because yesterday at 4:30 in the afternoon I was you know totally out of balance that's not it it's it's much like walking a a if you think of a balance beam and I I describe it this way in the book when you're on a beam it's it's very clear that you're either on or you're off but in business and in life it's more like a path and the the reality is we weave back and forth across that path and sometimes we're on the path and sometimes we're off the path in other words sometimes we're on balance and sometimes we're off balance but the real key is to not stray so much that you can't get back on quickly it's to it's to be moving ever you know ever striving to be on that path and the more we do that the higher the percentage of time that we're on the PA that we on balance and so I I completely reject the notion that we should not strive for balance and I also accept that sometimes we're going to be out of balance but life in and business are about working at being in Balance okay so take that analogy and you can all imagine you know we can all imagine that we that we that we Veer off of the the path of balance at times but if we're if we're committed to it our deviations become more and more slight and our our percentage of time on the path is greater and greater now take that analogy and apply it to chaos and where chaos in a business is things feel out of control where um we're spinning our wheels and not really getting traction where there's complaints and frustrations from employees and customers and family members where there just don't seem to be enough hours in the day and we wish we could replicate ourselves where things are slipping through the cracks left and right and you've got egg on your face because you've dropped the ball with a customer or you know an important partner or whatever that's what chaos looks like but we don't have to accept that and we don't have to say well that's just the way it is and we can actually work at plugging the holes in our business so that we don't have time and money leaking out which is what you know if you just had to simp simplify and say well what is small business cast it's the Leaky bucket that time and money is just dropping out of and you can all we can all feel it and it causes lots of frustration ation well we can plug the holes it's very possible and we can get we can do that through effective strategy and effective um Automation and effective leadership and um you know certainly when we have the personal side with our mindset vision and Rhythm we can feel very different about running our business and that comes as we execute purpose values as we execute our mindset vision and Rhythm yeah beautiful so business owners you just hear it um and if you need to rewind it and hear it again um there is place um to conquer the chaos but again I think it starts with your personal side and it starts with mindset as the most important piece as you mentioned between air and air because once you have the proper mindset and you know where you're putting your heart and work and the da activities too ultimately you're much more in control versus you know you running the day versus the day running you and everything going in chaos that's right and I don't speak as a theorist this this is not Theory you know to conquer the chaos is not Theory it is practice but it is practice and as I say in the book practice makes progress It's not practice makes perfect practice makes progress that's what we're after the progression where more and more we're reducing the chaos we're getting rid of it and we're feeling that growth The Profit the freedom in our business that we want beautiful how could people find out more about the book or even keep in general yeah you bet so they can go to conquer thee chaos book.com and there's a bunch of free resources there I you know from on the mindset um or on the personal keys to success there's um there's resources there for the business Keys as well so conquer thee chaos book.com and if they want to work on their the holes in their business and plugging those holes and getting their customer strategy right um we do what we call a growth Playbook and they can go to keep.com Playbook it's keap like keep going we didn't even talk about the the meaning of keep but it's all about keep going keep serving keep growing your business so keep.com Playbook and you can you can learn how to get your own uh Playbook there it's great for the links resources mentioned this episode check out the show notes at www.p group.com podcast and as I said in the beginning we'll also link to the first episode with Clay so if you did not listen to that one um we'll go back and listen to that one as well let's close with the four rapid fire questions are you ready I'm ready number one book that change your life Think and Grow Rich amazing number two a piece of advice you got that you'll never forget uh the the the fortune is in the followup the fortune is in the followup number three anything you wish you could go back and do differently yes when we raised capital I would have brought it into the business in tranches in pieces instead of like doing it all at once it has a it creates an arrival syndrome that you you just can't unwire people from that got it and last and final question what's still on your bucket list to achieve I have not been to Italy with my wife just the two of us so that is on my bucka list cool clay thank you so much for joining us I know your time is valuable that is why in the name of our listeners we'll forever be grateful for sharing some time with us today it's been a blast thanks so much man it's been awesome I appreciate all you [Music] do that's my conversation with clay mask my takeaway from this one number one embrace automation automate various aspects of your business operations from marketing and sales to internal processes to achieve growth profitability and freedom number two use comprehensive tools utilize platforms like keep to censorize and streamline your business processes enhancing efficiency and Effectiveness number three understand the evolution of Technology stay updated with technological advancement like AI to leverage new tools and strategies for business growth number four develop a personal Vision separate your personal goals from your business objectives to ensure a fulfilling life beyond dreams of your Enterprise and number five Implement customer life cycle automation automate customer follow-up processes to ensure consistent and effective engagement leading to higher satisfaction and retention and that's a wrap for today's episode of the let's look business podcast I hope you enjoyed the Practical non-nonsense advice that our guest shared if you found value on listening I would be so grateful if you could share the episode with your friends and if you could give the show a five-star rating on Apple podcast or wherever platform you listen subscribe to the show and get notified every time we publish a new episode the letto business podcast is a Pex group original production until next time make it a great day [Music]