On this episode of Investing for Freedom, Mike is joined by guest Andrew Neary. Mike and Andy discuss a multitude of topics such as the importance of building a personal brand, comparing yourself with other peoples’ success, and how effective just showing up every day is. Andy discusses his background and how his greatest setback in life helped him achieve his success.
“I spent too much of my life trying to be perfect, avoiding failure and being very intimidated by what others thought of me. Just getting rid of those limiting beliefs has done wonders for my business and my life.”
FIND | ANDREW NEARY:
Website: andyneary.com
Podcast: Bullpen Sessions
HIGHLIGHTS:
0:00 – Intro
0:52 – Mike asks Andy who has had the greatest impact on his life
2:59 – Not caring what others think and not being afraid to failing have had the greatest impact on Andy’s success
3:27 – Andy tells us a story about his greatest setback and explains what he learned from it
6:16 – The piece of advice that Andy finds himself sharing the most is – “just show up every day”
8:54 – Andy shares his background and how he got to the point he’s at now
13:05 – Mike asks Andy to discuss comparison to others and building a personal brand
15:30 – Andy talks about why he set up his coaching business, and how it runs
25:42 – Andy explains that his business helps advisors shine on screen, stage, and social media
30:28 – You can build trust with someone faster now than ever before, and the key is to become a master storyteller
33:26 – Every person who is growing a business needs to create their own personal brand, a podcast is one great way to do this
47:22 – Mike asks Andy what some common excuses are that people give him for not wanting to create a personal brand
FULL TRANSCRIPTION:
Mike Ayala: Thank you for joining me on The Investing for Freedom Podcast. Today we have a special guest on the show, as I always say. I met Andy at an event with one of my greatest dearest friends Kyle Depiesse. We were actually in Pinehurst, North Carolina. And from the time I met this guy, I just loved his energy, I loved his drive, I loved his curiosity. Just the questions that Andy asks are just amazing. And so we’re going to turn the table, I’m going to get to ask him questions, but I think you’re just going to love his story, his background, and just the energy that he brings to the world. So Andy, thank you for being on the show.
Andy Neary: I am Excited, Mike. Thanks for having me, man. I appreciate this.
Mike Ayala: Yeah, it’s going to be super. So you’ve got a super interesting background. I’m excited to get into it. Love what you’re working on today, but first and foremost, who’s had the greatest impact on your life?
Andy Neary: I would definitely say I know the cliche answer is my parents. And I’ve had this thought lately. Mike, I was listening to a podcast with Jesse Itzler and it was a Tom Bilyeu podcast impact three from a few years ago. And I probably didn’t give my parents enough credit over the course of my life. But Jesse said something that blew my mind. He said, you know, if the average human lives to be 78 and your parents are 70, 72, it’s easy to think you have six to eight years left with them, but you don’t because if you see them only a couple of times a year, like I do, you only have 12, 16 experiences left with them. And that really, that I’ve been, it still affects me. I listen to that podcast three weeks ago. So I would have to say my parents and just the kindness and as humble, sometimes they’re almost too humble and just how to treat a human being. I’ve never met two nicer people.
Mike Ayala: Man. That’s so impactful the way that you know, that was stated and just thinking about it, Cara and I, my wife and I, we do this exercise in our couples mastermind and we’ve got a spreadsheet where you put your age in it and then, and they don’t know what they’re going through, right? So they put their age in the spreadsheet and then they put their mom, their dad, their husband, their wife, their children, and the spreadsheet automatically calculates when you’re 62, your mom’s going to be 93 and your kids are going to be, and I’ve literally had, you know, in our couples mastermind earlier this year in January, we literally had somebody just start bawling. Like it just tore her up. So I love that. I love that that perspective it’s so important.
Andy Neary: It just cause, I live a thousand miles from my parents, and I see them probably twice a year and my dad’s 74 and my mom’s 73. And it just, when I did the math, after he said that I was like, Holy cow, I need to start seeing them more often.
Mike Ayala: Wow, yeah so important. If you could narrow it down to one thing that has had the greatest impact on your success, what do you think that would be?
Andy Neary: Hands down the, it’s two in one Mike. It’s the ability to not care what others think about me and the ability to not be afraid of failing. I think for me, I spent too much of my life trying to be perfect, avoiding failure and being very intimidated by what others thought of me and just getting rid of those two limiting beliefs has done wonders for my business and my life.
Mike Ayala: That’s impressive. Love it. What was your greatest setback and what did you learn from it?
Andy Neary: You know, it’s interesting that I’ll share if I can share the story. It was 2010. I was in a, what you would classify as a bad car accident. I was actually hit by two semis. However, I walked away with a shattered hand, so walked away very fortunate. It could have been a lot worse. And at that time into my life, I had a job I didn’t like. I was hanging around people who were probably not a good influence and a month after the accident, my girlfriend broke up with me and I will remember, I can never, I’ll never forget this Mike, actually it was 2011. I take that back. 2011, July 2011, I was sitting at my desk at work and I literally was paralyzed frozen. I couldn’t do anything. And I remember I got up off my desk, literally drove to my parents’ house, which was 25 minutes away. Sat out, in the backyard next to their pool. And literally just stared off into space for three hours. I couldn’t do anything. I was like, you define rock bottom. That was my rock bottom. And I made a promise to myself at that point, nobody is responsible for me right now. Nobody cares what I’m doing right now. Nobody even gives a crap where I am right now. Let’s go have some fun in life. And when I shifted that perspective of everything is a choice in life. Nobody is doing anything to you. It’s when I found my dream job, that changed my career. It’s when I met Amy. It’s when all of a sudden what was so wrong with my life became what was so right with my life. And it was that perspective of dude, everything’s a choice, in that moment I was frozen because I thought everybody was doing everything to me.
Mike Ayala: That’s so amazing to me. So I just have a quick question. Like did you realize at that point in time, that process you were going through or is this something that you decompressed after?
Andy Neary: Decompressed I would even say few years later, in the moment you don’t know what’s going through. Like I even go back to that summer from after that day, sitting at the pool, I had the best summer of my life. Nobody knew where I was. Nobody cared where I was. I would have fun. I was traveling every weekend. I was just enjoying life. But it was that perspective of you have a choice. You can literally sit here and do nothing else the rest of the summer, the heck, the rest of your life and blame everything. Or you can have a different perspective and realize this is your chance to go have the time of your life. And I think when my energy shifted Mike, that’s when it opened the opportunity of that job, that changed my career meeting Amy, that who I’m still with today. It’s that shift in perspective, nobody owes you crap. Nobody does anything to you. It’s all on how you choose to perceive it and the choices you make.
Mike Ayala: Wow. That’s amazing. I love it. What is the single piece of advice that you find yourself sharing the most?
Andy Neary: Just show up every day. I think I’m a big, big believer of the cliche of what’s your superpower, right. For me, it’s consistency. I think the people that I admire, Mike, you, the guys, we hung out with in Pinehurst. The people we know in our circles that are out killing it. What is the one thing I think that ties all of them together is their ability to show up every day. Don’t take my any plays off.
Mike Ayala: That’s awesome. Were you kind of born that way or is it something that you’re getting handed to you over time?
Andy Neary: I would say, part of the story I can share with you. I mean, my story of what I’m doing today really started in 2014, Amy and I decided to move out to Colorado. And what’s funny, Mike is we moved in May of 2014. Now, if you go back to February of 2014, something really important happened in the state of Colorado and that was there the first state to legalize marijuana. So we got a lot of crap for moving in May of 2014, but that was not why we moved. But when I moved out here, you know, I’ve spent my career in insurance. I went to work for an insurance agency where, you know, I’m supposed to sell for them. They have no marketing. I’m now in a market. Nobody knows who I am. So I had to build a personal brand and where I started building a personal brand was self-development and it was in that self-development where I really realized what it meant to show up every day. So to answer your question, no, it took quite a while for me to get there. I was not born with that.
Mike Ayala: Awesome. So I want to go way backwards and I’m going to let you take us wherever you want to go, because your story is super interesting. We’re obviously going to get to what you’re doing today. You just brought up, you know, some of it about building a personal brand in the insurance space. And it’s interesting because you know, there’s a scripture in the Bible that talks about like, I was born for such a time as this and I have these glimpses in these periods of time in my life where I just really feel that like, man, I was born for this. And I think, you know, you and I were having a conversation before we started recording the show on, you know, just the personal brand and what that means. And you know, all of my listeners know that I think it’s super important that you have a personal brand. Everything has changed so much in the last 12 months, 24 months, even five years, like things are exponentially changing. And you mentioned having a, you know, just showing up to Colorado and having to build the personal brand and everything else, which I think is super important. I know we’re going to get into that because every space, every person needs to build a personal brand in my opinion, but the space that you’re in super important, easiest way to reach people and also, you know, build credibility, but take us where you want to go. So you want to go way back to where you came from, your background?
Andy Neary: Yeah, you know, it’s funny because you talk about where I’ve been and what has led up to, to what I do today. To me it’s been about being on stage, Mike, you know, even you just said, you know, when is it you feel you’re alive, you’re in the flow, for me it’s on stage. Public speaking has been a huge asset in my career. I do it today. I feel like I’m always speaking when I’m coaching, cause you’re always on stage in one way, shape or form. But I go back to really where, you know, the story, a lot of people know about my past is baseball. And when you’re a pitcher, guess what? You’re standing on stage. Because when the ball’s in your hand, that game can’t move forward until you throw that baseball, all eyes are on you. And so I look back at my baseball career and it’s very simple. I won’t go into all the details, but you know, Mike, I’m the definition of average. You know, we talked about my parents. I grew up in the average family of America. I never had a rough childhood. I don’t have the rags to riches story. I had an easy life as a kid, truth be told. But there was always one place I excelled, on the baseball field. And that allowed me the opportunity to play at the division one collegiate level. Which after a successful second half of my career in college. Cause honestly my first half was terrible. It gave me the opportunity to sign as a free agent and pitch in the Milwaukee Brewers organization. So allow me to play professional baseball. And I’m a five foot nine pitcher who weighed 170 pounds at that time. And I barely touched 90 miles per hour. I would not be what you call an intimidating presence, who through an overpowering fastball, you look at the guys today, they’re all throwing 97,98. And so here’s where the story gets really interesting. Oh Andy, you should feel great. You overcame the ad five foot nine. You know, you’re not, how did you make it to that level? It’s all the work I put in off the field. However, when I got to pro baseball, I got away from a lot of the stuff that made me so good. Mike, when you’re playing pro sports, number one, it is so easy to get caught up in comparison because you’re being compared every day. And in minor league baseball, you can be compared to your teammates because you’re all trying to get promoted. And the number one way, all athletes are compared as what? Stats, you can’t hide from your stats. There’s the fear of failure. I was a free agent in baseball, in the minor leagues, I get one failure to the top prospects nine, I get one shot. And then the judgment because they’re constantly judging your performance. And so those three factors, Mike, I let get to me. And that’s what ultimately led my baseball pro baseball career to be as short as it was. Now Fast-Forward that impacted 10 to 12 years My business career. Judgment, comparison, fear of failure. We move out here and it was like a new chapter started for me. In that journey of self-development, I realized, man, failure’s good. I realized who cares what other people think about what I do and how I do it? I don’t let others judge me. I still judge myself from time to time, but I’m still getting better at not judging my own actions, but all of those mental mind shifts, Mike have gotten me to the point where I am today, where I now coach advisors in the part that one part that has elevated my career is when I realized what my gift is. It’s the public speaking. It’s the standing on stage. I said, I know why I love it. It’s no different than standing with the ball in my hand, I only have a microphone in my hand now. And so that’s really my story is being on stage. It’s why when I work with insurance advisors, I tell them my job is to get you to shine on-screen on stage and on social media. You need to stand up and step up on stage if you want to be seen.
Mike Ayala: Wow, I love it. So you were talking about like stats and comparison and all that. And it’s interesting because where my brain was going you know, Kara, I work with a lot of you know, like I said, we’ve got a couples mastermind and I work with a lot of business owners and that kind of stuff too. And the personal brand side of this comes up a lot. And I know you work on a lot of that with your wealth advisors and stuff, but when you were talking about comparison, that’s something that I see that comes up a lot in this world too. So how has that correlated and translated?
Andy Neary: Let me give you a really recent example. As a coach, it is very easy to compare yourself to my peers, others who are coaching, other business owners, you, and I both know together. And here I am with a coaching business. And I see them in a different industry with a business hitting seven figures. And I’m like, why am I not hitting seven figures? And it was interesting. I just sat down and had a conversation with Kyle who you mentioned. And he said something to me that was so impactful. And this is the getting rid of the comparison. He said, Andy said, you know something, I’m not impressed with numbers at all. I’m not impressed with somebody hitting six figures in one month or somebody having a seven-figure business. My question is this, what are they taking home? And I said, he said, do you realize you can have $400,000 coaching business that brings more home than somebody with a $2 million product-based business. And right there, I was like, what am I comparing myself to? And so that to me and the business side, I think as an entrepreneur, it’s easy to get caught up in the stats of, oh, somebody at a six-figure month. This person’s sitting seven figures. Yep. What does that mean?
Mike Ayala: Yeah, compared to what? I love that you brought that back together. You know, the stats and the comparison, because it’s such a problem. And you know, my brain goes to an old saying that I heard, you know, never compare your year one to somebody else’s year 20, which is true when it comes to wisdom, experience, knowledge. And then I have a mentor too. He talks about collapsing timeframes, you know, basically the concept of standing on the shoulder of giants. So my brain is always going between those two parallels. Like I don’t want to compare myself to anyone else, but at the same time, like I don’t have to go through the 20 years of shit they went through either. But at the end of the day, what you said that is so important, there is the stats like and not comparing our stats to someone else’s, but just knowing our stats. And I worked through this a lot. And I’d love your opinion on this for me, the driver, and I have a simple formula that starts with, what do you really want? It’s not even a formula. It’s fricking five questions. What do you really want? Why do you want it? And what are you going to do to get it, but really what do you want and why do you want it? There’s no comparison in that. It has nothing to do with anybody else.
Andy Neary: Well, and I’m glad you said that because often I have to remind myself why I started the coaching business. It’s three things. I want financial freedom. I want schedule flexibility. And I want geographic mobility. I want Amy and I to be able to live wherever we want. And there’s weeks, you know, where you get caught up and you’re like, Whoa, wait a second. I’m going through right now, Mike, you know, I’m fortunate that I hit my goal of reaching the number of one-on-one clients I’d like to have, I have room, I think I have room for more, but guess what I’m violating right now? I’m violating the rule of schedule flexibility because now be careful what you wish for. I’ve got the clients I want, but now it’s like I have in some ways on some days in eight to five job again. And so, yeah, I mean, I couldn’t agree more with you. What do you want and why do you want it? I mean, you have to start there. Cause I think so many people shoot for this number, this revenue number. It’s like, why, what does that mean?
Mike Ayala: You know, and I love this conversation and where it evolves to, and this is why Kara and I always have a coach. I know you’re always looking for mentors and involved and that’s pretty much how we met. But that’s why that’s so important too because you know, as we’re coaching, it doesn’t mean we have it all figured out and we get stuck. And just like you’re saying right now, like you’ve reached your goal. One of my mentors always used to say, the only way I can help you is when you’re stuck, I need you getting stuck. If you’re not getting stuck, you don’t need me. And I’m like, what I just heard you say was like, you’ve hit this, you hit this thing and now you’re stuck. And you got to just figure out what’s that next level. And I love the transparency because that’s where the victory is for not only you and I, but for those that are listening, realizing that, you know, with everything you’ve learned and the success you’ve achieved and it’s still an evolutionary process. And you’re going to get stuck and you have to figure out the next level.
Andy Neary: Well, and I’ll share this with you because it’ll be super helpful, I think for your listeners. So October last year, right before we met, I was down to three one-on-one clients because I had just lost a contract. Somebody had hired me to coach several clients. They got acquired and part of the acquisition, they had to let go of all their outside contractors. So I lost some clients. I was down to three. That’s right when I signed up for Kyle’s event, I hired a coach. And here I am, six, seven months later now hitting, you know, at 15. And I’m so blessed, but at the same time you hit that new level, new devil, right? And you hit that ceiling of well, that’s great. But now time is a problem. Energy is a problem. If I’m coaching 15 one-on-one clients, how do I maintain that energy every single week? And just the other day I woke up and I said, I’ve got to compress time. What can I do to compress time? What can I do to be coaching these folks in less time, same amount of money. And you know, where my head went, right when I thought that Mike is, you know, live events are starting to come back. I was doing live workshops with agencies before COVID hit, I was doing this and this. So now I’m already in that mindset of what can I be doing to compress time. To me how do I go do a one-day workshop instead of coaching this person over the course of 90 days, one day, same content, same impact gives me more time versus the one-on-one model I’m in today where you’ve got 15 people almost every single week.
Mike Ayala: Yeah. It makes a lot of sense. So what are some of the things that you’re working through to kind of transition some of those, navigate some of that.
Andy Neary: You’re talking to me as I’m going through it. So a mutual friend of ours helped me create that clarity, Jackie service. And yeah, it’s just a matter of shift. It’s one, how am I marketing my coaching business at this point moving forward to really market more of that group coaching, live coaching versus the one-on-one ongoing type of coaching. It’s having conversations with existing clients to say, Hey, you know, what would you think of going with more of a, what if I came out and spent a day with you versus the one-on-one, we do every single week. So it’s going to require some tough conversations, but at the same time, it’s what I know I have to do so that I can do what I love. Here’s the best way to say it, Mike. I know what I do I love, I know what I do works. It’s how I’m doing it right now that’s creating the schedule in flexibility and energy or mental exhaustion.
Mike Ayala: Yeah. Yeah. I appreciate you being so transparent. And it’s reminding me of a conversation I had with my coach. I think it was just this week on Monday and he was talking about, he gave me this parallel he was talking about the three different energies creation, transformation, and completion. There’s basically three energies. And I’m a creator at my core. So I’m always like, anyway, this is somewhat irrelevant, but the fact that I’m a creation person there’s different phases that we go through, and we all do it, but he gave me this analogy of like Mario brothers. Like, did you ever play super Mario brothers? I’m like, yeah, of course, like who didn’t play super Mario brothers. And he’s like, where are you? The kind of person that, you know, would go back, and play the game over and over. And I played would play it over and over just cause it was fun. But the reality is I looked forward to the next level. Like I wasn’t the person that would go back and be like, Oh, I only got 50 coins on this level. And I know there’s a hundred, right? I’m like, I want to play the next level. I want to beat the game. And he was giving me this like parallel. And I appreciate your openness, because I think some people, you know, want to just go backwards, and play the game better. And then some people want to just keep playing this level over and then some people want to just keep progressing to the next level. And that’s where you’re at. You’re like, you’ve beat this level and now you’ve got to figure out how to get like just kind of to the next level and master that next round. And I just thought it was such an interesting parallel.
Andy Neary: That is, you know, this is going to be totally off the subject, but with your listeners, I think they’re going to appreciate this. You know, where my head went when you said that did you ever play the game as a kid? Up, up, down, down, left, right, Left, Right. Okay, guys remember that code for 40 years, right? I remember a buddy of mine and I in college would play that game every single day. And our goal was to see how quickly we could finish the game. And we played it until the point we finished it Mike, the entire game. Talk about going to new levels, new levels. We’d literally played the entire game and finished it in like 11 and a half minutes. So maybe that’s one of my shortfalls. I want to play the game as quickly as possible and get it over with.
Mike Ayala: Oh yeah. Well, I mean, worst-case scenario, we start over and try it again.
Andy Neary: But you’re absolutely right. I think there is, and I see that with insurance advisers, the living in comfort, you know, this level, it’s good. It’s not great, but it’s not painful either. So there’s no need for me to go try that next level. I’m good here. And I am on a mission with the coaching. And that’s why you have a coach, guys like you, women, like, you know, like us who think like us have coaches, you want that next level. I want to find those advisors, those financial planners who are like, I get it. I’m doing well, but I know there’s more. And I think like what I was going to say, if I could just say quickly, sorry. It all goes back to the failure. What drives me every single day is the failure I had at pro baseball in pro baseball. Because if you were to say, Andy, I need you to break down the reason you only lasted two years in pro baseball into one sentence, it’s because I didn’t live up to my full potential. And I want to find people. I want to lead by example, number one, as somebody today who is waking up every freaking day, leading by example, trying to fulfill and reach my full potential. And I want to go find those financial advisors, those insurance advisors that are out to do the same. They’re out there. And they know there’s always more, they know that, Hey, I’m good. I’m not great. I can be better. That’s who I want to attract.
Mike Ayala: You know, we’re usually kind of other than people’s background and specifically what they do, I’m usually kind of a generalist, but I would like to actually just go, let’s go specific because what I just heard you saying, I think that if we have a conversation specifically about the wealth advisors, I mean, obviously I don’t have a podcast that’s geared toward wealth advisors. In fact, I would probably say that a lot of wealth of advisors, you know, I wouldn’t say they’re turned off by, you know, but I don’t spend a lot of time talking about wealth, the standard wealth advisor stuff, but let’s go there. Let’s talk about specifically who you’re looking for, what that looks like, what that process is, because I think what you do and even the mindsets that you were just talking about in any, I guess any vertical it’s exactly the same.
Andy Neary: Yeah. When it comes to marketing, branding and by no means I call myself an expert, I’m not. But what I was able to do for myself seven years ago, Mike, when I moved out to Colorado, I said, okay, nobody knows who I am. I’m in a new market. I’ve got to have one hell of a message. I’ve got to be able to share that message far and wide and share it more than any of my competitors. I have to create exponential awareness. Now I can try to do that by picking up the phone and smiling and dialing every day. But I hated that. The whole reason I built my brand is I wanted to avoid cold calling. But I said, wait a second. If I can get on LinkedIn and become really good at posting content and sharing content, I can get thousands of eyeballs on that at one time. If I build up an email list that provides quality content, I can email hundreds of people at one time. If I can get on stage. I can speak to 50,100, 200 people at one time. That’s a hell of a lot better than picking up the phone call one person at a time. And so that’s what I went and set about building and Mike, when I look at the two industries we’ve been meshing, insurance and financial planning, quite frankly, they are way behind the times when it comes to branding and marketing. To them, it’s still about the prettiness of the marketing, not what it says. And so really if people ask what you do for a living Andy, it comes down to this, I help advisors shine on screen, on stage, on social media. Because we do business this way now, right? This virtual thing ain’t going away. So you’ve got to shine there. You got to shine on stage, whether that’s a speaking stage or in the boardroom presenting and you got to shine on social media today. That’s where marketing has changed. And the number one thing I stress to advisors and the agencies they work for, advisors do not rent the logo of the company they work for. The company is renting that advisor’s personal brand.
Mike Ayala: That’s brilliant.
Andy Neary: I can’t credit for that. That’s from a good buddy of mine, but it’s true. It’s the truth. If you are an agency, a financial advising firm, you are renting the brand of every single sales rep you have because people are buying the business because of your logo. They’re buying it because they love the person that works for you.
Mike Ayala: I love that. And for our listeners, you know, don’t tune out on us just because you’re not a wealth advisor, because what Andy is talking about right now in this conversation applies to, like it applies to everything and I’m sitting on the other side of this. And I’m sitting here thinking about, I’m not a dumb guy. I’m not the smartest guy in the room. I’m just really good at identifying opportunities and leveraging people and rallying the troops. And there’s a few things that I’m good at, but I’m not the smartest guy in the room. And actually, every wealth advisor that I’ve ever worked with, like, I feel like the office is hot my eyes get sticky. I go cross-eyed cause I’m like, I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about. And I’m going somewhere with this. And I think what you’re doing is super valuable. And again, we all need to be doing this, not just wealth advisors, but I think it’s super valuable because you know what I want in a wealth advisor? I want someone that I can trust. I just want someone that can give me the 30,000-foot overview that I’m going to build a long-term relationship with and is just going to take care of me and translate something in a way that I can understand it. Because I don’t want to spend, you know, a big percentage of my life, not even a small percentage of my life, trying to understand life insurance and you know, wealth planning and all that. I’ve got businesses to run. I’ve got funds that I’m running. I’ve got deals to be had. I’ve got relationships to be. And I’m sitting here thinking about this when I go backwards, every wealth advisor I’ve ever worked with. And I’m working with one now who have, I’ve actually built a great relationship with over a couple years before he even asked me to come to down in his office, like he’s playing the slow game, right. Which I think is brilliant. And I love it because we became friends first and I trust him. And basically, if he said, you know, dot the I here and cross the T I would probably do that. But what I think is brilliant about what you’re doing, if he could also leverage his personal brand, he wouldn’t have to spend maybe two years with me on a personal level, the amount of time and money and energy that he’s invested. I don’t think he did it because he wanted my insurance plan. I think he did it because he’s a good guy and we are good friends. But if you could, how do you scale that? Like build your personal brand and tell me stories like help me understand it.
Andy Neary: And you just answered the question. This advisor you work with today, it’s cause you know him because you know him, you started liking him and because you like him now you can trust him. Well, sales is a game of who knows you, likes you and trust you. What I’m trying to do, Mike, especially in the insurance and financial planning industry, I’m trying to unwind what’s been screwed up for so long. Think about this. Most advisors get in the business why? Not Because they’re passionate about it. Somebody sold them the dream that you stay around long enough, you’ll make a ton of money and golf three days a week. So first it goes back to what you asked me a few minutes ago. Why do you even do what you do? Many of them can’t answer that question. But to your point, if you focus all of your time on getting people to know you and like you and trust you in some cases, even before they ever met you, it is game over. And there is not a better place to do that right now than on something like social media. I work with advisors who are now going out on LinkedIn, Mike, because that’s the business to business platform. And they’re starting to share their life with the audience, stories about their life that teach them lessons that they can use to teach the audience lessons. And you know, what’s happening? It’s not content around, I’m your insurance expert. And I am your finance, no, no, no, no, they’re just letting people get to know them. And you know, what’s happening? Prospects are reaching out and they’re going, wow. I feel like I already know you. Versus having to spend two years, try to get people to like you and know you. The way that you can build trust with somebody now can happen faster than it’s ever happened. But here’s the key Mike, you have to become a master storyteller. You want to become efficient on social media. You want to become efficient on stage, on screen. All the areas I coach, stop selling product, start selling stories. People emotionally connect to stories. And when they emotionally connect to stories, they emotionally connect to you.
Mike Ayala: Well, and the thing is, is like some of our listeners might be thinking, well, I’m not a storyteller. Yeah. You are, like, even the introvert of introverts when they’re sitting around with their friends, like we’re all just telling stories. We’re talking, it’s part of us. We might have to farm it out and figure out how to structure it. But a little on that note, like that resonates with me so much because I was at a, I was at a birthday party like four weeks ago. And the same guy that I was talking about that’s become a good friend. He had one of the advisors that works, I think in his, I think he manages the office, but one of the advisors that works there was at the party. And I got to talking to this guy and he owns like 45 rental properties. I’m a big fan of real estate. And you know, a lot of times those are, they’re at odds in the conversation piece. Not that they’re at odds in its generality, but a lot of times wealth advisors are not talking, Hey, you should go talk to this guy that runs a real estate fund. These guys are different. Like they want what’s in the best interest of their client. And I am like, that’s cool. So I started talking to this guy and he’s got, I can’t remember the number about 35 rentals or something. And I’m listening to this guy, when you were talking about, you know, doing business with people, you know, like and trust and building your personal brand and telling stories. If that guy was on LinkedIn and he was just talking about his real estate portfolio and his personal philosophies, I talked to this guy for two hours about the economy and what he believed and his rentals and how he got started in rentals in college. And I was so intrigued by this. And then all of a sudden, like if I’d been following that guy, even me, who’s a real estate guy. And like I would, if I find that like six months later that he’s a wealth advisor, I’d be like, oh wow, I really liked this guy. So the point that you’re making of like you’re sharing stories and telling our life, and that’s what people want. They don’t want to hear your next, you know, new plan that mass mutual or whatever has come out with, who cares.
Andy Neary: Well, and it’s storytelling is what makes very complex issues, AKA insurance and financial planning in my world. Very simple to understand and think about this, Mike, when you and I grew up, we had channels 4,6, and 12, 10, 18, depending on where you live, right. You had the old turn dial and you had like five TV stations that played all programming. Look where TV is today. Look where Netflix is today. Why does Disney have their own channel? Why does paramount have their own channel? They want you exclusively tuning into their channel. Every person who is growing a business needs to create their own channel. Now doesn’t have to be TV. But my point is you want your prospects tuning into you. That’s personal brand to me. When you create a community, you create a channel that your prospects want to tune into.
Mike Ayala: And so you literally take wealth advisors and just kind of teach them how to build their personal brand to get eyeballs that then they can, at some point in time have some kind of real conversation, not just people walking into a cold office.
Andy Neary: So here’s great two great examples if I can share them. I’m a storyteller. So I’m sorry, I’m going to go into stories. One was an event that happened to me where I’ve been public speaking Mike, for five years, I would always share stories about my baseball career, but then they would tie into health insurance. Cause that’s what I was doing for a living. And then at the end of the talk, like some people would come up, but there wasn’t really much interaction afterwards. I’m like, what the heck? I thought that was a good talk. Why aren’t people excited? And then at like 2018, I was giving a talk at a state association conference and I’m like, you know what, screw it. I’m actually going to focus my story on why I failed in baseball, not share all the fun stories. I’m going to talk about why I failed. And so I got up on stage, talked about my journey to pro baseball, but then I talked about everything I just mentioned earlier, the comparison, the judgment, the fear of failure, the mindset failures I had in pro baseball. And guess what happened? First time in my speaking career, I had people hugging me afterwards. Why? I now connect with them. Everybody has failed in their mindset. And so number one, when you’re able to share content and storytell that gets people to go, this dude’s just like me. That is how you create connection prospects. Number two, to your point about advisors putting themselves out there. I have a client that eight, nine months ago, Mike said, I know I need to be the linked on LinkedIn, but I think it’s a waste of time. I said, okay, I’ll prove you wrong. Comes through my Academy. As of January, he and his teammates build a brand between each other. They start producing content. They’re now going into prospecting meetings, no lie. And the person bringing them in, whether it’s the CFO or the HR director is literally introducing them as CB squared, which is what their brand is. You talk about brand recognition and getting somebody to know you. And like they’re getting introduced in the meetings as their brand. And now they’re winning business they’ve never dreamed of before, because people know them and they like them, which makes it so much easier to get their trust.
Mike Ayala: Yeah, man. So good. You know, there’s one of my one-on-one clients, who’s probably going to end up listening to this episode. So I got to tell it exactly like it happened. No, I’m just kidding. But this guy, his name’s Ben and he had been listening to my podcast for like a year. And he reached out to me on my community app, the text app. And I was in this period of time, I feel so bad cause I’m usually really responsive. And my follow-through is usually great. And I was in this, I had a bunch of stuff going on. This was probably like two months ago and I was kind of dropping the ball on him. Like not responding. I was in between assistance, like all kinds of stuff. And so I’m dropping the ball and he just stayed with it, man. He was like, he kept coming. And so finally I got a call scheduled with him after like three or four weeks of going back and forth, dropping the ball on him. I get on a call, a discovery call just to see if I thought I could help him and vice versa. And I’m like sitting here, you know, we’re talking and we’re jelling and what I didn’t realize, like he was ready to go. And I was just, he’s kind of like a somber guy. You can’t really read him, you know. So we get like toward the end of the call and I’m like, well, Ben, do you want to schedule another time? And he’s like, well, if you think I’m not a good fit then sure. But he’s like, Mike, I feel like, I know you I’ve been listening to you for a year. I’ve been following your podcast. I’ve been watching you on Instagram. He’s like, I actually literally feel like I know you. And I’m just like, Oh my gosh. That’s like the CB squared thing. Like I totally missed the boat, but it also clicked what my thesis had been for so long. Like you just show up and give your truth and people feel like they know you.
Andy Neary: Well, and you share a great point about podcasting because let’s be honest. If the goal is to create exponential awareness for your brand speaking, social media, podcasting, webinars, those are all ways to do it. Here’s the one number one thing. And I took, I learned this from Gary V by listening to them. What I see too many advisors and health insurance advisors especially do with podcasting is they’ll create a podcast. And all they talk about is health insurance. Nobody cares. If you would take the podcast and make it a podcast, that’s all about your prospects, where all you do is come on, bring them on, interview them about their business, your business would exponentially grow one because you made it all about them. And you’re not even talking about insurance. You’re the one hosting the party for them, which ultimately gets them to know you like you. And guess what? They’re going to do business. That’s, anybody who’s interested when I work with them, that’s interested in doing a podcast. I tell them hands down, do not do a podcast you’re a subject matter expert about. Do a podcast that highlights your prospects.
Mike Ayala: That is so good. And you know, I actually struggled with that, Andy, and I think this will be relevant, not only to my audience, but to the people that you coach and just kind of piggybacking on that. For two years, a very, very smart guy that we work with I mean, he’s a marketing genius. When it comes to raising capital, they do a lot of stuff for us, just a genius. He tried to convince me for like two years to launch a podcast, start building my personal brand and I didn’t get it. And what I was stuck on Andy, and it took me a while to figure this out. I didn’t want to talk to, so my avatar in the fundraising world is high net worth doctors, lawyers, W2 earners, wealth advisors, high-income earners, right? Accredited investors. I did not resonate with the message of showing up, talking about the wall street beast. And you know, alternate to wall street and you know, just talking about money all the time. Like I didn’t resonate with that. I struggled for two years to get moving. And then finally, when I said, one day, literally Andy, I said, I woke up and I said, you know what? I have to do this, but I have to do it a way that’s true to me. What do I want to talk about? And I just kind of created some content pillars around things that matter to me, mindset, passive income, family, you know, just the five pillars that were most important to me, relationships. I literally built it around that. And I launched the investing for freedom podcast, and I’ve had so many people ask me, Andy, Mike, what do you even do? And I’m like, perfect, because I didn’t launch the investing for freedom podcast so that I could raise a whole bunch of money. I launched the investing freedom for podcast or investing for freedom podcast so that I could build genuine, authentic relationships and have real conversation.
Andy Neary: Well, you know, what’s going to, the natural result, that’s going to be is you’re going to end up raising a lot of money and because you’re doing it the right way. And what you just said couldn’t have been more true. It’s, you know, it’s never about you. It’s if you make everything you do with your content about your audience, good things will always happen. And I think about like why aren’t, even when I lay the blueprint out for somebody and they don’t do it Mike, it’s for a couple reasons, insecurity, they’re too worried about judgment and the opinion and comparison from others. But if you just, and it’s the patients. If you’re willing to be patient to build a brand because it does not happen overnight, you will create a business you can never dream of. Now, here was the eye-opener for me, Mike, and this is where I want to stress the most important thing of personal brand. If you have a personal brand, you can never fail. Here’s why, if you tried to start your own business, you have yours. I have mine. We’ve got personal brands. Mike, if your business fell flat on its face, because you have that brand, there is always somebody who’s going to want Mike’s brand. If worst-case scenario happened and you lost all your businesses, there is somebody out there that wants to Mike on their team is going to help Mike make it happen. You literally can never fail at that point as long as you got a brand. And this goes back to the insurance industry, I see too many advisors hiding behind their company’s logo. They have zero brand. So nobody knows them. If they ever wanted to go out on their own, they have no brand to build off of. They are literally just hiding behind a logo and it’s helping their business go nowhere.
Mike Ayala: Yeah. Well, and that’s such an important point too, because like, as we’ve built the personal brand, I mean, I’ve gotten my community texts list. I’ve got my Instagram list and all this stuff. Those are my people. Those are not, you know, Matt’s new tools people, I’m just picking on Matt Cause I don’t even know why, but you know, those are my people. Like those are my really relationships. And it’s funny because we started out show talking about comparison and you know, six-figure earners and all this stuff. And I didn’t the power of the personal brand. I didn’t start the personal brand, so I could be a coach or so that I could, you know, launch the mastermind or so that I could raise capital. I just wanted to add value. But what was interesting, you know, you asked the question, if your business failed, what would happen or nothing because they have a personal brand. So when Kara and I finally decided to launch our couples mastermind, which we did like half heart, not half-hearted, half-assed at the end of last year. So I didn’t spill a penny until this year in my personal brand, like nothing. This year, we decided to do a couples mastermind and I decided to do one-on-one coaching and with no, like we threw this stuff together, like multiple, multiple, multiple six figures, just because I have a personal brand. And I’ve never even said that out loud, like, cause it’s not about the six figures for me. It isn’t even about that. It’s about adding value, showing up and doing what we’re passionate about. And Kara and I want to help couples. And this has been the funnest thing we’ve ever done. I’ve built businesses. I’ve exited, I’ve had, I’ve had multiple, like I’ve had an eight-figure valuation exit and doing this couples mastermind, making six figures is the funnest thing I’ve ever done. And so it’s not really about the money. It’s about just doing what you’re passionate about. And I love the way that you said that you build a personal brand. You can take it with you anywhere. Cause it’s your people.
Andy Neary: Exactly. And you just hit the nail on the head is exactly why you were able to create a six-figure opportunity by throwing something at the wall. It’s because your brand already existed. People already were in love with your brand. So Gary V says it so well. And I’m going to steal the line from him. When you have a brand that brings so much value to your audience, which means you are giving without wanting a thing in return, you literally guilt them into doing business with you. So when Mike, you, and Kara came out and said, we’re going to do a couples mastermind. I’m just one-on-one coaching. Those people were already bought in because of your brand.
Mike Ayala: Yeah. Well, and it’s, what’s nice too. And I heard you say this earlier about the CEO and CB squared, with your wealth advisors, or again, anybody that’s listening, when you build your personal brand, it’s the opposite of what we’re used to with cold calling, we got to make a thousand calls in order for somebody to raise their hand and say yes, with building a personal brand, the people that want to say yes, raise their hand. And it’s like such a, if they want to interact with me, I literally was last night I was, there was a guy that I know pretty well that I follow. And there was a guy that was just like pissing on him on social media. And the guy literally responded to him. He said, dude, if you don’t like what I’m saying, hit the unlike button. Like, please stop following me. And I love, that’s what I love about social media. And you know, like it’s backwards. We don’t have to make a thousand calls. We just have to show up, be true to our message. And then the people that want to talk to us, they’re going to put their hand up.
Andy Neary: And that’s the last piece of advice I want to probably leave with that conversation. Like if I told you how many times, I asked an advisor, financial or insurance who your ideal client is, and they said, anyone who’s willing to say yes to me, I’d be a rich man. You cannot be all things to all people. Why would you want to build? I would rather have a half-million-dollar insurance agency with clients I absolutely love versus a million-dollar agency with clients that frustrate the hell out of me. Once you know who your ideal client is. And you just go tell their story over and over and over again, guess who’s going to raise their hand? That type of client. And so your point is so well-made, I sucked at cold calling, but that’s the only way we were taught to go get business, go ask, go get, go get, go get, when you have a brand, you bring value, you put it out there. Guess what starts happening? They come to you. And that is a fun place to be. And that’s what happened to you and Kara when you started the mastermind in your one-on-one coaching. Now, all of a sudden, you finally made an ask, it was my coaching and the mastermind, and they were already ready to go.
Mike Ayala: Yeah. So true. One last question. And I’m sure, I mean, this exists in every, I keep running into this. People have all these reasons why they shouldn’t build a personal brand, like all these excuses. And I get they’re fearful, you know, I’m scared to get in front of, we all are. And if you look at Gary V’s first videos versus today, we all have to show up messy. So that’s not, I’m going to set that aside. That’s not even a good excuse. None of us want to show up, but what are some of the things that you run into on a regular basis?
Andy Neary: And I apologize if you hear my dog barking. Insecurity, they know they should build a brand. They’re too afraid of what people might say. It seems like a lot of work. And I think a lot of people, and especially in sales are still looking for the overnight hack. Building a brand takes time. And it’s just that fear of failure and poor judgment Mike. If you take somebody with the biggest ego, a lot of confidence, but you said, let’s go build a brand. I’m telling you right now, the insecurity start coming bubble up. Because you’ve got to be able to put yourself out there. There’s a lot of self-promotion, No one’s going to toot your horn. That was the biggest thing I had to come over with this business, no one’s tooting the horn for me. I got to go toot my own horn. And you’ve got to be able to put yourself out there day after day after day and show up consistently, Mike, I see you out there every single day. That’s why you’ve got brand. You show up every day, you don’t take any plays off and you just get after it. The ones that go out and try for two weeks and say, ah, it doesn’t work. They’re gone. It’s the consistency, man. Consistency, persistency, and a little patience, and amazing things will happen. It’s that simple.
Mike Ayala: And I’ve found that it’s really easy to just turn that into a process that doesn’t take five or six or seven hours a day. Is that something you can help your guys with?
Andy Neary: Absolutely. You know, I think I often run into the hurdle of getting advisors to the point where they now know they have to build a brand. They have to create content, all that stuff. They’re like, great. I don’t have time to do all of this. Outsource, you know, that’s the beautiful thing, Mike, today, you and I were talking about this offline. There’s so many tools out there you could be using that are inexpensive. That can be outsourced. You don’t have to do all the work yourself, but you do need to be out there, and this is the thing, Mike, this last piece, and this is really tied to the social media. I was just doing a clubhouse session today. And I use the CB squared example. And as I was doing this, one of the guys on clubhouse went to their LinkedIn profile and he’s like, you know, what’s so amazing if they’re generating business, I don’t understand it. Because I look at their videos and their content and only getting like three likes and one comment. I said, you’re missing the entire point. That’s exactly why you don’t post. You are worried about the likes, you’re worried about the comments, you know all they care about? Is top of mind awareness. The person that’s going to buy, that $200,000 opportunity they’re going after right now, that guy never commented on anything once, but he saw it and that’s all that matters.
Mike Ayala: So good. Andy, this has been freaking phenomenal. I really appreciate your time. Where can people find you?
Andy Neary: Absolutely Mike. Definitely hit me up on LinkedIn. That’s where I spend most of my time, Andy Neary. Www.Andyneary.com, go to check out my website and got my podcast, bullpen sessions. So I like you, Mike I do a podcast more for legacy. I bring on current and former pro athletes and we talk about the mindset they use to get to the highest level in sports and how they’re applying that mindset in chapter two of their life.
Mike Ayala: Wow. So, cool. Well, I really appreciate, as I said, at the beginning, your energy, the way you show up, and just sharing value with my audience.
Andy Neary: Appreciate it, man. This was great. Thank you for having me.
Mike Ayala: Cool. Thank you, sir.
